10 posts tagged “james”

It is now the late-early morning for me.  I've been thinking about things.  Nothing bad nor good, just simply things in general.  I'm a thinking person after all.  There isn't "much" to my thinking: life, work, love, future, past, present, finances, politics, technology, friends, challenges, opportunities, success, failure, freedom, and so on.  I'll deal with it as usual.

My sister pretty much has me beat in a hardcore match of Scrabulous on Facebook.  Scores are Jeanette: 297,and Mysef: 283.  She got lucky as hell with a 91 point word, "astonied," which really did not make any sense to me, but hey, it just goes to show you that it is never over 'till it's really over.  My winning streak comes to an end, which is probably a good thing because I have been far too cocky with that game.  My excuse for friends is that I am just a confident and competative person.

I miss Sierra a lot more than usual.  I almost feel alone for some reason, even though I'm far from it.  It is just a mental thing I am sure.  I'm probably 95% happy and optomistic.  When I get to that 5% of depression though, it can be just a minor thing where I avoid talking to people for awhile and feel jealous of other people for reasons which I can't explain.  It could sometimes be more serious where I just flat out refuse to speak to anyone, and things start to annoy me that wouldn't otherwise.  I rarely ever get angry; I can't remember the last time I was so, but I can suddenly feel really alone with no warning.  I'm not even sure if I am at this point of feeling lonely, but things like this come to mind and I evaluate myself as a person.

I think about how fortunate I am, and I never try to act depressed because there are so many other people that have much worse to worry about.  I just take life day by day.  I do not try to plan things for the future because they rarely ever work out in my life.  That does not mean I don't think about the future, I don't bother to plan as much around it.  I do this because it allows me to be more flexible (figuratively speaking.)

Yeah, it is starting to get very annoying.  No internet blows.  Things are apparently working though, as I had my mom check if the internet was working; she says that the indicator is solid, meaning I'm back in business.  I'm going to return home tomorrow and get back to work.

I don't really know of anything interesting going on.  Well, one interesting fact is that my site is now almost past the 1,000,000 rank on Alexa.  This is very good considering the fact that only a week ago I was ranked around 1,900,000.  I'm going to write a few more articles, and try to get out one more good one before the end of this month.  Right now I'm looking to end the month on 300 unique visitors, but maybe I can get it up to around 400.  I know that Sierra has visited my site at least 16 times.

I've been reading up on my old college book, Simon & Schuster Handbook for Writers, for ways to improve my writing. Making a good effort to read the entire sections about punctuation has really led me to find how many bloggers are doing so much wrong.  I must admit that I too am guilty of some things I have read.  Correct apostrophe usage is something I have more than likely abused.  I know I have placed "it's" instead of "its" a few times too many in writing.

It could be worse!  I do know I will continue to improve my writing, as it is a good skill to have!

Okay so I had a brief exodus, but now all is fine, and I'm back at it. 

My internet is failing to work at home, so that blows, but I am at my sister's for now until that gets back to working correctly.  I love technology, but it really sucks when it doesn't work.  Our reliance on technology is amazing.

Speaking of technology, this entry on Wikipedia had me very interested with regards to NASA and stuff.

The article talks about many amazing things for the future:

NASA's long range Vision for Space Exploration plan includes a return to the Moon, with a manned mission in 2019 and permanent staffing of a polar base by 2024.^[1][2] A Chinese space scientist has said that the People's Republic of China could be capable of landing a human on the moon by 2022 (although the country has announced no formal plans for human lunar exploration),^[3] and Japan is now talking about plans for a lunar base by 2030.^[4] None of these plans, however, involve permanent residents of the Moon. Instead they call for sortie missions, in some cases followed by extended expeditions to a lunar base using rotating crew members, as is currently done for the International Space Station.

It will be interesting to see how that works out a nice 10+ years from now.

Today, I have a pretty wicked headache.  Which is rare for me.  I used to have a lot of headaches when I was younger, but I can't remember the last time I've had one.  I just took two Advil to hopefully help it to go away.

I posted a news article on Tech In Demand, and will post up a feature article later.  Still can't think of a logo design.  I had some things, but they were all pretty simple, and can't think of a way to make it awesome.  I guess I'll have to wait for that.

That's all for the moment!

It appears Facebook is dying a slow and horrible death for some reason.  I don't have any idea why.  First a few buttons failed to work, then some pages were loading slowly.  Now the poking functionality isn't working at all, and peoples names are disappearing.

I wondering if I'm witnessing database corruption or who knows what.

Oh well, Facebook has done well so far; thus making sense that they are only the 10th ranked site on Alexa (as of  the time of this writing.)

So other than that, I just returned home from my sister's place.  That was nice to spend some time there before she starts taking classes for her nursing program.  Though while I was there, I was missing work and wanted to get back home to write up some more articles.  I am now back home, and finally posted my first review for Tech In Demand, which is about Windows Live Writer.  In short, it is an excellent application from Microsoft. (Yes, I did say Microsoft for crying out loud).

I got even more goodies to post up on Tech In Demand.  I have articles coming in the dozens: Firefox extensions, Ubuntu guide, system security guide, online backup, Facebook, Dash review, Miro review, game consoles breakdown, and much more to finish up.

Regardless, it is almost approaching 5 AM and I must hit the sack so I can wake up and get some work done.  I hope that Sierra will have a wonderful time starting her new classes tomorrow.  I hope that I will survive another day of work in this wacky world of technology we live in.

No, I'm not referring to being recognized in person; Although if I did hang around Newport News or VA Beach, someone might recognize me sooner or later.  I am speaking of online.  How, when I visit websites I used to visit, I am recognized.  The most recent example of this was only moments ago when a person on Newsvine left me a comment saying my name looked familiar, and then saying how he realized that I was writing for Mashable and he was reading my post on travel resources.

It's somewhat weird in a way.  I had been approached by the owner of Wakoopa, and he told me that if I ever wanted to know any information about Wakoopa, to let them know.  I had a member of the Particls team personally message me asking how my experience was with the software.  I had a person today on Stickam, while I was listening to Leo Laporte, notice me and praising my articles.  I have people commenting on my articles directly, telling me how much they like the articles.  Some people even seem to know how much effort goes in to the research I put in just for writing a single article.  It just really changes me in a way.  It's the same thing when I know even one person has watched a YouTube video of mine, or read a blog post of mine, or even just thank me for helping them with something.

It's just kinda weird in a way, but I don't mind it.  It's also quite amazing in other ways.  I like the fact that even though I have posted less than 10 articles on Mashable.com, that I'm already starting to feel the attention.  I want to make a difference, and I have always dreamed about doing something where people would remember me for.  I never imagined it would have been writing, even though since I was about 14 years old, I had wanted to be an IT journalist.

I could see myself doing this for a living.  I could see myself doing this on a daily basis.  I could see this being my life as a writer.  I don't mind it at all, and I'd be willing to work my best at it, because I know that if even one person reads my article, and they get something out of it, that I have made some kind of impact on that person.  I want to write about things that people care about.  Even though it's only technology, it still is important to many people.

What does this mean for me?  I don't know just yet.  It's all happened all of the sudden.  I never, ever, would have imagined being a writer for Mashable.  I sent in a few links to stuff I have previously written, and for a whole month there was no reply, until one day when I was given my shot, and my first article, ironically enough, was my best according to Digg.com, which had over 750 Diggs the last time I checked.  It was, and is a real personal achievement for me, as I'm not going to college to study English, and I was only a mediocre English student.  My best subjects were Math and History.  I just really never imagined I'd be doing this.

The only thing I really was certain of, was that I'd be working for myself.  I know that writing for Mashable, doesn't really mean I'm working for myself.  Yet, it is fairly close.  As I write more articles, and earn the respect of my fellow writers, I am confident that I'd be given more freedom to do as a choose, and it is a great responsibility, and one wrong thing could totally destroy it.  The recognition or writing for Mashable though, is an honor, and I think it is something that has given me the confidence in my writing, and the dream I had only but a month ago, my whole life, is slowly turning into a reality.

No matter what you do in life, make sure that the job you are doing, makes you happy in life.  Work hard, do well, and push yourself.  There is no reason why you, the very person reading this article, can't do something you have always dreamed of doing.  It takes patience and determination.  The best things in life come to you.  The person who I now love has found me, my best friends found me, my dream job has found me.  Some of these things took a long time, but I never lost hope, and I kept trying, even when it almost seemed pointless.  So never give up on anything you want to accomplish.  Just make sure that what you are doing makes you happy, because no amount of money can make up for doing the things you love most and enjoy.

I'm not sure if I'll be writing for Mashable for years to come, for a few months, for a few weeks, or for even only a few more days.  I do know that I'll do my best no matter what.  I know that just experiencing all this, is life changing, and is really making me re-think everything.  It reminds me of when I went on a 7 day cruise.  It was a life changing experience, because I've never done anything like that, and it's something that not most people are going to ever see.  It's something that I had to experience.  Now that I have experienced writing as a job, I don't want it to end any time soon.  I hope it lasts forever.

These were my thoughts and stuff.  I know I kinda went over what I initially wanted to write, but I just got into a groove and had to get it all out.  If you want to see what I have done on Mashable thus far, check this link: http://www.mashable.com/author/james-mowery/

As always, I appreciate comments, criticisms, and all feedback of any type.  I guess this was part personal, part dramatic, and part inspirational, but it was all me, and that is all that matters.  I'm sorry if I repeated some things, or if it is unorganized in any way.  I am about to pass out from tiredness, but I wouldn't have been able to sleep if I didn't get this out of my system.  So it is done, and I hope everyone has a wonderful life, and maybe if you have read this post, it will inspire you to try harder, and never give up on your dreams, no matter how big or unachievable they might seem.

When you visit a local business, you usually have a good idea of the quality of service they provide. You likely could provide a short review of that business by simply speaking to a friend. That of course is nothing new. Although today, there are many more ways to have your opinion read by others. If you are uncertain about the quality of a business, and would like some feedback from other people that have used that business before, or if you know a business well and would like to give your opinion, then using the following sites is a nice way to share amongst others.

Yelp, a winner in our 2006 Social Networking Awards, is a great site to find many user opinions and reviews on local businesses in the United States. Bolstering a large user-base and an easy to use website, chances are Yelp will have something of interest to you.

Angie's List is a site useful to anyone looking to use a business offering home service contracting. It allows you to search any home contract service in the United States and get real user opinions and experiences of their offered services.

PlanetFeedback allows you to create a complaint, compliment, question, or suggestion for a company of your choosing. Other people can then read your feedback and can add their own comments. You can also do the same for other posts on the site as well. It is quite fun to read the complaints, and at other times, it is just horrifying.

Google Business Reviews is a service you have likely passed up many times before. At any time while using Google Maps, the sidebar will show local businesses around the specified location. You can also specify what businesses you are searching for directly by utilizing the "Find Businesses" tab. You can then gain access to user reviews.

Zipingo seems to be lagging behind most of the competitor's sites in terms of social functionality. What it does offer is solid, yet there are still much improvements to be made for Zipingo before it has a chance of competing with other services like it.

InsiderPages, while not having any reviews in my small little town here in Virginia, does offer similar functionality to Yelp and others. It appears to take on a more direct approach to reviewing businesses in the United States, and not much else. It's worth a try. (Read our review)

Using welovelocal is a much more enjoyable experience as it provides many options to connect to your friends and see what they are writing. Unfortunately, this service is limited to London users only, but is going to expand to include the entire United Kingdom soon. It has many features that I believe most of the options on this list could use to improve their sites.

Another business review service specific to the United Kingdom is Touch Local. It allows almost all functionality of it's competitors. The site has over 2 million users, and will surely be growing steadily.

MojoPages allows users to share their thoughts on businesses in three categories which are value, service, and quality. A nice feature is that they allow you to upload a video review of any service. MojoPages also includes basic social functionality.

TrustedPlaces focuses mainly on United Kingdom users, but is going to be expanding to other countries. The site offers many social capabilities. TrustedPlaces allows people to share places with other users and also share opinions on those places with others.

Using these sites is an excellent way to find out information about businesses in your local area. As well as places you might be visiting in the near future. If you visit many businesses, why not help out these services by posting your opinions and help spreading the word for good businesses, and keeping people away from the bad ones!

I finally have had one of my articles posted on Mashable.com, which made me very happy because I'd been hoping I'd break into the site, and I now have.

http://mashable.com/2007/06/16/stalking2/

Hopefully this leads to more of my articles getting up on the site :)