@bignameseocompany.com

No-one get’s unsolicited mail from these guys.

@owndomain.com

Fair chance you actually know something about websites.

Quite probably mention the fact that you are based in India as a selling point.

You know how to “maximise brand effectiveness by leveraging the Web 2.0 Socioshpere” and hope your clients will be too embarrassed to admit they don’t have a clue what you are talking about.

@hyphenated-domain-with-seo-in-it.com

You have a directory submission script you paid $79.99 for and are willing to use to “boost” your clients’ rankings.

Guest book entries & blog comments for just $1 each.

@gmail.com

Won’t actuall say it, but you’re rather hope the client will think your having a Gmail account means that you either work at, or have some kind of insider knowledge of Google.

Client has never heard of anyone you have done work for before.

@yahoo.com

Similar to Gmail, but you also hope the client doesn’t realise no-one’s searching with Yahoo! any more.

@hotmail.com

You use Hotmail because then no-one can trace back your IP to your bedroom office.

I get dozens of these, through my own sites, and even more at work. The best ones have lines like:

“We’ve noticed your website is not ranking for it’s most important keyphrases” When it is!

“Your website is not appearing in the major search engines” Oh really? How did you find it then.

Some are even brave enough to include a url to their own websites. Oddly, none of them ever seem to rank for any word or phrase on their homepage. I wonder why.

Not sure the picture conveys the problem, but basically IBM (Lenovo really) have got the add in card retention mechanism in the form of a big steel plate to the right of the hole the expansion cards fit into. On this particular card, (made by Sapphire) the make has opted to put the VGA output as far to the right as possible. Result, it doesn’t really fit. That VGA cable is going to live under a constant pressure. I was still deciding who to blame for this, when as I installed the driver for the new video card I got this:

Listen very carefully if you write install routines for video drivers. Before we run your software, we’ve most likely removed any other video card drivers from the system. That means while we install your drivers, we’re looking at an 800×600 display. So PLEASE make your stuff fit within that.

While I’m ranting, why the hell are Sapphire showing me a bunch of advertisements during the install routine for games like Modern Warefare 2. This video card is NEVER going to be able to support that. And I’m not in the market to buy one – because I just bought one.

Honestly, if you’re willing to forgive Apple on this one, you are truly lost.

While I’m on this particular rant I also don’t get:

iTunes: why do I want DRM files I can’t use on another device? Have I paid for it or not?

iPod: er, my phone plays MP3s, so why would I want another device

iPad: well, what exactly is it? I’d say it’s Apples latest wireless handheld device that can’t run iPlayer. But that’s just me.

Sure, they’ve done some nice stuff, but in the main I’m never going to go for it further than pandering to my childrens desire to own Apple hardware.

They have a very interesting second to last section on anthropological climate change, and some interesting ideas on ways to combat it (as opposed to the “let’s just revert to medieval times” ala Kyoto). So I had a look around for more information on the topic. Which brought me to read a post on climateprogress.org, an “authority” blog written by Joe Romm which is essentially pro Kyoto.

Disagreeing is a good thing. We shouldn’t take things at face value, and most certainly shouldn’t simply believe things simply because they are in the press or published on the Internet.

My issue is, if Joe is right, and has the science to back himself up, why does he need to resort to schoolground name calling. I started reading his posts hoping to get an alternative view, but all I saw was what looked like to demented rantings of a spoilt child. Super Freakonomics says some bad things about (for instance) Al Gore, but at no point do they stoop to calling him an idiot, or making up derisory nicknames for him. Bjorn Lomborg didn’t do that in “Cool It” either. They didn’t need to – why does Joe I wonder.

Yet again, a pro Kyoto voice that simply is not willing to listen to any alternative. THAT’s why for some people (I’m one of them) the anti carbon movement is more a religion than a science. A shame, because I’m willing to listen to rational arguments. I’m not listening to someone who tells me this is how it is “you just need to trust me”. Asking me to trust you is telling me you have a secret, ulterior agenda.

Trust is for religion. Proof is for science.

Seems to me we’re not in a postion to start spending more of the money the country (and the NHS) simply haven’t got. And why the blazes should we. So just make it simple. Farmers (or anyone else who can justify ownership of a firearm for professional reasons) can have guns. Everyone else can have them, but they need to stay at the gun club at all times – they can’t take them home. I never understood why we would let private citizens have firearms in their homes for a hobby. Everyone goes a bit bonkers from time to time, and if they happen to have had a couple of drinks on top of that, there don’t need to be guns lying around.

I feel duty bound to correct that. He might have been paid £275,000 but he sure as hell didn’t EARN it.

Apparently in the cuts, the government is assuring us they won’t stop collecting rubbish from our doorsteps. Studies have shown it costs roughly 60 pence for a dustcart to take away my rubbish, while I’m paying about £30 a week in council tax. I have to say I’m glad to hear it since it’s the only benefit I seem to get out of my £30.

I also read that the Tories are going to ask us what we’d like to see cut, rather than just cut what they think we don’t want. Sounds nice, but I don’t see anywhere exactly how we are going to be asked. I can think of a few things the country does right now that cost money that I’d be happy to see dropped, feel free to pick up to three. Use the comments section if you feel 3 isn’t enough.

The connector pulls out very easily, so if you find you’re using some force, you’re doing it wrong

Footnote: this post is not intended for people who are stupid enough to want to drive without wearing a seatbelt. It’s for people who are smart enough to know when they should have a seabelt on, and not need a computer to help them decide.

Normally I’d join the conversation on there and pop in a comment or two, but in this instance I want to save myself the flames as I know there’s a high likelyhood lots of people will disagree.

First up, when the topic of facted search comes up, Matt firstly tries to suggest it’s a bad thing that users don’t “get”. Personally I love faceted search – and I think most users do too. I think what Matt really means here is that GoogleBot has some trouble with it. For all it’s cleverness, GoogleBot simply cannot mimick human behaviour that well, so a site using a navigation system like this presents it with a problem. How can it tell which content is good, if it doesn’t understand how to get to it?

For instance, if you and I were to arrive on a site with a good facted system (I’ve always liked the way dabs.com implemented theirs) and assuming we’re going to try and find a new laptop, we’d click the laptop category link, then use the facteted search to drill right down to get a list of the products that have the features that are important to us. GoogleBot’s problem is that it doesn’t arrive on a site with a view to finding something specific – it arrives at a site with a view to finding as much as it can.

When Matt is told by the interviewer about a site that has great faceted search that users love, he’s got nowhere to go. He absolutely can’t speak against anything that users say they like because (and quite right too) Google’s mantra has always been headed up by “build sites for users, not for search engines”. So he simply says “absolutely” in response to the statement “It’s actually a good user experience…resulted in much better revenue per visitor which is a good signal”.

The trouble is, the interviewer has also mentioned that this website with facteted search, has seen it’s rankings drop alongside it’s conversions increasing.

My problem here (if it’s not clear already) is that this idea of building sites for visitors and not for search engines sounds like it’s breaking down. Google is now such a huge source of traffic in percentage terms for almost every website it’s becoming the victim of it’s own success. If you make a site and only think about users, you’re unlikely to have any users because no-one will find you. If you build it for a search engine everyone will find you, but they’ll also leave just as quickly.

I was looking into facted search for a site, and have decided to abandon it having read what I’ve read this weekend. It’s going to be simple category structures going no further than 2 levels simply because I have to find a balance between what will work for a user, and what will work to get traffic – a website is worthless unless you have users and search engines interested.

Now, World War II ended in 1945. Any islanders that survived the war as adults will obviously now be close to 80 years of age, or more likely dead. The vast majority of the population would have been born post 1945 and not have experienced the occupation by Germany.

Of course, it goes deeper. Companies are exploiting the VAT exempt status by setting up logistics on the islands, and shipping goods into the UK without having to charge VAT (the products they sell have to be lower than £18 in value of they will fail to avoid the tax). There is a long list of companies including Play.com, TheHut.com, HMV, Tesco and (of course) Amazon.

I was reading on Amazon the other day about their “preferred” merchant, IndigoStarFish.com. The official line from Amazon refers to IndigoStarFish as a separate entity. Presumably there is a reason for this, and there is some information online suggesting that the mass distribution of CDs & DVDs from tax exempt locations into the UK is supposed to be regulated, but clearly nothing is happening. Amazon might refer to IndigoStarFish as their “preferred merchant” but since Amazon OWNS 51% of IndigoStarFish, that’s just a bit rich.

Please don’t be naive enough to believe this is all for your benefit as a UK consumer getting cheaper CD’s & DVD’s. Merchants operating out of the Channel Islands typically undercut their UK Mainland based competition by 10%. Bare in mind they are saving 17.5% by not having to charge VAT. So whilst avoiding tax, they are also making an extra 7.5% on the bottom line. Remember, small items can go through the Royal Mail, and the Royal Mail serves the Channel Islands. A first class stamp costs the same in the Channel Islands as it does in Birmingham or London so the merchants operating from there have no additional logistical costs, despite what must be a huge cost to the Royal Mail – that’s something you and me here in the UK are subsidising every time we buy a stamp. Additionally, it’s estimated that by moving goods from the UK out to the Channel Islands then back agian means a CD or DVD you buy online has travelled an extra 1000 miles just to make this whole tax dodge work. So here are the “costs” & savings broken down:

• You’ve saved 10% on your new DVD movie.
• The merchant has increased his bottom line profit by 7.5%
• The merchant gets extra business simply because his mainland competitors are unable to compete (remember Woolworths? this is a major factor in their demise)
• If you think CO2 is damaging the environment, ask if it’s worth your CD travelling another 1000 miles so you can save a quid.
• Royal Mail (by charter) incurrs huge extra costs WHICH YOU PAY FOR by having large volumes of post from an offshore location

Now, IndigoStarFish. I had a look into this. The guy at the head of this company (Alan Cox) is there to the right raising his glass to you. He looks happy doesn’t he? Well he would, he doesn’t pay VAT when he buys the wine he’s drinking. I could be wrong, but he doesn’t look 80 to me, so he’s enjoying a glass of VAT free wine while not having to have gone through the rather tedious inconvinience of having suffered under Nazi occupation of his home.

I’m guessing, but could the name of his company be some kind of corporate joke? Clearly he’s set up a distribution company in cahoots with Amazon. They have in the past had some quite high profile legal battles with a Canadian bookseller called Indigo. To me, it sounds like the name of this company is basically a one finger salute to that Canadian company. Just because I’m pedantic, I’d also point out that “StarFish” is a meaningless term – there’s no such thing. The correct term is “Sea Star” as any educated person knows. If you’re not educated that’s no problem – you can learn this by watching SpongeBob Squarepants.

I couldn’t help but read what was on his website – here’s a couple of snippets which I’ve thoughtfully covered with a translation into English:

“We will take all reasonable steps to manage our operations so as to minimise our environmental impact and to promote good environmental practice.”

hmmm – by making a CD travel an extra 1000 miles?

“We look actively for opportunities to improve the environment and to contribute to the wellbeing of the communities in which we trade.”

Er, you ( and a bunch of other companies) are directly responsible for the destruction of (for example) Woolworths at a cost of close to 30,000 jobs here in mainland UK – have you got any idea of the economic impact of that number?

I was going to drop a link to his website, but I noticed there’s not one backlink on Amazon.co.uk to their “preferred merchant”. Presumably is Amazon  don’t want to link to it, there’s a reason right? After all, Amazon are a company to trust right?

If a tree falls in the forest, and there’s no-one there to see it, does it fall at all?

Quantum mechanics tells us that in fact it falls, and it doesn’t fall. Both states exist as possibilities until someone comes walking through the forest to look at the tree. As soon as they observe the tree, the wave function collapses and the tree decides whether or not it fell yesterday, last week or last year. If it turns out it did fall, it rushes back in time, and falls. The observer just sees a tree that fell at some time in the past.

If you think that’s confusing, just check out quantum tunneling!