Crossed 2K followers on Twitter

Last night was a landmark for me. The number of my followers on Twitter crossed the 2000 mark. I know some of you guys reading this are laughing. 2K followers is nothing. However, for me it is astounding that a little more than 2000 people find my tweets interesting.

BTW, I am also the 6th top Twitter user or Twitterer or Tweep in Coventry according to Twittergrader. If you think that's impressive, you will be surprised to learn that up until a few months ago I was #1.

If you are one of those guys going, "What the hell is Twitter?", I am afraid this means that you are definitely out of the loop.


Unfortunately the Mrs is not impressed. "If you worked as hard on your research, you would probably have completed it by now", she says.  Of course, I have no comments or I won't be eating dinner at night.

Anyway, follow me on Twitter @admutum

UUM website hacked

Just went to the Universiti Utara Malaysia (Northern University of Malaysia) website to check some contact details and was shocked to see that it had been hacked, apparently by some hackers from Indonesia. They left some political messages on the screen.



This is not the first time the UUM website has been hacked and it's surprising that don't seem to have learnt the lesson. The University was one of the most innovative in Malaysia and they were quite proud of their IT services. The hype may have actually attracted hackers to target them.

Anyway, hope they get the site up and running soon.

First Commentator
Angel

How to get your own unique Facebook username?

If you are on Facebook you can now get your own unique username. I got my own yesterday. Previously our Facebook profile url would have lot of characters: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=751145254. Now it is http://www.facebook.com/dilipmutum.

Unfortunately the username Dilip was taken and so was Adam and I had to settle for the 'dilipmutum'.

I also got one for my wife as well as she is busy with her workshop in Berlin.

Is that a invasion of privacy? I am sure she won't mind.

Anyway, if you haven't got your own unique user name, go to the Facebook username page and see if your name is still available.

Warning :
You can't change the user name once you have chosen it. In other words, you will be stuck with it forever. So make sure there are no typos. Also is that cute, funny or obnoxious name something you might want to be associated with in a few years from now.

Think about it. Go on and get your name before someone else does (they probably have, unless it is really unique).

Google celebrates tetris

Did you notice something strange with the Google logo today?

The special doodle celebrates 25 years of one of the most addictive computer games ever. Russian Alexey Pajitnov created the game in 1984 and apparently he didn't make a single ruble out of it.

Top Entrecard Droppers for April

1. How to Make Money on the Internet
2. Life Reflections
3. Life After Work
4. A malaysian abroad
5. Digital Polaroids
6. Knowledge distribution center
7. Emila's Illustrated Blog
8. Blogger Rise
9. Beyond Feron
10. Turn-u-Off

Thanks guys and do drop by again.

Does Google control my life?

I couldn't resist the title.

A couple of minutes ago, I had a panic attack as I couldn't open Google mail on my browser. The reason is that it's nearly 2 am and I am going through a draft of a book chapter I am writing with my supervisor. I am really sleepy and I am meeting her at 11am tomorrow, and I really needed to go through the reviewer's feedback to see whether I have covered all the points.

I had a similar problem yesterday and even though the problem was solved after restarting my computer, which may indicate that the problem is with my computer rather than with Google. However, it made me wonder whether I am being too dependent on Google.

I use my Google mail account to read my university mail, moderate my comments and also to read Twitter updates and Tweet (using Twitter Gadget). It's also linked to my Paypal, Amazon and eBay accounts. I also use the Google calender to manage my appointments which is shared and syncronised with my wife's. There are a few documents shared with friends via Google documents.

Besides that, I have most of my blogs hosted with Blogger (which is also owned by Google). And I am guessing that I am not the only one.

I shudder to think what would happen if Google were to shut down even for a day - there might be utter chaos in the World.

Buying 3 pay as you go SIM card

My sister-in-law who's just moved to London wanted to buy a pay as you go SIM card only, as she already has a phone. It was meant to be a temporary thing before she signed up for a monthly payment plan. Of course I suggested 3. So off we went to their store in Bayswater, London. However, I was quite surprised when I found out that they didn't have any pay as you go sim card in stock.

Further down the road there's a Phones 4 U shop and they eventually bought the 3 sim card from there.

This is yet another example of a 3 store disappointing me. My previous experience was buying a phone from their Coventry store. Yet another reason for interested customers to buy phones or SIM card from their online store.

ah ok lah not on MSN search

Quite disappointed with MSN's Live Search. Searched for the keywords "ah ok lah" (the name of my blog) there and my blog was nowhere on the first page nor on the second page either. This is strange considering that it is the first result on Google and Yahoo for the key words.

Going through the MSN Live search results, I discovered that the #1 spot has been taken by www.ok-lah.com owned by someone in Singapore. However, #4 is a widget linked to my site provided by Netvibes. #6 links to my MyBlogLog page.

This might indicate that MSN search gives preference to top-level domain names, viz., .com, .net, .org, etc..

Choosing a web host

If you are really serious about earning money from your blogs, it goes without saying that you should get your own unique domain name. After that, you would then have to decide which blog publishing platform to use. Most of my blogs (yes, I blog on more than one blog)are hosted with Blogger. Finally, you then choose a place to host your blog.

Choosing a good web hosting company can be one of the most important choices. With all the offers out there, it can get real confusing. I have found out from experience that the costliest is not necessarily the best. The choice depends on the system requirements of the platform you choose, whether you prefer to host on a Linux or Windows based server, your bandwidth and of course how much you are willing to spend.

You may want to take a look at the "Top 10 Web Hosting Providers - Best Web Hosts 2008" on the webhosting rating site. They have some really useful articles as well. For example, check out their "Tips For Choosing A Domain". A must read before you go ahead and buy a domain name. I definitely agree with them when they say "Choosing a domain may not be as simple as perceived.." Finding a name for a new site I was planning on proved to be quite frustrating when I found out that most of the names I had in mind were taken. After reading the article, I decided that the name was too long and finally found a short varient to the name I had in mind.

Review of Socialspark.com

In case you haven't heard there is a new social marketing network on the web.
SocialSpark is the latest innovation from the same guys who brought you PayPerPost. It is similar to the latter in some respects in that it is an online market place where advertisers and bloggers come together. However, there are several features that makes Socialspark different from PayPerPost, or for that matter, from any other social marketing network on the web. More about that later.

After signing up, you go and add your blogs. In order to do this, I had to add the claim and the itk (IZEA ToolKit) Javascript codes. You can start taking opportunities (sponsored posts) as soon as your blog is verified.



Taking an opportunity was a bit confusing in the beginning but later found out that it was quite easy. After going through the list of opportunities available. A few seconds after you reserved the opportunity, you should receive an email from them informing that you have 12 hours to complete the opp.

I had signed up sometime back but this is my first SocialSpark sponsored post. One of the main reasons I didn't take any oops earlier was that I was scared of being Googlespanked again. For those who are not aware, Googlespank refers to Google (the leader in the web search industry) punishing websites, which they feel have not been complying with their standards, with a big fat PR 0.

Socialspark has done away with this problem by coming out with their own blog ranking system called "real rank", that takes several factors into account including traffic to your site. Furthermore, all posts will have in-post disclosures and all the required links in the sponsored posts will carry the no-follow tag - something that should satisfy Google guidelines and hopefully silence critics of sponsored posts. Other exciting features are the blog analytics and of course the social networking tools.

So if you are a blogger looking for a way to earn some money from your blog, I recommend that you check out SocialSpark.

Night in Nottingham

Spent a night yesterday at the Travelodge in Nottingham city centre. My wife is attending a course at the University of Nottingham and I decided to tag along with the kids. However, I had to come back today morning as I was presenting a paper at the Spring Doctoral Conference here at the University of Wariwck.

I had wanted to try out the 3 USB dongle over there but was so tired out when we finally got there, that I didn't get the chance to test it out. Just chatted with my wife over Skype and the sound quality was OK though the connection did drop once.

Will find out what she thinks about the 3 USB dongle when she comes back tomorrow.


A view of the street from the our room.

3 Dongle dangled

Take a look at what came via the post yesterday.

I am a satisfied 3 Skypephone user and had been thinking about signing up for their mobile broadband service after reading about it. Just imagine my delight when I was offered the opportunity to try it out for FREE for 3 months with absolutely no data restrictions.

The free gifts that came with the "dongle" was completely unexpected. I don't mind - I love free stuff.

Anyway, the dongle is actually a Huawei E169G USB Modem and looks like a bit like a normal USB flash drive.





Before using it, you have to take out the USIM card holder and insert the USIM card. Stick the dongle into one of your laptop's USB ports.



The modem software installs automatically. Once installed, all I have to do is click "Connect" on the pop-up screen and I am done - mobile broadband Internet access.

Over the next three months, I will be testing out the modem from various locations in the UK. Look out for more reviews and technical details on my tech blog Adamok dot net.

Thanks to Sam and the other guys at 3mobilebuzz for giving me the opportunity to try out the modem and of course, the other freebies.

TalkTalk broadband not so bad after all

Just a few posts back I ranted about TalkTalk being the worst broadband provider in the UK. Well, I might be wrong after all.

Last Sunday, at our friend's house in Birmingham, the topic of broadband speeds suddenly came up. My friend is on Virgin broadband. On checking the speed, we found out that their speeds were slightly lower than ours. However, I should point out that their promised maximum speed was only "up to 4 Mb" unlike our "Up to 8 Meg download speeds".

Have any of you guys been able to get up to at least 50% or more of the download speeds promised by your broadband provider?

TalkTalk the worst broadband provider in the UK

It's been nearly 3 months since got reconnected to the Internet via internet service provider, TalkTalk after my AOL broadband connect got cut off without any warning.

I was quite happy initially until I realised that our connections speeds were really slow. I complained a few times but the TalkTalk customer service people kept making excuses.

Really regret signing up with this broadband service provider (or should I say Narrowband service provider). I ignored the warning signals - low ratings on various consumer forums, delay in sending me the broadband router, etc. A guy who came to fix our gas even told me "they are crap mate".

I ignored all of them because I was blinded by their amazing offer of "Free Broadband with our Talk2 International Call Plan". Should have remembered the old saying "pay peanuts and you get monkeys".

Really ashamed that I promoted this "free broadband" thing to a few other friends as well as I thought it was a wonderful deal in the beginning. I just hope that they didn't sign up. And I simply don't want to ask lest they blame me.

Just proves my earlier observation that a lot of companies here in the UK are really bad when it comes to customer retention even though they are really good in attracting first time users.

Here are the results of two different broadband speed tests I carried out a few minutes ago:

1.
- Speedtest.net


2.
- Broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk

A little difference there but the fact remains that our broadband speed is not even half of the promised "Up to 8 Meg download speeds".

Really annoyed that I am stuck on a 18 months contract. Wonder whether there is any way I can move to another service provider without getting penalised in any way?

Update 8 Oct 2008 : They have improved their service. Read "Faster broadband speed"

Bloggers are Opinion leaders

Have you ever wondered who the most influential people in the World are? Are they politicians or are they the celebrities - actors and actresses, singers? Paris Hilton? I certainly hope not because apart from a few, majority are definitely not good role models.

I asked a few of my friends and quite a few mentioned their parents. Some mentioned peer groups and in particular- the opinion leaders. So who are these opinion leaders?

Searching for a suitable definition, I cam across several. Wikipedia defines an opinion leader as "the agent who is an active media user and who interprets the meaning of media messages or content for lower-end media users. Typically the opinion leader is held in high esteem by those that accept their opinions".

However, I prefer the definition given by Ronald S. Burt in his paper "The Social Capital of Opinion Leaders" in The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 566, No. 1, 37-54 (1999). According to him,

"Opinion leaders are more precisely opinion brokers who carry information across the social boundaries between groups. They are not people at the top of things so much as people at the edge of things, not leaders within groups so much as brokers between groups."

By this definition, I guess a lot of Bloggers are indeed opinion leaders. We share and carry information among various groups around the World. We bloggers can proudly say that we are indeed the most influential people in the World. Organisations, Governments and companies that ignore that fact do so at their own risk.

Introducing Nitro Digital

For several years, I have been helping people with establishing a presence on the net - this includes individuals as well as companies. Most of the time, I just point them to professionals who can help them set up a web site and in case they already have one, to market their sites online.

I always keep an eye out (and ear open) for companies specialising in web design and online marketing. It's quite hard to recommend a good one considering the fact that there are so many companies out there as well as freelancers involved in this area.

Among the criteria I look for includes whether the companies were established (when they started) and their portfolio.

One company I recently came across is 'Nitro Digital'. The compay was established in 2001 and started out as Nitro Ventures before changing to the current name. They specifically target pharmaceutical companies looking for agency to take care of their website - right from design and updating to marketing and driving quality traffic to it.

Nitro Digital is a succesful medium size Media Agency specialising in Web Design, Development and Online Marketing for Pharmaceutical companies (including PPC, SEO, Viral and Social Network Marketing, Online Display Advertising, You name it...)

Was quite impressed by their list of clients and case studies. I would defnitely recommend them to anyone looking for such services.

Free press release distribution service

The importance of having a good public relations or PR cannot be overstated. In fact it may be crucial to your business especially in times of crisis and may a good way to defend yourself against critics. One of the easiest ways is to come up with regular press releases.

If you want to create awareness about your web site, business or project you might want to check out the press release distribution service provided by PRBuzz.com.

This online service is totally free and your press release can be up and online within 24 hours. Definitely a great idea to improve the search engine results page (or SERP) rankings for your desired keywords.

I am going to try it out now.

Save money on office supplies

All the time I get queries from a lot of people asking me how it feels to be a student again. It exciting but to tell the truth, it's much harder now. I guess my brains are not that sharp any more and it's hard to sit down and listen to lectures for hours. I need to take a break every half an hour or so with loads of coffee.

Money is another important issue that always comes up for people like us who left their full-time jobs to study again. More so if you have a family. Even with a scholarship, we try to stretch every penny we have.

After getting free office supplies for years, it's a shock when you realise that stuff like notebooks, pens, printer ink are not exactly cheap. Looking for discount office supplies, I came across the OfficeDeals.info website. This site lists hundreds of discount coupons, coupon codes and promotions from leading stores that sell office supplies, computers, office furniture and a range of products and services. The merchants listed including among others, Office Depot, Vistaprint, etc.

I recently bought a Dell PC after my old computer crashed. I wish I had come to the site earlier because they have all the latest coupon codes from Dell here. I guess this site will appeal not only to students but business owners as well. Do check out the site if you are looking to save some money.

Reconnected finally

I have a big grin from ear to ear as I am writing this.

As you might have guessed, we are finally connected to the net from home. This is the first post I am making using the TalkTalk broadband connection.

The modem and the installation CD came by post today morning. The modem was fairly easy to set up but I was not really keen on setting up a network with wires in the house. It took me a while to figure out but I later realised that I actually didn't need the installation CD to connect to the net after all. All I had to do was reconfigure our old Netgear wireless router with the new user ID and password, which by the way, TalkTalk had already sent over sometime back.

Kick myself on the backside a few time

I will be posting the technical details in my SEO Expert blog.

Haven't checked the speed as yet but it definitely feels much faster than our old AOL broadband connection. Incidentally, both AOL broadband and TalkTalk are part of the Carphone Warehouse Group PLC.

TalkTalk Broadband update

I don't like to beg but if anybody from TalkTalk is reading this ... Please, Please, can you help me get connected to the net.

We were supposed to be connected by last week. "You will receive your modem and installation CD within 5 working days". That was what the lady on the line said, when we called them on the 30th of November. A lady called Aparna confirmed it when we called them again on the 3rd of December. It's almost Monday and I am fuming - you probably know why.

Technically we are connected and as I mentioned in my last post, TalkTalk switched us to the new TalkTalk plan and started billing us since the 21st of November. However, we can't "go live" unless I get their stupid Connect & Go installation CD.

Called them up today and Stephanie, the lady on the line intially told us that the stuff had already been posted but then later said that we should receive it within 7 days.

I hope so because if we are not able to get a broadband connection by next Sunday (16th), I am going to move to another provider and ask for a refund for non-delivery of service.