Countdown to the PSN Class Action Lawsuit

General Requirements For A Class Action Lawsuit

Enough Plaintiffs - There need to be enough plaintiffs in order to make the Class Action process efficient for the courts.  70 million should be a sufficient number of plaintiffs.

Commonality - All plaintiffs need to be affected in the same way.  The current situation seems to satisfy that criteria.

Class Representative - One of the 70 million impacted customers needs to act as the representative.  With such a large group to choose from, something tells me that this shouldn't be an issue. 

Adequate Legal Representation - According to the American Bar Association there are over one million lawyers licensed to practice law in the United States.  It should not be too hard to find one to represent this case.

Those Criteria Seem Easy To Meet - So Then What?

Once the Class Representative hires the Legal Representation, the Attorney will file a suit with the court and ask that the court certify the case as a class action.  Once the court agrees, the class action is established.

I predict that we will see our first Class Action Suits before the week is out.

>> APRIL 29th UPDATE:

>> It looks like my prediction has come true...

View Article

Timeline History

For those of you who haven't kept up with this story, here is a summary of the update statements made by Patrick Seybold.  I would not want to have Mr. Seybold's job this week.  He is Sr. Director, Corporate Communications & Social Media, Sony Computer Entertainment America.

April 22nd - An "external intrusion" was detected and Playstation Network & Qricity services were turned off the evening of Wednesday April 20th in order to conduct a thorough investigation.

April 23rd - Sincere regret that the network remains down.  Systems must be re-built and further strengthened.  People working around the clock to restore service.

April 25th - No Update on an eta for restored service.  "We'll keep you updated"

April 26th - Emails going out to inform account holders of a "compromise of personal information".  "Clear path to have PlayStation Network and Qriocity systems" restored sometime within a week.

How Serious Is This Latest Admission By Sony?

It is quite serious.  To put it in perspective, 70 Million people represents 25% of the entire population of the United States of America!


How Does It Compare with Other Similar Breaches?

According to datalossdb.org, this will rank as the fifth largest breach on record!

Source: www.datalossdb.org

Lady Gaga Nixes Weird Al's Parody - NOT!

Weird Al Has Been On The Gaga Roller Coaster

I've been a big fan of Weird Al since the very beginning of his career and I have a great deal of respect for his talent as an entertainer.  There are many popular songs from the past 30 years where I only know the Weird Al version of the lyrics - and I am sure that I'm not alone in that respect. 

As a kid I used to listen to his My Bologna and Another One Rides The Bus on the Dr. Demento Show in the early 80s.

In 1984, I was fascinated with the attention to detail that he put into the production of his Eat It video.  His parody was almost a frame per frame replication of the Michael Jackson Beat It video.

I recall interviews from back then where Weird Al mentioned that he asked for and received permission from Michael Jackson.  He didn't have to get permission, but I recall him stating that "his mommy made him".

Fast forward to 2011.  More than 12 million albums sold, more than 150 unique song parodies and Weird Al is still seeking permission from Artists before including parodies of their songs on his albums. 

Really, at this point in time, regardless of who you are as an Artist, it really should be considered an honor that Weird Al wants to parody your song.  In fact I remember one singer commenting that they really feel like they had made it in the business until Weird Al parodied one of their songs.



I've been a fan of Lady Gaga since Bad Romance.  I enjoy her music quite a bit and I appreciate the energy and creativity that she puts into all her performances.  I would stop just short of calling myself a little monster.

When I heard that Weird Al had released a parody of Lady Gaga's Born This Way on YouTube, I was excited to hear it.  The song was great and it was especially nice that the posting had the lyrics displayed so that you could fully enjoy all of Weird Al's creative talent.

Watching the video was a bit of a downer, as evidenced by the following four frames...

I had to find out what was going on.

Weird Al's Blog gave more details under the category GAGA SAGA.

From the Blog...

I was really hoping that this blog entry would be all about me announcing the release date of my new album. 

I wrote and recorded what I thought was going to be the first single off of my new album: a parody of “Born This Way” by Lady Gaga called “Perform This Way.” But after hearing it, Lady Gaga decided not to give me permission to release the song, so… it won’t be coming out commercially anytime in the near future. Sorry.


Have no fear, this story has a happy ending...

After Weird Al posted his video to YouTube, Lady Gaga came to know of the fact that she had decided to not grant permission.  Apparently it was all Lady Gaga's manager's fault.  He is the one who rejected the idea without even telling Gaga (or he's the fall guy once Lady Gaga decided this was bad press).

Either way Weird Al gets his permission and here is the updated post that he made this afternoon...

Well, this was a strange day.

After putting my Lady Gaga parody on YouTube this morning – and announcing that it wouldn’t be on my next album because Gaga didn’t approve it – there was a huge outpouring of disappointment from the Internet. 

Apparently the fact that she didn’t approve it was news to Lady Gaga herself!

Gaga’s manager has now admitted that he never forwarded my parody to Gaga – she had no idea at all. 

Even though we assumed that Gaga herself was the one making the decision (because, well, that’s what we were TOLD), he apparently made the decision completely on his own.

He’s sorry.

And Gaga loves the song.

I’m thrilled on many levels to hear this, because 1) I truly respect and admire Gaga as an artist and it pained me to think of her as having less than a great sense of humor, and 2) it means I GET TO PUT OUT MY ALBUM!

As promised, all my proceeds from the song (and the MUSIC VIDEO… I can’t wait…) will go to the Human Rights Campaign.

Thank you, Gaga. And thanks to everybody who had my back.

Whew!

Your pal,
Al

I think Weird Al is being very gracious.  Personally I think Lady Gaga's manager is a bit of a dummy...

Lady Gaga's Manager Even Gives Dummies A Bad Name

Experiment #7 - Begging For Money

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For this experiment, I decided that I would sign up for a PayPal account and give people the option to donate to this blog.

PayPal experiences vary by country, so what I am describing may not be exactly identical to what you will find.

Which Type of PayPal Account To Choose?

When I signed up, my first dilemma was determining which type of account to choose from.  PayPal offers three different account types: Personal, Premier and Business.  I couldn't find anything that clearly outlines the differences between each account type.

I did find out enough information to let me make my decision.

Personal accounts aren't able to accept credit cards and I wanted to be able to offer the convenience and security of donating by credit card, so the Personal account was ruled out.

Business accounts are geared more towards organizations that require a Paypal account.  This seemed to be more than I needed.

That left the Premier account type, and this is what I signed up for.

Hooking Up PayPal To My Bank Account

After creating my PayPal account, the first thing I did was to link it up to my bank account.  This was easy to do, and I actually made 63 cents doing it!  When you link up your bank account, PayPal will make two small deposits to your account as part of the account verification process.  They deposited 22 cents followed by 41 cents.  2241 became the code that I used to confirm to PayPal that the account was mine.

Creating My Donate Button

The next step was to create a button to include on the website.  PayPal has a wizard for doing this which was extremely easy to use.  Here is the donation button that I created.  You can also see it in the right hand panel of this blog.

Fees

I was impressed to see that if I wanted to transfer funds from my bank account to another person within my country that there should be fees involved. So if somebody donates $1 to me from their bank account or their PayPal account, I would get the full dollar.

If somebody donates from their credit card, PayPal takes a small percentage and they also charge a transaction fee.  The fee works out to be approximately 30 cents plus 3% of the transaction amount.

So for $100 dontation, PayPal would take something like $3.30 leaving you with $96.70.

For a $1 donation, PayPal would take 33 cents, leaving you with 67 cents.

I started to wonder...

What would happen if someone made a 10 cent donation via credit card?  Would PayPal take the remaining 20 cents from my bank account?

I had visions of thousands of people donating 10 cents and draining my bank account.

I looked into ways to enforce a minimum donation.  This definitely seems possible with Javascript and PHP validation.

That seemed a bit difficult for this experiment, so instead I did a test.  I donated 10 cents to myself through my credit card.  I found that PayPal informs me of the donation, but they don't actually put any money into my account for it.  The good news is that they don't take any money out either!!

How Much Do I Expect To "Raise"

To be honest, I don't expect that my donate button will contribute much to the total earnings of this blog - of course it is completely within your power to prove me wrong :)

Time will tell, and as the total money earned in my scoreboard increases, I'll provide a detailed breakdown of all the sources.

At the time I'm writing this post, the scoreboard shows a whopping $5 earned.  63 cents of that is from linking PayPal to my bank account.  The balance is money earned from Google AdSense.

If you're a non-profit with a cause people want to contribute to, this is a handy mechanism to allow it.  Certainly donations do work for some organizations.

Before PayPal suspended Wikileak's account, it had accumulated over $700,000 in donations.

Julian Assange - Founder of WikiLeaks

The personal appeal campaigns of Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales have also been successful.

Here's a cautionary quote I came across "avoid adding PayPal donation widgets on your website if it’s new or is not popular in its niche as that will only show your greediness for money".

Hmmm, I wonder if a 14 day old blog counts as "new"?

Experiment #6 - Yet Another Try At A Popular Post

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If you've been following the earlier experiments, you know that this will be my fourth post based on a topic that is currently popular on the Web. So far these posts aren't fairing well in terms of Search Engine ranking.

Unless you include the word "mikesblogexperiment" in the search, they don't rank anywhere near the top 100. As a result, traffic to this site remains quite low.

Search Engines 'discriminate' against new Blogs and Websites. To move up in the rankings, two things are important:

1. New and Unique Content

According to many sites on this topic, "content is king". Just do a search for "blog" and "content is king" - you'll find that you get over 1.8 million results.


It is important to continuously publish, and the information that you publish should be unique.  For the duration of this blog experiment, I intend to publish at least two postings per week.

2. Linkbacks

It appears to be a well known fact that quality links to your blog are one of the most influential factors in determining search engine ranking. Having links to your site from authoritative, highly ranked pages will dramatically boost your rankings. 

Once I create my new post, I will search for other sites on this same topic that have discussion forums.  I will post to those sites and include the URL of this blog in my signature line.  This way when search engines crawl those sites, they will see the link to this blog

One of the challenges of commenting on these sites is that you often have to register before you can leave comments. This makes it a very slow and tedious process.  It also means that I have a lot of new IDs and Passwords to keep track of!

3. Patience

Unless you're Charlie Sheen, growing an audience for your new blog is something that takes time.  This is a 365 day experiment.  We're only on day 11 with 354 more days to go - I'm not ready to give up yet.  

Today's Post - Rebecca Black and her Friday music video.

In case you are one of the few people who haven't heard of the latest viral music video, it is from 13yr old Rebecca Black. The video for her song Friday, has received over 100 million hits in the past month. With all these people searching for the video and information about it, this seems like it would be a good piece of content to have on the blog.

Another relatively new blogger tells me that they are getting lots of hits coming through from Google Images and they suggested that I include more pictures.  You will notice that I have included 15 images in my Rebecca Black post which you can view here.


UPDATE:  I recently created another try for a popular post.  This one was about Lady Gaga and Weird Al Yankovic.  I will be creating additional posts and they are really part of this experiment.  I will be updating this post with links:

View my Lady Gaga/Weird Al post

It's Friday, Friday...

Today is Friday April 15th.  Yesterday was Thursday, Thursday.

On Friday March 11, 2011, Rebecca Black's viral song and video had only 3,770 hits on YouTube.

A mere five Fridays later this video has surpassed 100 million views!

Official YouTube Video Just Before It Went Viral

The tune is catchy, but I believe it is the absurd lyrics that skyrocketed this one to fame.  Let's take a look at some of those lyrics...

"7am, waking up in the morning
Gotta be fresh, gotta go downstairs
Gotta have my bowl, gotta have cereal"

"Fun, fun, think about fun
You know what it is
I got this, you got this
My friend is by my right
I got this, you got this
Now you know it"

 

Huh??  If that wasn't crazy enough, it goes on to give us an autotuned lesson in the days of the week...

"Yesterday was Thursday, Thursday
Today i-is Friday, Friday 

...
Tomorrow is Saturday
And Sunday comes after...wards"

View the full lyrics to Friday here 

Rebecca Black

 
 

So Who Is Rebecca Black and How Did She Get Discovered?

Rebecca Black is a 13 year old from California.  Rebecca's friend, Alana Lee, told Rebecca about a song and video she had recorded with Ark Music Factory.  Rebecca's mom paid Ark Music Factory around $4,000 to record the song Friday and produce the video.  Ark subsidizes the cost of the the production, but retains a portion of the publishing rights.

Rebecca now has her own website: rebeccablackonline.com 

The rapper in the video is Ark Music Factory owner and co-writer of the song Friday, Patrice Wilson.

Patrice Wilson

 

This massively popular video has spawned many parodies...

Conan O'Brien did a parody called "Thursday".

Even Darth Vader has a parody.  You can view it here.  

Darth Vader "wakin up in the morning"

 

I've saved the very, very best parody for last.  

This is much better than the original and I have watched it many times.


Stephen Colbert Performing Friday on the Jimmy Fallon Show

You can also watch the rehearsal here.

7am, wakin up in the morning...

I see my friends...

Which seat can I taaaaake...

Partying, Partying, YEAH!

So chillin’ in the front seat...

Yesterday was Thursday, Thursday...

Ladies and Gentlemen... Taylor Hicks!

Yeah!

Ladies and Gentlement... The Knicks City Dancers...

It's Friday, Friday...

 

Experiment #5 - Try For A More Unique Post

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Based on our experiments to date, I have come to the conclusion that posting on super hot and popular topics is not turning out to be a good strategy at this point in time.  Maybe it is the newness of this blog, but whatever the reason, the posts aren't ranking anywhere near the top on any of the search engines and as a result we are not getting any traffic.

With this experiment, I'm going to try for the opposite approach.  I'm going to take some very specific items that should be much less common than the latest viral event.  I'll get lots of these unique keywords and load up a webpage with them.

For experiment #5, I'm going to try paint color numbers from Benjamin Moore.  I compiled a list of 150 of their color names and numbers.

These paint colors have unique names and numbers like:

• Brookline Beige HC-47
• Butte Rock AC-8
• Butter Pecan 2165-70

I wrote a few introductory paragraphs geared to someone who is struggling to find just the right color for whatever room they are trying to paint.

View my post related to Experiment #5 here.

Picking Paint Can Be A Difficult Task

If you're not a decorator and you're intimidated by the huge selection of colors to choose from, you're not alone.

If you're finding it difficult to select the right color for your room, use the list below to trim down your search.

Whether you're painting your bedroom, living room, dining room, hall, baby's room, basement, family room or study it might help to have the choices narrowed down somewhat.

The following is the top 150 most popular Benjamin Moore paint colors. If you choose from this list, at least you will know that you are in good company and you're not choosing some color that is way out in left field.

Top 150 Benjamin Moore Paint Colors

Acadia White AC-41
Acorn Yellow 2161-40
Adobe Beige AC-7
Alpaca 1074
Apple Blossom 479
Apple Green 2026-40
Arizona Tan 2162-50
Audubon Russet HC-51
Baby Pink 2085-70
Barely Beige 1066
Barley 199
Barley Harvest 1070
Black 2132-10
Bleeker Beige HC-80
Bleeker Beige HC-80
Bold Yellow 336
Bradstreet Beige HC-48
Brookline Beige HC-47
Butte Rock AC-8
Butter Pecan 2165-70
Camouflage 2143-40
Casabella 102
Cedar Key OC-16
Celestia Blue 1429
Chestertown Buff HC-9
Classic Caramel 1118
Clay 1034
Cloud White OC-130
Coastal Dunes 1032
Concord Ivory HC-12
Confederate Red 2080-20
Coppertone 2161-10
Costa Rica Blue 2064-50
Cream Yellow 2155-60
Creamy Orange 2166-50
Dark Beige 2165-40
Decatur Buff HC-38
Decatur Buff HC-38
Desert Tan 2153-50
Dorset Gold HC-8
Dry Sage 2142-40
Dry Sage 2142-40
Dunmore Cream HC-29
Fennel Seed 1101
Forest Green 2047-10
Fresh Butter 290
Georgian Brick HC-50
Georgian Green HC-115
Goldfinch 187
Grape Ice 1395
Greenbrier Beige HC-79
Greenfield Pumpkin HC-40
Guilford Green HC-116
Guilford Green HC-116
Hawthorne Yellow HC-4
Hay Stack 317
Hepplewhite Ivory HC-36
Hillsborough Beige 1033
Hint Of Pink 884
Hot Spring Stones AC-31
Ivory Tusk 2153-70
Ivory White 925
Jamaican Aqua 2048-60
Jet Stream 814
Kennebunkport Green HC-123
Kittery Point Green HC-119
Lenox Tan HC-44
Light Yellow 2022-60
Lily Lavender 2071-60
Limesickle 2145-50
Malton 1073
Manchester Tan HC-81
Mantis Green 2033-60
Maple Leaf Red 2084-20
Marble White OC-34
Marshmallow Bunny 2001-70
Mayonnaise 2152-70
Milkyway OC-110
Misty Lilac 2071-70
Monroe Bisque HC-26
Monterey White HC-27
Montgomery White HC-33
Moonlight 2020-60
Moonlight White 2143-60
Muslin 1037
Nantucket Gray HC-111
Navajo White OC-95
Neon Red 2087-10
New London Burgundy HC-61
Oklahoma Wheat 2160-50
Olive Branch 2143-30
Pale Sea Mist 2147-50
Palladian Blue HC-144
Peanut Shell 2162-40
Pear Green 2028-40
Pearl Harbor 2165-50
Philadelphia Cream HC-30
Philipsburg Blue HC-159
Pismo Dunes AC-32
Pottery Red 2085-20
Powell Buff HC-35
Prescott Green HC-140
Providence Olive HC-98
Putnam Ivory HC-39
Raisin Torte 2083-10
Raspberry Truffle 2080-10
Rich Cream 2153-60
Roasted Sesame Seed 2160-40
Rosemary Sprig 2144-30
Roxbury Caramel HC-42
Saddle Tan 1124
Sailor`s Sea Blue 2063-40
Salisbury Green HC-139
Sandy Brown 1046
Sanibel Peach 72
Sapphireberry 2063-60
Saybrook Sage HC-114
Sepia Tan 1116
Shaker Beige HC-45
Shelburne Buff HC-28
Shenandoah Taupe AC-36
Simply White OC-117
Soft Fern 2144-40
Soleil AF-330
Springfield Tan AC-5
Squire Hill Buff 1068
Starry Skies 821
Stone House 1039
Straw 2154-50
Summer Blue 2067-50
Swiss Coffee OC-45
Valley Forge Brown HC-74
Van Alen Green HC-120
Van Deusen Blue HC-156
Wales Green 2028-50
Weekend Getaway 473
Westminster Gold 200
Weston Flax HC-5
Wethersfield Moss HC-110
Wheeling Neutral HC-92
White
White Dove OC-17
White Sand OC-10
White Satin 2067-70
Wilmington Tan HC-34
Windham Cream HC-6
Yarmouth Blue HC-150
Yellow Freeze 2020-70
Yosemite Sand AC-4

Happy Painting!!

SNL - Saturday Night Live April 9th (s36e20)

Host: Helen Mirren
Musical Guest:  Foo Fighters

Opening: [5/10]  We've seen too many Barack Obama openings lately.  I gave it a 5 because at least they kept it short and sweet.

Helen Mirren's Monologue: [6/10] Monologue was pretty weak.  A few jokes that were obviously written for her.  They did a bit of musical number with other cast members which wasn't too bad.  Again, they were wise to keep this one short and sweet which is why I gave it a 6.

Usually it would be a bad sign to get the show off to such a weak start, but they recovered nicely with the next five skits...

Mort Mort Feingold - Accountant for the Stars: [9/10]  Very solid and nice and tight.  It gave a lot of the cast members a chance to showcase their celebrity impersonations which I always enjoy.  This one even had a few laugh out loud moments for me which is why I gave it a 9..

Digital Short - Touching Helen Miren's Breasts: [8/10]  This one started off lower than an 8, but it got better as it went on.  Kristen Wiig came in at the end and raised it from a 7.5 to an 8.

Fox & Friends: [7/10]  It was funny and pretty solid to start with.  They probably should have wrapped this one right before they did the telecast with Helen Mirren.  This is when the skit started feeling like it was dragging on.

Frankenstein: [7.5/10] This skit was clever.  It had me smiling, but not laughing out loud.


Foo Fighters Performance #1

Weekend Update: [9/10] You can always count on Weekend Update for some good laughs, and as always this one delivered.  Bill Hader's James Carville impersonation was really funny.

Hugh Jackman - The Best of Both Worlds:  [7/10] Helen Mirren does a great job playing a murderous Julie Andrews.

Underground Records: [5.5/10] - Not a huge fan of this skit, but it is so rapid fire at least it doesn't get boring.

The Reelz Channel: [7.5/10]  Helen Mirren seemed up for just about anything.  In this skit she played a lesbian Eleanor Roosevelt making out with Marilyn Monroe.

Perspective Photo Studios: [8.5/10]

Foo Fighters Performance #2


Bongo's Clown Room: [6.5/10]

Click here to watch Saturday Night Live online.

Experiment #4 - Another Try For A Popular Post

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Even though my Glenn Beck post from Experiment #1 didn't generate much in the way of traffic, I'm going to try once more to create a popular post by anticipating what people might be searching for.

This time I'm hoping that a Saturday Night Live post will bring in some traffic.  I know that I often spend some time on Sundays searching Google and YouTube for SNL skits that I may have missed, or wanted to see again.

It doesn't take long for the SNL skits to be taken down from YouTube due to copyright violations.  I'm sure a lot of people will be searching tomorrow and I hope they stumble across my SNL Review post.

Tonight's host is Helen Mirren and the musical guest are the Foo Fighters.  It will be Season 36, Episode 20.  Often referred to as s36e20.  I'll be sure to include that in the post.

A few minutes after the show finished airing I published this SNL Post.

I then posted a couple of comments on some of the review sites in the hopes that they will count as linkbacks.

When I search in Google, my post doesn't seem to be registering.  Once again, I'm afraid that there may be too much competition.  I realize that I'm going to have to learn a bit more about the latest Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques to try to get my pages to register on Google.

Experiment #3 - Link 4 Link

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I just did a Google search for "Blog Experiment" and I was pretty happy to see that this site ranked #2...  Out of 27 Million!!!

 

I was curious who this guy was that claimed to have the "Greatest" blog experiment, so I check out his site.

His blog claims that if I add a link to him, that he'll link back to me.  I have learned that Linkbacks are sites that link back to your blog.  The number and quality of linkbacks that you have is something Search Engines take into consideration when ranking you in their results.

I'm adding a link to his blog (http://thegreatestblogexperiment.blogspot.com/) and hopefully he'll add one back to me.

This was a short experiment, but I am already thinking about a future experiment where we generate a massive number of linkbacks to this site.  Look for it in the near furutre.

Experiment #2 - Setting up AdSense

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Google AdSense Example

You all know what AdSense is - right?

In case you have never seen it before, or have seen it, but not realized what it was, the sample at the left is an example of a Google AdSense ad.

I have to admit, I've never been a big fan of the way AdSense ads look on a blog.  I agree with the people out there who claim that they tend to cheapen the look of a site.  Also, in all the years that they've been around, I can't recall ever clicking on one (much the same way I always ignore the highlighted 'paid' results on my Google searches).

I always assumed websites got paid for displaying these ad.  This is not the case.  It was interesting to learn that sites only make money when visitors click through on these ads.

How much do you get paid for AdSense?

Google doesn't have a straight answer for that one.  They say that it depends, and that the best way to find out is to sign up, see how much you're making and then decide whether it is worthwhile to continue.

Whether I'm a fan or not doesn't really matter.  This seems to be my next logical "experiment", and my first step towards "Monitization".  Blogger really makes the whole process quite easy.

I'm going to start out light and only display AdSense adds after my posts.  Blogger gives you three options...

There is a lengthy Terms & Conditions page to read (or at least scroll through).  Everything seems pretty reasonable and it is clear that I'm just scratching the surface by displaying plain old AdSense adds on my blog.  The Terms & Conditions refers to that as AdSense for Content.  There are other types of AdSenses referenced like AdSense for Search, AdSense for Video, etc.  These are all things to explore, and you can rest assured knowing that they will be the subject of future "experiments".

There was one part in the Terms & Conditions that worried me for a minute.  I had to agree to not disclose Google Confidential Information including click-through rates.  I wanted to ensure that nothing was going to prevent me from being able to update my Scoreboard to let you know how much I've earned.

The good new is that although I won't be able to share details of specific click-through rates, I am allowed to disclose the amount of Google’s gross payments to me.

It looks like I have AdSense setup now.  It will be 48 hours or so before ads start to show.  There will be public service announcements in the meantime.

Once my adds are working and I've seen some of the reporting available, I will update this post.

Glenn Beck Leaves Fox News, Millions Upgrades to Fire Fox 4.0

On second thought, I guess these two headlines aren't really related.

If you are looking for information on Glenn Beck leaving Fox News, you can click on this image...

Glenn Beck and Fox News Call It Quits

If you are looking to download the latest version of Firefox, click the image below to be directed to mozilla.com where you can join the millions who have already downloaded Firefox 4.0.

Top 6 New Features in Firefox 4

1. Faster Browsing thanks to a new JavaScript engine.  Mozilla claims that the new JavaScript engine can perform at up to six times the speed of previous versions.  
2. If you're still not used to Tabs, Firefox 4.0 it will prompt you to let you know how many tabs you are about to shut down when you close your browser window.
3. Hardware accelerated video graphics.  Firefox will take advantage of your computers video card's processing power to improve the rendering time of video and graphics.
4. HTML5 support will let you take advantage of the newest and most innovative sites out there.
5. Firefox 4.0 sports a cleaner look that appears to be "borrowed" from Google Chrome.
6. The new Add On manager makes it easy to find new add ons and manage the ones you have installed.

For the past year or so I have seldom used Firefox.  I left it in favor of the performance and the uncluttered interface of Google Chrome.  Firefox 4.0 has brought me back (for now...).

Glenn Beck Leaving Fox News

Glenn Beck and Fox Call It Quits

Conservative talk show host Glenn Beck announced today that he will end his talk show on Fox News.

Beck has been with Fox for less than three years.  His brand of conservative populism attracted many viewers and increased ratings. 

It isn't clear whether he is quitting or being forced to leave.  What is clear is that his ratings have been dropping and the Network has felt the impact of the recent advertiser boycotting.

Beck at the Restoring Honor Rally He Organized at the National Mall

A turning point came last summer when Beck made comments indicating that Barack Obama has a "deep seated hatred for white people."

Comments like these led to boycott campaigns and caused Fox News to distance themselves from Beck.

The long turns at the blackboard turned off the younger audience, so sought after by advertisers

Facts about Glenn Beck

• Age: 47
• Parents operated a bakery in downtown Washington when Glenn was growing up
• When he was 14, his mother drowned in a boating accident.  Glenn has referred to his mother's death as a suicide during interviews
• Step brother committed suicide
• Married for 10 years
• 2 Daughters from first marriage
• Recovering alcoholic and substance abuser
• Married 2nd Wife in 1999, have 2 kids (1 adopted).
• Had been diagnosed with macular dystrophy.  At risk of going blind in the near term and has difficulty reading, driving and recognizing people.

What Are Others Are Saying about Glenn Beck



http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/07/business/media/07beck.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/baseball/cubs/mc-ss-ironpigs-sandberg-0406-20110406,0,6505137.story

http://www.tvlatest.com/article/2301/In+Other+News+Wendesday%3A+Alec+Baldwin,+Glenn+Beck,+Matt+Lauer

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/tv/la-et-glenn-beck-20110407,0,5973014.story



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