May the iPod Rest in Peace

Amber spots an iPod in a cemetery. The epitaph says "Fatal Error Occurred". Notice that the iPod is still connected to it's lifeline - the Belkin charging dock.

Why is Google Against Paid Text Links (Hint: Adsense)

It was a very interesting day at the Search Engine Strategies Conference in San Jose. Google Government represented by Matt Cutts on one side and the search community at the other end.

Matt, in his usual style, blamed paid text links for polluting the internet and shared that Google uses a combination of algorithms and manual methods to detect [and penalize] websites that sell links.

But this time, Matt had some very tough audience including Michael Gray who put forward a very interesting case as to why text links are in Google's crosshair. Rand has a round-up of Michael's anti-Google argument:

• Commercial websites are NOT generally linked-to naturally. Non-commercial websites are much more likely to entice natural links. [so commercial sites have buy links]

• By eliminating paid links, Google will fill the top results for commercial queries with primarily non-commercial results.

• Thus, when a searcher wishes to take a commercial action, the only relevant results will be the paid listings.

• And, thus, searchers will be more likely to click on AdWords links, which earn Google money.

Lisa Barone, Barry Schwartz and Tamar Weinberg have excellent coverage of the SES conference at Bruce Clay and SE Roundtable respectively. If you are looking to improve your site rankings in search engines, digest each and every word uttered at the SES conference.

Related: Banned from Google for Text Links

Update: Added the SES Conference PowerPoint Presentation.

Watch iPod Videos Privately on a Large Virtual TV Screen

   

Is the 2.5" LCD screen of your iPod too small for enjoying videos? How about a big TV screen for the iPod that you can carry inside your pocket and connect to the iPod anytime.

We are talking an affordable iPod accessory called Video Goggles - you wear them like any other Shades but they are not meant for protecting your from sunlight - they connect directly to your iPod and let you watch movies and video podcasts on a big virtual screen.

When plugged into your iPod video, these eye-glasses project a floating video image in-front of your eyes and you feel as if you are watching the videos on a large TV screen without any connection cables.

A great companion while you are on a road trip or a long flight - you don't have to look at the tiny iPod screen for watching the movies. Works only with iPod Video, not with your iPhone.

iPod eye glasses available at Amazon.com and ThinkGeek.com priced around ~$200. Thanks Mike.

What To Do When Google Mistakenly Identifies Your Website as Harmful

A webmaster recently wrote an email saying that Google has incorrectly flagged his client's "harmless" website as dangerous for distributing or hosting malware. Though the site still appears in Google organic search results, a prominent warning message saying "This Site May Harm Your Computer" is displayed near the title of the web page.

The website in question has been marked as spam independently by Google though the StopBadWare team has not reviewed the website yet. The webmaster says that his site requires the Adobe Flash ActiveX control and that probably caused Google to blacklist him and trigger the warning.

If you feel that you have a legit site and that Google has wrongly classified your site as harmful, here's how to appeal your case:

1. Check the HTML source of your webpage and make sure that there are no suspicious blocks of Javascript code or hyperlinks that point to bad neighborhoods. For instance, it is not uncommon for hacker to inject code into WordPress Blogs that are not using the latest patches.

2. Since your site is marked as spam only by Google and not by StopBadware, you have to visit this special page to request StopBadware team for marking your site as safe. When both Google and StopBadware have classifed a site as spam, the request for review page is located here.

Once StopBadware.org team certifies that your website is free of malware, the request is sent to Google - they do a follow-up testing and the warning page is promptly removed.

3. If you are using the Google Webmaster Tools, Google will show you a list of URLs on your site that are suspected of hosting or linking to malware content. Once your cleaned up your site, you can request Google via the Webmaster Tools dashboard (Index Status) to review your site.

If they find everything perfect, the malware warnings for your site are removed from the search pages in 24 hours.

Resources: Stopbadware.org, Google Support, Matt Cutts, Webmaster Central Team

Pigeons Can Collapse Bridges, Cows Can Cause Global Warming

Some off-beat but interesting stories from the world of cows and pigeons:

» Pigeons are being partly blamed for the collapse of Minneapolis Bridge this month. Pigeon droppings contain ammonia and acids - if the dung isn't washed away, it dries out and turns into a concentrated salt. When water gets in and combines with the salt and ammonia, the reactions cause the steel to rust faster and hence become weak. [Discover News]

» Scientists are trying ways to make cows burp less to make our planet Earth cooler. That's because when cows digest their food (grass, hay, etc), they burp methane gas which is more effective at warming Earth's atmosphere than carbon dioxide is.

Globally, ruminant livestock – including cattle, goats, and buffaloes – produce about 80 million metric tons of methane a year, accounting for about 28 percent of man-made methane emissions annually. [CS Monitor]

Online Software Tutorials, Office Templates, Shock Photos from HP

The HP corporate website has an unexplored Small & Medium Business section that's loaded with Office goodies, stock photographs, online software classes and some very informative How-To guides - they are all available without charge.

You can download readymade Business Templates for PowerPoint Presentations, Brochures, Business Cards, Newsletters, Letterheads and more - they all work with Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Publisher software.

Other than templates, you can download photographs to use in your your marketing material for free. The pictures in the Image Gallery may be used for commercial purposes without limitations until October 31, 2009.

HP SMB site also has a neat collection of online software tutorials for anyone to brush up their business software skills or learn using the software like Microsoft Office Word, Photoshop or CorelDRAW from scratch. [via WSJ]

Related: Microsoft Office Templates, Office 2007 Training

Blip.TV Much Better Than YouTube for Uploading Videos Online

Back in December, we carried a detailed comparison of Blip.tv vs YouTube for uploading video content on the web. Blip.tv won over YouTube by a huge margin because Blip supported most video formats, had no limitation on file sizes and maintained the original video quality unlike YouTube which resize clips to 320x240.

While YouTube uses Flash 7 (Sorensen Spark codec), most other sites encode using On2 VP6 codec of Flash 8 which results in more sharp video.

The current issue of PC World has a detailed comparison of almost all popular video sharing websites and Blip.tv has emerged as a clear winner again - it beats YouTube in video quality, audio quality, video encoding speed and the wide screen Flash video player that makes watching videos all the more fun.

Infact, YouTube also lost the race to Brightcove, Revver, Veoh and Microsoft SoapBox. While none of these sites have the millions of eyeballs like YouTube for your videos to go viral, when it comes to video quality and speed, most of them fared bared that YouTube in the comparison.

So if you want to embed high-quality video content with your readers (especially screencasts with text), Blip.tv is the way to go. They even offer advertising with a 50/50 split. And not just video clips. Blip is also a recommended destination for uploading MP3 music and podcasts.

Related: MIT TechTV on Blip.tv.