BBC news - it’s the details that matter

Richard Porter describes the difficulties in delivering the news when details are sketchy - such as the recent Iraqi truck bombings, and flooding in North Korea.
However, in my opinion, the problem with media in general isn’t lack of details on breaking stories - it’s the insertion of suspect details in more in-depth coverage.
For example, all [...]

New changes on Google this week

For those who read this with an interest in SEO, I’ve noticed a few interesting changes on Google over the past week.
Firstly, Google seems to have tweaked the algo so that keyword domains have lost a little of their dominance. So just because “blue-widgets.com” is an established, if poorly built and promoted site, it no [...]

Good staff are hard to find

Good staff are hard to find.
I’ve got some good staff on my team - my writers are especially of a good standard, namely because I never went on price, but instead, on quality, hiring experienced writers already working in the UK press industry.
However, writing requires a particular skill - what’s more difficult is when [...]

Netscape going Indonesian?

Is Netscape becoming a multi-lingual social media site?
For some reason a large number of posts from Indonesia - and written in Indonesian - appear to have been flooded into the site.
I can only guess the Netscape people figure on promoting Netscape as a multi-lingual site.
I guess I should start submitting in Gaelic. :)

Getting support calls for news sites?

Been an odd morning - it’s only 10am, but I’ve already had two phone support requests because of news sites I operate.
On HomeMove I wrote an article about NHBC certificates - a form of guarantee that a new build property is built to proper standards. It also ensures the builder/developer will correct faults (snagging issues) [...]

How to make blogs successful

I just got an email request for an interview - the second over the past few months. No idea what happened over the first as I was never updated, so I’ll repost my answers here.
The basic gist was - what makes for a successful blog?
Obviously ibrian.co.uk isn’t a particularly successful blog - but I’m not [...]

Netscape hit with porn spam

Damn - it looks like the porn spammers are hitting Netscape, with a whole set of categories based on adult and related keywords, promoting the sex videos on the site ebloggy.com:
Sex
Sexy
Lesbians
Love
gay
movies
humor
stories
Not sure what Netscape’s policy is on adult content, but I strongly suspect it’s not necessarily going to be welcome.
What’s a shame is that I [...]

Rediscovering link building

Since Threadwatch closed it’s killed off my social respite time, forcing me to concentrate more on work.
It’s sad to lose that social connection with the SEO world, but since then I’ve found myself being creative again with link building, and discovered some interesting new solutions.
Some I know other SEO’s are already using - some I [...]

Archive org - actually useful!

Normally I find archive.org something of a curiosity - it’s fun to see how sites looked years ago, but aside from that, not much use?
Or so I thought.
Recently I’ve figured on setting up a few blogs outside of commercial niches, just to document my personal interests as I see them.
I’m always reading up on [...]

Fancy Dress

What’s really interesting running the Platinax Business Directory is the type of submissions that it attracts.
While not expensive, the £14.95 submission fee is enough to separate the wheat from the chaff, and there are very few low quality sites that get submitted.
What’s really interesting is how many paid submissions I get from multinational companies. [...]

Rip-off links

Take a look at these two threads:

Want Help to Get Registered Office in UK
Another interesting Question?

The “SEO company” responsible for this forum spamming has a London address, but is essentially a bunch of Indian spammers.
Get this, though - I contacted them, and they told me each link provided in those threads cost £15. Each.
I don’t [...]