When Holding a Contest, Think About What You Are Contesting
two guy whom I find valuable to read, Alvin Phang, an up and coming “youngish” blogger from Singapore and Carl Ocab, one of the youngest bloggers of note at al, 14 I think he is now, are hold an “RSS Contest”.
Here’s an excerpt from a comment I just left for Alvin:
… A few months back I unsubscribed from John Chow and Shoemoney becuase because they were running a contest like this and every post, hour after hour was nothing but ‘sign up with me, sign up with me’ … it is as if they didn’t want the folks who had already become readers. I ha dbeen with both of them for ages, in John’s case from his very early days with his own blog … and all he seemed to want was more and more curiousity seekers looking for some kind of prize.
A thought to roll around anyway … getting people to sign up is one thing, getting them to stick is a different task….
These contests are popular (or they were 6 months ago, a little passe’ now) time periods when the bloggers post a lot, sometime soffer pri\zes, andf in general protitute themselves in orderto get mor RSS (real Simple Syndicaion) subscribers.
My view is, I’m more thna happy to have any an all folks subscribe, there’s a handy link down in the lower right corner of the footer box. But to hold a contest to attrcat more? Can’t see it myself.
I like my readers to come right here to the “home drome” and read my articles (and occassionally see my ads) as I write them, not as some feed reader may decide to present them. Som ebloggers go so far on this idea as to only let the feeds have excerpts of their writing, but I’m not hard-over on that … I make the feed available but to spend days and weeks poromoting it? Counterproductive in my book. What do you think?
Popularity: 1% [?]
Just Who The Heck Are You, Anyway?
There was an excellent post by Angel over on Revenews.com (one recommended reading sites, by the way) (I mean, how cool of a domain name is that .. Revenue News?) (I note they have been online longer that we have here at Talar Profit Systems … Kudos … not as easy a feat as you might think of … take a check someday as to how many sites you are reading that have been online with the same owner for more than 7 years). Anyway, this looks like it has nothing to do with online success … unless you read the article make the effort to understand simple English words.
How did you get involved with the Mars Exploration Rover project?
I was getting my masters degree in computer science at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign when I was recruited to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). I had always wanted to work in space exploration but it seemed to me that type of work was something other people got to do. In my head there was this wall and I was on one side and the people on the other side of the wall were the ones who got to work in space exploration. It wasn’t until I actually had the job at JPL that I realized there wasn’t any wall at all. What separates you and completing that goal you have isn’t an imaginary wall but simply the strength of your desire to go after that goal. read the full ‘attitude determines altitude’ story here.
Every single one of us is likely holding ourselves back because we likely have that ‘wall’ concept. John Chow makes eleventy-seven thousand pew month an I can’t. Darren has more RSS subscribers than the law allows. Shoemoney makes a fortune off ring tones for goodness sake.
Step one? Lose the attitude. Yes indeed there is a big difference between you and John Chow. he thinks he can (and therefore he does). You think you can’t and therefore you don’t. Pretty much simple as that.
And the quoted article seems so appropriate to me because it clearly shows that it isn’t only us "better class of losers" here in the MMO world who are artificially holding ourselves back. As important as any technical or business technique you can think of … even more important, actually … is one single thing you need for success. Lose the idea of the wail and do what you have to do. You’re as good as everyone else, you just have to realize it.
Popularity: 2% [?]
If You Build It They Will Come?
I’m always looking for real world experience someone’s get rich quick pipe dreams.
One of my favorite online experts is a fellow named Andy Williams (no, not that Andy Williams, this one is a PhD who got tired of the class room and decided to teach by example). he’s making a living by offering SEO advice, selling software (more on this below) and running his own websites while enjoying the good life on an island in the Atlantic. Not bad. In fact, a lot like me except I have no Phd and the island I live on, but never punch a clock on, is in the Pacific.
Anyway, this is a excerpt from an email Andy recently sent out to his subscribers that so well describes a very common malady that I felt I really needed to quote it and work some of my own thoughts into it. Thinks the following few paragraphs through, especially if you feel you know from experience that you can’t make money online.
Last week I told you about a guy who had built a site, but nobody came. In 9 months, he had just one sale.
He blamed Site Build It! for the site failing. I hear this a lot, especially from people who want to buy my SEO Website Builder because they think that my site builder can miraculously get them top rankings.
I have to explain, that while a site building tool can help with linking of pages together, etc, it is not the site building tool that will ultimately decide the success or failure of a site, it is the person operating the tool.
I finished my article last week with this:
"When a site fails to get traffic, its because those pages are not visible to people looking for that information. That is what you need to fix. Starting again on a new site or a new system is likely to lead to failure again, because you’ll repeat the same mistakes….
Here’s a synopsis of the rest of Dr. Andy’s thoughts and mine as well.
- Building a site is only a first step. An important first step but just the first step none the less.
- "Working" the site … interacting with visitors, adding new content and most importantly, Building Links and Driving Traffic to that site are necessary, no matter what6 tool you may use to build it.
Notice in my second point above I started the sentence with the word "Working". That was a conscious choice on my part.
You absolutely can make money online, you can even make a living on line … But you can not do it without work.
Consider the richest people you know in conventional careers .. medical doctors, high-power lawyers, stock brokers, corporate CEO’s, sports stars, continue the list as far as you would care to and when you come to one where the successful person typically doesn’t have to work … you write and tell me about it … I predict few responses.
Now those of you who know me know that I am not a get rich quick guy. But I do believe in using tools to get the job done. In this article I have mentioned two outstanding tools, both of which are fully guaranteed to be what the package says they are, and both of which I have followed for years and strongly believe in. If you read what I wrote above and are still ready to put in the work to succeed, check out one or both of these offers … they truly are tools that you can work with to succeed.
Popularity: 3% [?]
Scalable NAS for Digital Media — Plan Now or Crash later
The biggest hurdle for any network operator or designer is planning for the future. It wasn’t long ago that network authorities could just say, no video, no audio, no voice, etc. and make it stick … but it is not going to be that way in the future. Plan now how you will accomodate the technology your users will demand … or be sorry to play catchup.
Next-Generation Scalable NAS for Digital Media
Featured Speakers:
Srikanth Venkataseshu
Worldwide Solution Marketing Manager
HP StorageWorks NAS Division 
Michael Vizard
SVP, Editorial Director
Ziff Davis Enterprise
Aug 6, 2008
1:00 p.m. Eastern/10:00 a.m. Pacific
Duration: 60 minutes
Technology Professional,
The digital industry is in the midst of unprecedented growth and transformation. With so many ways to capture and share digital information, Web 2.0 businesses like social networking sites have propelled the growth and consumption of user generated rich media like photos, graphics, music and video files.
For video portals, live sports events and other online entertainment, the Internet is the vehicle for delivering on-demand digital content. Traditional broadcasting companies are also leveraging the Internet to deliver premium content in high-definition for on-demand viewing. As digital content and delivery evolve, both traditional enterprises and Web 2.0 companies need a solution that can scale to meet increasing demands.
Managing and delivering rich media files requires a special storage infrastructure. Attend this webcast as Srikanth Venkataseshu of HP explores the company’s next generation of Scalable NAS and discusses how its high availability and massive scalability is uniquely suited to address the demands of this new and exciting digital era.
Sponsored by Hewlett-Packard Company
Can’t make it? Register and watch the recording on-demand, after it takes place.
Popularity: 1% [?]
How Much Are You Willing to Lose?
I’ve been advocating virtualization and non-hardware consolidation of systems for years now, long before it was a buzzword. There are many provable operational advantages … which is where the focus currently seems to be.
But at heart I am still a maintenance guy and I now see some real savings in the maintenance/logistics side of the house.
Take a look at this free report and then sit down with yourself and a mirror and deice if the guy in front of you is the one who really wants to be responsible for your company or agency losing, and losing big time, day after day, month after month, year after year?
Nearly 75 percent of drives returned as failed are found to be without failure, or no trouble found, according to Xiotech. Find out how to address this problem in this paper:
Eliminate Storage Service Renewals
Find out how Xiotech can help you eliminate drive-related service events, while delivering unparalleled performance. They offer optimal virtualization, incremental scalability, unmatched ease use and a Web Services foundation.
Find out about a fresh new approach to the fundamental aspects of storage.
Download the paper here.
For additional resources about virtualization, visit our Tech Library. With our broad selection, you’re sure to find something of interest to you.
Sincerely,
Virtualization Review
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