I have seen the Light...

It's been a week since my last post, and for that I apologize. I think it is best for a blog to have an update about once every two or three days, and for the update to be somewhat lengthy (as opposed to a couple paragraphs). I think that way it leaves readers with a good idea when to check back and expect an update, as well as providing them with longer and more enriching posts for when it is updated. The reason for the delay stemmed from the fact that I simply had nothing to write about. The past week I've been pretty disappointed and bitter actually. See, I have around 7 different projects and things I'm waiting on, and while I could have worked on something while waiting, I simply didn't want to as I felt that one of these projects should pop up anytime anyhow. I also took the 'empty' time to watch every episode of Prison Break from 1 to 17. I haven't seen then before, but I heard a lot of people rave about it on ChatWebDev, and anyhow now I'm hooked as well :) Here then, is today's blog update: Blog Income Terrorist #2 AWOL? revenue Magazine MMAForums Marketing Dual Monitors PageDump Acquisition Replayer.org/Project AA Updates Blog Income I originally started this blog because I had a number of people request it. However, now TylerCruz.com is actually bringing in some income. A few weeks back, I added a 468x60 AdSense banner at the top. Shortly after, I had an advertiser (Spencer Fry) come forth requesting to advertise for a fixed monthly fee. I have since had two other advertisers come and ask to advertise on it as well. However, I am only allowing the one 468x60 spot. This is to keep the blog nice and clean and ad-free. It will also, as a result, give the 468x60 spot the best coverage - it's the only advertisement on the site, it's sitewide, and is at the top of the site for best exposure. Also, it's a good deal - traffic to this blog is obviously of perhaps the best possible target audience you could ever hope for - web entrepreneurs who frequent multiple forums, sites, and purchase design services, programming, software, etc. Traffic is around 500-600 uniques per day now. Anyhow, the advertisers are now bidding against each other to obtain the spot, so income, while extremely low, does exist and is increasing from this blog. Again, it's peanuts, but it is always nice to see income come in from a new source. Terrorist #2 AWOL?

Terrorist #2, after repeatedly missing his promised deadlines, suddenly ceased all communication for me for about a week. Worried and frustrated, I finally decided to hunt down his phone number, which wasn't listed anywhere on his various websites or main WHOIS info. I had to wait a couple of days to coordinate a good time to phone him, as the United Arab Emirates's timezone differs greatly from Pacific Time.

I managed to get a hold of him, and it was what I expected - his Internet was down. He said they told him it should be up in about a day or two, and that he'd complete MMAForums in about a day or two once he's up.

Hopefully my phone call will give him a bit of incentive to finally finish MMAForums once he's back online :)

revenue Magazine About a week ago I received in the mail a magazine called revenue. I hadn't heard of it before and have no idea how I got a free (or subscription) issue, and I was about to throw it into my recycle bin, but it's actually a very good magazine! I've been slowly reading it, absorbing everything slowly and methodically. The main downside to the magazine is that it's completely hogged with ads, but at least they are interesting ads - AzoogleAds, ValueClickMedia, etc. The magazine is for web publishers and web affiliates. I'll try to keep you posted in the future on how I like the bi-monthly magazine. MMAForums Marketing I have had way too many people blatantly copying things I've been doing, sources I've been using, and ideas. So I am going to be very careful from now on (If you think Project J was bad...) and often times frustatingly-vague, but I have to as it's in my best interest unfortunately to do so. That said, I've started... pursuing... my marketing for MMAForums. I've hired a worldclass (not an exagerration) person which is taking care of part of something and he should be complete any day now. I'll keep you posted on how MMAForums fares. Current stats: Threads: 80 Posts: 579 Members: 23 Dual Monitors Believe me when I tell you that whenever I heard all the hype of having dual monitors I shook my head and rolled my eyes. Why bother having two monitors? Sure, it's a vanity thing, but I can do everything I need to on one, why do I need two? If anything it'd slow me down. However, today I went out and bought another 19-inch LCD anyhow. Why? To be honest, mainly just for vanity. However, now that I have it. HOLY CRAP. It's not for vanity any more. What can I say? Dual monitors simply rock. It is so much different once you actually have them in front of you and start using them. Now I can't go back to just one. As soon as I placed my second monitor next to my first, it was simply shocking just how much viewspace I had. I had to change my pants. Which brings me to my next point. If you have 2 or more monitors or are thinking of getting another one, you have to get UltraMon. It's a program which unleashes the true power of multiple monitors. For example, it will allow you to have taskbars across both monitors, allow you to stretch applications across both monitors (Hello Photoshop...), let you stretch wallpapers across both monitors, has special buttons next to the minimize/restore/close buttons in windows which let you quickly move to the other monitor etc. It's completely customizable too. It costs only $40 and accepts PayPal.

Dual monitors are great for so many reasons... here are two examples of how they are useful which you may not have realized:

1. In the screenshot below, I am playing Oblivion on one monitor, while idling in IRC on the other. What makes this great is that now I can play my game, and see who is logging in or messaging me on MSN without having to keep on pausing and alt-tabbing in and out. It essentially allows me to 'screen' people and ignore people while I play while being able to watch out for important messages and such. I can't rememeber how many times I've alt-tabbed to check whenever I heard people log in or message me because I was waiting for one particular person.

2. Thanks to UltraMon, I can have applications stretch across both monitors with the click of a button. This is ideal for designers - think of using Photoshop across 2560x1024 of workspace.

PageDump Acquisition

I seem to have a bit of a problem with spur-of-the-moment impulse buys:

I wake up. Turn on the computer. Turn on some music and start to check my e-mails. Meanwhile, I log into ChatWebDev as I haven't been there in a while.

I hear Jon and a few others talking about PageDump and a couple members in the chat ask him if he's willing to sell it and how much he'd want. Jon says "$400" I say "PayPal?" he tells me, I say "Sent." Boom.

So it came with the design and logo and domain. I have absolutely no clue what I'm going to do with it, but the domain definitely is brandable. I'm not sure whether the buy was a good one but I'll just have to make sure I profit from it somehow so I don't look like a complete dork. For development of the site, I think I'm going to turn it into something along the lines of a site where people can easily click a couple buttons and it uploads their desktop screenshot to the site. I could see a lot of use for that.

Anyhow, we'll see. It's now yet another project I have coming up now..

Replayer.org/Project AA Updates

Replayer.org and Project AA programmers/designers have been progressing, albeit quite slowly, but progressing nonetheless. I therefore don't have much to update you with at the moment.