Cranial Soup

How can you rank well on search engines, without fussing with SEO?

2010-07-02T16:07:00.002-04:00

If you want to rank well on search engines without fussing with SEO, then pretend it's 1995 and there are no search engines that will list you, because you can't afford the high fees for inclusion.

Now, how are you going to, in an ethical way, make people want to visit your site, stay awhile and explore, come back often, and share what they find with others?

Your site should work well and not be broken.

Make sure all links to pages on and off your site actually lead to where you want them to.
Make sure you don't have broken images.
Make sure the content loads correctly in all the major browsers.
Make sure your pages adhere to W3C standards and they validate.

Your site should be designed for people.

Make sure your template is pleasing to the eye and not painful to look at.
Make sure it has good navigation and is easy to discover and find the content your site has to offer. Good use of sidebar links to important stuff. Links to similar content pages on your site.
Make everything within 2-3 clicks of the main page.
Break up huge amounts of text with related images to help the eyes stay focused where they should be,
Your site should load fast. Use real thumbnails for your images and not just merely resizing with HTML.
Don't overwhelm people with ads.
Remove spam promptly.

Your site should invite people back.

Give your visitors multiple ways to be notified and access new content (RSS feeds, email subscription, follow on Twitter, a Facebook fan page.) Make sure new content reaches them wherever it's convenient to them.

Your site should encourage sharing.

Make sure you don't use frames. Every page should have its own unique URL that shows in the address bar.
Use Twitter, Facebook, Friendfeed, Google Reader/Buzz buttons.

Your content should be unique and of high quality.

Don't copy other people's stuff, write your own.
Check your spelling and grammar.
Put thought into what you write.
If you post YouTube videos, add some unique commentary that doesn't exist anywhere else on the web.
For every sentence you quote from another source, write 3-5 of your own. So if you quote 3 sentences, you will have to write 9-15 to balance it. Don't quote in every article. Don't quote any more than what is necessary, less is much better than more.
If you are supplying information, make sure it is complete, accurate, and up to date.
Write about stuff people will care about enough to want read it. Don't write about what you had for lunch unless your a restaurant critic.
If your site is a blog, link out in every article to quality related content. Linking out to pages on other good blogs has the bonus in that it may earn you a trackback link on that page, or at the very least attract the eyes of the author of that blog who will stop by and check out who is linking to him.

Interact with your visitors and make them feel important.

Allow commenting and respond to comments as soon as humanly possible.
Give your visitors a means of contacting you privately, either by supplying an email address or a contact form.

Spread the word.

Become a highly respected member of a large community with similar content.. Put your link in your profile and signature. If people respect you, they will click the links.
Reach out to blogs by reading and participating in discussions. Never leave a "nice post" comment. Put some thought & work into your responses. You want to catch the attention of other readers and the bloggers themselves, and make them ask "Wow! Who is this guy?" so they will click your name and visit the site it links to. Always make your comments increase the value of that bloggers page.
Participate on social media sites and interact with people in a positive way. Get conversations going. Again, you want to make people ask "Who is that guy?" which will lead to them checking out who you are (your profile) and where you came from (your site).
Find an ad network that gives away free advertising. (I happen to really like Project Wonderful, personally)

If you do all of the above, quality inbound links will happen on their own and between the fact that others think high enough about you and your site to write about it and link to it, combined with having a great site, structurally, that makes it easy for spiders to find your content, you will get the ranking in the search engines that you deserve.

Above all, be patient, work hard, and don't engage in any "evil tricks". Good ranking does not happen overnight.

My Top 10 FriendFeed Friends

2008-12-04T17:42:00.001-05:00

In response to Growmap's Top 10 FriendFeed Friend Challenge, I figured I'd post my list and tell a little about my FriendFeed experience and give some tips to those of you that might be new or may be a bit nervous about jumping in and friending strangers.

What exactly is FriendFeed?

Simply put, FriendFeed is a social network that aggregates your activities from other sites and networks. It's lifestreaming.

But it is much more than that. It's a great place to meet people that share your interests, share content, discover great content shared by others, keep up with news and events, engage in conversations, etc, etc, etc. It's the grand-daddy of social networking and a never ending internet content feeding frenzy.

It does not replace the social networks you are already a part of. It compliments them, making them even better.

How did I find FriendFeed?

I was introduced to FriendFeed by Chris Brogan. I was looking for a way to combine all my internet activities into a single RSS feed that my friends and readers could subscribe to. Sites like FaceBook were falling flat and not fulfilling the needs I had. I needed a service that wouldn't limit the number of blogs I could add, could handle some obscure services, and would be able to include my Backtype feed, containing comments I leave on the blogs I read. Chris assured me that FriendFeed was more than capable of doing all that I wanted, so I decided to give it a try.

How did I find people to follow?

When I came to FriendFeed, I came alone. I had no friends that used the service (that I knew about). Originally I didn't intend on using it for social networking. I just wanted to get myself together in one feed.

But curiosity got the best of me and I decided to do some exploring and see what kind of real potential the site had, beyond consolidating my activities into a single RSS feed. To do this, I had to start from scratch, finding interesting people to follow.

I decided to start by subscribing to Robert Scoble and working my way from there, following the writers of some of my favorite blogs and other people of interest. This was the same thing I did on Twitter, although I didn't find Twitter as engaging as FriendFeed. (conversations are much more difficult for me to participate in and follow on Twitter)

Who are the most interesting people I have found?

Of the almost 300 people that I have subscribed to on FriendFeed, these are the top 10 that have captured my interest the most:

Rahsheen - Author of the social media blog, SheenOnline. He is always posting something interesting to to think about and discuss.
Mona N. - Author of Pixel Bits, a great blog about gadgets, technology, pop culture, and Legos. She posts lots of stuff that just screams for you to comment and share your thoughts and opinions.
Kol Tregaskes - Author of the Squashy Frog photography blog. He is always posting links to lots of visually appealing stuff. If you want to be a better photographer, he's the one to follow. And if you just want candy for your eyes, you won't be disappointed.
RAPatton - Subscribing to this guy will bring you a real mixed bag of stuff, most of it quite interesting. If you love click adventures as much as I do, you'll really appreciate what he shares.
Stupid Blogger (aka Tina) - Author of Is This Stupid?. Besides informing you of all the ridiculous stuff she comes across each day, she is also very friendly and down to earth. She is one of the few that I am subscribed to that really lets you inside her head. She makes it quite easy to get to know her as a person. If you are a nice person that has no real friends (online or off) subscribing to her will make you feel like you have at least one.
Live4SoccerVacations - When you have had a bad day and need a good laugh, if you are subscribed to this guy, you won't have to look far.
Cee Bee - If it's cool, unusual, amusing, or nostalgic, you'll find it here.
Duncan Riley - Editor of The Inquisitr.
Robert Scoble - He's Robert Scoble. Need I say more? You can not join a social network he is a member of without subscribing to him or finding him interesting. It's just not allowed.
Zee - Founder of We Do Creative, he has also contributed to The Next Web, ReadWriteWeb, and The Inquisitr. As a fellow reject of the "Internet Addicts Anonymous" outreach program, he'd rather stay addicted than limit or give up his surfing habits. It's a good thing for him that he was able to find numerous ways to make his addiction profitable.

Just as important as the content this group posts and shares, is the conversations they start and contribute to. They really understand what social networks are for and they know how to do it right.

How should you find people to follow?

Now, this might not be the appropriate list for you to subscribe to, since your interests may differ from my own. The nice thing about FriendFeed is that it is different for everyone. Your Home page is not like anyone else's. It's what you make it, and you do this by subscribing to people that post the type of content you are interested in.

My suggestion to you would be to visit each of the pages of the people from my list, look over the postings they make, click some links that catch your eye, read the FriendFeed comments to their posts, then move to their "Likes & Comments" page and do the same. If you like what you see, subscribe to them so you can see more of it.

Make sure you post content, too. This is how people become interested in you. The more you post and share, the easier it will be to find others that like what you like, and more people to subscribe to. Commenting and clicking that "Like" link helps, too.

And check out the rooms that the people you follow are subscribed to. You can find interesting things and people there too.

You could even subscribe to me, if you want.

With some effort from you, you might find yourself on someone else's FriendFeed Top 10 list, some day.

WARNING:

Be really careful with FriendFeed. It is very easy to get sucked in, addicted, and totally obsessed. If you find your productivity going downhill, you will have to set some limits for yourself. Try Instant Boss and only pay attention to FriendFeed while you are on a scheduled break.

The 10 Commandments for Marketing Your site on Digg

2008-11-24T21:17:00.009-05:00

Never submit pages from your own sites. Never Digg anything from your own sites. This is the most important rule of all, so this is why it is first. If you follow nothing else on this list, at least follow this single most important rule.
Create a proper profile with an image and links to your websites and profiles on other social networks. Your profile is an important part of your site activities. It allows people to get to know who you are and more about you. The default image provided by Digg doesn't make a good impression on anyone. A properly filled out profile invites social interaction. Digg is a social site. It's important to be social. Most of the traffic I get directly from Digg is people visiting my sites through links on my profile.
Avoid using the Digg shout system as much as possible. Even if you keep your shouts private, people and search engines can still see and find them. These shouts can hurt you. It can be viewed by some people and search engines as a form of spamming.
Make friends with your Digg mutual friends on other social sites that have a private message system in which private messages are never made public and accessible to search engines. Or even better, use instant messaging and email, instead.
Get your Digg friends to submit your content for you, and don’t use the same person too frequently…rotate them. (use the private message system on other sites to suggest what to submit and Digg) And not every page on your site is a worthy candidate for submission. Be selective and only give them links to the best content you have on your site. Be very critical of your own work. You know what will appeal to the masses and what won't. Don't act like you are stupid. Don't submit things that will likely only get a few Diggs. This will hurt your site, in the long run when your content is submitted to Digg and gets a low number of Diggs. Google rates your content in part, by the number of Diggs it receives. Choose wisely.
Get real friends that are also members of Digg to submit and/or Digg your stuff. (same thing…contact them offsite) Make sure those friends are not connected to your Digg profile in any way.
Digg a big variety of content submitted by others (not just your friends), from the upcoming section, and don’t Digg anything lame. Think massive quantities of mass appeal. Ask yourself the following: "What would the majority of people assume about me if they were to see this in my Digg history?" If it's not something good, don't Digg it, even if you really like it.
Make sure you comment and say something intelligent that won’t get voted down, on at least 50% of what you Digg. Commenting and interacting with others is being social. You need to be social on a social network, or it just won't work. You want to be one of the first few to comment as frequently as possible, and you don't want to seem like you are some sort of idiot. And vote up the intelligent comments that you like, made by others. The more you are an early commenter with something intelligent to say, and the more social you are, the more likely it will be that you will catch the eye of a more powerful Digger that likes you for what you have to say and what you Digg, and he will be more likely to check out the other things you Digg, and then possibly Digg things that you Digg. More powerful Diggers have crowd appeal that you don’t. Their followers are what you are after and you get to those through them.
Do not attempt to friend the top dogs on Digg until you have established a very strong profile and have an abundance of experience. They are not going to friend you back if they don't know who you are and have never seen you around the site. An even better idea is to wait for them to friend you, first.
Never friend anyone on Digg that breaks the above rules. Remember the old saying "Birds of a feather flock together". Don't mark yourself as "guilty through association". Anyone that breaks the above rules are poor quality Diggers and their activities can get you marked as a spammer or poor quality Digger, yourself, and then either your account will get banned, you submissions will get constantly buried, or people just won’t Digg your stuff. If that happens, then you will be useless to your mutual Digg friends, and they will not be willing to help you as much. They may even stop following you. Leave the poor quality Diggers that break the above rules as just followers and not mutual friends. Don’t follow them or you will be following them to failure. Associate yourself only with quality.

And what kinds of things should you submit and Digg besides the usual stuff that has mass appeal, and content of good quality from your friends? Submit and Digg high quality pages that link to yours. Your goal should be indirect traffic coming from those sites to yours and not from Digg to yours. This is one easy way you can reward people that are kind enough to write about you. You give those pages more traffic and a boost in page rank and have more links pointing to you in the top 10 results in the search engines.

The goal is not to get a day of traffic from Digg. The goal is not to increase your own page rank for your site (this will happen any way if you follow my suggestions). The goal is not for your site to make the front page of Digg.

The goal is to take over the entire front page of the search engines so all links will point to you, directly or indirectly when someone searches for something.

Most people never go to page 2 of the results. They usually find what they want on page 1. If every article on page 1 sends them to you, you WIN BIG TIME, even if your site is buried on page 8 of the search results, which it won’t be if you are paying attention and learning from what I just said.

The higher the page rank of the sites that link to you, the higher your page rank will be. Why have a bunch of PR0 sites linking to you when you can actively do something about it and help turn them into PR3 or higher? This is one case where nice guys don't have to finish last. Being nice can help you finish first.

My #1 Reason for Hating Digg

2008-07-24T14:09:00.009-04:00

Aside from all that infects Digg and makes it such trash, such as the Super Digger cartels that bury the good stuff and digg the crappy stuff without even reading it, the fact anything with "Google", "Digg", "iPhone", or "Linux" in the headline automatically makes it to the front page (even if it isn't news worthy), and the comments that seem like they were written by a gang of uneducated pre-teen delinquents that live under a bridge...there is one thing above all that really aggrivates me to no end.

THE BLOAT!

The site is the most unusable piece of trash that has ever been coded. Worse than AOL webmail, the latest version of GMail, Yahoo webmail, Neopets, and FeedBurner, combined.

It should not take 20 minutes to log into a site. One should not receive a billion "unresponsive script" warnings per page. It should not take an hour to switch tabs. Someone needs to dig a hole and bury that site before I lose my mind. I am so aggrivated right now that all the Kitaro in the world could not calm me down.

Every time I think about giving Digg another chance, I end up regretting it and shaking with frustration. I am a very patient person, but I am not THAT patient.

I seriously hope that if Google does buy Digg, that they don't turn their search engine into a bloated mess while they add Digg buttons to all their search results. My poor little computer and I wouldn't be able to handle it, and in my opinion, we shouldn't have to.

I have had it! Enough is enough! I will never load another page from Digg in any browser, on any PC, for as long as I live...unless someone can direct me to a Digg Lite that isn't loaded with all the bloated crap.

I don't care if I can vote or comment on stuff, or not. I really am not feeling in a very social mood right now, any way.

I just want a list of the headlines, descriptions, and direct links to all the articles that have been submitted in the upcoming stories section. I would like to find some interesting stuff to read that isn't already plastered all over every blog & splog in creation.

I don't want the front page crap. I would rather have all the hidden gems that never have a fair shot of making it to the front page.

Does such a thing even exist?

If it does, give me a link, please!

UPDATE 08-04-2008: I have found not one, but two alternatives to the main bloated Digg site. Please see my article titled "Digg, Digg Lite, Digg Ultra Lite" on my Snailware blog.

Win a Microsoft Visual Studio Team Suite Package Worth Over $10,000

2008-06-08T05:48:00.002-04:00

DonationCoder is running another whopper of a coding contest, with the help of Chris Hanscom (who runs veign.com).

The prize is a copy of Microsoft Visual Studio Team Suite with MSDN Premium subscription (almost every application from Microsoft!), worth over $10,000!

So what do you have to do to enter?

Code a new, never-released application, using one of the free versions of Microsoft Visual Studio Express.
Provide the source code for your application (but you do not need to release this publicly if you don’t want to).
The winning program must be freeware or donationware.
Code any kind of program you want.
Post a reply to this forum thread and email mouser stating your intention to enter, well in advance of the deadline.

When is that deadline?

July 1st, 2008

Oh, my! That’s not too far away, so go read about the full contest rules and information and get coding.

Good luck!

EntreCard Needs Bigger Better Whips

2008-05-09T13:25:00.005-04:00

What is the deal with EntreCard's signup form?

I have been trying to create an account for at least a week. Every time I hit the submit button on the signup page, I get this error:

Is there some trick to getting an account that I do not know about? Is this some sort of exclusive club and "certain people" are not welcome to register?

This is not a problem affecting a certain particular browser, as I have tried with more than one, my usual K-Meleon and I even brushed the dust off of IE and tried. No luck.

Checking through their forums to see if the problem has been reported (and what the official word on when it will be fixed) doesn't help. The only issues reported are from people that have accounts already. And there is no way for me to report the issue without having an account...and I can't get one! If I could get one, there would be no issue to report.

Maybe one of you guys that has an EntreCard account could post on their support forum and bring some attention to my post here.

My experiences with Project Wonderful

2008-02-26T01:41:00.004-05:00

I can't remember which blog I was on, but they had ads from Project Wonderful.

I have been looking for other ways to make money on my blogs and websites besides Adsense. I decided to give it a try.

It has been 16 days since I signed up and I figured I would let everyone know about my experiences with it so far, and some other thoughts I have had about the whole program.

Since one of my sites is an educational site that is accessed by a number of schools, I have to be careful about other sites I link to and what kinds of ads appear on it. Project Wonderful allows me to check each site and decide if I want to approve or reject it. I like this. I won't have to worry as much about who or what is advertising on my site. I can go see myself before the ad ever appears.

So how much money have I made? A big $0.44. That isn't very much for 16 days.

There is something that I have been thinking about though...

Are people clicking the ads that are appearing on my sites? No, not really, but I am clicking them all to check them before approving them. So I am being paid a tiny amount to look at other people's sites. And I look at their site even if they aren't the winning bid. Just the act of bidding, win or lose, will bring in some extra traffic.

Since I am checking all ads before they appear on my site, I have discovered quite a few really nice blogs and a lot of web comic sites, which I have sent the links to my daughter. She is nuts about web comics and is always looking for new ones she can get into, so it seemed like the logical thing to do.

Would I pay for placing an ad to one of my sites with Project Wonderful? Probably not, since the traffic it would generate would most likely be miniscule and not really boosting the traffic enough to make more off the ads that are already on my sites.

But you are allowed to bid and decide how much you are willing to pay per day for placement. And believe this is where the beauty of placing ads with them is. I think if you were to bid on every site where the ads are going for $0, you could do quite well generating some traffic without any cost involved. And at the very least, if you bid on a site that is run by someone that checks all ads, like I do, if you have a decent site you may win traffic from the 'secret traffic source' of Project Wonderful...the webmasters themselves.

If they like your site, it's all worth the no-cost effort. Advertising on a blogger's site and the webmaster liking your site, could turn into even better advertising if they like your site enough to tell their readers about it and give you a nice honest review and send their readers to you. At the very least, even if they don't write about it and you never get a click on your ad, you will have them as a fan, so you have nothing to lose and everything to gain.

Would I write about some of the sites that have bid on my ad box? Certainly, if the site excites me enough, and some have.

A few are about to get a bit more advertising than they had anticipated when they placed their bid. Rather than a day or so in a box on my ebook site, they are going to have a permanent spot here in this post.

Here is what I have discovered in the last 16 days that I found quite appealing:

Living on Adsense - A blog by a beginning blogger meant for beginning bloggers, sharing the knowledge he acquires with others, as he learns it, in a style that isn't boring or dry. This isn't the 'How to Get Rich Step-by-Step, Now Buy My Book' that you will find in other blogs of the sort. This guy is for real, and struggling with it, like the rest of us.

If you want to read about real experiences with trying to make money from blogging, this is a good one to read. If you are a little ahead in this game, a bit farther than this guy, maybe you would like to share some info with him and help him out. He wants to make a living from blogging and isn't doing too well at the moment. I think he could use a little advice and encouragement from his fellow "I am still broke & blogging" peers.

High T3ch - How do I describe this one? All I can say is that it is quite visually appealing and interesting. Lots of stuff from the world of science & technology, presented in a way that will appeal to the common person. Don't be afraid or think you aren't smart enough to understand. Dive in and learn a little something new.

impNERD - Nice blog if you are a blogger. Lots of stuff about social bookmarking, blogging, SEO, Wordpress, writing articles, marketing your blog, etc. Hopefully, Chris (from at Living on Adsense) is reading this and checking this one out. ;-)

Calamities of Nature - This is a rather well drawn and appealing web comic. One of the few that I have come across in the last 16 days that I would actually read. It's quite professional. And it seems the artist is starting to get some good exposure. Consider this little blurb of mine, approval, and a bit more publicity to help him out. He deserves it.

Technically Easy - An interesting blog that presents technical stuff in an easy to understand manner that even non-geeks can understand. He also does free website reviews, so if you want him to take a look at your site and write about it, ask him. He's an honest guy that will tell you and the world, the truth...the good, the bad, and the ugly. He scores +100 bonus internet points from me. I like a person with integrity.

So even though I have only made a measly $0.44, I think it was still worth it just to find some cool new sites. Once I have hit the minimum amount needed to place a bid, I'll be making some $0 bids and see if it has the same effect on other publishers as it has had on me.

DonationCoder N.A.N.Y. 2008 Programming Challenge

2007-12-06T21:48:00.002-05:00

This is a challenge for anybody with any kind of coding skills, even at the beginner level.

The challenge is to release a new freeware/donationware application on or before January 1, 2008.

It was a lot of fun last year and it got quite a bit of publicity. It was covered by ShellCity.net, CybernetNews.com, and ghacks.net, along with many other sites & blogs.

So if you can code, you might want to take the challenge this year.

I have been a member of DonationCoder for quite some time now, and it has been a wonderful experience for me.

One of the great things about this site and the community behind it, is the feedback you get from users, which helps you to improve your software and make it the best it can be. It is a kind of co-operative endeavor, with the end users and the developers working together as a team. You don't have any idea how great of an experience it is until you experience it for yourself, either as a user or a developer.

This entire team approach of software development brings the developer and end user together in a way that most people never have seen or experienced before. The results are amazing.

When you are coding for an unknown mystery user, it is easy to assume what he will want and like and what he will use your software for, having no clue what he really wants, likes, or needs. The reality is that you end up coding for yourself, and hoping the end user has the same tastes as you. It is quite easy to become disconnected and out of touch, when you are just coding and posting your creations on your own personal site for others to download, with no real interaction with the people you are writing for.

And as software users, it is easy not to think of developers as approachable people that will listen to you and consider your comments & suggestions seriously. It is also too easy to think of software as not having a human element behind its creation. This can lead people to not really care where their software comes from or appreciate the amount of work that goes into making it. It's this not caring attitude that can be an element contributing to the issues with software piracy that exist today. It's a bit harder for a user to bring themselves to pirate software, when they are hit with the reality that the stuff they are using actually has a 'face'.

Now before you get the wrong impression of what this is all about, let me explain what it isn't. This isn't a situation where a coder creates, users make demands, coder submits to demands, working himself to death and becoming resentful...or all he gets as feedback is bug reports or complaints. It's not like that at all.

And it's not a matter of users getting everything they want, which results in a bloated application full of useless features, that does everything except make your bed for you.

This is ongoing honest discussions, with not just feature requests, but an explanation of why they want the features, discussions between the developer and the users about which would be the best features to add and/or remove, and discussions on how the best way to present them would be.

Many of these discussions are between the users themselves, where they have to make up their minds and come to an agreement of what they really want & need, as a group. And the developer helps with guiding them and keeping things realistic and explaining what is or isn't possible, or what is or isn't within the limits of their coding abilities.

When something is outside the coder's abilities, there are other developers on the site that can be helpful and provide resources to learn from, and share some of their knowledge & experience so that you can do things you thought were impossible, and learn a lot in the process.

And the users really do appreciate the developers that will listen to them and be honest with them, with many showing that appreciation with donations. But don't do this for the money, because you will never get rich from freeware or donationware. Do it instead for the experience and the fun it will be, and the greater sense of connection to the people you are coding for, and how it will help to keep you from losing touch with your userbase...or the realities of real world software use.

So think about something you can make and accept the challenge today. You have about 3 weeks to come up with something you can release. And if you are out of ideas, you can take a look at the Coding Snacks section of their forum and maybe fill a request for a small tool that someone needs.

http://www.donationcoder.com/Forums/bb/index.php?topic=11206.0

Best of the Web 2006

2006-12-28T01:48:00.000-05:00

Here is my list of my best website discoveries of 2006:

donationcoder.com

Seriously...that's it!

Nothing else matters. Nothing else can compare, in my mind.

Anybody that has been reading my blog knows I love that site and it has become my online home.

But I am just one person, and my opinions on what is best would only reflect my opinions. If you want a great list of what is best try this one:

DonationCoder.com's Best of the Year 2006 list.

It contains the best

software

websites

essays

debates

flash games

humor

gadgets

programming stuff

entrepreneur related articles

and more

all selected from their fantastic forum postings of the past year.

This isn't the usual single person who just comes along and gives their opinion of what they think is the best...you can find that on any other website.

What makes this list special is that this is a huge community of dedicated enthusiasts that has collectively scoured the internet for the best of everything. No single person could have come up with a list like this, and it sure would have taken them a lot longer than a year to put it together if they tried.

If you would like to become part of the team and possibly contribute to the Best of 2007 list, register on their forum and become part of the community. You won't regret it.

It is my best discovery of 2006.

http://www.donationcoder.com/2006/

Shitware

2006-09-05T00:53:00.000-04:00

Ever use a piece of software that caused you to use up all the swear words you know...and you ended up inventing a few new choice words to fit the situation?

How about a software company's customer service or tech support?

Got some hardware that is making smoke appear from under your collar? Do you know a website that is constructed so badly it makes you want to rip your hair out?

You are not alone.

Welcome to Shitware.net.

Have your say...complain publicly where all can see and be warned. Read what others have said about their experiences.

Maybe if we all put our voices together those companies that are torturing us will listen & get their acts together.

Let the ranting begin!

http://www.shitware.net

Linux vs Windows

2006-03-20T15:51:00.001-05:00

"The thing I hate about an argument is that it always interrupts a discussion."
-- GK Chesterton

This is especially true in technology themed chatrooms.

Recently a programmer was engaged in a discussion about .net programming and how much he loved it and the whole idea of it. There are a few in the room that share his feelings for .net...and a few that don't.

One such guy that didn't share that point of view, decided to twist the discussion into an argument, claiming that Linux was superior to Windows and anything Microsoft could churn out. Of course the programmer didn't agree with him and started making some very valid points to support his own point of view. This ended up becoming a personal attack war with the Linux guy verbally attacking the Windows/.net programmers of the room.

The host of the room, the .net programmer he was mainly aiming his attacks at, ended up having to ban him for awhile, so the Linux guy could go cool off.

Instead of the Linux guy doing that, he hit the room's forum and proceeded to carry on with his attacking there, at which point the host of the room ended up having to delete his posts and was accused by the Linux guy of censorship.

A few days later I came across this little gem:

"The Unix/Linux community is very supportive. Think about your favorite sport and then imagine the team with the most rabid, loyal fans. Linux users are pretty similar except that if you show up at the game cheering for Microsoft, they will 'flame' you (post nasty messages on their forums about you) instead of beating you up in the parking lot."

(read full page...)

I guess Windows is better than Linux...at least Windows won't give you a case of rabies. :-P