See original post here: Avoiding Entry Level “Real Job” Scams by Scam Free Internet

This is a guest post by Nickolay Lamm.

Finally! An e-mail! It’s from Davis Direct Marketing and they want to hire you for an entry-level marketing position.

Unfortunately, the reality of many e-mails like these is that the company itself is a scam. Yes, they have a location, a manager and people working for them. At best, they are simply deceiving you into a door to door sales position whose salary is based off of 100% commission. At worst, they are trying to steal your identity or money. The former, of course, isn’t all that bad, but when a job is based only off of commission, it isn’t really a job.

I graduated from the University of Pittsburgh as a Marketing Major and consistently ran into MMI marketing, which I found on everything from Careerbuilder.com to Monster.com.

During my 3 month job search I also received about 10 calls from “marketing” companies, which wanted to immediately schedule an interview with me. Although initially excited, my hopes for employment were dashed when I Googled the companies (searching only for the company name may not reveal much, but adding the word “scam” may reveal online scam posts about the company). I found that unsolicited e-mails and calls from potential employers never pass the Google test:

Try Googling these terms and see what you find:

Ascension Marketing Group

Trinity Direct scam

MJ Promotional Group

MMI Marketing scam

The search engine results point to companies I wouldn’t want to be associated with. It’s not fair to look only at online complaints because anyone can write anything online without being fact checked, especially complaints that directly mention a company. A quick search on Yahoo! Answers and a blog dedicated to jobs scams reveals that entry level job scams are pervasive. A common theme among posts on Yahoo! Answers and the aforementioned blog posts is the following…

They are involved with marketing and tell you that they work with everyone from sports teams to movie production companies.

When talking to them on the phone, they ask questions like: “Mike, how would you like to work for a company where you can advance?” It’s normal for companies to boost their images when attracting talent, but these companies go overboard with their sales pitches.

They have a generic looking website in which you can’t figure out what the company actually does or find a description of what its employees do. Can you figure out what service it provides to its clients?

They try to sound credible by pointing out that their top clients include DirectTV. Yes, those are their clients because you’d be going door to door selling their services.

They tell you that you can make a lot of money through commission and that you can rapidly advance through the company.

They may woo you with assertions that some of their employers are pulling in $25,000 per year off commissions alone, which would make their not paying for business expenses seem reasonable. Know exactly what your job will entail before you accept any offer. You may find that that glamorous entry level sales position is nothing more than you going door to door, selling subscriptions to Direct TV. If a company refuses to give you any specifics you can be assured that something is fishy. Even if you do accept the job and nobody will out right steal your money, you will be wasting your time because you’d be working for a company, with which you have no real future, unless, of course, you enjoy being a commission only salesman making less than $20,000 per year.

Although the prevalence of “real” job scams can’t be measured, my own run-ins with suspicious looking companies, as well as other peoples suggest that there are companies out there, looking to take advantage of a work force starved of jobs. The best way to avoid “real job” scams is by being aware of the aforementioned traits, researching the company online, and using your own intuition. Before signing any contract, know what you are getting yourself into, especially for jobs which advertise “moving up” through the company with commissions.

Nickolay Lamm updates InventHelp Scam.

See original post here: 7 Ways to Avoid Facebook Scammers by Scam Free Internet

 This is a guest post by Nickolay Lamm.

Scammers target platforms, such as Windows, which are used by a lot of people. The popularity of Facebook has encouraged scammers to take efforts to the social network. Here are 7 ways to make sure that they don’t get to you…

Use Apps that You Can Trust

Facebook apps that promise some sort of “trick” (Who Viewed Your Facebook Profile?), which nobody else has, may be infected with malware and/or viruses. Some apps will make you go through hoops, such as texting your cellphone number, in order to use the service. These additional steps may cost you money.

In general, less is more when it comes to apps.

Stay On Top of Latest Scams

Check out blogs, such as Sophos’s Naked Security, which list the most common Facebook scams.

Be Wary of Off Site Login Pages

Have you ever logged onto Facebook from another site? Although Facebook Connect is used by legitimate sites, a fake version of it can steal your account information.

Don’t Accept Friend Requests from People You Don’t Know

Some people accept friend requests just to inflate the amount of friends that they have. A friend request from someone claiming to be one of your classmates in high-school may seem innocent and their profile may seem legit as well. However, this “friend” may very well be attempting to get some of your personal information so that he can steal your identity.

Accepting friend requests from strangers may also result in Facebook crime. If you have hundreds or over 1,000 friends on Facebook, some of which you’ve never even met in person, you are at risk of robbery. If you post your whereabouts you are essentially giving people, with malicious intentions, an open invitation to rob your house.

Watch Out for Phony Facebook Messages

Someone may have hijacked your friend’s Facebook account and is using it to ask for money. For example, “Joey Carmichael”, who you’ve known for 10 years, out of the blue, asks you if you could send him $1,000 through Western Union because he is stranded at the airport without any money.

The scammer hopes that by posing as your friend, he will dupe you into giving him a payday. Whenever you receive awkward requests, ask your friend a personal question that only your friend would know. If your “friend” can’t answer the question, call or e-mail your friend to confirm the worst: that their Facebook account has been hijacked.

Don’t Click on Facebook Links in Your E-mail

Unless you login to Facebook by typing in the website in your browser, there’s a chance that you login by clicking a link that takes you to a login page, which is actually a fake login in disguise. Your login page is actually a key to giving some stranger complete access to your Facebook account.

Be Wary of Your Newsfeed

“GRAPHIC VIDEO.. Japans Tsunami Sends WHALE Smashing Into A Building” Sound like a pretty interesting headline for a Youtube video? That’s exactly what the makers of Facebook scams would like you to believe. They post sensationalist posts on Facebook that are nothing but scams in disguise. Clicking on posted messages like these sends you to a survey page, which earns commission for the maker of the clickjacking scam. Furthermore, malware and/or viruses may be installed on your computer before you are allowed to view the video, which, in nearly all cases, doesn’t exist.

The best way to avoid clickjacking scams is to use your common sense. If you see a “video” in your newsfeed whose title is over the top, whose link url looks something like “amazing-video.rk”, and whose description is generic (click here), you can be sure your friend has been a victim of a scam.

Despite privacy concerns people have of the social network, people still have an inherent trust of a social site, which connects, family and friends. That trust people have and the ease with which scammers can access the site opens the door for malware, virus, identity theft, and online theft. However, if you are familiar with the scammers’ aforementioned tool box and use your own intuition, your chances of being caught up in a scam are very low.

Nickolay Lamm updates InventHelp Scam Watch.

See original post here: Seven Tips to Help Avoid Internet Scams by Scam Free Internet

This is a Guest Post by Holly Miller from Coupon Croc

Anyone who hasn’t heard the phrase, ‘Internet scam’ is probably a brand new Internet user. From email scams to ‘business opportunity’ scams to account hack attempts called phishing, scams to run the gamut. There are even scams that present themselves as from the director of the FBI, other security services or international bankers. To avoid loss of any money through false purchases, online or offline account take-overs or other illegal or immoral activity, be very aware and extremely cautious before providing any information about yourself or your credit cards, bank accounts or any user name or password to anyone on the Internet. Here are a few specific tips to help you avoid becoming a victim of Internet scams.

Email Scams

1: Illness: If you’ve ever read an email from someone in a foreign country, pleading a sob story about imperative medical care is available only in your country, but funds to travel aren’t available, don’t buy into it. The sender got your email address through data miners and is using it to send scam spam: Don’t provide any bank account information; don’t agree to any financial transaction, and don’t even respond to them.

2: Found Inheritance: Don’t give your name, mailing address or even confirmation that the email address is yours. Don’t believe a word of these emails: Odds are it’s a money laundering scheme that could land you in jail for it doesn’t matter if you ‘didn’t know’ the transaction was regarding illegal funds. If you provide banking information for a transfer of funds, and you receive those funds, you’re implicated, and you’ll go to jail.

3: Account Verification: If you receive that important-looking email asking you to use a link within the email to verify your user name, password or other account security information, don’t click. Use a different browser window or tab to navigate to the bank or payment site, log in there directly and find the notification on your account. If you find none, it’s a scam. Forward the email to your bank or applicable vendor. Security contact addresses are found on every online bank or vendor website.

Work-at-Home

This is probably one of the biggest scam areas on the Internet. Unfortunately, not all are easily recognized, especially if you have interest in the field.

1: Always search for independent user reviews. Never rely on those portrayed on the website. Many of them are fakes.

2: Search the website for the Better Business Bureau for US sites or the equivalent in other jurisdictions. The FBI also has a scam search option.

3: If a website guarantees you income in a work-at-home job or business, pass it by. There’s nary a one that can guarantee anything except disappointment unless you actually earn it. Watch payment methods, advertising requirements, revenue sharing wording—sharing revenue income may be possible, but how often you’re paid, whether you’re paid in total or gross revenue or ‘net’ profit can make a huge difference.

4: Envelope Stuffing: Whether this one is online or offline, the biggest catch to envelope stuffing isn’t that you will never get paid, although that’s a possibility, but that you will have to not only stuff those envelopes and probably provide the postage, but you will also have to advertise the product or service to which the stuffed information pertains. You have to generate responses in order to stuff those envelopes. Do you have the time, knowledge and money to start, maintain and perfect an advertising campaign that won’t get you fined from violating local ordinances?

Overview

Always read “opportunity” emails or websites with a well-jaundiced eye. Read with “catch” in mind, not “instant wealth.” Never fall for officious-looking email: If those departments or organizations that are sending you email want to contact you, they won’t do it electronically.

Article contributed by Holly Miller, who writes for Coupon Croc. Protect yourself and your computer with the latest security software. Use a Currys discount code and save when you buy online.

See original post here: Easy to Use Video Converters by Scam Free Internet

With countless video playing devices and countless number of video file formats, it’s hard for manufacturers and consumers to keep up with constant changes. One AVI file might play on your laptop just fine but refuse to play on your PMP. You need a video converter. It used to be quite difficult and time consuming to convert videos from format to format, but we have much powerful computers and hand-held devices now that can handle the converting process with ease. With the listed software, you can convert avi, mp4, 3gp and more.

Just as importantly, we have lots of options when it comes to converter software. Unlike the days past, they are much more easy to work with even if you have little to no knowledge of video converting. I’ve listed four tools – two of which I use frequently – that, together, should allow you to do all the video converting you want.

Freemake Free Video Converter

I mainly use this one to convert videos to PSP-compatible format. Free Video Converter can convert videos to iPhone, iPod, iPad, Android, PSP, PS3 etc.

Convert video free to AVI, MP4, WMV, MKV, MPEG, FLV, SWF, 3GP, DVD, MP3, iPod, iPhone, PSP, Android, rip & burn DVD, convert online videos from 50+ sites, burn Blu-ray, and upload to YouTube…

You can do just about everything and it really is easy to use. It also allows you to covert online videos such as Youtube directly to a format of your choice. When I convert to PSP though, it doesn’t create a thumbnail image automatically. The conversion process is somewhat slow from my anecdotal observation.

Hamster Free Video Converter

Very similar to Freemake’s converter, Hamster Converter is also very easy to use. Drag-and-drop is enabled. It supports 40 languages.

Hamster can do batch converts which is a very handy feature if you want to copy over a bunch of videos to your hand-held device.

This one has less features compared to Freemake’s converter but it’s faster at converting. If you’re looking for a novice-friendly tool that does its job fast, try Hamster Free Video Converter.

Any Video Converter Free

Slightly more advanced than the two above, this one’s been around the block for some time now. It does everything the other two does including batch converts and downloading from Youtube. They offer a non-free pro version and this free version does lack features compared to the pro version.

Convert X to DVD

This is one my most often used programs. I use it to convert mostly AVI and MP4 videos to DVD. You can either burn it to DVD or create an ISO. It lets you create DVD title menu, include multiple subtitles and audios, create chapters, change chapter length and more. It’s speedy and once you get used to the process, you’ll be burning lots of DVDs.

Convert X to DVD is not free but it’s worth its price. If you find it hard to use, read a few guides among plethora of ConvertXtoDVD instructions online.

Converting videos can be addictive, especially creating DVDs. You’ve been warned.

Sponsor
youtube to MP3, youtube converter

See original post here: Justin Bieber + Selena Gomez Facebook Scam by Scam Free Internet

Are you a Justin Bieber fan who uses Facebook?
There’s a Facebook scam going around. The post’s title reads, “TMZ Reports Justin Bieber Punched Selena Gomez IN THE LIP!!”

When you click on the wall post, you are taken to a page supposedly containing the video of the punching scene. If you click on the play button, instead of the video, you will “Like” the page and you’ll be spamming all of your Facebook friends with the same scam, this is called “Like-Jacking”. You will also be re-directed to a survey, like the one below, which is the scammer’s goal.

Bieber fans, beware! By the way, is the story true?

There are other Facebook “Like-Jacking” scams involving Nicki Minaj’s sex tape and other celebrity pseudo-news, all employing the same tactic. I’m surprised one can so easily concoct a spam-dissemination scheme on Facebook. What’s Facebook doing about this? I dislike Facebook…

And don’t complete the survey. At best, you’ll be giving your personal information to scammers with ill-intentions. Other cases will involve viruses and other malwares.

SOURCE: http://facecrooks.com/safety-center/scam-watch/item/1351-tmz-reports-justin-bieber-punched-selena-gomez-in-the-lip-facebook-scam

See original post here: Essential WordPress Plugins for My Blog by Scam Free Internet

Tired of looking for the top WordPress plugins? Here’s a fresh list of actively maintained plugins I’m using on this blog.

I’ve been running this blog for about two years now. During that time, I have gone through countless plugins. I feel like I now have a good grasp on what the essential plugins are for my site, and thought I’d share my collection of plugins with other Worpress bloggers out there.

When I choose a plugin, I try to find one that has a decent user base so that it’s easier to find answers when I’m struggling with the plugin. I also look for the following traits:

1. Frequent updates – Generally, I prefer a plugin that’s being actively maintained. I generally won’t use a plugin that hasn’t been updated in a while. However, some developers hastily release new versions without thoroughly checking for bugs. From my experience, Sexy Bookmark was like that. So I stopped using it.
2. Reputable authors – It’s always nice to know a little bit about the creator. I visit the author’s website, read about what they do and more importantly what other plugins they created. If I like one of the plugins they made, I tend to go for their other plugins as well. Using plugins from the same author should ensure compatibility.
3. Simple and small – I try to avoid any plugins that are over the top, too big, or convoluted. Those tend to slow down your site and/or are buggy. Even if it’s less user-friendly, I prefer simple over bloated.

In alphabetical order:

Advance Excerpt

I installed this mainly for the purpose of allowing links in the excerpt and controlling the excerpt length. You can choose which HTML markups to allow, add “read more…” link at the end of excerpts and more.

Akismet

It does a wonderful job of filtering comment and trackback spam. I’m sure most of you already know about Akismet.

Better WordPress Recent Comments

After trying out a half dozen recent comments plugins, I picked this one. It was easy to style; it supports thumbnails; and it came with a couple of nice small icons. You can see it in action in the sidebar. Click the ‘Talk’ tab. It doesn’t come with a tab. I implemented BW Recent Comments plugin inside another plugin that handles tabs (listed below).

Broken Link Checker

Checks your blog for broken links and missing images and notifies you on the dashboard if any are found.

Efficient Related Posts

I installed this one among many related posts plugins mainly because the name reads, “efficient”.  It doesn’t have too many options (i.e. thumbnails, exclude individual posts/pages), but it does what I need it to do and does it efficiently.

Fast Secure Contact Form

A powerful contact form plugin with lots of options. You can even have more than one contact form. It includes CAPTCHA and Akismet support. I’ve been using this for a while now with 0 problems.

FD Feedburner Plugin

Simply redirects RSS feeds to Feedburner feeds.

Google Analytics Dashboard

It allows you to display your Google Analytics graph and key stats on your dashboard. It also integrates mini graphs into the post list so you can see the trends of individual posts.

Google Analytics for WordPress

This plugin makes it simple to add Google Analytics to your WordPress blog, adding lots of features, eg. custom variables and automatic clickout and download tracking. I used to use Google Analyticator, which included a dashboard widget (like Google Analytics Dashboard widget above). So I went from one plugin to two, which I try to avoid, but the two plugins combined provide more options.

No Self Pings

By default, WordPress pings itself when you link from one post to another. I hated this behaviour from the beginning as it clutters the comments / trackbacks area needlessly. It’s an old plugin, last updated in 2007, but it still does the job.

Shortcode Exec PHP

I needed to execute some PHP codes in the sidebar, mainly the contents of the tabbed widget. I accomplish this by inputting the desired PHP code in the plugin’s options page, save the chosen shortcode into a text sidebar widget, and then drop the text widget into the tab widget.

Subscribe to Comments Reloaded

Sends emails to subscribers who want to be updated on new comments. The previous plugin would make the page hang after posting a comment. For pages with lots of comments, it would hang for nearly 10 seconds before posting the comment. This plugin does a better job of sending out email to comment subscribers. Readers can also subscribe to comments without leaving a comment.

Tabbed Widgets

If you want to create a tabbed section in your sidebar, this is the plugin you want. It’s simple to use, and you can style it to your liking. It creates a virtual sidebar widget section where you can drop in the widgets you want to be displayed under a tab. The styling took me a while but I think it is all set now.

User Spam Remover

Automatically removes spam user registrations and other old, never-used user accounts. Blocks annoying e-mail to administrator after every new registration. Full logging and backup of deleted data. Requires PHP5. I had a ton of spammers creating an account on my blog. This plugin definitely takes care of that problem.

W3 Total Cache

The highest rated and most complete WordPress performance plugin. Dramatically improve the speed and user experience of your site. Add browser, page, object and database caching as well as minify and content delivery network (CDN) to WordPress. It is the best Worpress caching plugin, period.

WordPress SEO by Yoast

After changing the theme, I didn’t bother to install an SEO plugin. But I wanted to customize the title and description tags for certain pages, at the least. I tried out a bunch of SEO plugins, including SEO Ultimate, Greg’s High Performance SEO, and All-in-One SEO (this one, a long time ago). Apparently, the method used by most SEO plugins is not efficient and prone to errors. I learned this by reading Greg’s High Performance SEO plugin description. Greg’s and Yoast’s SEO plugins both use the “good” method, but Yoast’s plugin was more user-friendly and easier to implement. Greg’s SEO does have more options, so if you’re looking for lots of options, go with Greg’s HP SEO. I’m also using Yoast’s Google Analytics for WordPress, which was a factor in my decision-making. Also, this plugin eliminated the need for other plugins such as Google XML sitemap and 301 redirect plugins. It is technically still in beta, so don’t trust all its features 100%.

WordPress Video Plugin

Embedding a flash video into a WordPress post is a hassle. WordPress likes to automatically alter your codes and that doesn’t bode well for flash videos. This plugin makes it easy to embed videos from just about all the video sites out there.

WP-PageNavi

Adds paged navigation to WordPress. You can see it at the bottom of the home page and other paged sections of my site. You can easily style it as well.

That’s in total 18 plugins. There are few more installed on my blog, but didn’t think they were worth mentioning. I try to have as few plugins installed as possible, but the list keeps growing. ^^; I hope the article helped you find the plugin(s) you were looking for.

See original post here: Sites for Music Junkies by Scam Free Internet

What do you do when you suddenly have the urge to listen to a particular song but you don’t have it in your collection and you don’t want to buy it just yet? Where do you go when you want to discover some new music? I’ve listed some free services that allow you to do listen to music online, discover your kind of music, and more.

Last.fm

If you’re looking to discover new music, Last.fm is your answer. Last.fm works by building up a library of your music collection. Last.fm will suggest similar artists to the ones you already listen to. You can listen to radios playing music you like, and you have a chance to meet and share with other people who share your musical taste. It may feel a little invasive to some, letting the world know what you’re listening to, but I personally find it to be a great resource for learning about new artists and getting updates on my existing artists. Once you create an account, you download and install their software called, “Scrobbler”. The Scrobbler automatically fills your library and updates it with what you’ve been listening to. You can also get it on your Android or iPhone mobile device. The Last.fm Scrobbler is compatible with Winamp, iTunes, and Windows Media Player. If you use some other player, like myself, you can install its own Last.fm plugin. For example, I use Media Monkey with its Last.fm plugin.

mp3-2000.com

is a search engine for mp3′s. I think mp3 is the only format they deal with. They claim you can download free mp3s legally, and it certainly is perfectly legal (in most sane countries) to simply link to files. Legalities aside, it’s a great site for a quick search of a song. you can either download the mp3 file or play it directly from their little player widget. Many songs also have lyrics which is a great add-on. mp3-2000 doesn’t have an extensive library of songs and some tracks are missing album arts and lyrics, but overall, it’s easy to look up songs, listen to them and get information.

Grooveshark

The best on-demand radio period. Visit Grooveshark, search, listen. It’s that simple. You can also maintain a library if you sign up for an account. Don’t worry this is completely legal. There isn’t much to say about Grooveshark; you just have to try it. I highly recommend Grooveshark.

My Music Player

My favourite media player is MediaMonkey. I used to use Winamp a long time ago, but Media Monkey has so many useful features I can’t do without. From auto-tag to auto-organize, it’s jam-packed with features and it does a wonderful job of organizing your collection. I don’t use the free version, but the free version should suffice for many users.

download free mp3 music

See original post here: Free Website Builders by Scam Free Internet

Remember the days of Geocities and Angelfire? Maybe, you don’t. But I have nostalgic memories of using Geocities to create a website to share with friends. That was a looong time ago. So, when I got a chance to review a new free website builder called Ucoz, I took the opportunity to assess the current market.

Kids today are all about Facebook and their “walls”. Compared to the days of Geocities – when we actually had to learn a few html codes -the social networking scene today is much more dumbed down. Socializing on the net used to educational! [/rant] Due to Facebook’s popularity, I thought all the website builders disappeared. I was wrong.

Whereas Geocities and Angelfire back in the day targeted youths, the website builders today target small businesses, realtors, and bloggers. The target market obviously had to change given the explosion of the social networking sites.

Ucoz.com

I spent a few hours signing up and looking around Ucoz.com. At first, it was very confusing. It took a while to figure out what’s what. And after a few hours? I’m still confused. I wouldn’t call myself an expert, but I know a thing or two about website making, and I was lost.

I understood what each page did once I got there, but the main problem was the control panel interface. It is not intuitive at all. Ucoz is based on different modules that you can install and uninstall. It’s got everything in there from blogging system to forum to photo album. As a user, you just need to take a long time to familiarize yourself with the UI. It feels like a powerful system, but things are all over the place.

I don’t recommend it to novice web masters. Once you get the hang of it, you should be able to incorporate various contents into your site. For example, you can easily add in a Twitter feed or Youtube or Picasa photos. Shopping mall and Google map integrations are also possible.

Overall, Ucoz is a powerful free website builder that needs to be streamlined.

Other Services

It seems Angelfire is still alive at angelfire.com. It had the same core business continuing for all these years.  Check it out if you’re interested. There are other ones, too. I hadn’t heard about these, but a brief glance through their sites indicates there are some good free services to be had. Wix.com, for example, looks like a good place to build yourself a flash website. Also try weebly.com, webs.com, jimdo.com if you’re looking to make a website for your small business or just a personal website.

How do these companies make money? Some have paid add-ons (ex. PHP) and others have tiered service plans that allow you to use more bandwith/storage etc.

If you’re looking for an e-commerce solution, have a look at my comparison table.

See original post here: Cheap Legal MP3 Download Services by Scam Free Internet

When it comes to mp3 download services iTunes probably comes to your mind. However, there are alternatives. They offer DRM-free new mp3 releases just like iTunes. Files are well-tagged and the bit-rate is usually 320kbps. The biggest difference is the price. Whereas iTunes charges $1.29 per song, these other guys charge a fraction of that.

Iomoio

The one that I got a chance to check out is called, Iomoio. They charge 16 cents per song. That’s right. 16 cents. You’ll find all the latest releases except the exclusive releases that iTunes often promotes.

It’s easy to get started. You sign up and verify your email address to receive the sign-up bonus of 32 cents – enough for two free tracks. I downloaded two tracks from Adele’s album, 21. The download speed was excellent, only capped by my own internet connection speed. They were 320kbps and were adequately tagged. You can also make ringtones out of mp3′s that you purchased.

The site interface, as you can see in the screen-shot, is very clean and organized. Its search function displays predictive suggestions as you type.

The minimum deposit is $16. You can use Paypal, Visa or Mastercard.

To answer how Iomoio and others can offer such low prices, here’s the explanation from Iomoio: “Our company and licensing authority is located outside U.S. area and we do not have to follow $0.99/track minimum regulations.”

Iomoio has about 1.7 million tracks available for download. I could find just about any new release that I was interested in. I found that Iomoio lacks non-English releases, though. It would’ve been perfect for me only if it had more Asian music.

Amazon

In my opinion, Amazon is the biggest competitor to iTunes. Not only do they offer a download service, they have recently launched Amazon Cloud Player. It’s a free service. What I would do is download from Iomoio or other cheap sites; then use the Amazon cloud player to organize all my music. See the video below.

If you want more information on cheap music download sites, visit http://www.mp3obsession.com/reviews/. The lowest price you’ll find is 9 cents/track.

Buy songs

See original post here: DISQUS vs Intense Debate by Scam Free Internet

Frequent visitors probably already noticed, but I’ve changed the comment system on this blog from the default WordPress comment system to Intense Debate, then finally, to Disqus.

I’ve kept the original WordPress comment system for so long because of its simplicity. But I’ve always wanted more features so I can better manage posts and pages with hundreds of comments. The main problem I had with the default system was that it would create a new page once it reached the set number of comments (ie. 30 parent comments). This meant that once the number of comments reached 30, all the previous comments would disappear into the ‘previous comments’ pages. This made it hard to follow conversations and replies to older comments which would be hidden in previous pages.

I’ve thought about disabling comment pages altogether, but that would increase the loading time of the page significantly, and no one likes a really long page.

So, finally, I’ve decided to change the comment system. I had tried Disqus before, but I was unsuccessful in installing it properly. It just wouldn’t work (it did work this time). Consequently, I tried Intense Debate. There aren’t many to choose from. It looks like it’s either Disqus or Intense Debate.

Intense Debate

Pros

• Highly customizable. CSS style sheet is easy to work with and more importantly, I could add ‘Rules’ section to the footer.
• Well integrated into WordPress. It’s made by the same company, apparently.
• Can add a bunch of add-ons to the comment system, such as CommentLuv.
• Feels simple and crisp.

Cons

• Does not render properly under IE9 and Opera (just one button misplacement in Opera).
• Importing comments process is buggy. The first time, the progress was stuck at 84%. So, I reset the plugin. This time, it was stuck at 0%. Then, I did a clean import. Now, it was stuck at “Queued, waiting for import”. I could never get it to import all the comments.
• Replies are hidden and you have to click the ‘Replies’ text to expand them. Replies were already shown for pages with few comments, but were not shown for those with many comments.

I had a good first impression of Intense Debate. But as I went through the installation process, the cons were too significant to overcome. I spent a lot of time customizing it, too. Argghh…

Here’s the CSS style sheet I was working with. I added line by line within the ID control panel on their website.  These are readily available from their help section. I customized them to fit the theme of my blog, but it should be a good starting point for most. I hope it helps you if you do choose to use Intense Debate.

DISQUS

Pros

• Lots of login options. You can use just about any of your login credentials (Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc). Of course, you can still post comments anonymously if you choose to. I’ve allowed that on my site.
• Looks nice and clean, though it took me a long time to customize the CSS. Still not 100% satisfied.
• It’s popular. Lots of websites use it; therefore, many people know what they’re dealing with when they see Disqus logo in the comment section of a blog.

Cons

• Not as customizable as Intense Debate. I couldn’t add any content of my own to the layout. I wanted to add the Rules section.
• By default, it inherits the blog’s main theme style sheet. This meant that I had a lot of work to do to redefine styles for each class. Editing CSS for Disqus took much longer than customizing Intense Debate. Even then, I still couldn’t get it to look just the way I wanted it to. Some aspects of the layout are only editable if you pay, it seems.
• All URLs in comments are auto-linked. Disqus creates a hyperlink to all text that ends with a typical suffix ie. “.com”. This is kind of a big issue for me as the blog deals with scam websites, and I don’t want commenters linking to scam sites. It is nofollow, but I still want the hyperlinks disabled. Before, with WordPress comment system, I told commenters to either omit “www” or use “www-“, but this doesn’t prevent Disqus from creating a link. There doesn’t seem to be an option to turn the auto-hyperlinks off.
• Doesn’t integrate well with WordPress comments. Once you install the plugin, you export your WordPress comments to Disqus system. This syncs the two comment systems for the time being. Once a new comment is posted using Disqus, Disqus will export that comment to the WordPress system after a few minutes. Thus, it is synced. However, as an admin, I can no longer reply via WordPress comment within the admin panel as Disqus doesn’t import future comments from WordPress. Also, my sidebar that shows recent comments doesn’t work properly as clicking on a new comment will not take you to that comment but only to the page where the comment is posted. I will have to work on this to integrate Disqus further into the current theme.
• Comments count within the WordPress dashboard is different from the actual number of comments. I’ve lost about 200 comments after Disqus was installed. I still don’t know which ones are missing. I’m hoping that it’s just omitting the trackbacks and pingbacks from the comments count.
• The Help section is lacking. There just isn’t that much information in their knowledge base, especially for CSS help.
• More at the bottom (see Update)

Download my style sheet. It should help you get started if you choose to use Disqus.

As you can clearly see, I have far more cons for Disqus than for Intense Debate. Why did I choose to keep Disqus? One reason is that I just don’t want to spend any more time fiddling with this. However, the main reason I can’t use Intense Debate is that although I’ve only listed three negatives, they are very significant for me. Disqus has many flaws, but I can work around most issues. The only major concern I have with Disqus is the auto-hyperlink problem. I’m hoping that there’s a solution I’ve yet to discover.

For both systems, I couldn’t find much information on any search engine. It’s not like I have terrible search skills. Getsatisfaction.com seems to have the most discussions regarding the two comment systems.

If you have solutions to any of the problems I’ve listed, please leave a comment. Also, please let me know if you experience any problems with the new Disqus comment system. Thank you.

UPDATE: Well, I’ve disabled Disqus comment system. I started getting more spam and it labeled me as “anonymous”. I think it has something to with “KVNPark” vs “kvnpark”. I also changed the WordPress commenting settings so that the latest comment is at the top, which does solve my problem a little. But I would still like a dynamic comments page. I think I’ll try out Intense Debate once the bugs are fixed. Their rep responded very fast to my questions and that made me want to give them another shot.