payperpost lives on

The website that launched a few months ago is still going strong and is making a mark paying people to blog about certain topics. There are a couple of good things that Payperpost has going for them:

1. It is a quick and painless way to gain link backs from the blogosphere.
2. Casual bloggers can make more than casual money.

It's no scam. So far I've been paid around 18 dollars and have about 60 more waiting to be paid. That's a whole lot better than my menial adsense profit. I'm by no means the top blogger on the payroll. Blog advertising, through payperpost, has paid up to $780 to some individuals. What have you got to lose? ...beside credibility with your readers...

Jon Stewart for President

A new movie is coming out that chronicles a story about Jon Stewart running for president. Man of the Year looks like it should be a fun movie with Robin Williams and Christopher Walken in the cast, but one blogger out there asked the question that was on everyone's mind: Should Jon Stewart really run for office? He then offered up 8 reasons why he should.
In responce to this, I offer up 8 reasons why he shouldn't run.

8. He’s got the Daily Show

Some might automatically jump to the conclusion that this would be the biggest tool in his campaign, but first one must step back and look. There is no possible way to have a serious campaign without having to leave his current position at Comedy Central. It would provide him with a strong base of support to begin a campaging, but beyond that I’m not sure he could utilize the show for polical reasons.

Furthermore, Comedy Central and Viacom might not be so quick to plug him for president with the intent of him actually getting elected. Yes it would make a nice publicity stunt for the network, but if he had to take the time out and run and got elected, the network would be out one show.

7. He hates the media

And they hate him back. Certainly we all remember his brief stint on Crossfire. I wonder if they will invite him back. One must realize that in a presidential campaign not all publicity is good publicity. You might remember in 2004 George Bush was all over CBS news. The media certainly had a frenzy, but it was to report alleged foul play concerning his time in the military.

6. He turns youth away from the government

There is no doubt that Jon Stewart has a whole lot of clout with the gen Y’ers, but what does his influence point toward? It seems Stewart’s opinion is that the government is broken, it has been broken for a while and looks like it will be broken for a while to come. It is this attitude that Stewart projects which causes young people to give up on the government and refrain from voting altogether.

5. He has no platform

Should he just enter the race because he ‘doesn’t like’ any other candidate? He has no niche upon which to build a lasting campaign. Whether you agree with the current political system or not, contrast wins overall.

4. He’s a comedian

He makes his money making the news funny. Is this the kind of person who should be the Commander-in-Chief of the United States of America? He is quoted as saying “I’m very uncomfortable going a couple of minutes without a laugh.”

3. Can’t function well as the interview-ee

This relates to point four as well as the reference to crossfire. It’s a matter of control, he feel uncomfortable when he is not running the show. His serious demeanor often comes off overbearing or over passionate. He just doesn’t seem comfortable being interviewed.

2. He’s more left than middle

Remember it was the religious right who pushed the election in 2004. Moreover, it will be a person like John McCain or even a Lieberman who could draw from both the left right and most of the middle.

1. All of his press conferences would open with that Daily Show trumpet theme

It’s actually a song called “Dog on Fire”. Is this the kind of Rock and or Roll that America wants in office? It is catchy…

Digg Rumor Mill

From a source who, unfortunately, wishes to remain anonymous, I have heard and unconfirmed rumor that Digg plans to release a new category in the near future. The theme of the category: Podcasts. As the source describes, with the recent popularity and success of the Video category it is likely that there will be the audio equivalent soon. He gave me no date range, but insured me it would be "sooner than [I] think".

Subsequent to the release of the categories, users have seen a dramatic increase in the number of videos and sports stories that make it to the front page. It won’t be long until there are podcasts on the front page.

Kevin Rose is currently speaking at the Building Blocks conference in San Jose and was unavalible for comment.

Ontok Highlighter Review

We've all been on sites with those highlighted words that lead toward advertisements and the like. Ontok Highlighter presents a similar system with a few twists. It's a highlighting system which upon mouseover shows a popup with search results on that specific topic as well as google, yahoo, amazon, ebay and other ads from your publishing accounts. Therefore when user x clicks on the popup ad you get paid - sometimes. The main catch in the whole ordeal, and the method by which Ontok will make its money, is that 20% of the time the ad presented is from Ontok.

There are a lot of great things about Ontok. First of all it is free and simple. It took me five min to get the code and throw it up on a previous post. Moreover, seems to work alright with blogger. There is no middle man, so you still get paid directly from the advertiser. The bad is simple: it’s still annoying. These popup ads are horrible when you are actually trying to read content. Furthermore, on my psudo-broadband connection the popups appear without any thing in them and take forever to load. The overriding factor in the whole expirence? It’s free.

Ontok really has a great model for business here. Forget content and advertisers, have others work for you to provide your income. I’m not sure what the click-through ratio is for such advertisements, but I’m sure Ontok wont be hurting. Perhaps instead of search results there should be a popup with a Wikipedia reference in addition to an ad.

new web extension

After the recent demise of the .xxx extension I have a new idea for an extension that would help all those engaged around the world.

.wed

It occured to a friend of mine at a wedding a week ago. Why not an extension to group this massive industry together. It's perfect.
Copyright 2006

really small hard drives

Reed recently purchased a new car stereo that had an interesting new feature which should have been included on stereos for years: a USB port. There, he is able to plug in a thumb drive or any other portable storage device. But why settle for a gig here, 256 megs there? Why not put your whole music library on a 120 gig drive and throw that in the cup holder?

It could happen. I started looking around and I found these portable drives which are not only really small, but USB powered as well. They have a one-touch backup system so you could make changes to your music library and then load it all on your hard drive in with one button. With a hard drive that's only only 1.3cm thick, could you really go wrong?

Wedding Photos

Flash Slideshow

Working Lego Guitar

Some of you saw the 42 string guitar as posted on Colemedia .com, but here is a working guitar made out of legos. If you look closely you can see the real pickups and tuning pegs and the whole gamut. Check it here.

Concordia Choir Tour Pictures

Flash Slideshow

auto-links

I saw a post on another blog that employed a system called auto-links. Within the post, you just typed your name and your name and link automatically appeared in a list of links. Thought it was a neat idea. Go ahead, give it a try.

a different video site

I am increasingly interested in sites that gain attention from content provided solely by outside users. I found a new site that puts a Web 2.0 spin on grassroots campaigning. Take Back The Capitol is a site calling for any videos that, in some way shape or form, answer the question: "Why must we overturn Republican control of Congress?" While I’m not sure this is the question we should be asking, the site is a novel idea.

Note: The domain name KeepCongressTheWayItIs.org is not yet registered.

coke vs. pop vs. soda

found an interesting map that plots out the mannor in which individuals from varying counties in the nation refer to their soft drink. Heather hates it when i call it "pop"

red is coke, blue is pop, and the mustard color is soda

free football calendar

found a free football calendar that has every college and pro game listed from augest til the end of the season. pretty neat

check it out: college and NFL football schedule

vocal jazz

Found this old recording from a couple of years ago of the concordia vocal jazz ensemble. We recorded it with the jazz band, it was pretty fun. Hope you enjoy it

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