Rory Hansen

Happy Cyber Monday everyone!

If you haven’t heard yet, you can use coupon code 99DOMAIN over at GoDaddy.com to purchase .com/.net/.org domain names for 99 cents!

This is a smoking deal for anyone looking to start the New Year fresh with a new blog/website. Even if all you do is buy a domain for $0.99 and flip it for a few dollars on SitePoint or DigitalPoint, that few dollars is nearly pure profit!

To make the deal even more smoking, as always, if you purchase 5 or more domains from GoDaddy, they’ll throw in free Privacy Registration (a $11 savings on each domain!).

Keep in mind, this is just for 1-year domain name registrations. I’ve got a handful I’ll be registering tonight. Lemme know which domains you end up picking up!

So, if you haven’t wasted 30 minutes yet flipping through the new Gmail themes, go do it now. Then come back and join the conversation. ;-)

My favourites were Ninja, Cold Shower, Shiny, and Tree, but I also did like those cartoon-ish themes like Bus Stop and Tea House, too.
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I just found out I won a $350 multi-function color printer!

A few weeks ago, I entered the TechVibes Small Business Week contest by commenting on one of their small business posts. It’s the kind of contest I don’t mind entering, because it’s quick and easy to write a comment, plus you might also get a few extra hits from your website link in the comment signature.

Anyway, I’m pretty stoked. I don’t have a printer at the moment, so I’ll be sure to put it to good use.

Here’s what it looks like:

Thanks TechVibes!

On Halloween, I wrote that my SERP’s (Search Engine Ranking Positions) were totally off-the-wall, with keywords that I was once ranked #2 and #3 and #4 for showing no ranking at all. My niche website had essentially disappeared from Google’s radar for these high-traffic keywords, resulting in a > 75% drop in traffic. Forums like SitePoint and DigitalPoint and WebmasterWorld were filling with posts of weary webmasters, concerned about their keyword positions changing for the worse.

Thankfully, SERP’s seem to be returning to where they were pre-Halloween, as in the last 24 hours I’ve started to regain my keyword positions. (At least for some keywords.) I expect the Google Dance to go on for another 24 hours or so, after which time things should be back to normal.

I’ll be doing a more complete write-up of this after work today, but from the reading I’ve been doing, it seems to have been a Google error, where they accidentally reverted to old indexing data.

Are you on Twitter? I am.

If you’re looking to add to your daily intake of distracting tweets, feel free to add me. You can find me under @rhansen.

On other Twitter-related news, Darren Rowse (of ProBlogger.net fame) has launched his newest blog TwiTip, with the clever tagline, “Twitter Tips in 140 Characters or More.”

The most amusing part of the site so far is his blog’s tag cloud.

Can you imagine what it’s going to look like when the blog really get’s going?! “T”-overload!

A friend sent me this video tonight. I think it’s amazing.

This post is by guest contributor Jay Lee, an aspiring filmmaker and creative writer who provides commentary on movies, literature, and video games through his blog, TrainWreckIdeas.

Vulgarity and crude jokes are the basic ingredients of a great Kevin Smith movie, and never have they been used so fittingly.  Funny while funny looking Seth Rogen, alongside up and coming Elizabeth Banks, star in Silent Bob’s “Zack and Miri Make a Porno”. 

Two lifelong friends find themselves in a monetary crisis and make an amateur porno to dig their way up.  As with all solutions, it includes pitfalls that can trap you in a deeper hole than the one before.  Bye-bye money issues, hello relationship issues.  “Never thought of the repercussions of sleeping with someone you’ve known your whole life? What are you, slow?”

Seth Rogen had always been a funny cat with his unforgettable roles in “Freaks and Geeks” and “Undeclared”.  In the last few years, he had proven himself to be Hollywood’s newest comedic powerhouse with his roles in Judd Apatow’s “40 Year Old Virgin”, “Knocked Up”, and “Superbad”.  Now throw in some witty dialogue from Kevin Smith’s repertoire, and you get comedy’s hottest dynamic duo – a funnier, not quite Oscar-esque version of Depp and Burton if you will.

The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, and has been the hype for the last couple of months.  With great reviews outside of his core audience (unlike Mallrats), Smith might be looking to crack the $30 million barrier on the opening weekend (His previous highest grossing flick was Dogma which grossed approximately $30 million in total).  With a gut busting supporting crew that includes: Jason Mewes (Jay and Silent Bob Strikes Back), Jeff Anderson (Clerks, Clerks 2), Craig Robinson (The Office, Pineapple Express), Justin Long (Live Free of Die Hard, Accepted), Brandon Routh (Superman Returns) as well as adult industry superstars Traci Lord and Katie Morgan, that barrier doesn’t look too hard to break at all.

My friend Keith, who is an avid contributer to a few technology podcasts, is working on a new mission: To get his KickJoey website to PageRank 1 within the week.

For those that follow PageRank updates, you might already know the unlikeliness of this happening, considering that Google hasn’t updated PageRanks since July (or February, depending on what info you follow). But, hey, a mission is a mission, and you never know!

Anyway, head on over to the KickJoey website and share your PageRank opinions. Does Keith have a chance?

Have you seen the updated Yahoo! Sports website? What do you think?!

Personally, I like most of the new look. Not sure I dig the excessive use of graphics on the homepage, but whatever, it’s their website not mine. (I mean, the main reason I visit the Yahoo! Sports website in the first place, instead of TSN.ca or Sportsnet.ca is because it’s quick loading and the information I want is readily accessible. More graphics mean it takes longer to get to what I want.)

I do like the sharp new look and the fresh colors. Out with the old off-white and grey and in with some bolder, more vibrant colors.

Wanted: Income tax information for Internet-based businesses in Canada

I am looking for books, eBooks, or websites.

If you know of any good ones, please let me know! Revenue from my websites is getting to the point where I’d better cover my bases before the Gov’t comes after me.  : )