Adsense Smart

Ubuntu mouse freeze

2011-10-23T07:12:00.000-07:00

My Ubuntu freezes my mouse when I'm typing Chinese, and this makes me believe that Chinese Input Method Editor causes this problem. But when I searched for answers, there seem to be many reports of this problem.

This morning, I was interrupted by a telephone call when my mouse freezes again, when I return back to my computer, the mouse has already became normal.

Next time it happens, I just ignore it, it turns to normal again in couple of seconds.

New BloggerTemplates: Dynamic views

2011-10-02T18:41:00.000-07:00

I have spent hours to customise my blog tonight, but when I almost felt satisfied with the result, I noticed there are new series of templates called Dynamic Views.

I can't help trying them out. They looks awesome. But the blog readers might have not been familiar with these types of browsing methods.

Update Vosao to Version 0.9

2011-10-01T03:58:00.000-07:00

Vosao for App Engine is the Content Management System (CMS) for Google App Engine, easy to install and update, and free to run. This CMS is currently in active developing and update frequently, seems very promising.

Vosao latest version has a default template Coolblue10 for you, so it now looks like a "REAL" website.

Steps to install:

Download App Engine SDK for Java, if you don't have Java installed, you shall download and install it first.
Download Vosao and extract to local folder. Find the file WEB-INF/appengine-web.xml and change the application name to your appspot application name.
Upload the CMS application by issuing the GAE SDK command line:

(Linux) $ {SDK bin directory}appcfg.sh update {unpacked war directory}
( Windows) ; {SDK bin directory}appcfg.cmd update {unpacked war directory>}

Beware that the admin login is admin@test.com, and password is admin. Do remember to change you password.

Fofou: Forum on Google App Engine

2011-10-01T03:29:00.000-07:00

A simple and very nice forum for App Engine, simple to install and free to run.

Steps to install:

Download python and install it.
Download App Engine SDK for python and install it.
Download the Fofou, and extract it to a folder, and edit app.yaml, change the application name to your App name.
Run SDK. File --> Add Existing Application.
Click Deploy button. You will be prompted to input your email address and password.

Login to your forum as admin, create the first forum.

Now here is the trick for Adsense. When you create a forum, you add Adsense code to the Sidebar, for Sidebar is displayed in the left column. HTML allowed.

Monetise Your Video on Youtube

2011-09-16T16:33:00.000-07:00

I received an email invitation from YouTube recently, it says:

Your YouTube account might be eligible to earn revenue from the playbacks of your videos.

If your account is enabled, we may place ads next to the videos that you submit for monetisation. You will earn a share of the revenue from the ads, as long as you meet the programme requirements.

I have tried to apply for Youtube partner several times without success, because my videos don't "appear to be viewed by thousands". Now several videos reach or over thousands views.

While I am trying to figure out monetising, I notice some interesting copyright issues:

Your video has to be 100% original, and you have to declare the ownership of the copyright, which include audio or musics.

You can't monetise video:

in Creative Commons Licence, or
created by Youtube Editor or Youtube partners such as GoAnimate!, One True Media, Xtranormal Movie Maker, or Stupeflix Video Maker, this happens to free version, I didn't try paid version,
or includes music by AudioSwap.

Monetise button appear below every video files, and you have to do it one by one. As soon as you monetise a video, you can't change copyright from Standard Youtube Licence to Creative Commons Attribution licence, the radio button turns to grey. Although the monetise button appears under CC licence, and you monetise it, but ads won't appear when you playback.

Another discovery is a subtitle tool which add or subtract an offset to or from the timings specified within an .srt file. The one and only for Windows is SubtitleOffsetter, and it's a command line tool. I download a long film and its subtitle file, and split the long film into several parts, and upload to Youtube with subtitle file. The video and the subtitle can sync for the first part, but the rest won't sync, all you have to do is subtract time of the previous part(s) in milliseconds and save the caption file to a new file, and upload it.

Adsense: You’re missing 81 opportunities to earn more!

2011-09-04T07:40:00.000-07:00

Received a message, saying that I am missing 81 opportunities to earn money, but I can't do anything about it, since I have no control of Ad palcements in Hubpages. In the previous post I mentioned that since Hubpages launched it's own Ad program, my Adsense earning are almost dried up. Here is the message:

At least 80 of the pages on Hubpages are running less than three ad units. Adding any of our top performing units (336x280, 300x250, 728x90 or 160x600) to prominent sections of your pages will substantially increase your ad impressions and overall revenue. Across the pages that we analysed, you could potentially add at least 81 units on hubpages.com. Click here to create new ad units and start earning more!

This is the big problems when you're dependent on revenue sharing publishing websites which you have no right to dictate your terms. Similarly, this happened to the traditonal publishing industry, in the life circle of authors, publishers, printers, distributors and booksellors, writers are always at the most disadvantage position, many were struggling with poverty, but became famous and his books were exploited again by those greedy publishers.

HubPages Ad Program and Adsense

2011-08-24T17:47:00.000-07:00

Since HubPage Ad Program became available to everyone, my Adsense revenue dropped drastically, then without choice, I submit my tax information and joined the Program, its earning seems OK, but Adsense earning gradually dried up.

Adsense pay out UK Sterling (pound £) into my bank account, but Hubpage will pay me dollars to Paypal, and the real value of earnings will be affected by exchange rate and service charge by Paypal during additional steps of transferring fund to my bank account.

Any Hubbers here have same experience?

Submit a comment to Google Blogger three times then it can be published

2011-08-24T17:35:00.001-07:00

I have a strange experiences in one blog on blogspot.com, every time I submit my comment anonymously, I have click the Post Comment button three times, then my comment will be published and appeared on under the post.

I wonder if anybody has same experience as mine, and I guess this may be an undeclared anti-spam technique or some smart trick?

Best Free antivirus software for your Windows PC

2011-06-22T14:23:00.000-07:00

I have a Dell laptop which pre-installed McAfee, because I don't want to pay for the license, so it becomes quite a nuisance when message windows pop-up several times a day, asking me to register, although it's still within the free trial period.

Spyware Doctor with Anti-Virus that comes with Googlepack is good, because it has basic function to clean up when find infections. The one you download from official website doesn't provide this service.

As far as my own experience goes, the best,antivirus software is Microsoft Security Essentials, although I don't know if it's most popular. Microsoft Security Essentials runs quietly and efficiently in the background so that you are free to use your Windows-based PC the way you want—without interruptions or long computer wait times. This is just what I want, because to be honest I really don't care much if my pc is PROTECTED or not, as long as the Security Centre tells me YOUR PC IS NOW PROTECTED, gives me peace of mind and leaves me alone to do my job without the pop-up windows interfering my thought.

Of course, your Windows system has to be genuine. Many of my Chinese fellows just buy a naked machine, and pay 10 -20 RMB (about $2-4) for a CD or DVD which includes 'genuine windows system' and many hacking tools, so when I recommend them to try Microsoft Security Essentials, they just shake head and smile.

Fake 'FastAntivirus2011.exe' pop-up alert

2011-06-12T14:26:00.000-07:00

Almost fooled by a fake fast-scan alert when I search for an image:

When I click the image, the website redirects me in 3 second to another site, and a pop-up message says:
Windows Security 20111 has found critical process activity on your PC and will perform fast-scan of system files!!

On click the OK button, it starts "fast scan", and "found" many Trojans, viruses, etc.

Another pop-up messages, it asks you to Remove or Cancel to ignore, wherever you click, it will download a FastAntivirus2011.exe for you!

This is the fake 'FastAntivirus2011", you may notice the left navigate pane of the Explorer is typical Windows XP instead of my Windows 7, address bar shows the website address instead my local files.

Delete immediately the downloaded file! Don't installed it!

Help protect your computer from fake 'FastAntivirus2011.exe' pop-up alert:
- Make firewall active.
- Always update operating system, internet browser and anti-virus programs.
- Install a separate anti-malware program aside from present anti-virus application if it is not included.
- Be cautious when clicking links. It can point your browser to download threats or visit malicious web site."

Google Search wish me Happy Birthday

2011-06-04T00:26:00.000-07:00

What a surprise, Google search wish me happy birthday!

I set Google search as my home page, almost never miss a birthday of celebrity or festival. Today I see a cake with candle and wrapped presents, wondering whose birthday it is. Moving my mouse on the picture, it says: Happy Birthday, Jim! I click the picture, it take me to my Google Profile page.

Adsense not showing up in Chrome

2011-05-31T05:05:00.000-07:00

I have searched for an answer, but in vain. There are many reports about Adsense ads not showing up in different browsers, in my case it's Chrome.

I implement adsense code within iframe tag, but this seems not a problem, because I build an experimental pages both with and without iframe (or together in one page), Chrome displays both correctly.

My website is built on Microsoft Office Live for small business, its free hosting, a lot of restrictions. for example it will append a 'defer=defer' attribute to the adsense code.

Vuala Chat

2011-05-20T11:55:00.000-07:00

Vuala: "Vuala is a new dating site. It is a place where you can always find a new friend. You can chat, draw, play games and even more. It is without any registration and it is completely free."

You specify your gender and age, and choose a friend's gender and age, then type something and click the Right Arrow button, somebody will show up instantly, and start chatting.

So you always chat with a stranger, and even if a family or buddy at another end of the line, you still don't know who they are, how do find other friends that you actually know? So some people think this is cool but is it safe, since you may thing is he/she a creepy stalker person?

Currently, you can't put your state, county, place as search criteria, and can't create account, seems haven't many people using it.

This site claims that it's a dating site, and it allows people under 18, even has an age range between 3 and 12!

This chat site has a App in Google Chrome store.

Google Chrome Angry Birds Game

2011-05-19T00:55:00.000-07:00

Why can't you see the target while you are aiming, is it because originally designed for smart phone with a small screen?

How to implement DFP on blogger blog?

2011-05-11T09:50:00.000-07:00

Many people monetise their blog, it's quite handy to set up Adsense, or Amazon Associates. But if you try to use third party ad network, or sell ads directly, best choice is DFP for small business. How to implement DFP on blogger blog? Of course it's not a big deal if you have only one blog with couple of hundreds hits a month, but it seems fun to figure out how to do it anyway.

This page tell you how to set up DFP small business for your website, but it doesn't go to the details of how to use it in blogger.

And then you may check out how to edit the HTML of your blog's layout. After you generate tags in DFP, copy and paste the first part into the document header. Then add page element by clicking Add a Gadget, choose HTML/JavaScript gadget, copy and paste the second part of DFP code into the it. After 10 minutes or immediately add will show up on blogger pages.

Pages gadget

2011-05-11T09:45:00.000-07:00

If you have no idea what is Page gadget, the check out how to Create Pages in Blogger.

http://buzz.blogger.com/2010/02/create-pages-in-blogger.html

The shortcoming of Page gadget is that the tabs only link to static pages, this post show you how to add tabs linking to label pages, individual post pages, website or whatever you like.

http://www.bloggersentral.com/2010/06/adding-non-pages-links-to-pages-gadget.html

Is Your Google Call Phone button missing too?

2011-04-10T09:34:00.000-07:00

Call Phone button missing in Google chat it was working yesterday - Google Chat Help: "Call Phone button missing in Google".

Google call phone are only available for US users, but people around the world soon found out that if you change Language settings to English (US), the call phone icon will appear in your chat.

But Google engineer seems to have changed the system, many people reported the button missing, I found mine missing too. People from US travelled to UK, found their the button missing in their laptop.

I have call credits, if Google don't let me use it, can I refund?

Criminal law and Google Adsense

2011-02-01T14:35:00.000-08:00

I once posted an article to a website on a murder case happened two hundred years ago, the Google Adsense advertising was disabled by the website based on automatic content filters.

I am just wondering if any criminal law cases are not allowed by Google Adsense, or just some extremely cruel or gruesome scenes are not allowed.

The article then is posted here in Blogspot.

OCR in Google Docs for Mac Users

2011-01-25T22:42:00.000-08:00

I have Epson Slylus Sx205 "3 in 1" printer, which includes free Abbyy Fine Reader Express. But since I lost my PC with Windows Vista and turned to use MacBook Pro laptop, I lost this facility to scan my documents into editable and searchable text by OCR (Optical Character Recognition), though I can scan images from Preview.

Now I have to find a free OCR software for Mac, this is not easy.

I knew Google Docs can convert text from PDF or image files to Google Docs documents. So after many failed searching, I gave it a try. The result is quite good actually. Here is how you do it in your Apple Mac machine:

Scan document in Preview and save it into PDF format.
Upload it in Google Doc, and select conversion options, tick "Convert text from PDF or image files to Google Docs documents."
Now you can edit and search the scanned document in Google Docs.

Some people say Preview in Mac has OCR functions, as to my experience, it's not the case. Preview can select for copy-paste and search PDF only if the your scanner has done OCR for you or the PDF created from text document such as MS word, Open Office or TeX, etc. Preview doesn't have this capability for pure image.

Some Adsense placement tips

2011-01-25T21:59:00.001-08:00

Some Adsense placement tips:

- Top banner above-the-fold (beside the logo) ad placement is the top earning slot.

- Placing ad units in the “F pattern” helps them optimize visibility of ads. Eyetracking visualizations show that users often read Web pages in an F-shaped pattern: two horizontal stripes followed by a vertical stripe.

- Showing text ads when content on the page is mostly images and image ads when content on the page is text-heavy. This helps make the page look better and improves ad visibility.

Google Affiliate Network Basics

2011-01-18T22:37:00.000-08:00

Commission duration

Commission duration is the same as "cookie duration." Some advertisers' cookies will remain active on a user's computer for a number of days. This means that once the user clicks through your link, and a cookie is dropped on their computer, they can revisit the advertiser's website any time during the duration of that cookie and make a purchase and you will still be credited with that purchase (as long as they did not click on any other publishers' links after they clicked on yours).

When cookie/commission duration is set to zero, it means that the user who clicks through your link must complete a transaction within the same internet session. If they close their browser or return the next day and make a purchase, this purchase will not track to your account.

Payment terms

Your Google Affiliate Network earnings are paid with your AdSense earnings on the same payout schedule in the same check or direct deposit.

If your advertiser is on 60 day payment terms, your earnings for February 2010 would have been posted to your AdSense account at the end of March 2010. They would then be paid out of your AdSense account at the end of April 2010. Note that this period amounts to 60 days from the end of the month in which activity occurred

EPC: Earnings Per Click

3-Month EPC - Three Month Earnings Per Click is the sum of fees paid to publishers in the past three months divided by the total clicks over the same period (Values multiplied by 100 for display purposes).
7-Day EPC - Seven Day Earnings Per Click is the sum of fees paid to publishers in the past seven days divided by the total clicks over the same period (Values multiplied by 100 for display purposes).

Payout Rank
Advertisers are ranked by commissions paid to publishers over the past 90 days. Each square represents one quarter of the advertisers payout to the network. For example, an advertiser with three squares is in the 51st to 75th percentile.

NTN
New to Network. Not enough data available to perform calculations.
n/a - No commissions paid during the relevant time period.

Multi domains

If you have several top level domains, and registered throughout one of them, you have a couple of options for running multiple websites in the Google Affiliate Network.

1) Create separate Google Affiliate Network accounts for each site on which you want to have advertiser links displayed. You will have to submit separate applications for each site you want a Google Affiliate Network account opened for.

2) Use Member Identification (MID) Tracking. MID tracking is a system where you give certain links separate codes so you can tell which site the click came from. MID tracking is necessary if you wish to keep track of commissions made from each site separately.

3) Use one Google Affiliate Network account. You would use the same link on all sites and track all activity in aggregate.

If you are going to use option 2 or 3, please also make sure to list all of the sites that are associated with your account in the "Publisher Site Description" section of your Account Profile (under Settings).

MID Tracking

MID stands for Member ID. To implement MID tracking, simply append your standard tracking link with &mid=xxxxx, where xxxxx is a unique identifier you assign to the member or website you're tracking separately. Member ID's may contain up to 256 characters with all special characters in HTML encoding.
Example of a standard tracking link:

http://gan.doubleclick.net/gan_click?lid=410000000XXXXXXXX&pubid=21000000000XXXXXX

Example of an MID tracking link:

http://gan.doubleclick.net/gan_click?lid=410000000XXXXXXXX&pubid=21000000000XXXXXX&mid=xxxxx

?lid= defines the unique ID of the link assigned to you by Google Affiliate Network

&pubid= defines the unique publisher ID number.

&mid= defines the unique identifier you assign to the member or website you're tracking separately.

Is a Laptop Touchpad Heat Sensitive?

2011-01-16T13:57:00.000-08:00

My MacBook Pro display automatically reduces brightness before I finish reading one page, sometimes it returns to its full brightness or even wakes up from sleep before my finger touch the touchpad, i. e. it can sense my "touching" even when it was a couple millimetres above.

I wonder if the touchpad is heat sensitive. In an Answerbag post How does a laptop touch pad work?, I learned that "laptop mouse touchpad usually use heat to detect touch. "

But some say on a macbook it's not heat, it's conductivity. One guy tested a cold sterling silver ring, it works perfectly even when not in contact with his body. A 50 cent euro coin works, but a stainless steel Ikea fork does not - even if he warm it up and/or hold the fork. But I tried a sterling coin and failed. I couldn't move the mouse by a Pound Sterling.

Location, location, location.

2011-01-12T12:03:00.000-08:00

In real estate, they tell you it’s all about location. It’s not so different with internet. The meaning of location of Internet has at least three levels: physical server location; Internet service provider(ISP); and Internet Service Application Provider(ISAP).

For many people, their website, FTP, or email service is the lifeblood of their day-to-day operations. Without the right hosting provider, these services can easily be disrupted due to weather, cyberattack or natural disaster.

Your hosting server can be a home computer, or company intranet server, or traditional IDC, cloud computing, the physical server locations is quite different, and the service application providers are also divergent.

In regard to small Adsense publishers, you can maintain your own blogs or a websites, but to my experience, it far better to write for a large revenue sharing website. Just as you open a shop in a huge shopping centre instead of a place near your neighbourhood. The former can attract far more traffics to your articles even though how bad it is written.

OpenSky afficliate programs

2010-12-24T00:09:00.000-08:00

OpenSky is an affiliate program which connects you with small e-tailers to write about their products on your personal blog. You can search for the products and services which interest you, and then pass those recommendations to your readers while splitting all profits 50/50.

The best part is that OpenSky takes care of all of the order processing, fulfillment, and customer service.

If you're "fashionable and fabulous" mum, and would like to be kindly exploited of your "time, energy", which should be used to mind your children, then you could get busy blogging and "feel fit" with an expectation of flooding cash into your bank account.

Link external pages with new Blogger Tabs? // Blogging Help

2010-12-18T13:28:00.000-08:00

Link external pages with new Blogger Tabs? "The new Page feature and Tabs in Blogger" hasn't got straight way to link external pages, such as another blog.

This post tell you how to link your pretty little Blogger tabs to external pages.