kenfluharty.com

You know how there are always ’satilite’ sites built around a brand once it’s established? for instance iPhone fan sites, WordPress Theme sites, Windows support sites, and the list goes on ad infinitum….

Well, I had a couple domains surrounding the Domain Parking service that I was happy with at the time WhyPark. I say “at the time” because I am not a fan of being threatened.

so much for my sites that were something like (but not exactly) ‘whyparkthemes’ and ‘whyparkhelp’, both promoting the use of WhyPark services.

I received two somewhat cryptic email from whypark telling me I was infringing on their copyright and that I either have to transfer the domains to them (yeah right) or seize using them immediately. Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not scared off that easily, but I am pissed off quite easily by a brand that has no respect for their own evangelists so, I canceled the domains that day and never recommended WhyPark again. (hence my almost exclusive use of AdSense for Domains) I am still a proud Google evangelist.

I’m sure once WhyPark get’s a look at this post they will send me out another love note, but they are out of luck this time. They have successfully ‘turned’ this evangelist. Great Job WhyPark. Congrats.

I’m Out.

I have said before that I has put all my faith and trust in google. And that is more true with every passing day…

Unfortunately, Google (more specifically AdSense) is letting me down. I was excited when I registered my newest domain name antisocialentrepreneur.com but I’m not ready to develop it yet, so I figured I would just park it with AdSense for Domains. (in case you don’t know, while parked with AdSense your page will come up with a google search box and some sponsored links etc…) Just like those Godaddy ‘This page is reserved’ sites except I will get some ad revenue (if any) instead of Godaddy hogging it all!! (Yeah, the Daddy is a selfish jerk sometimes)

Turns out that google thinks my domain name does not comply with their policy. I have no idea why they think that, unless someone at google is very bad with their vocabulary and thinks an entrepreneur is something obscene. Or maybe they think “anti-social” is some kind of hate speech… who knows….

Oh well, I guess I will have to put it over at WhyPark. (another domain parking service) for now.

Guess at least one of my eggs (albeit a small one) is not in Google’s basket for now.

Ok,  I’m going to take a few minutes If you don’t mind and return to my roots. Complaining.  

Today, it’s about eBooks.  I don’t mean best sellers on pdf… I’m talking about all the scammy spammy crap you see.  

“weight loss eBook”

“make money online eBook” 

“work at home eBook”

“how to get 1000 twitter followers overnight eBook”

The list goes on and on….  I don’t read books, why would I want to read some crap put together by a hack on a bogus subject?

If you are one of these people, Please, stop.  Put your crap online for free, If it’s valuable you will get traffic and make money that way.

NOTE: I will be releasing my eBook  ”avoiding stupid people online” soon.  first 10 people to buy it will get a free book light.  Maybe one of these that you can use while you read my eBook.

There are many sites that will produce those little URLs we all love,  TinyUrl is probably the best known.   (check out a list of others here)

But the one I use and reconmend is cli.gs.  cli.gs provides analytics on the URLs you create. What for?  I’m glad you asked.  Here is how I use them.

1) Twitter  -  I use twitter a lot, I have a couple hundred followers but do they actually read what I say? how am I supposed to know?   Now it’s easy, I just use cli.gs to provide a link to something cool (or not cool) like this, then I can check my stats on cli.gs site and see how many people opened it!!

2) “friends” – I know you thinking, “what is he talking about now”  well,  do you have a friend or two that you are consistantly taking time out of your busy day to send helpfull links but you have a strong suspicion that they don’t even bother opening them…. ever.  well, I do.   So i use cli.gs.  Now I KNOW I’m wasting my time.  

Will I keep sending my ‘friends’ links?   probably.  I’m guess dumb.

If you even a moderate Twitter user than Tweet Deck is for you! It allows you to sort updates by groups. Now you can still have hundreds (or thousands) of ‘friends’ but sort them so you can keep an eye on the useful stuff, while not looking at those “eating frosted flakes” updates…. Yeah.

My life is in google’s hands and I have always been a little bit nervouse about that.  

All my email is at Gmail, and all my important information is at google docs.  There has been many times when I needed to access an email or document but gmail was “experiencing technical difficulties”  well not anymore!   

All you need to do is click on the “offline” link at the top of gmail and docs and set up Gears and you will always stay synchronised!

Need more help?   That’s not my problem, but click here anyways for a google instructional video.

I have tried it before, but I have officially set my default browser to chrome on both my desktop at the office and by laptop.  It is clean and FAST.  faster than Firefox for sure.  (no point comparing to ie)   

Only complaint:  No Google toolbar for Chrome. Makes absolutely no sense. 

Ok,  2 complaints.   The spell check is not as good as Firefox.

I finally have my blog back online!   

Yeah,  I know it still has a default theme… I’ll get to it as soon as I can!  Right now I’m busy thinking of things to complain about.