We are a bunch of tech geeks, coders and designers. No Blogging For Six Months »
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Today it has officially been 6 months since we created a post on this blog. We intentionally stopped blogging just to see how much blogging REALLY helps our rankings across the different search engines.
During this blogging sabbatical, we noticed some interesting patterns relating to comment spam, visits from other countries as well as visits from the United States and we plan on using this traffic data to make our sites even better going forward.
Internet Technology and Web Design has taken some interesting turns over the past few months. It was nice to take a step back and just watch the metamorphosis unfold – seeing the bigger picture. Over the next few weeks, we will be posting about a few of the more interesting things we discovered, so stay tuned.
Popular Blog Posts for December »
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Here are a few of our more popular posts for the month of December based on our Search Engine traffic:
These are the top 3. I am not sure how popular they really are because no one is commenting on them 
. Hurts our feelings… haha.
Anyway, we are not posting them to get comments necessarily. Of course we are interested in traffic to our blog but we think our blog topics add value to our subscribers’ experiences. So, as long as our readership keeps rising, we are going to post things like this regardless of whether or not we get comments 
.
Boost Your Blog Traffic »
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If a blogger posts on a blog and no one shows up to read it, why bother posting at all? How many bloggers do you know that would post every day if no one cared? Not many. In fact, unless you use your blog as an online diary, you are really hoping that people will actually read your posts, which means that you want traffic to your blog. So how do you get people to visit?
Here is a great post from Marco Richter that outlines 25 ways to increase your blog traffic. Some of his suggestions are right in line with our post on building traffic by backlinks but his post goes into much more detail. If you are just starting out on your blogging career, save yourself some time and check out his list for some great tips.
Blog Action Day – 2007 »
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Blog Action Day – 2007 is about the environment and I decided to concentrate our post on the impact that discarded electronics have on landfills.
Each year, millions of computers are dumped into landfills in the US alone. The Environmental Protection Agency tells us that the number is between 50 million and 75 million (link opens in PDF). In addition, many of these computers still work although a little slowly perhaps.
While this is great news for computer sellers and manufacturers, this is terrible news for the environment.
Don’t get me wrong, hardware has to be upgraded periodically. It is the nature of the beast. Manufacturers built in what is called “planned obsolescence” and that means users have to upgrade their hardware every few years. But it does not mean that they have to simply discard the old stuff by throwing it in the trash. There are plenty of better options that will have a much smaller impact on the environment and will possibly even help out some less-fortunate.
Donate That Old Computer
Find a company that will refurbish your old computer. Maybe you can’t use if for your business any longer, but what about a non-profit or a school? Rarely will they turn down a freebie and you may be eligible for a tax deduction. Search for “computer recycling” in Google and you will get millions of options.
Erase That Sensitive Data First
Of course, before you donate that old computer you better make sure all the sensitive data is removed. Actually, this is probably the number one reason that businesses don’t donate. They don’t feel confident that their data is really gone.
Very valid concern. Before you donate, make sure your data is removed. Read up on the HIPAA information regarding proper deletion of sensitive data. Check out some of the software that has been designed to comply with those regulations. Here is a list that I found on the University of Auburn’s web site. It is a little outdated, but will give you a good starting point. If you want to jump into some Freeware / Shareware written to wipe your data, Free Downloads has a pretty good list although I have never personally tried any of the programs listed.
If you don’t feel like going through all that on your own, why not look into hiring a company that will guarantee the removal of your sensitive data and share the profits with you after they salvage and resell what they can. R. Frazier, Inc. in Virginia, USA does just that.
The point is this: When you get a new computer, don’t throw your old one in the landfill. Wipe the data and then donate it or take it to a computer recycling facility.
Stay Away from Quechup »
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Trying to get back into blog mode, I naturally checked out one of Garry’s blogs and saw his post on the Quechup Scam.
I then ran across a post on eWeek about Quechup’s viral marketing. It boils down to Quechup spoofing email origins – what a bunch of morons. Can you believe that a “social networking” site would resort to these spammy, anti-social tactics to increase members?
Here is what Quechup’s privacy policy page states:
Quechup.com Privacy Policy
This site is owned and operated by iDate Ltd. Your privacy on the Internet is of the utmost importance to us. At iDate, we want to make your experience online satisfying and safe.
Hmm…no so sure about that. I could not find anything in either the privacy policy or the terms of use stating that Quechup had permission to do what they apparently are doing. But one thing is for sure, if they want to succeed, they will have to change their marketing techniques.
Taking it a step further, with all of this negative publicty they are getting from the blogosphere, Quechup may already be doomed to failure because bloggers are not likely to forget this fiasco.
