Site #1: PCB

Traffic is growing now, in some ways dramatically. In crude stats terms:

Pages: we have now 101 pages of content on the site vs. about 75 pages in May. So content has accelerated. We’re now taking a break from content, but for a good reason.

Traffic is now approaching about 9~10K pageviews a month. In fairness, Analytics reports numbers much lower than this, but they also show month-on-month growth. And Analytics is quite restrictive in how it counts visitors.

Also, I added Adsense in May and that generated a minimal amount. This month looks like it means that the website paid for its hosting this month, the first to do so.

The challenge very much is to increase backlinks: through more Ezine Articles, some of which are doing well; directory submissions, I’ve already had some help; and tidying up the content/structure/images. There’s quite a lot to do even though I’m not adding any content.

My frustrations revolve around the Dreamhost Server which has been acting up all month. I’m still not sure what caused the dramatic jumps in server activity, but I’ve split up some sites, blocked a lot of Chinese spiders on several sites, and am now looking at what went wrong.

It seems that with using my server as a kind of hotimage linking for some of my other sites, and an adserver that it may be too much for the server to handle along with thousands of requests from Sogou, Baidu, etc.

Site #2: SST and Site #3: TCG

Site #2 is now back on. I’ve started adding a page a week to this site, more later on what’s going on with it. Site #3 is also up, though at the moment, I’m just lightly repurposing and redirecting content from my blogs to this site. Still, it bodes well.

Both of the other sites are showing similar levels of traffic to PCB in the early days, though I’m not sure how big any of them will be. So I’m focusing on just adding one page a week until I have a better time arrangement in the new year!

It may be that in 2011, both InvestorBlogger and Obblogatory Blogs will cease new posts, I’m undecided about this at the moment, but I’m increasingly skeptical that blogging content is hanging around longer than a few weeks.

Anyway, more soon, I hope.

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So I installed a couple of plugins there, including one called db cache and my site loads so much faster now. I matched it with a regular caching plugin, like SuperCache or HyperCache and the server just rockets along. Why?

The DB Cache plugin simply caches requests to the database, and the Caching programs just serve those cached files. Occasionally, the server experiences a slight hiccup, but even then I noted that server queries dropped from over 350 sometimes to a manageable 20~50 queries.

I thought you should try it out. It seems to be compatible with other caching programs like supercache, hypercache etc. and when both db cache and caching plugins are used together, the server really runs fast. And I haven’t found any incompatibilities with other plugins, yet.

I tried this solution matched with a different page caching plugin on different sites, and results are approximately similar: Obblogatory loads about 90% fewer queries, InvestorBlogger often loads just 10~20 queries each time. My school site occasionally loads in excess of 135 queries so there’s still some work to do there.

What I do notice even with sites loading so many queries is that the sites still load much faster than ever. I know though that queries can be cut down even more: by adding fixed urls in the header and footer, but that’s quite a bit of work to get rid of them. And subsequent page loads are significantly faster still, as much of the stuff needed is already cached in your browser cache!

But for the sites on Dreamhost, I also added a Database Virtual Server and Dreamhost upped my original Virtual Server Memory by 100%. So overall, any of my sites hosted on Dreamhost are loading much faster anyway. The database caching plugin keeps things chugging along!

For those bent on optimizing every last ounce out of their server, it might be worth doing! Getting a Dreamhost PS Server is worth it for me! It insulates me from flaky software running other people’s sites, it doesn’t cost the earth, and I have unlimited storage space and bandwidth… it’s an amazing deal, for about $31.00 per month all told. With a VPS system, I might actually get to use it, too!

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Tools I do not use much any more

1. SocialSpark*
2. PerformancingAds (they lost my money)*
3. Alexa (for increasingly inaccurate stats)
4. TopSpots*
5. BlogCatalog (too much like MyBlogLog)
6. Dreamhost Referrals (never had one successful referral)
7. TTZMedia*

Tools I would never use again

1. Scribefire
2. Widgetbox
3. Sitemeter
4. Smorty
5. Blogsvertise*
6. Blogitive
7. SponsoredReviews
8. AdBrite*
9. AdToll*
10. NewsRoom*
11. Picasa Online
12. CafePress
13. A GuestBook or Hit Counter (so 1990′s!)

*these sites marked all owe me money (in some cases more than $10). In total, I’m owed about $60 which would be better in my bank account than theirs.

These are the tools I can think of right now, but I’m sure that the lists could be much longer if I thought about it.

Be CAREFUL with your Cards

With the second one, we had a bit of a fuss this month. I had just finished upgrading the server at school, when I decided to replace one of the staff computers, too. It was partly to save money on electricity that we switched to low power computers and to save carbon (specifically, the Asus Eee Ebox 202 series, which is a fine complement for teachers in our school).

So I ordered an extra computer from our local supplier. It came, and I took out my credit card to pay the bill. No success. Tried again. Turned out the credit card had been canceled and that it had been fraudulently used abroad somewhere towards the end of 2008. Since I hadn’t noticed any odd transactions, I can only assume that the anti-fraud measures banks use had been successful in preventing the abuse of the card.

I’m still surprised that it happened. The gentleman at Taihsin International Bank was surprisingly polite and efficient. I had my new cards within just a few days, and was able to use them again. But I still have no idea when or how my card details were skimmed. I have checked my PCs for viruses and bugs and other nasties. All of them are totally clean. My only guess is that someone skimmed the details when I was in the UK, perhaps with a small hand scanner, at one of the hotels or restaurants or stores I went to.

This month’s report. Anyway.

Personal Shopping Purchases

1. For school, we bought several memory cards which were unbelievably cheap (2 cards at about NT$200 each for 2MB), a PC computer extension cord with lots of extra sockets, and a USB socket charger for the wife so she can charge her MP3 player without worrying about access to a PC. That cost NT$2477 in total.
2. The mobile phone bill was for two months at NT$376. Google AdWords was NT$8. I pretty much stopped my campaigns for the time being as the clickthroughs were really bad for both my personal sites and my business sites. In fact, the visitors clicking through were just bad quality.
3. We also paid our car insurance again this year for NT$3864: of course on the form that we received we noted that our car had devalued again! It’s quite surprising how F-A-S-T an NT$500K car becomes only NT$200K. And our regular payment of NT$2000 was also made as usual.
4. The biggest shopping purchase damage in January was our trip to Mitsuokoshi at Taipei 101 right at the end of December. Christine bought ear-rings for herself and her sister at NT$4480, and two pairs of shoes that she really liked which cost NT$6552.

Business Purchases

1. With the most recent set of fusses at the Server, I started migrating my domain registrations from Dreamhost to NameCheap. It has cost quite a lot of additional money to do this as I had to pay additional registration fees for extending the registration period. Given that I now control over 20 domains, you can imagine. Fortunately, NameCheap has been running special offers for domain transfers (US$7.99 for the first year). I have to say that I have been solidly impressed with the quality of the help and service I have received from NameCheap. It has been absolutely outstanding as they have dealt with three queries of mine: billing, DNS issues and non-transferred domains. On each occasion, the issue was satisfied. Good service. Damage to my wallet: NT$3241. I know there is at least one other bill coming for about NT2500 as well in February.
2. Dreamhost bills came up twice in December for December and November: total NT$1181 which included one domain renewal. There was another NT$101 for something that I can’t quite remember. I’m still checking what that was for. In fact, that was a payment to Scratchback. I had about US$15.00 in their system that had sat for months. I decided to stop using the widget on my blogs, so to get the money out, I bought a slot myself with one paypal address. And then I was able to withdraw the amount as it met the minimum required. It did cost me a little, but I figured it was better than letting the money sit in Jim Krukal’s Paypal account.
3. A New Theme: I promised a new theme for InvestorBlogger for 2009. And indeed I purchased the theme for InvestorBlogger (to be revealed) at about the same that this server was attacked and it was useless. I implemented it on EeeBlogger for a while, and discovered that there were some issues with the premium theme I bought. I’m still hoping to use it on InvestorBlogger soon, but implementation is a real pain. NT$2385.
4. Database and Scanner: Our business (a language school) decided to start categorizing and organizing the books we have for children to read. In other words, we felt we should have some facilities to start a small lending library. So we purchased software and a hand scanner to start cataloguing the books. We’re hoping to find out how many books we have, how much we spent on them, and have facilities to keep tabs on the books, too. Perhaps I’ll review the software one day. NT$2719.

Final Note: I use Paypal a lot for my online purchases, it’s pretty handy. But it’s difficult to keep tabs on what money goes out and how. So I’ve opted to use one account for money received, and one for purchases only. It hasn’t quite worked out like that yet. But it’s getting there.

Oh, and I earned a little cashback on one of the cards: NT$46.00. There were no penalties, no interest charges, or other surprises, and the total amount owed on each card WILL be paid in full. But I stupidly let over 4000 bonus points expire without using them. What a shame. I just noticed that they expired on the last day of January. Oh, well.

Overall, I’ve been very impressed with WordPress 2.7, in the few days that I have used it, and I’m a little frustrated that some of the hosting companies I work with haven’t updated the software on CPanel yet. Of course, Dreamhost jumped in pretty early, and that’s why I was happy to try it out. I’d say that there are five basic reasons I like this version of WordPress more than any previous release.

1. A Simplified Dashboard: You can eliminate clutter!

The dashboard has long been a bone of contention for me, because of the tendency of WordPress to want to flaunt its gimmicks, updates and features to all and sundry. In this version, though, users get to turn off the feeds, through the screen options at the top right. Simply uncheck the things you don’t want. Voila!

Additional features that are helpful are the little downward arrow that occurs at the top of most boxes, in the top right corner of each box. Simply clicking on that arrow or area closes or opens the dialog box in an obvious fashion. You’ll see the downward pointing arrow next to tools (see highlighted area). It works simply in a toggle fashion. These toggle switches are all over the admin area. To find them, just hover over the task bar for each item on the right hand sided.

The dashboard area is divided into three areas: the sidebar on the left where each of the menu items can be opened and closed; the central column which includes the stats box, the writing box; and the right column that pretty much includes everything else. As you can see from mine, it’s easy enough to pick things up and move them around a lot. Clicking on the words “screen options” highlights an area where you can turn off things you don’t want to see.

The right sidebar includes several new designations which may be confusing to new users. First the ‘pages’ button has moved to just below ‘links’. It used to be located right next to ‘posts’. This confuses me now. I often hover between writing posts and pages, and now I have to look further afield to find the pages button. It seems illogical to place it after ‘links’.

The old ‘design’ menu has been renamed ‘appearance’ on 2.7 but functions in pretty much the same way as the its predecessor. The Tools menu, however, is a new one and features several items that were moved from the former ‘Manage’ menu, including import/export functions. The Upgrade items, though, hint at some of the new features of WordPress that make management much easier (more later).

2. Keeping Upgraded – it’s getting easier!

Plugins are getting easier to manage: You will soon no longer need to use FTP to upload stuff – plugins and core upgrades can all be done within WordPress itself. This leaves ‘themes’ as the only item that now needs FTP. I imagine that future versions of this will remedy this. Other software, such as Joomla or SMF, have long had this ability. Right now, you can upgrade a plugin in much the same way as uploading other items. Find the item ‘plugins’ on the left hand menu. Click it, and you will see it open slowly to reveal four options. To add a new plugin, click on the words ‘add new’, and you will be taken to a page where you can upload a zip file of the plugin which is uploaded and installed. After it’s done, you can activate it straight away. A nice touch. Just hit ‘install now’ to upload the plugin!

It’s also much easier now to find new plugins. Take a look at the next screenshot: you will see what I mean! The tags below the upload button hint at the next page. These plugins are from WordPress.org’s own plugin area, and clicking on the tags reveals that they can all be downloaded and installed quickly and without any fuss.

In fact, activating and inactivating plugins has also got easier as has removing unwanted plugins. Simply just click on the plugins area on the sidebar, usually under ‘plugins’ >>> ‘installed’ menu option. You’ll find it easy to manage plugins from there, including removing them completely!

But this plugin management hints at another feature (one that I have not needed to try yet)… upgrading WordPress can now be done entirely from WITHIN the admin panel. Take a look for yourself! Under Tools >>> Upgrade, you’ll see the following dialogue.

Very tempting when you can choose to download and reinstall automatically. I have no idea how this works, yet. But it would be a neat variation IF you could upgrade from WITHIN the admin area. Perhaps this is just teasing us.

3. Commenting from WITHIN WordPress

Admins often had to comment in a very odd fashion before: read the comment in the comments area; find the post in the archive, read the post, and then comment in the comment box AFTER the end of the article. Now it’s much easier:

Just hit ‘reply’ to answer the query and a simple but functional comment box will appear just below, enabling you to answer without messing around in the archives! Of course, this presumes that you remember what you wrote!

4. Quick Posting and Quick Editing

The commenting function also has another feature that hints at much more power: the quick edit button. Clicking on the Quick Edit enables you to edit the comment very quickly, without calling up the entire post or page where it is entered. But the ‘quick’ idea has been extended with in several ways: making a powerful trio of blogging tools.

QuickPress : on the admin page, when you login you’ll be taken to a dialog box that enables you to write a short post, with media and tags and publish it in a matter of minutes! While you don’t have a WYSIWYG editor, you can learn some simple codes to faciliate quick blogging (they’re all available in the Write Post area).

Quick Edit is also enabled in the post and page view, and allows you to quickly update a number of features (the usual suspects that a busy blogger will forget in the heat of the moment!): such as tags, categories, slug, date or more…

This combined with Press Links (shouldn’t it be called ‘Quick’ Links?) means that posting, editing, linking and commenting can all be carried out fairly rapidly.

5. You can now add media without creating post

This is another puzzle from the previous version that was finally finished! For years, I never thought about uploading media to WordPress. I simply created a post and added the stuff I wanted… until last month when I created a batch of videos and wanted to upload them all at once. I would have had to create a post and add each one one by tedious one! Now it seems, I can simply upload media as I need and when I’m ready I can create a post and find the media I already uploaded! It’s funny, but that’s something you don’t need, until you really need it! And now it’s here!

Now it would be nice if I could upload a number of files at one go! Oh, wait! It does! Or at least I think it does! I’m practising uploading media now! Now I wonder how I can create a simple gallery from these files! …

I’ve getting lots of help but I’m still struggling to figure out the source of the problem, and hence the solution.

I’ve had five serious problems in the last 24 hours.

1.- Unable to reboot…

Yesterday my webserver went down, couldn’t bring it back up. When it did come back, some sites were absolutely fine… but some were totally screwed up.

So I’m trying to find out what if any updates DH made to the server that would cause these two kinds of problems:

#2: Erroneous Codes
this is being generated by the plugin wp-cache (yesterday the plugin was working without any problems!) I tried removing the plugin and reinstalling: didn’t work. Just produced the same errors even after removing it from the plugins directory…

Warning: fopen(/home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/cache/wp_cache_mutex. lock) [function.fopen]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-cache/wp-cache-p hase2.php on line 96
Couldn’t write to: /home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/cache/wp-cache-357509ba2733 b5ed2b4e72148985cc17.html
Warning: flock() expects parameter 1 to be resource, boolean given in /home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-cache/wp-cache-p hase2.php on line 105

Warning: fopen(/home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/cache/wp-cache-357509 ba2733b5ed2b4e72148985cc17.meta) [function.fopen]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-cache/wp-cache-p hase2.php on line 240

Warning: fputs(): supplied argument is not a valid stream resource in /home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-cache/wp-cache-p hase2.php on line 241

Warning: fclose(): supplied argument is not a valid stream resource in /home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-cache/wp-cache-p hase2.php on line 242

Warning: flock() expects parameter 1 to be resource, boolean given in /home/.damper/obblogatory/obblogatory.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-cache/wp-cache-p hase2.php on line 114

#3: I’m still getting this error on at least three sites…

Warning: require_once(/home/.damper/eeeblogger/eeeblogger.com/wp-config.php) [function.require-once]: failed to open stream: Permission denied in /home/.damper/eeeblogger/eeeblogger.com/wp-load.php on line 27

Fatal error: require_once() [function.require]: Failed opening
required ‘/home/.damper/eeeblogger/eeeblogger.com/wp-config.php’ (include_path=’.:/usr/local/php5/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php’) in /home/.damper/eeeblogger/eeeblogger.com/wp-load.php on line 27

What’s even odder is that they are all supposed to be running on the same server, all of them are running WP2.7 as you requested, and most of them have the SAME plugins or broadly similar ones.

#4: FTP is shutout

All the passwords for my FTP accounts were non functional until I reset them. I still can’t login via FTP to most of my accounts UNLESS I set them to Shell access. They were working before that’s for sure. And no one else has Shell access.

#5 A lot of permissions have been reset making errors for some blogs that I can’t fix EVEN IF I reset the folder permissions.

I am thinking that one of two possibilities happened: an update was roled out with unexpected consequences in some cases or that the server became corrupted (by accident or by hacker?) and this means some sites are just dandy while others are out.

I spoke extensively with DanielG who helped me get the passwords reset and saved me from tearing my hair out. But we’re still no nearer on what happened and how to fix the situation. Kudos to DanielG for his effort…

Please can you help me sort this mess out.

Best Wishes
Kenneth

These problems have had me spend hours trying to trouble shoot the origin of the problems. It’s really prevented me from running my sites, doing maintenance or getting posts done. Very frustrating, what is it with DreamHost? Things were going well, but things are just so seriously screwed up…

So, if you are going to manage any more than a couple of sites, split your eggs between baskets to ensure that WHEN one of your sites/accounts goes down, you can still be productive on the OTHER sites until service returns. This is what I’m doing at the moment to keep sites up and running.

Keep your domains and hosting SEPARATE

Domains are registered at NameCheap. If one host turns out to be really hopeless, as long as I can retrieve the most recent data, I can be up and running on another host within 24-48 hours as long as it takes the DNS to resolve properly. Recently, it’s been within 12 hours for some changes.

Separate Crucial Sites

Customer sites are generally hosted on their own accounts, separate from my blogs, and separate from each other. With domains registered elsewhere, it makes switching sites a breeze. Also, it largely protects sites from mistakes made by their owners having an effect on other unrelated sites.

Keep redundant back ups

My own blogs are generally hosted on one personal server, but the biggest have their own space on another server as well. Smaller blogs, though, share my VPS solution. Unfortunately, this means if my server goes down, most of my blogs are inaccessible. Since most repairs are quick, and data is generally unavailable during outages, moving the domains at that time is impossible.

However, if you have a daily backup of your blog, including the database and the files, you should be able to get up and running quickly on another hosting company. I don’t have a copy of the latter stuff. More fool me.

Redundancy: An Expensive Option

For my most important blogs, I’m looking at creating some form of redundancy so that I can switch and keep things up. But for most small blogs, this is quite expensive to achieve. It’s called Failover Web Hosting where your site is accessible from a number of IPs should the original site fail. This would work well with HTML based sites, but dynamic sites which lots of commenting and posting would have issues with keeping the data synchronized properly.

I’ve been using BlueHost, BlueFur, Hostmonster and Dreamhost for hosting these past few years. Though each has had intermittent problems through that time, I found Dreamhost has been the most reliable in the past six months, while BlueFur turned into a bit of a disaster as we kept getting locked out of our account/Cpanel/Website. It got so ridiculous that we stopped using their service. I can’t particularly recommend BlueFur but you may get different mileage. Still, let me know how you plan to keep your sites running in an emergency.

As a blogger, though, there are some problems that I’ve had with the platform, most of which is that I’m not getting enough work from them to be really bothered. Still, I’ve maintained my blog in the system to get access to the stats, keep an eye on SocialSpark and perhaps be able to take part on a better level in the future. So I’m keeping an open mind.

Izea Does Affiliates

Recently, though, Izea expanded the platform even more by adding affiliates . I’m naturally interested in affiliate marketing so I was pleased to see this opportunity in the marketplace. You can take a look for yourself.

There are only limited opportunities right now, but the payouts are quite generous. A smart blogger, for example, could easily attract extra income to the blog by posting certain affiliate type banners and links on their blogs. Of course, one has to ask the question: are blogs could places for making conversions? So far, I’ve not had much success with conversions, so I’m not convinced yet. But that may be due to my own limitations, rather than anything problems inherent in using blogs for affiliate marketing.

There’s a big but. It doesn’t seem to work like traditional affiliate programs. Why? There’s a time limit to the opportunity of one year. This would preclude certain types of sites that would be built to a longer time horizon. A friend of mine has just spent a lot of time and money building a website to market lawncare products and services, it’s taken him months to build his website, do the SEO, and start the marketing via AdWords. If the marketer only had a window of 12 months to pursue an affiliate program, it just wouldn’t make much sense: the first three months would be gone in the build-up period.

Since SocialSpark is simply trying out affiliate programs at the moment, we’ll see if they take a different tack in the future on this issue.

Enter a review site: WebhostingGeeks.com offers reviews for web hosting as well as ratings for many of the top websites available for hosting and they breakdown the different packages in ways that can help you identify suitable products for your needs.

Can a review site such as this be useful?

While the type of website isn’t particularly new these days, if you are researching a host, positive and negative reviews can be helpful in describing the kind of problems that you will experience with the different hosts. For example, if you are not particularly needing robust hosting, you may wish to go for more budget hosting that has reasonably good uptimes.

Some may legitimately wonder if a website like this can offer impartial advice, and this may or may not be the case. Reading reviews will allow you to have a better review of the site’s editorial policy. Negative reviews, especially, will allow you to see if the editorial is light- or heavy-handed. Check for negative reviews.

As a simple guide to some of the more popular solutions, a site like this may never be able to cover ALL the options out there. Indeed that would be impossible. But it could certainly help steer you in the right direction, provided you realize that these sites are affiliate links, and could earn money for the site-owner.

Some suggestions

Yahoo! hosting generally is not highly regarded, yet it is placed quite high on the list. I’m not sure why. It would also be great if users could submit hosts to the directory so that the list of hosts gets longer. Naturally, with many hosts offering affiliate schemes, it would be easy to generate additional revenues from them. But hosts without affiliate schemes may not be included… It would also be nice to see some easily identifiable disclaimer links such as “…this link is an affiilate link…” or even a disclaimer page.

Overall, it would have saved me quite some time, cut out some of the waste of effort in examining useless sites, and saved me even more money. Pity I found it six months’ too late. Oh, well.

This is a static page so it’s only updated every few weeks. To check recent posts in the last week or so, click to the frontpage or page 2 or page 3 .

July 2008

• 22: Quotation: Given a Shovel, Americans Dig Deeper Into Debt (0)
• 20: Trying Adsense Again! (1)
• 19: The Bear is here: Are you still bullish? (0)
• 18: DotCom Carnival – July 23rd 2008 (0)
• 18: Should I have stuck with those old stocks…? Let’s See. (0)
• 18: Dow stocks: General Electric (0)
• 17: Friday Foto: Overlooking Guandu Farms towards the South of Taipei (0)
• 17: RevResponse.com – The Leading B2B Performance Based Publisher Network (0)
• 17: Toys for the boys: WordPress 2.6, firefox 3 and livewriter (2)
• 16: Problems with the Top Twenty Money Making Feeds? (0)
• 16: Should I upgrade? Version 2.6 is very seductive! (2)
• 15: Would you buy Home Depot (HD) at these prices? (0)
• 14: 20th Carnival of Making REAL Money – July 15th 2008 (3)
• 13: Quotation: An English Proverb
• 11: Getting My Act Together: News Update on InvestorBlogger (6)
• 09: Quotation: George Burns (0)
• 08: Who is stealing your blog’s content? (0)
• 06: North East Coast: scenic coastline from Keelung to Gongliao (0)
• 05: Asus PC900 vs HP Mini-note 2133 (4)
• 04: July 4th: Taiwan welcomes cross straits direct flights – but what about all the other problems? (0)
• 04: DotComCarnival for Independence Day, July 4th (0)
• 03: FatChance you’ll get that deal next year: false advertising in hosting? (0)
• 03: Saving Money: You can save money by cutting energy use! (1)
• 01: June Income Report on InvestorBlogger Dot Com (0)
• 01: Follow up to yesterday’s complaint about FatCow dot com Hosting (0)

June 2008 (34)

• 30: Looking for hosting: getting the facts straight? FatCow Hosting isn’t, is it? (2)
• 29: Credit Card Crap: Statements ‘n’ all. (0)
• 28: Would you like a small, efficient PC? (0)
• 28: Should you use savings to pay debt? It’s tempting (0)
• 28: Dark Copy: A Useful Tool + Website (0)
• 27: 19th Edition: Carnival of Making REAL Money, June 28th, 2008 (0)
• 27: New TLDs? Could be a good business opp! (0)
• 27: Want to buy some RMB? In Taipei, you’re out of luck… (0)
• 27: Selling a house: Would you take a 100% profit? (0)
• 25: Video: My first JumpCut Movie (0)
• 25: Shame, Deceit and Double Standards? How to get caught in the trap (0)
• 24: Unbridled inflation is eroding income (0)
• 24: Budgeting Baby Steps #1: Recording Your Expenses/Income (0)
• 23: Blogging For The Money: Don’t just do it for the money! Enjoy it… (0)
• 23: Video: PC vs. Mac – it’s funny! (0)
• 19: Cool Stuff from Computex 2008: Video (0)
• 19: The Mortgage Crisis: Why Do Mortgage Lenders Hate America? (0)
• 19: Tips on Getting a Good Balance Transfer Card (2)
• 17: The DEAL – Would you buy an extra car parking space? (0)
• 16: Server Needs: Consider carefully what you need, and why! (0)
• 16: Vivid Skies: Sunday Trips in Northern Taiwan (0)
• 12: Welcome to BlueHost dot com
• 09: Problems with the server
• 08: Yehliu: Nature’s Spectacular Sculptures
• 08: Isla Formosa: Five Videos from Taiwan
• 07: Twitter Updates for 2008-06-07
• 07: In The News: MSI Launches a new UMPC
• 07: Your lightbulbs: Have you changed them yet?
• 06: Notes from Computex 2008: Asus Eee PC 1000
• 06: May Income on InvestorBlogger Dot Com
• 05: The British Economy: Telegraph TV
• 02: Save Money: Choose the right model, the best finances, and drive carefully!
• 01: Get Started Blogging #3: Writing Content

May 2008 (37)

• 31: Photo of the Day: On the Walk to Tamsui
• 30: Buzz: How did you choose your hosting company? 5 Things I’d Do Differently Now!
• 30: Credit Card Bills: May 2008
• 29: Fast-Teks: What do you do when your PCs crap out?
• 27: Stock Brokers: Which online brokers can YOU use?
• 26: What’s in that download now?
• 26: Trips in Taiwan: From little Bavaria to little Italy
• 25: Quotation: Timothy R. Fox
• 24: Buzz #12: Last.FM – beats Pandora hands down
• 24: New Blood: New Hope – Can Taiwan Finally Escape the Impasse of the Last 30 Years?
• 24: Living in Taiwan: Photographs found on Flickr
• 22: Make Money With Affiliate Marketing
• 21: News Updates from InvestorBlogger – EntreCard, Investing, Presidents and Last.fm
• 21: Stealing Blogs’ Content: What happened?
• 19: Weekend Trips Around the North East Coast
• 18: Video: Windows Vista on an Asus Eee 900 PC
• 18: Lots of Great Posts On InvestorBlogger
• 18: Splogging is STEALING… Stop STEALING our blogs…
• 17: Financial Bearings: Where am I heading?
• 16: Buzz #9 – Blog @ MaguireClan
• 16: Buzz #11: Obblogatory dot com
• 15: Twitter Updates for 2008-05-15
• 14: Introducing: Google Friends Connect
• 13: Making a Newsletter: Tips on Making One for your Business
• 12: Betelnut culture in Taiwan
• 11: Dot Com Carnival Edition for May 12th, 2008
• 10: Quotation: Why Investors Fail
• 10: Upgrading vs. buying new: Bring a new lease of life to your PC experience
• 09: Stimulus Checks: Are you going to go shopping?
• 09: Flickr: My first photostream!
• 08: That’s $900 off! Twisting Language in the Stores of America
• 07: Profile: Ron Sim – Chairman of OSIM International Ltd
• 07: BlogBuzz #8: My Little Corner
• 06: Portable Applications: Easy, Affordable and Portable
• 05: Some Weekend Exercise: Don’t try this @ Home
• 02: Finding your publicity on InvestorBlogger!
• 01: 19th edition of the Carnival of Making REAL Money – May 1st, 2008

April 2008 (44)

• 30: April Income 2008 on InvestorBlogger Dot Com
• 30: Success online and offline – or how to earn an extra $10K!
• 30: Are your posts being eaten by WordPress?
• 29: Photo: Reflecting yourselves
• 28: In-print vs. On-line: What are you reading these days?
• 28: Hacked? It could happen to your site!
• 25: Little Notes on Life – April 25th
• 24: Buzz #7: Strategist.org.uk – or how NOT to run a blog
• 24: Lesson #2: Finding a Blogging Platform
• 23: Tools for Making Money With Your Blog
• 21: Life on InvestorBlogger: What’s new?
• 21: Harley Davidson Launches in Taiwan
• 21: What advertising works on this blog?
• 20: Photo of the Day: Taipei 101
• 19: Buzz: Our Computer Guy @ NationWide Dot Com Dot TW
• 18: Newsbytes: Alexa, EntreCard and why PayU2Blog Could Suck for SocialSpark Users
• 18: BlogBuzz #5: My Opinion Counts, and a little more…
• 18: Video News Feature: Asus Eee PC 900 Series
• 18: Get Started Blogging: Lesson #1
• 17: Video: Good Advice for ALL Credit Card Applicants
• 17: NewsFlash: Asus Eee 900 PC – available VERY soon!
• 16: Taiwan vs China: Through the News Media Lens
• 16: Three Effective Rules for Credit Card Security – Take care of your cards NOW
• 16: Buzz: #3 – Mum’s Finance
• 16: Izea: It could still be a good Idea!
• 15: Buzz: Craig is in the News!
• 15: Buzz: Is 8 enough? Buzz #1 out of 30
• 15: Notebooks vs. desktops: What are we using at work and play?
• 14: Third Dot Com Carnival – April 13th, 2008
• 13: Payperpost and SocialSpark: Is it time to give up posting for pennies?
• 12: Buzz: Journyx – Will it keep you on time?
• 12: BlogBuzz 2008
• 10: New Advertiser Shout Out: AnyCredit Car Finance and Urgent CashLoan
• 09: Wednesday’s News on InvestorBlogger: Social Spark, Kiva and Dreamhost
• 08: Traffic, PR, Technorati, and more… How is InvestorBlogger Dot Com doing?
• 07: InvestorBlogger’s March 2008 Income Report
• 06: Mr Credit Card’s Survey: My Personal Answers… And yours?
• 05: Drive in Taiwan – if you DARE!
• 04: The Taiwan Haze: How to spoil good photographs?
• 03: Making it on Main Street: Are you looking for the big kahuna?
• 02: Accident Prone: And it’s not April First
• 02: Carnival of Making Real Money: 18th Edition April 1st, 2008
• 01: Kiva Update: Efrain Montuffar Olguin
• 01: April Fools: Technorati, Safari, SRG, and Analytics – all borked

March 2008 (49)

• 31: WordPress 2.5: Five Things InvestorBlogger loves!
• 30: Upgrading to WordPress 2.5
• 29: Quotation: Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War”
• 28: Shopping: Are retailers driving you ‘Potty’?
• 27: Cash Low? Play CashFlow 101 and learn why
• 26: Quotation: Douglas Adams
• 26: Money Talks: Read the fine print before you sign
• 26: What’s a ‘hui’? How you can borrow and lend money in China
• 25: Tuesday’s News on InvestorBlogger: WordPress 2.5, Social Spark, Hosting and more
• 22: Election from Taiwan 2008: The Results
• 22: When thing’s don’t work… shake things up!
• 21: Quotation: MR
• 21: 17th Carnival of Making REAL Money: March 22nd 2008 Edition
• 21: Open letter to PayPerPost: Goodbye and thanks for all the fish!
• 21: Whose blog is it? Google’s? Payperpost’s? Whose…?
• 19: Quotation: Steve Pavlina
• 18: Check Your Credit Card History and Save Yourself Time, Worry and $$$
• 17: Entrepreneur’s Club: Taipei Get Together
• 17: Credit Card Carnival: 2nd Edition
• 17: Five Steps to Managing a Carnival: Policy and Action
• 17: Balance Transfer Cards: The four rules of Balance Transfer Cards.
• 16: Quotation: James Brausch
• 15: Top Ten Posts Updated
• 15: “Money” – Liza Minnelli, Joel Grey
• 14: Saturday News: Errors, Making Money, PR, and more
• 14: PC breakdowns – why drag your PC to the repair store?
• 14: (Re-) Installing Google’s Tracking Code: it’s easy but Google makes it tricky!
• 14: Keep tabs on your budget: send yourself notes, SMS, even email!
• 14: Asus Eee PC 900: Video
• 13: Should you pay off your balance or make a minimum payment?
• 13: The RankSpank: What a skank!
• 13: Quotation: What Does a Millionaire Sound Like?
• 12: Is your bank book your financial statement?
• 12: Quotation: Caroline Baum
• 12: Seinfeld Reruns: George Costanza’s Wallet!
• 11: Identity Theft: It Could Happen To You! Protect Yourself
• 11: Tuesday’s News Round Up: Asus Eee PC 900, PPP, and Carnivals
• 11: LapTop Bags: From Fashion to Street Testing
• 10: Video: Make Music – Windows Style
• 10: Business Start-Up Killers or How to close your business in five steps!
• 10: Quotation: Successful Footsteps
• 09: Second Dot Com Carnival – 10th March 2008
• 09: Not your typical Costco – or is it?
• 08: Saturday’s News: Payperpost Campaigns, FaceBook, Forbes and NT$
• 07: Advertising Your Blog: My First Campaign On Payperpost
• 06: Buy, Sell and Hold: Javascripts for my blog, and Yours!
• 05: PayDay Loans: Should you use or avoid them?
• 02: First Dot Com Carnival – 2nd March 2008
• 01: February, 2008: Financial Results – a quiet month

February 2008 (44)

• 29: Friday News Bytes: Google, Greenbacks, Salaries, and more
• 28: February’s Credit Card Statement: NT$26,413 in 31 days!
• 27: Vote for your top money making feeds! Vote NOW
• 26: Make money like the top bloggers – in one easy download
• 25: Cool Tech: Personal Technology
• 25: My New Wallet: Bigger, Longer and Fatter
• 25: Check your credit card statement: Don’t let the fraudsters get away!
• 23: Quotation: Robert Phillips
• 23: Buy Cheap: Buy Dear – How many phones did you buy?
• 23: CreditCard Carnival: 1st Edition
• 22: Scenic View of Tamsui River: 2007
• 22: Buzz: SKY.FM – What a wonderful service
• 21: Three Tools for Managing Your Credit Card Debt – Calculators, Worksheets, and Forms
• 20: Quotation: Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert T. Kiyosaki
• 19: Download my Top Feeds
• 19: Four solid reasons to start a blog: audience, content, skill and a feel for business
• 18: Freedom from debt: can you blend your credit cards?
• 17: Monday News: Winners, Downloads, Carnivals and my new project
• 16: Saturday Business News from Jim Rogers
• 16: Banned in the UK: Let’s see why… NSFW
• 16: Saturday Reading: InvestorBlogger’s Top Ten Feeds
• 15: Review: PayU2Blog – Sponsored Blogging with a difference?
• 14: Consulting and Advising – Combining Blogging and your Career
• 14: Thursday and freezing…
• 13: Buzz: Michael Turton’s – The View From Taiwan
• 13: Downtime: A Few Minutes
• 12: Old Calendars: New Pictures – Creating extra excitement in your living room
• 11: Microsoft Vs. Yahoo: Yahoo said no!
• 11: Quotes: Ratatouille (2007)
• 11: Buzz: USAPlayers – You Are Welcome To Party Like It’s 1999!
• 10: Monday’s Video: Dani has the ‘big idea’ or does she?
• 09: Saturday News: Keywords, EASYMODE, WordPress, and more…
• 09: Saturday Competition: What is it?
• 08: The 80/20 Principle: It’s just a rule of thumb
• 07: Security in WordPress: Are you still showing YOUR plugins?
• 06: The View from My Desktop: Lots of great apps
• 05: WordPress 2.3.3 Security Upgrade: A simple upgrade technique
• 04: Buzz: StreamingQuotes dot Net – timely information for investors
• 04: Monday News on InvestorBlogger dot com
• 04: How do you navigate a 1000 posts? Five Practical Suggestions for WordPress Bloggers
• 03: Our trip to Taichung in Pictures
• 03: 11th Carnival of Making REAL Money: February 3rd 2008.
• 02: Guess the picture: Where in Taiwan?
• 01: January 2008: Financial Results, Traffic and More…

January 2008 (47)

• 31: A Man With A Plan: Ways to create additional income
• 30: What would you do if… (some bad news)
• 29: Missing in Action: The following keys from my keyboard; V, A, C, A, T, I, O, N
• 28: Quotation: Warren Buffett
• 28: Monday News: A Carnival, Tidying Up, Chinese New Year and our 1st Martian Reader
• 27: NetWork Solutions: How YOU can gouge your customers in 10 steps or less – a case study
• 26: Saturday Bytes: WMV to FLV and FireFox’s Causing Me Frustration
• 25: Technorati: Why you should bother, how you do it, and the ‘dark side’
• 25: Quotation: Ted Murphy
• 24: What’s in your wallet? Money Meme
• 24: Advice Column: Your House Is Not YOUR ATM Machine
• 23: LunchTime News on InvestorBlogger
• 23: On going projects: Obblogatory dot com and MakingREALMoneyBlog
• 23: Credit Card Spending: What’s your first bill in 2008 like?
• 22: Newsbytes: Blog Announcement, WordPress Problems, Money Manager Ex, and Goog Stock Price
• 21: Asus Eee PC: Video overview
• 21: Panasonic, Prada and Perspectives: Change isn’t that hard, is it?
• 20: Sunday Trips in Taipei – A Local Flower Market
• 19: E-commerce: Why are some sites so unfriendly to customers?
• 19: Carnival of Making Real Money 9th Edition – January 20th, 2008
• 18: Buzz: FlashBack Data Recovery – Just in case…
• 18: Newsbytes on InvestorBlogger: Apple Hot Air?, Affiliate Linking, Banner Plugins for WP and more…
• 17: Buzz: Linkfest Haven drives traffic to your blog everyday
• 17: Buzz: ManyBooks dot net – really does have many books!
• 16: Guerrilla Marketing Your Blog with GMail, Reader And GTalk
• 16: Quotation: Joseph Stiglitz
• 15: Dreamhost: is it turning into a nightmare again?
• 15: New Advertising on InvestorBlogger dot com: Best Small Caps Dot Com
• 14: PageRank: an intro, making money with PR, and recent controversy
• 13: Wimax, HDTV, Gadgets at CES, and more: Video Stories
• 13: Carnival of Making Real Money 8th Edition – January 13th, 2008
• 12: Is Alexa a REALRANK? Well, it tracks traffic but…
• 12: InvestorBlogger’s Quick Recap: Posts, links, and Carnival News
• 11: Goodbye Adsense, it’s been sweet’n’sour…
• 10: What should you do when you strike it rich? – 7 ways to benefit from windfalls, bonuses, and other ‘found’ money!
• 09: Buzz: Trading Concepts – Can you make money on E-Mini?
• 08: ABCs of Promoting your business, website or charity: Don’t forget the BIG PICTURE!
• 08: NewsBytes: EeeII, Carnival, Making REAL Money, Whitespace
• 07: Going to War Against Google’s Hubris: Three Actions You Can Take Today!
• 06: Carnival of Making Real Money #7 – January 6th, 2008
• 06: Sunset in Tamsui: Pictures from my Lumix
• 05: New Year – New Theme: Is it time to revitalize your blog?
• 05: Quotation: Alyce Lomax
• 04: NetLoans.co.uk: Polished, Pretty and (a little) imPersonal
• 03: Featured Carnival: Carnival of Making REAL Money
• 02: December 2007 Income Report
• 01: A Random Act of Kindness: Even I am an Apprentice

For posts in 2007, please search.

About this blog

I’m cutting to the chase about my search for financial and personal freedom. I’ll be exploring my business and personal financial insights, mistakes, and experiences over the years of my ‘Random Walk To Wealth!’.

So, this blog encapsulates three basic ‘nodes’ of interest: blogging, money and technology. I’m interpreting each of these ‘nodes’ in a broader sense than perhaps other blogs. blogging includes the act of blogging, the management of blogs, including creating and finding revenue streams; investing means money managing, stocks, dividends, creating business and revenue, debts, mortgages and so on; and technology includes OSes, blogger-related tech, cool tools and gadgets, software, websites, etc.

I’m going to try to tie these three nodes together with a regular stats update including stats on the success of the blog, and the success of my revenue streams. I’ll be using myself as an example of what to do and what not to do, and I’ll fill you in on things I have learned along the way.

Disclaimer

I’m not a specialist in finance or investing or blogging, for that matter. I have no financial qualifications, financial certification or financial education of any kind. Nothing stated in this blog should be construed as any kind of financial advice.

I’m merely describing the things that happened to me, some of which generated money, some of which didn’t. As such, this blog is a personal blog written and edited by me. It is not intended to offer financial advice or indeed any kind of advice. The information provided herein is solely for your enlightenment. Your mileage regarding ANY results may vary significantly from anything presented here. So, do your own due diligence, and research things carefully BEFORE you undertake anything mentioned in this blog. Naturally, I’d love to hear what results you got, but there is no warranty stated or implied.

As such, your own results may vary considerably. You should do your own DUE DILIGENCE for any investment that you choose to make or any financial service that you choose to use. You should also seek the advice of a specialist in finance, law, taxation, investment, etc..

Also, the blog doesn’t address the issues of taxation at all. My profits and any numbers mentioned here are considered gross profits, i.e. before any taxes are paid. Because tax jurisdictions vary greatly across the world, this blog does NOT address the issues of taxes. Any money you make may very well be liable to taxes in your jurisdiction.

For financial, investment and taxation advice that pertains to your own particular circumstances and jurisdiction, you need to consult a recognized authority in your country.

Disclosure Information
This blog presents information that I believe is honest, truthful and accurate. This blog also presents ideas, opinions and thoughts. In other words, I will try to write to the best of my ability, knowledge and experience as truthfully and accurately as possible. If you think I fail in either of these aspects, please contact me and show me what is inaccurate or not factual. You can contact me via the comments section, the contact me page or via email at investorblogger_at_investorblogger.com.

Compensation

I enjoy blogging very much, and I would like to spend more time writing for this blog and for my other blogs. Naturally, this requires money: Money to pay for my hosting, computer, coffee, etc.. I will not be shy about this point. It would be nice to live in a world, but every InvestorBlogger knows in their heart SOMEONE somewhere always pays, even if you don’t. ‘Free’ doesn’t really exist; it’s just an illusion. In addition, I would like to raise some money for one or two of my projects that are designed to benefit others, but without cash would otherwise be impossible. As time goes by, you will see these projects featured in different pages of the blog.

The consequence of which is that this blog accepts forms of advertising, sponsorship, paid insertions and/or other forms of compensation. I am compensated to provide opinions on products, services, websites and various other topics. Despite this compensation for the posts or advertisements, I will always give my honest opinions, findings, beliefs, or experiences on those topics or products. All such posts are clearly identified in one or more ways, such as at the end or with a graphic or published in a specific category of posts, currently called sponsors. In fact, this blogger will refuse ANY opportunity that does requires do not disclose , no matter what the product, price or benefits are. I will always disclose to the best of my ability.

To highlight the different methods of generating income, this website has a number of revenue streams:

1. Google Ads, or similar, are (sometimes) served in the sidebar and in articles.
2. Text Links and other text like links are served in the sidebar, too.
3. Payperpost is a marketplace that provides access to advertisers. As it is, a number of postings are sponsored by their advertisers. From January 1st, 2007, all such postings will be clearly identified in two ways: by appearing in a Sponsors category of postings, and with the words similar to this is a paid post etc.
4. There are occasional ads in the sidebar for Affiliate Programs, including Payperpost, etc.
5. As new revenue streams are tried out, they will be highlighted in the text of the blog. Stay tuned.

In the event that a posting has compensation not otherwise covered, I will endeavor to disclose that relationship. HOWEVER, given the size of this blog, it may not be possible to go back and edit the older pages to bring them up to the standards. If you see a problem, please contact me. I’ll correct the problem, if I can.

1. The A/C for our office was causing us a lot of bother: it was noisy, ineffective (except when there were few people in the room), old and expensive to run (probably was the piece of equipment that used the MOST power in our office). Thanks to a freak power outage, though, the outside unit was fried about three or four weeks ago, and wouldn’t start. So time to replace it! That’s when we bought a large Daikin replacement unit. The actual unit was an Inverter unit that is supposed to be more energy efficient as well as much quieter and should save us quite a bit of $$$ on electricity costs. Daikin claim

“…A Daikin Inverter has a more advanced technology that operates differently. It works like the accelerator of a car, gently increasing or decreasing power. It reaches the desired temperature quicker and steadily maintains it without wild fluctuations. That means uninterrupted comfort and significant savings on running costs.”

Total cost was NT$53,800 (plus installation fee of NT$1800 paid to the engineers). In fact, the total cost of air-conditioning for our business seems to be about the largest capital expense that we face and can easily top NT$250,000 for new machines. Thankfully, we purchased systems ‘as we went’ rather than laid out that money upfront! However, we have to replace a machine almost every 12-16 months as the older ones just wear out. Some of the expense of the purchase will be recouped through lower electricity bills, fortunately.

2. Paypal charges amounted to NT$7,752 for hosting. As you may remember I was using Dreamhost for all of my sites. Apart from being foolish, it was also getting expensive and Dreamhost wasn’t able to provide stable uptimes for such sites, so I transferred three sites to other hosting arrangements courtesy of Bluehost, Hostmonster and Bluefur. That way I could monitor performance across each site, isolate the sites from one hosting failure, and trim some of my hosting expenses. The results have been positive: ALL of my sites now seem more stable, even those still hosted on Dreamhost.

3. Other minor bills include my own cellphone bill (NT$376) and our regular life insurance payments (NT$2000).

That’s it. The total bill is NT$63,928 for July 2008. Quite the biggest in a few years! That’s for sure.

I’m sitting here wondering about this… It used to be pretty convenient upgrading on Dreamhost, their one-click installs would speed you through the process: without any fussy backing up (all done), the entire install was copied to .old and the new files and files were copied from wp-content. It was an easy and beautiful thing to behold. All you had to do was turn off your plugins!

Now I’m on a manual install, and I have to do the whole thing manually… it’s not that difficult actually, as I’ve done it manually many times in the past. But it’s still a little more difficult. Of course the bigger issue is: Should I upgrade?

The new features are quite attractive: Take a look for yourself!

Click to watch this video.

This is always tricky to answer. If you watch the video, you’ll know that there is versioning of posts, better gallery type functions, gears-type functionality, and better flock-type tools for blogging things you find… If any of these features are necessary or highly desirable for you, then upgrading might be the way to go. Also, if this is your first blog and/or you have JUST started blogging, upgrading should provide you with all these benefits and not much downside.

For larger blogs or more production-sensitive sites, a little tardiness may be in their best interests because usually upgrading provides great new functionality and it can also break things, too. As I found out: version 2.5.1 breaks password recovery and I suspected some posts were being eaten, too.

I’m not upgrading IMMEDIATELY. Why? Because no matter how many bugs and flaws are removed, there are ALWAYS unexpected developments that need fixing, so it is likely that I will wait for those fixes to be applied and perhaps version 2.6.1 or at least until I know that there aren’t significant issues with this version. It’s very seductive though to try, so I’ll be upgrading some minor blogs and less high profile blogs so at least I will be armed with the knowledge of how things work. In fact, I’m pretty sure most regular bloggers have their play-blogs where they try stuff out first, too!

Of Buzzes, Blogs, and Forms

David from eCommerce-Tools spotted an interesting new plugin and sent me news about it – It’s called a Form Builder and allows users to create a wide range of forms that then email content and display a unique message to the respondents. I can imagine a dozen different uses from that on InvestorBlogger – surveys, content submissions, a non-spammable contact form, etc… I might even use it to replace my current contact form.

In fact, David was the blogger who ‘borrowed’ my content and he helped me to see how sometimes people can easily fall into this trap of borrowing content without realizing. In fact, I wonder if I haven’t done it myself when I just started out … Anyway, he’s made good on his promises and actually his blog already has a lot of good content on it that he wrote himself, so I’m looking to see how it matures in six months or so. I’m also nominating him for a BlogBuzz as I have a few of those left as well. If you’d like one, too, just drop on over to my BlogBuzz page.

Spam, Plugins, and Banning IP addresses

In other news, I was getting really annoying and vulgar spam emails from some guys in Africa. The spam were being sent through an insecure contact form called PXSmail and they all came from just one or two IP addresses. Worse, the form though simple and effective allowed HTML to be added to the mix meaning that it was easy to spam me. The mails often had dozens, if not more, of links and keywords. And it hadn’t been obviously updated in nearly 3 years.

So then I tried blocking IP addresses for a while, and that was effective. I used one of Lester Chan’s plugins called WP-Ban. Unfortunately, that’s like treating flu with a gun. Effective, but permanent. Then I tried filtering the mails, but that was unsatisfactory as I would miss important mails. So then I switched to a plugin that excluded any HTML – problem solved. It’s called Contact Form II and it works simply and effectively. There is a simple toggle switch that can be used to exclude URIs in the message. Simply uncheck this. Voila! Problem solved.

Mailing List: Yes, I have one!

Having moved to BlueHost after being on DreamHost for years made me realize that both companies provide quite different ways to achieve the same results. BlueHost uses CPanel and that took a while to get used to, but in fact many hosts use CPanel, so I’m glad that I’m now learning how to use it. I’ve moved my popular sites to three different hosts (2 on Bluehost, one on Hostmonster, and one on BlueFur), and each uses CPanel though their configurations aren’t exactly the same.

Yesterday I was exploring BlueHost’s scripts and I found Dadamail so I experimented by adding a mailing list to the site to see how difficult or easy it was to set up! I didn’t fill in many fields, just enough to get things working. To my surprise I already found I had one or two ‘brave’ guinea pigs sign up! Wow! I’d better sort things out and set it up properly…

Growing UP: Should I move to WordPress MU

InvestorBlogger is approaching two years on this domain and it is growing up. Traffic is double last year’s and still growing, so I’m now thinking of moving the whole blog to WordPress MU. Why? I already experimented with MU on Dreamhost for a while, and I found that it was quite stable and mature. It also enables me to create a lot of sub-blogs, each of which can be managed separately but which draws on just ONE install saving a lot of management time and effort. With over 1000 posts, I am finding that I would like to create new blogs that draw on the content and that are more closely tied to some of the themes I already explore. It would also help me to publicize IB much more, and be listed in more places that so far reject my blog as “off-topic” or as a non-PF blog. So I’m likely to install WordPress MU during some downtime. Since most of IB’s posts are in the ‘archives’ post, nothing will change for the current archives, and perhaps the front page. Eventually, though, I will create a lot more channels, with posts and traffic suited to each. Most of the machinations will be invisible to current readers for the time being.

New Channels: PF, Tech, Investing, Making Money Online, Business

These are the base channels that I will be starting off with, as I break up InvestorBlogger into component parts. This transformation won’t take place overnight, and all posts WILL be visible on the front page. I’m still not sure how I’m going to handle the feeds for each sub-blog, perhaps I’ll have one super-feed with blogfeeds as well. So subscribers will be able to choose which feed to subscribe, too. Obviously I won’t be able to produce daily content for each of these blogs, but I will likely keep up my current rate of one or two posts a day across the mini-empire! Wish me luck.

Why? When I usually espouse having only one credit card. The first credit card is the TSIB card. Initially the limit was approaching NT$300K, but I cut that right down by 50%. I was unhappy having such a large credit limit on my card.

#1 – TSIB Card

This month’s spending will be paid off in full, as usual. The expenses are quite minimal: Hosting for my school’s Flickr account (NT$773), the usual NT$2000 life insurance premium, and hosting for BlueHost (for InvestorBlogger) which is for 12 months at NT$1,355. Though this account is less powerful than the one I had, it seems a lot more stable.

#2 – SCSBCC Card

The limit on this card is VERY small, and when I first got the card, I saved up a lot of points that EXPIRED, hence I downgraded this card to online and emergency purchases ONLY. Then I forgot to reactivate the card for ages, its limit is only NT$50K. In the first month, I charged only 2 items: the US$1.95 paypal activation fee, which is credited to PayPal; and the last month’s hosting fees for Dreamhost. The total was about NT$1841.

#3 – Carrefour Card

In Taiwan, Carrefour have their own branded card, that doubles as a membership card, allows cashback, and bonus points. The membership function is the reason we were particularly interested as we shop there regularly. I can’t see too many reasons for having this card, except earning some cashback/bonus points on spending we already do. Also, the card is able to use VisaWave technology, making spending at convenience stores, and other places more convenient. We also get points for regular spending. It’s UNLIKELY we’ll ever use this card for paying off larger amounts. But it will come in handy. We usually spend NT$4~5K there each month on groceries and items for home as well as school. In fact, we managed to get lots of points for replacing one of our school’s airconditioners.

That’s it on the personal credit card front for June. How many cards do you have? Is three too few or too many?

• 31: InvestorBlogger: A Year in Review
• 30: The Tea Kingdoms: Hong Kong, China and Taiwan
• 30: Carnival of Making Real Money #6 – January 1st, 2008
• 29: Best of Voxant Tech Stories, 2007
• 28: 2008: Do you know what kind of loan personality you are?
• 27: Buzz: YouConvertIt – a handy tool for converting all sorts of stuff!
• 26: Quotation: Ivan Raszi
• 25: My Christmas 2007 Present
• 24: InvestorBlogger’s Twelve Posts of Christmas!
• 23: Twitter Updates for 2007-12-23
• 23: Would you pay 2,600,000% APR on borrowed money?
• 22: Carnival of Making Real Money #5
• 21: BlogFest 2007 – Final Call for Entries!
• 21: Asus Eee PC with Touch Screen
• 20: Monetizing Makeover: Making Money in the NoFollow Era
• 19: So do we have PR or not? InvestorBlogger seems, too…
• 19: FTP: A Brief Introduction to Three FTP Tools for Bloggers
• 18: Quotation: Robert Kiyosaki
• 18: Newsbits and bytes: Ooo, Cows, Banking, and MT
• 17: Server Troubles: 10 things I learned from having a flaky WordPress Install
• 16: Carnival of Making Real Money – Issue #4
• 15: Would you like to win $25 and other news!
• 15: 10 Blogging Tools: Speed up your blogging with these tools – Qumana (part 1)
• 15: Quotation: Richard Lee
• 14: Adsense: Would the real clicks please stand up?
• 12: From BitchSlap to SmackDown – Why Google is just being DUMB!
• 12: Small Pre-X’mas Competition! Win $25 for X’mas!
• 12: Buzz: Trusted Tours & Attractions in San Francisco- Sign up and win an iPod!
• 12: Video On Blogging: The why and wherefore of blogging.
• 11: Getting Traffic From Forums: all it needs is your signature!
• 10: 2007 IT Month Show in Taipei: People, Products, and Pi-zzaz!
• 10: The Money Programme: MP Style
• 10: AGLOCO is over: Cash Over, Game Over
• 09: Carnival of Making Real Money – Issue #3 Online
• 09: Reprise: The Floyd – “Money” Dark Side of the Moon
• 08: Twitter Updates for 2007-12-08
• 08: Visit our Blog Sponsors
• 08: Quotation: John Mauldin
• 08: A Silver Lining: Google’s SmackDown brings rewards…
• 07: Friday’s Reading: Four Good Stories for the Weekend
• 07: LinkyLove for your readers!
• 07: Servers Part II: What is wrong? Or not fixed yet!
• 07: Fine Line: Sub-Prime Decline – The Richter Scales
• 06: Christmas is coming: the three ‘C’s of a Succesful Holiday
• 06: Who put that spoke in my server? Or how to bring a server to its knees!
• 05: Here comes the Bubble 2.0 – YouTube Video
• 05: Cashquests.com: A Blog with a future? Perhaps not
• 05: BuzzFest #11: AFrogToKiss
• 04: 19?, 22? or 24?: how big is your LCD monitor?
• 03: Bloggers: You CAN fight back against Spam, splogs and IP theft!
• 02: Carnival of Making Real Money Issue 2b Online
• 02: Buzz: Christmas Maps and Contest!
• 01: So which PC are YOU getting for X’mas?
• 01: Affiliates Income: Real Dollars, Real Sense

November 2007 (57)

• 30: How can you save $500K from a salary of $20K?
• 30: November’s Income on InvestorBlogger
• 30: Buzz: NetLoans.co.uk
• 29: Buzz RadioTime – a little lunchtime listening treat
• 29: Carnival of Making Real Money – Issue #2 Online
• 29: BlogAds Program, Indeed.com and TTZMedia: Three New Ways To Make Money
• 28: Layout, iThemes, and Myths: It’s all in Unison – Thanks StumbleUpon.com
• 28: You are not a ‘credit card slave’.. and you’re sure about that?
• 28: Quotation: Joel Maxwell
• 27: Are you a credit card slave? Part 4
• 27: Protecting Yourself Online: Ever been phishing?
• 27: Carnival of Making Real Money – Issue #1
• 26: Books from InvestorBlogger Bookstore
• 26: The Credit Card Cascade and the Madness of Spending Part 3
• 26: Carnival, Servers and TTZ Media: Monday Morning News
• 25: Join InvestorBlogger’s Carnival of Real Money
• 25: Credit Cards, Bank Accounts and Salaries Part 2
• 25: Buzz: NetCars – netting more than just a few fish!
• 24: PC and Mac: Can they ever be friends?
• 24: Where did our attitudes to money come from? Part 1
• 23: Thanksgiving, Themes, and Thoughts: Friday Round Up
• 22: MyDashBoard: Let’s change that WP2.0+ Dashboard!
• 22: RealRank: a ‘real’ alternative to PageRank?
• 22: Get YOUR Blog some publicity!
• 22: How DID being dependent on GOOGLE change our blogging?
• 21: Cashquests is GONE…
• 21: Real Rank Goes Live…
• 21: DashBoard Editor: Changing your Dashboard in WordPress
• 20: MP3, Mobiles and Digicams: Is it really a good choice to buy those multi-function phones?
• 20: Tuesday Lunchtime News Buzz: CashQuests, BTR, and RealRanking
• 20: Quote: George S. Clason
• 20: Commenting: How to get some fame (or notoriety!)
• 19: Adsense: How to cancel your account, and get your money back…
• 19: Apologies: Upgrading Website to WP 2.3.1
• 18: Credit Cards, Friends and PayDay Loans: Which would you use if you were short of cash?
• 18: When Google got rid of the Spammers, I remained silent…
• 18: Five Ways to Break YOUR dependence on Google
• 17: Quotation: Jennifer Laycock
• 17: Is Google Treating All Bloggers Equally… Oh, really?
• 16: Adsense: How to cancel your account, and get your money back
• 16: The Page Rank Song: Tres Amusante!
• 15: PR Going, going, gone: What now?
• 15: Quotation: Mike Perry
• 15: Seven ways you THROW good money away.
• 14: Learning from your mistakes… Charting a new course (part 2).
• 13: BuzzFest #10: Mike’s Money Making Mission
• 12: Got a personal blog? Get featured on this blog!
• 11: “24? in 1994: Video for Sunday
• 11: Sunday Newsbytes: EeePC, BlogDesk, and good food!
• 10: More Video Tools: Get making those summer YouTube Videos!
• 10: Refurbish that PC: Saving the environment, helping your business and making MS a little richer!
• 09: Have you ever found money? What would you do?
• 07: IRS Fraud: A whole new scam!
• 06: BuzzFest #9: LisaReviews.com
• 05: Are you committing Budget suicide? Then you need 10 steps to setting a realistic budget
• 02: Credit Card Expenses for October 2007
• 01: Is $70 for every 1000 page views a high target or not?

October 2007 (73)

• 31: October’s Income on InvestorBlogger
• 30: 10 reasons why Adsense sucks for your blog
• 30: Google vs. You the User: Who’s working for whom?
• 29: BuzzFEST#8: Hunna’s Happenings
• 28: Sunday Reading: Blog Carnivals that feature InvestorBlogger stories
• 28: Blog Theme Problems
• 28: From TYTN to Taiwan: 5 Stories for bloggers and techies
• 27: Taipei Trips: MaoKong via Gondola
• 26: 5 Qualities You Need in Your Business Partners…
• 26: Beringer’s White Zinfandel 2006: light, delicious and refreshing
• 26: Do you have what it takes to become your boss?
• 25: Stock Bubbles can seriously damage your wealth!
• 25: CartridgeFinder.com: Can you find a cartidge that is not listed?
• 24: Is Google getting too big for their boots?
• 23: Quotation: John Chow
• 23: BadCreditOffers.com: How do you fix the situation?
• 23: BuzzFEST#7: Mummified Times Five
• 22: Blog Law » 12 Important U.S. Laws Every Blogger Needs to Know
• 22: InvestorBlogger: Monetization Monday
• 22: LiveHuman.com: installs quickly and manages easily
• 21: Ancient Internet Topography Map: It’ll crack a smile!
• 21: Weekend Wonder: How to make money on the Internet?
• 20: LanguageTool and OpenOffice: Need help checking your grammar?
• 19: Buzz: Blish.com – turning your text to gold!
• 19: New Record Oil Prices… Did you expect it?
• 19: BuzzFEST#6: Before I am famous – “learning how to fly”
• 19: So, what kind of loan person are you?
• 19: Eee: Economical, Easy, and … Wait till you want one!
• 18: Markets in Taiwan: Taiwan’s ‘Little Eats’
• 18: IBackup Solutions: Making your company’s data safe, accessible and securely available
• 18: Your blog: just how does it really look?
• 17: Settlement Capital Corp.: creating image, authority and presence in your industry
• 17: BusinessSuites.com: A Suite Deal that could be just too sweet!
• 17: Check out the Carnival of Everything Finance: New edition Available…!
• 16: Buzz: Uplogix.com – remote management tools for large networks
• 16: How Do Users Read on the Web? Good advice for Bloggers
• 16: BuzzFest #5: Know a New Freedom
• 16: Mortgages: a chain around your neck or the shoulder of a giant?
• 16: And you thought a notebook pc was small?
• 15: How to Double Firefox Speed | PCTipsBox
• 15: eBay Suspension: It wasn’t me, I didn’t do it…!
• 15: Coutts.com: Wouldn’t you trust the Queen’s bankers?
• 15: Terabytes at your fingertips: what you gonna do?
• 15: Finding a new host/home for your website: top10webhosting.com
• 12: What were you doing on Saturday?
• 12: Themes, Plugins and Widgets: From A++ to B-
• 12: BuzzFEST #4: Cityslicker Mom
• 11: Tips: How many posts on your blog’s frontpage?
• 11: Lumix, Models and My first photographs…
• 11: Thanks to our sponsors: Check out their websites!
• 10: Can Selling Paid Links Hurt Your PageRank Or Rankings On Google?
• 10: Mozilla and a Flock of SongBirds: Developments in Browsers
• 10: Out with Kodak, In with Lumix
• 09: Blog Carnival News: InvestorBlogger.com on Carnival of Debt ManageMent
• 09: BuzzFEST #2: 33 is the new 23 – From wife carrying contests to digi-cams to Beckham!
• 09: BuzzFEST #3: State of Confusion, not a Kink in sight!
• 09: Building Links Naturally? Sometimes we all need a ‘little’ help
• 08: PostieCarnival: New Issue Online.
• 08: SanDisk Cruzer: 4GB and U3
• 08: September Credit Card Spending: Why no cashback spending?
• 08: Argus, Payperpost and Tracking Codes: What’s going on?
• 07: BuzzFEST #1 – Investing Adventures.com
• 06: Techniques: 5 ways to speed up WordPress
• 06: Creating a Clickable Image Map: Ideas for your Header Image
• 05: Typhoon Weather: October 5th and 6th.
• 05: Friday Quotation: Mahatma Gandhi
• 04: OpenOffice: 2.3 is now out! What? M$Office you’re still here…!
• 04: Random Bits and Bobs: Argus, Lost Cameras, and Dreamhost PS
• 03: Blog Design Update: Baby steps…
• 03: Recent Reading: Music, Profits, and AdSense!
• 02: Buzz: Spam to money – Can you turn straw to gold?
• 01: September’s Income on InvestorBlogger
• 01: eBay – They suspended me! And for no reason at all!

September 2007 (69)

• 30: Michael Kwan’s Review: $40 – is it worth it? Definitely
• 30: Upcoming Postings: A Quick Preview
• 29: Investor Blogger’s Top 5 Make Money Online Gurus
• 29: Did you install Alexa’s code on your website? If not, why not?
• 29: TNX.net – links marketplace and it’s buzzing for business!
• 28: Home Contents Insurance: Is yours enough?
• 28: John Chow did it. MacEwan did it. Can you?
• 28: Comment Spam: How do you tackle it?
• 27: BlogRush: Madness makes traffic!
• 27: My first advertising campaign on $100: Raising IB’s profile
• 27: Buzz: Blog your way to court with the LA Criminal Law Blog
• 27: Buzz: Are you too complex to categorize? Can you defy categorization?
• 27: 200,000 words and counting…
• 27: Loans and Rates: Four ways to save money on your mortgage or personal loan.
• 26: Quotation: Tim Ferriss
• 26: GumTree.com – Simple and Popular Community Classifieds for the UK
• 26: EMusic.com – is it the only music company that GETS the Internet?
• 26: Working hard? Take a break or just a change of office space!
• 25: Did this drive you around the Benz?
• 25: WordPress version 2.3: out and about
• 25: WordPress Lesson 7: Editing Your First Post.
• 24: Buzz: FormaSpace – create your own workdesk or bench!
• 24: LETS, Timebanks and other means of exchange
• 24: Buzz: Demerath Law – Nice Design But Get a Privacy Policy
• 24: Coupon Codes + Coupon Websites = Money In Your Pocket?
• 24: Question – $100 Ad Budget: How would you do it?
• 22: Buzz: Vista Prints Brochures – Effective Tools for Promotion
• 22: Server Issues: What has been happening?
• 22: Moon Festival: To BBQ, eat Pomelo and mooncakes, and watch the full moon!
• 21: Quick Linking: PR + Fake PR, a Scam, and WP
• 21: Printer Issues: DELLicious Deals at Dell.UK
• 21: WordPress 2.3 – preview – hoping for better draft and content generation tools
• 20: Finding Cash for Your Business: Easy or Tough?
• 19: Twitter Updates for 2007-09-19
• 19: LCD TV vs. Credit Card Debt – Is it really worth 12 years?
• 19: Credit cards: have you checked your wallet or purse lately?
• 18: 10 ways to send traffic AWAY from your blog
• 18: Rapid Supplies an easy solution for your office and mine
• 18: Buzz: In Series Plugin so you can put your all ducks in a row!
• 18: Slow Site Again… Apologies
• 17: Cramer goes ballistic on TV about
• 16: Twitter Updates for 2007-09-16
• 16: Monday Reading: to go deep or wide? What is the path to ‘blogging’ success?
• 16: Of Zondas and Moo-N Rovers
• 15: Plugins That Work: Manage Roles – a neat solution to an old problem in WP
• 15: Minimum Repayments: That’s EXACTLY how much? How long?
• 14: InvestorBlogger Update: Still Sluggish…
• 14: WordPress Classes: Lesson 6 – Your First Post.
• 14: Mortgage & Credit Crunch: Newsroom Stories
• 13: Learning from your mistakes… Turning your ship around (Part 1)
• 13: Buzz: accounting software group – welcome to our newest advertiser!
• 12: Flea Markets: Can they be fun?
• 11: PayPerPost’s Best Practices: Best for Bloggers?
• 10: Blog Forgetfulness: What a naughty boy you’ve been
• 10: Plugins: Remove those Dashboard Feeds in WordPress!
• 07: Buzz: Clean up your CSS – it’s just a cut-and-paste job really!
• 06: Trying Out GoogleApps: an adventure in working with Google Office… NOT Quite!
• 06: Readings – ‘b-schools’ why should they bother with research?
• 05: Needing PR? A quick program to gain 100 links…!
• 05: Buzz: CashQuests.com – PR on the nail!
• 04: Buzz: Want to be paid to blog?
• 04: Banner Sightings: Thanks eMonetized.com!
• 03: Google Docs: Powerful Editing Features for Sharing!
• 03: Blogging Network: It happened by accident!
• 02: Money… or … Money, Money, Money!
• 01: Banners #2: How is it?
• 01: August 2007 Results – Summer Slump is over…
• 01: Quotation: John Mauldin
• 01: Buzz: Financial Gravity – is it holding you back?

August 2007 (65)

• 31: WordPress Lesson 5: setting up your options (part 3)
• 30: First Time Winner: emonitized chooses InvestorBlogger
• 30: Tea in Taiwan: a sample for you to try!
• 30: Buzz: Making Calendars for 2008! #1 in my series!
• 29: WordPress Lesson 4: setting up your options (part 2)
• 29: Sunday Adventures in Taiwan: Of Apples and Mushrooms!
• 29: Google Docs: Does it represent a security problem?
• 28: Some great tips on doing Business on Ebay
• 28: WGA: Whose Advantage now?
• 28: Buzz: Alive Directory for Blogs – great categories, good editorial!
• 27: Paid Posting: Do you disclose or don’t you?
• 27: WordPress Lesson 3: setting up your options (part 1)
• 26: Spot the Explorer?
• 26: August 26th: InvestorBlogger is now 1 year old!
• 25: Buzz: Have you checked your credit report?
• 24: Tim Schroeder’s Banner Contest – Worth Entering.
• 24: Digi-Cameras: Pictures of the North Coast of Taiwan
• 24: Buying a house: saving for the deposit? It does have advantages…!
• 23: Four Corners: Australian Documentary TV at its best
• 23: It took 12 months, but I earned $5000…
• 22: Video: Money, Banking and the Federal Reserve
• 22: John Chow’s New Theme – bulky, bloated, and blunt!
• 21: The Next Internet Millionaire: a Donald Trump wannabe?
• 21: WordPress Lesson 2: Changing your theme!
• 20: Stories from the Newspapers
• 20: Review: Mortgage-Mart.com looks great… but can it deliver?
• 20: Buzz: AuthorHouse.com – Web 2.0 but needs a little spit’n’polish!
• 20: Lulu.com: Calendar Season is approaching – could you make some $$$?
• 20: WordPress Lesson 1: Changing your password.
• 20: Did you do an effective cost-benefit analysis before getting your credit cards? If not, read on!
• 20: Finance Week: August 20th-26th.
• 20: Short of cash: Are payday loans a good thing?
• 18: OIOpublisher plugin: Enabling bloggers to make money
• 18: Could Google be cheating its advertisers?
• 17: Down Time on InvestorBlogger
• 16: Starting Up: Again – reviving an old blog…
• 16: Buzz: don’t be an idiot – simple and neat!
• 15: Car Insurance: You never need it until you NEED it!
• 15: Well, it’s done … blog migration made easy!
• 14: Elaine Gilmour: Blogging for ESL
• 14: Do you want to be your own boss? 84% in Taiwan…!
• 13: OIOpublisher plugin: Enabling bloggers to make money
• 13: Time for a Promotion: Text Link Ads – 15% off!
• 12: HTC: Are they ‘Shift’ing the future?
• 12: Readable Email Subscriptions: How to keep your readers happy!
• 11: Sunday Recreation: Online Scrabulous
• 10: Ever been swindled – Legally?
• 10: Merging and Managing Your Blogs: How many do you have?
• 09: Vent: Do you hate updating your Windows + Software?
• 09: Buzz: It’s the Thoof, the whole Thoof, and nothing but the Thoof!
• 08: Microsoft Office: proliferating Office alternatives
• 07: Quotation: Jeff Raskin
• 07: Media’n’ the Net: Create your ‘TV channel’ with YouTube
• 06: SuperMario on your iPhone…
• 06: Updating my PC: Will it be enough?
• 05: Coupons from CouponChief: Easing your bugdetary pressures at expensive holidays!
• 05: A Little Sunday Relaxation: Fancy FaceBook Chess?
• 05: BlogDesk v.2.7 updated
• 04: Johncow.com now redirecting to JohnChow.com
• 04: WordPress 2.2.2 and 2.0.11: Out now!
• 03: Step 4: Evaluate your goals and repeat steps 1 ~ 4 as necessary.
• 02: Projector123.com: Helps you to project a good image!
• 02: Chinese Domain Names: They’re available!
• 01: Payperpost Click Thru Rates: Much HIGHER than you’d expect…
• 01: Winning a Prize: Geekyspeaky.com

July 2007 (60)

• 31: 2007 July Results – Nothing to write home about
• 31: Driving Me Batty: How do you store their data? Or do you?
• 30: Buzz: The proof is in the Thoof.com
• 29: Suzuki Swift VVT: 1.6L of small car comfort
• 28: Do you want to be counseled by Robert Kiyosaki?
• 28: Quotation: Seth Godwin
• 27: Five ideas for ’short’ posts: What to post when you are out of ideas!
• 27: WordPress.com Stats Plugin: Upgrade to version 1.1.1
• 26: Tea: A HUGE business in Taiwan
• 26: How do you spend it? Busted PC, that’s one way!
• 25: Can you save electricity? Is it worth it?
• 25: 666: The number of the devil? Not in Taiwan!
• 24: Why engadget frustrates me?
• 24: WordPress Reports: plugin borked?
• 24: Upcoming Posts: A Quick Note
• 23: Are all artists wishing they were making a PRINCEly sum?
• 23: You, the User, FBI informant! Where’s your badge?
• 22: I-phone or bye-phone? The emperor’s clothes…
• 22: Hate Email: if you’re getting it, you’re being noticed!
• 21: Step 3: Set your new goals and timescale
• 21: July 21st is here… time for a little break!
• 20: Considering a personal loan? Don’t be too frivolous!
• 19: Google for Broadband: Taiwan, HK and Korea
• 19: 7 ways to get rid of visitors to your blog! Quickly, effectively and permanently!
• 18: How long are visitors staying on YOUR website?
• 18: Alexa plugins: how to get all your visitors counted!
• 17: On The Money: Watch your Debit or Credit Card Limit this summer!
• 17: Spam in the mail: Gmail works well
• 16: Step 2: Consider your current goals and timescale
• 16: Alexa Toolbar for Firefox: A new plugin for Firefox 2.0.0 and up
• 15: Quotation: Pete Cashmore
• 15: Sponsored Reviews: Improving, but still opportunities lost
• 14: Needing Goals? Having difficulty following through? Set better goals: step 1 of four
• 14: What? No Comments? A ‘Commentary’…
• 13: drip, drip, drip – wealth accumulation is silent!
• 13: Yahoo! Finance: more cool videos
• 12: Sponsored Themes: On the out and out?
• 12: Choose your business partner – CAREFULLY!
• 11: Celebrating 600 posts
• 11: TLA: my links sold out, plus 15% special deal for July!
• 10: Stuck for Ideas to Blog: Get resourceful or don’t hack it!
• 10: IBackup.com: essential service for your business, and inexpensive
• 09: Support Our Sponsors: Check out their websites!
• 09: InvestorBlogger goes mobile!
• 08: ReadPrint.com: Source for Good Reading
• 08: Google Earth: A car race on the streets!
• 07: The Blogging Process: It’s more complicated than I first suspected
• 07: PR Update: Coming soon!
• 06: Mars, the Weather, and Panoramas
• 06: Amazon.com Affiliate Program: Surprised by earnings
• 05: Google Analytics: Have you got it set up yet?
• 05: Odd Facts About this Blog
• 04: Late Fees: Have you eliminated them all?
• 04: Quotation: Peter S. Magnusson
• 03: Online Photo Galleries: Alternatives to Yahoo! Photos
• 03: When it’s hot in Taiwan, what do you do?
• 02: Spam Karma 2: a real defense… against spam of all kinds.
• 02: Video: Charlie Rose interviews Bill Gates
• 01: Quotation: Barry Ritholtz
• 01: June 2007 Results: Less time, less rewards!

June 2007 (71)

• 30: Excerpt_Reloaded: Changing your archives pages!
• 30: Images for Your Blog – Five Good Sources You Can Use
• 29: Waiting for an Iphone… Is it really worth it?
• 28: How to lose customers: Pandora.com
• 28: 10 PR7 Directories: Submitting won’t hurt you!
• 27: Blogging: Is your blog ‘mobile’?
• 26: Making Videos for Your Blog: Challenging but fun!
• 26: Quick Link Roundup #2: Some good information!
• 25: How to get promoted on InvestorBlogger
• 25: BeatthatQuote: Lots of ways to save $$$!
• 24: Summer Driving Season: What better than a BMW Z4!
• 24: WordPress 2.2.1 is out: Upgrading now is recommended!
• 24: Movies: Making your own adds a special flavor to your blog!
• 24: Can you shake hands with a statue?
• 23: Car Photos on Finance + Tech Blogs: is it de rigueur?
• 23: the NewsRoom: myRevenue – it’s active now!
• 22: Difficult Decisions: So how DO you decide?
• 22: Links, Articles and More
• 22: Safari vs Firefox: Faster than FF, but less flexible…
• 22: The Blogging Habit: Time, Place and Mood!
• 21: Agloco: the viewbar works but can it really make $$$?
• 21: YourCreditNework.com: Not quite web 2.0?
• 20: Buzz: Gothic Peach.net – a real peach!
• 20: Buzz Media: Newsletters generate reputation, interest, and sales!
• 20: WPThemeShop: Special Offer for Summer!
• 20: Supplementals Hell: Are things improving?
• 19: Holiday Time in Taiwan
• 19: Can Blogging get you fired? It might… if you worked for the CIA!
• 17: Running a blog in another language: it’s a challenge
• 17: Driving Offline Users to your Business
• 17: Supplemental Savior: SEO-Wordpress plugin rescues you from Hell!
• 16: CyberPartyGal – Blogs and Biz: Buzz for June
• 16: Wireless Networks: Is yours secure?
• 16: Personal Development: Are you imprisoned by “Duality Disorder”?
• 15: Converter FAQs – VMware
• 15: Listen To InvestorBlogger: OdioGo creates an MP3/PodCast from a post!
• 15: Have you created an Advertising page yet?
• 14: Buzz: Links, Articles, and More: Find out what InvestorBlogger has been reading recently
• 14: Getting Started in Publishing: DIY is the way to go!
• 13: Financing University: Diversify the source of your funds
• 12: Buzz: Never Be Ashamed When You Promote Your Business
• 12: PPP: What would you do with $7,000,000 in your pocket?
• 12: Newsbytes: New Look Payperpost Website
• 12: Buzz: The Blue xB – how Not to design your Blog
• 12: Blogging 24/7 – Should bloggers have guest bloggers when they are too busy?
• 11: Books and MLM: two things that don’t normally go together
• 09: Mailing Lists or How small business can fall foul of Spam TOS, break CANSPAM laws and create a bad reputation!
• 09: Buzz: Reward Cards – Sensible Advice
• 08: Apologies: Been sick for a few days!
• 08: Spyware: Could be what you are searching for?
• 07: Spyware: It’s time to Sweep your PC
• 07: Quotation: Yaro Starak
• 07: Review: Teamwealthbuilder.com – Rome wasn’t built quickly!
• 06: Claiming my Blog on Bloglines!
• 06: Buzz: Asus Eee PC 701 – affordable, non-Windows, but not available – yet!
• 06: Tools: Automate YOUR Technorati Faving!
• 06: CardGuide.co.uk: Give yourself some credit where credit’s due!
• 06: Buzz: My Thoughts, Ideas and Ramblings.
• 05: Interest Rates: Taking Aim at Compounding
• 05: TheNewsRoom: Videos, Stories and Cash!
• 05: Charity: The Giving Hands website and blog
• 04: Reviewing 1MortgageUK – Loans, Advice and More!
• 03: SOS Series: some feedback!
• 03: Revenue Streams: Google Adsense
• 03: Keeping Traffic: tie up the loose ends!
• 02: Random Post Feature – All over the blog!
• 02: Interesting Reading? I hope so!
• 02: Supplementals Hell: Getting Rid of Multiple Categories
• 01: iTWire – Palm Foleo flop or future?
• 01: May 2007: Consistent and Improving…
• 01: blogdesk w.bloggar: web clients – but xml problems!

May 2007 (99)

• 31: Jobs You DON’T want: The latest kind of spam
• 31: Kiva Loan #2: update – Loan Disbursement
• 31: My Blog Stats – May 2007
• 30: Buzz: POS Software & Systems Group
• 30: SOS: Assess the damage!
• 30: Tax Deadline Approaches: Uncompetitive tax regimes make my blood boil as they extract more than a pound of flesh!
• 29: Technology Enables and Disables at the same time!
• 29: Supplemental Hell: SOS!
• 29: Blogging with Herodotus, Burns and the Brothers Grimm
• 28: Buzz: Lugnut22.com – A new blog to the ‘make money online’ fraternity
• 28: Secondhand or Brand New: Is that Fortnum & Mason’s or Fleamarket?
• 28: News: Postie Carnival for May 28th
• 27: Three Stats Plugins: SlimStat, TD WordCount and Stats Plugin
• 27: Digg.com: Autobury – undoing the voice of the people!
• 27: Sunday Reading: Good Blogging Tips
• 27: Payperpost Blog Carnival – A good way to build traffic and SEO
• 26: Quotation: John Milan
• 26: Weather Report: Another Dry Spell!
• 26: DonationWare: Three plugins that allow Paypal Donations
• 25: Follow up posting: Calculating Your Net Worth – part 2.
• 25: Quotation: John Chow – On Advertising
• 25: Tiptail and LunaTail: Double Blog Buzz with a little extra sprinkled on top!
• 24: Quotation: Charles Mingus
• 24: TheOpenCD: making it easy to find the best opensource software
• 24: Payperpost Direct: Good for Bloggers, Will be Great for Advertisers!
• 23: June Buzzes: Get your blog a little buzz!
• 23: Monetizing your Blog: Some thoughts by Alex King
• 22: CashQuest.com: How would you like to win $100!?
• 22: High Interest Accounts Yield High Interest from me!
• 22: Tips: Updating your image in TextLinkAds.com
• 22: Go on! Smile as you pay your credit card bill this month!
• 22: Enertia.com: Build a house, save the environment and line your pockets!
• 21: My Five Requirements For Investing In A New Business
• 21: Cool HTML to BBCode Converter v. 1.2
• 21: Cash for Old Phones: Recoup some of the value from your old phone
• 21: Buzz: NickQueen’s Personal Blog – Wide Ranging and Informed!
• 21: Backgammon: Odds on it could be your favorite game!
• 21: Making Money on Monday Morning – Bulk Candy Vending for Passive Income
• 21: Quotation: Charlie Munger – On Performance Chasing
• 20: Creeping in at #10: InvestorBlogger on Today’s Top Ten Commentators!
• 20: How NOT to bid for stuff! And get away with it!
• 20: What Would You Do If You Lost Your Job?
• 20: Make Money with the Amazon Affiliate Store – aStore
• 19: Quotation: Warren Buffett – on Index Funds
• 19: How my life insurance came in handy: AmericaDirect.com
• 18: Stats: Whither Gibraltar?
• 18: Throwing Down the Gauntlet!
• 18: Buzz: MomReviews.net – essential for busy mothers
• 17: Plugins: SRG Clean Archives 3.0.1
• 17: Good Reading from Genius Types – Learn From My Entrepreneurial Mistakes
• 17: Quotation: Larry Flynt
• 17: I’m Now Testing BlogJet: Blogging Tools
• 16: Money Management: Do you have Abusive Borrowing Behavior?
• 16: Confessions of an A-List Blogger
• 16: BlogDesk Imaging Tools – Functional, Attractive and Easy to Use
• 16: Useful Tips: Alt+(Shift)+V for WordPress
• 15: WordPress 2.2: Available Now
• 15: Buzz: Depend On You – Your Blog Depends On You!
• 15: PHP: Cheesecake Photoblog Software
• 15: Markets in Taiwan: Home of many small businesses
• 14: TraderMatch: where traders meet their match!
• 14: TV over IP: CHT’s MOD virtually stillborn
• 14: Buzz #3: I’m all abuzz for Karen’s Chatbug!
• 14: Monday Morning Blues: Just relax, sit by the river, and the blues are gone!
• 13: Kiva.org: My second borrower!
• 12: Good Reading: “The Poverty Business”
• 12: Business the Taiwanese Way 101
• 12: Quotation: Zig Ziglar
• 12: Win $25 Gift Certificate for Kiva.org: June 2007 Promotion
• 12: Paid Blogging Companies: 4+1 Reviews
• 12: Tools: Backlink PageRank Check
• 11: Buzz #2: Enthral’s Craft Blog and Shop
• 11: AIMpromote CRM: do your leads just vanish?
• 11: Cascades of Cash: Using Your Money to Make Money?
• 11: Quotation: Genius Types.com
• 10: The Blogitive Directory Network is Open – Blogitive
• 10: Link: Passive Income Strategies by GeniusTypes.com
• 10: Why do I blog? So I’ve Been Tagged!
• 09: Buzz: $99 – it can buy you a PC!
• 09: Simplifying My Blog: Not an easy task!
• 09: Blogging: The blog IS the website!
• 08: Buzz #1: Army Mom’s Blog
• 06: WordPress Rules: On Your Own PC!
• 06: Quotation: Warren Buffett
• 06: Yahoo + MSN: limited growth factors = a merger of equals?
• 06: Tri-Cities Real Estate: buying and selling great houses
• 05: Buzz: Skeet’s Stuff – a blog about ‘clutter’! And it’s not cluttered!
• 05: ‘Free Money’: What do you do with it?
• 04: Firefox Add-ons: You have HOW many!?
• 04: Buzz: ChoicePersonalLoans.com – providing quality personal loans
• 04: Plugins and Themes that don’t play nice: Let them out in your “Play Area”!
• 03: Comment Challenge vers. 1.1: Broken again?
• 03: Webmessenger: IM inside a browser!
• 02: Quit your day job: if you want!
• 02: 5 Ways to Manage Finances Better
• 02: OLPC vs. iPhone vs. PortableApps: Which will this tech tryout as the most influential technology?
• 01: Adding your signature to your posts
• 01: Neat theme: The Commodore 64 is dead – Long live the Commodore 64!
• 01: Big Web Links Directory: Is it really that ‘big’ yet?

April 2007 (69)

• 30: April 2007: Highlights and Top Posts
• 30: April 2007 Results: Money, Stats and Stuff
• 29: Clash of the Dictionaries: Merriam Webster’s vs. Dictionary of Definitions
• 28: Welcome to our New Text Link Ad: LoanNetwork.com
• 28: Quotation: Jeremy Grantham
• 27: MyBlogLog: buggy right now!
• 27: Foxmarks: Sync your bookmarks across the ‘Net
• 27: Bloggers-on-the-go: Portable Apps.com for the mobile life
• 26: BloggerWave: Wait till this ‘beta’ gets better!
• 26: Personal Sanity Tip: If you’re angry, don’t – DON’T – hit that send button!
• 25: Online Classifeds: cutting out the expense of ‘new’!
• 25: AgentsChat.com – A little refresh, a whole new look!
• 24: No more raining on your fashion parade – stylish laptop bags for women!
• 24: Re-mortgage your house: Not unless it made sense, as well as dollars!
• 23: Page Views: Up, down, then up again
• 23: Ten reasons why modern magazine headlines are DULL-DULL-DULL!
• 23: Buzz: SecureZip your files in a zip! Free Download!
• 22: Blogging Dollars and Sense: Is it passive or ‘active’ income?
• 22: Quotation: Steve Pavlina – “How to change the world”.
• 22: Thanks to Access Equipment Leasing
• 22: Bidvertiser: Special Deals for Publishers
• 21: Interesting New Blog: Free2Surf
• 21: Relocation.com: Did the earth move for you or did they just move the earth?
• 21: Buzz: Thunderbird 2 is now out!
• 20: Quotation: Charles Dickens – in “David Copperfield”.
• 20: Insured or not? Find out about Life Insurance from LifeInsure.com
• 20: Buzz: M$ getting serious about the Developing World and Piracy?
• 20: Learning PHP? Open Technology Group – Basic to Advanced Courses at Great Prices!
• 20: Of talk, income and software: Reading for April 20th-22nd, 2007.
• 19: Buzz: Google Docs adds Charting …
• 18: Upgrading your blog: What did you forget?
• 18: Idrive.com: When last did you back up your drive?
• 18: OpenOffice vers. 2.2 and Google Apps: Did the fat lady sing for M$ Office yet?
• 17: Buzz: Successful Office – success is just a phone call away!
• 17: Firefox 2.0: A Blogger’s Useful Firefox Plugins
• 17: Postie Carnival Comes to Town!
• 17: Buzz: AuthorHouse – Can they turn Bloggers into Authors? Could be…
• 16: PPP: managing your opps better
• 16: Motivation for Monday Morning: Don’t give into the Bloggers’ Blues!
• 15: Adsense: Does it still make sense? Or is it really just a scam?
• 15: Quotation: Julius Rosenwald (1862 – 1932)
• 14: Interesting Comment Experiment: Do you want more readers?
• 14: A new Plugin for PPP bloggers: payperpostopps from LegalAndrew.com
• 14: Gambling Games: Can investors learn anything useful? Definitely…
• 13: Blog Update: mybloglog with myavatars
• 13: SponsoredReviews.com: Should you waste your time?
• 12: Bug Fixed: Commenting on the blog!
• 12: Pixi-Ads: Little Ads – BIG Impressions
• 11: Whatever happened to JohnChow.com?
• 11: Buzz: Saving your way to better interest rates!
• 10: Networth: Assets – Liabilities $0!
• 10: Review: CardGuide.co.uk – fresh, responsive and useful
• 09: Tax time: Review your Income Sources…
• 08: We’re Back… and it was easy this time!
• 08: Temporary Problems: Permanent Fix.
• 07: Fun making “InvestorBlogger” business cards at 123Print.com
• 07: Making more than 6% on your checking – Now that’s evil!
• 07: Amazon Associates Introduces Context Links (Beta)…
• 06: Quotation: e e cummings
• 06: Forex and Futures: Do they have a future for you?
• 05: Adding WP_Optimal Title Plugin
• 05: VoIP Forums: Information and Service to the Vonage Community
• 04: SEO: Where does your traffic come from?
• 04: Fixed Asset Software: Not as taxing as it could be!
• 03: Life’s Little Luxuries or things you just gotta have…!
• 03: Review: UK Loan Store – Can you calculate your interest payments?
• 02: Lurid Ads on TLA: Change your options!
• 02: March 2007 Results
• 01: Tithing: A duty to God or a tax on idiots?

March 2007 (79)

• 31: Buzz: More than Pocket Change
• 31: Buzz: OpenOffice 2.2 released in the wild
• 31: Quotations: Oprah Winfrey
• 30: My Blog Stats – *updated* March 31st, 2007
• 30: Loans, Mortages and Credit: FinanceGuide101.com keeps you informed!
• 29: My Blog: Tweaked and Prodded…!
• 29: RegisterFly.com – wtf’s going on?
• 28: Revisiting the Boards: On Segmentation
• 28: Buzz: Broke As A Spoke but worth a million!
• 27: Norton: Need a good antivirus solution? What’s better than free?
• 27: Quotations: Donald Trump
• 27: Google Pack: Lots of Goodies to download
• 27: Review: The lowdown on “Mortgage Lowdown”
• 26: Jim Cramer Recap: Brief and To The Point – just like the show!
• 26: Our Sponsors: Give them a big hand!
• 25: Dropped like a stone: Technorati rank is now 260K
• 25: Dividends in 2006: Quite a lot more than I had thought!
• 24: Weekend Reading: Top Posts Viewed by Page and Last 30 Days
• 24: Axiar Payments: a cost-effective and prompt payment solution?
• 23: Do you have investments that make you poorer?
• 23: SMF, TinyPortal and Aero Theme: Add a community to your blog!
• 22: Future Page Rank Tools
• 22: Sensible Budgeting: Think Big Picture!
• 21: Resilience + Tenacity: Important Qualities in Business?
• 21: Publisherforums.com: Can you win $1,000?
• 21: $10 bonus from Google Checkout!
• 20: BuyList: Find the inside scoop on buying and selling
• 20: The Business Life: Marketing your small business!
• 19: PPP: Adding Juice to their system
• 19: Kiva Client: Leonard Joseph
• 18: DJI and NASDAQ: How wrong can I be?
• 18: Advertise on PPP? Some observations of segmentation
• 17: WordPress Jacking: Did you change your password?
• 17: Technorati: A Blogger’s Friend or Foe?
• 16: A first data: Should you or shouldn’t you save yourself?
• 16: Can you budget? It’s not that hard!
• 15: Gotta get me more pictures on this blog!
• 15: Apologies for downtime: Short Outage.
• 15: SanDisk’s New 32-GB Flash Drive – Liberation for the Blogger?
• 14: Rich Today, Poor Tomorrow by Robert Kiyosaki
• 14: ThriftyScot.co.uk asks if you are a spender, a borrower, a saver, or an investor!
• 13: DI-524: The Worst Router in the World?
• 13: Digital Point Forums: A Great Resource for Bloggers
• 13: Visit the Big Apple and take a break from blogging!
• 12: The Blogging Habit: Always a penny short and a day late!
• 12: Great Resources: Common Errors in English
• 11: Review: John Chow Dot Com
• 11: Blog Your Way To Wealth: Building Multiple Streams of Income
• 11: Building Your Own House: A Sensible Choice?
• 10: InvestorBlogger: Going Full-Feed
• 10: Virtualization: Coming to a PC or USB near you!
• 10: Credit Cards: Could you live without them?
• 10: TLA: my site under review?
• 09: Group ISO’s Merchant Accounts: Best for larger operators!
• 09: Quotations: Jonathan Swift
• 08: Bloggers Block: I got it… But it’s not infectious!
• 07: Our New Banner-As-Posts Exchange
• 06: TLA and ReviewME: striking out right now!
• 06: Blogitive Reopens: New tool – Blogitive Directory
• 06: Going Green: Help to make some green $$$ for a charity!
• 05: Advertisement: ReviewME.com – 50% off reviews!
• 05: Selling Your Soul: Choose your paid blogging company carefully
• 05: Paid Posting: Is mis-spelling a key word to attract visitors ethical?
• 05: UltimateCoupons.com: More than just a housewife’s trick!
• 05: Customers: HKJTEFL.org
• 04: 10 ways to protect your brand new credit card and your credit score!
• 04: Dell Coupon Codes: Are you Cheap and Stingy?
• 04: Update WP 2.1.1 to 2.1.2 – code compromised!
• 04: A disclaimer for InvestorBlogger
• 03: Credit Cards: Give yourself some credit?
• 03: Segmentation on PPP: For better or worse?
• 03: February 2007 Income Update
• 03: Copyright: does a blogger’s blog have copyright?
• 02: ReviewME starts their Affiliate Program
• 02: Quotation: Oprah Winfrey
• 02: Something odd happened on Alexa… What does it mean?
• 01: Ibackup.com: Do you back up your data?
• 01: SiteProPlus: Webhosting + Design – in one package!
• 01: Tuesday’s Drop: Is it just China’s bubble? Or is it America’s too?

February 2007 (66)

• 28: Debts Mounting? Can you pay them back?
• 28: BizIdeas #1: Start your own Education Agency!
• 28: Ideas2earn.com: An idea to make money – Every Day!
• 28: Personal Loans: Do you have an action plan?
• 27: Getting Started: Why is Web 2.0 different?
• 26: Getting Started: First Steps with WordPress.org
• 26: Update: Blogitive users can’t login right now
• 25: Quotations: Donald Trump
• 25: Great Plugins #5+6: Post Control and Draft Control
• 24: Running a proxy host: can it really make money?
• 24: RemotePC: Nothing Remotely Pointless About This Tool!
• 23: To WWW or not: that is a domain name!
• 23: Credit Cards: Budgets, Rewards, Self-Discipline!
• 22: Updates to WP 2.1 and 2.0.7: Upgrading is here
• 21: Apple Coupons: Take a bite now!
• 21: Technorati: A failing grade? Likely…
• 21: To win is to make a lot of mistakes!
• 20: Box.net: The whole world’s a widget away!
• 20: Word Count Tool: Courtesy of JavaScript Kit
• 19: 8 Ways I Tried Cutting Expenses: The Incidental Stuff
• 19: Ideas on submitting your blog to Blog Directories – does it really work?
• 18: .htaccess rules for your WP 2.0+ blog
• 18: John Mauldin: The Inverted Yield Curve
• 17: Quotation: Albert Einstein
• 17: Alexa toolbar: A Review – of sorts!
• 16: Wishing everyone a Happy Chinese New Year 2007!
• 16: PayU2Blog: a good alternative to PPP and Text-Link-Ads?
• 16: The ThriftyScot-ness Works: And how!
• 15: 12 ideas for generating traffic for your website!
• 15: Bloggers: Can you make some money?
• 15: Breaking News: IB ranks inside Alexa #1,000,000
• 15: 50% off promotion for advertisers!
• 14: How many posts do you have in your drafts section?
• 14: Our Disclosure Policy: Re-designing my policy
• 14: The Smart Way to check your Page Rank
• 13: Autometa: Meta Tags for each post
• 13: IDrive-E: Sounds like a good IDEA
• 13: Improve Your SEO: A quick action program
• 12: Word Count Stats v0.41
• 12: Capital Loans: a capital idea or not ideal?
• 11: Useful Tools: Google Docs Can Publish to Your Blog!
• 11: Review My Posts: A list of posts for you to review!
• 11: Insuring your car and home: it makes good cents!
• 11: Website Proxies: an interesting opportunity?
• 11: PayPerPost Review ME Program: Viral Networking Brings Benefits
• 11: Website Hosting: How I found my feet!
• 11: Customers: CraigFergusonImages.com
• 10: Mobile Phone + Internet + Organizer = InvestorBlogger?
• 10: Quotations #3: J. Paul Getty
• 10: Airline Credit Cards: Is there really any point?
• 10: Getting Started Blogging: Inspiration Hits You!
• 10: Agents’ Chat Forums
• 09: Blogging makes good dosh, but dosh doesn’t make good blogs!
• 06: 200 Posts And Counting…
• 06: WordPress Reports: Useful Plugin #5
• 05: Customers: NozKidz.com
• 05: January 2007 alternate income update!
• 05: Whatever happened to Adbrite.com?
• 05: Income Streams: Look how John Chow is doing!
• 05: Payperpost: a good way to make some dosh for bloggers?
• 05: Hosting@investorblogger.com
• 05: Name Your Price: Webhosting for those without deep pockets
• 02: Here Are A Few Web Design Tips For Businesses Living In The Jungle
• 02: Customers: TESOLTeachers.org
• 02: Quotation: Seneca
• 01: LittleAmerica.ws: a great example?

January 2007 (74)

• 31: Stockwire.com: A myspace for investors – or just plain ol’good?
• 31: Text Links on this blog: Available Now
• 31: Investorblogger’s Banner: Wanna Exchange?
• 31: How much is your website worth?
• 31: Two sides of Email: the nasty and the pleasant…
• 31: Warren Buffett: What’s your email address?
• 31: Posting Schedule Starts February 1st, 2007.
• 31: M$ acquires YHOO? Now that would be a boost for my stock!
• 30: Insurance needn’t be a nightmare, if you keep your cool!
• 30: Investing: How NOT to get started!
• 30: A motivational speaker just might inspire you!
• 29: Dogs 2007: Attractive Armchair Investing!
• 29: Google Page Rank: Ups and downs…
• 28: Small Websites: A good way to generate additional income!
• 28: Tweaked Admin Replacement Index
• 28: Thanks, John Chow
• 27: YHOO: going anywhere soon other than down?
• 27: Good Reading: Dugging, Reviewing, Bearishness, and the Essence of Being Rich!
• 27: Taipei City’s Experiment: The Wireless City – 2007
• 26: BlogDesk Saves the Day!
• 25: Do you have a ‘win the lottery’ or ‘baby steps’ mentality?
• 24: Good Reading: The Grand Dame of Dividends.
• 24: Mutual Win: do people really win-win with MutualWin?
• 24: Loan.com: is this ‘lending done right’?
• 24: Alexa Image Updater: Bingo
• 24: Gallarific: does this flexible gallery script make your gallery terrific?
• 23: M$: Digitally Real Mugging: DRM rips off customers…
• 23: Loans can empower your life: used wisely.
• 23: YHOO: Re – entry point?
• 23: PCLinuxOS 2007
• 23: Good News/Bad News: A new version of WordPress is out…
• 22: Blogging Software: BlogDesk
• 22: Business Cards: free or not? Get them for your business!
• 21: Useful Tools for Protecting Your PC
• 21: Apples and Oranges: making your pc into a fruit! Could cause you to pare things down!
• 20: Neat Simple Dashboard
• 19: In Sex and Blogging: is Frequency, Length, or Regularity important?
• 19: Quotations: Rex Stout
• 19: Great Investors Tools: Gurufocus.com
• 18: DELL and YHOO: I finally sold them
• 18: Local Businesses: We need SEO help, too!
• 18: Focus, Focus, Focus: Rule #1
• 17: Car parking: make money the easy Peasy way!
• 17: Regular Schedule of Posts: Beginning 1st February 2007.
• 17: Tip of the Day: Steve Pavlina
• 17: Second Hand cars: Lemons or Lemonfree?
• 17: Thinking about the blog: Explaining how I got here!
• 16: Income Stream: Using your movies to make $$$
• 16: Updating to WordPress 2.0.7: Hurrah!
• 15: Are you a nerd? I am!
• 15: PPP: a marketplace between advertisers and bloggers?
• 15: SEO Advice: Avoiding the bad guys!
• 14: Three Kinds of Blogs: the Passion, the Job, or the Splog?
• 14: Technorati Page!
• 13: Payperpost Really Does Help Make Money
• 13: Increasing your PageViews…
• 12: Good Reading – Fear and the risk of fear!
• 12: Excuses for Financial Fuzziness? Not acceptable here.
• 12: Quotations: Benjamin Franklin
• 11: Ways to cut your expenses: Refinance your Car Loan!
• 11: A useful plugin for Dreamhosters!
• 11: Google Ads: Should blogs have them or not?
• 10: Who can wait? I want my new mobile now!
• 09: Payperpost: Posts do really ‘ad’ up to successful ‘ad’vertising!
• 08: Domain Locking: Do you?
• 07: Cleaning Up My Blogs: Resolutions Come Early! Progress Report #1
• 06: December 2006: Scorecard
• 05: Quotations: Herbert Marcuse
• 05: Mess, Glorious Mess!
• 05: Do you use good Anti-Virus Software?
• 04: Our Feed isn’t working well, right now!
• 04: Great Tips #3: Maintain your plugins
• 03: Great Tips #4: Related Posts Plugin
• 01: PPP Blog Carnival: Available Now!

This wasn’t the first time that I had experienced such a spike, things had been pretty stable for a few months. But it was enough to prompt me to start reorganizing my sites: I manage/own over a dozen sites (some with no traffic, some with no income, some with no success!). I had to start by issuing this email to my clients!

Step One: Moved this blog

So, I signed up for a BlueHost account and transferred this blog to their hosting. In fact, the whole transition was relatively effortless, bar one problem: when I moved my install I somehow imported the posts into the database in the wrong format: ie. I think it was UTF-8, not Latin1-Swedish) I’m still wondering if it’s a big problem or not. Most of my posts look fine, but then some posts are hideous.

Since it doesn’t affect every post, I’m still confused at how or why it’s occurring. The other slight niggle was that I lost my install of Affiliate-o-matic, including the important files for configuring the updated versions!

In fact, courtesy of this program, I’ve created nearly $900 dollars worth of affiliate sales of books since I started doing it a few years ago. That’s without much tinkering of the script, in fact you can check it out installed on my site ! It’s now working again!

Step Two: Cleaning Up!

Having had the original account for four years, a lot of crud had built up: old data not removed, old installs not cleaned up, old databases not used in years, … so I spent 7 days reorganizing everything. I finally rooted out all the old unused sub-domains, installs and refugee data. Each of the users was allocated a new FTP user account, their essential data was moved to the new location, old data was stored or removed. Finally, I rebooted the server.

Difficult decisions

I’ve reached a decision point though with regard to Dreamhost. As a regular Dreamhost user, I am impressed by the facilities offered, the relative simplicity and help that is offered. In fact, in terms of simplicity, it is light years ahead of BlueHost. But Dreamhost’s biggest issue has been their stability – some of that was my own fault, I guess. But for business reasons, stability is more important than depth of resources available: some of the recent downtime since last August has really begun to affect my own traffic, as well as my customers. So we figured it’s time to move to more stable resources (or at least the business-related sites). I’ll keep the other sites here because the hosting on Dreamhost is just fine. But when traffic or business demands change, it’s wise to find the appropriate solution rather than whine and complain about the problem.

If you are facing a problem with your hosting company, you SHOULD have an alternative plan up your sleeve. There’s no use paying a little money for hosting and expecting it be totally robust. Dreamhost do their best, and for the money, they really do provide value for money. But if you’re livelihood depends on your website(s), you really need something SOLID.

So, my hosting needs will split into three: one site for this blog, a stable host (for the business sites), and Dreamhost for all the nascent sites until we see how they develop! I’m hoping that I can keep the costs within my budget, but anything has got to be better than throwing nearly $60 a month at broken servers!

What are you using for hosting? How is their service? How much do you pay? What problems did you encounter?

The first few days have been quite a breeze on BlueHost, but we’ll see the how things go. I’m not easily impressed as I was with net stuff.

Other notes on this website: I lost a few comments from a few readers, especially from MoneyEnergy. Sorry about that… I was desperately trying to get the blog working and had a lot of unwanted spam as a result. I think I lost about a week’s worth of comments or so.

I’m noting how different things are from Dreamhost, too. Some things that are easy in one are difficult in the other or, at least, not obvious.

Other soon-to-be changes include the theme: I’ll be looking for ways to simplify the theme, and make things even snappier. On Dreamhost, InvestorBlogger used to be a little slow at times. I’d like the first page to load in under 10 seconds (for me), and subsequent pages to be even faster. Right now, it’s loading in about 18-20 seconds for the blog page.

Please do drop me notes on what’s not working or missing images and stuff, … I haven’t done a full audit on what I had installed yet… Will do soon.

Best Wishes

Kenneth

Update: I’ve still disabled everything but it’s odd: one of my settings was set to fastcgi in dreamhost, and that is something I didn’t do. I think it’s the reason nothing has been working for the last few hours.

Update 2: Still having server issues. I’ve checked the logs, and there are a lot more error messages in the logs. There’s also a sudden increase in usage over the previous day. I’m still not sure what’s going on.

Kenneth

Shifted to Dividend Bearing stocks

That was the biggest shift I made. And it now produces about $100 per month gross (before taxes) for my account, which is not a bad return on the current value. I’m currently holding these stocks in my dividend portfolio, some of which now offer very attractive dividend rates.

I actually don’t know how much sense this portfolio makes for other people, but somehow it is comforting when the stock market is being creamed to check your account and see a regular income in dividends from your stocks. After losing a lot in the dot com crash, I currently find this preferable to picking stocks out of thin air. This portfolio has varied been $11K and $14K in value over the past few years, but with me being over 15% still in cash, the returns have still been quite respectable.

Paying Off Loans

We’ve nearly paid off our car loan, and we’re likely to start making other changes to our personal finances in the coming months. We now are considering paying off our mortgage quicker than usual, and we have several creative options that we are looking at.

With about NT$2.3 million still outstanding, a rising interest rate, it is tempting to shift more money into paying off our mortgage. Clearly considering the opportunity cost is something we’ll have to look at. Do we need the money elsewhere? Our salaries haven’t increased much over the last five years, though our life quality has improved in many ways. Therefore, inflation hasn’t really helped to mitigate our mortgage payment much. Lower interest rates initially helped, but with higher inflation rates creeping through most people are beginning to feel the pinch with higher oil prices, utility and food payments, and mortgages.

In the Biz column

Our business is financially ticking along at a slightly higher notch than in the previous two years, but it still hasn’t generated enough free cash to really amount to much. I had the depressing experience of comparing our financials to a number of companies, and realized that our business, though light in debt, still is relatively under capitalized. We are profitable, we do manage to budget our expenses well, and we are consistently beating budgets, but we are still trying to make up for the last three years poor performance when costs jumped out of control, and sales stagnated (that’s a position I don’t want to be in again, I can assure you!).

So we’re looking at a number of options to boost our business’ coffers, including short-term lending, better term deposit rates, and shoring up income. This should help in the long term, but it’s going to be a few years, before we find ourselves in the ‘healthy financials’ column.

Online Business

It’s been quite exhilarating online to reach the US$10K mark in entire earnings. In fact, that money is now sitting in the bank, earning a pittance. I’m planning to start using the money to generate more money (it’s all part of a money cascade… part of my philosophy!) where trickles of income flow back to create waves, then torrents of cash! Who knows if it will work? Part of the money has already been used to buy a new stock in my portfolio – more details later. More of the money helped open a new CD in my bank at about 2.2% (the best available at the moment in NTD). But the bulk really is just sitting there.

The bigger challenge is finding a real product that I can sell: I’ve had some success as an affiliate for Amazon racking up nearly $1K worth of book sales, and other smaller incomes, but running this blog has proven that it’s quite difficult for me to convert clicks. How difficult? Well, I’ve yet to sign up a single affiliate for any of my hosting plans (BlueHost or Dreamhost); I haven’t any ClickBank sales either. I keep feeling that I should persist with this to figure out the way to do affiliate sales, so that future online business opportunities become possible…

Any suggestions?

Milestones

March’s Income Report was a little late being published on this blog but April’s is going to be a little earlier! Why? Well because I reached a landmark!

$10,059 (US$)

But before that you read about this news, try out one of these two great ways to keep up with what’s happening on InvestorBlogger Dot Com:

——-
Subscribe to the feed: For more interesting articles on running a business, making money, operating your blog, , and so on…, subscribe to the RSS feed or email newsletter. There’s a lot more in the Random Walk to Wealth on InvestorBlogger dot com.
——-
Subscribe to the top 20 money making feeds: Subscribe to the top 20 money making feeds download. Just download it and upload it to your favorite RSS reader (Google Reader, BlogLines, etc. all work!) I’ve just updated the feeds with several new blogs that are worth reading. At the very least, check it out! After all, it’s free!
——-

So how did we do in April? Well, we achieved a good deal this month reaching a little over 51% of my initial target of $1200. However, caution is required: taxes and Paypal fees were taken out of this total as well as other costs.

* Bank Interest: $28.00
* Dividend Income: $109.49
* Advertising: $245.00
* Advertising (3rd party): $181.10
* Reviews – $30.00
* Consulting = $19.50
* Total = $613.09

*there are a few other residual sources but they generally don’t generate much, like Voxant, NetAudioAds, etc. that generate only a few cents a month. In addition, some sources that generate a lot one month, but nothing the next are not included.

I haven’t worked out the proportion of active vs. passive income yet, but it accounts for a little over half of the total income. I’m a big fan of passive income, and I’m now working very hard to increase the total of passive income to something nearer 75% of the total.

In terms of running a blog, it requires quite a bit of time, as does providing consulting and hosting services (which I enjoy doing). While monthly income varies from month to month, and sometimes by quite a lot, we’ve been a keeping an eye on the actual growth and reporting on a twice yearly basis shows a dramatic increase from the first six months to the third six months. So, in UK reporting style, here are the results:

February 2007 (1st 6 months): $2,462
August 2007 (2nd 6 months): $2,563
February 2008 (3rd 6 months): $3,994
August 2008 (4th 6 months): $-,—

Anyone care to guess? I’ll give you a hint as we’re already off to strong start. It’s only when we get a perspective over a longer time that we see what’s happening. If you want to read more about my plan, you can visit the entry.

Expenses

The blog currently has a few expenses such as hosting through Dreamhost’s VPS system and it works well. Of course, Domains and I own about ten or so all need to be paid for annually and Paypal Fees. I currently don’t advertise, though I may do so soon again.

* hosting – $49.40 (est.)
* Fees – $9.53 (Paypal, Commissions, etc.)
* Content, Development, and Advertising – $27.50
* Total = $86.43*

*These figures are estimates as final figures haven’t been received for some, and other commissions are invisible having been deducted at source.

It’s been a wild ride since I started blogging in 2006 on this blog! If you’re interested in what went before, check out Obblogatory dot com.

Thanks for all your support!

In the first article

In the first article, we looked at how to find a suitable place for blogging. There are free hosted solutions but these entail a number of limitations, and most people share the same opinion as Michael commented in my review of his blogger blog, The View from Taiwan, does:

“…I face similar dilemmas with my own blogger template, and wish now that I had used WordPress from the beginning. blogger is just too antiquated, buggy, and sluggish to do anything …”

What’s the difference?

It’s important to choose between having your blog hosted for you (as at blogger or WordPress.com or similar hosting companies – and there are many) and hosting it yourself on your own domain. For new bloggers, though, without much technical background, the issue boils down to:

Your own hosted domain gives you:

• a place to try out blogging;
• it costs some money; and
• you get your own FULL url, ie. http://www.yourdomain.com

BUT

• you don’t get much help to RUN your domain;
• there’s quite a learning curve to running your own site; and
• it costs some money.

Using a blogger or similar hosted service gives you:

• a well tested service;
• fairly decent startup templates; and
• it’s usually free

BUT

• if you decide you like to blog, moving can be a pain;
• some people regret the complexity of moving; and
• you DON’T get a decent domain name, usually http://yoursubdomain.blogger.com

For this article, we are going to assume that you have chosen to host the blog on your own domain, in the main folder for your website, http://yourdomain.com or whatever.

What is a blogging Platform?

A blogging Platform is the actual software (or computer program) that you place (or upload) to your server via FTP. For this you will need an actual database set up as well, whichever platform you use. For many of the hosting companies, though, when you login into your panel (that website thath controls the functions of your hosting account), you’ll be able to set up your blog, e.g. WordPress, in one or two steps. I’d suggest that you choose the easiest setup yourself at the beginning.

One-Click Install on Self-Hosted Domain

Dreamhost offers one blogging option on its Easy Install and one in its Advanced Install mode: WordPress 2.5. I’m including this as an example of a one-click install.

You simply fill in the name of the blog, the email address you will use, and the (sub)domain you want to host it on. As you will see, there are some limitations on this install, but it will give you a perfectly functional install of WordPress that you can easily update to a full-blown install. Many hosting companies, including BlueHost, Dreamhost, MediaTemple, etc. offer one-click type installs that make it easy to install a blog. You may not always get the platform of your choice, so check first before you hand over the dosh. A typical choice would be WordPress, B2, or any of a dozen other second-tier blogging platforms.

WordPress vs. Moveable Type – Tier 1

Is WordPress #1?

Perhaps this is the best known blogging platform. In fact, if you are seriously considering using this, sign up for a free blog at WordPress.com account and test out the latest blogging tools in WordPress BEFORE you even install it. Once you’re ready, just use the one-click install feature on hosting account.

It’s a pretty good platform overall, and you can be posting within minutes, if you wish, too.

Moveable Type: Confused?

MoveableType is the next major choice for an independent platform. In fact, some of my favorite blogs are hosted using MT software, such as Scott Sommers’ blog on Taiwan. I haven’t used MT yet myself, though I am interested in trying it out for its native support of multiple blogs (it’s uploading now).

The tools operate in a similar fashion to WordPress and it is a very worthy choice. BUT users need to note that there are free options and commercial options.

On your own host: If you wish to host MT on your own host, then you can download one of the different versions: Personal (ie. non-commercial) Edition, Commercial or Enterprise editions. The key to the different versions seems to be how many users will be editing the blogs and/or whether the primary motive is running a commercial or non-commercial site. Then, of course, there’s the OpenSource version, too.

On their hosting: Moveable Type also provides their own hosting on TypePad that you can pay for an annual basis from $4.95 per month right on upto Premium and Business Class plans.

So will it be OpenSource, MT or TypePad?

Confused? I know I am. Also the other concern is – what is non-commercial?… A popular choice – undoubtedly! A solid choice – certainly! A confusing choice?… For sure. Also, if I were setting up a blog, I’d be much more inclined to pay for their own hosting on TypePad or choose the OpenSource version for my own hosting plan.

While nothing beats free, TypePad offers an easy solution to bloggers not wanting to deal with the hassles of setting up, configuring and updating the software or the database. Of course, you’re subject to some similar restrictions as on blogger or WordPress.com but for beginners that may be okay.

And my conclusion?…

There are a lot of second-tier blogging platforms out in the wild, but for beginners it would be wise to choose one that is first-tier to make the transition to blogging easier. There are enough problems to deal with, without worrying about technical details, too. To make it easier to choose, try this:

1. If you have money but lack time or technological background, paying for TypePad would be a good place to start.
2. If you have some money and some time/skill in technology, self-hosting either WordPress or MT (OpenSource) would be a good choice.
3. If you have a little money but no skill in tech, self-hosting but going the one-click route would be appropriate for you.
4. If you have no money and no skills, then WordPress.com would be the best as it leaves you with an upgrade path (though money making options may be restricted somewhat by the TOS – and blogs are removed for breaking TOS). blogger would also be a choice for you without the TOS restrictions on advertising.

What did you choose…?

Let me know what you chose for your first platform, why and what problems you faced in your choice.

Step 1: Getting Started – Basic Reading

Blogging To The Bank – This is a popular book that provides a system for encouraging bloggers and webmasters to earn. Spending the money on this book could save months of frustration and failure as Rob Benwell takes you through his insiders method for bloggers that helped him to earn up to $34K per month! Why wait? Order “Blogging to the Bank” now.

Blogging for Dummies - What is blogging? The perfect companion to WordPress for Dummies or those thinking of using another platform. Though more generic it covers much of the same ground but with a platform neutral view. Order “Blogging for Dummies” now.

Step 2: Finding good webhosting

There are thousands of hosts on the web nowadays. Some good, some not. If you don’t have a host already checked out, you can look at these two companies.

Dreamhost Hosting – This is the first company I used and the deal is a great deal. To run your blog, this company offers two types of setup: easy and advanced. Truthfully, advanced isn’t much more complicated than easy mode. But there are a lot of advantages: FTP access, generous bandwidth, lots of great features, … Order Your Dreamhost Plan now.

BlueHost – is a suitable alternative and offers a lot of power, space and flexibility for the blogger. You get 1,500GB of space, 15,000 GB/mo of bandwidth, simple install of WordPress, FTP access, and a bunch of other great features that you can use as well. Order Your BlueHost Plan now.

Step 3: Installing WordPress

WordPress for Dummies - This book introduces the WordPress platform as a basis for blogging. It will take you through choosing a webhost, setting up a domain and install, personalizing your format, theme, writing and plugins, and much more. It’s the perfect companion to WordPress that I wish I’d had when I started InvestorBlogger three years ago. Order “WordPress for Dummies” now.

WordPress.org provides a free download that you need to decompress, and upload to your FTP server in the main folder of your URL, like “mydomain.com” or wherever you decide to place the blog. Download Your WordPress now.

Step 4: Start blogging

Learning the craft of blogging is the next step as you familiarize yourself with the technology of blogging, the craft of blogging and the art of building an audience.

Problogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income offers a great book as well as an active website that teaches the basics of blogging. Problogger will teach you how to select the subjects that works for you, how to evaluate and direct your blog’s success, how to keep content fresh and exciting, and how to develop income sources from your blog. Order “Problogger’s Secrets” now.

Step 5: Tricking Out Your blog

OIOPublisher plugin – This plugin offers you a realistic and very manageable way to earn your own money from your blog. It allows you to sell all manner of advertising on your blog, and keep 100% of the income for yourself. It’s got a Paypal Module, a Tracker Module, an in-built Ad Manager Module, and much more. Order “OIO Publisher Plugin” now.

Step 6: Monetizing Your blog

Text Link Ads is one of my favorite ad networks. They help me make money online by selling those text links you see under “Featured Sites.” The links offer advertisers traffic and search engine benefits and readers don’t seem to mind them at all because they are not intrusive. Your ad price is set by Text Link Ads and is based on Alexa, Google PageRank, number of RSS subscribers, and other factors. Join “Text Link Ads” now.

Linkworth offers a wide variety of advertising options for earning revenue on your blog or website. It’s well worth looking at their offerings, though it may take a while for your first advertiser to bite. Text ads, link-type ads, etc.. It’s not an easy option to begin but will provide a great number of alternatives in your advertising choices. Join “LinkWorth” now.

I’ll be adding more on the Make Money page as it evolves. I hope you find the tools interesting and valuable.

This page takes you through the different products that will get you started on blogging.

Step 1: Getting Started – Basic Reading

Blogging To The Bank – This is a popular book that provides a system for encouraging bloggers and webmasters to earn. Spending the money on this blogging book could save months of frustration and failure as Rob Benwell takes you through his insiders method for blogging that helped him to earn up to $34K per month! Why wait? Order "Blogging to the Bank" now.

Blogging for Dummies - What is blogging? The perfect companion to WordPress for Dummies or those thinking of using another blogging platform. Though more generic it covers much of the same ground but with a platform neutral view. Order "Blogging for Dummies" now.

Step 2: Finding Hosting

There are thousands of hosts on the web nowadays. Some good, some not. If you don’t have a host already checked out, you can look at these two companies.

Dreamhost Hosting – This is the first company I used and the deal is a great deal. For blogging, this company offers two types of setup: easy and advanced. Truthfully, advanced isn’t much more complicated than easy mode. But there are a lot of advantages: FTP access, generous bandwidth, lots of great features, … Order Your Dreamhost Plan now.

BlueHost – is a suitable alternative and offers a lot of power, space and flexibility for the blogger. You get 1,500GB of space, 15,000 GB/mo of bandwidth, simple install of WordPress, FTP access, and a bunch of other great features that you can use as well. Order Your BlueHost Plan now.

Step 3: Installing WordPress

WordPress for Dummies - This book introduces the WordPress platform as a basis for blogging. It will take you through choosing a host, setting up a domain and install, personalizing your format, theme, writing and plugins, and much more. It’s the perfect companion to WordPress that I wish I’d had when I started InvestorBlogger three years ago. Order "WordPress for Dummies" now.

WordPress.org provides a free download that you need to decompress, and upload to your hosting company server in the main folder of your URL, like "mydomain.com" or wherever you decide to host the blog. Download Your WordPress now.

Step 4: Start blogging

Learning the craft of blogging is the next step as you familiarize yourself with the technology of blogging, the craft of blogging and the art of building an audience. You can read my own basic series or one of the other suggested readings below.

Problogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income offers a great book as well as an active website that teaches the basics of blogging. Problogger will teach you how to select the subjects that works for you, how to evaluate and direct your blog’s success, how to keep content fresh and exciting, and how to develop income sources from your blog. Order "Problogger’s Secrets" now.

Further Reading: There is also a short series of posts on this blog that takes you through the steps of setting up, managing and posting your first blog posts called Getting Started With WordPress.

Step 5: Tricking Out Your blog

OIOPublisher plugin – This plugin offers you a realistic and very manageable way to earn your own money from your blog. It allows you to sell all manner of advertising on your blog, and keep 100% of the income for yourself. It’s got a Paypal Module, a Tracker Module, an in-built Ad Manager Module, and much more. Order "OIO Publisher Plugin" now.

Themes for WordPress – When you download the theme, or buy hosting with WordPress included, you will likely get tired of the standard themes quickly. Then it’s time to trick out your blog with a new theme, esp. one that isn’t used on thousands of other sites! Buy your new theme now.

Step 6: Monetizing Your blog

Text Link Ads is one of my favorite ad networks. They help me make money online by selling those text links you see under Featured Sites. The links offer advertisers traffic and search engine benefits and readers don’t seem to mind them at all because they are not intrusive. Your link price is set by Text Link Ads and is based on Alexa, Google PageRank, number of RSS subscribers, and other factors. Join "Text Link Ads" now.

Linkworth offers a wide variety of advertising options for earning revenue on your blog or website. It’s well worth looking at their offerings, though it may take a while for your first advertiser to bite. Text ads, Link ads, etc.. It’s not an easy option to begin but will provide a great number of alternatives in your advertising choices. Join "LinkWorth" now.

Step 7: Keep Checking This Page

I’ll be adding more great offers, great tools and much more useful information for this page in the future, so don’t forget to bookmark the page!

Version 1.08 released on July 28th, 2008.

Here are some notes. I’ve accorded each a status out of five points to help you consider if you should try them on your website:

* works poorly or doesn’t work
** works but unsatisfactory
*** works satisfactorily
**** works well but have some reservations
***** works very well and is recommended.

1. Google Ads.
Setting Google to display images instead of text ads is improving my clickthroughs. I’m displaying three ad boxes on the columns on auto-rotation. It’s improving from running traditional google ads. Even if no-one clicks, it’s a little more eye candy. I’ve still to decide whether Adsense will be a permanent feature on this blog or not. Image Ads are saving their skin at the moment… but… So it’s still generating income, much to my surprise.
Status: Works OK. (***)

2. Real Traffic Exchange
Real Traffic Exchange is producing some nice clicks but my own ads aren’t converting at all. So I’ve got to tweak them. I haven’t decided to keep them permanently yet. Also, updates are very slow if you make any changes to the text. Very SLOW.
Status: Works. (***)

3. TopSpots
TopSpots isn’t an expensive way to advertise on my blog, and I’ve seen several new purchases this month. I had a fake transaction that showed up that wasn’t paid for, so I quickly removed that. I would also like a thinner widget as it is a little wide for this theme.
Status: Works well. (****)

4. TTZ Media Ads
The TTZ Media ads are causing a bit of a headache, not displaying properly at times, but things seem fine right now. Generally, they’re not producing any clickthroughs in the sidebar at the moment. I think they’ll perform better in the post or between posts.
Status: Oh, well. (**)

5. TLA – Sell Ads for Traffic
I’ve recently had two new advertisers show up on the right sidebar. If you’d like a special offer to buy advertising here or sell your own advertising, check out Text Link Ads. This generates a fair amount of the monthly income from this blog. But it’s not without risks and penalties.
Status: Works fine but some hesitancy to recommend this due to the nature of the advertising. (****)

6. SocialSpark and PayPerPost
blog Sponsorship: I’ve added the blog Sponsorship at the bottom and on the first visit. The service is provided by SocialSpark. I’m only running it to see what would happen, if it adds to the blog or detracts from it.
(***) Status: seems okay, but only from a lack of information.

Other than that, I’m not currently doing any advertising for either of these due to limitations on my blogs’ presentation and ranking and segmentation. You can read more about this in other posts. Search for Payperpost articles. There’re lots.
Status: (****) – I do have serious reservations about this kind of advertising, but it works.

7. NetAudioAds

Publish NetAudioAds Adlets

Earlier this month I removed the NetAudioAds software from the blog, after being strung along for months by their always coming notice. Though my account is still active, I have all but given up hope that this will turn into a viable long term income source.
Status: Works but unsatisfactory due to lack of real ads to show. (**)

8. Voxant
TheNewsRoom is a video based website that provides feeds that can be shared and can earn money for your blogs. The videos I found present a number of problems: the new code is difficult to place in posts, I find; the videos aren’t current to begin with; the videos get removed (leaving ugly big gaps in your older blog posts); and payout rates are well… poor to say the least.
Status (*) I’ve not added this to any posts of late. I would remove them from older posts but I can’t find them.

9. Affiliates: Dreamhost vs. BlueHost
Although this blog has been hosted by Dreamhost for as long as it’s been online (and I love them, they’re great MOST OF THE TIME!), their affiliate program has not worked for me at all. I’ve had thousands of clickthroughs and not a single sign up in more than two years. So I’ve switched one of the text links to BlueHost to compare the results. The difference: I can track exactly where links come from to see what performs and what doesn’t.
Status: Works but not effectively (**)… Let’s hope that it gets a three-star, soon.

10. Amazon: Still successful.
I’ve been selling books on Amazon for quite some time now, and I’m still surprised to see anything sell there, but they do. Since January 2007, I’ve sold over $379 and earned a whopping commission of about $15. So affiliate marketing does work. But I don’t know how.
Status: (****) – definitely needs more work to make this profitable. But if you can sell $300, $3,000 shouldn’t be so hard, right?

I’ve also tried AdToll which is still active, but not being used here right now; Adbrite which was a waste of time; PayU2Blog (which don’t do customer service well, and bloggers who advertise for clients are as much customers because they provide the adspace); and a whole bunch of others that I can’t remember.

I’m always heartened by doing a post like this as it reminds me what I have been able to do with such knowledge as I have. Do check through the sites I’ve linked to (affiliate codes are included for most). Let me know how’re your money making efforts going with these vendors? Let me know.

This post has already been updated.

Kenneth

… I wanted to ask you some questions…This is for my personal use, i have a site on guitars(http://guitarheat.com/)
This is the blog page http://guitarheat.com/lessons/

Can you suggest me ways of how to built a blog and monetize it…

Also does your site have a wordpress theme?? or something else??
I have bought around 34 domains in the recent time, and i am thinking of devoluping a few…

So can you give any suggestions of how should i go with my regular blog? Will follow the same guidelines for all upcoming sites….
Also do you use Adsense? or any other affiliate?

If you have time and can suggest me something, it will be really kind of you.

Thank You
Anuj

These days with over 110 million blogs and more being created daily there are a number of challenges that need to be overcome.

But success boils down to three primary principles. There are three things you need to do to build a blog…

a. find content for your blog that is unique, relevant and well-written;
b. find an audience that needs your content or is motivated to read it, return to your blog or subscribe to your RSS feeds; and
c. find ways to monetize your blog through advertising, textlinking and affiliate marketing.

It’s that simple, and that difficult. If this is the first time you ran your own blog, I’d suggest that you work on one blog at the beginning otherwise you’ll find it to difficult to learn how to manage everything. When you have mastered the first blog, you’ll find the second and subsequent blogs much quicker to develop.

Finding a blog host

For your first blog, you can use Blogger if you wish or WordPress.com. I would strongly suggest that you don’t as there are a number of limitations for each of these. You won’t notice the limitations at the beginning, but after a few months you’ll begin to wonder why you didn’t make a different decision.

blogger Limitations

I loathe the commenting system on blogger. I hate the fact that most themes on blogger don’t show the comments after the post; I hate the fact that titles aren’t clickable in blogger themes, so it’s difficult for me to find the post URL to put in my article. That means less trackbacks and comments from me. I also think that other limitations will begin to annoy you seriously after a few months.

WordPress dot com Limitations

On WordPress.com there are a number of limitations, including the fact that you can’t add your own plugins, you’re not allowed to sell particular kinds of advertising; and both blogger and WordPress may decide that your blog is SPAM and lock it down or remove it, with little or no redress on your part.

HOWEVER, saying that using either of these is a good way to get a feel for the phenomenon of blogging and the tools that you are likely to use. In WordPress.com’s case, it will help you to understand how WordPress Software actually works. Very helpful.

Hosting your own blog

This is ultimately the best solution for most people. And when you pay for your own hosting, you will get your own domain name thrown in. You will also have your own server space, bandwidth, your own email accounts… and much more. Most importantly, you’ll be free to add your own plugins, use whatever themes you like, sell whatever advertising you like, write whatever kind of content you like, and much more…

For example if you sign up with BlueHost, you will get GB’s of space, TB’s of bandwidth, a ton of good features such as emailing, and mailing list help, … take a look at the panel from the demo.

Many full-size host offer WordPress as a simple install on their panel once you register. Dreamhost, BlueHost, MediaTemple, etc… all do. I’d like to look at installing WordPress manually in this post, but I think that’s beyond the remit of this “Getting Started Series”.

In general, despite the learning curve on WordPress software, you can still get started pretty quickly, esp. after learning the basics on WordPress.com’s trainer blogs. Once you’ve signed up for hosting, chosen your domain name and installed a blogger platform, why not do some test posting.

In Lesson 2, we’ll look at two or three different platforms; In Lesson 3, we’ll look at developing different content and so on; Lesson 4 brings up the issue of finding traffic; and Lesson 5 brings up how to monetize the blog. It’s likely that I’ll write longer posts so I may delay some of the later lessons.

Recent Posts

With these days of a heady credit crisis, I’ve focused a lot on financial issues of late from borrowing money in China via a ‘hui’ (a unique self-help scheme that CAN work), to learning more about why we always feel broke in Cash Low? Play CashFlow 101 and learn why, disclosing my own personal Credit Card habits in Mr Credit Card’s Survey: My Personal Answers… And yours?. Before taking any loan, you need to read the fine print before you sign. Shopping these days also provides its own headaches, and I’m not sure what was going on when I bought some CDs at Carrefour.

This month has not been without its challenges: Accident Prone: And it’s not April First, and April Fools: Technorati, Safari, SRG, and Analytics – all borked. Of course, I’ve been updating all my blogs to the latest version of WordPress 2.5 and I’m loving it – WordPress 2.5: Five Things InvestorBlogger loves!. But upgrading hasn’t been without its own tribulations: the blog that hosted the Carnival of Making Real Money: 18th Edition April 1st, 2008 has been experiencing trouble since I tried a manual upgrade, then an automatic upgrade. I had to revert to a previous version to get it working again. No idea why: the plugins are all the same as the other blogs.

And lastly, in my feature post, I looked at how success comes in different disguises in Making it on Main Street: Are you looking for the big kahuna?

In Today’s News

There are three stories that I would like to share in today’s news: Social Spark, Kiva Sponsorship, and Dreamhost (it ain’t so bad after all!)

Social Spark

Social Spark is now live and in Alpha. I was given a special code that meant that I could finally access it, if you’re lucky and you’re already a member of either PayPerPost or the Izea Boards, you may get a code by fnding a thread in which ‘keys’ are being given away. You may not get one, but it’s worth a try. I was surprised to get one! The whole system is very different to the current PayPerPost system, and offers new opportunities and new challenges. In fact, it’s a cross between elements of FaceBook, MyBlogLog and PayPerPost.

There’s a lot more to do in your profile, as you can interact with other bloggers and advertisers, your profile is quite detailed, as are the stats on your traffic. You’ll also find some variations on the traditional opps that you can take: traditional type opps have bonuses for work well done, there are ‘sparks’ which can be done for free in return for some non-monetary compensation, and there is blog sponsorship which posts a large Ajax type advertisement on your blog the first time someone visits, and after it’s been dismissed, a bar at the bottom of your blog’s webpage.

This is a sample for the current sponsorship that is supposed to be on my blog, but isn’t… yet. There are a whole range of other features for the social aspect, but since this program is still an alpha preview, a lot of things don’t work properly or at all, some of the organisation seems chaotic and less than ideal for new users, but the potential is tremendous. I do also like the fact that PayPerPost has allowed bloggers to go ‘nofollow’ on in-post links, making it acceptable for bloggers who would rather not cross swords with the Big G.

Kiva: New Sponsorship

Having been a participant in Kiva for over a year, I recently doubled my ‘investment’ in the organisation and now have sponsored a new client as part of a syndicate. This is a very worthy cause, and a great way to give something back to the community. I received this email from Kiva today stating:

This is an update written by Lola Khusanova on: Nasim Nabijonov

Thank you for your loan. It has been disbursed to Nasim Nabijonov by International MicroLoan Fund (IMON) in Tajikistan. We are excited to watch this business grow. Over the next 9 months, International MicroLoan Fund (IMON) will be collecting repayments from this entrepreneur and posting progress updates on the Kiva website.

Kiva very much appreciates your responses online. …

Take a look at his story at his bio and story.

Nasim has run his business of office supplies sales for more than 11 years in the central market. He competes effectively with big stores by offering prices that are lower and more attractive. This has helped him to succeed in his business. Nasim requests a loan of $1000.00 for the term of 9 months to expand the business and purchase more office supplies to sell.

This kind of entrepreneurship and vision is important if you want to succeed in your business.

Dreamhost: ups and downs.

In recent months, Dreamhost has added a lot of interesting features for its customers. Despite my complaints, I’ve generally found that for private and personal hosting, as well as small company hosting, Dreamhost is a great choice. If, like this blog, your website is attracting more traffic, perhaps it’s time to consider more serious choices… Things I’ve noticed:

1. Google Hosted Domains are now easy -

2. Easy Mode for some hosted Apps

3. There’s a wide range of hosted software that can be installed automatically for you at Dreamhost, including WordPress, Zenphoto, Gallery, PhpGedView, Pligg, dotProject, Moodle, Joomla, phpbb, MediaWiki, WebCalendar, and Advanced Poll. Some nice stuff there.

In tomorrow’s post, I’ll be looking at seven ways I’ve gotten additional traffic in recent months: what they are, why they work, and the kind of results you can or can’t expect.

Till then, happy blogging!

I’ve been plugging my free download as a way to attract visitors to download the top twenty subscriptions. Still waiting for that to work. I guess most people already seem to have their own ideas about who they want to download and listen to or read. I’ll leave it up anyway.

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For more interesting articles on running a business, making money, operating your blog, , and so on…, subscribe to the RSS feed or email newsletter. There’s a lot more in the Random Walk to Wealth on InvestorBlogger dot com.
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So let’s deal with the money fiirst this month. We’re edging ever slightly closer to the $10,000 mark. I had hoped that we’d pass it this month, but it wasn’t to be. Several sources of income proved unreliable this month as consulting work dried and I decided (temporarily) to quit PayPerPost. This really emphasizes why it is important to retain a number of income sources to prevent over-reliance on one. PayPerPost used to provide a majority of the income that this blog generated, but this past month I was forced out of the program because I had to choose between my own advertisers and PayPerPost – like that was a hard one!

* Bank Interest: $26.48
* Dividend Income: $75.52
* Affiliate Income: $3.04
* TLA – $81.43
* LinkWorth – $63.50 (for three sites)
* TopSpots – $1.78
blogging – $60.00
* hosting = $114.75
* Total = $426.50*
*there are a few other residual sources but they generally don’t generate much, like Voxant, NetAudioAds, etc. that generate only a few cents a month. In addition, some sources that generate a lot one month, but nothing the next are not included.

The odd factor about this income is that most of the money generated actually didn’t require me to do very much in terms of time, ie. it was mostly fairly passive income. If I had watched TV, written a book, slept for the entire month, or gone on a world tour, most of this money would have still been there. How nice! Of course, I wouldn’t desert my readers!

According to my plan, developing a part-time income from work is important. I have had several contacts for part-time work in Taipei, but it isn’t something I’m able to do just now. I’d love to switch my teaching load from full-time to part-time, but I can’t find anyone that would commit to working with us on a longer term basis. Renting is still an option that we’ve not explored fully yet, but my wife and I are talking about doing this in the longer term. We enjoy where we live right now, and we’re just not quite ready to move out.

Total Income Generated

Naturally, this means my total generated by blogging now jumps to $9446.87. With $10,000 just a little bit nearer, it surprises me that I could earn so much extra income just by focusing on what’s around me. Now I’m always looking for ideas to create additional income streams, and there are loads. But you can’t see them with your eyes: you have to use your head to see them.

Expenses

The blog currently only has a few expenses such as hosting through Dreamhost’s VPS system and it works well. Of course, Domains and I own about ten or so all need to be paid for annually and Paypal Fees. I currently don’t advertise, though I may do so soon again.

* hosting – $49.40 (est.)
* Fees – $0.00 (Paypal, Commissions, etc.)
* Content, Development, and Advertising – $94.20
* Total = $93.62*

*These figures are estimates as final figures haven’t been received for some, and other commissions are invisible having been deducted at source.

One other obvious factor that is now affecting earnings: the US$ vs NT$ is now approximately $1: NT$30.5 +/- 0.5 which is boosting some earnings superficially. Since I don’t do actual exchanges, the value is a notional amount, but it is worth mentioning that a few months ago the rate was over NT$32.5 so the NTD has strengthened quickly. We’d been expecting this for some time, but it was a surprise just how fast it jumped. It’s likely that we’ll see rates approaching NT$29.5 later this year, though it should stabilize in the short term. The USD is likely to remain weak for quite some time; and the GBP is looking like the next victim as the currency weakens in a slowing economy and property market. I’m not forecasting rates for that, but GBP:NTD is already 10% down from historical highs.

I keep getting cut off from my ADSL, so I guess this is a signal to finish this part of the post as quickly as possible. I’ve already written most of the traffic report, which I’ll publish tomorrow.

Don’t delete that FTP user!

I was clearing out the backlong of files for my server, emptying databases, and tidying up other stuff as well. Having been on Dreamhost for four years, I had accumulated over 50 mysql databases, twenty or so users (some now redundant), lots of installs, etc.. I began emptying the server in August last year, but only went part of the way. So last night I started deleting unused databases, and one or two infrequently used FTP users.

Unfortunately, this is what happens when you are careless…

I’m told that Dreamhost has backups of sites for such emergencies, so I wrote begging for help. I wonder if they’ll get back to me soon or not. I don’t have a backup of that site myself, either. So I’m hoping that the owner will have a backup … he should. Right? If you don’t have a backup of your site, esp. the database and the files… you shouldn’t be reading this. Go and do it. NOW!

This is the said email: it’s just like that 911 call you hear on the news, distressed voice on the other line…

HELP!

I was checking through the users on the manage users tab… and I don’t know how it happened but I deleted user ‘kuixing’… everything is gone!

I swear I didn’t hit delete or anything… but I backtabbed from the delete user screen. Then I refreshed the main FTP user list page… https://panel.dreamhost.com/index.cgi?tree=users.users&

And boom! Everything for user ‘****’ was deleted!

Is it possible to restore this user’s data?

Kenneth

Of course, I want to hear good news, but I’m braced for the worst. Let’s hope the give the news soon. Dreamhost service hasn’t been as good as I experienced before especially since I upgraded to their VPS hosting. Let’s hope they come through!

Don’t put your glasses on the floor!

I had a quick nap in the afternoon. I must have taken my glasses off, and put them on the bed as I slept. After getting up, my wife came in and fluffed the blanks. Glasses became aerial and end up on the floor whereupon her left foot comes into contact with the left lens (the expensive lens) and suddenly I have several lenses of varying sizes. Naturally, since she is my wife, this is *not* her fault! My old IBM notebook met a similar fate at her feet.

Of course, this is going to be expensive to replace, but fortunately the frame is fine somehow. I’ll give you a quote. Since I spend a lot of time at the computer, I need glasses so I have three pairs in all. I’ll be pressing my other pair into action this afternoon.

I want to hear good news on that one, too. But I know that it won’t be cheap to fix them!

Don’t drop the last coffee beans!

Then we’re almost out of coffee at work, the last precious coffee beans in the coffee jar. I put them in the grinder and hit grind. Then I stopped to see the quality of the grind, and the lid flew off scattering coffee half-ground beans ALL over the floor. Result: we all had half size cups of coffee. It was all the more delicious because it was so precious! The lack of coffee will affect productivity, too. I’d like to hear good news about those beans, but I have to go to Costco . That’s always bad for the budget and the waistliine.

Does anyone else think I’m kind of clumsy? Let’s see: I’ve lost my camera, lost several wallets, bank books, ATM cards, credit cards, ID cards, …

In Recent News

This review of recent posts starts of with the results from the Presidential Election from Taiwan 2008 in which the incumbent party got its ass kicked sharply, and we now have a new president-elect. This should bode well for business, investing and finance as Taiwan opens up to China and the world more. Of course, it fit in well with the theme “When thing’s don’t work… shake things up!” and that is what I will be doing short.

I already kicked out PayPerPost because it wasn’t working and I’m moving this blog to a new host once I find a reliable one. Why? Because just as the 17th Carnival of Making REAL Money: March 22nd 2008 Edition and my blog was featured on the front of BlogCarnival, Dreamhost pulled the plug for 12 L-O-N-G hours as they upgraded their equipment. I was back by 3pm NYT but I lost most of the daytime traffic that resulted from that.

The other big news was leaving PayPerPost (for the time being!) in an Open letter to PayPerPost: Goodbye and thanks for all the fish! I had several posts rejected because of ‘intrusive’ advertising which was against their TOS. Well, in Whose blog is it anyway? I wrote about how I was forced to protect my current advertisers by PayPerPost who effectively made me choose between a lot of money (my advertisers) and a little money (PayPerPost’s) – Wow! That was a hard decision. And in my first selection, one of the reasons my Carnival has been selected twice, was how I handle blog carnivals which I wrote up in Five Steps to Managing a Carnival: Policy and Action. So that’s the past ten days in InvestorBlogger dot com.

And now on with today’s news stories…

SneakPeak WordPress 2.5

Flashing on my screen today when I logged in: this intriguing news about WordPress 2.5:

A customizable dashboard, multi-file upload, built-in galleries, one-click plugin upgrades, tag management, built-in Gravatars, full text feeds, and faster load times sound interesting? Then WordPress 2.5 might be the release for you. It’s been in the oven for a while, and we’re finally ready to open the doors a bit to give you a taste.

Of course, I’m really eager to try the new software out but it’s unlikely I will be trying it on this blog any time soon. Why? Caution. There are likely to be bugs in the software that cause problems, and I don’t want to be the first to find them on InvestorBlogger. I WILL be trying it out on my new blog though, because the blog is basically a standard install without many frills. You can read more about upgrading WordPress.

SocialSpark: Alpha rolls out

As many of you know, SocialSpark will be a revolutionary change in advertising through blogs. It will also be a step (too late for my PayPerPost involvement) in the right direction as it recognizes that nofollow is now important (whether one agrees with it or not); Andy Beard has already a fairly detailed introduction to SocialSpark (probably about as much as anyone outside the inner circle knows!). Anyway, today, as an advertiser on PayPerPost, my wife received this interesting email announcing the next stage.

As I am sure you know, we are very close to releasing a public BETA of SocialSpark, our new Social Marketing Network. We would like to invite you to participate in a private ALPHA prior to that release. We are not accepting any hard dollars during the Alpha period, rather we are providing credits for current PayPerPost advertisers.

Now through the end of March, for every $1000 you spend in PayPerPost we will credit you with $100 in SocialSpark Alpha Bucks and a key to the Alpha. Maximum $5000 Alpha Bucks per advertiser. You can spend your credits on anything in the system during the month of April.

These credits have no cash value and can not be redeemed outside of SocialSpark. All credits must be utilized between April 1 and April 30th, 2008.

If you are interested in participating in this limited Alpha launch program please contact me or your sales representative for more information.

Regards,

Joe Vaughn
Director of Sales
IZEA – Innovations in Social Media

Since her budget isn’t that big, it’s unlikely she’ll qualify for the credit! (oh, well!) But anyway, the following screenshot shows some of the must-have features. A closer look at the center reveals that there will be quite a lot of information for advertisers on each page:including Page Rank, Alexa, Comments, blogger Profiles, click tracking, etc…

There are still a number of problems with Page Rank to be worked out, also with nofollow tags which are going to be common, and persuading advertisers that the new metrics will really help drive traffic. At the moment, most of the advertisers in the PayPerPost system are signing up to buy pagerank rather than traffic. In fact, in the most recent three campaigns that I ran (albeit small campaigns), the clickthroughs to my blog were in fact quite minimal – I ended up paying nearly $10.00 per click as tracked by Google Analytics. Although I got a $100 dollar freebie, at nearly $4 per click it was pretty expensive. Part of the fault may lie in the lack of actionable content, the fact that I got some really low quality posts on free domains (which I did not want), and some of the writing was lackluster to say the least.

Updating my Hosting

Having been with Dreamhost for over 3 years, I was comfortable with their service, enjoyed their generous space allotments, and have had quite a learning experience over the years. But one feature I have noted over the past few years: they’re just not so robust or reliable. In August, just as my traffic was picking up, there were outages that lasted on and off several days. Then again in September. In January 2008, there were serious billing issues. Then again on March 22nd we had an outage of 12 hours. I’ve also had persistent problems with old sub-domains that haven’t been ported properly.

While for many sites that are smaller with less visitors, the occasional outage isn’t a big deal, on several occasion just as traffic was building up, something happened to cap that traffic on InvestorBlogger Dot Com. I think that I’m getting the sign that it is time to move hosting to something more robust and stable, esp. some hosting service that will open up the doors to more traffic. I’m now considering two or three additional hosting companies: BlueHost, BlueFur, MediaTemple and A Small Orange are my candidates. BlueHost seems to offer a lot for a little (warning signs?), BlueFur (which hosts John Chow’s blog) had trouble getting their act together for new sales leads, MediaTemple seems okay and has a bit of oomph, and A Small Orange (seems expensive, but may be worth it). I also looked at Micfo (which hosts JohnCow’s blog), and one or two others.

I will likely divide my sites into three groups: static sites and very low demand sites will be hosted together on a small plan; my customer sites will be hosted on a more powerful host; and InvestorBlogger dot com will be hosted on the most powerful of the three hosting plans. In fact, using three separate hosting companies will allow me the flexibility to shift things around much more when the hosting plans go awry. I’m also considering shifting my domain registrations to another company, as I’ve heard that will allow more flexibility still.

Obstacles to Growth

Last year at our business, we were suffering something of a sharp downturn in business. In the end, we had to let go one member of our staff after she didn’t accept the changes to her job description. Since then, in our business we found that such a simple change opened the door to new growth as we cleared out the negativity that was part of our operation then.

Instead, we all buckled down and accepted the situation, then we got to work. It took us a year to rebuild that growth; and we all learned a lot during that time. But I was surprised how one person can prevent growth. I’m now beginning to wonder if InvestorBlogger dot com is now outgrowing Dreamhost (not the actual hosting resources) but the ‘quality’ of the service. Perhaps so.

So, change is coming (it always is); and it will bring new opportunities and new challenges. I’m ready. Are you?

I’ve been quite frustrated with a number of the service providers I use to support InvestorBlogger dot com currently. But when the shit really hits the fan, there is only one solution.

It’s time to shake things up…

Payperpost: I’d been with Payperpost since the early days in 2006, and started blogging with them regularly. But each iteration of their service progressively made it harder and harder for me to earn ANY money at all. There was segregation, then there were PR requirements, then there was regionalization, then RR, then Technorati, then Alexa… Each and every time I rose to the challenge by blogging a little bit harder, it got a little bit harder just to meet their requirements. So on Thursday, I quit Payperpost by simply breaking their TOS: I used a simple way – I started using nofollows on all my posts. I don’t know that it will be the right decision, but I think it’s time to move on, at least for me.

Dreamhost: I’ve been with Dreamhost since my first domain registration in 2004. With InvestorBlogger it’s already over 3 years. But in the past 12 months, I’ve experienced outages for this blog at the MOST inconvenient times. Today, my blog carnival was FEATURED on blog Carnival TODAY! I don’t know if I’ll get the chance again any time soon. Coincidentally, I managed to buy an EntreCard slot on John Cow’s website. Both of these sites are top websites with tons of daily visitors, and with prominent placement, I was sure to attract a lot of visitors.

But about 10 hours ago, I logged on to the message boards to find this UGLY message:

Due to continued space and power constraints in our primary data center, we will be moving all central DreamHost functions as well as the “spunky” cluster to one of our newer data centers. This move will begin Friday, March 21st, at 9PM PDT, and is expected to last up to 12 hours, until Saturday, March 22nd, 9AM PDT.

I was not advised of this message prior to the time, so I had no option to alter the contact. Who knows how many visitors tried to click through to a dead link? After the billing screwup in January where I received threatening notes that my websites would be shut down, and previous outages that were unexplained and interrupted traffic for hours, I’m at the end of my tether with Dreamhost, too, esp. as the websites are still down, and it’s been over 11 hours. This is a huge opportunity squandered.

So it’s time to change. In my heart, I can no longer recommend Dreamhost for anything but the smallest and most insignificant websites of all. It’s great for hobbyists, but if you are at all serious about hosting, you cannot rely on their service even with the VPS plans, and quite frankly, the unmetered everything is not worth the hassle when you can’t use it.

I’m looking at four different hosts: BlueHost, MediaTemple, BlueFur, and ASO, though I will keep Dreamhost for other things.

InvestorBlogger

Well, it’s time: here’s my plan for the blog.

Sub-domains

I’m going to be splitting up the blog into four (or five) sub-blogs each hosted on a relevant subdomain. Initially, I will set up two sub-blogs (for blogging, making money), then add the others. Initially all posts will remain at the current locations; but eventually, I will have to go through all of the posts, one-by-one and hive them off into their separate domains.

Traffic

InvestorBlogger’s main domain will slowly morph into a reblog of the subdomains. This will help to sharpen the focus on each of the themes, while retaining the overall feel of the blog. It should also help to keep the audience while bringing in more focused traffic on each of the subdomains. It may also help solve the PR issues, the nofollow issues by allowing different subblogs to co-exist with different requirements.

Writing

This is going to be the real challenge. My writing started off much like other bloggers, short and sweet posts, with not much real meat to the content. Occasionally, though, I would pump out different stuff. Now, though, it’s getting much more difficult to write just short posts. I am finding that I want to write more and in much more depth, about each of the issues.

Money

I’ve really appreciated having advertisers and hosters with me, though I may wish to reconsider some of my advertising methods such as paid posts, large banners, etc. I wonder if they are really that effective or if in fact they detract from the blog itself. I’ll be looking at changing the advertising as traffic builds.

Plans are set: things are moving

I’m now researching alternate hosts, and would appreciate some guidance from my trusted readers! Tell me what hosting you used, how reliable is it, etc? I’d love to hear.

I had hoped that my free download would entice visitors to download the top twelve subscriptions. Well, it hasn’t quite worked yet. But I’m going to keep plugging it, because I think it’s a useful way to promote this blog. I’m planning to up the number to 20 subscriptions, but so far I only have six more good suggestions. So now, I’m running a poll for the remaining 2 positions in the list. Do vote!

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For more interesting articles on running a business, making money, operating your blog, , and so on…, subscribe to the RSS feed or email newsletter. There’s a lot more in the Random Walk to Wealth on InvestorBlogger dot com.
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So let’s deal with the money, first this month. Parts 2 and 3 will deal with the traffic, and challenges. But I’ll post these over the next few days.

Income this month has been less, but the variety of sources is quite impressive. I’m pretty sure now that I could easily extend both the range and the depth of each source, if I had more time to do it.

* Bank Interest: $26.25
* Dividend Income: $78.22
* Consulting Income: $250.00
* TLA – $74.49
* LinkWorth – $63.50 (for three sites)
* TopSpots – $1.00
* blogging – $96.25
* Total = $589.98*
*there are a few other residual sources but they generally don’t generate much, like Voxant, NetAudioAds, etc. that generate only a few cents a month. In addition, some sources that generate a lot one month, but nothing the next are not included.

Unfortunately, I’ve not been very aggressive in getting extra interest generated. I have nearly $150,000 sitting in the bank, and another US$2500 sitting in a broker’s account, and still another $700 sitting in another account earning 0%. I’ve not invested these at all. So that’s pretty dumb. I don’t know why I haven’t got around to doing that, but I DO know that it’s costing me at least 2.5%pa now (or $16pm). And that’s not including any capital appreciation. This is a situation I will rectify.

Also the list of sources of income isn’t complete. For example, some of my customers buy hosting from on my server: no accounts have become due this month; nor have I had any new customers. According to my plan, developing a part-time income from work is important. I have had several contacts for part-time work in Taipei, but it isn’t something I’m able to do just now. I’d love to switch my teaching load from full-time to part-time, but it’s not possible. So…

Total Income Generated

Naturally, this means my total generated by blogging now jumps to $9020.37. Also, my revenue from writing reviews and buzzes has dropped from over $200 per month to just $96.25. In fact, last month I only wrote two reviews in February. It seems the Google Grinch is still out and about.

Expenses

The blog currently only has a few expenses such as hosting through Dreamhost’s VPS system and it works well. Of course, Domains and I own about ten or so all need to be paid for annually and Paypal Fees. I currently don’t advertise, though I may do so soon again.

* hosting – $49.50 (est.)
* Fees – $6.15 (Paypal, Commissions, etc.)
* Content, Development, and Traffic – $89.00
* Total = $144.65*

*These figures are estimates as final figures haven’t been received for some, and other commissions are invisible having been deducted at source.

Other factors that are beginning to affect me more directly now is the weakness of the dollar vs. the NT$. In fact in the past week, the NT$ has dropped by nearly NT$1. It’s now trading at a little under NT$31 to the US$. I’ve been using the value of NT$32.5 for a long time and I found it a good approximation. But no longer.

In the meantime, there’s been a lot about WordPress, especially security and upgrading this past week. I’ve also talked about some of the recent changes I made to navigating my way around this blog.

Here are some other recent posts this week.

• The 80/20 Principle: It’s just a rule of thumb
• Security in WordPress: Are you still showing YOUR plugins?
• The View from My Desktop: Lots of great apps
• WordPress 2.3.3 Security Upgrade: A simple upgrade technique
• How do you navigate a 1000 posts? Five Practical Suggestions for WordPress Bloggers

In this newsletter/post…

1. Sponsor a keyword
2. WordPress EASYMODE
3. WordPress: no longer just a blog
4. A competition: Just what is it.
5. Carnival of Making REAL Money 12th Edition

KeyWords: Sponsor a Keyword

I’m offering keyword links on a monthly basis beginning March 1st. You can advertise your website by having a text link on ANY keyword you want on the entire blog for one month. Each keyword is offered for $5 per month, and there are likely dozens, if not hundreds of instances of most words in the 200,000 words on this blog. Each word can only be sponsored once and no variations will be admitted. So be sure which word you want to sponsor.

There are only a maximum of ten keywords each month. Five of these are already taken. Are you interested in the other five?

Examples: loan or loans (if loan is taken, then loans will not be available or vice versa).

This is what they will look like and how they will look: hosting (mouseover to see the link text)

Contact me if you are interested in a particular word on the blog

In other news…

WordPress EASYMODE

Dreamhost has introduced WordPress for idiots install that keeps the fuss to a minimum. It’s called Easy mode, and offers all the bells and whistles of WordPress but you can’t upload any themes or plugins. PERIOD. It’s a perfect way to host blogs without any of the usual problems of themes, plugins, CSS, etc.

It will be perfect if you want to offer a blog to friends or family who do not have a technical background, or who do not want to waste time dealing with such things.

WordPress: not just a blog…

These days, WordPress is being made to do things it wasn’t initially envisaged to do . And with this ‘theme’, it’s doing even more.

This example is a contact form that is integrated into WordPress as a kind of contact database. It retains the functionality of entering information into posts but a contact db is installed over the top. Very imaginative. It’s fussy to install, not for the faint of heart, but it works! I’m amazed…

A competition: Just what is it.

Don’t forget to enter the competition.

Carnival of Making REAL Money 12th Edition

Now available at the new carnival’s new website.

Keep warm this very cold weekend! It’s only 9C here in Tamsui!

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For more interesting articles on running a business, making money, operating your blog, , and so on…, subscribe to the RSS feed or email newsletter. There’s a lot more in the Random Walk to Wealth on InvestorBlogger dot com.
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Page Rank, Alexa and Real Rank.

As most of you now know, InvestorBlogger’s page rank is still zero. Google has not relented in its pursuit of do_follow linking. You can read more in previous months about the scandal, and why relying on Google 100% is really bad for business, but I don’t want to go over that again. It’s 2008, and it’s time to move on.

With SocialSpark coming, and the requirements for no_follow being implicit in the design, I’m readying InvestorBlogger for that opportunity slowly. In the short term, the posts within the content will go no_follow shortly. The sidebar will remain as is for the time being until the text links expire or are removed. I will be unveiling my plan for no_follow soonish and my decision on whether to submit for reinclusion for PR. I’ve already requested to be removed from Payperpost for the time being with the following email:

Dear Payperpost,

I’m very supportive of PPP and have been with PPP since 2007 the early days! However, since my PR on my primary website is now zero, the number of posts I have been able to do on my blog has dropped to practically one or two in the last three months.

As a result of this hit by Google and a PR zero, I’ve been considering using nofollow on my blog for sometime. After the end of my most recent posts, I will be making my primary blog a nofollow blog.

While in the short term I don’t particularly care about PR, SocialSpark will be using nofollow, so it is time to get ready.

However, due to my frustration with PPP not permitting nofollow blogs on their roster, I have no alternative but to request that after the blog be removed from PPP for the time being. Naturally, I hope that PPP’s TOS is updated to include nofollow blogs, but in the meantime, if I am to maintain a healthy blog and get ready for SS, I have no choice.

Please understand that I’m grateful for the work and experience that I have obtained because of what we accomplished working with PPP. I would naturally like to continue working with Izea, too, but right now I’m caught in the no-man’s land: no pr, no posts, no nofollow… And SocialSpark is still some way…

Hoping your TOS changes S O O N!

Quite clearly Izea is a company stuck between the past and the future. Payperpost is dying slowly (at least for me!) and SocialSpark is still dormant. Whither Izea? I don’t know yet, but I’m hoping that PPP makes a decision on no_follow soon as SocialSpark may still be some way off. In fact, Gordon from Customer Love recently reaffirmed the no_follow blog policy saying:

As of today, the TOS has not changed, and no-follows are addressed in section 5.4 (A), regarding the blogs themselves: “Blogs must not include nofollow tags in the robots meta tags, though Advertisers may request nofollows with their required links. (See Section 5.5 Posting Regulations.)”

Some flexibility, but it seems PPP is still in the business of selling pagerank. Oh, well. I’m moving on, even if they aren’t.

Analytics

Traffic is simply off from December. This is primarily because of the extended holidays at the beginning of the month (New Year, you remember!) and my little vacation on the 29th-31st. Both of these directly impacted traffic to the blog, with visits and pageviews down 42% and 36% respectively. A more instructive comparison is with January 2007 with visits up 164% and pageviews up over 267%. Better! Traffic will pick up again in February through to July.

Alexa Ranking

Alexa swings with the mood, it seems. With my little vacation this week, my weekly rank has dropped to 184K, but the more important statistic is the 3-month average of 117K. I haven’t managed to break through the 100K consistently yet… Yet! But I’ve had several weeks where I’ve been under 100K for extended periods. The odd thing is though: page views on Alexa are way above even John Chow’s blog. But is Alexa worth much? Perhaps not.

Technorati

The Technorati ranking is bouncing around like a yo-yo at the moment: one moment at 38K, the next at 49K. Who knows what is going on?

Whatever the current situation is, the rank is a big improvement over six months ago; and traffic is edging up for sure because of the stronger base of links. I’m aiming to get the blog under 10K within 3 months. But it’s going to take some work! Wish me luck.

RealRanks

RealRanks is still in its infancy, and stats aren’t quite reliable yet. Worse, its launch coincided with a quiet period for my blog, so this month’s stats aren’t impressive. What makes it look worse is that after the launch, more sites joined (good for everyone) and bumped the early members (like me) from higher slots thus making my site appear to lose its rank, when in fact the sample was quite small in November anyway.

(All stats can be verified by clicking on the picture, except for Analytics which are NOT public).

Show me the money!

Just a few days ago, I went into great detail about my philosophy of investing for income and how well I’ve done so far. It’s well worth checking out.

Income

January income is very mixed and very unbalanced. This month I managed to earn …

• Bank Interest: $25.20
• Dividend Income: $226.83
• blog Income – Advertising: $560.00 (for two sites)
• TLA – $65.29
• Linkworth – $77.24 (for three sites)
• Payperpost – $14.42
• Adsense – $6.13 (for several sites)
• Business – $307.69
• AdToll – $6.22
• TopSpots – $2.32
• Total = $1,291.34*

*there are a few other residual sources but they generally don’t generate much, like Voxant, NetAudioAds, etc. that generate only a few cents a month.

That is an incredibly impressive total, and it’s unlikely that February will come anywhere close to this, but who cares! There were big jumps in irregular and one-time inputs though the underlying average remains close.

Total Income Generated

Naturally, this means my total generated by blogging now jumps to $8430.39. Also, my revenue from writing reviews and buzzes has dropped from over $200 per month to just $40.00. In fact, last month I only wrote two reviews in the whole month. I’d love to do more as it’s something I enjoy doing, but we’ll see.

Expenses

The blog currently only has a few expenses such as hosting through Dreamhost’s VPS system and it works well. Of course, Domains and I own about ten or so all need to be paid for annually and Paypal Fees. I currently don’t advertise, though I may do so soon again.

• Hosting – $44.67
• Domains – $49.75
• Fees – $20.24
• Total = $114.66

So that’s it for January. Do check back in February to see how we’re doing. The $10,000 goal is approaching soon. I’d guess in March, but let’s hope it’s sooner! Whenever, let InvestorBlogger dot com encourage you in your financial goals in 2008.

I had heard that Network Solutions had been trying to sell $9.95 domains for $34.99, so today… as I was cleaning out my closet, I decided to conduct a little experiment. I used Dreamhost to check for a domain that was available to register: I chose the one listed below and it showed it was available. I then repeated the experiment with a second domain (a different one entirely) to verify my results.

So here goes, is it true that Network Solutions is gouging customers?

On the first page, I entered the domain, I came across this oddly checked box (I had not submitted a request for dot net anyway, so I let it ride) – The FIRST UPSELL. But let’s not forget all the other domain boxes on that first page with four more attempts to get you to buy additional domains at greatly inflated prices…!

So I clicked ‘Add Domains to Order’. At this point I hadn’t seen a price on the page for the domain registration. The link shows the prices clearly elsewhere but NOT on the purchase order.

I was then asked to choose a public or private registration for $9 per year. So I clicked. Second Upsell – Checked!

Adding Hosting… Mmm. Well, it’s a reasonable question but… for someone with good quality hosting already, a superfluous question. And the prices: well, reasonable to pricy. Third Upsell.

Ok… In one fell swoop, you are asked about SEVEN additional products, taking you through to 10 upsell attempts in total… Let’s see… Fourth to Tenth Upsell in ONE Page. Oh, boy!

And they’re not done yet! We’ve still got the pricing page: Upsell #11.

Did you see that? Not only did you get upsold on the domain with private registration (which my host throws in FREE!) but they defaulted to FIVE years payments… and the first year is $34.99. Quite shocking, really. An original bill for just $9.99 (using another company like Yahoo! Domains or GoDaddy or any of a dozen decent registrars) was upsold to over $289 dollars for a domain that was a NEW domain!

And the EXTRA value?

Of course, you are getting some extra value: a dot com and a dot net, but the private security… Mmm. Let’s face it: domain names became commodity type services years ago, so the upsell is Network Solutions trying to add extra profitability to its bottom line.

But the customers? Who cares… As long as you are making your own bottom line. Upsell all you want… customers love it, in fact, they come back for more, and more. NOT.

Don’t UPSELL me!

The last time a company tried to upsell me on an item I was purchasing on the Internet, I hate to say it but it was box PC from DELL. I looked through all the options in the page, and came away disgusted. I understood that computers are massively complicated items, but my own needs were specific and didn’t need much tweaking, yet I was faced with the UPSELL on warranties, software packs, monitors (grossly overpriced, I might add), …

When I know what I need, do NOT upsell to me. If it’s online, I’ll just close the browser. If it’s at a store, and I’m not ‘just browsing’, I’ll be complaining to the representative or heading for the exit. It’s not that I’m a cheapskate or what… I just do not like being treated as a cash machine for a company.

I prefer to see a product or service sold at a price that doesn’t need an UPSELL as the company make a decent profit, and the customer gets a quality product or service. That’s all.

Am I nuts? Or is this one of the axioms of American business these days? Does it bother you, too? Let me know.

Important CAVEAT

Oh, and by the way, the domain that I tried to register with Network Solutions is now no longer available! So don’t even try to do domain searches there, you’ll end up being held hostage for your domain at $34.99 for the first year. The second domain I searched for but didn’t complete the transaction is similarly unavailable. As is the third domain which I merely searched for. Dreamhost doesn’t do this, why does NetworkSolutions?

Note: I didn’t link to NS other than for the single price page. It’s too ridiculous.

Dreamhost is billing me for bills that don’t exist! I’ve been using their hosting for nearly four years now, but this problem (and no host is without ‘issues’) is vexing. I emailed them questioning them on this.

This is just a notice that your DreamHost Account #####
(“*** Account”) has a balance of $40.80 (including any charges not
due until 2009-01-30), with $40.80 due (since 2008-12-30).

You also have $40.80 past due (owed since 2008-11-30), and if
by 2009-01-30 you do not pay at least the $40.80 part, your
account will be automatically suspended until payment is received.

If you would like to CLOSE your account with DreamHost, just visit:

Since I always pay on time, I knew this to be an error. In fact, I checked yesterday’s billing for something else… So I replied as I was nervous about losing my account!

Dear Dreamhost…

I’m sorry but I don’t understand what is going on with my billing… I
paid my bills on time, and the panel (when it works) shows no
outstanding amount… so could you advise urgently what is going on.

Kenneth

Then I tried to login to my billing in the Dreamhost Panel. Not loading. So then I sent an email to support but it was rejected because it didn’t have an account number or any details. The rejected email told me to login to my panel and request support. Hah!

We’re sorry.. your email was unable to be processed by our automatic
support system, and so is being returned to you.

Our system could not find the open support case you were replying to,
and so could not automatically tie your message into our system. If this
was a reply to an EXISTING issue, please be sure to keep the:

[blah 123456]

in the subject line of your reply!

If this is regarding a NEW issue, we must ask that you submit it
through our web panel at:

So then I sent another email as an attachment to my original billing problem with the following words because Panel is still not working…

Also, and this is a major problem, your Panel is NOT WORKING… And I
can’t send email advising you of this… because the email that I
originally sent. There is no phone number or contact number so how on
earth are we supposed to contact you when there is a panel outage, we
don’t already have a ticket in the system, and your system rejects
emails addressed to support@dreamhost.com

I’d say this is a pretty serious issue.

Kenneth

As if this were not rebuke enough, it was similarly sent back with the following error…

This is the Postfix program at host kitty.sd.dreamhost.com.

I’m sorry to have to inform you that your message could not be
be delivered to one or more recipients. It’s attached below.

For further assistance, please send mail to <postmaster>

If you do so, please include this problem report. You can
delete your own text from the attached returned message.

So then I checked the Dreamhost Status Website, no support is provided, just notifications.

So then checked the contact page, and the contact form wouldn’t load, and there was no telephone number, only a fax number and address.

I’m so very unimpressed that I had to blog this. I will be filing a formal complaint with them once the panel issue is resolved, and I’m removing the link to their ‘rewards’ program as a punishment for them.

I’ll be interested in a response from them on this issue. What do you think about Dreamhost?

Steve’s been one of my customers for a while and I occasionally help him on his work with his forums. In fact, it was work on his logos that gave rise to several of my posts: AgentsChat – a whole new look and Creating a Clickable Image Map (both of these posts are of general interest).

Anyway, he was experimenting with hiding affiliate links and wanted to use the .htaccess file codes to create 301 Redirects … but I realized that he didn’t know too much about FTP (and I didn’t know much either). I’ll be looking at these Redirects soon.

So what is FTP?

Well, after reading the Wikipedia article on File Transfer Protocol, you’ll know a lot more than I do, that’s for sure! Simply, though, FTP is a way to send files (ie. data, whether it is pictures, files, text, programs…) from one computer to another. Usually, bloggers will have their own host that is hosted at http://www.yourblogname.com, and for the most part, you will not need to access your files via FTP. In fact, some blogging tools make it really easy to upload, and you may not even realize that you are using FTP.

But there are times when you may need to upload or download files via FTP, such as when you are uploading or downloading dozens of files (images or movies), larger files, or special files; then FTP is the most reliable way to achieve this, and in some cases, the ONLY way to do this. So how do you access your FTP site? Well, for most domains, the website is accessed via the FTP:// command (NOT HTTP://) and your website is found at a slightly modified address: ftp://ftp.yourblogname.com (Yes, you’ll likely need to enter ftp twice).

Easy Downloading

For most browsers these days (IE6+7, FF2.0, Opera, etc), you can enter your FTP site by entering the address in the address bar. You will be then prompted for your FTP user name and your password. (These are NOT your blog user name or passwords but will have been issued to you separately).

You will then find a list of the files at your blog which you can ONLY download. It should look something like this. IE works very similarly to Firefox, too.

You are now placed in the ‘root’ or base directory of your account. Here you can see four different folders. But if you are maintaining a website, then you will need to find the directory that has a domain name, investorblogger.com. That is the home of this website. Of the four files here, it is the only one that is visible, but the other files are private files that can’t be accessed via the Internet, except by FTP.

You don’t really need much if you want to download stuff, but uploading is another matter, it’s a little more complicated than downloading, but you need the same basic information, and a new tool, an FTP program.

3 FTP Tools: Uploading large or multiple files

Most reasonable OSes these days include some form of FTP. Windows has two FTP programs, the first of which you already saw. But the second is included in Windows Explorer (not Internet Explorer). Simply open a regular Windows explorer and enter the user name and password, and you will enter the FTP site as above.

Then you will be taken to the root. And it should look like the following image:

This time though the view is different and you can now upload, move, rename and delete files. The FTP actions will be a little slower than Windows Explorer proper, but you will find it easy to use. Take a look at the image to see what I mean. A word of caution: FTP does not have a recycle bin. So if you delete a file, it is gone PERMANENTLY. You won’t be able to retrieve the file via FTP. So tread carefully.

There are other tools for FTP, but Windows Explorer usually works without too much trouble. You can also find two other great tools: FileZilla and FireFTP (for FF). Remember to download the Client version, not the Server edition.

Using FileZilla

Set up is a little more complicated for these tools, but they have additional functionality, stability and speed. I’ll show you how to set up one tool, and the basic information should be the same for most FTP tools. Naturally, there are variations but they are beyond the scope of this ‘Introduction.’

This is the setup screen from FileZilla, which is available when you start the program, under File >>> Site Manager. Click ‘New Site’. You will need to enter the basic details as above: but first set the Logontype to Normal. Then enter the host details (that’s FTP.yourblogname.com). Leave the port number (the entry key to your PC) as ’21′. Enter the User and Password. Then hit Connect to connect to the server.

After a few seconds, the screen will activate and a bunch of information will fly by. It will look something like this: reduced in size to hide personal information. Sorry!

• 1. The top box is the messages between your computer and the server.
• 2. This box is the file structure of your computer;
• 3. The box is the current folder.
• 4. This box is the file structure on the server.
• 5. And the final box below is the list of files you want to upload (if any).

Double clicking on any file in either #3 or #4 will copy the file to the other PC. So if you double click on a file in #3, it will copy itself in a few seconds to the server. Obviously you may need to choose the folder where you want to put it and open that folder first. Double clicking on a file in #4 will copy the file to YOUR computer. Try it. When activating either, the files will be listed in box #5 and the instructions and messages will be listed in #1. Confused? I was the first time. Experiment a few times before you do anything that you might regret!

WebFTP: in your browser

If you are really lucky, and your hosting company is smart (like Dreamhost is!), you will be able to upload files with a neat piece of software called Net2FTP that allows you to perform pretty much every FTP action IN YOUR WEB BROWSER. Dreamhost Web Hosting provides this at http://webftp.dreamhost.com (Yes, that’s http:// … not ftp://…). This kind of tool is very handy if you’re uploading only a few files or you’re not working at home, or wherever it’s not convenient or allowed to install an FTP program.

Which then takes you to the root folder as above:

All of the actions that you can perform are listed in the drop down box on the right. Folders are listed below as folders (well that’s a surprise!) and click on the folder opens and lists the contents of the folder. Don’t be scared to play with dummy files and folders, but don’t delete important things. There is no recycle bin!

Caution: FTP does not have a ‘Recycle Bin’ nor does it have an ‘undo’ function, changes are immediate and permanent!

There are quite a few more intricacies that you will discover as you use FTP and encounter problems. FTP is the fastest and most reliable way to upload and download files from servers. As such, it’s a great tool to learn whichever of the three ways listed here you decide to use the most.

Oh, you can find FTP tools for your CRUZER, too. And remember FTP can also mean a “Friend To Publishers”!

——-
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——-

This graph is taken from December 5th and shows four significant spikes in server traffic in the previous 24 hours, with the spike around 00:00 being the largest and also bringing the server down!

Dreamhost helpdesk have VERY helpful to me over the years, and patiently answered almost every query fully and in detail. The last few times though have been frustrating because the amount of activity has been quite high on occasion (without obvious justification either!), and they were suggesting that perhaps I should raise the allocation of resources (and the cost!) to cover the spikes! Now, I’d already tried this once or twice: having raised my basis from $15.00 to $20.00 to $30.00. While this did indeed improve my server responsiveness, I was still getting server outages every day about once or twice a day, and it just didn’t seem that my server traffic justified that!

What is a poor server to do?

Go on a bug hunt! It’s that simple. I decided to find out what was going on, and see if I couldn’t eliminate all the other possibililties before increasing the expense further…!

Step 1. Find the Crap…

I was amazed how much crap had built up on my servers over the three years I’ve been using Dreamhost hosting… It was actually quite shocking. And it took me days to clear. But first I took stock of the files and data that were on my server: html files, jpegs, mp3s (not many), php, applications, data, backups, gzips, etc… Once I determined which domains and subdomains were only serving files, I could eliminate those pretty easily. Then I went on a hunt for old PHP applications, principally old versions of WordPress, Galleries, etc..

Step 2. Three Choices: Choose NOW!

On finding an application, I was faced with three choices: upgrade the software to the current version; remove the software entirely; or password the entire directory. In most cases, I chose the second option to cut down on the security risk. On one or two occasions, I passworded entire subdomains (with .htaccess and .htpasswd files) as well to provide access to these applications only to the person concerned. In the cases of my primary websites, upgrading became mandatory. In rare occasions, I moved applications to the root directory as a stop gap measure.

From now on, though, I’m going to be much stricter on removing old applications because of the potential security problems that can be hidden by forgotten software.

Step 3. Deleting unnecessary plugins and themes

Since most of my blogs run versions of WordPress 2.2+ and I usually auto-install or auto-update the files (courtesy of Dreamhost’s great service), the process is quite quick and painless. Dreamhost have gotten it down to a fine art, such that upgrading involves backing up the Database, Turning off the plugins (one click), click update, and wait for confirmation. But each and every time I update Dreamhost creates a backup of the original files named domain.old, and throws in EVERY theme they can get their hands on with each install). This leads to a lot of stuff each time. So I usually now delete 95% of the themes, and maintain a lean installation with as few plugins as possible (and none spare). This helps make WP as responsive as possible.

But as you can see I was still getting server spikes, and my options were running out. Everything was eliminated in one way or another, and the server was still coming down. So what next?

Step 4. Is it time to ‘log’ out?

I compared the performance of my main blog with several other blogs by checking the error.logs (I had never checked these before) just to see what was going on. Surprisingly, I found the logs quite detailed (they’re in your FTP folder called ‘logs’… click through to your domain to find the logs and then look for the error logs. They were dated a couple of days back so I had to check through and this is what I saw:

That’s right, line after line of the same error: this read “(12)Cannot allocate memory: couldn’t spawn child process: /dh/cgi-system/php5.cgi” and “(12)Cannot allocate memory: couldn’t create child process: …” To make sure that I wasn’t just reading regular errors, I queried it on Google and got nothing, then I checked the logs of WordPress Sites that I had just started with no themes or plugins. Sure enough, everything looked fine. Then I remember something a Dreamhost engineer had said:

Just the other day, I was dealing with a fellow who had a wordpress blog who was almost instantly crashing his PS with a single hit, because he had some wonky wordpress plugin which was spawning hundreds of php.cgi processes. Jeff

Well, thanks, Jeff. That has proved to be the best advice I’ve received yet… So I’ve been testing different plugins to find out which one or ones have been causing the problems. The best way to do this is to simply turn off all the plugins to restore the neutral state and then turn them on singly and checking the error log to eliminate those that don’t create the problem. I think I have a culprit already, but I’m now double checking them to make sure that I don’t blame the wrong plugin. Think ‘sticky’…

While the testing goes on, please excuse me for having unstable features on my blog as I try to eliminate the problem. But as you know, this problem has been going on for months; and this represents my best hope to get to the root of the problem.

Have you had these problems? What happened? I am not particularly an expert, but I was surprised at how much I could figure out by myself!

We’ve been doing buzzes for quite some time, but the pace of buzzes dropped off… I nearly forgot to buzz AFrogToKiss.net (unless I already did!). This time it’s for a websites not about frogs… but a whole lot of things: Blogging, Shopping Deals, A Blog A Day, and of course, Geeky Stuff.

Given the size and the popularity of her blog, she was wondering if she should move to a private server… I do think it’s a worthwhile move for her. It will provide her with much stability, resources and flexibility should her blog be stumbled or dugg. In fact, she will be able to increase the resources in a few minutes with the solution provided by Dreamhost. So, yes, go ahead. But be aware. It can get more expensive. I’m currently paying about $40 per month for my VPS, but I think the hosting is worth it. Really. I find it comforting that I no longer have to share my host with dozens of other websites.

If you’d like a blogbuzz, like AFrogToKiss’s, then hop on over to Buzz your BlogFest, read the instructions, and sign up today. There are only 18 buzzes to go! I’m happy to say I’m extending the program until I reach 30 buzzes or Christmas comes first! So hurry before I forget!

Disclaimer: I was featured as a “Blog of the Day” in November, and I signed up to advertise in her TopSpots

——-
For more interesting articles on running a business, making money, operating your blog, , and so on…, subscribe to the RSS feed or email newsletter. There’s a lot more in the Random Walk to Wealth on InvestorBlogger dot com.
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Page Rank, Alexa and Real Rank.

Well, it’s now time to report that my PR rank finally fell to zero. A big fat zero . At the time, I was surprised by the situation, and somewhat angry, esp. since Google was dictating what we could and couldn’t put on our blogs, and how we could monetize them. Naturally, this still irks when you realize that Google is themselves guilty of breaking their own guidelines.

Oddly, things haven’t been so bad: Traffic to the blog has increased significantly in the last month , despite having zero ranking.

Last Month’s PageViews were only 2800 with about 1300 Uniques. This month’s both of these figures jumped noticeably by about 50% thanks to be being Stumbled, increased links in, and better rankings on Technorati (about 58K) and Alexa (about 132K). In fact, with extra work on inbound links from Carnivals, Friends, and commenting on different blogs. I’ve also had a couple of purchased links on JohnCow ‘s blog and on CashQuests.com.

Payperpost’s new Ranking has been introduced and that has created some buzz: though there are no external ways to verify my ranking yet, it’s generally been between 500-800. I’m still not sure exactly what tier that puts InvestorBlogger!

Show me the money!

Financial results are posted below:

Payperpost: $0.00
Google : $6.35
Other : $225.00
Adlinks : $84.75
Stocks: $75.50
Hosting : $123.08
Bank A/C Interest : $26.18
Amazon: $9.99 (last five months)
Other Incomes: $0.53
Total: $551.38*

On the upside, I’ve been able to sell links directly through the blog this month, which has kept the blog going. I’ve already done the buzzes for these links for Netloans and CarFinance. Additionally, one of my clients recently paid for their hosting on my spanking new Dreamhost PS. That rocks! I’ll be introducing them as well as a way to make money. And Steve and I dreamed up a challenege, which I’ll share this weekend.

On the downside, I haven’t scored any opportunities for reviews in the past month onPayperpost, Sponsored Reviews, or ReviewMe. This is likely due to my PR being reduced to zero, and RealRank not being a factor for advertisers yet. I’ve always felt that creating extra income from a number of sources (in fact, as many as possible) was a good idea to offset in any temporary or permanent glitches. If I were just relying on Adsense, I think I’d just have about $10.00 in income which would be pretty pathetic. I’m still pretty far off my total of $1500 per month in income. But I’m still learning the ropes!

Expenses: Expenses

blogging is getting expensive for me, in a number of ways; and running a small hosting service also costs money. Additionally, there are fees for Paypal, Advertising, etc.. From 1/1/2008, I’m going to be tracking these costs much more accurately to present a balanced picture of the costs I’m facing. Suffice to say, my hosting is costing about $40.00 per month, and as the popularity of the bloggers using the hosting service increases, this is going to increase. Fortunately with Dreamhost PS hosting, increasing the ‘power’ of the server is a relatively easy thing to do.

*Subject to revisions.

Carnival of Making Real Money

Are you interested in joining in my Blog Carnival? It’s a great way to gain additional traffic to your blog, get some link juice, and find great links on a similar theme.

This is the first time I’ve run a carnival, and I’m really looking forward to publishing it on my blog tomorrow. I’m taking a slightly different tack: I’ll be publishing them in batches of ten rather than every week or month. I hope that that will make the Carnival much more ‘digestible’ and you’ll be able to check out the links provided. Of course submissions are welcome right up until November 26th 11:59pm (that’s one minute before midnight NYT)… Any late submissions will be included in the next batch.

Server Problems or is it 500 Server Problems?

Running a Virtual Server as this blog is hosted on is a step up from shared hosting, and there’s something of a learning curve thrown in for extra fun. Seems that I’m having unusual spikes in my server Memory… as the surges cause “Server Outage” errors for all the sites on the server. My guess is: it’s a rogue code or plugin somewhere that is using up the juice, but I haven’t started looking for it yet. Dreamhost suggested that I increase the resources, but I fear that the surge is so huge that it won’t make any difference.

One friendly guy at Dreamhost said in a private email:

“You may want to take a look at your sites to see if you have any runaway processes, modules, or plugins that are sucking up memory. Just the other day, I was dealing with a fellow who had a wordpress blog who was almost instantly crashing his PS with a single hit, because he had some wonky wordpress plugin which was spawning hundreds of php.cgi processes.

I’m in the process of inventorying every non-HTML file, application and plugin that I can find to see if any of them are causing the problem… If in the meantime you get a server outage, do check back in a few minutes, the outage resolves itself. If you’re kind of busy, then just subscribe to my feed. I do apologize for the problems, but we’ll get to the back of it, eventually.

Monetization Monday

This feature isn’t a regular column yet, but I’m thinking of running it as a regular Monday morning column. Anyway, I’m happy to pass on a new affiliate program (one that I’m now using): John Chow’s blog is now featuring a new way to earn residual income: if you are using TTZ Media, you can now set up a new referral system. John writes:

For every publishers you referred that are accepted into TTZ Media, you will earn 10% on what the referred sites make for 12 months. There is no limit to the number of sites you can refer. Refer enough sites and this can become a nice passive income source.

Of course, John is doing it in his usual style: with a competition and you can win 22″ LCD monitors ( a grand prize! ) , so if you are interested in checking out this, don’t hesitate to sign up! It could be quite a nice little income if any of your referrers do a lot of business!

So that’s it for Monday, we’ll be back tomorrow.

OK. What have we spent? Let’s see:

We bought a few items for the school/business for NT$1,205, mostly small items and stuff for day to day expenses from Carrefour. We also bought a few items from Marks and Spencer’s which just opened a store in Taipei, at the East District, but mostly it was edibles from Blighty NT$1,014.

One of the more satisfying purchases, of course, books from Amazon which were only about NT$1,383. We bought a couple of teaching books to inspire us in our work!

• Teach with Your Heart: Lessons I Learned from the Freedom Writers
• The Freedom Writers Diary : How a Teacher and 150 Teens Used Writing to Change Themselves and the World Around Them

by Erin Gruwell and the Freedom Writers.

Of course, the two most important items in the list are: the virtual hosting for the websites, which serve this website and a few others (cost NT$8,688); and the new camera, the Panasonic Lumix DMC Model (cost NT$10,589).

The last item on the list is the NT$2,000 regular insurance payment.

So overall we spent about NT$25,059, with no penalties and no interest payment fees. We also earned 1,253 bonus points, but I’m not sure what we are going to use them for.

So, what lessons can I learn from this month’s expenses? Well, not that much.

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Take advantage of the services travel agents offer!

Some travel agencies also offer car rental services, an additional feature of travel deals. Find those travel agents which offer such all-inclusive travel deals. You may also discover cheap flights to various locations at reasonable rates. Taking one of the cruises provides tourists with a luxurious vacation experience. The hotels are reserved by the travel agents who provide the services for the exclusive travel deals.

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While I have lost my camera, I couldn’t make any typhoon movies, I’ll leave you with this video: So if you aren’t getting new posts, please bear with me and check out my past posts in the archive. Or search for your posts that might interest you, such as making money, etc.

The general Taiwan weather situation.

The second link didn’t load for me, but the first worked beautifully: http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscolw.html http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/tropic/real-time/visir/westpac/visirjava17W.html

For local weather, you can’t do better than… http://www.cwb.gov.tw/V5e/typhoon/ty.htm I’ll update the weather on this post. If I can, I’ll keep posting other stuff, too.

Best Wishes Kenneth

Missing Kodak
The second bit of news is that I lost my second digital camera. It was a Kodak C360 Model with EasyShare. Included in the camera was a rechargable battery, and a brand new 2GB memory card with photographs of our cute students! I didn’t make a copy, who’d have thought I would lose it! I know when approximately it went missing, and some idea where. But it has not been found…

It was a nice little camera which took good photos in daylight, but the night time quality suffered from too much flash. I liked the fact I could take movies, but hated the fact that the movies were in QT format. I dropped it a couple of times, it had no problems with that!

When you lose things like that, it’s important to remember to let it go! I’m still trying to accept that it’s gone. I really hope that whoever finds it makes the most and takes great pictures… My own problem is knowing now which one I would like to replace it with…! Any ideas? Do comment me some suggestions… I’d be happy to purchase something more expensive, but I did have a soft spot for those with drop in batteries…! I won’t buy a Sony… but other brands… ? Let me know!

New Server
I’m happy to report that I’ve been moved to a new Virtual Server, courtesy of Dreamhost . I had been thinking about it for a while, and finally opted to go for it after the problems with the blog on a shared server. You can check out how the PS works here. Since Dreamhost is now offering only one plan, I opted for that, and decided to spend the extra money on my server. Here are my stats for the last few days, it’s fun to see how things go up and down. There’s also a reboot server button for when things get sticky! It works a treat.

I’ll be doing a full review of the service in about a couple of weeks. Suffice to say, if you’re interested, you can use my special Dreamhost Coupon. To celebrate Dreamhost’s 10th birthday , I’m offering the Triple 10 – That’s get 10% more bandwidth, 10% more space, and 10% off the price, too, on ANY plan, and that’s in addition to the discounts that Dreamhost is offering for longer term contracts.

If you’re interested, when you sign up , you can use the DreamHost Promo Coupon Code: DH10THBIRTHDAY . And yes, pass it on!

Argus: Payperpost’s new system
After Payperpost’s proposed deal with Performancing fell through, they were left without a reliable stats program for traffic. Alexa isn’t particularly reliable for low volume, Google PR is getting strict, not to mention, VERY Slow in updating, and Analytics is private, there are no public options at all. So Payperpost is developing their own set of tools! I was invited to help track the data and verify their own stats. I’m not sure of the implications for Posties, yet as I have not seen Argus, but you can find out what’s known here. There’s a lot of talk at the moment about Argus in Payperpost Circles, what is Argus? Who knows…?

And that’s it on InvestorBlogger’s News Round-up!

Of Dreamhost, Servers and Coupons for all!

As I’m happy to report that I’ve been moved to a new Virtual Server, courtesy of Dreamhost. I had been thinking about it for a while, and finally opted to go for it after the problems with the blog on a shared server. You can check out how the PS works here. Since Dreamhost is now offering only one plan, I opted for that, and decided to spend the extra money on my server. Here are my stats for the last few days, it’s fun to see how things go up and down. There’s also a reboot server button for when things get sticky! It works a treat.

I’ll be doing a full review of the service in about a couple of weeks. Suffice to say, if you’re interested, you can use my special Dreamhost Coupon. To celebrate Dreamhost’s 10th birthday, I’m offering the Triple 10 – That’s get 10% more bandwidth, 10% more space, and 10% off the price, too, on ANY plan, and that’s in addition to the discounts that Dreamhost is offering for longer term contracts.

Payment Period Cost Discount Monthly $60.90 $5.10 Yearly $119.40 $11.94 Two years $214.80 $21.48 Three years $286.20 $28.62 Five years $417.00 $41.70 Ten years $714.00 $71.40

If you’re interested, when you sign up, you can use the DreamHost Promo Coupon Code: DH10THBIRTHDAY . And yes, pass it on!

OK. Here are the numbers.

Payperpost: $126.50
Google : $2.48
SR/ReviewME/Other : $25.00
Adlinks : $56.89
Stocks: $73.26
Hosting : $58.46
Bank A/C Interest : $23.54
Business: $61.54
Total: $427.67

As usual, these numbers represent gross income, not including any taxes paid or fees paid to Paypal or currency exchange fees. Overall, this represents a 67% increase on my first month in September 2006. That’s not bad!

Visitor traffic to this blog has been weak for the past month or so, and the problems I had with the hosting company, the busy server, and the problems of having just too many plugins running all served to make the website unstable for nearly 10 days. Obviously, this cuts into my posting schedule, as well as my traffic. There are also a couple of days for which stats weren’t working again (or was it my website?)

It’s hard to compare statistics with last year. At this time, I didn’t have Google Analytics installed, and the Alexa stats only show reach. But anyway here’s the graphic from Alexa for the past 12 months. Basically, my blog was ‘invisible’.

Let’s have a look at the blog design one year ago. Time for blushes, as WayBack Machine highlights how my blog looked a year ago.

Now, Michael, how’s that for generic design!? Makes MistyLook look almost decent!

How has your blog changed over the year? How have your stats changed?

Recently, though, coupons came to the Internet. For many products, you can search for coupons that can save lots of cash on up front purchases. Such coupons can either be used directly on companies shopping websites, or printed out and used at stores.

When I started out hosting my websites on Dreamhost, I didn’t know about such things! Apparently, there are lots of coupon codes for such companies. Search through this blog to find several such coupon companies, and see the list of companies that offer coupons.

If you are disciplined, you could use deduct difference between the regular price and the price with a coupon and put that in an interest bearing account. Not only would you save money on your purchases, but you’d actually earn a decent return on the money saved. Of course, this would work best on items that are regularly purchased.

For example, you get a 10% reduction on CouponChief’s website for books purchased from Barnes & Noble priced at $85.99. You get $8.56 savings which you put in the bank or building society account. While you won’t get top rates of return, you will still see 3%-4% returns on your income. Do that 20-30 times a year, and the amounts will add up.

But it isn’t the only way to make money with coupons. Occasionally, some sites will allow customers to create their own coupons and then give them away. One good example is Dreamhost which will allow you to earn money from referrals and has a coupon scheme, too.

The traditional referral scheme allows you to make a percentage of any sale for a customer whom you refer. But Dreamhost goes one step further. You can actually create your own Coupon Codes. I made several today: Blogger2yr and Blogger1YR

For example, Blogger2y coupon code will allow a new customer to purchase a plan and get $60 off if s/he pays for two years at once. This represents quite a saving: upto a maximum of about 46% (if my math is correct on the smallest plan!). That’s quite a saving over the 1 year payment for the customer.

Since the promo codes are offering upto a maximum of $97 per discount, that’d mean any customer who uses that discount would get a great deal BUT $37 would still go to the referrer!

I’ve found a few websites that are happy to take information about new coupon codes, too. So once you have created your coupon code, you can visit these websites and add your new code information there.

1. Redeem Coupon at http://www.redeemcoupon.com/ this website works very much like Digg.com. It was easy to get listed there.
2. http://www.couponshock.com/ is focused much more on hosting and domains. I submitted my listing but it hadn’t shown up by the time of this posting.
3. http://www.retailmenot.com/ is also a coupon site that offers a wide range of coupons, worth checking out, and worth submitting too.

So, look around for a coupon site to save a few bucks or use a coupon making facility at one of your favorite stores (such as …) to make a few bucks that way. Either way is good! Both are better!

Disclaimer: I am a customer of Dreamhost, and this email contains affiliate links.

What I found though, was quite interesting. I have installed over 45 plugins, four or five separate javascripts (Payperpost, Stats, Alexa, etc.), and used a theme that required extra resources (I think), and each page had to have 10 posts on it.

Though I didn’t use all of the plugins, at the busiest times, I was using over 27 (by my last count). Given the other features, I think that they may have been partially responsible for my server’s recent slow down. Coupled with the fact that other sites on the server have been increasingly popular, it is quite likely that my demand on the server was just placing too much of a strain. I also found that mod_gzip and the linkworth plugin were both causing problems.

For the time being, I’ve taken a very strict line:

1. cut out all but the most essential 12 plugins;
2. stripped out all unnecessary linkages in the sidebar;
3. switched to a much less-intensive theme;
4. cut down the number of posts on a page to five;
5. gotten some help with mod_gzip;
6. and removed the rogue plugin from LinkWorth

Jason at Dreamhost has been quite helpful, but it will be a few days before my server usage drops observably. My stats showed that I was using about 30 CPU minutes per day.

I stupidly removed the Google Stats Tracking code, now I have to put that back. I may also switch some features back on. I’m planning to move to a Dreamhost PS in the near future which should give things a bit of a kick, I hope! But till then, it will be plain vanilla InvestorBlogger, with a little chocolate sauce; no more Double Chocolate Chip!

I’ve contacted support for help, but as many of my websites are now unavailable, I believe it is a problem with the server again. I’m waiting an appropriate response from Dreamhost as to the nature of the problem.

We’re now evaluating our options for hosting this website. Even their Dreamhost Status page is unavailable at this moment. It’s quite likely it’s a DNS or DOS problem again.