I got an email the other day from my hosting company that said they got acquired by another company.  24 hours later my old hosting company was gone and this site a long with a few others were down for nearly 24 hours.

I learned some valueable lessons from this:

1. I will back up my database and files on to my computer more frequently.  If this ever happens again, I will find a new host with in minutes.
2.  The host that I had wasn’t an extremely well known hosting company.  I will never again use a hosting company that isn’t better known.

My old hosting company was very awesome to work with.  I never had a problem with them.  But the transition to the new hosting company was horrible.  First they only gave me a 24 hour notice, which I didn’t see until most of my 24 hours were up and I couldn’t do anything about it.  Secondly, the new hosting company wasn’t ready to take in their newly acquired customers.  All I can say is holy cow, couldn’t you guys done a little bit better job than this?

I found the site Justin.tv the other day. Someone at Digital Point was talking about it. If you haven’t seen the site yet, this guy named Justin has a camera strapped to his head. The camera is on 24/7 filming his every move. He even has his cell phone number on the site so you can call him. It’s kind of like an internet version of the Truman Show.

I think this is a great marketing idea. Justin will probably receive a lot of business opportunities from this.  I also think it’s pretty boring, but a lot of people are interested in hearing about people’s private lives even if they aren’t famous. I think people in general are pretty nosey. I don’t know about you, but when I visit other people’s blogs, I enjoy reading posts that are about the blogger themselves. Maybe the have some pictures of their family up or what not. I will spend a ton of time looking at this person’s person’s family photos, and I don’t know the blogger and their family from Adam.

Anyhow, if you haven’t checked out the site, take a gander, www.justin.tv.

Wouldn’t it be nice if other people could help you sell your products?  You can entice others to help you sell your products by starting your own affiliate program.  The Idev Affiliate makes it easy to start your own affiliate program.  Idev software starts out at only $100.

This kind of affiliate program software is great for nearly any site that sells products or services.  Idev also has their own affiliate program.  You earn $20 just for signing up.

I plan on using this affiliate program for my directory in the near future.

I just installed a cool plugin called Show Top Commentors Plugin.  It is pretty sweet.  This plugin will display your top commentors.  I placed my top commentors right above my blog roll.  This plugin will help encourage people to comment on your blog.  For your reader, it is like getting a free link in your blog roll.  All they have to do is keep up with commenting.  So if you would like to show up in my top commentors section, comment away.  Just don’t spam me. 

I haven’t been posting much lately since my schedule has been so crazy. With what little down time that I have, I’ve been playing a game called Zuma. I borrowed a friends laptop to check out some programs that he had. One of the games he had on his laptop was Zuma. He told me before I borrowed his laptop that the game was addicting. I didn’t listen to him and I started playing. Now I’m addicted. I’m not a video game kind of guy either. I don’t even think I beat Super Mario Brothers 1 on the Nintendo NES.

I think sometimes it is good just to chill and not worry about working on stuff. Off to Zuma I go.

Well, I got rid of the My Blog Log badge, at least for the time being. I can’t control people’s avatars so I’m taking it down. I’m going to look into to it to see if I can still have the badge, but leave the avatars off. I am not an advocate for porn, or anything that is in any way related to it.  I’ve had a couple avatars show up on My Blog Log tag that I did not feel were kosher.

Here goes a quick rant about porn.  Many of you who read my blog know that I do children’s ministry for a living.  In the time that I’ve been in ministry, I’ve seen marriages that have been destroyed by pornography.  And I’ve met kids who’s lives were in a downward spiral because of being exposed to it.  The world wonders why there are so many sex crimes committed.  The truth is, what a person puts in their heart comes out.  I could say more, but the bottom line is, I don’t want trashy pictures on my site.  Until I figure out (take the time to figure out) how to take the avatars off, I’m not going to display My Blog Log badge.