This entry was posted on
Friday, August 16th, 2002 at
10:14 am and is filed
under Uncategorized.

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Date
20020816
Ronald Scelson
Time
10:14
Lots of new links to Can Weblogs Reach Ronald Scelson? this morning, and we just hit #18 on Blogdex.

Links of note include Sean Bonner, who has decribed it as ‘what might be the best fight against spam yet’, and the lovely Firda who has come up with a cracker; she’s responded to one of those Nigerian scam spams expressing interest – in the name of one Ronald Scelson.

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Date
20020816

Time
10:22
Man sick of junk mail dumps paint on receptionist at direct marketing company.

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Date
20020816

Time
10:25
Davezilla is under attack by Toho Ltd., who own the Godzilla trademark.

Many speculate this is a warm-up before Toho takes on the much bigger Mozilla. Then Mothra, presumably.

Look! Corporate lawyers! We must flee!

UPDATE – Just happened across this at Linkdump: Bushzilla!

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Date
20020816

Time
11:25
The Sun has an interested rant this morning, regarding the flood of pornography from the web and the danger it represents.

‘The Sun Says’ (aka ‘What To Think’) actually foams at the mouth at one stage with the distinctly Morris-esque:

“Even the most harmless-looking website can be two clicks away from another site that peddles sex and bestiality with children.”

Bestiality with children? I’ve seen some weird stuff online, but obviously Sun editor David Yelland has access to much more interesting sites than I do. We’ll get back to bestiality in a moment (for you know it is a subject that is near and dear to my heart). In the meantime, let’s go to the introduction of the linked article, presented online in menacing blood-red text:

“A foul horde of perverts is threatening our children as never before – fuelled by a river of filth spilling from every home computer. Porn is a massive industry that pollutes the web. Thousands of sites are free to reinforce the warped desires of paedophiles and sexual weirdos. Yet the computer industry, the police, the politicians and the judges seem powerless to stem its flood.”

The important word to remember here is ‘flood’. I’m not denying for a moment that there isn’t one. The porn market is so saturated with small-timers vying for a piece of the pie that there are often more images provided as free samples than the average modem can deal with. In fact, I do my best to stem the tide with The Porn Report, which gets plenty of traffic thanks to this top search result in Google for the search term ‘bestiality’. I know, I know, it’s all a rich tapestry – and here we are back on the subject of kinky animal sex.

The site that gets these results is Celebrity Bestiality, which has enjoyed steady results over the last two years. So steady, in fact, that I was able to look at my stats about a year ago and ascertain that there is a general increase in the number of searches made for ‘bestiality’ in general. I mentioned to a colleague not long ago that this would result in a notable increase in ‘real life’ offences. Sure enough, it did. Highlights included the idiot who had sex with a goat in front of a trainload of passengers and the chap who got kicked in the goolies when he tried to molest a horse. The list goes on, you couldn’t make it up, won’t somebody pleeeease think of the children, etc.

I actually contacted the Home Office at one stage to see if I could figures on all offences of this type, not just those that made the papers. It was an entertaining phone conversation, but I didn’t get very far. Oh, right. The point. Sorry, here we go:

The point is that, when faced with a flood of pornography (or anything for that matter) the average person eventually gets bored and seeks variety. With some people, this curiosity spills over into their real lives – and The Sun itself contributes to this flood.

As soft as the porn on Page 3 may be, it is still porn – and there’s much juicier content held in the back pages, cleverly disguised as an advice column and series of morality plays.

It should also be mentioned at this stage that the owner, Rupert Murdoch, is right now trying to buy Hughes Electronics. The jewel in this crown is DirecTV.

“DirecTV is one of the leading players in the US adult film business, with industry estimates suggesting it rakes in as much as $US200 million a year from its pay-for-view porn sales.”

The Age, Friday 9 February 2001

And that’s not just tits, folks. We’re talking hardcore down-and-dirty, mop the floor porn here. Beamed straight into millions of homes and only a click or two away from the most harmless-looking television channels.

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Date
20020816
Books, Plugs, Etc.
Time
11:46
I love feedback like this. Toby from creatorcommunications.com just dropped me an email saying:

Hi Tim,

Just wanted to say that I was so intrigued by your publications I went out and bought “Marketing Your Website“.

Just wanted to say I think it’s a great and concise guide, and have made it compulsory reading for all our team.

Now, isn’t that nice? Makes we think twice about getting of my arse and writing that weblog marketing book (this has been on the back burner for about 6 months now). So, again with the feedback – what do you think I should tackle first? Blog book or novel? The former will be very useful, but the latter will be much more fun. Emails to the usual address.

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Date
20020816

Time
12:37
The Ground Force garden make-over show has transformed a public space in New York ‘as a memorial to mark the tragedy of 11 September’. Dear God, I’m going to be ill….

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Date
20020816
Search Engine Optimisation
Time
16:14
The Universal Church of the Interactive Network is now top search result in Google for ‘join a religion’. For ‘religion’, we’re up two spots from #251 to #249. Slowly but surely…

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Date
20020817
Ronald Scelson
Time
09:22
Can Weblogs Reach Ronald Scelson? has attracted the attention of the Cult of the Dead Cow. It also rated a mention in the latest B3ta newsletter

That rates a Woo! That calls for a Yay!

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Date
20020818

Time
12:08
There’s still time to get your feedback in, folks. Should I write another business book, or a novel? So far it’s running at about 50/50, so your vote counts. Emails to the usual address.

If it helps any, the proposed novel will be light on sex, but chock-full of graphic violence.

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Date
20020819

Time
10:01
Prove that you’re smarter than Toho’s legal department by taking the Godzilla Quiz.

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Date
20020819

Time
10:05
Topping Blogdex and Daypop today is a new spam-filtering technique.

Says Paul Graham:

“I think it’s possible to stop spam, and that content-based filters are the way to do it. The Achilles heel of the spammers is their message. They can circumvent any other barrier you set up. They have so far, at least. But they have to deliver their message, whatever it is. If we can write software that recognizes their messages, there is no way they can get around that.”

Yes, but I don’t think it’s going to stop them trying – or at the very least convincing a wide range of snake oil salesmen that the message will still reach that vital 0.01%

Relying on an end user solution still leaves the network overloaded with junk email that will never be read.

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Date
20020819
Latest Viral Agent
Time
10:15
So much for Emoh Ruo. British Gas’s Homenamer says my ideal home should be named Mud Slide. Hmm. Better top up on the home insurance, just in case. Or maybe clean the toilet.

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Date
20020819

Time
10:21
This is good. This is very, very good. A blog presented in the persona of Richard ‘Dick’ Vernon. Don’t recognise the name? Maybe this post will pump your nads:

“What was that ruckus?! I was just in my office, and I heard a ruckus! Didn’t I say to not cause a ruckus? You all just bought yourselves another Saturday.”

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Date
20020819

Time
10:28
Dave Letterman’s post-11th monologue touched a lot of people.

Now he’s wondering what the heck to say this year.

A new segment called ‘stupid plane tricks’, perhaps?

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Date
20020819

Time
10:38
Toddlers to rate teachers. Because the loveable tots can’t read or write, they’ll be allowed to rate their teacher as a smiley face, a straight face, or a sad face.

I’m rating this initiative with a ‘stupid’ face.

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Date
20020819

Time
11:08
Middle-Earth names! Getcha Middle-Earth names here!

All pretty dull on my side, with the exception of my Orkish name, which is Azhósh the Insane.

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Date
20020819

Time
13:39
Hang around. Something interesting should happen in about an hour.

(Via orbyn.com)

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Date
20020819

Time
13:52
Bob the Builder: A Crash Course in Sexual Innuendo – teaching you the difference between hard + soft, front + behind, etc. etc. etc.

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Date
20020819

Time
14:08
And you thought crop circles were weird…

Some farmer/artist has carved himself a 50-acre Elvis.

The above link features a large image of the portrait, but presented here for your own personal amusement is the Bloggerheads version.

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Date
20020820
Here’s Gonzo!
Time
09:58
Soham has been awash with journalists since Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells first went missing. The story has been a godsend for newspapers this silly season, but with police leads often bearing little or no fruit (or copy), many journos took to quizzing the local paper, and in some cases the locals themselves, for dirt and details.

In yesterday’s Evening Standard, the lead article focused primarily on the helpline that had been set up to help the people of Soham some to terms with the tragedy, but closed with the following:

“After a request from police for the media to give the families of Holly and Jessica privacy to come to terms with their grief, the Evening Standard has withdrawn its journalists from Soham.”

One turn of the page later and I’m confronted by a charming exclusive from Harriet Arkell, whose unique perspective of murder suspects Ian Huntley and Maxine Carr resulted from her doorstopping the couple with a request to use their VCR to watch a recording of the police appeal for the abductor to get in touch. She claimed that she couldn’t watch it in the vans of the TV crews because they had ‘the wrong format’. Me, I think it’s far more likely that the queue for VHS access went around the block once this tape was released, so the simplest way to take notes and file copy ahead of a pressing deadline was to knock on the door of the nearest private residence and blag a way in. Arkell’s ‘think of the children’ angle on this was faultless. I wish I could have been there for the performance.

“Please,” begged the desperate journo. “It’s an appeal for the abductor to get in touch – it may help the girls get back safe and well.”

Erm, and it might even help you get your precious inches of copy back to London too, dearie.

As you might expect, Huntley’s natural reluctance to let a presumptuous journalist into his home was cast in a far more sinister light, given his new status as murder suspect. Even though he had the door open and invited her into the house, his insistence that he would have to check with his girlfriend before letting them use the VCR was noted and related with a due sense of drama.

“This seemed odd,” wrote Arkell, “for such a small request.”

Odd? I would have acted in much the same way if a member of this army of journalists turned up on my doorstep with the same request. No, wait, I tell a lie. I probably would have closed the door in the hack’s face, but not before giving a vocal opinion of her rudeness that would be more or less unprintable.

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Date
20020820

Time
10:13
Spamming the voters? Not a very good idea.

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Date
20020820
Christianity Watch
Time
10:23
Take your pick from this bikin’ pastor (who has a sidecar for carrying coffins) and this vampire-hunting bishop.

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Date
20020820

Time
10:28
Man invents machine that reminds you to wash your hands after using the toilet.

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Date
20020820

Time
10:33
I work with some very clever people, but you’d be surprised how many of them fail to keep their bullshit-detectors on full when using the Internet. Remember folks, when in doubt, search Snopes.

Museumofhoaxes.com also has an excellent retrospective collection, but is more tailored to leisurely lunchtime browsing.

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Date
20020820

Time
11:19
Carjacker attempts to steal minibus carrying Judo team. Hilarity ensues.

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Date
20020820

Time
15:21
So now when you see someone walking down the street with a torch in broad daylight, you’ll know exactly what’s going on.

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Date
20020820
Christianity Watch
Time
17:11
Where Was God on September 11?

Never mind that. Where the bloody hell was Superman?!

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Date
20020820

Time
17:17
It’s been a good day on B3ta today. Lots of quality stuff and a heady dose of sex and religion. We even had some fun with the London Underground (1,2) – erm, before swiftly getting back to sex and religion.

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Date
20020821

Time
10:01
You may remember that a few months ago Tommy Hilfiger released his legal hounds, closing down a number of operators he claimed were trading on his name. In my case, Cafepress folded faster than Superman on laundry day, requesting all sorts of official appeal documents before they would consider reinstating the store. As smellfinger.com wasn’t really designed to make money, I decided not to bother – but pet supply company Nature Labs took their matter to court, and had the pleasure of seeing the case thrown out by a judge who insisted that only a “dense and humourless consumer” would think there was a connection between Tommy Hilfiger and their products- a range of doggie perfumes called Timmy Holedigger. Good for them. They deserve a treat, and they’ll probably get it if they chase Hilfiger for the £75,000 worth of court costs.

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Date
20020821

Time
10:03
As expected, Jeffrey Archer didn’t have to make a single cup of tea yesterday. Instead, he spent most of his time in high-end meetings discussing a new play. According to most accounts, he behaved, and was treated, like the man in charge.

I keep thinking back to the old race footage from Archer’s days as an athlete. The race had to be restarted time and again because Archer kept jumping the gun. Play every angle, probe every weakness. The world loves a determined rascal, right?

It’s obvious that he’ll keep pushing the boundaries of his freedom until the whole matter of his incarceration begins to look like a very sad joke. Not that it doesn’t already. His regular release for family visits – and now for ‘work’ – has been described by officials as part of the resettlement process.

Resettlement? The man is less than a quarter of the way through his sentence!

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Date
20020821

Time
10:05
A lot of the ‘hell in a handcart’ and ‘string ’em up’ stuff I’ve been reading harks back to the glory days of yore, when children could walk safely in the streets. That’s not the way I remember it. When I were a lad, I lived less than a mile from one of the crazy fuckers that did this.

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Date
20020821

Time
10:10
Oh, won’t somebody pleeeeeeeeease think of the kittens?

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Date
20020821
Christianity Watch
Time
10:12
“Question: What do you get when you cross authentic Catholic teaching with “Weird Al” Yankovic?”

Why, Mick Alexander, of course. This wonderful site features his two albums ‘A Time To Laugh’ and ‘Eternal Life – The Party Album’. If you have RealPlayer (I don’t, I’m sick of that particular piece of hijack software) you can even listen to a track or two. Choices include ‘I Got You Saved’ (a’la ‘I Got You Babe’) and ‘Old Time Gregorian Chant’ (a’la ‘Old Time Rock and Roll’).

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Date
20020821

Time
10:48
Fighting back against the telemarketers.

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Date
20020821

Time
10:58
Enjoy a daily dose of dillemas at wouldyourather.com

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Date
20020821

Time
11:07
The Monster Raving Loony now has representatives in the U.S.

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Date
20020821

Time
11:22
Another journalist who doorstopped Ian Huntley and Maxine Carr. In other news, I’m sincerely hoping that Harriet Arkell goes ego-surfing today.

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Date
20020821
Search Engine Optimisation
Time
11:50
Finally, Bloggerheads gets a listing in Yahoo!

The only good search result is for ‘weblog consultant’, but what I’m really interested in is the increased link popularity once the listing reaches Google’s database.

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Date
20020821

Time
11:54
The votes are in and a decision has been made. The next book will be a novel. It will be worked on daily during my hellish 4-hour commute, so be prepared for many characters to die in all sorts of horrible ways as I try to purge the demons inside of me and my overwhelming desire for vengeance.

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Date
20020821

Time
13:10
Best. Episodes. Ever.

Worst. Episodes. Ever.

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Date
20020821

Time
13:40
The editor of the category for hemorrhoids over at the ODP actually goes by the name of ‘hemorrhoids’. This is the only category he manages. Could he possibly be a chronic sufferer? Does he only edit that one category because doing more would require being seated for even longer periods? Curse me and my enquiring mind. It eventually led me to the site of this sufferer, who gives a personal account that is incredibly straightforward.

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Date
20020821

Time
15:36


That bloody picture of the shark jumping up at the helicopter has enjoyed a new lease of life (and then some) today. It’s turned up in my Inbox and about a million others a number of times with the usual “It has been nominated by National Geographic as THE photo of the year” rubbish.

Here, for your personal use, are some free clue-by-fours you can send back to the witless wonders who forward this outdated rubbish. It’s a hoax. Duh. National Geographic did not name it photo of the year, in fact, they say just as much on their website.

If you like, you can also send on this new, improved model (to your right) or another variation that’s charting well on Lycos.

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Date
20020821
Christianity Watch
Time
16:18
The Bible, boiled down into text message fomat? I haven’t seen anything this obscene since Blue Jeans Bible.

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Date
20020821

Time
16:35
A 72-year-old disco owner and notorious womaniser has offered the last woman he sleeps with an inheritance of about $244,000. Anna Nicole Smith could not be reached for comment.

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Date
20020822

Time
10:02
Student arrested after camera discovered in the locker room of girl’s volleyball team.

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Date
20020822

Time
10:05
By the power of Greyskull, He-man returns!

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Date
20020822

Time
10:06
After using this penis estimation site, Football365 reports that David Beckham’s penis is below average. Are they sure? It’s not very scientific, you know. Perhaps they had best slip a camera into the locker room just to make sure.

Hmm, suddenly I’m reminded of Aussie rugby player Andrew Ettinghausen.

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Date
20020822

Time
10:16
Alien reptiles live among us! They’ve got me convinced.

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Date
20020822

Time
10:19
How big is your ecological footprint? Who cares? I’m more interested in penis size today.

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Date
20020822

Time
10:21
The Coca-Cola Company is accused of using paramilitary death squads to murder, torture, kidnap and threaten union leaders at their Colombian bottling plants. Space lizards are behind the plot, I’m sure.

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Date
20020822
Latest Viral Agent
Time
10:30
The Virgin Mobile House Price Challenge asks you to value 4 homes for a chance to enter a prize draw (actually, you can get all of them wrong and enter as well). Exactly what house prices have to do with mobile phones is anybody’s guess, but the design on this mechanism is the mutt’s nuts and well worth the minute or so it takes to play and enter.

However…

Yet another agency has missed out on the full benefit of a hosted mechanism by hosting it at a new URL (instead of at the main site of the client). Granted, the site does link to Virgin Mobile, but only inside the flash content. Basically, the link is there but indexing robots can’t see it.

Again, allow me to cut’n’paste the following for the uninitiated:

The more people who link to your site, the better it performs in search engines (especially Google). Arming and hosting a viral mechanism in the correct way boosts your link popularity. In this way, you not only attract people via the mechanism, but also attract more folks making general search queries via search engines. This gives you a far better shot at a good return on your investment.

The referral tool at the tail of the competition should aim at improving this, too. There should not only be a function that allows you to ‘send to a friend’ (standard issue these days) but also something that encourages users to link to the site. If doing either or both improves their chances in the prize draw, then so much the better.

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Date
20020822

Time
11:05
You know those dreams that seem so close to normal, so very, very real – that you wake up from them needing a few minutes to adjust to reality?

Our youngest son Jack woke up with one of those in control of his head this morning. He was convinced that it was his birthday and that there were presents and a big cake waiting for him downstairs.

Poor little tyke. What a crappy way to start the day. Yes, there were tears. Yes, I will have a small present for him when I get home.

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Date
20020822

Time
11:21
The little shark picture I made yesterday is now No.4 on the Lycos Viral Chart. I figured they could use some new material…



UPDATE – No. 2! No. 2!

Can I crack the top spot, do you think?

Oh, also doing well here is the very cool Virtual Elvis. Its existence tickles me for reasons that are none of your damn business. Now, where did I leave that holographic power converter?

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Date
20020822

Time
16:57
The attack was sudden and unexpected.

They should have known that Disco Stu doesn’t advertise.

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Date
20020822

Time
17:16
Air rifle enthusiasts take pot shots at pussies.

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Date
20020822
Ronald Scelson
Time
17:21
Well, would you look at that.

In all the excitement, I forgot to tell you that Can Weblogs Reach Ronald Scelson? was Site Of The Day in The Mirror today.

Hooray for me!

Hooray also for poor old Ronnie’s postman, who must be developing a serious back problem by now…

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Date
20020823

Time
09:24
It’s going to be a quiet day today, folks – for me, anyway. The site is due a fair hammering after this mention at siliconvalley.com and all the little links from business blogs that are popping up as a result. A whole new audience for Ronnie – yay!



Tell you what though, I will take the time to mention this selection of rejected Penthouse letters just before I go to do my husbandly duties. Enjoy.

(Link courtesy of dogbomb, who also plugged our Ronnie piece today – but hasn’t said anything nice about the free book I sent him yet….)

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Date
20020825

Time
10:11
My back hurts, my hands ache, but the garden’s not even halfway there yet. Mind you, I spent most of yesterday clearing land that’s the council’s responsibility. Given that their contractors once left it to grow wild for over 18 months, I don’t expect to see them again anytime soon – so yesterday, I took about 3 carloads of bindweed to the local green waste tip. The soil underneath is now fully turned, aerated and seeded with grass seed (grass seems to be the only thing that can overpower the evil combination of bindweed, nettles and blackberry that grows out there).

And, in case I haven’t mentioned it, my back hurts and my hands ache.

Today, I have to clear and turn the soil where the greenhouse used to be. This should be fun, as the soil is full of leftover scraps of concrete (from the foundation for the greenhouse) and lots and lots of broken glass. Still, the whole exercise should give us a few extra square yards of… erm, yard.

The only problem is, my back hurts and my hands ache.

Perhaps this is my penance for unwittingly punishing Ronnie Scelson’s postman…

UPDATE – Oooh, lookie. Here’s a photo of the job somewhere around half-done. If you look closely, you can see the document tray and dish drainer we used to filter the garbage out of the soil (they were found on one of our many trips to the tip, and turned out to be perfect for the job). The wheelbarrow you see in the foreground is one of five we took away full of rocks, concrete and broken glass. We also found quite a few worms while we were about it. All were released unharmed to go about their duties.

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Date
20020826

Time
16:28
One in four employees spend more than an entire workday each week surfing non-work-related web sites according to this survey. Of a few hundred people. By a company that makes software which can ‘control employee Internet use’. Ahem.

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Date
20020826
Mustard Man III
Time
16:34
Mustard company French’s is seeking a Mustard Man.

What do you think – should I tell them?

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Date
20020827

Time
09:51
The Google Quiz looks to be a recruitment tool for Google Answers.

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Date
20020827

Time
09:54
An Australian women’s soccer team was duped into appearing ‘naked’, now the players are banned from stripping for money under any circumstances. Awwww…

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Date
20020827
Department of ‘I Told You So’
Time
09:57
81-year-old cowpoke given suspended sentence and counselling after poking cows. Hmm, I think maybe I should write a static article on the rise of bestial offences so I have something better to link to than this.

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Date
20020827
Flash Movies
Time
10:01
Violent Flash cartoons for the whole family! (Link via ultimateinsult.net)

Oh, and check out this cute sailor song. Is that Aqua?

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Date
20020827

Time
10:03
Texas tourists showered with stale urine. Must be travelling economy if they can’t afford the fresh stuff.

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Date
20020827
It Had To Happen
Time
10:10
Weblogs.com lets you see the latest updates on a number of blogs.

A primitive interface for participating bloggers, but it’s sure to improve with use.

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Date
20020827
Christianity Watch
Time
10:16
A short list of Jesus-sightings across America.

Hmmm, it doesn’t list this one.

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Date
20020827

Time
10:19
Light dawns as folks begin to realise that the rise of blogs is more about a publishing format than a cultural movement. Mind you, we are a fickle bunch.

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Date
20020827
Flash Games
Time
12:02
Forget Lycos Fight Club. The open bitchfest at sissyfight.com is far more entertaining. Claws out, girls!

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Date
20020827

Time
13:10
For those with .co.uk domains, worried that the personal details they provided in good faith were about to go public, I have good news: Nominet UK have now backed down.

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Date
20020827
Search Engine Optimisation
Time
15:39
The latest version of my Lego site just went live in Google, with some fan-fucking-sock-tastic results for the new vehicles:

No. 1 for ‘goblin glider’

No. 3 for ‘swoop bike’ (only the official Star Wars site does better)

No. 8 for ‘e-wing’ & No. 1 for ‘e-wing fighter’

No. 4 for ‘slave 1’

And, even though there are hundreds of toy shops and review sites plugging the official set, my beefier version is sure to get the attention it deserves now that it’s No. 4 for ‘lego jedi starfighter’. Only the official Lego and Star Wars sites can do better.

And yes, I do like to show off from time to time. Obviously.

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Date
20020828

Time
07:10
Ho-hum, another day full of meetings and devoid of bloggage.

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Date
20020829

Time
10:05
Would you scrape brains off the wall for $32.50 to $40 an hour?

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Date
20020829

Time
10:06
The creator of SatireWire has emerged from a staff meeting with himself and decided to call it a day, citing ‘creative differences’. An inner turmoil I’m only too familiar with.

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Date
20020829

Time
10:09
It sounds like a country & western song updated for the 21st century:

Ah drove mah pickup truck into nuclear waste.

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Date
20020829
Countdowns of Note
Time
10:12
Is it over yet?

Well, not quite.

When I checked this morning, the Bush administration was only 40.04 percent over.

Make regular checks for yourself at this George W. Bush administration countdown.

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Date
20020829

Time
10:15
Enjoy a morbid fact of the day. Or maybe a virtual blowjob (you’ll pardon the pun, but I saw this one coming from a mile away).

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Date
20020829

Time
10:19
It’s the British Mascot Grand National! You know those chaps who wear animal suits and run around on the sidelines during football matches? Once a year, they get together for a no-holds-barred all-in race at Huntingdon Racecourse. 29th of September, people. Mark it in your diaries.

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Date
20020829

Time
10:26
Scientology says it’s threatened by “unadulterated cyber-terrorism”. Awww, diddums.

In this release, they note that ‘the freedom provided by the Internet is open to abuse’.

Like copyright infringement, for example?

See their rip-off of Urban75 here.

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Date
20020829

Time
10:34
Was Bin Laden inspired by Isaac Asimov?

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Date
20020829

Time
10:47
Dogbomb.co.uk bites the dust. Sad, very sad. Dogbomb is a fellow B3tan and longtime supporter of Bloggerheads. It is now my sad duty to report the site’s untimely demise to the weblog coroner.

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Date
20020829
Yet Another Lame Quiz
Time
11:21
… for which, I must admit, I am somewhat responsible:

Click here to take the embarrassment quiz.

Me, I’m officially in denial from this point on.

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Date
20020829
Flash Games
Time
15:32
Arm-wrestle with Sigmund Freud.

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Date
20020830

Time
09:48
Another quality link from ultimateinsult.net:

A complete episode and character guide for The Muppet Show.

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Date
20020830

Time
09:51
Jim brought this anti-Google rant to my attention yesterday. Basically, Daniel Brandt claims that the Google PageRank system is undemocratic.

I was surprised that salon.com deemed it at all noteworthy, though they do describe the largely personal attack as being ‘pretty easy to dismiss’.

I tend to agree, though the water is muddied by Google’s curious inability to note links to that page. (They are there, but you do have to dig to find them, and they certainly don’t add to his PR.)

Interestingly, Brandt claims that the system ensures that ‘the rich get richer’. Not so. I’ve worked on a number of large campaigns where my warning went unheeded and large amounts of money were wasted generating link popularity artificially. Funnily enough, it didn’t help much. Nine times out of ten, only natural link support works that Google magic. It is supremely democratic, and yes it works.

If you have an idle moment, check out the PR of this site. It doesn’t look like much, but Bloggerheads has a lot going for it in terms of link popularity. A lot of this link support does not show up in the PR or even in many of the obvious manual searches you might think of. But it’s there, and I know it’s working for me.

Google knows what they’re doing, and they know when to keep their mouths shut about it. PageRank is only one face of the link popularity algorithm, as I’ve pointed out here a number of times. You get the people behind you, and you will succeed in Google.

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Date
20020830
Universal Church of the Interactive Network
Time
10:06
We have a new disciple!

Don’t delay, convert today!

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Date
20020830

Time
10:10
Doctor arrested for keeping body parts at home. In Tupperware containers, no less.

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Date
20020830
Christianity Watch
Time
10:12
Answering the question: “Did Adam have a bellybutton?”

You know, I once had an argument with a chap who was convinced that women have one more rib than men – because, as everybody ‘knows’, God created Eve from one of Adam’s ribs.

I started by pointing out that, if this was the case, then women would have two more ribs than men.

Things went downhill from there.

Finally, I dared to suggest that he actually feel and count his own ribs… then invited a woman over so we could count hers. He refused to do so on moral grounds, so I counted them for him. He was too ’embarrassed’ to look, and kept claiming that I was fudging the count.

It was about then that I admitted to myself that there are some people you can’t reach, and some fights you can’t win.

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Date
20020830

Time
13:06
OK, guys – here’s the plan: a surprise attack on Iraq. On November 30th. Keep it under your hat.

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Date
20020830

Time
13:10
36% of all email is spam. Only 36%? Has to be a misprint…