Semi-Hiatus Over
Wishing I was on hiatus because I was really on vacation, but missed several weeks of posts because I was actually tied up on another project and just can’t find anymore time nor the energy to get online after banging my head on the monitor dealing with the folks involved in this project. Hopefully in the next few weeks, it’ll be finally done. It’s almost like looking forward for that root canal to be over with…
Do People Still Fall For This?
I still regularly get communication like the one below from wives of presidents, sons of billionaires, daughters of a wealthy sheik, etc. and saying that with my help I can be an instant millionaire. The words in the message slightly vary, but the message is pretty much the same. This scam, commonly known as the “Nigerian Sam”, has been going on even before e-mail became widely widespread, but after all these years and after all the media exposure it has received, one would think folks would no longer fall for it and perhaps the scammers will change their tactics.
Well as illustrated in the e-mail below, and from the tons of similar e-mails I have received, it doesn’t look like the tactic have changed at all. I wonder if people still fall for them, since nothing changed on the bad guys side.
Yeah Boy! Yah Suck! – David Pogue | Microsoft
This week’s, Yeah Boy!!!
I don’t know if you’ve heard of David Pogue, New Technology Columnist for NyTimes.Com. His website is aptly named: DavidPogue.com. I first got turned on to him (no he did not turn me on 
) when he did the keynote for a marketing conference I attended in Las Vegas about 2 years ago. The man has proven that he had the gift for writing, the gift of gab, he delivers his stuff in a very down-to-earth and funny fashion (both in text and in speech) and as he demonstrated in that keynote speech, he got musical skills, too. He explained that Music was actually his major in college and becoming one of the most recognized and respected tech reviewer in the web today is quite a feat indeed. Read more
Does Microsoft Even Care? Technet willing host of Spammers…
I was out of commission for the past two days, not because I was sick, but is simply loaded with other commitments and barely had any chance to pee… 
…
Anyway, an unavoidable facet of blogging or the Web 2.0 framework in general, wherein the web publisher allows their visitors to submit entries such as comments, is the fact that you will be dealing with a lot of spammers who will use every trick in the book to exploit your system. This blog is no exception. I do, however, care and try to monitor and try my best not to let spammers inundate this blog with useless crap.
It is a standard practice for all Web 2.0 systems developers to provide some form of spam protection in their system and it is wise for the users of these systems to utilize these protections in order for them to avoid getting their site inundated with junk and their mailbox with even more junk. Read more
Thursday Geek Mail – Stuff in my e-mail that may be worth sharing
Why Small Businesses Quit Advertising Online
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
When I was focused 100% on online advertising, the rate of advertiser churn was perhaps the biggest challenge of the business.
Customers buying cheap ad packages were extremely happy and loyal (well over 90% retention). They got a great value and bought a product that they understood.
But as the advertising become more sophisticated and expensive, advertiser churn became a major drag.
Read more
DARPA and the Red Balloons
A little something-something to tickle the fancy of social media geeks out there. If you have not heard of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), they are the central research and development organization for the United States Department of Defense and are essentially the key organization responsible for creating the Internet, and no, Al Gore was not the head of DARPA 40 years ago when the concept of digital inter-connectivity was being developed … And yes, it is the same the “Intranetsh” George Dubya Bush likes to quote… 
QUICK UPDATE: MIT STUDENTS WIN THE COMPETITION (http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2009/12/06/MIT-students-win-military-balloon-hunt/UPI-82141260114716/)
Increasing Online Sales through Affiliate Marketing
One of the most tried, trusted, and beneficial ways of increasing online sales through marketing and advertising is affiliate marketing. This is basically a revenue share sort of system, where an affiliate is given a form of commission from a merchant, based on how many sales the affiliate has generated through advertising on his or her site. Affiliate marketing began just four years after the world-wide web was launched, and many successful e-commerce sites owe much to this simple yet effective method. Read more
Let’s do the Wave… (Or at least as soon as I figure out how…)
I finally received my invite for Google Wave. If you have not heard of Wave, below is the snippet from Google Wave about page:
Google Wave is an online tool for real-time communication and collaboration. A wave can be both a conversation and a document where people can discuss and work together using richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more. Read more
Affiliate Marketing – Highly Cost Effective, Highly Efficient
The Internet has fast become an efficient and trusted way for companies to market and sell their product. One of the reasons for this has been the rise of “Affiliated Marketing” – which is when a website directs traffic to itself through adverts on other (usually related) websites. Affiliated marketing either pays the affiliate through a pay-per-click program (the affiliate receives money every time an advert is clicked) or a pay-per-sale program (the affiliate receives commission every time a posted advert on their site generates an actual sale or subscription.) Generally, the pay-per-sale program (also called cost-per-sale, or CPS) is the tried and trusted form of affiliate marketing used. Read more
The Different Types of Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is a broad term that refers to a sort of on-line revenue share scheme, involving advertising and selling. It dates back to late 1994, when many e-commerce sites started employing the system and finding that it produces fantastic results. Currently, affiliate marketing is actually a serious player within e-commerce strategy.
When an affiliate joins in with an e-commerce merchant of some sort (be it a subscription service, a shopping site etc…) payment is received through referrals done from the affiliate’s website – done through the following methods Read more
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Business Tech Press Releases- ConvergEx Offers Eze OMS Clients Access to LiquidPoint's Latest Options Execution and Routing Technologies March 11, 2010
- NI Technology Updates Outlooks for Microvision, Towerstream, National Semiconductor, TriQuint Semiconductor and RF Micro Devices March 11, 2010
- Fund.com Forms Strategic Alliance With Transparensee to Create Next Generation Search Engine for Mutual Funds and ETFs March 11, 2010
- Allion Test Labs Selects LeCroy USB 3.0 Test Suite for Complete SuperSpeed USB Compliance Testing March 11, 2010
- High Gear Media Launches All-New Used Car Listings Marketplace March 11, 2010
- From the National Vulnerbility Database
- CVE-2010-0958 (tribisur) March 9, 2010Directory traversal vulnerability in modules/hayoo/index.php in Tribisur 2.1, 2.0, and earlier, when magic_quotes_gpc is disabled, allows remote attackers to include and execute arbitrary files via directory traversal sequences in the theme parameter. NOTE: some of these details are obtained from third party information. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0957 (saskias_shopsystem) March 9, 2010Directory traversal vulnerability in content.php in Saskia's Shopsystem beta1 and earlier allows remote attackers to include and execute arbitrary local files via directory traversal sequences in the id parameter. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0947 (bbsmax) March 9, 2010Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in post.aspx in Max Network Technology BBSMAX 3.0, 4.1, and 4.2 allows remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via the action parameter. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0956 (opencart) March 9, 2010SQL injection vulnerability in index.php in OpenCart 1.3.2 allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary SQL commands via the page parameter. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0949 (natychmiast-cms) March 9, 2010Multiple cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities in Natychmiast CMS allow remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via the id_str parameter to (1) index.php and (2) a_index.php. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0955 (bild_flirt_community) March 9, 2010SQL injection vulnerability in index.php in Bild Flirt Community 2.0 allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary SQL commands via the id parameter. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0791 (ncpfs) March 9, 2010The (1) ncpmount, (2) ncpumount, and (3) ncplogin programs in ncpfs 2.2.6 do not properly create lock files, which allows local users to cause a denial of service (application failure) via unspecified vectors that trigger the creation of a /etc/mtab~ file that persists after the program exits. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0954 (pre_e-learning_portal) March 9, 2010SQL injection vulnerability in search_result.asp in Pre Projects Pre E-Learning Portal allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary SQL commands via the course_ID parameter. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0103 (duo_usb) March 9, 2010UsbCharger.dll in the Energizer DUO USB battery charger software contains a backdoor that is implemented through the Arucer.dll file in the %WINDIR%\system32 directory, which allows remote attackers to download arbitrary programs onto a Windows PC, and execute these programs, via a request to TCP port 7777. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0953 (phpcoin) March 9, 2010Directory traversal vulnerability in mod.php in phpCOIN 1.2.1 allows remote attackers to read arbitrary files via a .. (dot dot) in the mod parameter. […]nvd@nist.gov
- CVE-2010-0958 (tribisur) March 9, 2010