JimWorld Gazette Issue #65 10/16/1998

Gazette - Issue #65 - October 16, 1998

I received an email this week that took me to task for send out 'your newsletter which is nothing more than blatant self-promotion of your web site. Every article just tries to send your readers to places on your site where there is more information.'

First, let me say 'DUH!'

It has taken 2 1/2 years to create a web site where people can learn just about anything they need to know about promotion, emarketing and community building. When an item comes up that our readers need to know about, we're proud to be able to send them to specific information and tools to let them investigate the issue. The fact that many of them are on on of my sites is the result of lots of late nights trying to find information elsewhere, not finding it and having to create it.

If you take the time to actually read an issue of the Gazette, you will find that most of the articles point to other sites, not just mine.

So, keep those cards and letters coming. I really need the chuckles I get once or twice a week.

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I want to thank Dottie Gruhler of Extreme Women <http://www.extremewomen.com> for asking me to 'speak' at their Expo'98 Conference today. The hour and a half just flew by as the attendees asked a steady flow of challenging questions about on-line promotion and commerce. The Expo continues Tuesday with featured speakers TJ Walker (yes, our very own TJ) <http://antifraud.com/> discussing ways for merchants to protect themselves from credit card fraud, and Liz Folger of The Bizy Moms site <http://www.bizymoms.com>

You really should plan on attending. The quality of the conversations is far better than you will get at 'real-world' conferences that charge you big bucks to attend. I'll get an address from Dottie where you can go download the proceedings of the various discussions and send it in the next issue.

This event also exposed me for the first time to an outstanding chat system, called ChatSpace <http://chatspace.com/> I will review it as soon as I receive a copy of the software, but for now if you want to set up a very good chat room for your site, get on over there. There's even a free download of their chat server that runs on Windows on your machine and hosts up to 10 users at once.

And The Winner Is:
Goings On
New JimTool - TracerLock
Building An Affiliate Network
Finding Content For You Newsletter
A Call For Change - Part III
It Works
Get Linked
Snippets

Link to this issue of the Gazette as http://gazetteworld.com/go/to.cgi?l=g65

AND THE WINNER IS...

The winner of the Intermark <http://www.intermk.com/> contest for Gazette subscribers is Bonnie Jean DeBoard. Bonnie is currently using WebTV to access the Web, so our little speed-demon prize should help her get around a bit faster.

Bonnie wins the following computer: AMD K6-2 300 Mhz MMX processor, 128 MB DRAM, 6.3GB drive, 16-bit sound card, 4MB video card, 32X CD-ROM, Superdrive, mouse, keyboard, speakers, 56K modem, 17" monitor, Win98, Websuite, WebDB, CoolCat, WebSnake.

Congratulations Bonnie. Hope you enjoy your new computer and software.

To the rest of you, hang on. I'm working on the next contest right now and hope to have it in place for a drawing before Christmas.

GOINGS ON

GIF Runner
http://jimworld.com/freeware/

To those of you that experienced troubles getting GIF Runner to run, take heart. It is fixed, and you don't even have to download it again. Just run it and it will 'heal' itself. Don't we wish Windows was able to do that? Remember: the code is 5020.

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Keyword Keyhole
http://keywordkeyhole.com/

Several new directories have been added and they are now contributing their search words to the 'pool' of real life searches.

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Helpware Sites Directory
http://helpwaresites.com

It's done at last. The long awaited final design of the Helpware Directory has been completed, and if I do say so myself, it ain't bad.

John Cokos has added lots of new features to the Directory.

A chat room
An Opt-In system that lets you register to be notified every time a new site is added to the category (or categories) that you want to monitor.
Rank-It voting. Now you can express your opinion (once only) of each site in the directory. Rank-It from 1 to 10. Help others know what to expect when they visit a site.
Review-This-Site. Now each and every site in the directory has its own page for visitors (and site owners) to post their comments. Just another way to make the directory more useful when someone is searching for just the right information on the Web.
Not completely operational yet is the system to allow members to maintain their own listing information. More about this as soon as we get it ironed out. Look for the procedure in your email box.
Lots of new content pages explaining about the directory. Look at the bottom of each page for the links.
Complete banner rotation system with full accounting. It even has a unique ability to rotate text-based ads. Now directory owners can rotate their affiliate links to books, toys, and others without taking up a lot of bandwidth displaying GIF banners.
Even more additions to the Administration system. You'll have to wait for the review to see how that works. There is so much to the administration modules that I need lots of screen shots to show it to you.

If you have been considering adding a link directory to your site, do yourself a favor and check out Hyperseek. I'm preparing an extensive review that will be posted to the VP site this week with lots of screen shots, but for now just go to http://hyperseek.com/ and see the whole list of amazing things Hyperseek can do - right out of the box.

Now that the Helpware Directory has reached its final design, the Public Relations and Promotion team is swinging into gear. They will be getting the word out everywhere which will mean a lot of new traffic for each of the member sites.

If you want to pitch in some promotion effort, or resources you can donate for their use, please contact the PR Team Leader, Carole Lipari at mailto:c27653@erols.com

I am now caught up reviewing Helpware submissions. If you submitted a site and did not get either a confirmation or a message that the site was not added, you might want to check the directory. If your site isn't listed, please submit it again.

You might also want to go post some comments about your site in the Review section. Please, no hype and BS. Just explain what someone can expect to find at your site.

When you are posting reviews of sites other than your own, play nice. This is not open season to slam everybody in sight. Try to post comments that will help surfers decide if the site has what they are looking for. We don't need reviews of design. Just content. I will be reviewing the posts and people who don't paly nicely will lose there right to post additional reviews.

If you haven't joined Helpware yet, this is the time. We are ready to stimulate major traffic growth. Just remember to put the button on your page(s) before you submit.

NEW JIMTOOL

TracerLock
http://www.peacefire.org/tracerlock/

For the past few weeks I've been watching the email box for messages from TracerLock. They show up as regular as tax bills. And I always learn something from them.

TracerLock is an engine that watches keywords on AltaVista and lets you know when new sites are indexed containing your keywords.

The service is free. Visit the home page to sign up. Once you have your free account and password, log in to your User page. There you can select up to five keywords or phrases to monitor in the AltaVista database, and an additional five that you can monitor in the Usenet listings.

Every night, TracerLock searches for your keywords on AltaVista and sends you the listings of the first 10 new listings it finds in AltaVista and also in the Usenet discussions.

This is one of the handiest 'push' implementations I have yet seen. I never seem to get around to visiting the search engines as often as I should, so TracerLock brings the search engine to me.

There is another similar service called The Informant at http://informant.dartmouth.edu/

It is every bit as useful as TracerLock.

The Informant lets you register up to three keywords/phrases and at intervals selected by you, it searches Lycos, AltaVista, Excite, and Infoseek for any new sites that appear in the top 10 results from each of those engines and sends you an email to let you know to visit the Informant sites to view your results.

Every time you visit, the Informant logs your visit and the next time it informs you, it doesn't show you any sites that you have already seen.

Each of these services fulfill a different need. You should get signed up with both and start letting some of your work get done while you sleep.

BUILDING AN AFFILIATE NETWORK

The Nuts and Bolts

I believe it was several months ago Jim started to hound me about the need to set up an affiliate program for some of the software products we sell. Although I saw the value in doing such, it was not until a couple days ago that our program went online.

Why the big delay? Very simple actually. I could not find an affiliate system that met all my qualifications, that would do everything I wanted it to do, that I had complete control over, and that would not give me permanent brain-damage trying to get it set-up and working properly.

Sure, I used the fact that we were in the middle of a complete and total redesign of our primary web site as an excuse to put the affiliate project on the back burner. But after we were down to the final testing stages of the site redesign, I realized I had better find what I needed.

In its simplest form, an affiliate program allows other web sites to promote yours (usually through banner displays) with a special affiliate link. Then, all visitors to your site coming from an affiliate link are tracked and the affiliate is then rewarded in some manner.

However, there are many other considerations when evaluating a system for your site. Several of these considerations are obstacles I ran into while evaluating such systems.

In house control: There are several other companies/web sites out there that host affiliate systems. You sign-up with them to run your affiliate program on their server. The ones I looked at were fairly expensive - although flexible. But, I did not want to have my entire affiliate program dependant on an outside company - the old saying "Here today - gone tomorrow" is especially applicable to the Internet.

Zero-wait startup: There is one thing I have learned about my own habits when it comes to responding to emails or finishing projects. If I don't respond to an email as soon as it comes into my box - within a few days it is pushed so far down that I might not get back to it for weeks. The same applies to projects - I can't begin to count the stacks of unfinished projects piled up on my desk. The reason they sit there uncompleted is I am still waiting for something I need to finish them. I needed an affiliate system that would enable my affiliates to sign-up, receive their ID and everything else they needed to get started immediately - not days later.

Customization: I don't like "cookie-cutter" solutions. An affiliate system should be customizable. Can you assign different commission rates? Can you customize the tracking system? Can you change the look and feel of the interfaces?

Reporting: I wanted a system that allowed my affiliates to check their statistics in real-time - without me having to do anything.

Processing: This one factor was the biggest downfall in most of the systems I evaluated. Granted, my situation is rather complicated. I wanted to offer not one, but 10-12 different products to my affiliates. To further complicate matters, each of our software products can be ordered by 6 different methods (secure online credit card, credit card by FAX, secure online Vcheck, Vcheck by FAX, phone and mail). How in the world was I going to find a system that could track orders via all those ordering methods?

Nirvana: Finding a system that would do everything I needed and having someone else install, configure and test it for me before "giving me the keys."

Being reassured that I must have some good karma left in my account, three weeks ago I literally stumbled upon a new start-up company offering a new affiliate system. I think I came across this company when I misspelled a URL in my browser. Anyway, I looked at their online information then gave them a call - yes, they actually listed a phone number. After explaining all my needs and the complexities of my site, I was assured the system could do what I wanted, although the US representative I spoke with was not intimately familiar with the exact technical details. A few hours later I was contacted by the actual programmer of the system and we exchanged a dozen messages working out the final details.

One week later, my affiliate system was installed on my server, tested and ready for customization - for less than half of what the other programs cost. It took me less than an hour to make minor alterations to my existing order forms (including the creation of a new Phone Order form). Then I splurged and spent another hour or so doing some heavy customization to the HTML output pages to fit the new site design.

Here is what I ended up with: A completely CGI based system (available for NT also) that handles the entire process. The only actual editing required is in a couple of text files to set commission rates and such.

Now, when someone wants to become an affiliate for our software products (our affiliates are eligible for commissions on 10 of our best selling programs), all they have to do is complete a simple online form. Upon submission, the CGI instantly generates a page in their browser containing their affiliate ID number and full instructions on how to link into our site. They are also directed to another section on the site where they view and download all our eligible products banners. I decided to go a step further and wrap up the 50 available banners (5 different sizes for each product) into a self-extracting .exe file so a new affiliate can download that file and have all 50 banners and full instructions on their hard drive. In other words, someone can join our program and start earning commissions literally within a few minutes from submitting the sign-up form.

On the order processing end, the system is flawless. The package included two order processing scripts that embed the affiliate number into both online transmitted forms and into any page you wish - such as "fill in and print this form to FAX" pages. Each time an order is submitted online, the total of that order is immediately added to the affiliate database allowing each member to go to a special URL to check their current sales and estimated commissions.

All in all, I could not be happier with this system (OK Jim, I guess I owe you for finally talking me into doing something about this) and although it has only been live on the site for a couple of days, the number of affiliate members seems to grow by the hour.

I would like to invite you all to stop by our completely new site at <http://softwaresolutions.net> and check out the redesign. If you follow the "Reseller Programs" button you can get a good general idea of how this particular system works. If you are interested in a great affiliate system for your own site, you can follow the "Our Friends" button and click on the link for The Affiliate Zone - it is directly above the link and logo for the Gazette.

FINDING CONTENT FOR YOUR NEWSLETTER

In our continuing saga for publishers (or wantabe publishers) of e-newsletters, we now take up the rather complex issue:

How To Find Content And Still Have A Life.

Obviously, I can't tell each of you where to find information specifically for your industry, but I can give you some general sources and point you in the right direction.

The most important subject is: push versus pull.

Pull: Not the best method. Using Pull, you have to go out onto the web and seek out the news you need to create your newsletter. Trust me, you won't get around to it.

Push: The better way. Push means arranging to have the news come to you. Most news sites have options to allow you to register for categories of information that would be of interest to you. Go to those sites, register to receive daily updates, and then you will have a steady flow of material for your newsletter.

I have been registered with the following press release services for a long time. Every day I receive several messages, each having a list of today's activities. All I have to do is scan for items that I can use, and click on the links to retrieve the full story.

-- PR Newswire http://www.prnewswire.com/

-- Internet Wire http://www.internetwire.com/

-- NewsBytes http://www.newsbytes.com/

-- PR Web http://www.prweb.com/

-- Web Wire http://www.webwire.com/

-- Internet News Bureau http://www.newsbureau.com/

Add to the above a subscription to every other e-zine that addresses your industry. Monitor those e-zines. They will be monitoring yours. I'm not telling you to steal their content. But their articles will give you ideas for your own e-zine, and you may also find articles that you want to tell your subscribers about so they can go read them.

Next, go out and find daily news sites that have content appropriate to your industry. Subscribe to their daily news summary Push. You'll get summaries (with links to the full story) every day in your email box.

I subscribe to several, but Andover is a good example. <http://andovernews.com/> Each day they send me a summary of current Internet news.

Now sign up for several 'What's New On The Web' services, like the one a Yahoo! This will give you a steady flow of leads to new web sites that might be of interest to your subscribers, or provide you with subjects for your articles.

Finally, make it easy for your site's community members to send you information that they have found. They know what your subscribers would be interested in and they will gladly send you a steady flow of tips. Be sure to reward them with a credit and link when you use a tip.

Whew! that's a lot of information headed your way. If you will spend about 30 minutes each day filtering this information, you will wind up with more great information than you will need to create your e-zine.

A CALL FOR CHANGE - PART III

Moron-Proofing Your Perl CGI Programs

A typical CGI Program installation goes something like this:

Webmaster decides he needs a script that does "X"
Webmaster goes to CGI Resources (http://www.cgi-resources.com) to find the perfect freeware Perl program to suit his/her needs.
Webmaster downloads 2 or 3 similar programs.
After spending an hour fiddling with all of the variable settings inside the program, Webmaster decides to try and upload the file(s) and have a go at it.
500 Server Error - Webmaster re-examines the program and discovers that he forgot to close the quotes on a variable. Re-Upload the program.
Repeat Step 5 until the program works properly.
2am Webmaster is frustrated with steps 5 and 6 so he decides to pay me to either install the program for him or write him a new one.

The webmaster is not really a moron. It's not his fault. It's the CGI programmer's fault that the installation went awray. Why should we, as CGI programmers expect the average "Joe Webmaster" to know anything about Perl or variable syntax, or anything for that matter, about the program. The real problem here is the CGI programmer, who expects that everyone should obey the 'extremely well written' comments in the source code to his program. Shame on him, you, and me for adopting and conforming to this worst of all possible standards.

So now what, Mr. High and Mighty?

We can completely de-moronize our programs in 2 simple steps:

Step 1.
Have the guts, as a programmer, to dive in and re-think some of your programming practices. Your users will appreciate it, and might even (if you're careful) come back for more.

Step 2.
Take the heavy load off of your users. Make your program idiot proof enough, so that all that has to be done is for the webmaster to upload it and go. That's right. Upload and go. I'm going to make a blanket statement here, and if it offends you, you had it coming. If not, welcome to the world of open minded programming....

ANY CGI PROGRAM THAT REQUIRES THE END USER TO EDIT THE SOURCE CODE TO MAKE IT WORK, FOR ANY REASON, IS GARBAGE. NOT ONLY IS IT GARBAGE, BUT THE PROGRAMMERS BEHIND THESE ATROCITIES SHOULD BE FORCED TO APOLOGIZE TO THE ENTIRE INTERNET COMMUNITY.

Now that I have your attention, and the collective anger of 99% of the CGI programmers out there, let me show you how to moron-proof your program.

require, require, require, require

This is the single most important command in the Perl Language to the open minded programmer. With a simple statement like this:

require "variables.pl";

You have just idiot proofed your program. This simple statement will "pull-in" an external file into your program, just like it was part of your code in the first place. Here's how it works:

Consider 2 files...The first is a .cgi program with a require statement, the second is the file that is being required:

myprogram.cgi

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

require "variables.pl";

print "Content-Type: text/html\n\n";

print "Hello, and welcome to $WEB_SITE_NAME\n";

exit0;

variables.pl

$WEB_SITE_NAME = "My Site";
1;

A quick note about this "required" file. It has to have a 1; as the last line in it. Just as every Perl program needs to start with #!/path/to/perl, any required file must return "true" or 1.

When myprogram.cgi is run from your server, it actually looks like this:

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

$WEB_SITE_NAME="My Site";

print "Content-Type: text/html\n\n";

print "Hello, and welcome to $WEB_SITE_NAME\n";

exit0;

Pretty cool, huh?

So, now, all that the webmaster has to do is edit the variables.pl file correctly. This is better than the old way of having them edit the source code, but not by much. They can still mess this up very easily. Let's give them an online way to do this quickly, easily, and without the chance of a mistake.

------ LISTING: Config.cgi -------
#!/usr/local/bin/perl

require "variables.pl";

&parse_form;

$ACTION = $input{'action'};

if ($ACTION) { &save_config; }
else { &get_config; }

exit 0;

######### Subs ########
sub get_config {

## This is simply going to show a form with the variables in it

print "Content-Type: text/html\n\n";
print "

Variable Configuration

\n";
print "\n";

}

sub save_config {

## Now, we just save whatever the user typed in to the variables.pl file.

## It's not necessary, but I like to convert the $input into more readable
## variables for this...

$new_web_site_name = $input{'web_site_name'};
open(CFG, ">variables.pl");
print CFG "\$WEB_SITE_NAME=\"$new_web_site_name\";\n";
print CFG "1;";

close(CFG);

print "Content-Type: text/html\n\n";
print "

Changes Saved

\n";

}

sub parse_form {
## Code omitted here for space.
}

---- END LISTING -----

This is the basic framework for a simple 'configuration' editor. Obviously, you could enhance it with file locking, open/print/close verification, etc. I just wanted to give you the idea of how to construct it....

Using this example, you would distribute 3 files to your users:

config.cgi
variables.pl
myprogram.cgi

All your user has to do is upload all 3 of them, and chmod them all to 755 (chmod 777 for the variables.pl). Once they're uploaded, firing up the config.cgi in their browser will give them a form that they will use to enter all the information your program needs, and save it. Once saved, myprog.cgi will work immediately (assuming you've gotten it bug free....)

Whew. That's enough for this installment. Next issue, we'll explore how you can give your users more control over the output of your program, so they can have it fit into their web site. Again, without having to go through your code and muck it all up.....

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John Cokos
The Interactive Web (http://www.interactive-web.net)
Web Programming Supersite (http://www.web-programming.com)

IT WORKS

Jim-

Just a quick "thank you" for all the information and experience I have received from JimWorld over the past 8 or so months. Thanks to your advice and the excellent help of your forum moderators, I have finally accomplished some of the goals I set for my fledgling web site, GreekNet <http://greeknet.hypermart.net>.

After working for months to even get LISTED in a search engine, I joined this community and it has paid off handsomely. I now have listings in almost all of the major search engines. And, while I'm working to improve those listings, I have taken your advice to heart and begun to focus on content and community efforts.

Well, it has paid off. GreekNet is now listed as a RECOMMENDED WEB SITE by EXCITE and WEBCRAWLER in their education channels. What I could not do through search engine promotion, I actually accomplished by content. Now, a visit to Excite and a search for fraternity or any related topic will bring up a list of recommended sites in advance of the standard results. And now, GreekNet is one of the four resources featured. The same can be said of the Excite owned Webcrawler.

I owe these results to you and your community. I will continue improving my content and working within your community to improve my site and the sites of others.

While my accomplishment is by no means out of the ordinary for JimWorld community members, I just wanted to say thanks. Please keep up the great work.
Again, thank you,

Kevin Donahue
Webmaster, GreekNet
http://greeknet.hypermart.net

GET LINKED

Romance Network
http://www.romantics.net/webmasters/#submit

Got a site about romance? Submit it for a free listing.

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Web Search 2K
http://websearch2k.com/

Growing directory with ability to search by state or global. Get your free listing.

----------

More places to submit your URL:

Site Shack
http://www.siteshack.com/

The Cozy Cabin
http://www.cozycabin.com/urlsearch.html

Manga Seeker
http://www.mangacenter.com/

Dewa.com
http://www.dewa.com/

Aeiwi
http://www.aeiwi.com/

Infohighway
http://www.infohiway.com/

Jump City
http://www.jumpcity.com/send-page.html

What's New?
http://www.whatsnew.com/whatsnew/submit/

Splat
http://splatsearch.hypermart.net/

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Hi Jim,

I am sure I don't need to tell you again how priceless JimWorld.com has been for my online efforts, but I will anyway.

Most of my traffic (approximate 65%) comes from my listing in Yahoo. I was completely unsuccessful getting listed at Yahoo until I participated in your Yahoo forum. With advice found there, I was listed within 3 days!

I can't thank you enough.

If you feel it is appropriate, I would like to share a resource with the Gazeteers:

Cafe Progressive's Resource Directory

<http://users.lmi.net/jchas> is a unique blend of progressive political, educational and multicultural online resources. All listings are categorized and annotated and our search engine makes finding the site you need even more convenient.

If you have an appropriate site, please come and get listed!

SNIPPETS

GTE Abandons Unlimited Internet Access

The movement away from unlimited Internet access builds up a real head of steam. I see this as a positive step towards reducing the congestion on the Net. The timing is right to help reduce busy signals during the Christmas shopping season which looks to be a record setting busy time for the Net this year.

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Hack puts AOL off limits

Because AOL had not taken the option of securing their records with Internic, a hacker was able to have the AOL domain name moved to another server, making the AOL site and email addresses unavailable for several hours. Could this happen to you? Have you simply taken the easy route at Internic and secured your records using your email address for security? There are more secure options available that you should investigate, such as using a password instead of the email address. While you are there, make sure Internic has the correct ownership and contact information for your domain. When you need to move is not the time to do battle over out-of-date information.

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Search Engine Doings

Excite and Webcrawler have made the move to recognize Meta tags as part of their relevancy ratings. Lycos remains as the only one of the 'Majors' not using Meta tags when they index a page. If you have been happy with your rankings on Excite and Webcrawler, you might want to check them to see if you're still happy. There are some excellent discussions going on in the Search Engine Forums about the impact of this development. Drop in at Jim's http://searchengineforums.com/ and get caught up.

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Free Online Resource Center
http://www.come.to/the-source/

One of the Helpware Member sites, this extensive resource of Where-What-How-Why has extensive links to Webmastery resources all over the Net. Absolutely worth a bookmark.

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Atajos-Auto-Registralo
http://www.enter.net.mx/xyz/atajos/autoregistralo.html

If your site is written in Spanish, you need to know about this resource. You can submit your site to 48 different Spanish language search engines and directories.

----------

Four Corners Effective Banners
http://www.whitepalm.com/fourcorners/

Enough information on good banner creation and placement to keep you busy the rest of the night. Another Bookmark site.

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Surviving The Net

Just a gentle reminder: When you are considering doing business with a company on the Net, ask for the official name of the company, their street address (not a P.O. Box), their phone number and the names of the principals of the company. Check this information against their Domain name information on file with Internic (or other TLD). If it doesn't smell right, wrap it in yesterday's Gazette, throw it out, and find another vendor. If they pass the first test you can move on to checking their references. If you do all of this and get burned, that falls under the category of bad luck. It you don't check a company out and then you get burned, that falls under the category of lazy.

If you just want to hire someone to do something for you and you don't care about it really being done, shucks, just send me your money. I can not do it for you with the best of them.

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Things I'm REALLY Tired Of

About 50 times a day I get one of the following. They don't vary. They are mindless autoresponders that do nothing but embarrass their owners.

"Thanks for your offer, its is very tempting. I might consider it further. But first I have some questions.

"Are you PART of an online community like AOL, Geocities, or Tripod. Would your rather OWN an Online Community for FREE at MyFreeOffice? Do you know some have built organizations as large as 500,000 webpages?"

The spelling is not mine. These 'enticing, on-target offers' come back to me in response to everything from FFA confirmations to status reports from the Submitter. None are ever in response to anything I offered the person. Why send out something like this that doesn't even pretend to be communication? People should have to pass a test in order to get access to an autoresponder. I'll even volunteer to design the test.

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Jim,

Been enjoying your newsletter for a couple of months now and keep gleaning little tidbits of marketing tips from everyone. However, I am a little concerned about the GIF Runner. As a photographer, I post a lot of my images to my site to be used as a portfolio and to advertise stock. I don't currently use GIFs but I know some other artists who do. This work is copyrighted and to download it and use it for your own page would be an infringement.

Please let people know that they need permission to use the graphics unless it is specifically stated that the work is free for use. Most sites I have looked at that have "free" graphics, usually have stipulations about how the work may be used or that links or credits must be given.

Otherwise, it certainly does sound like a neat piece of software. When will you promote some Mac software?

Thanks,
Matt
http://home.earthlink.net/~mckeephoto

Jim .02 - Matt, I couldn't have said it any better, so I didn't. Thanks for pointing this out. Just because you can download something doesn't make it right. Copyright infringement can bite anybody, even when they try to behave. If you doubt that, go read the back issues to find out about the Scumbag that infringed on Post-It Notes (me).

I'm looking for some cool Mac software for our Freeware Plus program. If anybody has some, drop me a line. We'll make you famous!

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Drop by -your- web site.

Do you see any testimonials?

Why not?

Testimonials are the most powerful selling tool at your disposal. It lets new visitors bond to your site at the encouragement of others that have come this way before. Much more powerful than all the pages of hype you might write to sell yourself and your site.

This tip is for everyone, not just the commercial sites. If your site has anything to offer a visitor, then let your visitors 'sell' it to each other. If your site doesn't have anything to offer, why are you taking up the bandwidth? Develop some content.

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Proper use of a Domain Name for Trademark Protection
http://www.arvic.com/library/domanuse.asp

Nice article on your rights in the use of your domain name.