Old = Expensive. Especially cars.

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So this morning I was driving my 1978 Merc Coupe to the office, when my fuel cage suddenly dropped to 0, and I ended up pushing the car to the side of the road. Ok, no big deal, I have a 5l jerrycan for situations just like this. Unfortunately, I forgot to fill it up after I took out the petrol for the lawnmower last week!

Ah well, got a lift to the nearest petrol station, got my jerrycan filled up, and drove to the petrol station again to fill up the car. While I was there, I figured it’d be a good idea to pump up the tires, and top up the engine oil. So I spend $120 on petrol, $50 on engine oil, and a fiver for a can of red bull (yes, terrible idea for breakfast, I know!)

After pouring the engine oil in, I went ahead and tried to close the bonnet, when I heard a SNAP! somewhere – crap. So now, my bonnet somehow leans to the right hand side, and wont close properly anymore. Had to drive it to the nearest garage going 30k/h on a 70k road, because all I had was a shoestring to hold the bonnet down! Figured I might as well let them do a service on the car, seeing it hasn’t had one in a few years now.

I have the feeling I’d better bring in an extra credit card when I go pick it up…

When Dot Com Is Dot Apple

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With the news that businesses will now have the opportunity to snap up brand-specific Internet domains through ICANN’s latest gTLD program, no more will domain squatters have a strangle hold on the dot com. That is, if companies have the cash to fork over 200 grand for their brand. Let’s face it, owning Bob dot bob could be a game changer, but the cost may be prohibitive.

The ICANN gTLD “dot brands” are the most recent convention being talked about on the World Wide Web, the move gives some companies the chance to use an internet domain that is specific to their brand name, meaning companies such as Pepsi or Nike will no longer be limited to using a .com or .org domains. Instead, they will be able to host their online operations on .pepsi or .nike domains, and etc. And, experts say that the gTLD brands offer a number of advantages, such as a better (branded) experience for customers, as well as obvious SEO benefits.

Stomping on the competition

Who's looking out for the little guy? - Courtesy © laurent hamels - Fotolia.com

ICANN has announced that there will be a three months grace period, during which businesses will have first option to register domains specific to their brand name, from January until April next year. A $5000 deposit is made, then when the dozens of pages of documentation are done, and the red tape crosses – Bobsrealty dot property can own a very powerful brand. Dot Branding, as industry insiders term it, will probably be changed forever.

However, there has been criticism from some quarters about the scheme, particularly regarding the costs of registering a gTLD. With application fees in excess of $185,000, plus additional fees likely to follow, the dot brands have been lambasted by some as nothing more than a money making scheme for ICANN, who have priced small businesses out of the equation. For the medium sized business, an article on Search Engine Journal suggests a solution however.

SEO and SEM expert Ann Smarty, reported on the latest ICANN initiative, and in so doing mentioned a couple of companies on the leading edge of Dot Branding. One, VAYTON Brand Capital, offers an interesting service for new DotBrands. In short, a way around the excessive costs thanks to special intellectual property rights legislation in Luxumbourg. According to Vayton, companies can essentially take tax incentives for their Luxembourg registered brands, and use these to “auto-finance” their new domains. For those who do not know, Luxembourg offers some of the strongest protection laws for intellectual property assets in the world, not to mention tax savings of up to 80 percent for businesses operating from there.

Companies like Vayton, Dot Brand Solutions, Brand Shelter, and many others have loads of information about these new domains. For those whose companies rake in enough to “save” $200,000 in tax write-offs in Luxembourg, it might be a good idea to contact VAYTON. As for the rest of us? At least we won’t have to worry about domain squatters, but then me operating out of Bob dot microsoft probably won’t happen – EVER.

I leave you with video from ICANN which explains a bit more about these new gTLDs.

Russian Robber Turns Sex Slave in Russia – Again?

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I don’t know why, but it looks like some newspapers are really struggling to get new material, so they rehash old stories, which were probably never real in the first place.

Whatever happened to the Principles of journalism?

Democracy depends on citizens having reliable, accurate facts put in a meaningful context. Journalism does not pursue truth in an absolute or philosophical sense, but it can–and must–pursue it in a practical sense. This “journalistic truth” is a process that begins with the professional discipline of assembling and verifying facts. Then journalists try to convey a fair and reliable account of their meaning, valid for now, subject to further investigation. Journalists should be as transparent as possible about sources and methods so audiences can make their own assessment of the information. Even in a world of expanding voices, accuracy is the foundation upon which everything else is built–context, interpretation, comment, criticism, analysis and debate. The truth, over time, emerges from this forum. As citizens encounter an ever greater flow of data, they have more need–not less–for identifiable sources dedicated to verifying that information and putting it in context.

This is the oldest copy (15 April 2009) I found of the Russian Robber story, who became a tied-up, viagra fed, sex slave to a martial arts hairdresser in Moscow. Link.

*Edit Looks like I wasn’t the only one who noticed this.

Gmail created a special feature just for me.

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When Gmail first became available in April 2004, I was one of the first people to sign up for an account. Little did I know that picking bobjones@gmail.com would mean that I’d be getting thousands of emails from all over the world, all accidentally addressed to the wrong Bob Jones. I even started a fun site to publish those wrongly addressed emails, but I let it expire :(

I shouldn’t have to tell you that this has pretty much rendered the email address useless, because it’s impossible to go through all the wrong emails and spam. On the upside, I do get loads of pre-paid porn site logins from people signing up for these services, and using my email address :D

Here’s a picture of my current inbox. I think I completely trashed the whole thing at the beginning of the year.

It looks like Google has developed a new feature especially for me. http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/dont-forget-bob-and-got-wrong-bob.html Let’s see if this will really work, and cut down my inbox traffic. Thanks Google!

Can you switch between Google gmail accounts? Yes.

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Just sharing a quick tip I only discovered recently. I like organizing my stuff, so for example, every product site I have, has multiple email addresses. Think support@ sales@ billing@ etc.

Because I run all my email via Google Apps, I always had to logout, login, logout, login, logout, swear, login, logout, swear some more, login. A pain in the ass if you’re trying to juggle between the lot of them.

So, Google actually lets you sign into three different Google mail accounts at the same time, in the same browser. This is SO awesome. (well, I think it is anyway – saves me heaps of swearing time).

Go here and be enlightened from now on. https://www.google.com/accounts/b/0/MultipleSessions