New - B - Log

Setting Up Apache

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Well, we're back ;o)

Having a little difficulty with the moveabletype upgrade right now, so I'm going to be using this again to keep everyone informed.

It's been a crazy few weeks. If you've been following along in the newsletter, then you're well aware of all the changes and improvements we've made. If you've NOT been following along ... then it'll take me a few posts to catch you up!

The new portal is up and running and in full force. Even got our first hack! But it was a fantastic learning experience. I learned more about PHP and MySQL in a couple hours than I have in my entire online experience!

For those of you who are fellow nukers .... if you haven't already patched your site against SQL injection ... do so NOW! And I also highly recommend you install the Protector Module


It is like fortknox .. the system protects EVERYTHING and automatically updates your .htaccess file with rewrite rules, banned ip's and just about anything else you ned for your PHP-Nuke site.

I'll post more about SQLl injection and security later ... just wanted to let everyone know what's up ;o)


Protector Module from "Warcenter'
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I'm not exactly sure how you "break" a blog ... but we managed to do it here!
The bottom of the page is missing ;o) The page cuts off after just a couple posts ... and the archives aren't working correctly.

I thought it must be due to the upgrade to our server which we just completed. It's much more secure and world writing isn't an option anymore. Everything is done solely through the owner and scripts are run differently now. It's a much more secure method ... so I figured that must be the problem. But ... I deleted it all and rebuilt it through Blogger. But it remains the same.

So ... after hearing good reports on Moveable Type ... that's where we're headed. You can visit the new site here at the

New New-B-Log

The RSS, XML and feeds are a webmasters dream! All automatically written and Promoted for you! The control panel is awesome. The installation is a little complicated, but the results are well worth it.

I started transferring some posts earlier today from work (shhhh! not a word!) but it's going to be a bit before it's done. I will start using it and updating it starting now though. Once it's completed, I'm going to delete the old old log.

If you have any tools and resources for Moveable Type .... we'd love to hear them. And .... I might get a little contest going on "Create a NHO Template contest going. In fact .. we will!

If you would like to enter the contest and help dress the NHO. Post here and and contact us Contact Us

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I'm not exactly sure how you "break" a blog ... but we managed to do it here!
The bottom of the page is missing ;o) The page cuts off after just a couple posts ... and the archives aren't working correctly.

I thought it must be due to the upgrade to our server which we just completed. It's much more secure and world writing isn't an option anymore. Everything is done solely through the owner and scripts are run differently now. It's a much more secure method ... so I figured that must be the problem. But ... I deleted it all and rebuilt it through Blogger. But it remains the same.

So ... after hearing good reports on Moveable Type ... that's where we're headed. You can visit the new site here at the

New New-B-Log

The RSS, XML and feeds are a webmasters dream! All automatically written and Promoted for you! The control panel is awesome. The installation is a little complicatedd, but the results are well worth it.

I started transferring some posts earlier today from work (shhhh! not a word!) but it's going to be a bit before it's done. I will start using it and updating it starting now though. Once it's completed, I'm going to delete the old old log.

If you have any tools and resources for Moveable Type .... we'd love to hear them. And .... I might get a little contest going on "Create a NHOTemplate contest going. In fact .. we will!

If you would like to enter the contest and help dress the NHO. Post here and and contact us Contact Us

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The Paypal Email Spoof

Remember the email I told you about yesterday that was supposedly from Paypal? Well ..... it was actually a virus in that attachment.

Here's the word from Payap:

Dear Darla,

Thank you for contacting PayPal.

We can confirm that the email you received was not sent by PayPal. The
attachment contained within this email is a virus that has circulated
around the internet. If you have opened the attachment, your computer may
have been infected.

Do not surrender any personal or financial information that may be
requested. If you have previously submitted this information, we suggest
you contact your issuing financial institution to report the incident.

For additional information regarding this virus, including how to prevent
or disinfect your computer, please contact your anti-virus software or
program provider.

If you have any further questions, please let us know.

Sincerely,

The PayPal Team
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Virus Alert from Symantec

This is in from Symantec .... remember to always be safe and never open attachments unless you know the person and are expecting an attachment from them.

Trojan.Xombe
Discovered on: January 09, 2004
Last Updated on: January 09, 2004 03:51:41 PM

Trojan.Xombe is a Trojan horse that has at least two components: a 4,096 byte downloader and a 27,136 byte Trojan. The downloader component will retrieve the Trojan file from a predetermined Web site.

The download component has been distributed in an unsolicited email, purporting to be a security update for Windows XP, sent by Microsoft.

The email has the following characteristics

From: windowsupdate@microsoft.com
Subject: Windows XP Service Pack 1 (Express) - Critical Update.
Attachment: winxp_sp1.exe(4,096 KB)

The Trojan is packed with UPX

Also Known As: Xombe [FSecure], Downloader-GJ [McAfee], Troj/Dloader-L [Sophos]

Type: Trojan Horse

Systems Affected: Windows 2000, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT, Windows Server 2003, Windows XP
Systems Not Affected: Linux, Macintosh, OS/2, UNIX, Windows 3.x









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PayPal Spoof

The people who have nothing better to do than try and mess up other people's computers are at it again. This time it is in the form of an email looking like it's from paypal. It also contains an attachment called "pp_app.zip".

DO NOT OPEN THE ATTACHMENT

I'll post what the message looks like below. If you get a copy of it, forward it to spoof@paypal.com

*** GREAT NEW YEAR OFFER FROM PAYPAL.COM ***


Dear PayPal.com Member,

We here at PayPal.com are pleased to announce that we have a special New Year offer for you! If you currently have an account with PayPal then you will be eligible to receive a terrific prize from PayPal.com for the New Year. For a limited time only PayPal is offering to add 10 percent of the total balance in your PayPal account to your account and all you have to do is register yourself within the next five business days with our application (see attachment)!

If at this time you do not have a PayPal account of your own you can also register yourself with our secure application and get this great New Year bonus! If you fill out the secure form we have provided PayPal will create an account for you (it's free) and you will receive a confirmation e-mail that your account has been created.

That's not all! If you resend this letter (with its attachment) to all of your friends you may be eligible to receive another New Year bonus because the 1000 PayPal members that send the most of these to their friends will get the bonus. If you are one of these 1000 lucky members then PayPal will add 17 percent of your total balance to your account!

Registration is simple. Just unpack the attachment with WinZip, run the application, and follow the instructions we have provided. If you have problems opening the application then you may want to try downloading a free version of WinZip from http://www.winzip.com

Do not miss your chance at this fantastic opportunity! Thousands of our current customers have already received their prizes and now it's your turn; so hurry up and take advantage of this special offer!

Best of luck in the New Year,
PayPal.com Team

Be safe, don't open attachments from people you don't know ... and know that paypal, ebay and microsoft will not be sending you an attachment.
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Just got a new beginner's tutorial uploaded. Actually, it was there before but disappeared during the server move.

It's a simple tutorial for beginner's that uses a template to instruct how to create a simple blinkie. Hope you enjoy it!

Paint Shop Pro 8 Tutorial - Easy Blinkie and Blinkie Template
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Here's another bandwidth bandit.

I was just going through our server logs and found this site had tons of hits to us. Went to go say "Hi" and found out they were using our dancing angels graphic as their background.

Tsk, tsk, tsk. Now come on ...... you know that's not polite. You didn't even ask or say "please."

donzerella2002's 9/100 REG Tournament
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Now I know why the Opera browser has appealed to me so much!

Just check out the management. Young and cute!

Opera People


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The Web from Your Cellphone

Did you know that if you by hitting SHIFT+F11 in Opera (or select view/small-screen), you will be able to browse the Internet in SSR modus. But that's getting ready to change. Soon, opera won't be using the SSR technology. Instead, .. if you hit SHIFT+F11 Opera will shift from the "Screen" style sheet to the "handheld" technology.

Opera is AWESOME! Not only for their technology, but the ease of use, the speed and ... the community! Just got me an Opera Journal (like I need another blog!)

And we have a customized Opera Browser if you wanna use the NHO browser!

Download will belocated at: Opera Download Site in a couple hours.

In the meantime if you just gotta try Opera, check out:

All About Opera
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Pure CSS Headings

I may be on the late freight for this one but better late than never. A design problem has been creating menus ... dynamic menus for webpages that validated well. You may have seen the Pure CSS Menus that were a great leap ahead with one fault ... they didn't work in IE.

Well, someone's found a solution to it!

Check out Peter Nederlof's Explanation and his Demo Page for a cool solution that's actually pretty simple! It is created in XHTML and just uses

and
• elements.
  
  # posted by Darla : 1/11/2004 02:20:08 AM
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The NewbieHangout is honored to announce that Matt Paolini is joining us as a contributing author.

Matt is a Webmaster/Tech Support Specialist for FirstPlace Software, the makers of WebPosition Gold. He's also an experienced freelance Search Engine Optimization Specialist and Cold Fusion/ASP.NET/S!QL Server Developer/Designer. You can visit his site and check for more information on his services at WebTemplateStore.net

Matt has completed his first article which you can read here:

Dispelling the Myths - Will WebPostion Get me Banned from Google?
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I have been so touched by this page. A true story of love, courage and proof that life is precious and that even one, small person can affect and touch the lives of many. (Make sure you have a box of Kleenex before reading.)

Baby Sean's Home Page
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Just received a post from an RSS-DEV group member who has put up a fantastic XML tutorial that covers just about everything. He describes it as 'A “just enough education to perform” guide to Unicode and ISO 10646 for authors of XML parsers and other software that processes XML'.


You can read it here:: Entry-Level Unicode for XML
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Very cool! Thanks to a FREE service by  

So ... who's gonna be the first to comment?
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The NHO is very honored to announce a new partnership with Sanders Consultation Group Plus.  Sanders Consultation Group is now an official contributing author to the NHO.

Jim Sanders, the owner of Sanders Consultation Group Plus is a brilliant author who will be providing weekly content on up-to-date HOT topics that we're sure you'll benefit from and won't want to miss. The first article "Emotional Marketing" has already been published. You will always be able to locate Jim's articles indexed on our articles page.

If you haven't had the pleasure of visiting Jim's site yet, be sure and put it on your "to-do" list. The site offers a full range of web design and optimization services. Their focus is on webmasters, the self-employed and those interested in self-employment. We're comfortable recommending and being associated with Sander's high quality standards.
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If you notice any "strange" things going on with the NHO, it's due to the Server upgrade we're performing on B2Phat.com. We've changed IP addresses and are just about complete with the upgrade. We backed up all data last night and it's been restored, but anything that was done between 1am and about 6am this morning has been lost in never-never land.
We're on a much more secure server now and you should also be able to notice an increase in speed.
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The title and article speak for themselves. Excellent source of information.

RSS 2.0 'Specification
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One of my friends recently told me that RSS would totally replace mailing lists. That surprised me. It seems to be a pretty extremist statement considering how many of us rely on our mailing lists and have taken such a large amount of time building it.

But ...the statement served a purpose, because it sparked enough interest in me to get me off my butt to investigate further ... and find out what "those in the know" have to say about XML, RSS, Data Feeds, communication and where they see the twists and turns leading in the future of the Internet.

After having gotten quite a few opinions, I still think the statement is extremist .... but not entirely incorrect. My own personal belief is that mailing lists are here to stay. If for no other reason than that we're creatures of habit .... and Old habits are hard to die ;o)

Mailing lists also offer a certain "familiarity" between the publisher and the reader. They're more personal. You can let your personality shine through. You can develop relationships. Gain trust. So, I tend to believe that mailing lists are indispensible .. and I won't be tossing mine any time soon.

On the other hand .... I believe that the sites who DO move over to RSS ... and implement this technology into their existing communications ... will be the most successful and profitable sites.

As with anything new, it's our philosophy not to eradicate what worked in the past, but to take parts of the new and add to what is currently working for you.

RSS is not just a trend. It's here to stay, and we'd do well to start implementing it into our current systems now.

A useful tool which allows you to submit the url of an xml doc and have it validated for use as an RSS data feed can be found below:

Validator
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Found a handy tool that I wish I'd known about when I was still "riding the fence" about RSS feeds and XML.

Quoted from the Syndirella homepage: "Syndirella is free software, distributed under the GNU General Public License. Syndirella is a .NET application, and requires Windows 98, Windows 2000 or later, the .NET Framework version 1.0 and Internet Explorer version 5.0 or later.

Why use Syndirella
If you currently do not use any news aggregator and read all the news in a regular Web browser, Syndirella gives you the following advantages:

You do not need to make regular visits to all the sites you read. Syndirella polls the sites automatically and notifies you when a site is updated. You see only the content of the site - the text of the news themselves. The pages are not cluttered with advertisements, navigation bars and other things that are not essential for reading news.
Syndirella keeps an archive of the news items published on a site, and viewing the items archived by Syndirella is usually more convenient than using the archive system provided by the site.

yole.ru / Syndirella

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Well, I haven't got around to doing the "What's New" page yet, but did manage to get quite a few pages with some marketing info up.

First page is an article by Roy Oron who has a successful online business. He went from almost no sales to over 500,000 in sales in a very short amount of time He did it using JV's or Joint Ventres. That is what the article is about. People helping people. He also gave me a copy of the entire package to review and from what I've seen so far ... it's excellent.

Read the article here: http://NewbieHangout.com/articles/jv.htm Joint Ventures

*******************************************************

The next article is by Shelley Lowery who we have published before. She has an informative article on "Writing for Publicity" that presents some new and some old faithful ideas to build your publicity, get more traffic and basically earn more ... all through written material.

Read the article here: Write for Publicity
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Just remembering my mother on this very special day.
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I do hope everyone had a great day and that the coming year will be full of light and love and health. My wish for all: Your Highest Good. And that you receive all the Blessings that you can manage.

I completed a really nice Incredimail Letter style - just for today - that I'm going to send out to everyone. It's the first I've done in quite awhile.

Hugs everyone! And again ... Merry Christmas!

Note to Bobby: Love ya, kiddo. Thanks for diong what you're doing ..... I'm proud of you and lucky to call you "brother"

Your big sister,

Darla
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I love magical, fantasy stuff ... so had to share this with you all ....


Tree Fairy thats what you are.
Please rate my quiz even if it is a 1. Thanks.

Which Fairy are you?(for anyone many out comes)
brought to you by Quizilla

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Adobe recently released a new version of their eBook Reader software. Adobe Reader 6.0 combines all of the features of the Adobe eBook Reader with the features of Acrobat Reader, so now you only have to use one Reader. Download Adobe Reader 6.0 and you can use it for all features that you previously used Acrobat Reader for..
You can download the Windows 98SE version directly by clicking here.
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I just realized that we're missing a "what's new" area. There has been so much added this week alone .... that I have difficulty keeping up and can't imagine being able to find it all if I was just casually surfing in.
So, we're adding a new section to the site, appropriately titled "What's New" :-) Look for it by Saturday.
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This is going to have a serious impact on the marketing world. We can thank those who have marketed irresponsibly and dishonestly.

The Federal CAN-SPAM act of 2003
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One of the latest Press Releases about the Opera browser goes into full detail about their newest technologies. Makes an interesting read. Long known as "the fastest browser on earth" it's also a leader in technology. They are first class in web enabled cellular and give developers great tips and tricks on making their sites compatible and good looking in the small screens.

The Opera Browser Making Headlines
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So You Want a New Web Experience?

Who said the web was flat?
The new X-Tool which is still under development let's you experience the web in a 3-dimensional way :o)
There's too many aspects to cover here, but basically it's a whole new "out-of-browser" portal experience that gives you benefits like a spam-free personal mail box, your own private, virtual office, access to your Pop3 mail accounts, a link into their other webmail accounts (Hotmail, Yahoo Mail etc) and several opt-in admail boxes which give Dash users the power to control the tidal wave of information that washes through the Net every minute of every hour of every day.
Check out the X-Tool today!
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Just found a fantastic CSS resource!


This is definitely worth taking a look at ... or two, or three or four ;o)

The CSS Know-How Site
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Powerful XML Tools

Altova is one of the industry leaders in advanced XML Application development. Now you can evaluate some of the best apps for free via their 30 day trial downloads.

I recommend XML SPY and Authentic.

XML SPY lets you easily design, edit and debug enterprise-class applications involving XML, XML Schema, XSL/XSLT, SOAP, WSDL and Web Services techniques (keep in mind Amazon Associates).


authentic© 2004 empowers business users to easily capture thoughts and ideas directly into an XML document through a user interface that closely resembles a word-processor, for FREE.



Check them all out at Altova.com
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ValueClick: Acquisition of Commission Junction is completed

First announced in October, it has officially been completed. This can have a significant impact on online marketing. This merger puts the successful Be Free company in-line with Commission Junction. The two leading organizations are now under one roof. Read more about it:

ValueClick acquires Commission Junction Inc.
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The NewbieHangout has (finally) gotten up an rss feed page.

We've currently just got one feed in there, but will be adding more shortly

Access the NHO RSS feeds here.
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I'm probably on the late freight in discovering this ... but I'm typing this and publishing this from my desktop! Not from the google toolbar either.

It's a program called w.bloggar and it's awesome. Even has a little WYSIWYG editor on it. It automatically publishes your content right from your desktop.

Download a free copy of w.bloggar v3.02 here.
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Great stuff is happening around here!

Lockergnome and Sausage Software have launched the new feedreader product. I was able to download the app and test it out and it's fantastic. I see RSS, SML and Web Services as THEE way the net will be operating real quick here. It's important that if we don't want to get left behind, we need to hop on that freight and start learning all this stuff now.

We're mirroring for the download so you can Download the Lockergnome FeedReader right here at the NHO ;-)

The app lets you post 4 feeds of your own to begin with. That's alot of traffic right there ;o)

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The NewbieHangout.com is proud to announce the launch of their new store.

The store is the result of the latest technologies. Amazon Associates are able to add valuable content to their site using Amazon Web Services. Using this service allows for real-time prices and catalogs.

Check it out at:
The NHO Store
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Big news for publishers is in the works.

Commission Junction has emailed all of their affiliates with the announcement regarding the joint venture between CJ and ValueClick.

Read the notice at the following page:

Commission Junction is Joining forces with ValueClick
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Microsoft Courting Google For Possible Takeover
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We're taking our association with Amazon.com to another level. The Amazon Associates program has some really awesome tools for webmasters. We just opened up our Amazon shop and have downloaded the Amazon Developers tool to develop our own program which blends Amazon.com material seamlessly into any site using XML or SOAP.

I have looked the developers kit over and am really surprised at the simplicity of it.

I recommend the Associates program to anyone who wants to add real-time pricing, customer reviews, quick buy links, shopping carts and similar items to their Web site.

Ken is busy working on our new portal. B2Phat.com is going to go through some dramatic changes in the next few months. By January, we hope to have the B2Phat.com portal up and operational. I'm really looking forward to it ... I've got a ton of stuff to plug into our portal once it's up ....
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Gator is a little upset over it's association with the word "spyware".
According to this article: News: See you later, anti-Gators they have won a lawsuit against a spyware-removal company. The company settled with Gator and pulled Web pages ... critical to the company, off line.

Others are getting a bit nervous about it. I am having a difficult time understanding this. I don't see a grey area here. Either it's spyware or it's not. At least, that's how I see it. If the program phones home and reports your activities .... sounds like .... well, I won't say the word ;o)

For those of you looking for a good form filler that is 100% better than Gator ........ has better control, a technology that grows smarter the more you use it .... and is free ... and does not phone home ... try Robofrom.

I used to love gator. So much so that even after I found out about it's phone calls home .... I continued to use it. I disabled it's ability to phone home with my ZoneAlarm firewall ... and just kept using it for my 100's of user
id's and passwords...... until I found Roboform.

Roboform is an intelligent robot that works seamlessly with IE. Netscape, and now Mozilla that you can download for free

Once you set it up, you'll love it. After having Roboform, I don't know what I ever saw in Gator.

AntiScumware Organizations recommend RoboForm as a safe replacement for Gator. Find out more on Roboform Here.
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New article completed and uploaded today. Web Site Design Tips for Newbie Webmasters

We've also got the main sites Newbie Webmaster Forum upgraded and reopened to the public. Am looking forward to getting in there and interacting with our visitors again.

Yep . .... that means YOU ...
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Did Google Develop AdSense specifically for
this program? The fit is almost perfect.
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Now here's a brave guy ......... or incredibly .... well, I'll let you fill in the blank ;o) He actually put it in print that he's been "beating the search engiens" to get his customers more traffic since 1994. Search Engine Cloaker - Outsmart Spiders & Competitors I don't think I'd wanna go that route. But then ... since they aren't HIS pages ...
I think I like the idea of finding out how the search engines work and working with them instead of against them. I'm not one who wants to pay the price of having the search engines angry at me for any reason.

We really need comments on this board, cuz I'd love to hear what you think on this.

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Start and Grow your Small Business
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It's on and it's live!!! The NewbieHangout Halloween Graphic Contest is going on now ... just got the website up. This should be alot of fun. Everyone is welcome to join ... or to help judge.
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So ..... MicroSoft is going head to head with Google! According to this article: Microsoft brains take on Google from CNET News.com ol' Bill Gates has decided that they need their own search capacity. In fact, they've already launched a new search program called MSNBot which crawls the net, much like Google, building an index of HTML links and documents. The next question: Will MicroSoft BUY Google?
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I thought this was kind of interesting ... a blog template created with CSS that changes colors randomly and gives users the ability to change the font. I'm gonna have to work on it a bit to get things lined up correctly ... but it was an interesting little project ;o) Check it out here: CSS : CSS Test Blog And be sure to visit the creators page ... he's got some great CSS tips and tricks and the elusive 3 table CSS code for webpages! The Holy Grail: 3 Column Layout
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WindowSizer is a cool tool that works great for web developers who want to see what their site will look like at various resolutions without having to reset their screen resolution. You can download it free at Mike Lin's Home Page
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Affiliate University How to Succeed as a Publisher Online Is Contextual Advertising About to Rock your World Wide Web
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LOL ....

I got these from an email list I belong to ... maybe they'll help someone:

These are the "greatest" tips, you'll be pleasantly surprised :)

*Budweiser Beer will condition your hair.

*Pam cooking spray will dry finger nail polish.

*Cool whip will condition your hair in 15 min.

*Mayonnaise will KILL LICE. It will also condition your hair.

*Elmer's Glue -- paint on your face, allow it to dry, peel off and see the dead skin and blackheads.

*Shiny Hair - rinse in brewed Lipton Tea.

*Sunburn -- empty a large jar of instant Nestea into your bath water.

*Minor burn -- Colgate or Crest toothpaste

*Burn your tongue? Put sugar on it!

*Arthritis? WD-40 Spray and rub in; kills insect sting pain, too.

*Bee stings - apply meat tenderizer

*Chigger bite -- Preparation H

*Puffy eyelids -- Preparation H (avoid eyes)

*Paper cut -- crazy glue or Chapstick (glue is used instead of sutures at most hospitals).

*Stinky feet -- Jello!!

*Athletes feet -- cornstarch

*Fungus on toenails or fingernails -- Vicks vapor-rub

*Kool Aid to clean dishwasher pipes. Just put in the detergent section and run a cycle, it will also clean
a toilet.

*Kool Aid can be used as a dye in paint also.

*Kool Aid in Dannon plain yogurt as a finger paint. Your kids will love it, and it won't hurt them if they eat it!

*Peanut butter -- will get scratches out of CD's! Wipe off with a coffee-filter paper.

*Sticking bicycle chain -- Pam no-stick cooking spray

*Pam will also remove paint, and grease from your hands! Keep a can in your garage and shop.

*Peanut butter will remove ink from the face of dolls.

*When the doll clothes are hard to put on, sprinkle with cornstarch.

*Heavy dandruff - rinse scalp with vinegar!

*A Slinky will hold toast and CD's.

*To keep goggles and glasses from fogging, coat with Colgate toothpaste and wipe clean.

*Wine stains -- pour on the Morton salt and watch it absorb into the salt.

*To remove wax - Iron a paper towel over the wax stain, the heat will cause the wax to absorb into the
towel.

*Body paint -- Crisco mixed with food coloring. Heat the Crisco in the microwave, pour into an empty 35-mm film container and mix with the food color of your choice and allow to cool.

*Tie-dye T-shirts -- Mix a solution of Kool Aid in a container, tie a rubber band around a section of the T-shirt and soak.

*Preserving a newspaper clipping -- large bottle of club soda and 1/2 cup of milk of magnesia -- soak for 20 min. and let dry, will last for many years!

*Remove labels off glassware etc. -- rub with peanut butter! WD 40 works good on this one too.

*Baked-on food - Fill the container with water, put in a Bounce static remover and softener sheet. Soak overnight. The static from the Bounce towel will cause the baked on food to adhere to it. Also you can use 2 Efferdent tablets, soak overnight!

*Crayon on the wall -- Colgate toothpaste and brush it!

*Dirty grout - Listerine

*Stains on clothes - Colgate toothpaste

*Grass stains -- Karo Syrup. Rub in, let soak and wash.

*Grease Stains- Coca Cola, it will also remove grease stains from the driveway overnight. We know it will take corrosion from batteries!

*Fleas in your carpet? 20 Mule Team Borax: sprinkle and let stand for 2-4 hours.

*To keep FRESH FLOWERS longer, add a little Clorox or 2 Bayer aspirin in the water. Or just use 7-up instead of water.

*WHO KNEW? When you go to buy bread in the grocery store, have you ever wondered which is the freshest? So did you "squeeze" for softness to determine freshness? Did you know that bread is delivered fresh to the stores five days a week? Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Each day has a different colored twist tie. They are: M - Blue, Tu - Green, Th - Red, F -White, S -Yellow. So if today were Thursday, you would want red twist tie, not white which is Friday's (almost a week old)! The colors go alphabetically by color Blue - Green - Red - White -Yellow, Monday through Saturday.

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Just got this email a bit ago. Looks like some exciting changes coming for Adsense ;o) You can read about it here: What's New with Google's AdSense?

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Google has a Weblog!!!

Check it out Google Weblog
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The moral and legal aspects of copyright

I have a confession.

Shhhhh .... it's embarrassing.

Okay ... come real close and I'll whisper it to you .....

I've been the victim of "Netfever." Yep .... it's true. I've done it ... and I'm sure alot of people have that normally wouldn't. If you're wondering what "Netfever" is .... take a peek at this rant:


Point of Focus Rant
I've been guilty. Not of actually taking it - as is - and trying to pass it off as my own .... but of seeing a graphic or a website and thinking "hmmm .... I like that .... I wonder what I can do with it?" And I've then made changes to it ... .animated it, recoded it ... added other graphics or stuff .... and then created whatever.

Why? I don't know. I could say it was the ultimate compliment -- duplication ;o) And that would be partly true. I loved what I saw and thought of it as a challenge and wanted to be able to do something similar .... so I played and practiced with it until I could. But .... you know ...... it's not right. When you think about it .... it's just not right. Learning and practicing are wonderful things to do and is a necessity in order to be able to create the wonderful UNIQUE things that make up the world wide web.

But .... think about it before you do something like that ..... I know that all of us who have been guilty of such a thing would never, in real life .... want to hurt anyone, or take from anyone or take credit for someone else's hard work ..... and when you think about it ... that's exactly what this does. Just because you don't "see" the other person and may never .... doesn't mean that they aren't there. And would you want someone to do that with something you worked so hard on?

Anyway ...... I'm reformed ;o) And to anyone out there who's stuff I've ever "played" with ..... thank you .... thanks for creating such wonderful stuff that you've peeked my curiosity and creativity. And for showing me what value and respect for other's work is really all about.
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Google's AdSense

Recently I was faced with a dilemma. It had to do with the size of this site and the cost of maintaining it. The time and effort I was putting into it was - virtually - unrewarded. Yeah ... I can go into how much personal satisfaction I get from working on and in the NHO .... but the fact remains that I have to have my bills paid and that the quality of life should improve with your daily activities ... not worsen....

In other words, it just doesn't make sense to put 4 or more hours into something on a daily basis if it's not improving your quality of life. There have been days that I am here ...... for nearly the entire 24 hours ... researching ... coding ... trying to find stuff that will be useful and interesting to visitors.

Anyway, I was faced with the dilemma of advertising. I've never been big on clogging up pages with ads, banners, popups, etc., etc. But there was a real need to find SOMETHING that would supplement the NHO without being too ..... invading to members. Something that .. they would even ENJOY or get use of. I thought I was asking too much ;o) BUT .... I think I've found it:


Google Rewards Content with Revenue

I've put up AdSense on many of the NHO pages ... and so far so good. And our visitors are interested because they've been clicking on them. And the amazing thing about AdSense is that they automatically display ads based on your content and keywords. So I don't have to worry about non-related or uninteresting ads facing my visitors. I am not going to be able to quit my day job ... but the NHO will be going strong for a long time coming ;o) And thanks ... to all you who click ;o)

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Former for-pay Blogger services to be free

I found this article today which is really good news for all of us Blog users. It states that Blogger is cancelling its paid version, and apparently all premium functions will now be included with the free version.

Article Exerpt:

"We wanted to keep basic Blogger free, but we needed to start charging in order to keep the lights on. Today, as you may know, Blogger 's situation is much different. For one thing, we're part of Google. Google has lots of computers and bandwidth. And Google believes blogs are important and good for the Web."

Have fun all you Bloggers!
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I got this email message today about blogs that proved pretty interesting.

I don't have a url for it ... just the email and it came from creditwench which is linked on this site ... so you'll probably find the article there. Here's an excerpt from it:

There is an important "new" development coming to blogs. It is already here and well developed in fact but it is at least new to me and it will be new to many of you as well.

It is known as "klips" and Klips is a desktop application that will enable those who visit your blog or your website to keep up with all sorts of things such as news, weather and whatever. But more importantly with changes to your website or blog as they occur in real time.

In order to impliment this you will need to download a few programs. One of them is called cooktop.exe and it is an xml editor that you can use to build RSS feeds for your website that you can then use to submit your website automatically to quite a few syndicators such as syndic8.com and many more. But more importantly you can use the RSS feed you develop to feed and automatically update those Klips so all your visitors will immediately know when you update your website.

Cooktop2.zip can be downloaded free from
http://www.creditwrench.com/cooktop2.zip and that is what you use to update your RSS feed which will also help you increase your traffic greatly and keep your repeat traffic coming back to your site to see your new updates and informaton. Repeat traffic is highly important to your success in online marketing and activism.

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I found this article on another blog ISSN 1707-9926#zc106081227728904660 and it appears that it's a matter of hot debate. I don't know ... I guess it is a good thing for those who are writers or journalists. In fact, for them it make a whole lot of sense. But for someone like me who just wants to have their readers easily receive the latest updates ... it seems a bit "stuffy" LOL

Just a newbie ;o)
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This site brought back some memories ;o)

BLUE CREATIONS - Home


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Nite newbies!
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