What is the DMCA?

The DMCA, (the Digital Millennium Copyright Act) was created in 1998 to protect provide hosting services like YouTube from being help liable for users who may post copyrighted material.

User's who feel their rights have been violated, and content used without permission can write to the provider using contact info cataloged at the copyright office, state there has an infringement, and request that the material be taken down.   The process is fairly simple.

Sometimes companies will abuse the DMCA provision and overstep and make demands that infringe into fair use territory, (eg: parodies), and other material that may be protected. 

U.S. Copyright Office website at http://www.copyright.gov/legislation/dmca.pdf,

10 Reasons to Buy CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X6

Highlights

• New! Native 64-bit support
  
• New! Multi-core processor support
• New! Multiple trays in Corel Connect
  
• New! Smart Carver and Shape tools

1. Complete professional graphic design software suite
It has everything you need for professional graphic design, illustration, layout, tracing, photo editing, web graphics, website creation and online collaboration in one complete suite that is easy to

Woot! Let's DO this!

#Proudparentofbrandnewfacebookad

Exxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxcited!!!!

5 Top WordPress Plugins for Affiliates

If you are new to using WordPress, the following free WordPress plugins can help you take your affiliate websites to the next level with functionality:

1. All In One SEO Pack – Absolutely necessary for EVERY WordPress and affiliate site. This plugin optimizes your WordPress blog for Search Engines (Search Engine Optimization).
   
2. XML Sitemap Generator – This plugin will create a Google sitemaps compliant XML-Sitemap of your WordPress blog. It supports all of the WordPress generated pages as well as custom ones. Everytime you edit or create a post, your sitemap is updated and all major search engines that support the sitemap protocol, like ASK.com, Google, MSN Search and YAHOO, are notified about the update. If you are looking for maximum search engine rankings, this plugin is also a MUST HAVE.
   
3. WP-PageNavi – Adds a more advanced paging navigation your WordPress blog. This is a more sophisticated paging system for more complex affiliate websites.
   
4. WP-Affiliate – Easy affiliate link masking and more. This is necessary if you want to cloak your affiliate conversion URL’s.
   
5. WP-PostRatings – Adds an AJAX rating system for your WordPress blog’s post/page. Perfect for review sites!

Source: The Affiliate Theme

Humanize Your Website With Live Chatting

People just want to be heard.

To be seen.

To know that they matter.

They want to be in relation to real people, not stuffy avatars, or typical cookie cutter scripted videos.  ~And that includes on your website!


Here's an idea: how about adding a chat widget to your website so you can engage in real time with new visitors to your site?   It's immediate, real life contact.  And if you're not available, there are even some  services that can pick up the slack and do the initial chatting on your behalf; gathering vital contact data and questions and forwarding them to you via email for further followup.

For example, when you become aware that someone is perusing your site, a chat could immediately launch:

"Hello!  Thank you for visiting my site, it's a pleasure to see you! My name is Annie, may I have your name?

And if it's someone chatting on your behalf, their goal should also be to secure contact info. so you or someone who represents you can followup.  For example,

"Before we proceed, may I have your phone number and email address in case we get disconnected?"  

Or, 

"The next step would be for me to have one of our team members contact you to answer additional questions and off you additional support. "


You could ask, "Would you like to be contacted?" or "Would you like to be put on a mailing list?" Or even better: 


 "I'll be happy to send you an information packet (or report, etc) via email." 


And finally, to seal the deal and develop rapport and further connection,


"Thank you for contacting me. Please take a moment to watch our informational video here____"

This is a great example of creative lead generation, leading to better ROI  (return on investment), and conversions.

Try it out!  Lemme know me know what you think!  :)

Beautiful Nightmare. Ready. Set. Go?

Been feeling groggy and tired, but pushing through. Decided at midnight to take a "nap" and woke up at 2:00am in a nightmare. I was suddenly plummeting uncontrollably, and then ferociously accelerating up up up in a run-a-way elevator that wasn't stopping on recognizable floors.  When it did stop, I was blinded and could only see the faint, disturbing outlines of unfamiliar, strange and frightening worlds unknown to me.  Everything was in an infuriating, undecipherable, terrifying haze.  And then the elevator would began racing again, the doors still open as the eery goings-on raced by.

What a metaphor! This affiliate marketing journey is exciting but terrifying, and currently totally unpredictable. What's next? I finally feel like I have a good strong base of knowledge - enough to get going.  But, on what? The next step is the real step. The most important step. And perhaps - the hardest?

What is An Alt Tag? (Or Alt Text?)

Alt Text is HTML that gives some alternative text with images.  It's often overlooked or not used at all, but it's an important and useful tool for improving SEO results. 

* It gives more info on an image or an image's hyperlink
* It can be helpful for folks with disabilities
* It can be helpful for text-only browsers
* It can help people with slow connections navigate a site while images are still rendering

How to Pick A Niche

Confused about what direction to go? Where to start? Here's a quick breakdown based on content from Yaro Starak:

First,

1. Do Keyword research to find out how many searches are going on
• Goal: Over 1000 searches a day 
2. Check  Google search results to see how much competition there is
   
   • Goal: Less than 10,000 competing pages

Firewall breech? Spam attack? Pinterest Goes Wild!

A mysterious uninvited pin is sweeping Pinterest and is threatening to invoke a riot!  From demure crafts and tiered cakes to cussing and curses,  Pinterest is totally freaking out!   In the past few minutes, 3 pins by the  now much vilified Gabrielle Union,  have been "repinned" without consent over 85,000 times provoking a chorus of vitriolic outrage.   Have the bots and zombies taken over?    What is going on?  What is happening?   Is someone using bots from daisy-chained computers to infiltrate the ladies?   Now we're all gonna hafta see the doctor and get ourselves checked for trojans!?  

Helllllp! 

Poll: Which Forum Tool Do You Prefer?

What is "Quality Content" according to Google Panda Update?

On Feb. 24, 2011 Google began instituting a series of major changes to their algorithms with the goal of more effectively distinguishing "high quality" from "low quality" sites in effort to return the most relevant, and helpful results to their Google users.  Now, more than ever, if an affiliate doesn't add value beyond what the supplier adds, they can expect a lowered page ranking.   Effectively, this can be seen as a call to action for affiliates to strengthen their work, provide quality, and use their own authentic voice.

Starting Your First A/B or Multivariant Experiment

Google outlines in detail how to design and set up your first Website Optimizer experiment, the different types of testing, and how to interpret experiments' results.  There's also a video walkthrough of the experiment setup, Website Optimizer User Guide which covers much of the same process.

Where is my "Upload Theme" Tab? (Wordpress Problems)

PROBLEM:

I purchased a domain yesterday and transferred from Wordpress and would now like to
change themes. However, when I login to WP, I am missing the "Upload Theme" tab under "Appearance". I did find a WP Forum Thread that describes my problem, but the solution was unclear.  Do I need to reinstall WP?  
___________________________________________________________________________

SOLUTION:

Because I had ALREADY purchased the domain with Wordpress, everything was was STILL on their servers, NOT the new domain host as I had thought.   So, apparently the "1-click" transfer works only for brand new domains that you purchase with the new host.   So, in this case, I had to change the "name servers" at Wordpress to my new hosts' servers.
I did so in the following 9 steps: