Easy ways for link building to gain link popularity

Links, link building and more of it, that’s what we hear from most SEO experts, e-commerce consultants and all those in the profession of making other sites and blogs profitable. That is exactly what most bloggers do once they create their blogs. They visit other blogs and request for links exchange or inclusion of their blogs in other blogs’ blogrolls. It is a usual thing and generally the easiest thing to do.

When exchanging links, there are a few things that you look for in your link partners. There are factors like a good PageRank, great content and a descent number of visitors. But often we don’t care much about these, as bloggers are a sort of ‘anonymous, unrecognized brotherhood’ that helps each other. But definitely there are other factors that even a new blogger can do to make his or her blog link-worthy. The most important thing is that the blogroll or link exchange should be visible. It should be either in the main menu or in the sidebar menu displayed prominently, NOT HIDDEN among hundreds of inconsequential add-ons. Additionally the blogroll should be a part of the blog, in the same server and attached to the root URL where the blog contents are, and not in an external directory or URL linking service. It is also not a good idea to exchange links with sites or blogs that display links in i-frames or moving links that show only a few links at a time, as no one is going to scroll down all the links. If you link to such blogrolls, if not traffic, it should have a good PageRank that can benefit you for SEO purposes. Otherwise it is useless and you pass on benefits instead of receiving!

All said and done, link exchanges as above can mostly send you only traffic if that site/blog itself attracts good number of visitors. They cannot pass on substantial SEO benefits or help you gain a good PageRank (PR), because they are basically reciprocal links and cancel out each other in the link popularity calculations, though some search engines do count them in link popularity ratings.

What helps you most as a valuable organic link (natural link) is when your link appears as a one-way link in other sites. For example, I may like your articles or posts and I may like to recommend others to read them and include your URL, as a reference, in my posts. If you receive links like that from good sites or blogs that helps a lot both for traffic and SEO/PR purposes. I have received many such links that helps me a lot. You too can receive such free links if you have good content in your site.

Once link directories were a craze and many thousands of such directories mushroomed either to trade reciprocal links or to list your one-way links for a fee. Reciprocal links serve the same purpose as link exchange with no SEO benefits, while paid links are treated as unnatural by most search engines, and you may sometimes end up penalized for buying paid links. However, there are some very good directories that do not ask for reciprocal links or money and you can list your blogs or sites with them for better results.

If you can write some interesting articles they are a great source to get valuable inbound links. They allow you your sites’ or blogs’ links in the byline. By doing this you are allowing other sites to use your articles, but they usually are required to keep links to your site intact. So, one article can get you multiple links from other sites.

We usually read other blogs and sometimes leave our comments too. Most good blogs allow your links, as forums and article sites do. So, you can visit some blogs and leave relevant comments on blog posts with your link and your name. If the blog is popular with good ranking, you will get both more traffic and link popularity.

There are many forums helping bloggers and others to get to know each other, exchange views, discuss and solve problems, etc. If you are not a member of such forums already, join a few of them. They are free! Apart from their primary purpose, they allow your links with your site URL in your signature. Just like you write comments in blogs, you can write in forums too with your URL in your signature. This can lead to targeted traffic to your site, gain good link popularity and search engine ranking because these are one-way organic links.

If you have anything newsworthy, like an interesting fact, new features on your blog, or anything interesting, you can write a press release and send to sites publishing press releases. There are many sites that publish press releases. Make an internet search using the key phrase ‘press release’ to find such sites that publish your press releases. For example, www.free-press-release.com and www.prweb.com have great many such press releases. While some of the press release sites are free services, some others charge a fee for publishing your press releases. Still they are worth it because of their high rankings, popularity and the visitors that you get from these sites. Additionally, some other sites or blogs may pick up your press release and post on their sites and get you more external links, traffic and link popularity.

Jessica Biel & Katie Price: the most dangerous internet celebrities

American celebrity Jessica Biel is reportedly the riskiest US celebrity target on the internet with one in five celebrity websites related to her being potentially harmful, closely followed by Beyonce Knowles, New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, Jessica Simpson, Jennifer Aniston, Gisele Bundchen, Miley Cyrus, Megan Fox, Angelina Jolie, Ashley Tidsdale, etc., reports coming from internet security and virus protection company McAfee.

The British celebrity and former lingerie model Katie Price, also known as Katie Price Jordan and Katie Jordan, has been rated as the "most dangerous celebrity in cyberspace" by a survey by internet researchers. The survey found that if you search for news, photos, or anything relating to Price you have the chance of one-in-six clicking on very risky websites loaded with spyware collecting information about users without their knowledge with the goal of making money and committing ID theft (identity theft), besides viruses that can infiltrate computers. Of late Price has been a lot on tabloid news and internet gossip sites because of her divorce with her ex husband Peter Andre, the eccentric and often hilarious behavior of the model, and the latest gossip on Price's relationship with cage fighter Alex Reid. You have the next danger of infected with viruses, malware or spyware in Price's ex Peter Andre who came in joint 14th position of danger level of spreading virus infection.

When computer security and protection company McAfee used search boxes of search engines like Google and Yahoo! in an effort to assess how far is celebrity names targeted by cyber criminals spreading malware and viruses, they found more than 16% of websites and web links related to Katie Price had risky contents.

Closely following Katie Price is Jude Law, who had the second highest percentage of related websites targeted by cyber crooks. And interestingly Law’s ex wife Sadie Frost was 13th most dangerous cyber celebrity. If you want to have something on the royal celebrity Prince Harry, you have one in 20 chance of clicking on some virus infected link.

Supermodel Kate Moss comes in at fourth, while singer Lily Allen, recently spotted on holiday with Moss was 12th. Victoria Beckham with her new role on American Idol spiced up with David Beckham's falling out of grace with LA Galaxy fans made the couple dangerous cyber searches, as they occupy five positions - Victoria Beckham third dangerous with 13.6% and David Beckham fifth with 12.1%.

Top 10 risky British celebrities and the percentage of websites related to them which were found to be potentially harmful:

1. Katie Price - 16.3%
2. Jude Law - 15.4%
3. Victoria Beckham - 13.6%
4. Kate Moss - 12.6%
5. David Beckham - 12.1%
6. Daniel Radcliffe - 12%
7. Kerry Katona - 9%
8. Amy Winehouse - 8.6%
9. Cheryl Cole - 8.5%
10. Leona Lewis - 8.3%

Top 11 risky US celebrities and the percentage of websites related to them which were found to be potentially harmful:

1. Jessica Biel - 20.1%
2. Beyonce - 17.9%
3. Tom Brady - 17.4%
4. Jessica Simpson - 17.6%
5. Jennifer Aniston - 12.3%
6. Gisele Bundchen - 15.8%
7. Miley Cyrus - 15.5%
8. Megan Fox - 15.3%
9. Angelina Jolie - 15.3%
10. Ashley Tidsdale - 14.9%
11. Brad Pitt - 14.8%

McAfee's principal security analyst Greg Day said, "Cybercrooks capitalising on the public obsession with celebrities and current events is nothing new... A quick flick across the front pages of the latest popular newspapers and magazines offers a fairly reliable snapshot of where the criminals will focus their efforts next."

Now, are you worried about viruses/Trojans, malware, spyware, adware, etc.? Want to search, find and download music, photos, videos, and more on your favorite celebrities without getting infected? If so, use internet traffic light system called McAfee SiteAdvisor which flags up what are safe and what are not, and also test websites for spyware and other dangerous internet worms. SiteAdvisor is FREE and available for free download at
www.siteadvisor.com

Creating wealth out of debt

Take the case of people living without any planning for the future and without budgeting their monthly and yearly incomes and expenditures, as it happens in most consumerist societies. Such people overspend and at the end of the month they face a huge deficit. To tide over such temporary inconveniences they borrow again from another source. This process continues and they get trapped in what is called a debt trap. The situation becomes so bad that there will not be any easy source for further borrowing. The credit rating of the person will also be the worst that no bank or credit card company will be ready to extend any financial facility. Day and night, such a person will be troubled by phone calls, mail, text messages, personal visits by recovery agents, etc. for recovery of the loans or debts that have already become bad debts - debts that are no longer serviced or repaid as per the agreed terms are bad debts.

They say, ‘debt is not bad, bad debt is bad’. The difference between a debt and a loan is often quite narrow. If debt is bad, loan is also bad. If we go with this theory, we will have to disapprove of most of the big business corporations in any country, every country. All companies and businesses have debts and loans to be repaid. Debt or loan is used to finance business operations that create further profits and wealth. The loans or debts are repaid using the profits generated. It is an ongoing process, getting into debts and getting out of debts. In the process businesses grow, and keep on growing. As businesses grow debts too grow! Once you decide to do away with all kinds of debts, you have to face shortage of funds and the business becomes one with no growth and then negative growth will follow. This is a very dangerous situation, worse than being in debts.

If this is true for businesses, it should be true for personal purposes too. And it is true if loans and debts are wisely availed and productively used. If you keep on taking loans or incurring debts in an unplanned way without any budgetary planning, you are bound to get into trouble sooner or later. Like the companies are doing, you too can use loans in a productive way. For example, you can buy a residential property with borrowed money and pay off the debt every month with interest in such a way that your cash outflow will be equal or nearer to the rent that you pay for your current home. When you pay off the debt in five or ten years, the property is yours and you no longer have to pay any rent throughout your life. Additionally, possibly, if you want to sell the house then, you can sell for a sum that is about a few times more than you pay now. That means you have created wealth too out of debt, apart from almost living free of any rent. So, debt is not always bad, but it helps to create wealth if wisely used.

Credit cards as a better financial option for smart people

Credit card companies or card issuers (terms like banks, lenders, creditors, and financial institutions are sometimes interchangeably used) often introduce many innovative credit offers to attract more and more customers and to increase the volume of their lending transactions. These offers may vary widely depending on the laws regulating such card transactions, country, etc. Such variations reflect the marketing trends and the level of competition too.

Banks or card issuers (debit cards, credit cards, and even plastic in common parlance) aim at making the maximum sales of their products and thereby to increase their profits, even though some of them offer lowest interest rates or even zero percent interest, often called promotional interest rates, and the balances in such accounts as promotional balances. It is for the consumers or card users to understand the basic rules regarding credit or debit card transactions so that they can avoid penal interest rates for violation of terms on which such low interest rates or zero interest rates are offered.

Very low interest rates -- often 0% or interest free loans -- are offered by card issuers for certain periods or a certain number of statement cycles. They can be on certain sub-balances or the entire balance, only on amount spent on purchases, or even balance transfers used to pay off other accounts. Lenders sometimes offer 0% interest rates for purchase of certain merchandise from some select stores owned by them, or stores with whom they have contracts to boost sales. This arrangement, when used properly, can benefit all, the cardholders enjoy zero interest rates on their purchases, merchants benefit from bigger sales volumes, and the banks are compensated by the merchants for the 0% or low rates offered to cardholders. So, when a bank offers interest free loans, they do not lose money because someone else is paying the interest on the cardholders’ behalf, unless it is a subsidy from the government.

If cardholders enjoy zero interest rates or low rates, they must clearly understand the terms under which such rates are offered. No banks or card issuers can issue zero or below par interest rates unconditionally, or for indefinite periods, because financing has costs. The conditions can be timely payments, use of the cards as specified by the issuers, keeping purchases or payments within the limits prescribed (if any), etc.

Most importantly, cardholders have to understand that zero or low rate interest cards and the credits availed using them are the best financing options available anywhere in the world, for the simple reason that they are mostly with no collaterals. Mostly the credit is offered solely based on customers’ credit rating. If they need loans in the normal course, they must furnish collateral to the lender. There are intelligent and well known smart people who had built up billion-dollar business empires, and even Hollywood film producers who had financed their entire film production costs using credit cards.

Also, there are several thousands of hopeless losers who mindlessly misused credit cards and made themselves liable for unbearable burden of huge debts, and to pay off such debts they had to sell of everything including their homes. So, the key is proper use of credit cards, and abiding by the terms under which cardholders are given such credit facilities. In other words, credit cards can be a boon as well as a curse, and only cardholders make the choice of the boon or curse.

As observed above, the plastic can make or break card users. To avoid pitfalls, before they use credit cards they must understand the issuer’s terms that can be often complex, requiring them to understand the terms of the offer to pay off sub-balances by certain dates. On other occasions, cardholders may be required to pay a certain amount per month (installments) over the minimum due (an ‘interest free’ minimum payment) in order to pay down the sub-balance. On failure to comply with the terms, sometimes card issuers charge interest at normal rates, or even penal rates and retrospectively.

The card issuers use various methods for communicating the balances and rules on statements and they do not usually conform to any standard practices. Sometimes the balances are not always reconcilable with the bank due to unavailability of debit and credit statements on those balances, and even the term ‘cycle’ is not well defined in writing by card issuers. If such ambiguities are noticed, cardholders can always insist on clear terms defining their liability and all other issues. All reputed card issuers provide cardholders with the required information. However, for the US consumers, the CARD Act 2009, signed by President Obama in May, is highly helpful as it makes it obligatory on banks to issue notices on dues, change of terms, change of interest rates, etc. and these become operative this week, though some provisions of CARD Act 2009 will be effective only from 2010.

Cardholders’ account may have promotional balances (low rate, 0%, etc.) and higher-interest balances. Banks may sometimes allocate their payments automatically to any such balances, often in obscure ways. For instance, they may pay off promotional balances before higher-interest bearing balances. This means cardholders will continue to pay higher interest on normal or higher-interest debts or dues in their account until the account is fully paid off. In a way it helps them because if zero interest rate balances are not liquidated, they may become overdue and they may have to pay even penal rates on them. But besides possibly saving the cardholder money over the expected interest rate, it may serve to obscure the actual rate charged by the bank. For example, consumers may think they are paying zero percent when the actual calculated amount of interest on their daily balances is much more.

So, if cardholders want to use credit or debit cards, promotional offers and rates, it becomes imperative to understand the methods and rates that are applied by the banks and other card issuers. Wisely used, credit cards offer an excellent opportunity to finance personal and business financial requirements.

New credit card provisions in US CARD Act

If you are a credit card user in the US, it is time that you understand the new laws regarding credit cards, especially in view of the CARD Act (Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act of 2009) that becomes effective immediately. Not all of the new rules, but only a few key provisions are becoming effective this Thursday. The rest of the provisions will be effective only next year.

One of the provisions that become effective immediately is that making it obligatory on creditors to issue 45 days’ written notice to consumers before increasing interest rates or making major changes in the account terms. This 45 days notice is to replace the existing 15 days notice. In the same notice the consumers should be informed of their right to cancel the credit card account before the changes become effective or binding on them.

Another significant new rule is that creditors must mail or deliver account statements to the consumers at least 21 days before the payments become due. This requirement is applicable to credit cards and other open-end consumer credit accounts. From February 2010 the due dates must be same day of every month. If such due date for payment falls on days when payments are not accepted (like weekends or holidays), creditors must accept payment on the next day and such payments cannot be treated as late payments or delayed payments.

Ironically some of the laws that squeeze the consumers remain unchanged. For example, though companies can offer fixed rates, they have the right to change the rates, as you see printed on your account statements. Most consumers are unaware of it and its consequences on their accounts.

The credit card companies used to do many things in their interest like moving the due dates, allowing over limits and overcharging for them, hiking interest rates, and similar practices. Though credit card holders had grouses, they continued with the companies, because they either never bothered to find out better options, or canceling an account and opening with another credit card company meant the same as they too were operating under the same rules.

The new rules are becoming operative when many cardholders are frustrated with credit card companies. In a new survey conducted by Consumer Action, credit card users said that their interest rates are shooting up, minimum payments are rising and credit limits are being cut. This included high interest rates on purchases and cash advances “up to three percentage points between March and June”. Even cardholders paying dues well in time were “being subjected to costly, unilateral increases”, the survey showed.

Under the new CARD Act, credit card companies or card issuers cannot raise interest rates on existing balances except under certain agreed conditions, like if the card carries a variable interest rate. Also the credit card issuers cannot be arbitrary about changing terms. For more information on the new credit card rules you can log on to http://www.consumer-action.org and type ‘new credit card provisions’ in the search box.

How to make the best out of Twitter

In the good old days, everyone used to have some bosom friends to whom everything in their minds could be unloaded so that they can relax with a lighter mind, and also get comforted for all the nasty things they do or did. Such secret things reside in the darkest corners of one’s mind and sometimes they are the meanest of things that you can think of doing! It can be a crime, a socially unacceptable behavior or even an unpatriotic deed, or anything you do not like to tell anyone else for fear of the consequences. But the good old friend used to be one who forgives, sympathetically listens and even comforts the doer.

Now a new friend with no physical body or mind is taking up that role. It is none other than the microblogging service, Twitter. Just open a FREE Twitter account and tweet away all your worries or sins. If you keep anonymity no one will identify you easily, and still you can have ship loads of Twitter friends who are eager to listen to you. Infidelity, physical and psychological problems, or anything can be tweeted with confidence on Twitter. But be careful! If you are not faithful to yourself, or if you turn out to be a trouble for others your “friends” can un-follow you too!

Want to do an online business or earn money online? Well, many people would like to. But doing business presupposes investment of money, in the normal meaning of business. Many online businesses can be done with the least amount of investment. But if you do not even have a site or blog where you can showcase or sell your services or products, can you earn? A bit difficult, again, in the normal circumstances! But even such persons can find friends and followers who will help them earn, if you are a sincere Twitterer.

There are tens of thousands of Twitterers who are online marketers without their own sites or businesses. They promote their businesses using only Twitter. What they do is simply post their affiliate links on Twitter. Also, there are companies who pay generously to Twitterers simply for tweeting. It helps those companies too as they do not have to pay for employees, office space, and other expenses. So, tweeting for others is also a new business.

The simplicity of Twitter is such that even a child can operate a Twitter account. All it takes is a few minutes to set up your account and start tweeting, even simpler than creating an email account. Once having set up your account, start tweeting, like, “I am looking for online business opportunities”, “Looking for ways to make money” or anything you want to do or can tweet. You are sure to get offers from many Twitterers who are exactly looking for Twitterers like you. So, you do not go and beg to anyone for money or help, but they are hunting for persons like you to promote their businesses, and you get paid in that process.

Want to switch your job? Looking for better employment? Or, worst come, are you unemployed? Use Twitter! Keep on tweeting about your job, need to change, and anything and everything relating to that. Headhunters or those who seek manpower for their businesses too use Twitter extensively. They will search you out, or you can search for such opportunities! You are sure to find jobs and opportunities as there are more than 2.25 million Twitter messages being posted every day worldwide, as of now according to some surveys.

Tweets can contain links to other websites, blogs, documents, and images or pictures. This makes Twitter a great opportunity to promote your site or blogs. Just post the titles of your posts and URLs of the pages yo want to promote. If you have s sizeable number of Twitter followers, your message will appear in all their pages and you will get tons of hits from visitors to your followers’ Twitter accounts.

Twitter is microblogging equivalent of viral marketing! If you have just 100 followers, your tweet will appear in those 100 persons’ Twitter accounts. Though all Twitterers are not like Barack Obama (235,000 followers) or CNN (135,000 followers), Twitterers with 1000 or 10000 followers are quite normal among Twitter users. So, out of 100 followers you have, about 50 can be with 1000 followers or more, and only those 50 followers automatically put your short ad plus URL to more than 50,000 viewers. Additionally, every message posted by you brings new followers for you!

Twitter is not merely a social networking site; many people are using Twitter as effective professional tools. So, whatever your profession, you can use Twitter for the growth of your profession using the same tools and methods used by business Twitterers and Twitterers tweeting just for social or personal pursuits.

The speed, reach and immediacy of Twitter are so amazing that Twitter is extensively used by businesses and organizations for market research, surveys, and as a business promotion tool. If you have any such interests, you too can use Twitter’s speed and simplicity for promoting your interests, whether it is marketing or research or surveys.

Twitter messages can be forwarded or re-tweeted to thousands of people, virtually, instantaneously and virally. So, if you have anything of interest to others, your message will be re-tweeted to thousands of others instantaneously. Your website links can get thousands of free inbound links too, depending on the content of your site or blog.

Video: How to make Twitter useful for your business

How could the 140 characters long Twitter messages take the world by storm and make everyone crazy about it in a very short period of time? How long is a Twitter message or tweet? Just as long as the first sentence in this paragraph!

The prominent Twitter users include TV host Jonathan Ross, actor Stephen Fry, comedian Russell Brand and Chef Jamie Oliver who has recently signed up. President Barack Obama has effectively used Twitter throughout his presidential election campaign.

The fact that the growth of Twitter over the past year is an astounding 974% says a lot about the Twitter explosion around the world. Among governments and countries, Israel Government is credited with using Twitter for the first time officially. In the recent Iranian elections Twitter played an important role of communication and the Iranian protestors who questioned the fairness of elections used Twitter so effectively that the Iranian authorities tried to block Twitter in Iran.

Thousands of stranded people could use Twitter effectively to contact others for help. Google uses Twitter to announce updates of Google policies and programs. Student communities use Twitter to exchange academic and other messages. Business houses use Twitter to communicate with their customers and others. Websites use Twitter to announce updates and business offers along with site URLs. A whole lot of business and marketing campaigns are currently running using Twitter as an effective medium. Thousands of new websites and businesses have come up to monetize Twitter and make money online. Similarly, there are thousands of programmers and software developers in the business of making applications to make Twitter work for special interest groups and businesses. In fact there is no field of work or life that is not influenced by Twitter!

So, as I said what makes Twitter so special? Listen to the video above and start tweeting if you are not a Twitterer already!

Do you have any Twitter experience that you would like to share with our readers? Please use the comment box and let us know. You can even publish your Twitter experiences in this blog!

DoS attack against Twitter and other social networking sites

Are you a regular Twitter user? If so you know about the DoS attack (Denial of Service attack) or DDoS attack (Distributed Denial of Service attack) directed at Twitter and other social networking sites. From August 6th, 2009 onwards, I have been trying to post some tweets and reciprocate to some of my followers. But nothing has been working till the time of writing this post.

From news sites I understood about the DoS or DDoS attack on the same day and read on newspapers the next day. The attack seems to be one of the biggest in recent times, as it has paralyzed Twitter and affected other social networking sites such as LiveJournal, Facebook, Blogger, etc. Blogger was the least affected as Google’s preventive measures could stop the attack. Others too came back on service soon while the attack that caused a blackout of Twitter for about two hours is still crippling Twitter that expects to be normal soon.

The DoS attack was aimed at a single individual, a pro-Georgian activist and blogger known as Cyxymu, who has a presence on a number of sites, including Twitter, LiveJournal, Facebook, Blogger, etc. So the attack appears to be directed at him rather than the affected sites themselves. Reportedly, a bot was directed to request his pages at such a fast rate that it impacted service for other users and drove the servers of the affected sites on the verge of collapse.

"Attacks such as this are malicious efforts orchestrated to disrupt and make unavailable services such as online banks, credit card payment gateways and, in this case, Twitter, for intended customers or users," Twitter co-founder Biz Stone wrote on his blog.

The microblogging service site Twitter has had a meteoric rise since its launch in 2006 with about 45 million users worldwide as of June 2009. The actual users’ number is likely to be higher as they interact with Twitter through mobile phones or third party software. But still it is much less in comparison to Facebook, which claims to have 250 million active users worldwide.

Both Twitter and Facebook were recently in worldwide attention when they were used by Iranians to co-ordinate demonstrations following the disputed election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president, and as many Iranian protestors believed there was electoral fraud and that opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi should have won the elections.

Typically a DoS attack or DDoS attack aims at making server resources unavailable to actual users. Sometimes they target sites or services hosted on high profile servers such as banks, credit card companies, and other sensitive services. In DoS attacks, the miscreants use a bot or malware (malicious software) to flood the targeted server with service requests so that the usual users are denied service. In DDoS, the attacker may take advantage of internet security vulnerabilities of a user’s computer by planting a bot or malware hidden in free downloads. These user’s computers are then used by the attacker to launch attacks on targeted websites.

Mostly attackers flood the target servers with service requests massively so that servers cannot respond to legitimate traffic. DoS attacks are also aimed at either forcing the targeted machines to reset, or consume its own resources so that it can no longer provide any service.

The effect of increasing bank failures on US economy

What does the continuing and increasing number of US bank failures mean to the American public and small and medium size business entities? Simply put, it is a big dampener, a depressant to those who want to strive and come out of the recession. One has to keep in mind that the medium and small enterprises and the labor of the common man contribute the major bulk of the GDP, not the handful of the big players!

With every failure of financial institutions, stock prices plunge, real estate market dampens, and the labor force which is already under pressure with one of the biggest job losses in recent history lose heart and give even much lower levels of output. The effect is a complicated chain reaction that is bound to leave a psychological scar even after the depression is over.

As it happened in the recent takeovers of financial institutions, bankruptcy cases and similar contingencies, not every thing is lost with every failure. The government steps in for rescue, of course at the expense of the taxpayers. So, ultimately, directly or indirectly, if the government has to do the carcass cleaning, why should it wait till the patients are mutilated? Symptoms are already known much before the financial breakdown. And if the government intervenes timely and take corrective measures, the news of the bank failures will not inflict psychological depression along with the financial depression. And it will not decelerate the rate at which the economy is recovering.

There were only 3 US bank failures in 2007, but it jumped to 25 in 2008, and the tally of the federally insured banks to fail this year rose to 72, the latest additions to the failed banks list being First State Bank, Community National Bank and Community First Bank. Interestingly, all the 72 failed banks were federally insured. The FDIC estimates the cost to the deposit insurance fund due to the failure of the three banks around $185 million.

The banks collapse because of the increasing job losses, sinking real estate/home prices and dwindling personal wealth that make it difficult for them to pay off debts. Bank failures and loan losses have sapped billions of dollars out of the deposit insurance fund making it at its worst since 1993, $13 billion as of the first quarter. The FDIC expects US bank failures to cost the insurance fund around $70 billion through 2013.

With the July 2008 seizure of IndyMac Bank, the insurance fund is estimated to have lost $10.7 billion. The largest US bank failure last year, Seattle-based thrift Washington Mutual Inc., which had about $307 billion in assets, fell in September 2008 and was acquired by JPMorgan Chase & Co. for $1.9 billion in a deal brokered by the FDIC.

A case worth considering is the performance of US stocks that opened higher on Thursday as a sharp fall in the number of US workers filing new claims for jobless benefits spurred optimism about the labor market and the pace of an economic recovery. It otherwise means, news of positive economic indicators immediately bring an improved economic performance, while negative indicators like increasing bank failures pull back an already beleaguered economy.

Tips for using user-generated content for AdSense

Dealing with user-generated content can be a tricky business, as your users will be adding their comments, uploading photos and images in your comments sections and guest books, etc. User generated content is highly useful for blogs, sites, forums, etc., but they can be troublesome too.

User-generated contents like comments are highly useful as they add valuable content to your blog or site and can be monetized, and many publishers are doing so profitably and effectively. Moreover, comments add value to your blog because your readers find a useful forum to discuss their views. If you actively promote user interaction, your blog will become very popular too.

While user-generated content is useful, they can be sometimes very harmful, both monetarily and branding your site or blog as one with inappropriate content or non family-safe. Inappropriate content or non family-safe content does not qualify you for displaying AdSense ads according to AdSense program policies. So, if users post inappropriate contents, and if you do not moderate or remove them, you may sometimes end up getting your AdSense account suspended by Google.

Inappropriate contents can also appear as links to adult sites with no words/text suggesting that the link is potentially harmful. You must also avoid comments or user-generated contents on violence, drugs, etc. that are not permitted by AdSense program policies.

The biggest problem is that you cannot know if such harmful comments/ contents are placed in comments, especially if your site/ blog is too big with thousands of pages. There are a few methods to restrict these problems, like installing filters and mechanisms that help you avoid such harmful contents.

Another way is to include a form link using which users can report you about inappropriate content and when you receive such messages, you can immediately remove the harmful content.

For more information and methods to deal with this problem, read AdSense guidelines by Inside AdSense Team posted to Inside AdSense. In case you have any questions or comments you are welcome to use the comment box and express it. I will be happy to reply to you, or provide you the appropriate link to Google’s guidelines.

Don’t let success stories mislead you

Do you like success stories, especially of people who made it big in wealth, fame, etc.? Most people do. I too like to read success stories. But success stories can sometimes make you do things that you never wanted to do, things that you are incapable of. You realize your folly only when you sadly understand that you just cannot emulate what the other person did.

This urge to emulate someone’s success is the strongest in the case of success stories of people who made millions and billions from virtually nothing. Such stories are abundant in the case of bloggers and others who try to make money on internet, mostly at their spare time, and in some cases full-time internet entrepreneurs, bloggers and others.

You can find success stories of people who made four-to-five figure incomes from content based ads (like AdSense), affiliate programs, etc. Mostly these success stories are published in the sites where such programs run. For example, I find success stories of AdSense publishers when I visit the related site to verify my AdSense account. I read the stories. They are really inspiring, they have the psychological impact to change your mindset and make you do what you are capable of or incapable of.

What you have to understand from success stories is that if certain persons can do certain things, you too can, but not necessarily by doing exactly what he or she did. They were successful because they were good at what they did. They had an inherent liking and passion for what they were doing. Then they worked to make their passions bear fruits. So, they, in fact, succeeded in their missions, accomplishing their goals, and success automatically followed and along with that came wealth. So, the key is doing passionately what you are good at. Not emulating someone blindly!

So, whenever you are awestruck with a success story, take that opportunity to locate your own inherent talents, things that you can do easily and enjoy doing. Once you locate what you are very best at, think of ways to do it. If you are a blogger, think of how you can present your strengths, talents and positive sides in your blogs. Write about them; publish them in your blogs. If required, include photos, videos, or whatever can supplement your main passion.

Do not be afraid of failure. Just make sure that you are doing what you are best at. If you like hunting, write your experiences about hunting. Add tips for others to follow. With the almost infinite reach of the internet, you are sure to find many fellow hunters, bloggers and others who are having interest in hunting. If you are regular in updating your hunters’ blog, and if you write some nice experiences and tips, you will have a stream of regular visitors who want to read your blog. Like, ‘birds of the same feather flock together’. (Not necessarily hunting, you can write about photography, music, or whatever you like and know the most!)

Having done the above elementary work, look at the traffic that your blog is attracting and think of ways to increase it. You can use a little bit of SEO, link building methods, marketing methods, social networking, etc. to boost traffic to your blog (to succeed, the blogger has to know a little bit of everything, especially the technology and mechanisms that make blogs and sites successful!).

If you could do what you are the best at, taking the above as an example, you are on your way to success. Think of monetizing the site, if you have not done so. You can monetize your site by placing ads, affiliate program links, and all other options available and do not take our time much once you set up these monetizing links/ programs in your blog. If you proceed like what you read, may be the next success story that I read (and others too!) will be yours.

Please do not take the above as a sure success formula (there is no sure-shot success formula, though many sellers of success stories claim so!). Try, improve, improvise, and retry. Improve yourself till you succeed. That is the only success formula. Do not give up till you succeed!