The History of Santa Claus... at the North Pole

Ever wonder if you could get your cell phone to do something it's not supposed to...check out cellphonehacks.com and you might be surprised what your lil' old cell phone can do!

We'd all like a new car for Christmas - who wouldn't?  But how about a classic car - 1inamillioncars.com has classifieds and information about the car of your dreams.

Do you have Native American roots?  You might be interested in the Index of Native American Resources on the Internet.  It can take some drilling down though menus, but this site has a wealth of information.

Award winning Santa Claus site for parents and kids.  Check your naughty or nice rating.  Play games, print your honorary elf diploma....maybe you'll get a better gift from the big guy...

Want to track your website's uptime? Check out basicstate.com and you can set up emails to tell you when yours or any site you are interested in goes down.

Del.icio.us - keep all your bookmarks in one place and find out what others are bookmarking. 

What are the different kinds of search engines?

Generally there are 3 kinds:

1. Computer-generated indexes: they scan the web with "spiders" or special programs looking for words relevant to your search.  This is why you want content rich topics on your website.  They can't read, but they do know how to find relevant words.

2. Directories: are lists edited by humans and organized by topic.  These engines often find the most useful information and are the reason you just can optimize for the spiders - people read too.

3. Meta search engines: which search other search engines.  This is why if you can get good rankings in one SE, you'll often get good rankings in others. 

While each engine has it's own criteria or algorithm for figuring out what it considers important, all look for certain things:

Is the site about what it SAYS it's about? Are the articles interesting? Are they helpful? Do they mesh with what people are actually looking for? Are the articles comprehensive or just fluff? Would YOU want to read this site?

Writing good articles, with good keywords is the groundwork of a well found site. A professional can help with this, or if you are a good writer, you can do it yourself - just don't get carried away and "spam" by repeating the same words over and over.  Get creative - have fun - and give away real information people can use..

Spammers and unsolicited email

All that spam - what to do about it?  Is it possible to do anything about it? How did they get your email address in the first place?  Should you unsubscribe or or send a not saying "take me off"? 

What to do when you no longer want to be bothered by a newsletter or spam, is often tricky. They may have gotten your email from many sources: you signed up, you visited or ordered from a website (sometimes even an affiliate website), it was mined from on the Internet or you belong to an organization that provided it because they thought you might be interested in certain products and services.

It's not always clear what to do.  Legitimate advertisers will provide a link somewhere on the page that allows you to unsubscribe or even change your preferences. Here's ours  It's the law.   For a true spammer, though, "unsubscribing" may alert them that your email is a valid one which may increase the pharmaceutical and mortgage ads. True spam rarely has this kind of link and when they do it  won't work. Legitimate businesses don't want to bother someone that really isn't interested so provide a link to unsubscribe or change preferences for their publications. If the link works, use it.

It's just not adequate send an email "saying take me off the list".  Many small businesses are not set up to unsubscribe an email manually - the software they use to send the newsletter has a database that reads an email and then unsubscribes it. Sometimes they are technically unsavvy about how to do it, and sometimes they contract for someone else to send it for them so it goes out in a timely manner. That's why it's best if you use the link provided if at all possible. 

On the other hand, if you click the link and it doesn't work - or it isn't there - it's best to ignore the spam and screen it out with your spam filter. By doing so you still eliminate the unwanted solicitation. If you write to a spammer and say "take me off your list" - odds are he's not going to do it - he'll just put you on the "this is a hot one" list because now he knows your email is valid. 

How to avoid spam altogether?  Use a "junk" email address when you sign up for anything online. Hotmail and Yahoo have good spam filtering and will eliminate a lot of known junk mail. Also, be aware that the longer you have an email address, the more likely you are to get spam.  It's just a fact of modern life.  If it really bothers you, change your email address regularly and avoid spam-attractors such as AOL, Comcast, ATT and the other big providers. True spam is not sent to YOU, but to any address that looks like it might work. They will send out hundreds of emails hoping to hit on one that works. It will be sent in bulk to entire domains so that everyone in that domain (AOL, Comcast) gets the same stuff.  I bet you wondered why you were getting mail addressed to Fred@comcast.net - when you're Harry - that's because of the hundreds of spams sent out - odds are they WILL find a Fred and maybe he'll need Viagra! (and Harry might just look because he's curious as to why he got Fred's mail)

Most of all, don't sweat the small stuff.  You can spend hours trying to eliminate spam and it won't make a dent in the overall volume.  You can sign up for spam blocking web sites, but we don't recommend them because they often block mail you want to get. It may be easier to just bulk delete by highlighting several items at once.   Spam is a fact of life, unfortunately, so if you don't want it - use your delete key often.

Wireless Security

One problem I'm seeing a lot these days is that though many have jumped on the bandwagon for wireless internet in their homes - most are not securing that connection against hackers.  Even a few businesses are guilty of this faux paus.  It may seem like an unimportant issue, after all, how many of us do something relevant to national security on our home computers? But I bet you DO shop online with a credit card sometimes, perhaps you keep some bookkeeping info there, photos and email. Do you really want your neighbor reading this stuff?  Anyone driving by can "join" your network if it's not secure and get access to your computer.

It's easy to secure your computer against outsiders if you connect directly to the internet - just turn on your windows firewall.  You are not a network, so your problems (if any) will come from over the net.   If you use a router, however, it's a little more complicated. You also need a firewall, but you can also be compromised by someone near enough to pick up your wireless signal.

Here's how to secure your router (if you don't, anyone can log into your connection and use your Internet for free - as well as gain access to your computer and use it's programs, files and computing power). 

Log into your router by typing into your web browser:  192.168.1.1 and it will bring up a log in box.  If you have it configured, you put in your user/password.  If you haven't, you'll need to call your router's maker and find out the default password.  All Linksys' for example are just "admin".  Bet you're really feeling safe now! 

Once you get in, you will see your router's control panel.  Look for a tab that says wireless settings - sometimes it's under setup.  Give your router a better name - ssid or Linksys is not adequate.  Choose a security type - either WEP (for older computers) and WPA for newer ones.  It will prompt you for a passphrase.  Come up with something complex but easy to remember with lots of letters and numbers.  WRITE IT DOWN and APPLY/SAVE the settings. 

Now you are going to go to each computer on your network:  start - settings - control panel and choose the wireless network set up wizard.  It will walk you through setting up your computer to use the now encrypted and safe router. You'll need that passphrase and also which security option you chose.  (WEP or WPA). 

When complete, your computer is now connected to your router securely and nobody can get in without knowing the passphrase.  Your computer is now secure.  See, that wasn't so hard!

Thinking of buying a new computer with Vista? Read this first - another article about it's useless improvements - in other words, it received the BOTTOM OF THE PIT AWARD for 2007...personally, I'll stick with XP for now...

Even if you don't need a website yourself, you can refer a friend!  We'll give you a bounty on each referral that becomes a new customer. Earn up to $100 cash.  Register Here 

It doesn't matter where you or your friend is located, we can work with clients wherever they are -  by email, phone and fax. We are in Michigan, and have satisfied customers from Connecticut to Canada.  Visit our website at http://c-omalley.com.

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