What makes you happy ?

A couple of posts ago I mentioned that I was debating a site move. Someone left a snide comment that because this was on the web I could do what I wanted then move on and reinvent myself. I am changing domains, I do intend to blog less contentiously, I do intend to blog better but I’m not doing it to reinvent myself.

This blog started in it’s current form in January 2004. Between then and now my family has changed, we went through bankruptcy, my mental health went from up to down many times and has now settled somewhere closer to the norm, I have aged and now see certain things in a different light, much of my anger and frustration has waned (though it will return of that I am sure) and none of this is reinvention. It’s how things are and things change. This domain is now wrapped around memories and choices which I made at the time and they were right at the time – but much like the haircuts we get, the clothes we wear, the foods we eat and maybe even the music we like our tastes over time change. We are no different than we were 5 years ago because we are still the same person but we are very different on the inside. Just because it is on the net does not mean it has to stay on the net. Just because there is digital evidence at archive.org does not mean you should be able to come back to a site to see the same state. I’m not ashamed of what was here, I would defend what I said at the time, my family all know and have read whatever they wish it’s just that I will feel more comfortable without it around me – in precisely the same way that I left ‘podz’ behind.

In around 2001 I met some people from uk.people.bodyart for the first time. We all shared an interest in bodyart but if we were all to meet up again then while our interest maybe close to the same level our participation would have dropped (I’d not let Martin pierce my hand again for instance…) But we aren’t reinventing ourselves – we are just changing as people do.

I get some comments on really old posts and when I go back to read the post I most of the time have no clue what on earth I was on when I wrote whatever the post was. It reads like it was written by a stranger – and given what has happened between then and now maybe I would be.

Am I doing it because of work? Nope. If you have read this blog for a long time you will have seen the post frequency fall and just recently it fell a lot more. That happened incidentally. The recent part – yes there was a reason and no it was not work.

Anyway…… all the posts and pages here were made private. I’m not deleting it, but it’s just for me should I choose (which is like those embarrassing photos we all have but won’t throw away but won’t show). Some posts are back published – those I like or whose comments are well worth reading ( I apologise for the feed doing what it did). Some other posts will follow because I know they exist I just can’t find them yet. The new domain is bought (today, so there is no history to google…) and when there is a theme I’ll drop back to this post and edit the link in.

There were:
3,150 posts.
10,148 comments.
2,063 different nicknames represented in the comments.

Post 3152 will not happen.

Thanks for putting up with me here :)

One loss, one deeply touching post. src: lots of places and justifiably so.

This domain just stole my content.

Whois:
Domain Name:HOWSHITWORKS.ORG
Created On:23-Apr-2007 05:12:04 UTC
Last Updated On:18-Oct-2007 16:37:37 UTC
Expiration Date:23-Apr-2008 05:12:04 UTC
Sponsoring Registrar:GoDaddy.com, Inc. (R91-LROR)
Status:CLIENT DELETE PROHIBITED
Status:CLIENT RENEW PROHIBITED
Status:CLIENT TRANSFER PROHIBITED
Status:CLIENT UPDATE PROHIBITED
Registrant ID:GODA-030591892
Registrant Name:Developer Hut Inc Developer Hut Inc
Registrant Organization:Developer Hut Inc
Registrant Street1:P.O Box 3743
Registrant Street2:
Registrant Street3:
Registrant City:Idaho Falls
Registrant State/Province:Idaho
Registrant Postal Code:83403-3743
Registrant Country:US
Registrant Phone:+1.2087579111

Hosted at http://hostingloser.com who have no sitemap, no contact, no aup / tos.
So the loser that steal anyone’s blog content hide away in the State of Idaho.
They have http://www.buyblogcomments.com, they sell ads and have ads on stolen blog content.

Google ‘developer hut inc’.

And the jerk behind this? The man who steals? The man who takes the work of others to make himself money? Jon Waraas. Behold – a thief.

http://www.jonwaraas.com/who-is-jon-waraas/

–

Update 12 Dec.
I find http://growablog.com/ as part of my work. Why do I find it? It’s spamming. Spamming trackbacks.
And guess who it is?

Registrant:
Developer Hut Inc
P.O Box 3743
Idaho Falls, Idaho 83403-3743
United States

Registered through: GoDaddy.com, Inc. (http://www.godaddy.com)
Domain Name: GROWABLOG.COM
Created on: 02-Jun-07
Expires on: 02-Jun-08
Last Updated on: 18-Oct-07

Administrative Contact:
Developer Hut Inc, Developer Hut Inc developerhut@gmail.com
Developer Hut Inc
P.O Box 3743
Idaho Falls, Idaho 83403-3743
United States
2087579111 Fax –

It’s that thief Jon Warass again. He is stealing from every blog he can scrape.
Oh yes, and I did email him to ask him to stop stealing. His response was that I got 2 free links from him. Well hell yes, that’s just great eh? He’s still Jon Waraas – thief

Update again – Tuesday 24 March 2009

Developer Hut, Inc.
P.O Box 3743
Idaho Falls, Idaho 83403-3743
United States
1-208-608-5133

Dear Mark R,
It has come to our attention that your Dec. 11, 2007 blog posting on tamba2.org.uk, “Developer Hut aka Jon Warass steals your blog content,” is making false and deceptive claims that are or may be misleading customers about Developer Hut, Inc. We request that you immediately cease and desist from continuing to make any such claims. We further request that you immediately remove such claims from your website, including Web site pages.

Developer Hut, Inc. is Internet Marketing company based out of Idaho Falls, Idaho. Since 2006 we have been offering web based advertisement to company’s looking to increase there SEO ranking. Developer Hut, Inc. is widely recognized for our quality seo services and has a well-deserved reputation of providing our customers quality seo link building. This reputation has been harmed, and will continue to be harmed, by any and all false and deceptive claims that tamba2.org.uk has made.

In light of the foregoing, we request that you immediately cease and desist from continuing to make any false, deceptive or misleading claims, statements, assertions or representations — whether explicit or implicit — regarding Developer Hut, Inc. We further request that you immediately remove all such claims from all your website, whether in written, electronic, verbal, visual or audio form, including, but not limited to, advertisements, emails, Web site materials, press releases, announcements and correspondence.

If you fail to take this requested action within 2 business days, Developer Hut, Inc. will have no choice but to pursue all available legal remedies against you, Mark R.

You will also be receiving a certified cease and desist letter sent to your whois address. If you have any questions or would like to talk to our lawyer then please set up a time for a conference call. Your full cooperation in this matter is appreciated.

Sincerely,
Developer Hut, Inc.

You are not entitled to modify or redistribute the content of this Website or reproduce, link, frame or deep-link it on any other website without the express written permission of The Sampsonian Co Pty Ltd

I would link you to that site but then I would get into trouble.
And after saying “You are not” twice it then says:

Every effort has been made to seek copyright permission and the web producers apologise for any inadvertent breach.

so if it’s okay for them to break copyright and just apologise, I’ll break their Website Terms of Use too.

Dear Stephen Fry,
Please tell the people who wrote those terms to get a grip. It’s nonsense.

The site I mentioned in the post below. A friend’s dad wanted a site for his business. I talked to his dad and in the end he got the domain and I set up WordPress for what he wanted. It’s not a blogging site at all – it’s a business site. It took me all of 30 mins inc the photos he wanted. It was a favour done one evening and the ‘reward’ is that one day I will call the favour in from the son – as in “I need a hand with…. I need you to help”. The dad asked how he got his site found by people so I explained how – and said I would link to him for a while which I did.
It was a business site and that link would have looked like a paid link. But it was not. So if I installed a few blogs and had in the sidebar “And here is one I made earlier” then Google are going to nail me even though they aren’t paid? That’s nice. Still, Google knows best…..

“Warning to abusive bloggers as judge tells site to reveal names” says the Guardian Unlimited.
Just one tiny problem – the article mentions 2 forums.
Forums are not blogs, forum posts are not blog posts, forum users are not bloggers.
I honestly thought the Guardian had more of a clue.

Court orders obliging websites to disclose the identity of users posting anonymous defamatory remarks began in 2001.

That may be true, but if we take this blog for instance I can reveal no more than you can see. Sure I have the email addresses but if you are really going to have a go at someone then you shouldn’t use your email. And even then it proves nothing because you can put anyone’s details there. There are a surprising amount that start comments@ blog@ wordpress@ and none are real. So as a blog owner who requires no registration – and therefore a verifiable address – for use I can’t see that I could be held accountable. I’m sure some lawyer somewhere would say that I am. “I” also being “us bloggers”.

But then abuse is the least of it – linking is illegal now.

Photos. Take lots and hope you get a good one. That’s the general philosophy I suppose.
In the electronics shop across from the hotel I happened to remark that a Canon EOS he had was meant to be a nice camera. He sniffed a sale and went on a full charm offensive. His end price – complete with 2gb card, protective lens, case was 500 quid. I declined this marvellous opportunity as I could get it through Amazon much cheaper and with no risk of tax on return to the UK. It got me pondering though.
I have a FinePix s5600 which by most reviews (1 2 3) is pretty good so not only is there no point in me getting another camera, there is also every point in looking more at what I have and how to use it. While I’ll just point’n’shoot most of the time there is no reason why I can’t look at things like white balance, field depth, wide angle stuff, macro images and more of the options in the P A S M buttons. But pressing the button is only one part of the deal isn’t it…

I’m pondering taking a photo, publishing it and all the EXIF data then inviting constructive criticism.

A macro shot could cover lighting, angle of the shot, probably other stuff.
A not-macro one could cover white balance, composition, cropping out a good detail and again other stuff. (See how little I know!)

The aim is to not just take a shot but learn from it. Taking a hundred pictures and hoping to get 1 good one is not a problem, but learning a bit so the chances rise to 2 good ones could be worth it. It would be interesting…. and I’ve already bought a domain so it’d be a shame to waste it :)

Keeping the thing – the photoblog – going would also be easier because of the feedback and the desire to keep experimenting.

I’ll probably set it up over the weekend.

Just saw this at the end of a blog entry:

I guess they just want people to think quietly. To themselves. Because they don’t really want to know. There’s a place for rhetorical questions, and this wasn’t it.

So opening new windows from your site is a bad thing – I get that and I agree with that. It’s irritating when it does so. But I think there’s a case for an RSS link to open in a new window.

Currently:
Find interesting blog
Click Feed link
Go to ‘add to Google reader ?’ page
Click to Add
Click again to Add
Wait for feed to load to be able to click the title to return to the blog

That’s clunky. I don’t read a full blog before adding it to the feed list, and I don’t always remember to ctrl-click. I know this last is my fault but making feeds open in a new tab/window means I get to stay in the blog and I also get a tab to deal with the feed. Make sense?
Maybe there’s a GM script…

Yesterday at WordCamp Matt Mullenweg asked Matt Cutts about Text Link Ads on blogs. I have Text Link Ads and have done for some time. I never thought that they wanted me to link because my content matched theirs – to think that is stupid. It’s Page Rank all the way and to be honest I didn’t care (still don’t) because they are paying me to occupy that small space. But because these people pay me money and those people have PR in mind Google doesn’t like it. Google’s ball park, Google’s rules and the rules are going to apparently hit sites who have these links.

So Google knock me down to a 6 or a 5. The link buyers don’t want me and go – I lose money. I decide to not renew ads to keep my PR and I lose money. It’s not a huge deal as it was never counted into any budget but I lose either way. Google does not want me to get money to promote something that would not get that exposure without the money being behind it.

So a site that does figure in their results is not allowed to try and get higher by paying a blogger for advertising space. But what about a site that does not figure at all in their results paying someone else to get not just some exposure but the most visible exposure?
Their game, their rules.

Right now it’s really easy to see the TLA but would they know if I slotted them into my blogroll? Yes, of course they would. Google has the technology to come to my site and figure out that my link to Podrunner is a genuine link but the one to some directory is not. It could penalise that directory in some way that allowed the blogger to make cash but which did not harm the PR. It has that power. But it does not want to share that pie. It wants it all and it will take it. Their games, their rules.
It’s telling of course that the very people who work for TLA will not have their sites using their own product but that is not the issue. The issue is that Google are saying that they want the ad cash and bloggers shall not be allowed it.

Do I care about PR? Yes because the cash is nice because I’m a 7. No because when I search for it I have to wade through a heap of junk to find the results I do want. And it’s not sponsored links that are causing the junk (what is does not matter right now) so if sponsored links are not impeding my experience of using Google then why hit me with that stick just because it’s an incredibly easy stick to use? How many bloggers actually use TLA? Is blogging really hurting Google (because by definition PR is Google) to the point that they do this? Is blogging – or rather a few links on well-structured sites – so powerful that Google cannot do anything else? Are they backed into a corner? No – they just cannot be bothered / don’t care / want to be greedy.

Better people than me will have dissected and argued this and this post is not going to change a damn thing but I’ve always hated hypocrisy despite Matt Cutts being a nice guy and a very entertaining speaker what came out of those last few minutes of presentation seems wrong.

(The two ’sponsored links’ above I cannot find in a Google search with 100 results for ‘text link ads’ if I block ads.)