Archive for September, 2007
Tuesday, September 25th, 2007
Halo 3: The line starts back there, dude!
About 2 hours ago I was walking past a local store that sells video games on my way to grab some Mexican food. It didn’t occur to me that the line represented months of development work by Microsoft’s gaming division on the much hyped and ballyhooed supposedly final release in the alien shooter series, Halo. In this latest release annouced at E3 2006 with a special video trailer, we once again find ourselves immerersed in Master Chief’s world. This is the third in the series, appropriately titled Halo 3.
Anyhow back to my story which started with me walking past that store… I quickly realized what the line was for. Mostly due to the kid who kept shouting “Ha-mother-f’n-lo, wooooooo!!”
As a side note to parents everywhere. If your 13 year old kid has a mental defect for which he should be wearing a helmet 24/7 please chaparon him. Both for his own safety and the sanity of everyone else, thanks!
No where was I? Oh yeah, so I figured out what all the ruckus was about about halfway down the line. A line which incidentally streched a good 30 yards down the sidewalk. Anyhow I got about halfway down it and stopped for a moment to take a look at everyone there who was waiting. There was a good mixture of folks waiting for the doors to open at midnight. All ages and sexes were present. I saw kids with their parents who couldn’t have been more than 5 and adults who looked like they might be pushing 65. As I stopped some girl around 20 or so looked at me, curled her lip and said “Don’t even try cutting in front of me” in a voice that absolutely seethed venom. The guy ahead of her in his late 30s or early 40s turned around and kindly informed me The line starts back there, dude! and pointed to the back of the line. I just smiled nodded and went on my way wondering if people have become so ignorant because of things like video games or has it happened in spite of them?
As for the game itself, I never much cared for Halo 1 (combat evolved), or Halo 2 so I don’t expect much from this game. I believe when Microsoft makes statements such as:
“We very much want to treat this like a blockbuster movie launch,” said Jarred West, Microsoft’s global marketing chief for “Halo 3.” “We want the title itself to transcend gaming and turn into a pop culture phenomenon.” - Source
There is bound to be a huge kink in the armor that will rear its ugly head sooner than later. This has been a dismal year for Microsoft’s gaming division after having to finally admit to an unacceptable number of issues with the XBox 360 which the company has reserved 1.15 Billion dollars to deal with. Only time will tell how an already soft economy will respond to Halo 3. The marketing campaign has been phenomenal if you’re a hardcore gamer or a teenager waiting on your latest fix of the week. For the rest of us who are neither teens nor hardcore gamers it will have to be a wait and see approach. Experience tells me a few things though.
- It will never live up to its hype
- People will expect more than it was ever intended to deliver
- Chances are excellent that the this isn’t the end of the Halo series
If you’d like to purchase Halo 3 consider doing so through Amazon.
Posted in Video and Flash games | 8 Comments »
Monday, September 24th, 2007
Dealdotcom: Content Composer
I’ve been a little hesitant to really start promoting these Dealdotcom opportunities because I was concerned about it becoming a full time endeavor trying to keep up with it. After witnessing for myself how quickly affiliate profits begin to accumulate I’ve come to the realization it well worth the 20-30 minutes it takes to promote the item of the day. I just wish we knew a day or so ahead of time what that item will be so we can prepare for it before it hits the site.
- Todays Product: Content Composer
- This is a pretty interesting product. Basically it allows you to make several versions (over 20) of the same article you’ve written with the push of a button. Each article is unique enough that Google won’t hit you with a duplicate content penalty. Aside from how this obviously benefits you in regards to SEO consider how it benefits you in terms of time spent writing. I mean who wants to sit around like a monkey at a keyboard banging out article after article trying to say the same thing for 20 different promotional angles?
Feature wise it is rich enough to be useful, but not overly so to the point of being a burden. The features Content Composer include:
- “Create 20 or more unique, coherent articles in the time it takes to write 1″ - The fact that these articles are coherent is huge. I’ve seen other software which has the same basic idea as this except it sucked. Nothing was coherent about it. I’d have better luck running it through an online translation service like Babelfish. Content Composer however aims to be coherent.
- “Helps you keep track of your content to maximize your traffic” - I don’t know how much content you have floating around out there, but I have a decent amount. With Content Composer I’m able to keep track of that content and not only will this allow me gain more traffic, but also to simply keep the content updated with changing information as it becomes available.
- “One-button check for plagiarism so that you can avoid the Search Engines’ dreaded duplicate content penalty” - I’m certain I don’t need to explain why plagiarism is bad for reasons above and beyond duplicate content penalties. Don’t get me wrong it’s a great reason to use Content Composer, but legal issues with plagiarism is more of a concern with most people than duplicate content.
- “Eliminates worries of Adsense lockdowns and other penalties associated with “Black Hat” methods of driving traffic” - Master Google doesn’t appreciate when we use things like social networking sites or other ingenius methods to drive traffic to our sites. In fact they consider it to be “black hate” and often times a violation of their terms and conditions. Basically Google only wants you to get traffic by making a website and having people link to you. Anything that artificially drives traffic to your site is frowned upon. With Content Creator the content comes from well written articles that you distribute throughout the internet. Because it is “organic” google approves and doesn’t do something like shut down your Adsense account for violating their Terms and Conditions of service.
- “No matter what your content needs are, Content Composer is guaranteed to save you hours of precious time” - If saving time isn’t important to you then you have WAY too much free time on your hands. But since most of us are burning the candle at both ends on a daily basis why not bring some of that under control? This program will save you untold hours of work. Time you can spend with your family and friends. Time you can relax and enjoy.
Posted in Making Money | 3 Comments »
Monday, September 24th, 2007
Stuff that kicks ass (apparently)
I was just going through some stat information on my RSS feed and was suprised to find that my most popular articles there are not the same ones that those who come to my actual site seem to like viewing. I’m not sure why this is happening, but it does give me a chance to bring up some older articles from my archives that you might not have been aware of.
- 5 tips for riding the wave of success
- This article was written after one of my first signficant success with Stumble Upon and I was explaining to readers a few tips for staying on top of things and knowing when to leave sleeping dogs lie
- Firefox extensions everyone should have
- This was just a list of common extensions and their uses. I was really suprised it did so well on Stumble Upon and with just general traffic. Aside from one guy saying there was “nothing new” most everyone had a good reaction to it. Like I said I was surprised because there really was nothing new. It’s all extensions you find on the top extension list and all within 2 or 3 pages of the top
- The 2 most important things you can do as a blogger
- An article explaining two things you need to do in order to succeed as a blogger. Planning and setting goals.
- I have 3 reasons never to look at your blog again
- It’s fat (content). It’s ugly (poor writing). It’s mother dresses it funny (poor theme). Those are three reason that anyone will likely not return to your blog. By themselves not a big deal, but all combined and it spells disaster.
- How much money have you thrown away?
- You’ve been leaking money from your blog and you probably never thought about it. If you’re like most others and not thought about it you’ve also not thought of a way to stop the leak. You really should before it costs you anymore money.
Like I said surprising results as news related content seems to do the best from the website itself.
Posted in Blogging | 5 Comments »
Sunday, September 23rd, 2007
Are people born this stupid does it take practice?
Warning ranting and raving (and a little bit of lunacy) lie ahead!
What you see above is a traffic sign. Indicating no left turn. This is something you learn sitting on your daddy’s knee pretending to drive. If you don’t learn it there you most certainly have to know it to pass the written part of a driving exam. Not to mention they’ll flunk you faster than you can say “oh crap” if you don’t obey it on the driving part of the exam. So why then Mr. Dodge Cummins Diesel would you be stupid enough to make a left turn onto a one way street and wonder why everyone was scream and flipping the bird at you?
Did it not occur to you that “I own the road” is only figure of speech? And then to get out of your truck, which of course was left dead center in the middle of a narrow street, and go into the store. Real class, jackass. I called the cops but they didn’t get there in time. I gave them your license hoping they’d maybe track you down by that, but the officer didn’t seem to interested at that point. I suspect you’ve never used your pickup truck for anything aside from tooling around Gloucester Ma. Which brings me to the next part of my rant.
Why would anyone except construction types have any need for a pickup around the Boston Ma area? What reason can any of you give for needing one of them? You’re probably the same idiots who elect people who whine about global warming. Perhaps you’re like the married woman with NO kids who I was talking to that got one because “it’s so much safer”. No lady safer is people like you learning how to drive responsibly instead of assuming you own the road.
Speaking of owning the road is it really that hard to move over to the far left, or at least out of the turn-in lane when you get on Highway 128? It would be much appreciated seeing as most of you drive for a good 10 or 15 miles before you have to exit the highway. Why is that such a big deal? Because the rest of us would like to get on the road and get where we need to go too.
Oh and before I forget stop honking your damn horn at everything everywhere. Some of you people honk so much it’s a wonder you haven’t gone deaf from it.
Well now I feel much better.
Posted in Potpourri | 2 Comments »
