Archive for July, 2007

On april 19th, i hit 200 posts.About 10 weeks later, i’ve doubled it and am now at 400 posts (well, 401 now!).

This blog is 232 days old, or 7.5 months

An average post count of 1.7 posts per day. Not bad going. It does take quite a bit of time posting and preparing posts, browsing for material etc.. but at the same time you only have to visit digg, general forums or some news sites to get the latest news or talking points.

I was always told to try and write at least once a day by my english teacher in school… a year later and i’ve pretty much done that Writing is good.. it keeps you sharp and improves your ability to express yourself.. i suppose blogging is a form of journalism just with a bit more fun and freedom.

Anyway, 400 posts is a fantastic achievement, and i hope to continue blogging at this sort of pace.. The last day you haven’t seen any posts on this blog was 6th May 2007. Two months ago. Since then, it’s been blogging 7 days a week – non stop There aren’t many who can match that

I see the UK has now raised their level of security to the highest – critical.Obviously this is due to the two foiled bomb plots in London, plus the Glasgow airport scare.. add in the fact the July 7th anniversary is comming up and in general it’s a pretty nervy time to be going through airports and getting around on the tube.. we’ll just have to get on with it

6 years ago you wouldn’t think twice about hopping on a plane or train.. security was there just because it had to be, it wasn’t there because there were threats – i think that’s the view most people had. When you thought of security, you thought of keeping entrances clear, keeping an eye on drunks and maybe sorting out the odd scuffle.. it’s all a little different now

I’d be lying if i said i wouldn’t look twice at passengers on a plane or on the tube. That’s the reality of it nowadays, nobody can tell me they hop on a plane with not an ounce of thought. And it’s that suspicious attitude which probably saved scores of lives in London last week. Had those carbombs been there 6/7 years earlier, things could have been very different.

Anyway, even with all the danger, i don’t think it stops people travelling – and rightly so. You can’t let a few individuals bully a city or scare it out of it’s daily routine. We’re pretty lucky here in Ireland, i mean we’re probably one of the easiest targets of all the EU countries (unarmed police force, fairly laxed attitude in general…plus we have that Shannon airport link to the US military).

Luck only goes so far though

As a webmaster owning servers and running into problems myself every now and then, i understand/accept downtime more so than the normal browser..

But for me, boards.ie has been down for the past 3 days or so I think i got on yesterday at lunchtime, but perhaps i was dreaming or something

I’ve gotten 404′s most of the time. It’s set as my homepage so anytime it’s down, i’d notice straight away. Anyway, it feels strange having your base camp blanked out.. it’s like google being down for me

Boards.ie is the first place i go if i’m looking for help/browsing about in free time.. let’s hope we see it back up and running shortly It’s probably a victim of it’s own success – yet again

last month i earned $31.44.

It was my worst month ever.. this was mainly down to the fact i was banned from adsense and failed to recover…

I said i would bounce back, and here i am, one month later and up almost $20

Text-Link-Ads =$27.42

ReviewMe = $10

PayPerPost = $10

AuctionAds = $0.79

Bidvertiser = $0.72

Total = $48.93

So that’s a more normal month’s revenue. For this month’s (July) i hope to top that again and come close to the $60. If i manage that, it will almost be a complete recovery from adsense – which let me tell you, isn’t easy. Adsense was basically my only source of revenue online a few months ago. It’s also pays the highest CPC imo, plus it’s highly targeted ads which are shown to viewers, so the ads don’t look like ads.

I also have to point out, my CTR has been woeful on any CPA ad network i’ve tried. We’re talking 0.5% or less. With Adsense i was hitting 2/3%+. So whoever got me banned from adsense obviously isn’t bothered getting me banned from other networks Even if i was clicking on my own ads or getting friends to do it, would i not just continue on other networks, make a quick buck and get banned from them? or just re-apply to adsense under a different name/address?

Ok, i know, i know “get over it!” – but i am still bitter about that banning and more so the fact they wouldn’t disclose any details and didn’t give me warnings. None the less, i’m doing a good job of recovering and fingers crossed it continues.