My New Sites and Changes
In the last week there has been a distinct lack of new posts here, nothing interesting, anyhow. That’s because I’ve just finished getting about half of the new sites I bought / took over online and running smoothly again.
I’ve also decided that GPearce will remain just a blog, with a whole new site “running” the rest of my and Joshes combined network, it’s the best way.
I’ve also finally set myself a target for this year, I want to be No. 3 or better in the Google search for “George” and No. 1 for “Pearce”.
It is going to happen, I’ve just got to get some decent content online first 
Server Move Done
I don’t know if anyone noticed, but I’ve just finished moving GPearce to a new server, along with pretty much every other site I own, for the second time in as many months.
I’m on a more powerful server now, still with BizStreet.Net , because they rock, and so far there have been no problems with the migration.
It also means that over the next week, there will be around 10 hours downtime per site I own, with the exclusion of SparkGaming and oo4, because they already moved.
I’ma Writing Again, Honest
Yeah, same story. I’ve neglected to post anything here in like.. ages?
Well, I’m going to do some updating now. First thing, change the about page. Second thing, bin the gallery. Third thing, move all the “my sites” posts over to GSPearce, for when it’s finished.
Then, I’m going to go suss out some interesting stuff to write! 
I’ve been exploring various other paths, like playing with oo4.org , and trying to work out the appeal of autoblogging, and failling.
New look for Project Recipe
I have finally got the new theme for ProjectRecipe *almost* ready for public, so I’ve gone ahead and put it online, to see what it’s like.
I hope that it will improve the user experience of P-R, and hopefully draw more visitors in
I’m also going to add another batch of recipes shortly, as it’s been neglected for nearly a month now, so keep your eyes open 
Playing with Photoblogging, Magazines and more..
Yeah, I’ve neglected to post anything decent on here for a while, I’ve been working on some other sites I have, I’ve been experimenting with photoblogging, and considering (and testing) making a web magazine, of sorts. It’s more complex than it seems
However, things are now moving forwards, I think, and I hope to get everything running properly again soon, and then maybe I’ll manage some good posts
I guess as my network grows, this will become as much of a developmental blog as my own personal one, but it’s not all bad, maybe then there will be some more posts that people actually want to read
Messing With A Gallery and Stuff
I’ve been messing with a new plugin for my blog, there is now (sort of) a gallery installed, along with a frame plugin, using Gallery2, a cool script I found.
There aren’t any pictures up yet, but I hope to upload some of my own graphics work and maybe some photographs, and if I can suss the plugin, make a page which just shows a random image. It’s all just ideas at the moment, though, and I’ve got tonnes of other work to do on other sites, so it might be pushed back a little bit :\
Horowitz: Sorry Yahoo, I’m Going To Google
The vice president of Yahoo’s advanced developmental devision, Bradley Horowitz, has just just jumped ship to Google, claiming that it was nothing to do with the proposed takeover from Microsoft.
He mentioned in his blog that the timing was a bit unfortunate, and he has been with the company for nearly 4 years. His announcement comes just two days after another prominent employee left Yahoo.
Indeed, unfortunate timing. Right in the middle of lots of takeover rows. Maybe he couldn’t bear to work for Microsoft?
Would It Be Possible To Create A Website You Can’t Leave?
Probably sounds like a dumb question, doesn’t it? Well, I think it could be possible. There’s a Javascript function that executes when the window or tab is closed, and another when you try to navigate away from the website, so what if those functions were set to execute, and launch a popup window with the said page in it? Is there something that stops this, and if not, why have I not seen it before? It sounds like exactly the kind of thing some people would do, and, more worryingly, it’s something that the scammers and spammers and virus-spreading sites might do?
Of course it’s not impossible to leave a site like that, but it would be damned difficult, and I can’t think of any way of doing it, other than shutting the browser totally :\
GPearce Offically Goes NoFollow Free
Yep, I’ve done it. Along with a nice new theme (again, I know), I’ve made it so people who have posted more than 5 comments which I moderate as ok, using the same details, will have the author links in their comments returned to dofollow, rather than the default nofollow in Wordpress. This is thanks to a sweet plugin that I really should give credit too, so here goes. NoFollow Free For Wordpress
I have also installed a new related posts plugin, and found some new stats, which means hopefully, I’ll be able to publish some visitor stats here at the end of the month
This should serve as an enouragement for people to get commenting, PR3 linkbacks are always good
Have fun
Ooh, Their Sueing Them Software Pirates on eBay, Finally..
Found it in pcpro today, that Adobe and Symantec are now taking nine indeviduals to court over their selling of illegal pirated software on eBay, as they are “Tired Of Waiting for eBay to take action” , not suprising really. Should have happened earlier, selling pirated stuff is just beyond pathetic. Guys, make them find it for themselves! xD
What amazes me is that a lot of people on eBay buy this stuff, and don’t think twice about it. Most of them have no idea that it’s illegal, ignorance seems to be abundant on eBay.
The lawsuits, filed by the Software and Information Industry Association, known as SIIA, are apparently the biggest filed to date over such a subject, which means that maybe they are finally taking a stand, which is good for them, and not so good for software pirates everywhere.
It seems that eBay is ‘reluctant’ to take any action against pirates, and I’m sure this is the first of many companies taking things into their own hands.
PxGreen Proxy Template V1.0-ZELUNE Released
Hey Everyone
I’m excited to release my first proxy theme, for Zelune. Stay tuned for versions for Glype and Phproxy.
This theme is called PxGreen (yeah, unimaginative, but nevermind.) and I thought it’d be good to release it today, valentines day.
It looks like this, and you can find an up to date live demo here.
Please report any bugs by means of the commenting system, and likewise, if you like this, or think it can be improved, please drop me a comment, and let me know.
And now for the legal stuff.. While I made this template, once it leaves my servers, it’s no longer anything to do with me, apart from the credits. You are responsible for how you use it. Also, you must leave the two credit links at the bottom of the template intact, I’m not fussed if you move them, make them invisible, whatever, but they must stay in the code somewhere. You may not sell or redistribute this without my express prior permission, and all rights are held by myself.
You can download this template for Zelune Proxy Here
Oh Noes! My HSBC Account Was Compromised Again! But… I’m with Barclays :\
Yes, I am sad enough to read my own spam sometimes, because it gives me something to write about, and someone to insult online
I got the following email today, telling me that they are trying to protect my HSBC account from scammers (hm, yeah), and that I should follow a link, and fill out a form. Great, huh?
Dear HSBC Bank customer,
We have implemented security procedures which use reasonable measures to ensure the security, confidentiality and integrity of Business Customers Data in our possession and guard against unauthorized access or use.
HSBC Business Internet Banking Form (BIB Form) is one of these security measures. You should complete BIB Form on a regular basis.
Please complete BIB Form using the link below:
Hm yeah, but I’m with another bank, guys, and I sure as hell dont use online banking, that’s what Paypal and suchlike are for. So yeah, that was a failure.
But, because I felt like it, I followed the link, ignored the warnings, and sent the scammers at mandas.hk a nice (insulting) message. I hope they like it There is a faint pic bottom right, if you can’t see it x)
Firefox kept spitting warnings at me, saying that it was a known scam site, and IE? Nothing. xD
Goes to say, doesn’t it?
Why Is The News So Crap?
Well, it is, isn’t it? There’s bugger all going on, and it’s boring. This is mainly because I couldn’t think of anything to post, but it’s still true, nonetheless.
Everywhere is talking about lawsuits, depressing things that they are, and how everyone has messed up, can’t we have something nice and cheerful to read about for once? The most interesting thing that I have read today is about The Pirate Bays traffic actually going up after it was meant to be banned, and then there are articles about environmental awareness on pcPro, how is the computing news? Oro how it might hurt some companies, how interesting is that 
SOMEONE DO SOMETHING INTERESTING!
Wordpress 2.4 Beta Is Pretty Cool, Yeah
Well, I finally got around to testing the new wordpress today, the bleeding version, as it’s called. And it’s really pretty good
I’ve been on the mailing list for ages, but I only just got off my arse long enough to download it and shiz, and I’m glad I did.
It’s not running here, on this install, but I’ve got a copy running elsewhere, purely to experiment with, and the new admin panel is really awesome
See, I even made a nice screenshot to show everyone
Isn’t it cool
Although, some of the input boxes are a little messy or small, but otherwise it’s awesome
I’m sure hundreds of other people have blogged about this, but I decided too, too. Just for the hell of it. xD
Tutorial: Getting Up There In Google
Ok, well I can’t say I’m perfect. But I’m doing a damn site better than a lot of other bloggers I have seen, at least some of my pages get top rankings in Google
So, I decided to write a sort of tutorial in order to help the not-doing-so-well or brand new bloggers along the way a little bit
So, you want to get your site or pages up there in Google? But there are so many results 
How are you going to do it?
First step is research. Decide what the keywords are for the page or site you want up there, and Google them. See what you are up against. I don’t reccomend taking on huge sites, like BBC or CnET, but look for keywords with slight less results. Now, take your page, and place those keywords (in a relevant way) into the text. For instance, if you are talking about computers, referencing a certain component might help.
Next up, you need backlinks. This is how Google chooses your position in otherwise tied results, backlinks and PR. So, you need backlinks.
As I’ve said before on the forums that I frequent, one of the best ways (in my opinion) to get backlinks is to use Google BlogSearch, found at blogsearch.google.com
All you have to do is search for your keywords, find blogs about them, and post comments, with a nice link back to your site, and suddently, Google will value your page more. It’s not instant, but after a few days or a week, your rankings will go up.
To track this, and not spend forever searching for your keywords, you should use the Google Webmaster Tools. It is the best, without a doubt. It’s at www.google.com/webmasters/tools , and once you’ve verified your site, you have access to a huge number of resources.
Well, that’s most of what I can think of, for the moment, I’m sure there is more, but that’s what worked for me
Bringing It All Together, New Proxy and All
I’ve finally got round to starting to clear things up
All of my other sites are slowly coming back together, I’m getting the work done on the new sites, and of course, I’ve finally got FilterKill to the point where I can launch it
For those who don’t know, Filterkill is the first of my proxies, hosted with iwhic, and is currently online with some template I found, while I code the other one ready for it. It’s fast, and the ads are only on the home page, everything else seems to work, so please use it
ProjectRecipe is back up and running after the database tore itself apart, I found my backup, and I’ve got MicroURL working again
The sites can be found here:
FilterKill
MicroURL
ProjectRecipe
Sorry Microsoft, But No.
It appears that Yahoo will be rejecting the bid by Microsoft for it’s takeover, according to an article here.
The Journal source said the company would be unwilling to consider an offer below $40 per share, which would represent a $12 billion increase over Microsoft’s original $44.6 billion bid. It is unclear if Microsoft would be willing to increase its bid by such a significant amount.
This should put an end to many speculations on what would happen if the bid was successful, although I’m sure there will still be people out there, determined that Microsoft will raise it’s bid. Honestly, I don’t think they will, and MS should get off of their own backsides and work on Live, because with some simplifying, they could challange the great G.
If the bid had been accepted, Microsoft would have gone into debt for the first time in it’s existance, despite it’s massive backups of money. Microsoft’s shares have also dropped 13% since the announcement of the bid, and Yahoo’s have increased 51% in value.
If the bid was accepted, I’m sure the whole thing would be heavily scrutinized, as Google said:
“Microsoft’s hostile bid for Yahoo raises troubling questions. This is about more than simply a financial transaction, one company taking over another. It’s about preserving the underlying principles of the Internet: openness and innovation.”
That was the chief legal officer of Google
What will become of this? It’s become pretty messy, I guess everyone gets to wait and see if Microsoft push their prices up, to buy shares that will probably deflate when the purchase is complete :/
What are eBay Doing?
eBay is trying to gag us. I read this week that they are going to stop sellers leaving negative feedback , because, apparently, buyers are ‘afraid’ of the retaliation, and therefore don’t leave true feedback for transactions.
While what they are saying is partially true, I’m sure there more sellers leave negative feedback due to the buyer not paying or suchlike, than because the buyer left negative feedback for them. This effecitvely silences the seller, which is pathetic. Absolutely pathetic.
I sell on eBay, and I’ve had one or two non-paying buyers, so I know how annoying it is. What eBay is doing may just make me give up or move elsewhere.
Hardy Heron Hits Alpha 4 :)
It’s happened, Ubuntu Hardy Heron has been released in Alpha 4, which means that is inching ever closer to being ready for it’s full release in April
The new Alpha brings with it a host of new features (apparently) which should be interesting to both home and business users.
For those who don’t know (shame on you) Ubuntu is (in my opinon) the best Linux out there, and can be found here .
More information on the new release can be found here, I’m going to download it, give it a shot, and post about it
Linux CANNOT run a whole computer! So we got told ;)
Well, we have been well and truly told:
You are kidding arent you ?
Are you saying that this linux can run on a computer without windows underneath it, at all ? As in, without a boot disk, without any drivers, and without any services ?That sounds preposterous to me.
If it were true (and I doubt it), then companies would be selling computers without a windows. This clearly is not happening, so there must be some error in your calculations. I hope you realise that windows is more than just Office ? Its a whole system that runs the computer from start to finish, and that is a very difficult thing to acheive. A lot of people dont realise this.
Microsoft just spent $9 billion and many years to create Vista, so it does not sound reasonable that some new alternative could just snap into existence overnight like that. It would take billions of dollars and a massive effort to achieve. IBM tried, and spent a huge amount of money developing OS/2 but could never keep up with Windows. Apple tried to create their own system for years, but finally gave up recently and moved to Intel and Microsoft.
Its just not possible that a freeware like the Linux could be extended to the point where it runs the entire computer fron start to finish, without using some of the more critical parts of windows. Not possible.
I think you need to re-examine your assumptions.
Well, that clears up any doubt anyone might have.
For those who don’t know, that’s complete and utter bollocks, Linux (yes, opensource) is fully capable of running a whole computer, from start to end
I found that whilst browsing Digg, and I find it amazingly funny that anyone can say this, and apparently there is more by the same author, detailing how Vista is 100x faster than XP, and suchlike, it’s great
For those who want to have a read, it’s here
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