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So what’s All The Fuss About PIPA & SOPA?

These laws would go well beyond the noble intent of protecting copyrighted content; due to the draconian nature of these bills, if made law, they would enable a business to shut down a competitor or Politicians to silence opposition over minor copyright infringements even if they were accidental.

So if you value free speech and an Internet that can’t be shut down or censored by the government, take action.

Visit WordPress, Wikipedia or Tucows and learn how to let your Congressmen know that you don’t support PIPA or SOPA!

On a recent trip to California, it occurred to me that perhaps wind energy isn’t all that environmentally friendly.  This scenic landscape dotted by massive wind turbines went on for nearly 20 minutes as I drove past Palm Springs.

What is the true environmental impcat of wind energy?

• Mining of materials used to construct the massive turbines
• Drilling of oil used in the production, transportation and assembly of the massive turbines
• Massive encroachment on the desert ecosystem

Perhaps there isn’t really such a thing as environmentally friendly energy.

As any information product creator knows, piracy is an irritating fact of life — if you make it, someone will take it. Unlike the Entertainment and Software industries, information products are often viewed from the “Glass Half Full” Viral marketing perspective. Once your content gets out there, your chances of selling bigger ticket items increases. Whether you choose to view piracy as “Glass half Full” (Viral Marketing) or “Glass Half Empty” (Money taken From Your Pocket) all sides can agree that it’s wrong.

It’s no surprise that Congress would finally get their act together and address the growing issue of digital piracy. With copyright and piracy laws written decades before the advent of the digital revolution, protecting content is often difficult and costs big bucks. 

Excerpt from SOPA must die! by HostGator Web Hosting Blog.

SOPA, aka H.R. 3261 is a bill right now in the House sponsored by R-TX Lamar Smith. It’s not just any bill though, it’s a bill that would allow the USDOJ, RIAA, MPAA and anyone else who lobbies for the entertainment industry to effectively censor the internet to suit their needs.

James Allworth recently wrote “Is this really what we want to do to the internet? Shut it down every time it doesn’t fit someone’s business model?” and I couldn’t agree more. Censorship is a slippery slope. Not only that but it also creates an absurd amount of bureaucratic busy work. Here at HostGator we already spend a HUGE amount of time answering DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) requests. If we allow our representatives to begin deciding what is and what isn’t ok for you to view on the internet then where will it end?

The bill itself is absurdly broad, creates a ton of liability for small to mid size e-commerce based businesses and will serve to stifle the tech industry in order to cater to lobbying groups paid by companies who refuse to adapt to a world in which free information is king (and almost as unstoppable as a force of nature).

A couple months back Godaddy CEO Bob Parsons decided to head to africa to help out the good african citizens by murdering elephants (pesky elephants!). They received so much hate in response to that you’d think they would take a more neutral tact in their views going forward. NOPE! Today Godaddy came out in support of SOPA (which is mind blowing to us as we’re both in the same sector) and they’re receiving a good amount of (well deserved) lashback:

http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/nmnie/
godaddy_supports_sopa_im_transferring_51_domains/

We here at HostGator support a free internet. An Internet in which free information and unhindered distribution of said information is an unalienable human right. Do the same, contact your representative and tell them to vote NO on SOPA.

Following the same steps as the first two installations didn’t work in this case. The Dell Inspiron 2650 was a bit lower tech and had a few issues that weren’t present with the Dell Inspiron 2200 or the HP ze2000. 

The first problem was that the Live install for Ubuntu 11.10 locked up with a flashing curser. Easily fixed by holding the shift key down while booting, then selecting F6 and setting acpi=off. Once the O/S was installed, nothing but a blank screen loaded; after searching Google for a while I decided to go with an answer I found that suggested using Ubuntu 10.04 LTS. 

After downloading and burning a new ISO to bootable DVD for trial or install, an entirely new issue presented itself — no keyboard or mouse; this lead to more searching and head scratching, but was finally resolved by simply removing the battery. As with many Dell systems, the battery in this Inspiron 2650 was toast. 

A battery is being ordered from Amazon for $26 (price on date of this post); once it arrives, Ubuntu 11.10 will be tested from a live CD in case the acpi issue was also related to the dead battery — updates to follow.

For some time I’ve been meaning to test out Ubuntu and this Dell Inspiron 2200 presented the perfect opportunity. Even though I didn’t really care about the Windows XP Home Operating System installed, I created an Install disk set prior to loading Ubuntu in case I didn’t like the Linux based operating system. On this particular model, Dell had included a program that generated the install disks. On other systems you may have to access the Dell hidden restore partition (CNTRL-F11) or use the windows disk shipped with the system.

The installation of Ubuntu was actually pretty simple:

• Download The Ubuntu ISO
• Create A Bootable Installation disk — I went with the Flash/Pen Drive option using the Universal USB Installer downloadable from PenDriveLinux.com
• Boot from the Flash/Pen Drive and select the option to install to the hard drive — I choose to format the 30G hard drive so that the Inspiron 2200 would have more available free space

Not only did the installation go smoothly, but it took a fraction of the time Windows does. once installed, it was time to play around a bit and get used to Ubuntu’s GUI interface. Everything went fairly smoothly, until I tried to get online with FireFox — which came pre-installed with Ubuntu. 

Working off of a hunch I assumed a Windows Driver Scenario and went to the System Settings from the Launcher, then Network  →  Wireless. The Wireless dialog stated that  card wasn’t properly installed; “device not ready (firmware missing)”. At this point, it was time to physically connect the Inspiron 2200 directly to the Wireless router via the built in RJ454 jack resulting in instant internet access.

Ubuntu Wireless Firmware Missing Issue — Dell Inspiron 2200 

Resolving the Missing Firmware issue was a bit trickier than installing drivers in Windows. Trying to figure out how to find then install drivers in Ubuntu took some time, as it involved simultaneously learning the Ubuntu/Linux operating system.

A few Google searches on “Ubuntu Wireless Firmware Missing Dell inspiron 2200” quickly located the exact issue with instructions on how to fix the missing firmware issue. Unfortunately it would prove not to be so simple on this particular system.

After a few hours of searching and browsing support forums a solution revealed itself.

1. Download the b43-fwcutter package from the Ubuntu website — be certain to get the proper package for your processor, either i386 for Intel or amd64.
2. Once downloaded, double click on the package where it was downloaded (default download location: Launcher  →  Home Folder  →  Downloads) then click install from the Ubuntu Software Center.
3. Launch a terminal by going to Dash Home →  System  → Installed and locating either the UXTerm or XTerm applications.
4. In the terminal type the following code:

   1	sudo apt-get install b43-fwcutter firmware-b43-installer

5.  Enter your administrator password if required — the cursor in the terminal will not move or display * like it would in Windows Command Line.
6. Once the dialog in the Terminal completes, Reboot

If all went well, your system now has Wireless Firmware and can connect to the internet once you select a network name and configure your wireless settings.

Once installed the WP-Snap plugin needs some configuration or your Snap Glossary will display vertically in a very unattractive ordered list.

Below is a sample of the code used on this website to configure our Glossary page.

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/***** WP-Snap ********************
ol.snap_nav {
        background: #f4f4f4;
        display: inline;
        margin: 4px 4px 30px 4px;
        padding: 6px;
	float: left;
	clear: both;
	list-style: none;
        border: 1px dashed #000080;
}
 
ol.snap_nav li {
	display: block;
        background: #fff;
	float: left;
	padding: 0 5px 0 5px;
        margin: 4px;
        text-align: center;
        border: 1px solid #c00136;
        color: #333;
        font-weight: bold;
}
 
ol.snap_nav li a {
        text-align: center;
        color: #0e1b92;
}
 
ol.snap_nav li a:hover {
        text-align: center;
        color: #c00136;
}
 
ol.snap_nav li.snap_selected a {
	cursor: text;
}
 
ol.snap_titles {
	clear: both;
	display: block;
	border: 0;
	list-style: none;
}

Take a look at the screen shot to the right from the Washington Post (the error was corrected in the time it took to create the screen shot). Notice how the left column is floating below the right column and the actual content of the blog post is below that.

Modern website designs and platforms like WordPress rely heavily on the use of CSS to determine the look and feel of the presentation by controlling the positioning of elements like columns, images, hyperlinks and headings. Div tags are used by HTML to then tell the browser when to load which element of a page.

When the CSS assigns too much/too little width to an element or an extra Div tag opens or prematurely closes an element in the website’s design, columns and backgrounds can become misaligned. Think of it like having a one gallon bucket and tossing in several books of varying sizes, if they aren’t organized correctly the books will extend above the lip of the bucket.

So what’s the lesson to take home here?

When changing the structure of your website or adding new content, take a moment and preview each change. Also, don’t forget to backup your files before making too many changes; repairing a damaged theme or template can take up a lot of valuable time.

Some years ago I became frustrated with having to correct all the misinformation about SEO that my clients were getting from ”Internet marketing Gurus” and decided to write an eBook. Originally this 22 page eBook sold for $19.97, but now it’s yours for free!

Why another guide about Search Engine Optimization and
Keyword Targeting — an Old School one at that?

The answer is simple; the basics haven’t changed in nearly a decade. If you don’t try to cheat or fool the engines and you provide quality relevant content, you will do well in search engine listings. It may take a bit of work, but you won’t be punished for being honest.

Unfortunately most of the internet marketers and search engine optimization specialists pitching “the next new thing” are simply using or making up new terms for old concepts and techniques.

The goal of this eBook is to revisit some highly misunderstood concepts, giving beginning and existing website owners the tools they need to succeed in simple, no-hype language by sticking with Old School Terms.

You might be asking your self  why give away for free what so many people charge for? The answer is simple, because I got tired of updating it. While the information in the eBook is still valid, many of the referenced tools like the “Overture KeyWord Suggestion Tool” required updating or replacement. Rather than spend time updating old eBooks, I’d rather be blogging.

Click Here to Download your Free copy!

You can also get a Free Copy of

Your Propeller Head’s Old School Guide To Link Popularity: 
A Beginners Guide to establishing Authority!