How to be a Top Blogger

John Robb posts about how to build a hot/popular weblog. His suggestions of different approaches make some sense. Basically he breaks it down into a number of approaches you might take to become popular.

- Connection machine
- Name dropper
- Ideologue
- Thinker
- Topic Owner
- Voice of outrage/affirmation
- Cool Hunter

You'll have to head to John's to get explanations on each.

More Blog Tips

[via LivingRoom >> A space for Life]

[Rizzn's Note: Besides the IBM/Linux commercial, probably one of the few good commercials (and I use this in a loose sense of the term, because even this commercial was weak), was the Pepsi commercial.  Perhaps I'm the wrong person to ask on this since I don't really enjoy Pepsi products, and I'm not a big fan of Apple products -- but on the other hand, I do enjoy me some P2P filesharing and I am a supporter of the iTunes business model.

I guess I was just hoping it was some sleeper cell of some anti-RIAA group that actually got the capital to put up a superbowl ad, and it turns out to be yet another culturally savvy ad from Pepsi.

Props to the marketing department.  I'm still not going to drink Pepsi though.]

It's hard to wrap your head around the cultural message...

It's hard to wrap your head around the cultural messages in the upcoming iTunes/Pepsi Superbowl ad.

Some 20 teens sued by the Recording Industry Association of America, which accuses them of unauthorized downloads, will appear in a Pepsi- Cola (PEP) ad that kicks off a two-month offer of up to 100 million free--and legal--downloads from Apple's iTunes, the leading online music seller.

It's the classic Merchants of Cool technique of co-opting youth culture to sell product to youth. But, as USA Today notes, this ad 'winks' at filesharing.

Annie Leith, a 14- year-old from Staten Island, appears with other downloaders in the ad, which features music by Green Day. The band cut a special version of the 1966 Bobby Fuller Four hit I Fought the Law for the ad, by BBDO, New York. In the ad, Leith holds a Pepsi and proclaims: "We are still going to download music for free off the Internet." Then the announcer says how: "Announcing the Pepsi iTunes Giveaway."

So, wink, wink, nod, nod, all that file sharing was in good fun, wasn't it, the establishment really doesn't get it, but now we can help you do it for free. It's a brilliant strategy, but I notice that Pepsi isn't featuring convicted vending machine vandals in their campaign.....

 

[via what's in rebecca's pocket?]

The Mob and The Net

Shakedown of gambling sites before Super Bowl: Remember the good old days, when they just broke your thmbs if you didn't pay? Now mobsters hack your server.

Organized crime gangs are shaking down Internet betting sites on the eve of American football's Super Bowl, threatening to unleash a crippling data attack unless they pay a "protection" fee, police and site operators said.

[via Gadgetopia]

When Geeks Have Kids

Engineering geek names son version 2.0: This could qualify as a form of child abuse.

Jon Blake Cusack talked his wife, Jamie, into naming their son Jon Blake Cusack 2.0.

[via Gadgetopia]

[Rizzn's Note: Slashdot/Alterslash has an excellent Q&A session with Adam Davidson up on their sites right now combining two very interesting spheres of influence: a LUG (Linux Users Group) in IRAQ.  Quotes below.]

Answers On LUGs, Life, and Linux in Iraq - by Roblimo (36% noise) View Skip
Adam Davidson is an American reporter who has been in Baghdad for many months, and in his ‘spare time’ helped start Iraq’s first LUG. We sent him your questions last week, and he’s replied in great detail, not only about the LUG itself but also with a rare ‘geek’s eye view’ of daily life in Baghdad, and comments about how the Iraqi IT infrastructure (and laws controlling it) are being (re)built.

[California Cybercafe Regulation Decision Released]

Activate Tinfoil Hat! - by American AC in Paris (Score: 5, Insightful) Thread
What the iLug needs most is: 
1. Money. 
2. Information. 
3. Technical help.

Free software, hackers, and Iraq, all wrapped up into the same organization? Danger! Danger! Potential terrorist organization detected!

Seems only a few weeks ago we would have run the risk of getting our asses detained for violationg the Patriot Act. Now that this part of the Patriot Act has been ruled unconstitutional, though, we’re safe to help these guys out.

<voiceover style=“announcer:campy-1950’s-sci-fi;”> or are we? </voiceover>

[via AlterSlash]

Zombie Army of MyDoom Drives SCO from Its URL:
Under intense DDoS bombardment from the approximately one million MyDoom-infected computers, SCO abandoned ship at www.sco.com in favor of the more-of-a-mouthful www.thescogroup.com. SCO plans to return in about two weeks, after the deluge is scheduled to end.

When it comes to vulnerabilities in our information infrastucture, we're only a couple of small steps away from skilled hackers being able to delete anyone they dislike from the Internet. That's scary, and some of the possible reactions are even scarier.

[via LawMeme]

Several observations from the Super Bowl last night.
1) Unintentional or not, I rather enjoyed Janet Jackson's performance.
2) When she was behind the screen at the beginning of her performance, I could have sworn that she was her brother.
3) I think it was intentional.
4) Why am I not commenting on the game? Because neither the Bucs, nor the Cowboys played.
5) It was pretty exciting.
6) Which reminds me, I was dead on with every prediction I made about the game last night. I said, for instance, that this game is going to come down to a dramatic field goal sequence in the last ten seconds or so of the game. Fourteen seconds before the end of the game, there is a dramatic game winning field goal sequence.
7) I should try to make some money of this skill.
8) Thank goodness I missed the streaker man-ass.
9) That is all.