A day of Darkness – Top 3 Highlights

January 19, 2012 by Aaron in Personal Blog | Leave a comment

Today was the day that the internet went on strike to protest a set of laws racing through the US legal system that will cripple the internet. Laws that will bend the internet over, and allow big brother and the MPAA/RIAA to shove it’s grimy fingers on inside and go to town. It was a needed success. With Wikipedia, Google, Craigslist, and loads of other web giants participating, the impact was huge. And there’s no denying the discussion we saw on facebook, and the trends we saw on twitter.

My own sites participated. And our voices were heard, by at least some people. Over the course of a day – 3 members of congress changed their minds. And a whopping 13 members of the senate pulled up their pants and put away the Astro Glide. Let’s hope some more follow suit, and that we can finally get these proposals crushed out of existence.

Now we all know I’m not one to waste time with words, so while we’re here, let’s take a look at the blackout highlight reel.  And please, if you oppose this bill, and you enjoy the way the internet has enabled us to be creative, open and free – sign this petition.

SOPA/PIPA Blackout Highlights

1. Mark Zukcerberg says “SOPA IS TEH SUCK!”

In more or less words, Zuck hated on Sopa via facebook today.

 

2. The Oatmeal makes an anti-sopa GIF image

I think by far, this is one of my favorite “Blackouts” I saw all day. Matthew Inman, better know as The Oatmeal, blacked out his site today with this GIF image:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3. The Lonely Island & Aziz Ansari say “The MPAA pays our bills, but we hate SOPA”

OK, I may have paraphrased that, but today Andy Samberg, Aziz Ansari, and a number of other hollywood actors came out opposing the bill. And The Lonely Island made an official post. To see actors and record producers going to this length to tell the public that this is unjust is amazing, and cripples the arguments against the MPAA and RIAA.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ll post some more SOPA related articles soon, but for now guys, lets take a breather, and move on with the fight. Today was a day that will go down in internet history, and coming out of today, at least we can say that the vast majority of our public is informed.

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SOPA Blackout Code

January 18, 2012 by Aaron in Personal Blog, Projects, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

If you are planning on blacking out your websites today, please feel free to use this bit of code on your page.

Please, for the love of god, backup your index.php file before making this change. 

Add the following code to your index.php:

<?php include 'http://blixhost.com/blackout/'; ?>


That’s it. Save the file, and the page will be blacked out. Remember, this is most effective on the index.

Godspeed.

			

						
		
	

				
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Math Sucks – A word to today’s youth

			
			

			
			

			
			January 10, 2012 by Aaron in Personal Blog | Leave a comment
			
			





			
			
As a kid, I definitely hated math. But I was good at it. It was one of those necessary evils that I just had to deal with on a day to day basis. My mom and dad always told me how good I was at math, and how I’d one day become a math genius. But where was the fun? Where was the purpose? There was none. As a kid I was led to believe that math was the end all be all of our existence - the almighty backbone of the universe.


I recall my teachers in high school telling me that years and years of math would be required if I wanted to be a programmer. “Math is the language that runs all programs!” – my high school math teacher Ms. Trahern told me that once. At the time, I was a script kiddie. I could program to en extent, but I couldn’t back it with any real skill. So when a teacher tells you that your life goal is based on the one thing you hate the most, it’s kind of a turn off.


Anyways, here’s the thing kids. It’s been over 6 years since I was in that class. Hell, I even took some more advanced math afterwards, thinking to myself “Hey, I might need this in order to what I love.” I was so wrong.


Ladies and gentleman – I program for a living. It pays my bills. Want to know how much math is involved in that? Like none. I mean, you have the simple shit, like a fraction here and there, multiplication, and addition if needed. But if your teacher tells you that you need a heavy background in math to be a programmer, tell them I said you don’t. All you need is the drive, and a bit of general logic and clear thinking.


Spoiler alert: Unless you plan on doing hardcore chemistry as a living, the extent of math you’ll use as an adult is Algebra. Do yourself a favor and stop there. And if you like code, for the love of god, enroll yourself in a computer class.


Love yo faces.

-Aaron


 

			

						
		
	

				
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Successful Blogging Resources – Week 2 – “Where’s my Money, Man?”

			
			

			
			

			
			January 1, 2012 by Aaron in Marketing & Internet Money, Personal Blog, Projects | Leave a comment
			
			





			
			
So if you haven’t already – go read the  first post in the series, and get a blog online for yourself. Want a cheap blog? Well then go to BlixHost and get one for a buck a month (Ohey look product placement – go me!)


So now that your blog is online – I wanted to share these links to all sorts of reputable ad agencies to make sure that you can make at least a tiny biut of cash off of them. I can guarantee that you’ll at least make enough to cover your hosting.


Again, I’m not going to spoon feed you through using these services, but I did 60% of the work for you just finding them!


 


Banner and Text Advertising PPT/PPC

The way these sites work are simply by acting as a broker for advertising. You place the ad on your website, and you get payed when it’s viewed/clicked. These sites are meant for people with blogs, or websites that they can earn from.


The top PPC sites are as follows….


1. Google Adsense - High payout. By far the best ad network ever. Note that they have a pretty intense screening process. But check out this post to see how much can actually be made.


2. Adbrite - Medium high payout with an instant approval. I’ve used them in the past, but only because I was monetizing content that Google wouldn’t allow. (Spoiler alert – it was a website that contained pictures of boonies)


3. Clicksor - Lower payout, more ad options. PayPal Payments. Clicksor is great because they offer full page interstitials, and they can convert inline text (like you are reading right now) into ads.

4. Bidvertiser - No ad options, medium high payouts. PayPal Payments. Bidvertiser is great because their minimum payout is 10 dollars. That’s hard to come by.


Link Advertising

A lot of people think that link advertising methods are nonprofessional. They are, however for a teenage/ entry level web entrepreneur it can be monetized in so many different ways. Basically all you do is place links all over. The more people click your links, the more money you get.


The best link sites are….


1. Linkbucks - Medium payout, numerous redirects, allows adult content. Payments by PayPal.


2. Adfly - Higher payouts, numerous ad options, very easy to monetize, and works as a link shortening service like Bit.ly. But better.  This is the one I use for a lot of stuff.


CPA – “Cost Per Action”

We’ve all been to those websites where you have to work your ass off doing surveys to get what you want. Have you ever wondered where those surveys come from? They are from CPA Access sites. This is currently the highest paying Ad division on the market, with it’s top earners making millions of dollars a year.

I myself make over 400 dollars a month from CPA Sites.


The best CPA Sites are…


1. CPALead - Payment through paypal or check. Lots of ads, “easy” money. Big marketers on this site make upwards of 4 grand a month. Read my gull review of CPALead here.


2. AdultAccessNow - The Adult version of CPA Lead if you wanna make booby ads.


3. Adscend Media - High Payout, but a lack of widgets. This can be used as a secondary CPA ad site.

			

						
		
	

				
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