Random Thoughts From Marybeth

The First Part Was Just as Dumb

This was at the end of an email I received: Confidentiality note: The content and/or attachments accompanying this email contain confidential information. The information is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named in this transmission. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution, or the taking of any action in reliance on the contents of this email information is strictly prohibited, and that the documents should be returned to (company's name) immediately. If you have received this transmission in error, please notify us by writing immediately at (their email address), so that we can arrange for the return of the original document to us at no cost to you.

1. You can't send me something that I didn't ask for and tell me what I can or can't do with it.
2. They're going to tell me how to send back an email or attachment at "no cost"? Can't I just delete it?

More Spam

The beginning of an email sent to an internet directory: "My name is Zack Schwarz and I am a freelance link developer, working mostly in the field of Forex.
Have you ever heard of linking to other sites in order to increase your website traffic?"

What is this linking to other sites you speak of? If only someone had thought of this before...maybe even creating a site of links to sites that they felt worth visiting....

This guy was promoting a forex site but if this is an example of how he researches something, I wouldn't trust his advice on investing.

Dear Webmaster

Dear Webmaster,

My name is webmaster, and I run the web site Car Hire in Larnaca:

Seriously, the spammer's name is "webmaster"? He addressed me as "webmaster too. Trying to create a feeling of sameness or just stupid?...I'm going with stupid.

WhoIs shows a proxy registration so I can't tell who the email is from that way either.

Spammer's site

I recently found your site xxxxx and am very interested in
exchanging links. I've gone ahead and posted a link to your site, on this
page:

I looked here and have no idea where among the tons of spammy links they posted is the one they are talking about.

As you know, reciprocal linking benefits both of us by raising our search
rankings and generating more traffic to both of our sites. Please post a
link to my site as follows:

Title: Car Hire in Larnaca
URL: deleted
Description: Spammer whom I wouldn't do business with on a bet. This description has been changed to make it more accurate.

I love being sent unasked for information on the "benefits" of reciprocal links by some spammer whose site shows zero backlinks. Reciprocal links from spammer's sites aren't worth anything. Links from linkfarm pages like the one this idiot has may even damage your ranking on search engines.

Once you've posted the li! nk, let me know the URL of the page that it's on,
by entering it in this form:

Why is there a "!" in the word "link"? Am I supposed to click in the middle of saying it?

Link to spammer's form

You can also use that form to make changes to the text of the link to your
site, if you'd like.

Thank you very much,

webmaster

Almost all of the emails I get like this have the same wording about reciprocal links or assure me that our sites "definately" are related. They appear to come from LinkMachine.

Why would any reputable business use this garbage to spam people? I replied to one once to say that we don't link to spammers and got an unreprintable reply.

Badgertastic!

I've been reading a blog called Sleep Talkin' Man that's been getting a lot of attention lately. I also ordered one of the t-shirts they sell and it came within a few days. I don't know if I beat the rush, if the t-shirts aren't as popular as the site, or if they are just handling the demand well.

There are a lot of good quotations but two of my recent favorites are:
"No, not the cats. Don't trust them. Their eyes. Their eyes. They know too much."
"Hey, don't... don't say anything. Why don't you put it in an email, then I can ignore it at my pleasure."

Warning if you decide to check out the rest of the blog, some of the language may be offensive.

No Sales Tax

I was reviewing a website and saw something that really irritated me. Up in the righthand corner of the online store's site was "no sales tax".

It seems like false advertising to me. Yes, the store won't charge you sales tax if your purchase is going to another state but you are still required by your state to pay the tax when you file your income taxes. Implying that you are not responsible for this seems like shady business practices to me. If they are willing to encourage you to cheat the government out of the taxes you owe* then why would you think that the store/company wouldn't cheat you when/if they could?

I think we (me!) are taxed too much but disagreeing with it doesn't mean we shouldn't pay it. It's better to elect politicians that will decrease the size of the government and its spending.

SECCO Home Services Spams Forums

Someone using the editor name "SECCOhome" (Jason Harshbegrer 209.74.12.195) joined JoeAnt as an editor but instead of submitting his site(s) for consideration for listing, he spammed the forum.

Mon 01 June 2009 14:17:47 I was curious has any heard of this HVAC, Plumbing, Air conditioning, Electrical, Solar, Wind, Duct Cleaning, Carpentry, Home Improvement Company? http://seccohome.com

Mon 01 June 2009 14:24:07 Has an heard of this awesome site called http://prontotoday.com its all about a plumbing service company in harrisburg pa 17011, check them out and make your comment.

Mon 01 June 2009 14:26:20 Has anyone ever heard of any Harrisburg PA Home Improvement Company called Carpenter TODAY?? check out there site http://carpentertoday.com and leave me your thoughts, I thought it was a great service company in harrisburg pa 17011

Mon 01 June 2009 14:27:46 Quicktricity Electric is a harrisburg residential electrical company, I really liked their service check into their web site and let me know what you think of them. http://quicktricity.com

Mon 01 June 2009 14:31:00 Harrisburg PA 17011 Home repairs and Home Improvements check them out online at http://carpentertoday.com

Mon 01 June 2009 14:29:56 WOW check out this site: http://sungenuity.com now they look like a great service company that you can depend on for solar PV solar thermal and Wind energy installations in the Harrisburg PA 17011 area. Check them out at http://sungenuity.com

Anyone who has been online for more than 10 minutes knows that spamming forums like this is wrong. How crappy must a business be if you resort to this kind of behavior to get your site noticed?

If I lived near Camp Hill, PA and needed electrical work, plumbing, duct cleaning, HVAC reapir or carpentry, this is the last place I would call. Anyone who is unethical enough to spam (and to write the spammy posts as if he were not connected with the company despite having an IP that belongs to SECCO), why would I trust anyone from his company in my house? People rarely keep a lack of ethics confined to just one aspect of their life.

I'm Clicking the Gmail "Report Spam" Button

I have found your website _______ when searching the web on the topics related to our website theme.

I must say your site content is very good and I think we would benefit much from possible partnership - for example link exchange. This would bring more targeted traffic to our sites, plus increase our websites' weight at the search engines, as they give greater value to the links from the topic-related sites rather than irrelevant backlinks.

Our website http://www.curtainpolesunlimited.co.uk/ is definitely related to yours.

Feel free to email me direct to penny@baker-simpson.co.uk to discuss the details on the possible partnership.

Hope for the fruitful cooperation,

Best regards,
Penny Green - Baker Simpson
http://www.curtainpolesunlimited.co.uk/.

Who falls for this? What site owner/manager would want their site to be linked to by a spammer? Who would want to do business with companies that send out spam? I doubt that poor business practices stop at an email account.

I consider it spam because I get several emails a week that are very similar in their content. All have minimal relevance to the site they are requesting a link from...about as much as a single mention of something in one post of this blog would have to the blog overall.

My "Online" Has Expired?

Who responds to emails like this? You know that enough people must to make it worth the scummy spammers' time.

Dear eBay Member, This is your official notification from eBay. Your online has expired. If you want to continue using our service you have to renew your online. If not, your online will be limited and deleted. To confirm your Account records click on the following link:

Deleted phishing link

Random Design

A couple of weeks or so ago I downloaded Spore Creature Creator. I tried the free trial version first and had fun with it so I got the $9.95 enhanced version (more creature parts available).

When you register the game, they send an email to the address you supplied for verification. For some reason my myway.com email wasn't letting the verification email go through. I lowered the filter as much as I could, put ea.com on my accepted list, and told myway to deliver all email from ea.com to my inbox. I would request the verification email be resent but still no email arrived. I knew it was my email account since my son had also gotten the Creature Creator but had listed his gmail account when he registered and had gotten his verification email with no problem.

Everytime I tried to log on to the Creature Creator it told me that I still needed to verify my account so I contacted their customer support. Their first reply to me didn't give me much hope. You have to pick a topic/category for your problem before filling out the help request form and I think they just look at the topic and send a canned answer. Basically they told me to make sure I was signing in with the username and password that I registered with...even though the message to them had been explaining exactly why I haven't been able to do this.

Someone actually read this one and told me that if I provided some information they required to prove the account was mine they could verify it from their end. I did, they did, now everything is just fine. Their customer support ended up being quite helpful even though the main problem was due to an email account they had no control over and no responsibility for.

Now, if only we didn't have to wait until September for the full game to come out.

My creatures are still mostly products of random design...I'm working my way up to intelligent semi-retarded design. The creatures my kids build are much cooler. It's tough being a god of creation when you have these showoff godlings around. But we'll see whose building creatures that can evolve and survive long term. Their flashiness may just get them eaten by predators earlier.

Eureka!

The Center of the Internet

I Should Be Working

But instead I'm looking at stuff like this.

That technology can let me watch this is awesome. The fact that I do watch it, and want to share it, is a bit troubling.

Domain Listing Services Scam

I just got a letter from DLSCorp.net in the mail. For $75, they offered to submit my domain name to "25 major search engines".

What a scam.

First of all, the domain name they mentioned in the letter is one that I had never used. It makes me wonder what "eight keyword/phrase listings" they had planned for it. Other than "parked domain", I'm kind of drawing a blank here. Maybe "Oakland" (there isn't any there there).

While I'm calling what I received a "letter", it looked more like an invoice. It did state that it was a solicitation and not a bill but only on the back side. It's quite possible to look at what appears to be an invoice, see the list of services, cost, and where to send the payment without ever seeing that you don't actually owe that money.

They have at least three sites that are basically the same thing: dlscorp.net (Domain Listing Services), domainlistingservices.net, and ilscorp.net (Internet Listing Service Corporation). All have very low Google page rank and none show any back links. It doesn't exactly instill confidence in their ability to generate traffic for a website.

The contact information for DLScorp/ILScorp sites is a UPS store in Chicago. Who knows where it is actually going or who is behind it. I have found blog posts about this scam going back several years. Contact details for the company changes but the format of the "letter" is basically the same.

More here, here, and an article.

Location, Location, Location

I spend some of my time online reviewing websites for JoeAnt. The majority of the sites I look at are nice - clean and easy to navigate. A few sites are outstanding and a few are virtually worthless - either through poor design or lack of content.

Among the ones that make up the majority there are some that do one of two things that is really beginning to bug me. Both occur on business sites. The first is when the site announces that they deliver/sell/provide a service nationwide...only you have to search to find what nation it is.

The second is one I see with local businesses that are trying to attract new customers in their area. At least I would have thought that is what the site was for but I'm not sure when they make it difficult to find what the address of the business is. There was one recently that didn't even have the location on the "contact" page. I can't remember now where I finally found it but I remember spending more time than I should have had to finding it.

If you provide a product or service to a specific area, whether it's a city or a country, this information should be obvious to anyone viewing the site. Even if you don't have the full address on the opening page, at least refer to the area you serve in the text on that page. This not only will make your site more viewer-friendly but will also help people who are using search engines to find a product/service in a particular area more likely to find you.

Top Videos

BlogPulse is now listing the most-linked videos of the previous day.

Hmmmm, YouTube's not loading for me this morning. This isn't good since the majority of the top videos seem to be from there.

Preview Search Results

Pagebull shows screenshots of the results for a search. You will need a broadband connection and even then it's not the speediest search. I don't know how often I would use this but I can see it being handy to "refind" a page that I've viewed before but can't remember anything other than the subject of the page.

Testing Meme Speed

From Acephalous:

1. Write a post linking to this one in which you explain the experiment. (All blogs count, be they TypePad, Blogger, MySpace, Facebook, &c.) 2. Ask your readers to do the same. Beg them. Relate sob stories about poor graduate students in desperate circumstances. Imply I'm one of them. (Do whatever you have to. If that fails, try whatever it takes.) 3. Ping Technorati.

The links will be tracked by Technorati.

Describing the Elephant: Missing the Big Picture

The Universal Music Group, the world’s largest music company, filed a copyright infringement lawsuit yesterday against MySpace, the popular social networking Web site, for allowing users to upload and download songs and music videos.

...In a statement yesterday, Universal said its music and videos “play a key role in building the communities that have created hundreds of millions of dollars of value for the owners of MySpace. Our goal is not to inhibit the creation of these communities, but to ensure that our rights and those of our artists are recognized.”

I think that Universal Music is placing a rather high value on the "contribution" that its music has added to MySpace and I think they are overlooking the likelihood that the communities that are built around music increases the fan base for artists which increases music sales. Also, it only considers the gain made by MySpace and the article does not state how much (if any) they believe was lost by Universal Music.

I understand that Universal Music has an obligation to protect the rights of their artists but I'm not sure that this is the best way to do so. I doubt the fans think of themselves as pirates. For them, web space is just an extension of real space. You hang up posters of musicians in your bedroom, you post pics on your page. You play your latest CD or music download for friends, you make the same available online. In most cases, the generation that populates most of MySpace just want to share something they like. There isn't any desire to "stick it to the man". That was their parents' (or grandparents') thing.

Will users of MySpace see this as simply a law suit against a Web site or as a personal attack from an industry they support? Maybe a little of both, but what they know rationally is not always what they feel. As a group, teenagers tend to view everything as all about them.

American teenagers spent about $159 billion last year. How much is viral advertising to this group worth?

The title of the post comes from this story.

You See, There Are These Really Big Pneumatic Tubes...

Ted Stevens, R-Alaska understands the Internet about as well as my cats do (maybe less).

...an internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday and I just got it yesterday. Why?

Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the internet commercially.

He goes on to explain that the Internet is made up of tubes. These tubes get clogged with "enormous amounts of material" and says, "Maybe there is a place for a commercial net but it's not using what consumers use every day." (Besides explaining the Internet someone should also tell him that without consumers there would be no commerce.)

(Link via Anywhere But Here)

Checkout

Google Checkout looks like a handy service. Log in once with Google and buy from several online sellers without having to log in or give your full credit card number or email address to the stores.

Very tempting but I wonder if I really want Google to know more about me. With the search toolbar, Gmail, talk, and calendar is there much that they couldn't know if they wanted to? Not that they would do anything evil (#6).

Smarter Spoofs?

One of the first clues that an email that appears to be from eBay, PayPal, a bank or other business is a spoof is that it addresses you as member, sir/madam, or by your username instead of your real name. Judging by an email I got recently, this may be changing. I received a spoof email (it claimed to be from PayPal) and it addressed me by my first and last name. It was similar to the emails that are sent out when a payment is made through PayPal but was for a payment that I hadn't made.

I've forwarded it to spoof@paypal.com but haven't received a reply.

Zeal-less

The Zeal Directory was a community of volunteer editors who contributed non-commercial sites to the LookSmart Directory but is no more.

Google Calendar

If you have a Gmail account you can just log in to use the new calendar. If you don't have a Gmail account you can still sign up for a Calendar account but won't be able to use all of the features. ("Gmail users can send event invitations directly from their Gmail accounts without accessing Google Calendar, and can easily add events from Gmail conversations to Google Calendar.")*

The calendar lets you share (or keep private) events, import events from Yahoo! Calendar or Outlook, automatically send Gmail invitations by adding guests to a list within the calendar, and get reminders by email or text message to a mobile phone.

*If you want me to send you a Gmail invitation, just leave a comment letting me know and I'll be happy to send one to the email address you use in the comment form.

And the Winners (?) Are...

Web Pages That Suck, the Worst of 2005

Since I spend a lot of my time reviewing sites for JoeAnt, I have seen some sites that have excellent design and some pretty poorly designed sites (most fall somewhere in between). Many of the award winners are typical of sites that annoy me most.

Sites with poor navigation are among the worst offenders. I spend a lot of time online and have done so for years. If I have to search around to figure out how to find what I want on a site, how well would someone new to the Internet do?

I think that some site designers (or their clients) forget about the potential visitors to the site. Not everyone has broadband and those of us who do may not want to sit through a Flash opening. Even without Flash, some sites seem more set up to show all the designers skills and knowledge of various new techniques than they are for providing content.

While I don't like sites that force me to listen to their choice of music (or turn off my speakers), the site that is a leading contender for the 2006 awards does just that and is a "must visit" just for the humor of it. Unfortunately, it's not intended to be funny. The site is The Association of International Glaucoma Societies. Glaucoma is a serious disability, nothing funny about it at all. But the site has a song!

Glaucoma, Glaucoma, Glaucoma Constricting vision slowly Halted by progress of science Vision of a world united Beyond all science knowing

Between their "Glaucoma Hymn" and the bobbing heads in the upper left corner, I couldn't help laughing. The fun doesn't stop there though. If you click on the words "Glaucoma Hymn" at the lower left of the page (also making it a potential nominee for obscure navigation) you can change the music to Chopin, Callas, or Elvis Presley's Suspicious Minds.

Don't Play Hide and Seek With Google

Google has removed listings for bmw.de for violating Webmaster Quality Guidelines.

Make pages for users, not for search engines. Don't deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users.

My high school German was a long time ago and, even then, not very good but the text the SE sees doesn't seem very spammy (Mercedes-Benz was worse.) I do see a difference between a description of what the site offers and text that is little more than a list of keywords but sometimes the line between the two can get a little fuzzy. I also know that even if the text looked okay today, it could change tomorrow. Because of this, it is simpler to ban all hidden text than to try to make judgement calls on a case-by-case basis.

How to Pronounce .GIF

The how and why.

To everyone who has been pronouncing it wrong, now you know better so knock it off.

At Least They Don't Have a Guestbook

Does anyone outside of the media care that government sites have issued cookies or use traffic counters?

Maybe I'm too easygoing. I'm happy when a site doesn't have bits that blink or jiggle around. Legible fonts are good too.

Earlier this year I clicked on a referral link and without my having to do anything else, the site downloaded adware/spyware onto my computer. It took many hours over a couple of days to get rid of it. Now, that was a problem.

Froogle Local

There are many people out there who have a day-after-Thanksgiving tradition of getting up early and joining large crowds of holiday shoppers for all of the "Black Friday" sales. I am not one of these people. I like shopping well enough, I just don't tolerate "early" or "crowds" well.

If you are one of these brave people, Google has launched a new Froogle feature that can help you plan your shopping trip. Go to Froogle and type in the product and your city or zip code and you'll get a list of stores with the product prices along with a map showing the stores' locations.

Google gets the inventory information from a third-party inventory database. For many items, this may work quite well but I did a search for "xBox 360 Louisville" and got almost 100 results. I'm guessing the results were stores that were advertising the xBox and not necessarily ones that had in stock.

I'm just glad I don't work in any of those stores. Their employees will be spending the next few days telling customers that they know what is in the store's inventory better than Froogle does. Many of the customers will refuse to believe this.

Anyway...this feature does look like a useful tool for most gift shopping. You can sort results by price, distance, and product rating to make your choices and then plan your route.

Sober Worm

Internet users are being warned of an in-the-wild worm which is pretending to be an email from an FBI or CIA investigator.

The new version of the Sober worm arrives as an email attachment, with the following message body:

Dear Sir/Madam,

We have logged your IP-address on more than 30 illegal Websites.

Important: Please answer our questions! The list of questions are attached.

Yours faithfully,
Steven Allison
Federal Bureau of Investigation-FBI-
935 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW , Room 3220
Washington , DC 20535
Phone: (202) 324-30000

It's easy to tell this is a fake email. The tip off isn't the part about "illegal Websites". (What is an illegal Website?) It's not the part about tracking my IP. (Google knows more about where I go and what I do online than I believe the government ever could.) It's the "!" in "Please answer our questions!". Agents just aren't that excitable.

Will My Refrigerator and My Car Gossip About Me?

Machines will take over from humans as the biggest users of the Internet in a brave new world of electronic sensors, smart homes, and tags that track users' movements and habits, the UN's telecommunications agency predicted.

What the report talks about is less a "takeover" and more a parallel use of the Internet.

"Today, in the 2000s, we are heading into a new era of ubiquity, where the 'users' of the Internet will be counted in billions and where humans may become the minority as generators and receivers of traffic," it added.

It's the Internet, not an elevator with a limited occupancy. Improving technology, finding new uses for connecting inanimate things, doesn't reduce the possiblities for its use by people.

The ITU's vision goes further, highlighting refrigerators that independently communicate with grocery stores, washing machines that communicate with clothing, implanted tags with medical equipment and vehicles with stationary or moving objects.

"Even particles and 'dust' might be tagged and networked", the ITU said.

If they're worried that technology is moving too quickly they can begin tagging the dust in my house. That ought to slow them down for a century or so.

While the report laid out economic opportunities, a huge expansion of the IT industry and innovation in a wide range of fields from health to entertainment, it also warned of a number of challenges, including privacy issues.

"In a world increasingly mediated by technology, we must ensure that the human core of our activities remains untouched," the report concluded.

In my opinion, the best way to that end is keeping the Internet in the hands of the tech geeks and out of the UN.

EVDO

I've been trying out Verizon's wireless broadband access for my laptop. It's pretty cool so far but it really uses up the battery very quickly. I need to recharge after about an hour online.

Gvisit

Track visitors to your website using Google Maps.

My map. It's only tracking my index page because I'm using it more as a novelty than as a source of information.

Yahoo! Site Explorer

Yahoo! launched a new search that shows all the subpages within a URL that is indexed by Yahoo! You can see how many pages of your site are indexed along with the number of inlinks.

ICANN'T.EU

The Internet began as a U.S. Pentagon project. Because of this, the control over domains and traffic routing has been handled by the U.S. Now the European Union wants shared control "because the Internet is a global resource."

If I understand correctly, they want to share control because they use it too. If this works for them, I'm asking for a share of the control the INAO because I drink wine.

Half of My Searches Are Just to Check Spelling...

John Battelle has written a book called "The Search" about Google.

"The Search" tackles such prickly subjects as the serious privacy concerns raised by the reams of data collected by Google's 175,000 computers about the millions of people who use the company's services each day.

At one point, Battelle paints a disturbing picture, sketching out a scenario in which the federal government could demand that Google provide personal information about its users in the name of national security.

If that were to happen, Google would have to notify all the affected parties, right? Not under the U.S. Patriot Act, which specifically forbids companies from making disclosures about government requests for information.

Didn't know that? Don't feel bad. Neither did Brin when Battelle asked him earlier this year about the potential perils of Google becoming a secret tool for the U.S. government.

It's early morning (and I'm NOT a morning person) so excuse me if my thinking is a bit slow right now, but I'm not sure why I should be more alarmed about the government having this information than I would be about Google having it.

It's true that by using their toolbar and allowing cookies I have given Google permission to collect information about me. Any effort by the government to get the same information would be known only to the agency who wants it and the judge that approves their action without any permission from me.

Maybe my expectations are low. I figure once information about me is out there, whether collected by Google or another entitiy, I'm not going to assume it will be kept private. There are lots of sites that collect information that could be shared or sold and, considering what could be done with it, the government knowing what I'm searching for is way down the list of worries.

Elections and the Internet

Japan has silenced the internet, as far as election chatter goes. In a country thought of as a technology utopia, a law passed 55 years ago has muffled the heads of political parties and candidates.

Employing an inflexible interpretation of an old law devised to control the number of election posters, flyers and postcards, election officials have classified home pages, emails and other internet material as "documents", meaning that every download is counted the same as if it were a brochure thrust at a train commuter.

Those who defy the law and update their home pages risk being stripped of the votes cast in Sunday's poll and jailed for two years or fined up to 500,000 yen ($6000).

Meanwhile, back in the U.S....

Most Disgusting Email Scam Yet

Another email pretending to be from Amazon.com but this is one of the worst I have ever seen. It is designed to prey on good-hearted people by claiming to ask for donations for victims of Hurricane Katrina.

The email has a Red Cross banner across the top and the subject line is "Amazon.com & American Red Cross Hurricane Katrina Relief".

Amazon.com Online Donation

All of us at Amazon.com are deeply saddened by the loss and devastation resulting from Hurricane Katrina.By making a financial contribution to support Hurricane Katrina relief efforts, the Red Cross can provide shelter, food, counseling and other assistance to those who need help.

Victims of Hurricane Katrina are attempting to recover from the massive storm. American Red Cross volunteers have been deployed to the hardest hit areas of Katrina.s destruction, supplying hundreds of thousands of victims left homeless with critical necessities. By making a financial donation to support hurricane relief efforts, the Red Cross can provide shelter, food, counseling and other assistance to those affected by Hurricane Katrina. Privacy Notice: If your donation is $250 or more, Amazon.com will provide your name, credit card billing address, and donation amount to the American Red Cross, and the American Red Cross will provide you with a receipt for your donation. Other than this, Amazon.com will not share information about you with the American Red Cross. Amazon.com has waived all customary Honor System fees associated with your contributions to the Red Cross.

Click here to make a financial >contribution

We are grateful for the continued generosity of Amazon.com customers at this time of great need. Thank you in advance for your support.

Sincerely,
Amazon.com Customer Services

The second paragraph is the same as that shown on Amazon's site but the link actually goes to http://61.233.119.49/.www.amazon.com/amazon/amazon/.x/index.html

I've forwarded the email to Amazon and put the email properties in the extended entry.

Anyone who would send out this scam crap is on the same moral level as those who were looting corpses in New Orleans.

Return-Path:
Received: from pacificworld.com ([203.127.222.130])
by [deleted] with ESMTP id j871rPXe017625
for [deleted]Tue, 6 Sep 2005 21:53:32 -0400
Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1])
by pacificworld.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 7755A219E3D
for [deleted]Wed, 7 Sep 2005 09:55:03 +0800 (SGT)
Received: from pacificworld.com ([127.0.0.1])
by localhost (travel.pacificworld.com [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024)
with ESMTP id 22756-06 for [deleted];
Wed, 7 Sep 2005 09:55:02 +0800 (SGT)
Received: by pacificworld.com (Postfix, from userid 2191)
id 0F79821342E; Wed, 7 Sep 2005 09:48:08 +0800 (SGT)
To: [deleted]
Subject: Amazon.com & American Red Cross Hurricane Katrina Relief
From: "Amazon.com"
Content-Type: text/html
Message-Id: <20050907014808.0F79821342E@pacificworld.com>
Date: Wed, 7 Sep 2005 09:48:08 +0800 (SGT)
X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new at pacificworld.com
Status:

Gmail - Send Mail As...

Gmail has added a feature to accounts where users can use it to send mail from other email accounts. Replies will go to the "from" address unless you specify another "reply to" address.

You can't use just any address - Gmail will send a verification message to your other email address to confirm that you'd like to add it to your Gmail account. You'll need to click the link in that message, or enter the confirmation code in the 'Accounts' section of your Gmail account, to complete the process. Once you've verified that you'd like to add the address to your account, you can start sending messages using your custom 'From:' address.

Google Talk

Google's new IM program has been released in beta. Along with instant messages, you can also use it to make calls over the Internet.

If you want to try it but don't have the Gmail account needed to get it, just leave a comment. Your email address won't show in your comment but it will show in my blog control panel and I'll send you a Gmail invitation.

Update: You don't need a Gmail invitation anymore. At least you don't if you have a mobile phone (U.S. only for now).

And Another Thing...

Real Tech News posts the results of a survey of the things that most annoy Web users.

I'll add one more that bugs me, not providing an obvious link to the original source of news/information.

Vanity Revisited

It's been a while since I've done a vanity search. Searching just for "marybeth", I've moved up from third to second in Google, from second to first on Yahoo, and have stayed in first with MSN and AlltheWeb.

Searching for my full name yields about the same results (second in Google, first in the others) but some of the links that referred to me in the first couple of pages were in a different order and some appeared that hadn't shown in the "marybeth" search. Interesting to see the difference one keyword can make in the results.

I also did a search for my father's name. He doesn't even have a website but he still got more search results than my full name did. I shouldn't be surprised though, he's been "playing" (his term, not mine) computer for a long time and all of the search results referring to him were *nix related. I guess that means that doing something still beats just talking.

Talking About My Baby

Webpronews has an article about attracting search engines to your site along with suggestions on how to benefit from the crawls. I found the article through a Google Alert on the keyword "JoeAnt".

It's like seeing my child's name in the news.

A third way to invite the spiders into your website parlor is to by submitting your website to the many internet directories available. Whether you choose, DMOZ, Yahoo, JoeAnt, Gimpsy, Zeal/Looksmart, or one of many lesser known directories, inclusion in them will get your website crawled by a spider. Since the various internet directories are crawled on a very regular basis, you can be almost certain a spider will travel to your website.

It's getting to be that time of year when I expect the submissions to JoeAnt to increase as businesses try to optimize their exposure in preparation for Christmas. Sites may be submitted by editors (make sure to join the correct topic for your site's listing) or through Speed-Pass (one-time $39.99 fee). To use Speed-Pass, find the best topic for your site and click the "Add URL" link.

Really Personalized News

In the future everyone will be Paul for 15 minutes.

We're Not Afraid

People from around the world are posting pictures on We're Not Afraid to show support for London and to denounce terrorism after 7/7. To contribute a picture, send it to :
pics@werenotafraid.com

Hotlinking is Stealing (Or at Least, Impolite)

I've been cleaning up after comment and trackback spammers for the past couple of days. When I was looking at my logs to see what they had been up to I found a couple of my images being hotlinked on forums. (Here, here, here, here, and here.) Only the first couple are still showing up in my daily logs so I'm guessing that someone removed the images from the others after they changed to a sign saying, "I steal bandwidth".

Update: This is in reply to a comment by Rob in the comments section:

The original post title "Hotlinking is Stealing" is a broad statement but I really meant it to refer to this instance I was experiencing. If another blogger had wanted to use an image I had and he/she asked for permission to just link to it, I would probably allow it. My problem was that someone was using an image on my server on every post he was making in a busy forum. One image on a site that gets a hundred or so visitors a day wouldn't change much for me where using it in multiple forum threads that each get a hundred or more visitors an hour changes things a bit.

A few instances of an image being displayed wouldn't change anything. I might not even notice it but if it happens enough so that I go over my hosting plan's allowed bandwidth for the month my account could be suspended. If that happened the hotlinker would have basically stolen a service for which I pay from me.

Hotlinking isn't just a problem for the site with the original image. Sites with hotlinked images load slower because you have to wait for all the servers to answer requests for the images. Also, when some people find out an image of theirs is being used they replace it with another...and it could be one that's much worse than the one I used.

I've read arguments for hotlinking that discuss copyright. This doesn't make sense. If you're using the image without permission you've still violated the owner's right to the image even if you haven't actually copied it. I've read one argument that as long as the image is linked there is no harm done since anyone who clicks on the link would be visiting the original site and would benefit by having the image already loaded. Um, maybe. You're still using the image without permission. The original host of the image may consider that free advertising or may consider it misuse of their image and bandwidth. Smaller sites with limited resources, especially ones without advertising, may not consider it worth the bandwidth usage regardless of whether it's linked or not.

Update II: Rob also posted about this on his blog.

Breaking the Internet

Netdisaster
Pick a URL and a disaster. I liked the dinosaurs but I haven't tried them all yet so I don't know if it's the best (worst?).

Note to those who think emails from Nigeria are offering an excellent financial opportunity*: The linked site does not actually damage any Web site.

* A PSA for clueless people. After looking at this site, I've begun to understand just who is falling for scams like that. Some people go beyond beginner ignorance to obstinate stupidity.

Internet Frauds and Hoaxes

Protecting yourself from online fraud:

A recent Federal Trade Commission (FTC) survey, "Consumer Fraud in the United States," (August 2004) found that "nearly 25 million adults in the U.S. -- 11.2 percent of the adult population -- were victims of one or more of the consumer frauds covered by the survey during the previous year." Fourteen percent of fraud victims first learned about the scam through e-mail or a Web site.

Fraud is getting harder to detect. No surprise there, the scum who want to scam you consider tricking you to be their job. For most of us, shopping or other online activities that can lead to us becoming victims of fraud are not our jobs. (Although if someone knows where I can get a job shopping online, please let me know. This would come in a close second to my first choice of jobs - taking naps. I haven't found anyone willing to pay me for that yet either.)

I've been using the Internet for at least 15 years now and haven't fallen victim to these scams yet but I'm not going to assume that means there isn't a chance it can happen. The best way to stay safe is to stay current on scams.

Check out Anti-Phishing Working Group too.

From Demographic Info and Activities Data:

About 67% of American adults use the internet. That translates into approximately 135 million people.

The percentage of people with Internet access do the following activities:

Send e-mail - 91%
Buy a product - 67%
Read someone else’s web log or “blog” - 23%
Create content for the internet - 19%
Create a web log or “blog” - 9%

Anytown, U.S.A.

Lately I've been adding sites to the Regional topic of JoeAnt for a few specific cities. One thing I keep noticing is that some businesses with Web sites don't really seem to understand that it's a World Wide Web. They will have just a street address and/or phone number without any clue on the site as to the city, state, or even the country that they are in.

I understand that they want a Web site to attract and provide information for local customers and including the city in their address may seem (to them) to be stating the obvious. It may be obvious for people who have lived their for years but for ones researching the city before visiting or relocating, that little bit of added information is important.

It's also helpful for those of us trying to build an Internet directory.

DomainKeys

DomainKeys from Yahoo! lets email servers verify that the email really came from the domain it claims to and that it wasn't altered during transit.

I don't know enough about it to make any kind of judgement but anything that reduces the amount of email crap that I get sounds good to me.

What's Up With the Savannah Search?

I kept seeing these weird referrals in my stats. I'm not talking about the kinky-weird, those are common enough that I don't really take much notice of them anymore. I'm talking about referrals from a Google image search. The first picture there is from here but if you click on the image in the search it says it's from here.

This morning is the first time I've seen the picture and I have no idea why Google would think it was on my site. The text under the thumbnail in the search results has the correct URI.

Dual Duel

YaGoohoo!gle - type in a search term and get a split screen with Google results on one side and Yahoo! results on the other. If you click on any of the links they will open in that frame so you may want to open a new window if you want to see the whole page.

Of course my test search was for "marybeth" (I say "of course" because I am that vain that I search for myself first). This blog shows up (at the time of this posting) as #2 in Google and #1 in Yahoo!

AdSense

I still use Blogger for my Mom's Kitchen Weblog (although after all the problems I've been having with "page not found" when I tried to publish today, I may be changing that soon) and every time I log in I see their promotion for Google AdSense. I was considering applying for AdSense...and had even begun updating that blog more often so it would be more likely to be approved just in case I decided to apply.

At this point it was just something I was thinking of as a possibility...I wasn't sure that I really wanted ads on my blog or Website. Besides, would it really be worth it? Although I get decent traffic, it's nothing spectacular and would it be worth it to me, Google, or their advertisers for me to display their ads? Apparently someone thought so.

Before I had a chance made up my mind to apply, they contacted me. First by email (I didn't reply) and then by phone. They asked me if I would like to put AdSense on my Mom's Kitchen site. I agreed to give it a try.

I'm not getting rich but there have been some click-throughs. I don't expect to earn a lot of money through it and to be honest it's the flattery of my site getting noticed and them contacting me that's been the biggest payoff.

I still haven't added AdSense to my cooking blog (Blogger wasn't cooperating this morning) and have only put it on some of the pages of my Website so far. I am satisfied with the ads that are showing - one of my concerns while I was still considering doing this - the ads are relevant to the content and may be useful to my visitors.

Thanks Anonymous Visitor

A couple of days ago I was looking through my blog stats. I like looking at the search engine terms that have brought people here. Some are not surprising, for example from October through Christmas I had lots of visitors looking for my favorite pumpkin muffin recipe.

Some are really odd and/or disgusting. The odd ones are just quirky ways of thinking. The disgusting ones...well, some of you people could really use professional help.

Occasionally I find one that gives me an idea. Most recently it was one looking for a "Monk" theme song cell phone ring tone. I didn't write about that although I have written about the show and about making ringes for my phone.

Guess what my phone plays now! It was time for a change anyway.

I made another one and sent it to my son's phone. It says, "Behold the power of cheese." (If you knew him, you would know how appropriate it is.)

Try and Catch the Wind

A Truth Laid Bear post got me thinking. The whole business about applying campaign finance laws to blogs makes me think that the FEC doesn't understand the Internet and how complicated it would be to enforce this.

What happens if a blogger links directly to an opposition candidate but links to a search engine or directory page that shows the link of the candidate they support? If, as I am assuming here, SEs and directories are exempt, what is it that makes them different from a blogroll or a separate page (or pages) that I could set up as a personal directory from my site to candidate's sites?

The problem with linking to a SE or directory is that it would take readers two clicks instead one. I could get around that if I link to another site or page that I've set up to redirect to a candidate's site. The redirect could be seamless enough not to annoy readers but the FEC will have to click each of my links to see where it really goes.

Do they plan on using a large number of servers to crawl the Web daily looking for violations? If so, would the bots ignore a robots.txt telling them to stay out? Or would they just have people viewing blogs or RSS feeds and pings announcing recent updates all day looking for links? Who's going to pay for this? (Okay, I know the answer to the last question.)

What happens if I use an online blogging service? How will they know who I am and if I am in the U.S.? If they shut it down, I can just begin a new one. Will blogging services have to use software that prevents these links? What if I use free hosting but my own software? Will they be able to demand that IPs of violators be banned? What if my ISP uses dynamic IPs? Will everyone who has that ISP be banned from using these services? What if I have my own domain but my site is hosted outside the U.S.? Will they be able to get my contact information from my hosting service?

This could be good news for hosting services in countries that wouldn't feel inclined to cooperate with providing information on site owners. Wouldn't that be a nice bit of irony if U.S. political blogs/sites were hosted in "less than friendly" countries?

Will I have to disable all html in my comments? Not allow a link to show for the commenters name? What if I search for abandoned blogs that allowed comments and add links there to candidate's sites? (Not that I would, I consider comment spammers among the lowest of the low...but still, you know some people would do it.)

Will I have to delete pages from my archive? Will I be responsible for telling Google (and others) not to cache pages with links to candidates to make sure they aren't availabe to anyone within 60 days before an election?

The FEC is wrong because this will restrict free speech. Any attempt to do this is also stupid because enforcement wouldn't be practical.

GeoURL

Last night when I read that someone was starting a database of Kentucky blogs (found via Inside Allan's Mind), I thought about GeoURL and how it would be nice if it were still up and running.

It turns out that it is.

GeoURL is back up again. I had to re-add my blog. I finally gave up on it coming back earlier this year and I removed the link so maybe that's why it was gone. My husband's blog and my recipe site were still listed though.

Remembering the Web

Is the Internet too young to feel nostalgia over trends that have already come and gone?

A Vernacular Web brought back memories of the early years of surfing the Internet. The section on links talks about how early web sites had lots of links. "Ten years ago every web site had a section of external links because people felt it was their personal responsibility to configure the environment and build the infrastructure." Now we use search engines or directories to find links and regular web sites may have only a few (if any) external links.

"In todays web blogs compensate for over precise search engines by delivering a constant stream of surprise links." This is one of my favorite things about blogs. I appreciate being able to find news and information, but it's the "look at the cool site/quiz/game" links that makes reading blogs fun.

Other sections cover Under Construction, Starry Night Backgrounds, Graphics Collections, MIDIs, Frames, and Tildes before user names.

Google Maps

Of all the online maps I've looked at, this one has been the best at pinpointing the location of my house. Since it passed my accuracy test, I tried a different type of search.

Under "Find a business" I first tried pizza in Crestwood but didn't get any results. I tried "pizza" again with Crestwood's zipcode (40014) and got the names and locations of my local pizza restaurants.

You can also get driving directions. The maps are draggable so you don't have to wait for it to reload and (at least for me) it makes it easier to follow.

Search Terms

I like looking at my referral info (as if you don't) to see how people find my blog. It's nice to see that right now, my Kuchen post is showing up as the first listing in Google for Butter Kuchen. My cheesecake bars have been number one for a while and my pumpkin muffins are in the top ten. My crab appetizer post has dropped to the second page of Google results but I'm still number one for honey hot wings.

If that doesn't encourage you to post a recipe on your blog and submit the link to the next Carnival of the Recipes, I don't know what will.

I'm number one in Friendster's search for "MaryBeth"...I'd never seen this one before. Third on Google, first on AlltheWeb, second on Yahoo, and first on MSN.

It's not vanity. It's curiosity. Really.

Caveat Emptor

It had been a while so I did a Google search to see if my search results under "marybeth" had changed. It hasn't but I did notice this ad under the sponsored links:

Marybeth For Sale
Low Priced Marybeth
Huge Selection! (aff)
ebay.com

I'm relieved to find out that none of the listings are for me. I was concerned for a minute that my husband was trying to auction me off to buy more casino chips.

Google Desktop

Google is offering a desktop application to search your "email, computer files, chats, and the web pages you've viewed." When you do a Google search online, your desktop results will also be listed. I don't know if it takes into account different user profiles on the same computer or gives access to all files to any user.

I can see how this could be useful but it only works with Windows XP and Windows 2000. That's fine for my laptop but my desktop still has Windows 98 and since it's the one filled with years of barely organized files, it's the one that is most in need of this type of search.

"Marybeth" Ranking

See here and here for background on my vanity search and experiment to see what influences Google search result rankings.

I just did another Google seach for "marybeth" and found that I moved up from 92nd to 25th in the results. Still not as good as the SE love coming from AlltheWeb (1st result) and MSN (also 1st), but much better than before.

Vanity Search Continued

Two days ago, I wrote about doing vanity searches on Google, AlltheWeb, and MSN.

As of the time of this posting, I was still the first result for AlltheWeb and MSN. AlltheWeb showed my "...From Marybeth" title while MSN still shows the "...near Cambodia" one.

Not much ego stroking from Google though. My blog currently comes up as the 92nd result for "marybeth". I made the mistake of not looking very deep into the results before beginning this experiment so I don't know how much of a change that is or if it has changed at all. It does show my new title. Maybe I should talk about myself in the third person...or rather, maybe Marybeth should talk about...um, maybe not.

I want to thank John Ray of Dissecting Leftism for linking to me using "Marybeth" as the anchor text in an Elsewhere post. I got a link and found another good blog to add to my blogroll (double bonus!).

Vanity and Search Engines

For a while now Google has been my default search engine. I have the Google toolbar and use it frequently. Now I'm considering changing that habit. It's not because of something Google has done. It's an ego thing.

When I do a search for "marybeth" on AlltheWeb or MSN my blog is the first result. Not so with Google. It's obvious to me that these other two SEs have keen insight that Google lacks.

Not really. What is happening is that AlltheWeb and MSN are giving weight to frequency of the term (each "Posted by marybeth") on my blog while Google appears to give more weight to the title and URL and possibly the position of the text on the page.

Since Google presumably looks at the anchor text of incoming links to the site, then those with the keyword in the title or URL would be given more weight for that term. But I don't think that is a very big factor. About a week ago I temporarily changed my blog title to "Random Thoughts From Somewhere Near Cambodia". (Hey, if Kerry could claim to be in or near Cambodia when he was 50 miles away, I can claim to be near there even though I'm in Kentucky. I look at the big picture - on an astronomical scale, I'm near Cambodia.) As far as I know, no one changed their links to me to reflect this title change yet in a Google search for "near Cambodia" my blog shows up on the front page. I'm making a change in the title again to test how important it is to Google.

Which makes for better search results? I've reviewed enough sites for JoeAnt to know that a keyword in the URL, title, or repeated in the text has little to do with the quality of the site's content. For some things (not a vanity search, though), using a human-edited directory may give the best results. Sites are listed by topic which isn't necessarily the same as by keyword. You know that the site was reviewed and considered to have some merit before being added.

For search engines, it's not so much which is better, it's recognizing that different engines will give different results. Relying too much on just one search engine would be like having cable TV and only watching one station. If you're in the habit of using only one search engine, try a new one. Try a directory too.

JoeAnt is always looking for more volunteer editors. If you have a favorite subject and know a lot of good Web sites that you don't see listed in our directory, consider signing up to be an editor.

If you're a blogger and you sign up for a category other than Computers (where Blogs are a subtopic) and you would like to have your blog listed you can post in the JoeAnt forum (put "MB- blog listing" in the title) or send me a message through the editor message system and I'll list your blog for you. Who knows, you may end up getting the Blog of the Month listing.

Finally

I understand why newspapers require people to register to read them online but I still find it annoying. Knight Ridder has made it a bit easier. Now you can register once and have access to all associated publications.

Not Even In Black and White

I was looking at search terms people have used recently and saw this, "Olympic Games In Acient (sic) Greece Photos".

Photos?

Firefox

I decided to try out Mozilla's Firefox. I haven't used it much so far so I'm still undecided as to whether it will become my main browser or not, but I like the tabbed windows. With it, I'm able to set my regular start page, my blog, and my MT page all as my homepage.

The popup/popunder blocker is good too. A problem I have with the popup blocker I usually use (the one in the Google toolbar) is that I like to play games and some of them open in a popup. Firefox lets me add URLs of sites that I don't want to be blocked.

So far, every site I've looked at appears much the same as it does in IE. My biggest problem is that I visit several sites that remember me when I'm using IE but now I have to remember the username and password so I can log in with Firefox. So far, so good, but since I use many different names and passwords (based on some random thing I was thinking about when I first signed up with the site) my memory is bound to fail at some point. If I'm lucky it won't be one that I signed up with two or three ISPs/emails ago and I'll be able to recover my info.

I hope I like it. Netscape 4.something used to be my favorite browser. I gave it up when there got to be too many sites that wouldn't work with it. (It made things a bit difficult since I spend a lot of time reviewing sites for JoeAnt.)

Kids Need a Snooze Button

Conor woke me up at 5:30 to let me know he couldn't sleep. Had I anything within arm's reach that was heavier than a pillow, I might have been able to solve that problem for him. Science needs to develop a built-in snooze button on kids. And a volume control.

So, now I'm awake too and browsing the Internet.

John Kerry announced that he would reveal his choice for vice-president on his Web site. Canny decision or just another site owner who's fallen victim to the power of the hit counter?

I just noticed that his site is no longer the number one result for the search term "waffles". It's not even in the top 100 results. Have the links dropped off that much or was a change made manually? The good news is that in a search for "Jew", that anti-Semitic site is no longer number one. (See earlier post) The Wikipedia article is now the first result but Google still has a link at the top of the results page that says, "We're disturbed about these results as well. Please read our note here."

Gmail

I seldom use my Blogger accounts any more (only when I remember to add something to my Mom's Kitchen Blog) so I was pleasantly surprised when I read in It Crossed My Mind that I could get a Gmail account through Blogger.

Not that I need another email account.

Still I wanted to try it out. The keyboard shortcuts are nice, or would be if I thought I could remember them. The storage space is more than generous and more than I need.

I've read a lot about the controversy of Google including ads in the emails. I sent myself one test message and there were no ads in either the message I sent or my reply. I even mentioned Viagra, thinking that should get some ad action.

The thing that's the most special about it (for now) is that it's the only email address I have that isn't getting spam...but it's only been active for less than an hour, so I expect that to change.

There is only one thing that I can think of that would make it more useful to me than my other email accounts, a notification link from the Google search pages to let me know when I have mail. Without that, it's just one more email address.

Referral Hits

According to my logs, I've been getting visitors looking for Ron Reagan, Jr.'s eulogy. I added the text that was published in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette to the extended reading section of that post because I was afraid it would go the way of so many newspaper links and become inaccessible.

Several people have also come here looking for information about shareyourexperiences.com. The only good thing I found about it was in this press release posted by Kevin Millares (646-637-5142). The following is the only quote from it that comes close to being useful.

In today’s environment of constant “Googling” of people’s background, where someone’s name or other identifying features are entered into the popular search engine for the sake of finding background information, ShareYourExperiences.com offers an unparalleled service. The online community allows people to directly connect with other individuals who have had direct positive or negative experiences with their search subjects.

I Googled them and found that they are running a scam. That's what I call unparalleled service. (I didn't get any search results other than this press release when I Googled for "Kevin Millares" or "646-637-5142".)

SOTM

The JoeAnt Site of the Month, Editor-Owned SOTM, and Blog of the Month have been listed on the index page since this weekend. (Thanks, Hugo, for the suggestion for Editor-Owned SOTM.)

For me, getting this done before mid-month is a real accomplishment. I didn't get it done at all last month. One day I'll surprise everyone and have it done on time.

I'll probably be the most surprised of all.

Blogs Wanted

One of the projects at JoeAnt that I plan to begin soon is to further develop the Weblogs section of the directory. I plan on adding more topics, subdividing some of the larger topics into subtopics, and adding new blog listings.

I need help.

If you want your blog listed (or you want to suggest someone else's blog, blog hosts, directories, awards, or tools), please put a description of the blog/site in the comments section for this post or email me at Antie_emATjoeant.com (change "AT" to @). Include the Weblog topic that you think best suits the blog. Descriptions should be objective and give our visitors an idea of what they'll find when they visit the blog. I'll also welcome suggestions for new subtopics.

Please do not submit any blogs with objectionable content.

Another Reject

A company that sells t-shirts is complaining that its Google AdWords was rejected. The owner says it's a free speech issue. How often do you hear this when it has nothing to do with the government's regulation of speech? You can say what you want, no one is required to give (or sell) you a forum in which to do it.

It really is tiresome how some people will start protesting that their rights are being violated when they aren't allowed to do whatever they please. No one has stopped the company from selling the shirts. The site, yque.com, can be found through the search engine. The only thing it can't do is advertise a site that is, in Google's opinion, a violation of their guidelines for acceptable Ad Words content.

Waffles Update

I checked to see how the effort to have johnkerry.com show as a top result for "waffles" in Google was doing.

At 8:20 Eastern Time, it was #1.

Update: By 8:30 it's gone again. If you're curious about what it looked like for that brief moment, look here.

Waffles

USA Today reports on a recent Google bombing.

Esoteric Diatribe began an attempt to make johnkerry.com the first listing for "waffles".

They've nearly succeeded on the No. 2 search engine, Yahoo. By Sunday, eight days after the prank began, johnkerry.com was listed second among 703,000 results of a Yahoo search of the word "waffles."

At the No. 3 search engine, MSN Search, johnkerry.com was also the second Web page result of a search Sunday for "waffles."

The senator's site isn't showing up at the top of the list in Google (yet). The only front page result that I saw that mentioned John Kerry and waffles was a Slate article, John Kerry's Waffles.

Reading about waffles is making me hungry. Usually Kerry has the opposite effect.

2 large eggs
2 cups flour
1 3/4 cups milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil or melted butter/margarine
1 tablespoon brown sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Heat waffle iron.

Beat eggs in a large bowl until fluffy. Beat in flour, milk, oil, sugar, baking powder, and salt until smooth.

Pour 2/3 cup batter onto the center of the hot waffle iron. Close the lid.

Let cook for about five minutes or until steaming stops. Carefully remove waffle. Repeat with remaining batter.

Serve hot.

Makes six 7" waffles.

Jew

GROUP SAYS GOOGLE'S NOT KOSHER

Jewish activists are trying to unseat an anti-Semitic site that has taken top placement on Google during the eight days of Passover. Type "Jew" into the search engine, and the first result is "Jew Watch," a newsletter that promotes conspiracy theories and Holocaust deniers.

After Google refused to remove the listing, Daniel Sieradski, who runs a blog called Jewschool, started a campaign to replace the top entry with an encyclopedia entry defining "Jew."

"[Google] is a private company, that's their prerogative," Sieradski said. "But since I'm capable of abusing the algorithm, too, we're fighting back."

The Wikipedia article for "Jew" includes the etymology for the word "Jew", Who is a Jew?, Conversion to Judaism, "Jew" in Israeli Law, Ancient Israelites, Ethnic Divisions, Religious Leadership, Population, and The Jewish Community Today.

Musical Universe

MusicPlasma - search for a band or musical artist and find other musicians with a similar style. Clicking on a group will center the map on them, bring up a brief discography (links to Amazon.com) and let you hear some short music samples. Left clicking lets you zoom in or out.

Gambling Ads

Google and Yahoo have announced that they will stop running advertisements for online casinos.

The move, which the companies said would take effect by the end of April, comes as federal prosecutors are threatening action against American companies that do business with Internet casinos that are based abroad. The prosecutors are arguing that the American companies are "aiding and abetting" offshore Internet casinos, whose operations are illegal in the United States.

I couldn't find any mention of removing the search listings for these sites.

Search Engine Features

Search Engine Showdown has a chart that compares the features of the most popular search engines and another that compares search directories.

Google has changed the look of its homepage. The link to the directory is gone and one for Froogle is listed. (Clicking "more" will take you to a page where there is a link to the directory.) Google's results pages have a new look too.

You can also use number ranges in Google searches now. Enter two numbers separated by two periods - 1960..1977 - and text to show what the number range represents - years, dollars....

Google personalized search lets you refine searches according to your interests. After you search, you can adjust the results from minimum to maximum personalization. I selected the category "Cooking" under "Home" and then searched for "bread". If you move the slider, you can see the results list change. When I selected "Kentucky" and did a search for "restaurants" it said, "Personalized results not available for this query." Ths same for everything else I tried under a personalized regional search.

News, Editorials, and Opinions

A few more sources for news and opinion:

Feedster - another way to organize blog feeds.

Findory - personalized news service. Chooses news articles based on what you have read there before. It also has a link to a list of articles you've read. If you've ever had to try and backtrack to find an article you read earlier, you can see why this might be useful.

Opinion-Pages - serach for opinion articles and letters to the editor by topic. There are also categorized columnists' pages. You can also browse by location (all indexed newspapers and magazines are in English though.)

News Sources and Feeds

Finding and organizing news sources:

Google News - frequently my first choice for searching for news because it's handy to use from my toolbar but it can be annoying when there are multiple copies of the same news article from different sources. I like being able to sort by relevance or date, I just wonder what determines relevance. The advanced news search does help finding a specific article since you can select a source or location along with your keyword(s).

Google Alert - will send email notifications when selected keywords are mentioned on news or websites. Notifications are sent out when Google updates its index. This service is good for tracking information that you won't find from news services...sites that mention your name, website, business, or hobbies. There are better ways to track regular news, but this is useful for finding information and references from sites and discussion forums. This service is not affiliated with Google.

Topix - sources for local, national, or world news. You can search for news by topic and it will save a list of your most recent searches. There are also lists for hot topics, people, industries, and companies. I added this one to the list of links next to my IE address field and it may become my favorite souce.

Yahoo - now includes the ability to add RSS headline feeds to your personalized page along with the headline news from their regular sources. Many of the RSS feeds that I've found in my searches here come from Topix.net. I don't use this as a homepage and I seldom use the email address that comes with it (I use MyWay.com for a homepage because I registered early enough to get the email address marybeth@... no numbers after my name!). If I did, I might find this one more useful than I do.

Bloglines - you can subscribe to standard news sources, weblog feeds and comic strips. You can find blogs by browsing the directory or by adding the URI from your page of listings. Click a link and Bloglines will recommend other feeds based on your current subscription list. You can see other subscribers to the blogs if they have selected to share their user lists (this is opt in, if you don't select it, no one will see you listed as a subscriber and they won't see your list). Seeing the lists of people with the same interests can help you find new blogs to read. You can also see how many subscribers you have for your blog. I like the features it offers but not the layout (frames) and the blog directory can be difficult to use since it sorts them by title and you can only begin with the first letter of the title and have go through it page by page.

My Wire Service - subscribe to news and weblogs, sort subscriptions by topic, and clip headlines to save for later. This is a nice service but has always been slow to load. (I have DSL, I would hate to see how slow this is on dial-up.) The weblogs are sorted A-E, F-K...but are not alphabetized within these divisions.

News is Free - another web-based feed aggregator. You can select news sources to add to personalized pages and also add RSS feed for blogs or news sources that aren't listed in the directory. If you get the premium service (you get one month free when you register), you can set it up so that you can post to your blog from this site. You also get news alerts and archiving. None of these extras appeal to me and although I like the look of the layout of the site, I'm still not sure how often I'll use it.

I know there are many more sources out there. If there's one that you have found useful, please leave a comment and tell me what you like about it (include the URI).

Google Bails on Oceana Ad

Google removed the AdWords listing for the environmental group Oceana. The ad appeared for two days when searches were made for "cruise" related terms. The ad said, "help us protect the world's oceans" and linked to their site which accuses Royal Caribbean Lines of polluting the ocean. The removal of the ad does not affect the search engine results.

Oceana believes the ad removal is unfair and that Google was probably pressured by Royal Caribbean. Both companies deny the accusation. According to Google their ad policy prohibits ads that criticize another company.

Google AdWords begin showing immediately once they are submitted and are reviewed within the next few days so having the ad show and then be removed doesn't indicate a change in opinion or policy. It isn't the first time, nor will it be the last, that an ad was removed. As far as I'm concerned, Google is a privately held company (for now, anyway) and can refuse to display any ad they choose.

According to the article:

Oceana's ad probably would be accepted by Yahoo!, which operates a similar online marketing program through its Overture subsidiary. Overture accepts critical ads, as long as they aren't obscene or libelous, said company spokeswoman Jennifer Stephens. "We see it as a freedom of speech issue," she said.

I don't see it as a "freedom of speech" issue. Google is not the government. I do see it as a freedom issue. Oceana can say what it wants but Google has the freedom to decide whether or not to provide a platform for that speech.

Devilish

When I did a Google search for my younger son's name (is it still a vanity search if you're looking for your kid and not yourself?), the second site listed was a result from a site called Devilfinder.

How appropriate. Not that he's a bad kid but he has his demon moments, and enough of them, that I almost wondered if we were now being indexed by personality types.

Soople

Sometimes it's easy to forget that Google offers more than simple searches it (usually) does so well. Soople presents many of the extra Google functions on one simple to use browser page.

You could do this just as easily using the Google Toolbar but Soople could be very useful to people who aren't familiar with all the Google features, don't know the required syntax for some of the searches, or for those that prefer not to add any additional toolbars to their computer.

Sound Search

FindSounds (owned and operated by Comparisonics Corporation) is a search engine for sound effects and musical instrument samples.

Files with obscenities are filtered out so the search engine is family friendly. Each result includes information such as file size, channels (mono/stereo), sample rate, and a waveform graphic. There is also a link to find similar results.

See a list of example searches.

Military Portal

MilitarySpot.com

Find news, forums, blogs, magazines, TDGs, photos, and service links.

New Google Features

Chris Sherman, associate editor of Search Engine Watch, reports on some new Google features.

Area Code Information - the top result for a telephone area code will be a thumbnail of that area's map and the name of the geographical region. Example.

Universal Product Codes - type in the UPC from a package and the results should have a link to the UPC Database. Example. I had trouble getting this to work at first. I had left off the first and last numbers (ones outside the barcode.) Sometimes you get the link from Google but when you click on it you get a message that the UPC wasn't found in the database.

If you looked at the Google links above, you saw a link to "Track FedEx package...." This was one of the number searches introduced last month. It looks as though it now checks for FedEx tracking without having to add the "FedEx" prefix to the number as described below.

The search by number feature lets you directly enter UPS tracking numbers, FedEx tracking numbers, U.S. patent numbers, FAA airplane registration numbers and FCC equipment IDs. The topmost link in your results will be a link that takes you directly to databases that have specific information pertaining to the number.

For weather conditions at U.S. airports, just enter the three letter airport code, followed by the word airport -- for example, "den airport." The direct link takes you to a page of airport status information provided by the FAA's Air Traffic Control System Command Center.

Flight Tracking - enter the airline name or code and the flight number to "get two links to flight information, from Travelocity and fboweb.com."

Vehicle ID Numbers - returns a link from CarFax.com.

U.S. Postal Service Tracking Numbers - allows shipping status tracking of a package.