NewsPier.com

Well, died online. It’s atrocious to be honest, I know I should be updating this weekly if not daily and here I am going on month long breaks. SORRY GUYS! The truth is, there has just been so much going with work and life in general. Sadly, enough I have postponed the writing of my new book “The Art of Domaining”, but should be able to start back up within a month or two when one of my current businesses kicks off.

Good news is, that business I was talking about? Yeah, that is FindABusiness.org which is actually undergoing a huge redesign today. Regardless, we already have people talking with the amount of data we are offering! This is the only Niche Generator which provides users with so much data free of charge!

When I get the time, a few new tutorial videos will be created but in the meantime go ahead and check out the new site and all the things we are currently offering. Once again, I would like to apologize for the blogging delays, I’ll attempt to sky rocket the posts again.

Cheers
Eric

I’m proud to let you all know that FindABusiness.org is now live. Simply put it will act as the ultimate business development too, providing users with all the statistical and graphical information they need to start up there own business both online and offline. Keep in mind, however that we are still in Alpha and A LOT of new things are going to be added over the period of the next month or so.

We understand that many entrepreneurs know how to implement their ideas successfully but don’t really have any ideas to get started. As a result we have developed a Niche Generator which offers a plethora of market and web data!

Markets tend to fail and pickup rapidly, it’s important to analyze these markets and be able to anticipate when the next big thing is going to hit. To cater for this we have included a simple market status tool, which will present to the user how the market has been performing on monthly and yearly  scale.

This is just the beginning, stay tuned.

Get access and install the hidden Windows 7 themes

To be honest, this couldn’t be simpler and I don’t really know why Microsoft didn’t include these themes with the standard selection from the personalize menu. The themes consist of five countries, Australia, Canada, Great Britain, USA and South Africa. All of them look great, a lot better than the current ones in my opinion.

So this is how you do it.

Open up a folder and in the toolbar type this.

C:\Windows\Globalization\MCT

Five folders will pop up, each relating to a country. Open the folder then open the theme folder and double click on the file.
It’s as simple as that. It is important that you have “show all folders” checked. For a better explanation of how this works, refer to the video below.

For those of you who are unaware, Wolfram|Alpha is currently the most intelligent computational engine online today. The core Mathematica system has been in development for the last twenty years and made it’s debut in May this year.

http://wolframalpha.com

Good news is, I have now applied for the Wolfram|Alpha API key which will help me incorporate the intelligence of their engine into my new project – find a business.

So stay tuned, as this is going to be quite big.

Presenting the WheelsAndWood.com toolbar. With a plethora of features and updates you will never be bored at your computer again.

To be honest there is just too much to say and I don’t want to spoil the fun by giving it all away now. Let me reiterate the fact that when I say a lot of things I mean things that you wouldn’t even dream were possible.

WW Toolbar

I do apologize for the consistent lack of updates and valuable posts, however, I do have some good news. The book is now underway and about twenty pages have been written thus far.

The first major chapter which will cover the majority of registrations and methods is ready.

Registering your first domain and the domains to come

What will be covered:

-         Companies/Registrars/ICANN/Resellers and differences between (2-3)

-         What to look for in a name (5-6)

-         Conducting market research (4)

-         Prices to look at (2)

-         Look at previous sales of similar names (1)

-         Analyzing trends (2)

-         Expired Names (2)

-         Drop catchers (2)

-         Cyber Squatting (2)

-         Back ordering (2)

I intend on keeping you all updated and for those who are interested copies can already be pre-ordered for a cheaper price.

Dear Internet,

First off I would like to apologize for the lack of posts that have been presented lately. As the rest of you guys I hope, there have been a few things coming up from time to time and my brief career with Watford Observer took some valuable minutes out of my day. For those keen readers, I did actually get fired from the blogger position, no clue why but we’ll cover that in another post.

Onto the slightly more exciting stuff. Judging from the success of my previous book titled “Torrent Traffic” I have decided to write yet another mind blowing tale of lust and adventure. In other words, domains intertwined with online real estate. Good news is, writing has officially begun and unlike the last one attempts will be made to get this book published.

The book will incorporate a non fictional tale of business with a technical How To piece of literature which will without a doubt aid you in earning anywhere from $1 to $1,000,000 of income online. Covering topics ranging from domain registration to selling for profit, it will consist of approximately two hundred enlightening pages.

Updates will be posted as development continues.

Kind Regards,
Eric

People + Work + Frustration = Money

In the current age we live in, which is centered around communities both online and off it is crucial that you develop an online presence. For most people this may entail building a website, populating it with a few pictures and letting it sit there but to be honest, this won’t suffice and will by no means give you the satisfaction of having a real job.  Here is where the online community or a “forum” as it is known shows its face.

Being a forum creator  and community developer myself, I’m here to tell you that it really does make your life harder at first. The constant activity, maintenance, promotion and all round lack of sleep exhausts you. Now don’t take this on board as discouragement from establishing a social network because after all that is  not what this article is about.

Over the last five years, I have learned that there are a few essential things you must focus on during the early stages of your website.  Let me remind you that when I say “essential” I’m not just beating around the bush, your forum will FAIL if these things are not implemented.

Forum Activity

As I’m writing this article, I’m constantly checking up one of my forums and making sure I’m posting and contributing. This is potentially the most important thing you should place your time towards because otherwise it will die out before you can say “hey, where did my forum go?”. I cannot stress this enough, ensure that your members are as active as possible and post new topics as much as you can (controversial ones help). The more lifeless a forum is the less likely people are going to want to join it. You see, the reason behind this is that one usually joins a forum in order to interact with other people interested in the same topic, so if nobody is talking then what is the benefit of joining? The way you can workaround this is by creating a few other accounts from which you can post. I recommend about four or so as it will depict some kind of activeness. Keep those 4 members logged on as much as possible and posting a great amount.

If you are having trouble attempting to log in with all accounts you can use a proxy server or have another browser running in the background.

Treat your members nicely

Make your forum actually feel like a community, set up automated messages and send out constant “what’s going on?” type posts . When you see that a new member has joined instantly welcome him to the site and point them to any help they may require. If he creates a topic introducing himself use all your other accounts to welcome him to the site. Later down the track think about giving some members special perks, perhaps a few new features or even a minor payment if you have the funds available.

Constant Updates

The primary thing which you should try to center your development strategy around is progression, make it appear as if your forum is moving quickly, even if it’s not. This sense of progression can be achieved through constant updates which to be honest are mandatory in any business especially online communities. Updates can be as simple as a weekly email or as complex as a complete site redesign. Ultimately it’s in your discretion on how you decide to keep things moving forward.  Judging from the success of my own Skateboard Forum I recommend you install some type of new modification or template edit every month or so. In addition to this you should potentially manipulate the post, member and topic data, this encourages guests to become a part of the site and gives your members the illusion that it is growing faster.

Nobody enjoys slow development or a monotonous forum that remains exactly the same for five years. As a result, statistics show that this is one of the highest contributing factors to the demise of your website.

Staff Members

Nine times out of ten, anyone interested in the subject of your forum will be happy to moderate for free. It provides them with a feeling of power and singularity from the rest of your members and results in them caring for the site as well as helping it succeed. Hiring staff members is virtually essential when running a forum, simply because it is almost impossible to build it from the ground up in a timely manner otherwise.

Unfortunately it isn’t all that easy, there are a few important things you must bear in mind when electing your staff.

Niche Specific

As mentioned above, people who are genuinely interested in the activity your site revolves around will undoubtedly make better staff members. They will contribute more posts and inform you of any possible suggestions they may have in regards to the production of the site.

Maturity Level

Simple enough, make sure they are old enough to drive and act like at least somewhat educated adults.  Potential staff candidates may also need to have some prior knowledge of the forum software you are using if it is considerably complicated.

Power Abuse

Make sure that the staff employed will not be abusing their powers to make themselves feel better. This may include doing things like banning unnecessary members, editing posts and so forth.

Activeness

Again we return to the issue of activity, it is compulsory that the staff remain relatively active on the site in order to monitor the behaviour of members and deal with any possible spam attacks.

Promotion

Another crucial step in the development of your forum, promotion. Throughout the life of the site you must attempt to promote it in every which way, seriously, whatever it takes. There are hundreds of promotion techniques available on the internet which will aid you in spreading the word. Here are a few that I believe stand out the most in the potential success or failure of your website.

Related site advertising

There is absolutely no point in spamming up unrelated websites with links to yours, mainly because it’s going to be pointless traffic. You are not going to be targeting a profitable demographic, these people may visit your site, browse for about ten seconds and then never let you bask in their company again.  Instead you should aim to leave comments on websites which contain viewers who are interested in what you have to offer. Perhaps comment a blog about cooking if that is your niche.

Unorthodox methods

Of course for those who are not fond of the traditional advertising strategies there are some which are on the other side of the ethical spectrum. These may include things like black hat search engine optimization, buying links and advertising through torrents. For those who are interested in harnessing the power of torrents as a form of promotion I have written a book titled, Torrent Traffic which may help you.

And there you have it folks a relatively easy to read guide on how to build up a successful online community. Obviously there have been a few minor things which I haven’t mentioned, simply because I didn’t want to bore you with 5000 more words. If you have any questions or requests don’t hesitate to ask.

Just incredibly delayed!

A demo shot of the London City Center in Getaway 3

First presented during the 2005 E5 convention The Getaway for the playstation 3 has been through its share of rough patches. The game boasts an unprecedented graphics and animation system which when coupled with the gritty storyline can only leave the player wanting more. Conforming to the previous principles of the game there are no major changes in the setting, it will still be closely centered around London and its outskirts. What is interesting however, is the means by which those settings, sceneries and interactions have been or will be altered.

Since the projected release date was announced there have been countless speculations, claming that the game has been canceled. And truthfully the project had actually been scrapped for a period of time. Fortunately for myself and the rest of humanity, as of June 2008 I think it was a Sony and Soho representative who stated that the game will again be pushed back into development.

According to a few primary sources, the game has been set to debut some time through 2010 with a plethora of new features. Let’s just hope they are correct because otherwise the north pole will be receiving a lot of hate mail this year.

Follow your god damn schedule!

It may only be me who is suffering from this but if you are planning on accomplishing your goals, it is unbelievably crucial to stick to your own schedule and set realistic time slots.  Even up to this point I still find myself spending too much time on things that aren’t that high on my priority list and as a result I’m constantly being forced to over work myself.

It’s one thing to say “Okay, I’ll start the book by 5pm, finish it by 7pm and move onto the cooking”, it’s a totally different game when you actually attempt to implement it. To be honest this post has been sitting in the process of being written for the last two weeks. I’ll usually work around it by telling myself there are too many things going on or that I don’t have time to focus on this right now. Let me tell you once and for all, that, that is total bullshit.

Luckily you have approximately 24 hours in a day, give or take actual scientific time. Although sleep and work progress is important there are ways by which you can emphasize and tweak both systems to work in accordance with each other. At the time of writing it is 1:51am GMT and I am laying in bed with the laptop placed on top of me. This isn’t technically correct because although I’m not currently sleeping I can feel the drowsiness coming on and this is for the most part due to the way my body is positioned. It has been scientifically proven that while awake if you are seated in a sleep type stance there is much higher chance that you will begin to feel drowsy and fatigued. If I get up now and walk around my house, maybe have a sandwich or two all those feelings of fatigue will disappear. For the most part at least.

Moving along to my original point, if you would like to get more work done and achieve the things you have been trying to achieve at the right time you must come to understand the way your body works. The body is an amazing thing, isn’t it? And everybody’s is slightly different, the differences are subtle but they are still there. For example between 3pm and 5pm is when the body basically takes an inside nap, hence making you feel slightly more tired and causing you to yawn etc.

The faster you come to terms with the way your body functions and at what rate, the more effective your set time slots will be. I’m not going to go into any further detail regarding tracking your body and figuring out at which times is it most efficient because well besides it making me feel unbelievably feminine, it’s 2:30am.

To conclude I would like to say that it is essential to set accurate and realistic schedules to center your work around. I don’t think I really mentioned above but for people like myself who run a bunch of different business’ and have multiple different jobs it is mandatory to create some sort of schedule to work by. Otherwise you will find yourself dealing with things at inappropriate times and increasing your overall stress and workload.