Do I Have Swine Flu

Some people are naughty and creative. Imagine someone buying a domain name just to make a joke. Here's a site that makes a joke out of the swine flu panic: DoIHaveSwineFlu.org

If you want to smile, check it out.

Wolfram Alpha

They are saying that Wolfram Alpha will be a "Google killer".  In case you do not know, Wolfram Alpha is a new search engine. But this search engine is quite different from Google or from any other search engine you know. Here's what makes Wolfram Alpha different according to ReadWriteWeb:

Instead of searching the web for info, Alpha is built around a vast repository of curated data from public and licensed sources. Alpha then organizes and computes this knowledge with the help of sophisticated Natural Language Processing algorithms. Users can ask Alpha any kind of question, which can be constructed just like a Google search.

Wolfram Alpha is from the makers of Mathematica. Stephen Wolfram, the creator of Mathematica explain that Wolfram Alpha "is built on top of 5 million lines of Mathematica code which currently run on top of about 10,000 CPUs". Wolfram is currently expanding its server farm in preparation for the public launch. 

Wolfram Alpha will come in two versions; the free version and the Pro version. The Pro version will allow users to download and upload data to Alpha.  

I guess Wolfram Alpha is too different to be a Google killer. Google has its own thing, Wolfram Alpha has also its own thing, they are not in the same field so there's no killing to happen.

Wolfram Alpha will be launched in May.

Battlestations Pacific Demo

Battlestations Pacific Demo is now live, you can download it from the Xbox Live Marketplace.

Featuring one single player mission from the US campaign, Divine Winds of Leyte, you'll be thrown feet first into the action taking on a deadly Kamikaze attack on a US carrier fleet, before ultimately sinking one of Japan's largest battleships.

But that's not all. Also included in the demo are two of our brand new multiplayer modes, available for play offline in single player Skirmish.

Siege, where one team must hold and defend an island stronghold whilst the other must attempt to capture it before the time runs out, and Island Capture, where you'll be able to choose and set up your war machines as you see fit and fight your way through enemy defences in order to capture all important territory, unlocking specific naval supplies along the way. The first team to control all of the islands claiming the win.

But you've waited long enough, go see for yourself. Hit the links below to grab your first official taste of Battlestations: Pacific.

You can download Xbox 360 Demo here (Via Xbox LIVE Marketplace)
And get games for Windows Demo here (via Gamespot)

Floating Water Bridge

Here's a weird phenomenon discovered by Elmar Fuchs and his colleagues at the Graz University of Technology in Austria. Check out the video above.

Here's the explanation of this phenomenon from PsyOrg.

When exposed to a high-voltage electric field, water in two beakers
climbs out of the beakers and crosses empty space to meet, forming the
water bridge. The liquid bridge, hovering in space, appears to the
human eye to defy gravity.

Upon investigating the phenomenon, the scientists found that water
was being transported from one beaker to another, usually from the
anode beaker to the cathode beaker. The cylindrical water bridge, with
a diameter of 1-3 mm, could remain intact when the beakers were pulled
apart at a distance of up to 25 mm.

Why water would act this way was a surprise, Fuchs told PhysOrg.com.
But the group’s analyses have shown that the explanation may lie within
the nature of the water’s structure. Initially, the bridge forms due to
electrostatic charges on the surface of the water. The electric field
then concentrates inside the water, arranging the water molecules to
form a highly ordered microstructure. This microstructure remains
stable, keeping the bridge intact.

iPhone Lite

There are rumors circulating around that Apple and Verizon will be launching two new products this summer. One hot product is the iPhone Lite; this is said to be smaller and cheaper than the regular iPhone. I guess they are swinging with how the economy hangs these days. The second item is some sort of "tablet-like device" that allow the user to watch HD videos, listen to music, place calls over WiFi, play games, and enjoy the great things that touch screen technology could bring.

Details about what Apple and Verizon are cooking but BusinessWeek has some stuff leaked.

Cheap Web Hosting

The best business that you can start today should be online. The internet is the new media so it is where the money is. I've got my share of experiences with web hosting so I pretty know my way around the web now. A friend of mine who wants to self host his blog asked me for guidance, I recommended to him my web host but he could not afford it price as of now, he wants to have something cheaper, or perhaps free. So I scoured the net for a web hosting that could give him what he wants. I came upon KVCHosting, a cheap web hosting that shows good promise. This company offers free hosting, unlimited cheap web hosting, reseller hosting, vps hosting, and dedicated hosting. I told my friend to start with this company's free hosting and then upgrade later to their shared hosting which could be as low as $2.49 with unlimited bandwidth. What is good about KVCHosting is that they do not put banner ads in you pages even if you only have a free hosting with them. They also give free domain, free dedicated IP, rvsiteubuilders (with 500 templates), Shell Access, CPANEL 11, Fantastico script and many more. They offer level 3 support and they work around the clock. Their response time is 30 mins. Check the site out a see more of what they have to offer.

Hacking Time's 2009 World's Most Influential Persons

The big ones are not that invincible after all. Time Magazine is big but after their 2009 World's Most Influential Persons poll, they come out as nothing but like everyone else--hackable. This is how they tell the world about their "most influential person in the world" for 2009:

In a stunning result, the winner of the third annual TIME 100 poll and new owner of the title World's Most Influential Person is moot. The 21-year-old college student and founder of the online community 4chan.org, whose real name is Christopher Poole, received 16,794,368 votes and an average influence rating of 90 (out of a possible 100) to handily beat the likes of Barack Obama, Vladimir Putin and Oprah Winfrey. To put the magnitude of the upset in perspective, it's worth noting that everyone moot beat out actually has a job.

When I heard about it, I was confused, I thought it would be someone as big as the likes of Obama or Oprah but it was someone known as Moot. Christopher Poole (a.k.a Moot) is the founder of the online community 4chan.org. To tell you honestly, I really do not know anything about 4chan.org or its founder that is why I was surprised about the result of Time's poll. So I did a little research and found out the funny side of the supposed to be serious Most Influential Person poll. I learned how Time's poll was precision hacked. The hackers were so good that they were able to embed a message in the manipulated poll results. The message is shown in the image above, it spells "MARBLE CAKE ALSO THE GAME". What does it mean? Zombocom, one of the hackers says: ” Marblecake was an irc channel where the “Message to Scientology” video originated. Many believe we are “dead” or only doing hugraids etc, so I thought it would also be a way of saying : we’re still around and we don’t just do only “moralfag” stuff ."

What is funny about the Time poll is that something as big as Time failed to use the very basic of security measures like authentication or validation. When Time realised that their poll was being hacked, they threw in some security measures but by then it was too late.

Read more about how Time's poll was hacked at MusicMachinery.com.

How to Capture Color Codes the Easy Way

Okay I'll tell you a little secret : I do not memorize the color codes. Yes, I only know the code for black and white; with other colors, I leave it to Photoshop. I know that some bloggers find it difficult to match the color scheme of their ads with the color scheme of their theme just because they do not know how to capture color codes on screen. If you will look at my many blogs, you'll notice that the color scheme of my ads matches that of the color scheme of my theme. How do I do it? In the past, I used good olp Photoshop to capture color code. But of course relying on Photoshop is not always advisable for people who use slow machines; waiting for Photoshop to load every time you want to capture a color code is too time-consuming.

I discovered a very good substitute for Photoshop in capturing color codes from your screen, it is a little color picker that does the job of capturing color codes many times faster than when you do it with Photoshop. It is very easy to use and very powerful. You'll be able to get the code of any color on your screen very quickly. This color picker can be found at http://www.adesclrpicker.com. It is called AdesClrPicker.

Konami Code

I don't know if it was a stunt pulled by ESPN webmasters or someone who just did not have anything to do and found it amusing to have fun with the ESPN webpage. A few hours back, the ESPN website suddenly got the ability to display magical figures (like the ones in the screen shot) when one applies the Konami code on the ESPN homepage. 

But don't hurry now to the ESPN website because the ESPN guys have removed their page's ability to show you magical unicorns when you pull the Konami code on it.

File Extension Sam

Are you familiar with the file extension sam? The .sam file extension stands for "sample" and consists primarily of text. It is primarily associated with the Samna Ami Pro word-processing program. The Samna Ami Pro was a word-processing, spreadsheet program developed in DOS. Other successive approximations of the .sam file extension include CalTech PaleoMag, Map, Microsoft Office 97 and the Signed 8-bit Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) sample. Because file extension sam is associated with some old programs, you may have encountered problems with it. It is usually with opening it sometimes. When a file does not open, the possible cause is that the computer's registry could be corrupted and could not point to the proper application to run the file. If this happens it is important to clean the registry. You can check out the website File Extension Sam for some solutions. The site offers a free scan that will analyze your system so that you will know where the problem is rooted. You can your their Driver Detective software for free and have your system a good scan.

YouTubeTweeter Allows you to Post Youtube Videos in Twitter

We've seen lots of services that allow us to share photos and music at Twitter but we have yet to see a service that will allow us to share videos. Not quite, because here comes Youtube Tweeter,  a service that allows you to post Youtube videos in Twitter. It is very easy to use, all you have to do is put in your username and a YouTube link. Youtube Tweeter will then generate a link and a button to post it on Twitter. Every time someone clicks that link in your tweet the Youtube video will pop up and the video will play.

Egnyt Your Data

A company, small or big, will always have data to to store; the bigger the company grows, the more data there is to manage. Managing an ever growing data is not easy, it could take away the company's focus on the business because of the challenges of purchasing, managing and maintaining a server. So the best move for smaller businesses is outsourcing their IT infrastructure. There are companies who do just like that--help other companies manage their IT infrastructure. Egnyt is one such company, they offer solutions to many companies data management woes. Egnyt delivers infrastructure on-demand file sharing and local cloud computing services to small and medium sized businesses looking to outsource their IT infrastructure. What does it mean? This means that they can give you with online data storage. Your data is stored in a secure central location and their file sharing software allows easy sharing and seamless collaboration among your employees and business partners. And you don't need to buy a server and worry about maintenance and security because Egnyt has an online server that is designed to be easily configured by you according to your needs. With Egnyt, you have secure access to your files using a web browser, and it's as easy as dragging and dropping files to where you want them to be. Large files are also easily handled, Egnyte is optimized for easy upload and storage of large files and data. Another thing that makes life easier with Egnyt is its powerful search feature; it allows you to quickly search and retrieve any information. With Egnyt, your company can focus on the business and not be distracted by worries about VPN, FTP, or tape kind of stuff.

Vbootkit 2.0

Windows 7 is coming but would you want to use it even if there are two person who are claiming that they have found a "hole" in Windows 7 that is "unfixable". Researchers Vipin Kumar and Nitin Kumar claim that they have the latest hack for Windows 7 using a 3kb software called Vbootkit 2.0.

“There’s no fix for this. It cannot be fixed. It’s a design problem,” Vipin Kumar said, explaining the software exploits the Windows 7 assumption that the boot process is safe from attack.

This is how the hack works, the program VBootKit 2.0 during the boot time, loads itself into the system memory and bypasses the hard drive altogether, making it extremely difficult to detect. Because nothing is changed on the hard disk itself, VBootkit 2.0 is hard to detect.

Once the software is loaded onto the memory, any ill-intentioned attacker can access all data, change passwords, install softwares to remotely control the PC. However, when the victim’s computer is rebooted, VBootkit 2.0 will lose its hold over the computer as data contained in system memory will be lost.

Scary? Not really because the attacker must have physical access to your PC before he (or she) can do the attack. But if Vbootkit 2.0 is already in your PC, the attacker can control it remotely.

More about this story at CIO.com

Geocities Died

I guess most of you are familiar with Geocities, a free Web hosting service that achieved fame in the mid-90s. Well, it died last Thursday at at the Yahoo headquarters in Silicon Valley. More about the death here.

Wiew TIFF and PPT Files Right from Your Browser

Gmail is making the life of Gmail users like me easier everyday. Last year, a fast online viewer for PDF files was added to Gmail. Now, they've added to the web-based viewer support for PowerPoint and TIFF files. Though I am not opening PowerPoint or TIFF files everyday, I find this a very good addition to Gmail's features. You can test drive the feature at Gmail Blog.

Web Design Best Practices

Web design can make or break a site. The success of your company's web performance is dependent on the how your site is designed. A badly designed site will turn off prospective customers; a website with good design will hook customers. But how do you know the difference between the badly designed website and the one that is a product of web design best practices?  The answer is sad but true: many of us do not really know what is good design and what is bad design that is why we need the help of those who know. It is important to know the best practices in web design and development so that you can apply it in your site.  There is one site that can give you knowledge about Web Development Best Practices; you can purchase their product that will give you a very clear roadmap to the most important things in web design and development--Basics of design elements, Marketing and targeting, Conversion and tracking, Security, Legal requirements and obligations, Email vs browser considerations, Interface usability, and many many more. Their Best Practices in Web Design will give you insights about very important things in web design like color scheme and website navigation. You can also visit TheWorkingWeb's blog and read about Why you need Best Practices in Web Development to give you lots of knowledge in this field.

O3D: create interactive 3D applications in a web browser

Google has released O3D, a new, shader-based, low-level graphics API for creating interactive 3D applications in a web browser. The video above is a demo of what it can do. I have already downloaded and installed the plugin and on the process of testing it. Well, this is not the first thing of its kind, I have seen Unity 3D which I guess is very much ahead of the new O3D, check out the Unity 3D demo video below.

Google Profiles

I know that like me, you have tried Googling your own name and see what comes out. I bet that some people who know you also tried Googling your name to see if you are any good. If nothing comes out about you in Google, well, you are nothing at all.

Now Google want you to have a face in the crowd, you can now have your name come out in the search with some voice with Google Profiles. To see what google Profile is all about, try googling your own name then try googling my name. See the difference? 

Google Timeline

Google has announced Google News Timeline, a web application that organizes search results chronologically. Here's how Google explains this new feature:

"Google News Timeline presents search results from a wide range of sources. You can search and browse results from Google News, including headlines, quotes, photos from our Hosted News partners, and YouTube partner videos. You can also search for thousands of archival newspapers and magazines from Google News Archive Search and Google Book Search.

You can also add Blog Search results and sports scores, as well as information about books, music, movies, tv shows, video games, and even artists, to see how they've appeared over time."

QuickCert

In today's world, the world breathes IT. The IT professional is very much in demand. The surest way to find yourself a good niche in the IT world is by being certified. A certification is the key to a good future as an IT professional. One of the must-have IT certification is the MCSE Certification, the proof that an IT professional possess the skills and knowledge required of Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer. To ensure that you pass the MCSE Certification exam, you need to prepare your self. You can get some training from QuickCert, they can give you a state-of-the-art training course that will help you pass the exams and become a successful MCSE certified IT professional. 

Google's Ranking Algorithm is Set to Change

Because more and more cybercriminals are becoming good at using blackhat techniques to manipulate Google's search results, Google will be changing its ranking algorithm. Google has always been ahead of anyone and always claim that their algorithms are already designed to combat blackhat SEO techniques but now they are set to change it again, it makes us think that somehow blackhatters are not that slow when it comes to getting at Google.

Another algorithm change is good for combating the black hat. But will it affect us normal bloggers who are trying to get a decent ranking?

Windows 7 RC will be Released on May 5, 2009

The above image is a screen shot of the page from Microsoft Partners that announces the release of Windows 7 RC on May 5. But if you would click on the link, the page will no longer show up. But it was there.

For more details, check out this post at NeoWin.

Do You Want a Complete, Comprehensive, and Accurate Free Credit Report?

The best way to avoid becoming victim of identity theft is by always closely monitoring your credit report. If you want a complete overview of your credit history rating, it is important to know what company does this thing best. Credit Nexus is the company that can give you a complete overview of your credit history rating. Their easy to follow annual credit report allows you to review your credit information from Equifax, TransUnion, and Experian.

The free credit reoprt that Credit Nexus gives you a better look at your credit rating and keep track of your bills and credit cards accounts. With their easy to understand reports, you can immediately spot discrepancies and other signs that someone else may have been using your name and credit rating.  

If you want to increase your credit card limits it is a must that you keep a good monitoring of your credit report. Increasing credit limits take a good credit rating. If you have a good credit score, it could mean that you have a lots of assets and very minimal debt and a healthy credit history. 

Use Credit Nexus' free credit report to monitor your credit rating. A well-monitored credit rating can help you come up with a healthy credit report that is the basis for having an increase in credit limits. Check out Credit Nexus now and see how you can improve your credit rating.

New Event Gadget for Google Friend Connect

Yesterday Google launched a new events gadget for Google Friend Connect. This new gadget allows webmasters "to spread the word about upcoming events that may be of interest to their communities". Here's how Yoah Bar-David, Google Calendar Software Engineer, explained how this new gadget works:

Members of your site can sign in and RSVP, and their responses will appear directly on the website. Visitors can see if any of their friends will be joining, and can add the event to their personal Google Calendars with just a click. To ensure that no one gets lost on the way, a Google Map showing the event's location is automatically embedded. Of course, that doesn't mean you should limit yourself to physical events -- host a virtual meet-up or "webinar" and share all of the important dial in codes through the event gadget.

The video below shows a step-by-step guide to setting up this gadget on your site.
Google has also set up a sample site that demonstrates the gadget in action.

Vanity URL for your Google Profile

Google Profiles are now letting users enable the option to create a vanity URL. In other words, if you check a box, your Google profile page will become htp://www.google.com/profiles/whatever-your-gmail-name-is. 

If you want to get your vanity URL now, click here.

Baltimore Remodeling

Thinking about giving your home a makeover? Of course, if your home is quite big, you can not do it yourself, you need the assistance of a company that specializes in home remodeling. But how do you choose the best company to do the job? There should be something to base things upon. The company that you hire for the job should be able to make into reality what you are imagining, what you want. You should choose the one that will work with you to design a floor plan to present to an architect; this will be very good for you because you will save much with this kind of arrangement. Choose also the company that builds custom and modular homes, do total rehabilitation, build additions and garages and do interior and exterior remodeling. The company should also be good at erecting and completing modular homes, both stock and custom floor plans, builds decks, patios, carports and fences. A company that does all these things proves to be what a home remodeling company should be-- a company that delivers a complete package. You might be wondering where to find such company, well have you checked out Baltimore Remodeling? Visit their site and learn more about them. Remember that only good companies can give your home a real make over.

3.1 Patch Notes

Many is waiting for this: the official World of Warcraft Patch 3.1 will go live in just a few hours. This patch features many improvements, additions, and bug fixes but the major features are the New Inscriptions, Major Class Changes, Ulduar, Swimming Mounts, Dual Specs, and the Argent Tournament.The patch is now on Blizzard's server and in a few hours it will be released.

Here is the full list of what WoW Patch 3.1 will give you:

Ulduar’s secrets will be revealed after many battles and a great journey.
The Argent Tournament will begin, and it will decide who is good enough to fight against the Lich King.
Select classes will get new spells and abilities, players are required to visit class trainers to learn the new spells.
In the Argent Tournament players will discover new ways of getting reputation using capitol cities; mounted combat and more; new titles, achievements, and daily quests(!); new epic and rare items.
40+ level players can pay a fee to learn dual-talent while visiting their special trainer.
New meta-achievements for the Noblegarden which now includes quests, items, and many others.
For the PvP area, the improvement consists of a new feature called Enemy Unit Frames which can only be used when you find yourself in the Arenas.
Many new features, and a hoard of improvements were added to the Battlegrounds, Races in general, Lake Wintergrasp, Alterac Valley, Classes in general, Druid, Death Knight, Frost, Unholy, Blood, Balance, Feral, Arms, Hunter, Restoration, Fire, Beast Masteries, Discipline Pets, Holy, Priest, Fishing, Enhancement, and this list could go on forever!
New dungeon maps for Wrath of the Lich King.
Properly delay for Malygos after a Vortex.
Raid’s thread is no longer restarted by the Chains of KelThuzad.
Shade of Naxxramas’s Portal of Shadows only stands for a minute.
Players will have their pets dismissed when using Obedience Crystals.
Emalon, Archavon, and their allies now banish 10 minutes before the Lake Wintergrasp Battle.
Quest Tracking comes with some more advanced features. You can activate the feature from the menu.
The Interface menu features a Color Blind option.
The Spell Effect Level now features Particle Density and Projected Textures settings.
Video Mode Ultra for high-end computers.
Better Shadow Quality can now be set from the Interface.
Players can now allocate talent points before confirming the spending. You can activate the new feature from the menu.
New Equipment Manager, that can manage 10 sets of items.
Confirmation box for buying more than 150 gold.
Objective tracking window now features the Achievement and Quest tracking.
Advanced features for the objective tracking window can be turned on from the objective menu.
When operating a vehicle, the player can now see Health, Fuel, and Ammo on the vehicle interface.
Better performance for the minimap.
Vehicles, Class Colors, OffMap pings now show on the minimap.
V-Key frames features new elite mob frames.
Stamina took Dodge rating’s place.
Gift of Arthas is now a curse.
Hearthstone cooldown is now 30 minutes.
It takes 3 seconds to create a Darkmoon card of the North.
The players can now mail the Pack of Endless Pockets.
Holy Shock healing bonus is now just 10 percent.
Food Eaten statistics have been improved.
Giang Darkwater Clam can be found by fishing in Wintergrasp and features 5 times more meat than regular clams.
Improved loot stacking.
Succulent Clam Meat is not grudge anymore.
The Glyph of Heart Strike took Glyph of Blood Boil’s place.
Dancing Rune Weapon duration is 10 seconds longer due to Glyph of Dancing Rune Weapon.
Bersek’s duration is 5 seconds longer due to the Glyph of Bersek.

via SoftSailor

My New Blogs

I can't get enough, so here again I have two new blogs up today, Digital Journal and Freelance Network. I am also working on two more that I hope to be up by tomorrow (that is if my day job would not bury me deep in work tomorrow).   

StalkDaily Worm is Eating Twitter

There's a spam worm that is eating Twitter as of this writing. A site called StalkDaily has been infecting Twitter profiles today with a spam worm that forces accounts to send spam tweets towards the StalkDaily website. Do not visit the site because if you do, you'll get infected. And if you are already infected, these steps from Mashable might help:

1. Go to your Twitter account settings and switch your bio back to normal

2. In your browser settings, clear out your cache and cookies

3. As a precaution, change your Twitter password

To prevent re-infection, you need to:

1. Avoid visiting Twitter profiles until the issue is fixed

2. If you do land on a Twitter profile with StalkDaily as the URL, you have 3 seconds to close the tab before you’re affected!

3. Since these attacks only work when visiting Twitter profiles on the web, you might want to consider using a desktop Twitter client like TweetDeck or Seesmic Desktop.

Mashable has also given out some information about how this worm attacks:

1. Realized that Twitter allows you to insert not just a text in your “bio” section, but also a script (a quick glance at the source suggests that the javascript used is hidden in the color attribute and hosted at a site called mikeyylolzuuug dot com)

2. Created one or more Twitter profiles with malicious code in the bio sections, enticing Twitter users to visit the pages by following those users (one malicious account may have been called “gangsterboy”)

3. When the profile is visited, the script has a delay of approximately 3 seconds before requesting the Twitter cookie and username from your browser

4. These details are used to create an authentication token, allowing the script to execute any of the actions allowed through the Twitter API

5. The script sends out Tweets on the affected account

6. The script also inserts the itself into the user’s Bio section, making their Twitter account a host.

It's Adsense Payout Time!

It's Google Adsense payout time for me!

And in compliance with Adsense terms, I hid the stats :) Thanks for plin who told me about it .

Bumptop

This one's cool but don't attempt to have it if your system is not that well endowed. BumpTop piles work like in the real world. Toss items at a pile to add them or pop them into a grid, flip through them with your scrollwheel or fan out a pile to quickly see what’s inside. Converting between folders and piles is seamless too.

My Traffic Experiment Day 3 (3,680 unique hits in one day)

I have made two posts about the experiment with traffic that I did with my other blog, this is the third part of the topic. You can read the first two posts here and here. On the third day of my experiment, I got results that was way beyond what I have expected. My target was to get at least 800 unique hits for my MyFreedomWall blog. Instead of 800 unique hits, I got a whooping 3,680 unique hits in the last 24 hours! You can check out the stats here. Mind you, all this traffic came from the search engines, mostly from Google.

I am in my fourth day of the experiment, I will do this experiment for one week, if it shows very good results, I will post the method I used in getting a bigger traffic. Just last week and the many weeks before, the average daily visitors of my other blog was 25. In the last three day it has grown rapidly. You can do it too. 

Update:

I have added one of my wife's blogs yesterday in this experiment, her traffic also skyrocket. See the stats here of just see the screenshot below.

Google App Engine

Google's environment for building and hosting web applications, Google App Engine, was first announced a year ago. Now, in celebration of its birthday, Google unvieled new features for the App Engine. In the Official Google Blog, Google has this to say about the new features:

Tonight at Campfire One we released a new set of features -- based on community and internal feedback -- that helps App Engine interface more easily with businesses' existing technologies:

*App Engine's early look at Java™ language support includes a Java runtime, integration with the new Google Web Toolkit 1.6, and a Google Plugin for Eclipse

*The Google Secure Data Connector enables centrally-managed access to on-premise data from Google Apps

*The database import tool makes it easier to move gigabytes of data into App Engine (and export functionality is coming within the month)

*Cron support can execute scheduled tasks like report generation and DB clean-up at regular intervals

App Engine is still quite young compared to the more established Amazon Web Services. If you do not know Amazon Web Services, it helps to know that their famous customer is Twitter.  App Engine's limitation to apps built in Python makes it a baby in this field. Let's wait a little while more for this to grow.

Do You Need Media?

I regularly buy a lot of blank DVD because I have so many files to back up every now and then. I have lots of music and movies to back up every month. I don't want to fill my hard drive with gigbytes and gigabytes of files so I use a lot of DVD-R media. I know that everyone knows what a DVD looks like but probably not everyone really knows what DVD stands for. DVD stands for Digital Versatile Disc, some people refer to it as Digital Video Disc. But what does the "R" stands for in DVD-R? Well, the "R" stands for "recordable".

It is important to know that not every DVD is made th same, some are of high quality while others can only put your back up in the danger of being damaged because the wuality of the DVD is not good. Low quality DVD has the tendency of having its coating flake off. So every time you buy a DVD-R for your back up and other media needs, be sure that you know which is the best disc for your need. Buy only at trusted stores like Gotmedia.com, the place where you can find the best and the most trusted brands of media at great prices.

Mocospace

What social network is growing fast today? You may say Facebook but Facebook is out of the question, Facebook is already there, lets talk about something that is not that known but is growing fast because of word-of-mouth. Well, I think it's Mocospace. This mobile social networking community designed for people with feature phones, announced at the CTIA convention in Las Vegas that it registered its six millionth user last Friday.

In January 2008, the community had only 2 million members. The company also shared the results of a study by Openwave that found MocoSpace members spend an average of 6.05 minutes per session using the service—more than MySpace mobile users (3.79 minutes) and Facebook mobile users (1.89 minutes).

"We continue to experience terrific word of mouth growth mostly among younger consumers looking for a great mobile experience and certainly the Openwave report confirms our ability to capture their attention," said Justin Siegel, co-founder and CEO of MocoSpace. "Very few, if any, companies have the depth and breadth of information that Openwave has, so it's very exciting that they are sharing some of this information and of course it's nice that it validates our own data, which indicate that MocoSpace is really growing in popularity and relevance."

GM PUMA

What do you think is the fruit of an 18-month collaboration between General Motors Corporation and Segway? Something unexpected like a two-wheeled, two-passenger, covered vehicle dubbed PUMA - the Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility vehicle. See the image above? That's the PUMA.

Why Satellite TV is Better than Cable

Television is the heart of entertainment at home. No home is complete without television. Now, this form of home entertainment has been taken to a higher level with the advent of satellite television. Satellite television is better than your traditional cable tv. There are many reasons why satellite TV is better than cable; first the cost of satellite TV is way better than cable television especially if you get to see how many more channels you can have with Direct TV compared with cable. Direct TV can give you what cable could not--100% digital programming. Aside from that, with direct tv, you will have in your hands HD programming with over 130 channels available in HD. And of course, with direct tv, you can have premiere, edge-of-your-seat interactive sports packages that you can watch with clearer, crisper, and higher definition coverage. Cable subscribers can only dream about these features. Home entertainment with directv deals give you big time entertainment at home while saving you a lot of money. And who can beat sports that don’t normally get U.S. TV coverage; this thing, along with the best sports packages on the planet will be in your living room if you have satellite television or directv. Well, with directv deals, you can have the best in home entertainment.

My traffic Experiment (Day 2)

I started this experiment last sunday with my other blog, My Freedom Wall. I have heard about this technique in getting more traffic to one's blog for some time now but I never had the chance to try it. But last sunday I just tried it and just about 30 minutes after I started the test, my blog started to show signs of getting lots of visitors, all coming in through Google. The blog I am using in this experiment is hosted by Blogger. I did not buy a custom domain for it. Before the experiment, it averaged 25 unique hits a day (I know that it's a very poor performance) but last sunday, on the first day of the experiment, it got 431 hits. Yes, from just 25-30 hits, it skyrocketed to 431. On the second day, the traffic got even higher, the blog made it to 672 unique hits! More than 90% of all the visitors were brought in by the search engine, mostly by Google. Now I am on the third day of the experiment, I am expecting to have more than 700 hits for the third day :) As I am writing this, there are 136 users viewing that blog! See the image above.  Below you can see the stats. The last bar represents the third day of the experiment which is not done yet, I am expecting that it would get to around 800 by tomorow. More on this later on :)

click the image to enlarge

DirectTV Adds Cancelled Shows for TV Addicts

I know how it feels to have something you like just disappear, like the TV shows that you came to love but suddenly being cancelled by your cable television for one reason or another. It is frustrating and it feels like you are in the middle of something delicious when suddenly the plate is snatched away from you and you are left hanging with yearning. Directv knows this that is why they are now getting those cancelled TV shows so that you can continue enjoying them. These programs can not be seen anywhere else, only directv has them. This is great because those wonderful show will now be back in your home and you can live your nights again with all your favorite characters. Examples of the TV shows that Directv has acquired are Friday Night Lights, Wonderland, Eyes, The Nine and Smith. As for me, I am looking forward to watching Friday Night Lights.

What's good about Direct TV is that they offer 100% digital programming. Aside from that, they also offer HD programming with over 130 channels available in HD. They lead in this area in home entertainment. Well, with Directv you can have the the best directv deals. Check out their site and see that you can save a lot of money with them.

My Traffic Experiment

Last night I started a little experiment with my other blog. I tried a very basic SEO trick with it to see if I can increase its search engine traffic overnight. I was surprised that the trick really works, and it is very effective. My Freedom Wall averages 25 unique visits per day but yesterday it got 431 unique visits, 90% of which came via the search engines, mostly from Google. Now on the second day of the experiment, there are positive signs that it will get more than 431 hits. Look at the image below, see how big the increase in traffic? The last bar is not as high as the one before it but tomorrow, I am sure that it will be higher than 431 because as I am writing this visitors continue to arrive via the search engines.

I am still studying this trick, when I am quite confident with its ins and outs, I will post a little tutorial here for those who want to increase their traffic.

Viral Video

Digital cameras and video phones are ubiquitous today; people from every walk of life can now take videos just anytime, anywhere and whenever they like it. many people are also becoming good at it. These videos they make often become popular for a short time and they get passed around from mobile phone to mobile phone, or via email, or better yet via Youtube. According to Wikipedia a viral video is a video clip that gains widespread popularity through the process of Internet sharing, typically through email or Instant messaging, blogs and other media sharing websites. Viral videos are often humorous in nature and include televised comedy sketches.

And don't you know that there's a website that is solely dedicated to charting viral videos? It's ViralVideoChart.com. The video above is an example of a viral video, actually it is at present the top viral video in the chart.

Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood

Anime lovers will have a good time with Aniplex's megahit anime series “Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood” which will debut on MBS and TBS in Japan nationally at 5:00 pm today. FUNimation® Entertainment has acquired digital, broadcast, DVD and merchandising rights to this anime series. 

“We are proud to be able to simulcast the most anticipated series of 2009, I hope our fans will appreciate the video and subtitle quality we have achieved as we are working toward the simulcast of more series this year,” president and CEO of FUNimation Entertainment Gen Fukunaga stated.

FUNimation will deliver high-quality, free, original Japanese dialogue accompanied by English subtitles, streaming episodes of studio Bones’ new Fullmetal Alchemist via Funimation.com as well as other key video-sharing partners beginning April 9th.

Why Free Hosting Sucks

Nothing is free in this world. The word "free" attached to some web hosting sites is there only as a hook. Why would anyone give away hosting for free? There's got to be something in it for those "free web hosting sites". These companies are there because they are doing business and not  philanthropic work.  

A good example of a "free" webhosting company is 110MB.com. I had an account with them because like many people who are new to web hosting, I opted for free hosting before diving into the real thing. The reviews of 110mb.com were quite good so I was convinced that they are really good. I signed up fo a free account and immediately attempted to install my very first WordPress blog. But I soon realized that the a free 110MB account does not include MySQL database feature which is needed to run a WordPress blog. To unlock the MySQL feature I had to shell out $9.95. I told my self that it's okay, that amount is quite small. And so I shelled out $9.95 to be able to get on with the WordPress install. 

I was impressed with the cPanel of 110mb; installation of WordPress was a breeze and I was able to upload tons of templates in a matter of minutes after installation. I then proceeded to buy a domain name from GoDaddy for my new WP blog. But when I attempted to point my new domain to my WP blog I learned that .htaccess support must be turned on first before I can use a custom domain on my WP install. Another $9 is needed to unlock this feature. So I shelled out another $9 for the .htaccess feature. At last my new WordPress blog was running smoothly with its shiny new custom domain. But when WordPress 2.7.1 came out, a problem made itself known: I needed to turn on the Sendmail ON feature to be able to do an automatic download and upgrade of my WordPress install in 110MB server. It costs $9! And of course, if you are doing a WordPress upgrade you need to back up your blog. To be able to back up my blog, I had to turn on the 1-Click Backup ENABLE feature which is worth $7!!! My goodness! So I uninstalled my WP blog and forgot about 110MB and their not really free web hosting, along with the $18 I wasted on them. Actually, it was not wasted, i learned a lot from them.

I then did a little research about the best web hosting companies around and I was torn between WebHostingPad.com and FatCow.com. After chatting with the customer service of the two companies, I decided to get a one year web hosting from FatCow. I was able to get a very good deal from them. Now I am enjoying FatCow's good service, really worth my money. If they continue to perform this good, I'll buy more hosting from them. As of now, I have around 15 blogs hosted on FatCow.  Yes more than 15 and I don't know how I'd take care of them all :)

Take Care of Your Eyes

I face the monitor 12 to 16 hours a day because of the nature of my work. That's too much strain on my eyes. Now I am beginning to feel that there is something wrong with my eyes and that I would soon be needing eyeglasses; there are times when I could not recognize faces just a few meters away from me. I have also noticed that lately I am finding it difficult to read the fine print on newspapers and magazines. So I checked around the net to see about eyeglasses, just in case I'd be needing them. I came upon GlassesShop.com, an online store that sells high-indexted prescription eyeglasses. What I have noticed about their eyeglasses is that they are stylish. It is obvious that their eyeglasses were made with not only the the basics of eyeglasses in mind but also fashion. I guess the people behind GlassesShop.com see eyeglasses as a fashion accessories also (aside from its main purpose). I checked the prices of their elegant and fashionable looking eyeglasses and was a bit surprised at how low their prices are. Imagine an eyeglass that is only $8! Yes, prices start at 8! They have lots of discounted reading glasses to choose from that are really of high quality. They also have this virtual try on feature in their site which allows buyers to "try" the glasses online. How it's done is for you to check out, just visit the site and see how they make it possible to let you try their glasses online.

Google to Buy Twitter?

There are rumors circulating around that Google is in "late stage negotiations to acquire Twitter". The actual price is not known but there are speculations that it is more than $250 million. Last year Twitter turned down Facebook's acquisition offer. Now it is another story and it seems that in a few weeks Twitter will be Google's. 

Now the question is why would Google want to have Twitter? Is it because Twitter is beginning to show that it has something important that Google doesn't have? Twitter is showing the world that it can change the meaning of the word "search" and Google is threatened so it decided to buy the threat.