Top 10 Animal Flu Virus Carrier

Flu was first found among pigs in 1930s. Over subsequent decades, health experts have identified influenza viruses in several other species as well. Pet owners, farm workers, animal handlers and people wandering at the market are likely to be exposed to the flu virus carried by live animals. But which animals can pass such viruses on to human?

1. Chicken Flu

Bird or Avian flu may not be the headline-maker now, but it has caused hundreds of human deaths over just the past decade, with chickens being the most common source of contagion. Many birds are susceptible to influenza strains that may transmit to humans, but butchering, handling and other forms of close contact heighten the risk. The H5N1 avian virus continues to be of concern because 60 percent of all humans who have contracted this illness died after becoming infected. Asia was last strike by the Avian flu outbreak.

2. Pig Flu

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has been monitoring swine flu for some time, since pigs can be infected with human and avian viruses, in addition to their own pig-specific germs.

If an infection of more than one virus occurs simultaneously, recombination may occur. The latest strain appears to consist of "a virus that's 80 percent swine, with the rest being a mixture of avian and human viruses". World leaders are urging "concern" and not alarm over the Swine Flu outbreak but the potential for pandemic exists since the disease is now spreading from person to person. Read WHO raises pandemic alert to second-highest level

3. Duck Flu

Ducks are often raised for their meat, especially in Asia. Health experts, therefore, often monitor duck illnesses in China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam and other Asian countries that have experienced avian flu outbreaks.

Ducks are more considered as carriers, however, than as direct threats and ducks seem less likely to spread influenza to humans, but that they can infect other animals. Researchers in Mexico have not ruled out the possibility that a bird, such as a chicken or duck, was the original source of the latest outbreak, which could have jumped to pigs and then humans.

4. Goose Flu

Both wild and domestic geese have been known to contract the infamous H5N1 virus. The birds' broad ranges can pose a problem: These birds can fly 1,000 miles a day at maximum. If geese raised for poultry come into contact with infected wild geese, the risk of influenza spreading to humans increases. Most cases involving geese began with poultry workers in Asian countries who had direct contact with sick or dead birds.

5. Turkey Flu

While not all birds can catch the flu, most are susceptible to Type A influenza that may spread to humans. Turkeys are no exception. Earlier this year, in fact, an H5 avian influenza virus surfaced on a turkey farm in southern British Columbia. It was quickly contained. Nevertheless, tens of thousands of turkeys have been slaughtered in Canada and elsewhere when such infections have been identified.

In 2004, for example, British Columbia's Fraser River Valley experienced an outbreak that affected 40 commercial farms and led to the culling of 17 million birds, according to the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy. Suppliers maintain rigid guidelines to ensure public safety. We often criticize factory farms, but in this case modern production has helped to reduce direct contact with animals, thus staving off infections. In Asia and Mexico, many families live with their poultry and other animals raised for food, so they remain in close proximity to them.

6. Horse Flu

According to the CDC, horses too can become infected with Type A influenza viruses. People with horses must handle them a lot, particularly around the facial area. When horses suffer from an influenza virus, they can cough, sneeze and have a runny nose just like we do. What's coughed out is of less risk to humans than avian germs because most pathogens that infect horses become more species-specific.

7. Dog Flu

In 2004, cases of an unknown respiratory illness in dogs, initially racing greyhounds, were reported to the CDC. An investigation showed that this respiratory illness was caused by the equine influenza A H3N8 virus.

Scientists believe that this virus jumped from horses to dogs, and can now spread from dog to dog, leading to the canine-specific H3N8 virus. Experts consider the strain to be "a newly emerging pathogen in the dog population."

If it jumped from horses to dogs, could it move from dogs to humans? It's possible, but it would need a perfect storm. The moment of transfer would have to involve the right person, the right place, the right animal and the right time.

8. Cat Flu

Cats, like dogs, enjoy close contact with people. While most experts believe that simple hand-washing can eliminate the risk of obtaining diseases from pets, there is a possibility that both dogs and cats could spread a recombined form of avian influenza to humans.

Cases of tigers and domesticated cats coming down with avian flu have been reported overseas. In most, if not all cases, the animals had consumed dead infected chickens or other birds. The easiest way to stave off such risks would be to monitor pets so they don't eat birds or any other wild, potentially infected prey.

9. Seal Flu

While no "seal flu" has been known to spread to humans, the marine mammals can become infected with Type A influenza viruses. And other diseases have crossed the human-seal species line. Some populations consisting of people who eat raw seal meat have been diagnosed with toxic parasitic illnesses. Studies have shown that cooking reduces nearly all of this problem. Sushi lovers, time to think of the risk.

10. Whale Flu

Could a whale flu be in our future? Whales can suffer from influenza, probably by catching germs spread by bird waste. In theory, people could be exposed to and infected by the virus if they came in close contact with infected whales or poorly cooked whale meat. But the risk of that happening, not surprisingly, is very remote. It's really unlikely, because the ocean tends to dilute things. Again, such a scenario would need a perfect storm since, as it stands, wild waterfowl, like seagulls, poop out the virus, which then has a slim chance of infecting whales.

WordPress And Blogger Voting Script

I'm sharing a snippet of voting script especially to poll the best blogging tool between WordPress and Blogger. Copy and paste the code below and we all can see the popularity of either WordPress or Blogger. The beauty of the voting script is that the voters can be the visitors of your blog or my blog, but will share the same result. That mean the more votes casted, the more reliable is the poll data.

How the vote frame look like


Copy the code below and paste in on your blog side panel or as part of your blog post.
<br /><form method="post" action="http://poll.pollcode.com/oiq"><table background="http://pollcode.com/images/bg/blue_stars.gif" bgcolor="#eeeeee" border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="250"><tbody><tr><td colspan="2"><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 240);font-family:Verdana;"><b>What is your favourite blogging service?</b></span></td></tr><tr><td width="5"><input name="answer" value="1" type="radio"></td><td><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 240);font-family:Verdana;">WordPress</span></td></tr><tr><td width="5"><input name="answer" value="2" type="radio"></td><td><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 240);font-family:Verdana;">Blogger</span></td></tr><tr><td width="5"><input name="answer" value="3" type="radio"></td><td><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 240);font-family:Verdana;">Others</span></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"><center><input value="Vote" type="submit"> <input name="view" value="View" type="submit"></center></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2" bg="" align="right" style="color:white;"><span style=";font-family:Verdana;color:black;">pollcode.com <a href="http://pollcode.com/"><span style="color:navy;">free polls</span></a></span></td></tr></tbody></table></form><br /></br>Which is your favourite:<a href="http://www.blogtactic.com/2009/04/wordpress-vs-blogger-blogspot-whose.html">WordPress vs Blogger</a> WordPress vs Blogger

How the vote result will look like


Related posts:
* WordPress vs Blogger BlogSpot - Whose the Best

Top 10 Time Management Blogging Mistakes

Most seasoned bloggers would agreed that they have committed some time management mistakes during their blogging heyday. Those mistakes may not be fatal but potentially could lengthen their blogging objectives.

Time management is not as simple as maintaining a calendar and to-do list. Even with optimal effort your time management attempts can fail. If you delayed in your blogging target, it either cost you more money or more time. Thus, to avoid similar pitfalls, check the common time management blogging mistakes below:

Top mistakes that blogging make (including myself) are:

Time Management Mistake #1 - Being a slave to your BlackBerry or Mobile Phone

Multitasking when it's not effective. You know you have become a slave to your blackberry or cell phone when, almost every time it rings or buzzes, you jump and answer it. Cell phones and mobile email systems can be wonderful tools, but only as long as your control them (i.e. you decide when and how you will pick up and answer). Otherwise, they become a phenomenal time waster eating up to several hours a day. And when it comes to blogging, you don't have all day to blog, unless you are professional blogger.

Time Management Mistake #2 - Working by emergency

Most blogger with day job feel overwhelmed with their desk job and hardly find time to update their blog. More often than not, it turns out that those bloggers work by emergencies. In other words, they take care of the things that scream at them the most and forget about the less urgent tasks until they, in turn, become emergencies. The problem is that most emergencies don’t start out as emergencies, they start out as projects or tasks on a to-do list, that got pushed back until something happens to transform them into emergencies. Furthermore, when taken care of before they become emergencies, they often require less time, energy and resources that they do as full-fledged emergencies. Stopping work by emergencies to take care of your projects in a timely manner makes a dramatic difference in your available time – not to mention your stress. Bottom line is that, less time spend on emerging, more time you can spend on your blog.



Time Management Mistake #2 - Not sleeping enough

This might sound surprising in a list of time management mistakes list, but the fact is that sleep is critical to making the most of your time. When tired, we all think and do things more slowly, and are much more likely to make mistakes. Studies have actually shown that sleep deprivation has effects very similar to alcohol. It would never occur to us to get drunk on the evening before an important client presentation, yet we don’t think twice about staying up until two or three in the morning to finish the presentation handouts. The result the next morning is not much different, except for the hangover and zero time even to visit your own blog.

Time Management Mistake #4 - Not using a task list, or using an inappropriate one

Not getting your priorities straight. Leaving it to your memory. No check list or check list which is too long. Most task lists don’t work because they are too long or too short; not prioritized; too complicated; or simply in the wrong format or medium for their user. On the other hand, a well thought-out task list, adapted to your needs and style, is an extraordinarily effective tool to plan, prioritize, save time and increase your effectiveness. Quick example: A blogger was spending about an hour each day updating their overlong task list, never finishing their priorities. Solution? Reorganize and reprioritize your task list and the update time should be shorten, thus improving your effectiveness in your work and blogging.

Time Management Mistake #5 - Not taking time to sit back and look at the big picture

Being disorganized. No matter your day job, it is very easy to get caught up in the “doing” of things, and consider thinking time a waste, “because there are so many things to do.” Yet taking a step back on a regular basis to assess the big picture of your life, career, or current project, and taking some time to plan your next steps, before diving back in the daily grind, makes all the difference between being busy (i.e. doing a lot of things) and being effective (i.e doing the things that matter), even on a day-to-day basis.

Time Management Mistake #6 - Not taking time to relax

Taking on too much. Working non-stop. Sufficient sleep is necessary, but not enough to ensure that you function at your best, and make the most of your time. Providing your mind with rest is just as important to effective time management. By not giving your brain breaks from work on a regular basis to do completely different things – engaging in fun activities that have nothing to do with work or obligations – you slowly lower our performance level, always resulting in much lower performance (hence more hours at work to achieve the same results) and sometimes ending in mental burn-out.

Time Management Mistake #7 - Ignoring your own time management style

There is no such thing as one-size-fits all in time management, but the different styles and the corresponding techniques are not widely taught. So you most likely learned your time management skills from our parents, a teacher, a mentor. If this person had the same time management style as you, you learned and improved your skills. But if this person had a different style, no matter how much you tried, you never were able to replicate their habits successfully, and probably blamed yourself for it. Don’t… All you did was try to use for yourself a solution that is not adapted to who you are. Learning your personal style will allow you to develop tools and strategies that actually work for you.

Time Management Mistake #8 - Reinventing the wheel

There are also too many blogging trying to re-invent the wheel on a regular basis. Too many don’t take the time to sit down, think through a procedure for activities and tasks that they perform on a regular basis. As a result, every time they need to re-create the whole process, again and again. Taking a few extra minutes to think it through and create a written procedure or checklist can save you untold amounts of time. It could prepare you better for the next tasks.

Time Management Mistake #9 - Not delegating enough

This is one of the most common, and most time-consuming time management mistakes I see. You have built your business on your own; or you have built a career based on your ability to get things done. You now have resources to delegate, but you still perform many tasks that would be more profitably and/or effectively done by others. As a result, you waste time on tasks such as filing, or packing, or drafting letters. You’re also wasting money in the process: if your hourly rate is $100/hour, it is the same whether you are in front of a client or filing your papers. By delegating tasks that can easily be done by others, you are freeing time for you to do more of the things that only you can do, and using your resources much more effectively.

Time Management Mistake #10 - No emergency planning

According to the National Fire Protection Association, in 2006 a building caught fire every 60 seconds or every day in America. In other words, most people will be directly affected by a fire in their lifetime. Unfortunately most people don’t have a plan to deal with such an event, and will waste enormous amounts of time, money, stress and effort in trying to recover from it. When life’s smaller emergencies strike, it’s often the same: there is no set plan B, or even plan C, if their child falls sick the evening before an important meeting, or if they themselves fall sick right before a critical deadline at work. Having a backup plan in your real life or blogging life, on the other hand, allows you to immediately spring into action and deal with the emergency effectively and quickly, then be able to move on without stress.

How many of those time management mistakes do you make?

Related posts:
* 10 Time Management Mistakes to Avoid
* Top 10 Time Management Mistakes


Photo: elearners.com

Make Money From Swine Flu

We are still bombarded with Swine Flu news. And while we are at the Swine Flu topics, why not think of ways to make money from the Swine Flu. We are not belittling the swine flu victims or making more fun at the pigs, we just wanted to make more money. It may sound like a stupid ideas of making money but read further and see if you think it is creative ways of making quick cash. Simple ways to make money off of the hysteria, hype and horror of our current Swine Flu outbreak:

Make Money From Swine Flu #1 - Swine Flu T-shirts

T-Shirt design has been quite boring and everyone is in full fear mode about the Swine Flu virus. Why not break the gloom. Design funny captions or graphics related to the Swine Flu. Print out something irregular. It can became a niche product. But you better hurry because these Swine Flu will slowly die down. Check Zazzle for quick T-Shirts designing.

Make Money From Swine Flu #2 - Selling Alternative Foods For Pork Lovers

If people mind now, pork = death. People are scared to eat pork right now. There is an unfounded belief that if you eat a tainted piece of bacon or a pestilent pork rind, you will immediately keel over and become riddled with flu symptoms and eventually turn into a pig and then die. Take advantage of the situation and make money out of people's fear. Sell desease-free pork from clean farm. Sell organic pork, if there is. Sell vegetarian foods to those pork lovers who cannot get a clean supply of the meat.

Make Money From Swine Flu #3 - Designer Face Masks

You have seen pictures and photos of men, women and children wearing dull looking face masks. And I've seen designer baby diapers. So why not introduce a designer face masks. With new face masks from Louis Vuitton, Calvin Klein and Osh Kosh B’Gosh, you’ll be able to stand out from the crowd. You can even put Manchester United logo on that face mask. Yeah, glory ManU. Just because there’s a pandemic going on doesn’t mean we have to let ourselves go.

Make Money From Swine Flu #4 - Swine Drugs

With a new pandemic comes new opportunities for preventative drugs like anti-flu. Don't be surprise if there new products hitting the shelves fast. So get hold of those drugs maker and sell brand name to them, like:
* SwineBuster
* SwineBorne
* SwineAway
* SwinFlu
* Swinadol
* Swingra
* Swinprin
* Swinprocal

Oh, and if by some chance you actually have Swine Flu, just get a few hits of antiviral drugs like Tamiflu or Relenza from your doctor and you should be fine.

Chinese Zodiac - Jackie Chan 100th Movie

Jackie Chan has his 100th film project. The Hong Kong-based action hero will star in and co-direct "Chinese Zodiac," an action caper with a budget set at 250 million yuan ($37 million). Chinese Zodiac is also known as Armour of God III: Chinese Zodiac (2009).

Produced by Emperor Motion Pictures subsidiary Emperor Dragon Movies, "Chinese Zodiac" will see Chan on a series of treasure hunts across the globe that are intricately linked with one of the major events in Chinese history.

Produced by Emperor Motion Pictures subsidiary Emperor Dragon Movies, "Zodiac" will see Chan on a series of treasure hunts across the globe that are intricately linked with one of the major events in Chinese history.

Jackie Chan has celebrated a milestone with the announcement of his 100th movie project - a collaboration with "Rumble in the Bronx" director Stanley Tong.

The 55-year-old "Rush Hour" star said on his Web site he will co-direct the film tentatively called "Chinese Zodiac" with Tong, with shooting to take place in China, Austria and France.

The brief statement seen Wednesday did not give further details.

Tong, whose credits include the TV series "Martial Law" and the comedy movie "Mr. Magoo," directed Chan in the 1995 action film "Rumble in the Bronx" and the 2005 fantasy "The Myth."

Chan's main spokesman, Solon So, said Chan will invest in the movie with his frequent partner, Hong Kong-based Emperor Motion Pictures.

He declined to reveal the plot or budget.

Chan's most recent release was the Chinese-language gangster thriller "Shinjuku Incident," in which he plays a Chinese immigrant who becomes a hit man for the Japanese mafia.

His upcoming films are the Hollywood action comedy "The Spy Next Door," about an undercover Chinese spy whose cover is blown, and another Chinese production, "Big Soldier," reportedly about the friendship between two soldiers set in China's ancient Qin dynasty.

The veteran action star has also been in talks to star as the Mr. Miyagi character in a remake of "The Karate Kid," the 1984 film about a mentor who teaches a youngster how to stand up to bullies.

Chan recently caused an uproar by saying at a business forum that freedom may not be a good thing for authoritarian mainland China.

Critics called his comments an insult to the Chinese people.

So said afterward that Chan's comments were taken out of context and that the actor was referring to freedom in the entertainment industry and not Chinese society at large. - AP

U.S Claimed First Swine Flu Death

A 23-month-old Texas toddler became the first confirmed swine flu death outside of Mexico as authorities around the world struggled to contain a growing global health menace that has also swept Germany onto the roster of afflicted nations.

Detailed story at CNN: First swine flu death in U.S. reported, BBC: US reports first swine flu death

Regular Flu More Deadly Than Swine Flu

Swine flu getting focus, but so far it's not deadly in United States.

There had been no confirmed deaths in the United States related to swine flu as of Tuesday afternoon. But another regular flu virus had killed thousands of people since January and is expected to keep killing hundreds of people every week for the rest of the year.

Related posts:
* Swine Flu Outbreak of 2009
* Twitter Hit By Swine Flu Virus
* Things You Need to Know About the Swine Flu Outbreak

Experts are nervous that, as a new strain, the swine flu will be harder to stop because there aren't any vaccines to fight it. Since January, more than 13,000 people have died of complications from seasonal regular flu, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's weekly report on the causes of death in the United States.

Public are advised to be prepared but not be be alarmed yet.

Source: CNN - Regular flu has killed thousands since January
Photo: tiffadoodles.com

Digg Traffic vs Google Traffic - Ads Clicker

Digg users can come in droves to visit your post, especially if your post is a breaking news post or your post title is sexy enough to pull in the crowd. However, Digg users are lousy ad clickers.

To begin with, Digg users are more interested to read post about something that just hit the Internet. Something new, a major scoop and sinister. Forget about them ever going to click your ads and improve your per-per-click revenue.

According to Chitika's study, Digg Traffic is more than 3 times Less Likely to Click on an Ad than Google Traffic. In short, click through rate (ctr) from visitors coming from Google is much better. Yes, Google traffic is still reliable as far as making money online is concerned.

So what do you do with the Digg traffic ? Is it worth your time to get your post Dugg ? Here are some experts who have delved on this topic:
1. Neil Patel - How to get the most out of digg traffic
2. ProBlogger - How to Build a ‘Digg Culture’ on your Blog

Read further at Digg Traffic v/s Google Traffic - A Chitika Analysis Report

Twitter Hit By Swine Flu Virus

The swine flu outbreak is spawning debate about how people get information during health emergencies -- especially at a time when news sources are becoming less centralized. Observers are saying that Twitter has become a hotbed of unnecessary hype and misinformation about the outbreak, which is thought to have claimed more than 100 lives in Mexico. Twitter as accidentally became a hotbed for propagating fear amongst people as opposed to seeking actual solutions or key information about the swine flu virus.

Of the swine flu news on Twitter, bad news always travels faster than good news. Unofficial swine flu information on Twitter may lead people to unwise decisions. For example, some Twitter users told their followers to stop eating pork. Health officials have not advised that precaution. There is also incentive for Twitter users to post whatever is on their mind because it helps them grow their online audiences.

But in an emergency, that tendency means people write about their own fears of symptoms and widespread deaths, which can create an uninformed hysteria. The debate about swine flu on Twitter is not one-sided, however. And the site is not the only place online where people are talking about the outbreak.

Some Twitter users have expressed concern that the swine flu story is being hyped. According to Nielsen Online, Twitter traffic about swine flu has been strong. Swine flu has worked its way into about 2 percent of all notes posted on the site on Monday.

Chatter about swine flu is also loud elsewhere online. About 10 times more people are writing online about swine flu than wrote about the salmonella and peanut butter scares from this winter, Nielsen says.

Source: Swine flu creates controversy on Twitter
Photo: Tweet Tweet, Oinked The Pig


SEO: Twitter swine | Twitter pig | Twit Pig | Twit Swine

World's Most Influential Person Is Moot

The World's Most Influential Person 2009 is not Barack Obama, Oprah Winfrey or Angelina Jolie. Based on TIME 100 Influential Person poll, the winner is moot, founder and owner of 4chan. And moot is only 21 years old student.

Yes, I'm equally shocked. I have heard, seen and visited famous sites (latest social networking sites and web 2.0 sites) but not 4chan.org.

In a stunning result, the winner of the third annual TIME 100 poll and new owner of the title World's Most Influential Person is moot. The 21-year-old college student and founder of the online community 4chan.org, whose real name is Christopher Poole, received 16,794,368 votes and an average influence rating of 90 (out of a possible 100) to handily beat the likes of Barack Obama, Vladimir Putin and Oprah Winfrey. To put the magnitude of the upset in perspective, it's worth noting that everyone moot beat out actually has a job.

Since moot launched 4chan.org in 2003, the site has given birth to Internet memes as diverse as Lolcats and Rickrolling. 4chan averages 13 million page views a day and 5.6 million visitors a month; by some estimates it is the second largest bulletin board in the world.

For proof of moot's influence on the Web, one need look no further than the TIME 100 poll results. While Filipino boxer Manny Pacquiao got a larger vote total (20,391,818), the runner-up for the title of World's Most Influential Person, Malaysian politician Anwar Ibrahim, received a mere 47 on the influence scale. Moot denies knowing about any concerted plan by his followers to influence the poll, though TIME.com's technical team did detect and extinguish several attempts to hack the vote.

Undoubtedly, many people will question moot's worthiness of the title World's Most Influential Person. TIME.com managing editor Josh Tyrangiel says moot is no less deserving than previous title holders like Nintendo video-game designer Shigeru Miyamoto (2007) and Korean pop star Rain (2006).

About 4chan.org

4chan is a simple image-based bulletin board where anyone can post comments and share images. 4chan's collaborative-community format is copied from one of the most popular forums in Japan, Futaba Channel. Different boards are dedicated to different topics, from Japanese anime, manga, and culture to videogames, music, and photography. Users do not need to register a username before participating in the community.

The Complete List of 2009 TIME 100 Finalists
* Barack Obama, read Blog about Barack Hussein Obama - BHO
* The Twitter Guys, Jack Dorsey and Biz Stone
* Jim Cramer
* The Charter 08 authors
* Tzipi Livni
* Bernie Madoff, read Bernard Madoff sure made lots of money
* Arianna Huffington
* Pope Benedict XVI
* Rain
* George W. Bush
* Katie Stam
* Alex Rodriguez
* M.I.A.
* Prince
* Bill O'Reilly
* Joaquin Phoenix
* David Plouffe
* Rahm Emanuel
* Dov Charney
* Mark Cuban
* Eric Holder
* Odell Barnes
* Rod Blagojevich
* The Pregnant Man: Thomas Beatie
* Roland Burris
* Stephen Colbert
* Sarah Palin, read Sarah Palin Double In Nailin Paylin Porno
* The Jonas Brothers
* Britney Spears
* Miley Cyrus
* Angelina Jolie
* John McCain
* Hillary Clinton
* Ron Paul
* Mike Huckabee
* Arnold Schwarzenegger
* Ratan Tata
* Oprah Winfrey
* Tina Fey
* Michelle Obama
* Katie Couric
* Michael Phelps
* Kobe Bryant
* Lil' Wayne
* Mukesh Ambani
* Ron Bloom
* Bill Gross
* Sheikh Ahmed bin Zayed Al Nahyan
* Warren Buffett
* Carlos Slim
* T. Boone Pickens
* Ram Charan
* Neel Kashkari
* James Lockhart
* Jamie Dimon
* Michael Duke
* Ken Lewis
* Dick Kovacevich
* Sheila Bair
* Charlie Gasparino
* Tim Geithner
* Meredith Whitney
* General Petraeus
* Abdul Rahman al-Rashed
* Michelle Rhee
* Nancy Pelosi
* Elizabeth Warren
* Gordon Brown
* Boris Johnson
* Benjamin Netanyahu
* Asif Ali Zardari
* Ashfaq Pervez Kayani
* Morgan Tsvangirai
* Robert Mugabe
* Paul Kagame
* Richard Kelly
* Alexander Lebedev
* Ronnie Screwvala
* Steve Jobs
* Jeff Kindler
* Nouriel Roubini
* Yochiro Nambu
* Stephan Schuster and Webb Miller
* Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki
* Douglas Melton
* Nicholas Christakis
* Nate Silver
* Rowan Williams
* Paul Krugman
* Dr. Alain Carpentier
* Doris A. Taylor
* Roland Fryer
* Steven Chu
* Connie Hedegaard
* Jon Favreau
* Rachel Maddow
* Rush Limbaugh
* Kate Winslet
* Seth MacFarlane
* Damien Hirst
* William Kentridge
* Danny Boyle
* Gustavo Dudamel
* Renzo Piano
* Ricky Gervais
* Dan Barber
* Will Wright
* Hugh Jackman
* Clint Eastwood
* Roberto Saviano
* Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger III
* Jeff Bezos
* Rick Warren
* Patrick Swayze
* Tiger Woods
* Danica Patrick
* Manny Pacquiao
* Jessica Jackley
* Rafael Nadal
* Dalai Lama
* Vladimir Putin
* Hu Jintao
* Jacob Zuma
* Anwar Ibrahim
* Ben Bernanke
* Muqtada al-Sadr
* Robert Gates
* Sonia Gandhi
* Baitullah Mehsud
* Evo Morales
* Ma Ying-jeou
* Brad Pitt
* Lance Armstrong
* Kaká
* Sheik Mohammed al-Maktoum
* Yoani Sénchez
* Madeeha Hasan Odhaib
* Tony Blair
* Aung San Suu Kyi
* George Mitchell
* Craig Venter
* Larry Brilliant
* Jeff Han
* Nancy Brinker
* Peter Pronovost
* Eric Chivian and Richard Cizik
* Mary Lou Jepsen
* Mark Zuckerberg
* Tyler Perry
* Khaled Hosseini
* Rem Koolhaas
* Judd Apatow
* George Clooney
* Suze Orman
* Sister Mary Scullion
* Stephenie Meyer
* Takashi Murakami
* Indra Nooyi
* Ali al-Naimi
* Rupert Murdoch
* John Chambers
* Jay Adelson
* Steve Ballmer
* Prince Alwaleed bin Talal
* Jeffrey Immelt
* Tom Ford
* Lloyd Blankfein
* Mo Ibrahim
* Ted Kennedy
* Nadya (Octomom) Suleman
* Tom Hanks
* Elizabeth Diller and Ricardo Scofidio
* The View
* Jay Leno
* Dan Houser
* Angela Merkel
* Shigeru Miyamoto
* Leonard Abess
* Kevin Rudd
* Stella McCartney
* Zac Efron
* Eric Cantor
* Newt Gingrich
* Jeff Kinney
* Tom Dart
* Sam Zell
* David McKiernan
* Ryan Schreiber
* Michael Rapino
* Jonathan Krohn
* T-Pain
* Tucker Max
* Jon Stewart
* Taylor Swift
* moot
* Gamal Mubarak
* Kanye West
* Matthew Weiner
* Malcolm Gladwell
* Cory Booker
* John Boehner
* Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein
* Michael Bloomberg

SEO: moot money | moot rich

Things You Need to Know About the Swine Flu Outbreak

Right now health officials around the world are trying to take precautions without inciting panic from the possible Swine Flu Outbreak. As world government race to contain swine flu (also known as Influenza A H1N1) outbreak, including issuing travel advisory to Mexico, U.S and Canada, we the public should avoid both a pandemic and global hysteria. It's not a time to panic.

UPDATES:
* Apr 27, 2009 - Twitter Hit By Swine Flu Virus

In addition, as a precautionary measure, other governments were increasing their screening of pigs and pork imports from the Americas or banning them outright. Here are just a few of the questions facing them — and ultimately, us as well:

1. Is this a flu pandemic?

The influenza virus is constantly mutating. That's why we can't get full immunity to the flu, the way we can to diseases like chicken pox, because there are multiple strains of the flu virus and they change from year to year. However, even though the virus makes us sick, our immune systems can usually muster enough of a response so that the flu is rarely fatal for healthy people.

But every once in awhile, the virus shifts its genetic structure so much that our immune systems offer no protection whatsoever. (This usually happens when a flu virus found in animals — like the avian flu still circulating in Asia — swaps genes with other viruses in a process called reassortment, and jumps to human beings.) A flu pandemic occurs when a new flu virus emerges for which humans have little or no immunity and then spreads easily from person to person around the world.

2. What will happen if this outbreak gets classified as a pandemic?

Moving the world to pandemic phase 4 would be the signal for serious containment actions to be taken on the national and international level. Given that these actions would have major implications for the global economy, not to mention the effects of the public fear that would ensue, there is concern that the WHO may be considering politics along with science.

Of course, declaring a pandemic isn't a decision that should be taken lightly. For the WHO, phase 4 might trigger an attempt to keep the virus from spreading by instituting strict quarantines and blanketing infected areas with antivirals. But we appear to have missed the opportunity to contain the disease at its source since the virus is already crossing borders with ease.

3. Why have the U.S. cases been so much milder than the ones in Mexico?

This is the question that has health officials from Geneva to Washington puzzled. In Mexico, swine flu has caused severe respiratory disease in a number of patients — and even more worryingly, has killed the sort of young and healthy people who can normally shrug off the flu.

Yet the cases in the U.S. have all been mild and likely wouldn't have even garnered much attention if doctors hadn't begun actively looking for swine flu in recent days.

Some of the difference may be due to the fact that Mexico has apparently been grappling with swine flu for weeks longer than the U.S. As doctors across the U.S. begin checking patients with respiratory symptoms for swine flu, CDC officials expect to see more severe cases in the U.S. as well — and as better epidemiological work is done in Mexico, we'll probably hear about more mild cases there too. Right now, however, the true severity of the H1N1 swine flu virus is still an open question, whose answer could change over time.

4. How ready is the U.S. — and the world — to respond to a flu pandemic?

In some ways, the world is better prepared for a flu pandemic today than it has ever been. Thanks to concerns over H5N1 avian flu, the WHO, the U.S. and countries around the world have stockpiled millions of doses of antivirals that can help fight swine flu as well as other strains of influenza. The U.S. has a detailed pandemic preparation plan that was drafted under former President George W. Bush. Many other countries have similar plans. SARS and bird flu have given international health officials useful practice runs for dealing with a real pandemic. We can identify new viruses faster than ever before, and we have life-saving technologies — like artificial respirators and antivirals

At the same time, the very nature of globalization puts us at greater risk. International air travel means that infections can spread very quickly. And while the WHO can prepare a new swine flu vaccine strain in fairly short order, we still use a laborious, decades-old process to manufacture vaccines, meaning it would take months before the pharmaceutical industry could produce its full capacity of doses — and even then, there wouldn't be enough for everyone on the planet.

5. So how scared should we be?

That depends on whom you ask. Officials at the CDC and the WHO have emphasized that while the swine flu situation is serious, they're responding with an abundance of precautions.

Outside of Mexico, the swine flu hasn't looked too serious yet — unlike during the SARS outbreaks of 2003, when an entirely new virus with no obvious treatment took the world by surprise.

And there are simple things that people can do to protect themselves, like practicing better hygiene (wash hands frequently and cover mouth and nose when sneezing) and staying away from public places or traveling if they feel sick.

But the truth is that every outbreak is unpredictable, and there's a lot we don't know yet about the new swine flu. There hasn't been a flu pandemic for more than a generation, and there hasn't been a truly virulent pandemic since long before the arrival of mass air transit.

Panic would be counterproductive — especially if it results in knee-jerk reactions like closing international borders, which would only complicate the public-health response. But neither should we downplay our very real vulnerabilities. As Napolitano put it: "This will be a marathon, not a sprint." Be prepared.

Source: Swine Flu: 5 Things You Need to Know About the Outbreak

Google Celebrate Morse Code

To honor the birthday of Samuel B Morse (the fellow who invented the Morse Code) on April 27, today you'll noticed that there is a bunch of dash-dash-dot symbol on Google front page (some called it Google Skin). Those dots, dashes, dits symbols represent the word Google, coded in Morse Code.


Try Morse Code Generator/Translator

About Samuel Finley Breese Morse

Samuel Finley Breese Morse (April 27, 1791 – April 2, 1872) was the American creator of a single wire telegraph system and Morse code and (less notably) a painter of historic scenes.

What is Morse Code

Morse code is a type of character encoding that transmits telegraphic information using rhythm. Morse code uses a standardized sequence of short and long elements to represent the letters, numerals, punctuation and special characters of a given message. The short and long elements can be formed by sounds, marks, or pulses, in on off keying and are commonly known as "dots" and "dashes" or "dits" and "dahs". The speed of Morse code is measured in words per minute (WPM) or characters per minute, while fixed-length data forms of telecommunication transmission are usually measured in baud or bps.

The Usage of Morse Code

Morse code has been employed as an assistive technology, helping people with a variety of disabilities to communicate. Morse can be sent by persons with severe motion disabilities, as long as they have some minimal motor control. In some cases this means alternately blowing into and sucking on a plastic tube ("puff and sip" interface). People with severe motion disabilities in addition to sensory disabilities (e.g. people who are also deaf or blind) can receive Morse through a skin buzzer. An important application is signalling for help through SOS, "· · · — — — · · ·". This can be sent many ways: keying a radio on and off, flashing a mirror, toggling a flashlight and similar methods.

International Morse Code Signs


..-. --- .-. . -. - .-. . -.-. .- .-. -.. -- . -- -... . .-. ... --..-- ..-. .. .-. ... - .--. . .-. ... --- -. - --- - .-. .- -. ... .-.. .- - . - .... .. ... - . -..- - .-- .. .-.. .-.. --. . - ..-. .-. . . ..... ----- ----- . -.-. --..-- ... . -.-. --- -. -.. .--. . .-. ... --- -. - --- - .-. .- -. ... .-.. .- - . - .... .. ... - . -..- - .-- .. .-.. .-.. --. . - ...-- ----- ----- . -.-. .- -. -.. - .... .. .-. -.. .--. . .-. ... --- -. - --- - .-. .- -. ... .-.. .- - . - .... .. ... - . -..- - .-- .. .-.. .-.. --. . - .---- ----- ----- . -.-.

Different Between Blogger and WordPress

This is a second series on comparison between two very popular blogging tools, Blogger and WordPress. For the first series, check out WordPress vs Blogger BlogSpot - Whose the Best. At a glance, the popularity of Blogger/BlogSpot and WordPress are shown below:

From Google's query:
431,000,000 for .blogspot.com
47,700,000 for .blogger.com
168,000,000 for .wordpress.com

From Yahoo's query:
443,000,000 for .blogspot.com
32,600,000 for .blogger.com
139,000,000 for .wordpress.com

Common features in Blogger and WordPress

1. Blog Templates - Both Blogger and WordPress allowed the blog owner to customize their blog layout or template. There are a lot of free templates for both tools. There is always some one converting WordPress template theme into Blogger template theme and vice versa. So bloggers are spoil for choices here, really.

2. Plugins, Gadgets, Widgets - If Blogger doesn't have Plugin, it has Gadgets. If WordPress doesn't have Gadgets, it has Plugins. Plugins and Gadgets are small little codes or a part of the blog page element like a sub page (e.g. showing recent postings, showing most popular pages, and so on) that appeared on the side of the blog. If Plug-ins and Gadgets are not enough, check out how to pimp your blog with Widgets.

3. Control Panel, Dashboard - Because blogging is for non-technical savvy users, the blog user use Control Panel or Dashboard to maintain their blog. The functions in Control Panel or Dashboard allowed them to Create or Add a new Post, Edit Post, Publish Post and do a host of other things visually without looking at the HTML tags. It's like typing a document using a Word Processor and publish it on the Internet. Some may argue that WordPress's Control Panel is more advance but so long as the bloggers can publish their articles and maintain their blog, the tool would have serve its purpose. After all, the blogger's job is to come out with quality contents and not to become a savvy webmaster (but of course, over a time bloggers tend to be as skillful and resourceful as a savvy webmaster themselves).

4. Blog optimization - After a few months of blogging, you would be more adventurous to tune your blog. And by that time, you would be more resourceful on how to optimize your blog to gain more traffic and exposure. So when you are ready, you can also manually optimize your blog for example in Blogger, you can edit your HTML layout/codes to customize certain appearance or perhaps to optimize certain things. WordPress also allow you to do that.

5. Blog Speed Performance - Some said that the more plug-ins you installed on your WordPress blog, the slower it become. This is also true for Blogger. The more stuffs you added on your blog, the more time is taken by the browser to load the page. As such, only install essential plug-ins or gadgets on your blog. The target of your blog is to let the visitors see your contents not those fanciful panels on the side of your blog.

The above is a brief list of features between Blogger and WordPress. Now, let's move on to the advantages and disadvantages of both tools.

Blogger

Advantages of Google’s free blog service,Blogger :
* You do not need hosting since Google hosts your blog for you. Free.
* Its impossible to hack Blogger.
* You do not have limits like bandwidth and diskspace.
* The more visitors you get,the more money you earn.
* You can host pictures and javascript files on Google and its free.

Disadvantages of Blogger:
* Characters in post URL is limited. To me this is not an issue because it is a good practice to make your URL short but contained relevant keywords. Read Optimal Length Of Blog Post Title
* You cannot create sub-categories and tags for a better SEO.
* Your blog can be shutdown (banned) by Google. So don't do nasty stuff. Blogging is suppose to be clean and fun. So follow the rules.

Wordpress

Here is the advantages of WordPress engine :
* You’re free. Your blog cannot be locked or deleted due to “spam”. Does it mean, WordPress is favored by spammers?

and disadvantages of WordPress :
* You have to pay for hosting if you want to use custom domain. Yikes.
* Your blog can be hacked. WordPress being features rich is a big piece of software and it need to be constantly upgraded and potential exposure to security risk.
* You have limits like bandwidth and diskspace.
* The more visitors you get the more money it costs.

The future of Blogger and WordPress

Blogger.com being owned by Google will not die so soon. While Blogger may lack some features, it will slowly but surely catch up. Google need members to compete with other software companies such as Microsoft, Yahoo and FaceBook. And at the moment, Google members based now come from users of GMail and Blogger. Thus, Blogger will be around for a long time and there is strong support from the giant Google.

WordPress on the other hand "may" be taken over by other company. And when that happen, WordPress members will jump ship. For WordPress's fans, don't worry for the time being as WordPress is equally popular as Blogger. The potential of take over would probably happen in the next five years.

Swine Flu Outbreak of 2009

Swine Influenza (swine flu) is a respiratory disease of pigs caused by type A influenza that regularly cause outbreaks of influenza among pigs. Swine flu viruses do not normally infect humans, however, human infections with swine flu do occur, and cases of human-to-human spread of swine flu viruses has been documented. Since March 2009, a number of confirmed human cases of a new strain of swine influenza A (H1N1) virus infection in California, Texas, and Mexico have been identified. An investigation into these cases is ongoing.

And in Mexico, a unique strain of swine flu is the suspected killer of dozens of people in Mexico, where authorities closed schools, museums, libraries and theaters in the capital on Friday to try to contain an outbreak that has spurred concerns of a global flu epidemic.

The worrisome new virus which combines genetic material from pigs, birds and humans in a way researchers have not seen before _ also sickened at least eight people in Texas and California, though there have been no deaths in the U.S.

UPDATES
* Apr 27, 2009 - Twitter Hit By Swine Flu Virus
* Apr 27, 2009 - Things You Need to Know About the Swine Flu Outbreak

Symptoms of Swine Flu

Symptoms of the new strain are similar to regular flu symptoms, like fever cough and sore throat. This strain is presenting with more vomiting and diarrhea than regular flu. The viruses cannot be spread through eating pork. Those infected will show symptoms within 9 days or so, and be contagious for up to 7 days.

Overcoming the Swine Flu

The latest Swine Flu viruses have proved resistant to amantadine and rimantadine anti-viral drugs. They are, however, susceptible to oseltamivir and zanamivir, both newer anti-viral drugs for flu.

About Swine Influenza

Swine influenza (Swine flu) refers to influenza cases that are caused by Orthomyxoviruses endemic to populations of pigs. The viruses are referred to as Swine influenza viruses (SIV). The distinction is not based on phylogeny. SIV strains isolated to date have been classified either as Influenzavirus C or one of the various subtypes of the genus Influenzavirus A. In short, Swine influenza virus develops first in pigs and carried to humans.

Swine Flu Keywords

The Swine Flu keywords have been buzzing across the Internet landscape and the general public are all curious on the possible latest outbreak. Emerging keywords observed on Google HotTrends include: swine flu symptoms, swine flu more condition symptoms, cdc.gov, pig flu, swine flu san diego, pandemic, swine virus, center for disease control, swine flu mexico, swine influenza virus, swine flu in mexico, pig influenza, schweinepest, pig flu mexico, Pig flu sparks epidemic fears, can you get the swine flu from eating hotdogs, swine flue, tamiflu, spanish flu, swin flue.

Related posts:
* Animal Oddity - Photo of Valentine Piglet

How Spammers Contribute To Global Warming

A recent study conducted by the research firm I.C.F. International, and commissioned by security company McAfee (which, as it happens, also sells one of the leading anti-virus and anti-spam software suites) — examined the environmental impact of junk e-mails.

Among the findings:

• An estimated 62 trillion spam e-mails were sent worldwide in 2008.
• The annual energy used to transmit, process and filter spam worldwide totals 33 billion kilowatt-hours, equivalent to the electricity used in 2.4 million homes.
• A single spam message produces the equivalent greenhouse gas emissions associated with driving three feet.

The solution? Not surprisingly, Jeff Green, a senior vice president for product development at McAfee Avert Labs, in a press release on the McAfee Web site, said “Stopping spam at its source, as well investing in state-of-the-art spam filtering technology, will save time and money, and will pay dividends to the planet by reducing carbon emissions as well.”

Geocities No More

I thought Geocities was long gone but today, I saw a news indicating that Yahoo Inc is shutting down GeoCities, a free service that hosts personal home pages for consumers, which it acquired for more than US$4 billion (RM14.34 billion) 10 years ago during the heyday of the dotcom boom. A posting on a Yahoo Help page for GeoCities said the service was no longer accepting new customers and that it will be closing later this year, with more details about how individuals can save their data coming this summer.



So before Yahoo pull the plugs, some of you may want to browse those Geocities pages and scraps some contents because it might be useful for future republication. Once Geocities is removed from Google search index and other search engines as well, that contents if reposted will be valuable.

Chitika Has Malware In Its Ads

It was reported sometime in February 2009 that small portion of Chitika published ads linked to a site that try to inject Malware (or Adware) into your PC. This incident was exposed in Digital Point - Chitika has viruses and has been deal with by Chitika's representative. Apparently, it was due to third party advertisers that have their malicious script slipped through Chitika own ads scripts.


Chitika has also assured publishers that the problem has been rectified and the ads culprit has been identified and removed. The glitch did caused a temporary uproar among Chitika members. And strangely, the Chitika Malware incident was not reported on their blog.
Click above image to enlarge:

Fast forward to now, to verify if Chitika is clean, try SiteAdvisor: Chitika. There is no longer any significant problem with the site but that doesn't mean their ads script is 100% safe (these goes to other Ads publisher, except Google AdSense).

Earning money with Chitika

Chitika offers attractive revenue for pay-per-click ads. The only things is that, their ads is only served to visitors from Canada and the U.S.

Adware or Ad Supported Software

Adware describes usually pieces of Software which are included or bundled with programs as plugins to show ads. But besides showing harmless ads, they may collect user relevant information with or without asking the user. Most adwares send the collected user information to a central server to maximize the advertising effect. Some of them are using cookies to trace the visited websites of the user.

Hypocrisy of Google PageRank Update

The Page Rank (or PR) for most blogs and websites were recently updated in March 2009 and those updated would probably see their PR increased. And Google follow-up on the blog PageRank updating in mid-April. This time, Google decided to penalize some blogs. The worst PR slapping was when some blog previously have a PR5 was demoted to PR0.

Some of the blog owners who got their blog PR bashed by Google were also mystified as to the reason why their blog PR was demoted. They did no wrong. Their blog has nothing to do with link farm, paid post or what not, but their blog PR ranking dropped to PR0.

And this is when Google becomes hypocritical of itself because some lousy sites has been granted high PR even though those sites is idling for months without any updates and with useless content. Why did Google keep the mentioned blog with high PR but reducing PR for updated blogs?

Take a look at this website called Google Will Eat Itself. The site is a total crap but Google ranked it with PR5.

UPDATES:
* Google PageRank Update For October 2009

Affiliate Program Malaysia

Welcome to Malaysia Affiliate Program. This page will show a compilation of Malaysia based affiliate programs. At the moment, this list is almost empty because most Internet entrepreneurs from Malaysia relied on Affiliate Programs from the United States. Some Affiliate Program originated from Malaysia are obviously a clone from its counter part from the U.S.

Other type of affiliation programs in Malaysia allow you to earn commission in introducing services like web hosting and common electronic product like camera and photography accessories.

OnlyInMalaysiaMah - Money for nothing & chicks for free. A typical affiliate program selling ebook that show you how to make millions from Malaysia. Don't they all. The notable different with OnlyInMalaysiaMah is that your commission can be transferred to your local bank account such as Maybank, CIMB, Public Bank, Bank Islam, Bank Rakyat, RHB.

More to come, so visit often to check the list.

Recommended reading:
* Nexus One Affiliate Program
* Bing Affiliate Program

Make Quick Money on the Web - How to

Here are five things you can do to earn quick money from the Internet.

1. Solicit Tips To Make Quick Money

Add a button from microfinance site Tipjoy.com to your Facebook page, blog or Web site to let your fans tip you for entertaining them. Or encourage your Twitter followers to text-message you some coin: Tipjoy tracks payment "tweets" (usually a dollar or so) and transfers the money via PayPal.

2. Answer Questions To Make Quick Money

Become an agent for the KGB—the Knowledge Generation Bureau — at
 kgb.com. Inquiring minds text questions (say, "What are hot dogs made of?") to 542542 (kgbkgb), which are relayed to agents online. You do some digging, send back a quick, accurate response, and pocket a cool dime each time.

3. Adopt a Blog To Make Quick Money

Instead of trying to gain a following for a brand-new blog, go to Orble.com to take over one, like Extreme Critic or Veggieorgasm, that’s been abandoned by its writer. That way you can start with a good Google ranking and maybe even a dedicated readership. Orble takes a cut of your AdSense haul for the trouble.

4. Master a Domain To Make Quick Money

Put your dot-com cleverness to use at Pickydomains.com, where clients who are launching a Web site for a new company pay $50 to garner suggestions for a domain name. If they register your idea, you get half the fee.

5. Be a Critic To Make Quick Money

Rate and review songs on U.K. site Slicethepie.com, and your opinions will earn you up to 20 cents from the site’s managers for each write-up. Or contribute software reviews to Softwarejudge.com, which shells out at least a buck apiece. Reviews the site deems “damn good” can bring in $50.

Photo source: d70focus

WordPress vs Blogger BlogSpot - Who is the Best

WordPress and Blogger users (or user to be), find out which blogging platform is the best. Is WordPress the best blogging platform? Is Blogger the best blogging platform? Both platforms or services are free and have a lot in common. If you are a beginner, I strongly recommend Blogger. You can post your articles on the fly and worry less on the technicality of managing the blog internal coding. If you are a seasoned blogger, read through this post to find out the comparison in features and capabilities between Blogger and WordPress and then decide whether to stick on with Blogger or move on to WordPress.

UPDATES:
* Apr 30, 2009 - WordPress And Blogger Voting Script

In practicality, the toughest part of the sign up involves choosing a name that will be the prefix for your blog’s address. WordPress blogs have domains with the wordpress.com suffix and Blogger blogs have the blogspot.com suffix. You choose the name in front of the suffix. Either way you will have a basic blog ready to go in just a couple of minutes.

About Blogger and WordPress

One of the most widely used blogging platforms, of course, is Blogger by Google. Blogger tends to get indexed in search engines a lot more quickly then other spots; this is because its owned by GOOGLE. With Blogger, you receive your name for free, but it will include a “Blogspot name (example: http://rwsphoto.blogspot.com ) in the title. You also will have access to its very easily used software, and be able to add free or cheap templates to personalize your account.

WordPress offers free hosted and also self hosted software. WordPress is more for the professional blogger then most blogger programs out there. However, that comes with a price as there are less WordPress designers and it can be tricky, and confusing, if something goes wrong with your site. That is why some called WordPress as a blogging platform for the geek. Always remember to backup of your blog before you start messing around. WordPress comes with hundreds of templates to utilize, that are easily customized by just overwriting the pictures with new ones, or changing the color codes in the CSS template. There are also thousands of plugins to use to customize your blog for whatever your purpose is. From adding in video, to polls, to automatic signatures, its as simple as downloading, adding, and hitting an activate button. What I like about WordPress too, is if something is incompatible, it doesn’t just load it. It shuts off the plug-in and lets you know that it cant be loaded.

Blogging Flexibility

With Blogger.com you can have your own template, with WordPress.com you can not. The reason apparently are related to security concerns. However, the other side of the story is that whatever modifications are possible at WordPress.com, they are a lot cleaner and you do not have to redo it all over again, simply because you decided to change your template. And a lot of additions, deletions in the sidebar are still possible. Creating links in the sidebar, for example. You can simply define the category and add links to them. You won’t have to redo it with a change in template. While with Blogger.com, you must manually change the template code with HTML and then redo it with a template change. Any customization of blogger.com template requires some minimal knowledge of HTML. WordPress.com provides nice interface. But if you just want the control over HTML of your blog, well go for Blogger.com!

Platform Maturity

WordPress.com is under experimentation. That's why it have a version number. If you do not like to see little surprising changes and little messing up here and there on a daily basis, you would want to wait for sometime before trying to shift. For self-hosted WordPress, you are required once a while to update your WordPress version. You won't have those problem with Blogger.com Blogger.com is stable and cool that way.

Blog Simplicity (Ease of Use)

It is very easy to use Blogger using the WYSIWYG editor, with previews available before you have to publish the article/template. This is partly due to the fact that Blogger doesn’t have as many options for advanced information management. Blogger has now added many more options for managing a blog including integration with FeedBurner and a drag-and-drop page editor for page elements (gadgets).

WordPress, although easy to write articles, does require amateur knowledge of HTML/CSS (as well as due to it’s many features and menu items), which is one of the reasons which I was more inclined to using Blogger. For all you pro’s though who can handle the messy stuff WordPress is the way, but being realistic, most of the population doesn't have a clue about CSS, and WordPress has no preview, so I'm afraid that one will have to go to Blogger. And if you are serious about make money from blogging, wasting your time tweaking the HTML code for your blog post is the last thing you want to do.

Adverti$ing on your blog (money making potential)

WordPress.com does not allow third-party ad serving services like AdSense or AdBrite to be present on their blogs. Since Blogger is owned by Google they support AdSense advertising on blogs and include a page element to help ease integration. Since Blogger supports adding javascript from other sites, automatic ad serving from other services should work as well.

Search Engine Optimization and Traffic

There are many stories of getting indexed fast and ranking high in search engines from both WordPress and Blogger users. As long as the content is good, the spiders will come.

When you post in Blogger, you can only “ping” a limited amount of sites, whereas with WordPress on your own domain you can ping as many blog directories as you want, and start getting more traffic.

As a conclusion, I would say that WordPress is only slightly ahead in terms of optimization for search engines, and building large amounts of traffic.

Themes and customization

For Blogger, you can edit template layouts, styles and colors, or install a third party theme. This can be done by adding JavaScript pagelet or gadgets.

WordPress doesn't allow template editing. Style sheet editing is only available as a paid upgrade. Many of the 60+ themes let you upload a header image. Some have additional customization options. To add things, WordPress allowed you to include pre-built plugins.

Visitor stats

Blogger has no built stats. Since it is owned by Google and you have a Google account, you can check your detailed blog stats from Google Analytical. You can also include third party tracker scripts — or any type of script.

WordPress doesn't allowed scripts. The admin dashboard shows 2 days of stats and daily, weekly and monthly graphs. Side track a little bit, with no script allowed, you will not be able to monetised your blog unless you use the paid version of WordPress.

Blog Import Features

Blogger can import posts only from another BlogSpot blog. WordPress meanwhile allow you to import from Blogger, Type·Pad, Live·JournaI, MovabIe·Type or another WordPress blog.

Image storage

Blogger gives 1 Gigabyte for images space. There is no interface to browse through the images unless you sign up for Picasa Web Albums. WordPress gives 3 Gigabytes. Paid upgrades are available to add more space. You can also upload .ppt, .doc and .pdf files (more file types with an upgrade).

Photo Galleries

Blogger - You can use Picasa Web Albums.
WorPress - Simply add the tag [gallery] to any post or page (more info)

NOTE: For a photo galleries site, blogging platform either Blogger and WordPress are both not suitable. This is because for photo galleries, you may want your own artistic presentation and neat tricks to show off your photos. In short, Blogger and WordPress are not specialized in photo galleries.

Static pages

Blogger does not support static pages. All post are chronically order by date. That is the basic nature of blog - an event driven publishing of articles.
WordPress - Create posts or 'pages'. Static pages are listed in separate menus.

Categories

Blogger called it 'Labels'. And WordPress called it 'Categories'.

Optional excerpts

Optional excerpts is not available in Blogger. Closer to it would be using Block Quote.
WordPress - Some themes allow unique text. Others depend on a "more" tag.

Post by email

Blogger allow you to submit posts by email. You can receive new posts by email too (helpful for team blogs). Post by email is not available for WordPress.

Blog Syndication

WordPress.com offers standard RSS feeds and includes native support for podcast enclosures. Blogger offers the less popular Atom syndication format. While RSS is the standard for syndication, many feed aggregators can also handle Atom feeds (just to satisfy Google, so syndication is not an issue for Blogger). In addition, services like Feedburner offer options to convert the feed to all usable formats and standards for RSS. WordPress offers RSS feeds for comments which is a feature not available via the Blogger service.

Google purchased FeedBurner in June of 2007 and now offers feed redirection so that you may use FeedBurner or other services to manage your Blogger RSS.

Contact forms

Contact forms is not available in Blogger. You could add a third-party contact form, however.
For WordPress, simply add the tag [contact-form] to any post or page.

Private blogs

For Blogger, you can restrict access to invited Google account holders or make the blog entirely private. With WordPress, you can restrict access to 35 invited WordPress account holders (unlimited with a paid upgrade). Alternatively, individual posts can be password protected or Private.

Team blogs or Team Blogging

Blogger only support Administrators and non-administrators only. With WordPress, you can multiply roles such as Administrator, Editors, Authors and Contributors. Actually not relevant if you blog on a one-man show capacity.

Comments or commenting

Blogger -Visual confirmation and moderation options, but no editing of comments to be fair.
WordPress - Moderation, comment editing and Akismet spam protection.

Publishing Location

WordPress saves the content of your blog on their servers. Blogger allows you the option of publishing the pages to your own server via FTP. This allows you to fully host the blog with your own domain name, eliminating the need to use one of the blogspot.com addresses. Some businesses may find this to be a plus if they want to have the blog seem completely integrated within their company website.

Wordpress.com now has the option to redirect your blog to a domain of your choosing. The files will still be published on WordPress.com but visitors will see your web address instead of one with ‘.worpdress.com’ at the end.

Blog Widgets

Blogger.com Widgets - Add a Gadget | Followers | Blog List | Subscription Links | Slideshow |
Newsreel | Video Bar | List | Link List [Blog Roll] | Picture | Text | HTML/JavaScript |
AdSense | Feed | Labels [categories] | Logo | Profile | Page Header | Blog Archive | Poll

Wordpress.com Widgets - Akismet | Archives | Blog Stats | Box.net file sharing | Calendar | Categories | del.icio.us | Flickr | Links | Meebo | Meta | Pages | Platial MapKit | Recent Comments | Recent Posts | RSS | Search | Sonific Songspot | Tag Cloud | Text | Top Clicks | Top Posts | Vod:Pod Videos | Twitter

Theme choices (Blog Templates)

Although the WordPress.com collection of 60+ themes sounds like a lot, many of them are quite disappointing. Two of the themes are specifically for the Christmas season, and of the remainder, a significant proportion are gaudy or tacky.

If you don't like any of the BlogSpot themes you can modify them or install third party themes.

NOTE: Those cool and professional WordPress template that you encountered are done by seasoned blogger who know how to trick the template internals and configurations.

Copyrights and Ownership of Content

Google has the authority to shut down your Blogger account without warning if they don’t like what you’re blogging about. You don’t have absolute control over your own blog. But rest assure, all blogspot blogs are maintained clean and safe.

With WordPress, you own the domain name and the blog is hosted on your own account. You have full control over your content.

With the self-hosted version of WordPress (not WordPress.com), you’re free to write about anything you want, and use the software in any way you want. Yes, Blogger allows you to publish to your own domain, but they still own the database that holds your content! Don’t forget that!

HTML Coding

If you are a webmaster or familiar with HTML, Blogger allows you to embed CSS in your blog HTML codes.

FTP Connection

Both Blogger and WordPress support FTP connection but Blogger seems to lag behind in performance and reliability as far as FTP uploading is concerned.

Conclusion

The best advice for you (especially if you are a beginner) now is to take the time to start a test blog on both services. Work with both of them for a couple of weeks to see which one suits your needs best. Once you have made a decision on a favored platform you’ll also have the advantage of some time in the driver’s seat before you get into the blogging fast lane.

Both of these services have made great strides over the last couple of years. There is still no clear ‘winner’ if you will. But so long as Google is still alive, Blogger will be surely gain advantage over WordPress. It is just a matter of time before we see a shift in this blogging war. So as for me, I'll stay on safer ground.

Please vote for your favorite blogging service below

What is your favourite blogging service?
	WordPress
	Blogger
	Others
pollcode.com free polls

Related posts:
* Choice of blogging platform | Software


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Earth is in deep trouble

Earth is in deep trouble. What are you doing about it.


Related posts:
* Top 10 World's Most Polluted Places
* Hypocrisy of Earth Day 2009
* Make Money On Earth Day
* 10 Endangered Animals On The Brink Of Extinction
* From Tonnes Of Craps To a Pot Of Gold

Top 10 American Companies - 2009 Ranking

Fortune500 has released their Top 100 American Companies for 2009. For a shorter list, see the Top 10 ranking below. The Top 10 List of American Companies is dominant by Oil and Gas companies or those related to Energy Sector. Microsoft is ranked at number 35 of the Top 100 American Companies for 2009.

Related posts:
* Top 10 Paying Companies
* The 2009 World's Billionaires Are Poorer

1. Exxon Mobil

Displaced as Corporate Enemy No. 1 -- thank you, Wall Street bankers! -- Exxon Mobil regains the Fortune 500's No. 1 slot this year, despite the sharp fall in oil prices. Indeed, if the fourth quarter of 2008 demonstrates anything, it's that Exxon Mobil is perfectly capable of making billions of dollars even with oil at $50 a barrel or less.

2. Wal-Mart Stores

Wal-Mart may have fallen to second place, but shareholders surely don't mind: Last year Wal-Mart boasted far and away the best one-year stock return of any Fortune 500 company: 19.99%. With credit-crunched consumers looking for bargains, Wal-Mart has emerged as a rare recession-buster -- consistently growing same-store sales at the expense of Target and other higher-priced rivals.

3. Chevron

Chevron's oil-and-gas production declined in both 2007 and 2008. CEO David O'Reilly thinks 2009 is the year to pull out all the stops to get production growing again -- spending $23 billion this year on drilling new oil fields and expanding refineries.

4. ConocoPhillips

Timing is everything. ConocoPhillips reported a $17 billion loss last year -- most of it related to an ill-timed acquisition. (It bought natural gas producer Burlington Resources for $34 billion in 2005, back when gas prices were triple what they are today.)

5. General Electric

For years, critics have complained that far from being a well-diversified conglomerate, GE was really just a financial company disguised as an industrial firm. CEO Jeff Immelt has typically brushed off such complaints, telling FORTUNE in November 2007, for instance, that he saw more opportunity than risk for GE's finance arm (which veers from business loans to real estate investments). "I like our financial hand right now," Immelt said.

6. General Motors

It will be interesting to see where GM ranks on this list next year. Will it finagle enough concessions from unions and enough bailout money from the government to continue as a leading carmaker? Or will there be a Chapter 11 filing, resulting in GE being picked apart by creditors and re-formed into a new GM with fewer brands and skimpier sales? - J.B.

7. Ford Motor

While GM fights for its life, Ford wants to be seen as a survivor. Ford has extracted breakthrough concessions from bondholders as well as the United Auto Workers union. (Bondholder concessions alone will save Ford some $600 million a year.)

And while it too is being battered by the recession, Ford has been adamant about not taking federal bailout money -- a stance that seems to be a winner with consumers.

8. AT&T

You'd think that as the exclusive wireless carrier for Apple's iPhone, AT&T would be making big money on the hyper-popular device. You'd be wrong.

AT&T is kicking back a huge share of its iPhone sales to Apple -- a subsidy that cost the carrier $450 million in the fourth quarter of 2008 alone. AT&T is betting that the payoff will come when all those iPhone customers start racking up heavy Internet usage charges year after year after year.

9. Hewlett-Packard

Yes, HP's leap into the top 10 was aided by its funky fiscal year. HP closes its books in October, which means its 2008 revenues were shielded from the economic disaster that was last November and December.

Even so, HP's performance was impressive. Revenue and earnings rose 13% and 15% respectively, buoyed by strong demand for laptops (up 21%) and services (10%). And that latter figure doesn't even include the impact from newly acquired EDS. - J.B.

10. Valero Energy

Remember a couple years ago, when experts blamed high gasoline prices on the fact that the U.S. hadn't built a new oil refinery since 1976? Back then Valero was practically minting money, earning upwards of $20 for every barrel of gasoline it refined.

Transformers 2 Sneak Peek

I am not a big fan of Transformers movie but I putting this post to experiment on the keywords performance of "Transformers 2" and observe how it performed until June 2009. I expect the keywords will be hotter nearing the movie opening (slotted on June 2009).

Based on queries from Google.com, the result of Transformers 2 - Revenge of the Fallen matches and keywords are as follow:
181K - Transformers 2 sneak peek
2.3M - Transformers 2 movie trailer
641K - Transformers 2 teaser
1.1M - Transformers 2 poster
502K - Transformers 2 soundtrack
25M - Transformers 2009
1.08M - Transformers sequel
8.8M - Transformers 2 reviews
706K - transformers 2 autobots
581K - transformers 2 box office
250K - transformers 2 movie footage
2.6M - Transformers 2 revenge of the fallen
6.1M - revenge of the fallen
34M - Transformers 3
52K - Transformers 2 ticket sales

The line in red denotes that the keywords is over saturated and competitions will be tough. The only way to get on top of Google is to blog about the failure of Transformers 2 and really hope the movie flop.

UPDATES
* Jun 11, 2009 - Craze For Megan Fox Clubbed Thumb Nail
* Jun 03, 2009 - Added sneak peak clip at desert village scene and posters pictures.
* May 01, 2009 - Latest Transformers 2 Movie Trailer. The new one seen below makes the most of leading lady Mikaela (Megan Fox) in a pair of cut-off jean shorts, has a dancing robot Bumblebee and with some Pointer Sisters music and sees Sam (Shia LaBeouf) moving into Princeton as the action starts.


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Transformers 2 Full Movie Trailer

You can’t really expect great quality here but the trailer should be enough to get a better impression of what kind of destruction America gets to see in Transformers 2.



Transformers 2 Official HD Movie Trailer



Transformers 2 Sneak Peak clip - desert village scene




The Robots In Transformers 2

Expect to see Devastator, Constructicon, Chromia, Jetfire, Sideswipe, Blackout or Springer, Megatron, Rampage, Bumblebee, Scalpel, Wheelie (made of Nokia junks).

Transformers 2 Posters and Pictures








Other stuffs related to Transformers 2

For Transformers 2 Video Games, check out Transformers 2 Video Game - site live, screenshots, details and concepts, image result of Transformers 2, video results of Transformers 2 and finally, transformers 2 wallpaper.

That is all. Roll on. Revenge is coming 6.26.09


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