The CRIA threatened the company renting the servers to us, and because of this it is not possible to keep the site online. Sorry for the inconvenience and thanks for your understanding.

This is not the first time Demonoid has been shut down. In September of 2007, Demonoid.com was shut down without warning, and remained offline for over a week with no explanation. Ultimately, it was revealed that the company hosting the Demonoid servers had caved to pressure from the CRIA (Canadian Recording Industry Association) and had shut down access to the Demonoid servers.

Unfortunately, that seems to be the same case, this time, although it is believed that the Demonoid administrators took the site down, semi-willingly, rather than be forced offline as before. It is unknown whether or not the site administrators will attempt to re-open at a later date. Demonoid.com administrators could not be reached for comment.

As of 6:30am EST, the demonoid tracker still reports a status of “working” on seeded torrents, although several seeders are reporting no connected peers and no upload traffic for the past several hours.

The removal of all eBay advertising from Google began when Google attempted to crash eBay’s user conference, in Boston, this week.  eBay is holding their annual user conference, this week, in Boston.  Google, in an effort to promote their Google Checkout program, unveiled plans for the Google Checkout Freedom Party.  The event was intended to try to convince eBay - via lobby from eBay users - to start accepting Google’s Checkout, a direct rival of eBay-owned PayPal (eBay has banned Google Checkout from their system, stating that it has yet to prove itself in fraud protection).  All attendees of eBay’s user conference were given special invitations to attend Google’s Checkout Freedom Party, for free food, free drinks, and free massages.

Google backed down at the last second, when eBay expressed serious reservations, publicly, about the Google event, and Google’s actions toward the advertising partnership.  On Wednesday Google canceled the event, only one day before it was to take place several blocks (a quick trolley ride) away from the eBay event.  Google’s blog stated that, “eBay Live attendees have plenty of activities to keep them busy this week in Boston, and we did not want to detract from that activity. After speaking with officials at eBay, we at Google agreed that it was better for us not to feature this event during the eBay Live conference.”

Spokespersons for both companies have made a few choice comments on the issue:

Hani Durzy, an eBay spokesman, declined to say whether his company pulled advertising on Google in retaliation for the party. But he did voice disappointment in Google for the event, saying, “We didn’t think it was the way for one partner to treat another.”

Durzy decided to cast the advertising freeze as an experiment, news articles say, in an attempt to see if the money eBay has been using on Google will yield better results, elsewhere.  Neither Durzy, nor any other eBay representative, has mentioned where eBay will next advertise.

Derek Brown, an analyst for Carter Fitzgerald, stated, “We’ve seen that the two companies (eBay and Google)  have been on a collision course for a long time.  This seems to be the latest and most bizarre twist.”

eBay’s advertising funds were withdrawn from Google, this past monday, and AdSense publishers are already feeling the pinch.  Although the majority of eBay ads were relatively low cost per click (most in the two to five cent range), eBay was still Google’s biggest advertiser.  According to comScore Networks, eBay’s ads showed up on Google a whopping 188.3 million times in March.  More than double the number shown by Target, Google’s second largest (now first) advertiser.

What does this mean for AdSense sellers?  Those profiting off of eBay-related AdSense sites will find themselves in a sudden financial loss.  Publishers whose sites deal with specific products, auctions in general, and/or brand specific information, will find a good portion of the advertising on their site has disappeared.

In some cases, this may be a windfall for some publishers.  Almost every publisher would have had eBay ads on his or her website a few times a day, regardless of the theme.  Now the eBay ads that were so prevalent, and out of place, will be replaced with more highly targeted ads with potentially greater cost per click.

It will be interesting to see how this affects each individual publisher’s income.  This particular publisher has noticed a slight increase on one site, and a noticeable increase on another.  Time will tell how well publishers will fare with the loss of Google’s largest advertiser.

Technorati Tags: Google, eBay, AdSense, eBay User Conference, Google Checkout, Google Checkout Freedom Party, Target, PayPal

Want more hype?  Try this one on for size.  Wired News (a service of Lycos) bloggers are now posting more efficiently thanks to Lycos-Qumana.

Want even more?  Lycos-Qumana now presents a Mac version, as well as the PC version we’ve all come to love.  What are the differences between Lycos-Qumana, and plain old Qumana?  Well, none that I can see, besides the branding.  This means that everyone enjoying the Lycos branded version is enjoying the same Qumana featureset, and ease of use, that many have come to love.

Let’s not forget that Quamana’s AdGenta program has been re-branded as well.  Welcome to Q-Ads. The same AdGenta program, with a spiffy new name.

Take some time and go check out the hype at the Qumana Blog.  This should be an interesting partnership, and I’m definitely going to see where Lycos and Qumana go, from here.

Powered by Qumana

In the 1970’s, when Apple Computer was first formed, the Beatles’ company sued the fledgling computer company, and won quite a bit of money, as well as the following judgement: Apple Computer’s name and logo would be used to sell computers only, and not be used as a music company.

Apple Corps is now claiming that Apple Computer violated the agreement by creating the iTunes music store.  Apple Computer claims that since iTunes simple sells music (and does not produce music), it does not violate the agreement from the previous lawsuit.  The most amusing thought out of all of this?  If Apple Corps wins, it is possible that iTunes could be taken offline.  Oh heaven forbid, what would everyone do for music, then?

…can you even add your own mp3s, downloaded from other sources, onto your iPod?

sources: Fox News, AMCP Tech Blog, NY Times.

JournalHome.com has been sold for an undisclosed bid amount to an anonymous party. I am currently working hard to transfer all files and services to the respective party, without much interruption in service.

The full plans and details of the new owner are unknown, but I have expressed great concern in maintaining Journal Home integrity and keeping member journals in tact.

I find this absolutely hilarious that the creator of the service, Ant Onaf, is unwilling to disclose the name of the new JH owners.  It looks even more suspicious as his e-mail appears to say that even he does not know who the new owners are.  The part that REALLY gets me is, "The full plans and details of the new owner are unknown…"

The full plans and details are unknown?  You know, if I built a hugely successful site from scratch, I’m for damned sure want to know the full plans of bidders before I sold the site.

This sale is a bane for members of Journal Home.  Not only did it come out of the blue (NOTHING pointed toward the possible sale of JH, including JH’s own official blog), but members are receiving virtually no information as to what’s going on.  They’re so completely in the dark, they don’t even know that their accounts will still be around, tomorrow.  This is an extremely bad move for Journal Home.  Failing to keep their members informed, and simply sending an e-mail stating the site has been sold - and failing to give any details on the new owner - is absolutely ridiculous.

Currently, I have no idea who the new Journal Home owner will be.  The domain registration information still lists Shem Computers/Ant Onaf as the holder of the registration.  I’ll keep checking the domain info every few days, and will report back as soon as I have more information.  Anyone who can provide more information is extemely welcome to do so.

Share This ]]> http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/27/blogging-news-journalhomecom-sold/feed/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/06/blogging-science-pigeon-blogging/ http://www.fyreplace.com/2006/02/06/blogging-science-pigeon-blogging/#comments Tue, 07 Feb 2006 00:00:56 +0000 Fyre http://www.fyreplace.com/?p=315 From the “what will they think of next” category comes Pigeon Blogging.

Reuters reports that in August, a flock of pigeons - fitted with mobile phone backpacks - will be released over San Jose, California.

The birds will be used to monitor air quality/pollution, according to New Scientist Magazine (from the Reuter’s article). Each bird will carry a GPS tracking device, air pollution sensors, and a basic mobile phone (what do you want to bet, it’ll be a Nokia). The pollution sensor, in combination with the mobile phone, will send text messages back - in real time - to a special “pigeon blog” that will be publically accessible on the Internet.

The best part (and this is from the “I s–t you not” category)? “Miniature cameras slung around the pigeons’ necks will also post aerial pictures.”

This is truly the most unusual use of electronics - or birds - I’ve ever heard of. Even Google’s pigeon ranking system made more sense than this (on first read).

The Texas Progressive Alliance features seventeen of the best blogs in the Lone Star State, and its mission is to advance the cause of progressive issues and candidates. It also features an advertising network for those who wish to deliver their message to over a quarter of a million Texas progressive, weekly — the readers of the following blogs:

The Agonist, Annatopia, Brains & Eggs, Burnt Orange Report, Common Sense, Capitol Annex, District Sixer, Eye on Williamson County, In The Pink Texas, Just Another Blog, The Jeffersonian, MindFyre, The People’s Republic of Seabrook, Pink Dome, The Red State, Rhetoric & Rhythym,
Truth Serum Blog, Wyld Card.

You may remember that recently, the United States Justice Department subpoenad Google, MSN, Yahoo, and AOL to release user search data. All but Google complied in some form or fashion. Boing-Boing has requested that MSN, Yahoo and AOL publically release the data submitted to the Justice Department. EFF (Electronic Fronteir Foundation) co-founder John Gilmore has stated:

If Yahoo, MSN, and AOL didn’t reveal any personal info to DoJ, let’s see them publicly post the results that they sent back to the DoJ.

They sent “a generic list of aggregate and anonymous search terms, and not results, from a roughly one day period” (AOL)? Let’s see it. The public can decide whether there are privacy violations in there.

They sent “a random collection of page URLs that we had web-crawled”? Let’s see them.

No need for barrels of ink to speculate with, let’s just look at them. There can’t be a problem with looking, if there’s no personal privacy issues involved. There’s no trade secrets here — these are queries typed by end users, and web pages set up by end users. Right?

Just like Boing-Boing, I cannot issue subpoenas; but just like Boing-Boing, I would like to know.

I hereby issue a request to America Online, Microsoft, and Yahoo! to release the data submitted to the DoJ, publicly, or to show us where such data already exists online. This way, everyone who uses those services can look for themselves and decide whether or not their privacy was violated by said information. (Although one couldn’t do much, as it was legally subpoenaed. No lawsuits could legitimately come of this, as the DoJ legally obtained the data, whether it was privacy-violating, or not. (This is, of course, assuming there was a legitimate legal reason for obtaining said data. If such a reason was not found to exist, then certainly, one may sue for a violation of inherent privacy.))

I also encourage each of you to post a call like this in your own blogs. Let’s get the message out. The more this appears online, the more likely the companies will reveal the data.

God grant you rest, Coretta Scott King. Your will, zeal, and fire will be missed.  Tell your husband, when you see him, that millions upon millions say “thank you.”

RIP Coretta Scott King (wife to Martin Luther King, Jr.).  1927 - 2006 (78 years)

1) Bush stated “We are at war, with an enemy, who wants to hit us again.” In short, Mr. President… Duh. When have we ever been at war with an enemy that did not want to hit us, again?

2) Bush stated that “[questioning his advisors] would set a chilling precedent” for future advisors if Bush questioned their advice. In other words, he is stating that he should accept what they say at face value, as they are his advisors.

Mr. President, I have to be honest, here. You’re running a country. If Iwas running a country - especially during a time of war - I would check out, at least, the big things that my advisors state. Even if you don’t check out the minor advice, it’s a good idea to at least check out the major advice before you carry through with it. Remember, if those advisors screw up, it’s your ass, not their’s.

Personally, I feel IWIN is invaluable for quick checks of severe weather conditions, and it’s always the first place I turn (assuming I still have power and internet), even before I turn on my weather/hazard radio. Those of you that use IWIN, please leave a comment on the NWS’s discussion of the IWIN termination, in support of this great service.

For more information on the strike, keep up with the New York City MetBlog.

As part of the configuration of the new storage system, we needed to reboot the storage device. When we attempted to bring the device back online at 10:50 pm PST, a hardware failure occurred and damaged the index of the file system. Essentially, the system couldn’t mount the drive, even though the data was still there.

This disk failure led to both published blogs and the TypePad application being down. After diagnosing the problem in order to understand the severity of the issue, we decided to serve published blogs from a snapshot that was between 2-6 days old.

Essentially, they only had backup snapshots.  Whatever happened to the days of RAID?  Whatever happened to the days of as-you-go disk mirroring?  Is that smiply not scalable, in todays solutions?  I understand TypePad is a huge service, but you would think that they would have some sort of mirroring system availible to automatically replace data, should the primary system go offline.  Perhaps I’m completely mistaken as to what is acceptable and able to be used in today’s environments, but it seems to me that TypePad was using a disk and backup structure that simply didn’t scale properly, and was not designed for a worst case scenario (which, I - and many others - feel all systems should be).

Technorati Tags : six+apart, typepad, downtime

What I want to know is… Why didn’t anyone pick up on this?  Out of all of the web2.0-based blogs I read, none of them picked up on this story.  Personally, I wound up not being able to bookmark a good many websites.

Ah, also in del.icio.us news, I’ve added a daily links posting to the blog, and will be removing the one currently in the feed.  No worries, feed readers, you’ll still get your daily link goodness, it’s just that now it will also be in the form of a blog post.

(UPDATE: I stand corrected.  Jack of All Blogs picked up on the story.

According to the Los Angeles Times:

negotiators agreed to promote AOL’s services across Google.com, a change for the company that made famous the sparse white Web page. Google also hired AOL to sell non-search ads to Google’s advertising partners.

Google will continue to take 20% of the revenue generated when people click on the text ads in AOL Search, and AOL will take 20% of the revenue from flashy banners and other display ads it sells on the Google network, according to people familiar with the deal.

So what does this mean for Google?  The company that pioneered the sparse white layout (and drew in billions of users with it), will be promoting AOL’s services all across Google’s domain.  According to the New York Times, “Google, which prides itself on the purity of its search results, agreed to give favored placement to content from AOL throughout its site, something it has never done before.”  Now I don’t know about you, but that screams “JUMPING THE SHARK” to me.  Google has long been the best at pure search results, showing their sponsored ads distinctly seperate from the general search results.  The wording of this deal makes one wonder, will google promote AOL results to page one, position one, regardless of “sponsored listings?”  Add to that, the fact that Google will be showing “flashy banners” from AOL, across its network.  Flashy banners?  One thing I can’t stand is a website full of blinking, twinkling, animated and flash-based banners/advertisements.

Many who know me - and my individual perspective towards advertising in the Internet - know that I use the adblock plugin for firefox, and block around 90% of the ads online.  I try not to block Commission Junction ads, Amazon ads, or Google Adsense.  Why?  For one, I use them, and need to make sure they’re displaying correctly across my websites.  For another, I find them to be the least intrusive, normally.  Unfortunately, if AOL starts populating Google’s ad results with flash-based banners, and blinking overkill, it may spell the death knell of Google, and underscore the addition of “*ad.google.com” to my block list.  That would pain me, as I’ve long been a supporter of Google.

At this point, we can only wait and see how this megadeal with AOL will effect Google’s ad systems, and search results.  Provided Google stays true to itsself and only promotes AOL’s results within their sponsored listings and ad units, I think all will be well.  If Google starts messing with the general SERPs, then there may be some trouble.  Google already has to watch out for Yahoo.  Yahoo was formerly the Big Name in search engines, although they lost that niche when Google came on the scene.  These days, Yahoo is making a big name for itsself; and Google needs to start watching out.

There’ll be a search war before all this is through, folks.  Mark my words.  In fact, I predict many people will begin turning to smaller search engine companies, or the sites that aggregate multiple engine results onto a single page.  Google’s and Yahoo’s loss may be web 2.0’s gain.

I’ve talked to three people present for the meeting that day and they all confirm that the President of the United States called the Constitution “a goddamned piece of paper.”

I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.

I still think you’re a coward, and now you’re making excuses for it, and doing the usual coward thing — trying to shift the attention on someone else. If you were the tough guy you said you were, you would have stood up to Mena and said it was bullshit to her face. Or you could have said you’re sorry (and you still could).

BTW, Mena used to trash me, in her own way. Now the shoe’s on the other foot and it’s gratifying to see her speaking out for civility.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Shortly after being elected New Jersey’s governor, Democrat Jon Corzine speculated aloud that he might appoint a woman to fill out his unexpired Senate term. Then he singled out black state Sen. Nia Gill, calling her an “extraordinarily capable woman.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — Shortly after being elected New Jersey’s governor, Democrat Jon Corzine speculated aloud that he might appoint a woman to fill out his unexpired Senate term. Then he singled out black state Sen. Nia Gill, calling her an “extraordinarily capable woman.”

(This story was brought to my attention by Strangerina, over at Stranger in a Strange Land. You can read her post, for more details, and another take.)