Grandpa Magician Cyril Goes Bowling posted to YouTube by guyverfour

I just saw this on Connected Internet and verified the story via the BBC newswire:

In a strategic move to dominate the search markets and what appears to be a bid to regain lagging internet surfer attention, Microsoft has offered to buy Yahoo! for $44.6 Billion - that is Billion with a capital B folks!

According to the BBC - the offer letter to the Board of Directors at Yahoo! was offering 62% more than the closing share price of Yahoo! on Thursday afternoon.

Yahoo confirmed that it has received an unsolicited offer and said that its board would evaluate the proposal, “carefully and promptly in the context of Yahoo’s strategic plans and pursue the best course of action to maximize long-term value for shareholders.”

What this means for Google remains to be seen - below is a chart from Alexa which shows the overall Daily Reach of the three major search engine sites. Of course each company offers more than just a search at their sites, but, this is an interesting bid by Microsoft to say the least. I cannot imagine that the Yahoo! Board of Directors would turn down an offer at such a high value, but we will need to wait and see.

This will be fun to watch!

We’ve all felt the lure of the largest city in the United States. New York City’s endless shopping opportunities, the perpetual line of yellow cabs that stream down the roads, and some of the world’s best night life all beckon to us from the movie and television screen. The night life is so good, in fact, that jet setters from all over the globe think nothing of flying into New York City for a good party. With so much to do, how does a mere mortal like you and I figure out where to best spend our time? The entertainment choices are daunting, to be sure, but there are some good guidelines to use to weed out the dud venues and find the stuff great vacation memories are made of.
The best place to start is to determine what to do. Dancing? Clubbing? Theater? New York City has it all.

Clubbing and Dancing
Most of the better bars and clubs will have a cover charge ranging from $1 to $15 and many of them don’t even open until 9pm or later. New York is broken down into districts and is quite a large city. If you’re not familiar with (or able to figure out) the complex subway train system, you might want to look for bars that are close to where you are, but there are always an endless supply of those yellow cabs to help you out if you want to stray farther afield. So what are the best bars in New York City? Well, tastes in bars is as varied as the bars themselves so the quickest way to find a bar that interests you is to go online and take a look.

TicketsinSeconds.com has a great section on New York night life as well as listings of concerts and other activities in the bustling metropolis. The aptly named NY.com (http://www.ny.com) has a listing of bars categorized by genre – Jazz, Dance, Bars & Pubs, and even a section listing venues that people under 21 can get into. Finally, 10 Best (http://www.10best.com/New_York,NY/Ni…ubs/index.html) has a ranked list of dance clubs in New York City. How they’re ranked isn’t all that clear, but if you like top 10 lists then this is the site for you.

Theatre
Aside from the clubs, New York City is world-renowned for its theater. We’ve all head of Broadway and guess where Broadway is? You guess it! Broadway is in Manhattan which is one of New York City’s largest boroughs. There are almost 40 theaters on Broadway so if you’re into theater it’s almost inconceivable that you won’t be able to find something to interest you on Broadway. Check out Broadway.com (http://www.broadway.com) for show times and to book tickets online.

Television Show Tapings
All big cities have clubs and some theatre, but New York City also presents some really exclusive opportunities. Saturday Night Live, a popular live comedy show that has been on the air for over 30 years, is recorded in New York. There are only two ways to get tickets to SNL. If you’re thinking ahead you can submit a request for tickets in August for the upcoming year to snltickets@nbcuni.com. Sooner or later, you’ll get tickets to either the live show or a dress rehearsal. The other way is be a ’standby’ which means lining up at 7am at 30 Rockefeller plaza. If you’re lucky, you’ll get tickets to either the 8pm dress rehearsal or the 11:30 pm actual show.

As well as Saturday Night Live, other night time shows such as David Letterman (http://www.cbs.com/latenight/lateshow/) and Conan O’Brien (http://www.nbc.com/Late_Night_with_Conan_O’Brien/index.shtml) also tape in New York City and ticket information can be found on their respective sites.

The trick to mastering New York City nightlife isn’t finding things to do, it’s wading through the mountain of things to do to find the stuff that interests you. With a little planning and little time invested online, you’ll be able to narrow down the field and have a great time in New York City.

As if teenagers aren’t complicated enough, trying to figure out the whole Hannah Montana thing is destined to cause a headache. Miley Stewart is a character in a the hit Disney series entitled Hannah Montana. Stewart’s character plays a mild-mannered student during the day and super rock star Hannah Montana at night. While that’s not really all that hard to grasp, it becomes more complicated in that Miley Stewart is played by Miley Cyrus who is also a singer songwriter in her own right.

It gets weirder. Miley Cyrus comes by her talent honestly. She’s the 15 year-old daughter of Billy Ray Cyrus who is a real life country superstar. Strangely enough, Billy Ray plays Robby Stewart, Miley Stewart’s father on the show, which must feel right at home for Miley. One has to wonder how Miley (Cyrus, that is) knows when she’s at home or on the set. And really, since both Miley’s have the same father, does it matter?

One has to give Disney credit for creating the whole Hannah Montana phenomenon. Not only has Disney managed to come up with a hit TV series which has all the normal revenue streams such as syndication rights, soundtracks, and marketing swag, but they’ve managed to double everything. Fictional Hanna brings in the money on television and real life Miley Cyrus goes on tour (as Hannah) singing all the songs that are on the show. Walt would have been proud.

As with all things in Hollywood, sometimes what goes on behind the scenes is more interesting than what is presented through the media. The theme song for Hannah Montana, for example, is co-written by Robbie Neville. If you were around and walking upright in the 1980’s then you will recognize Robbie Neville as the guy who sang “C’est La Vie” - a massive hit in 1986. In another brush with the 1980’s Brooke Shields plays or played Hannah’s deceased mother. Even WWE wrestling sensation Duane “The Rock” Johnson has graced Hannah’s screen which is in keeping with his recent foray into teenage girl targeted films. And quite possibly the biggest secret is that Miley Cyrus’ real name is not Miley. Miley is a nickname derived from “Smiley” but her real name is Destiny Hope Cyrus.

Within the show itself, it seems that Miley Stewart’s secret life as Hannah Montana really isn’t all that secret. There are no less than 13 characters in the show who know Miley’s secret and when you consider that there are only 14 characters named in the main and recurring character lists, that’s pretty much everyone.

Not everything is silver in superstardom, however. It seems that all popular personalities have their detractors. Kevin Soo, from The Star Online, doesn’t think much of Hannah/Miley’s second album, but then again Kevin isn’t a teenage girl so his opinion doesn’t really matter. On a more sober note, a teenage boy was recently arrested for boarding a plane with intentions to hijack the plane and crash it into the Hannah Montana concert in Lafayette, LA.

All in all Hannah/Miley/Destiny’s career seems well underway for someone so young. No doubt the Hannah Montana phenomenon will die down over time, but Miley is well set for a life of stardom now that she has proven her talent and desire.

And if you are interested in seeing Hannah, be sure to get some Hannah Montana tickets, and enjoy the show.

So, you are browsing the Internet and you see a site, or article that reminds you of something you worked on a few weeks, months, or years ago.

Upon further review, you realize this is not just a common feeling of Deja Vu - this is not just a reminder of an article, but when you go back and look at your work (which is still published on your blog, or website) it is an almost exact replica - perhaps a few words changed here and there for effect. You begin to remember, the hours you spent sweating over all of the little details, making sure all of the links were live and valid, revising the article and tweaking it to make witty observations and the satisfaction it felt to realize you had created a tone with just the right amount of originality, humor, and valuable content for your readers. Not to mention the work you spent on the CSS, *.php or other formatting issues which came up to deliver the full reader experience.

You are left feeling violated and “ripped off!” What can you do? What could you have done?

Enter Copyscape - a service which not only allows you to search for copies of your page and content on the Web, but it provides many useful services. Its free services include

basic searches and plagiarism banner notices. Not only do the banners (some found placed in the article here) come in many different color schemes and sizes to fit the design of your site comfortably, but the folks at Copyscape have also centralized resources which offer information on plagiarism and a forum to network with other site owners and industry experts.

Some of Copyscapes offerings come at a very reasonable fee - I am not an affiliate of Copyscape, in fact, I do not think they offer an affiliate program, so feel free to use these links to get to their site, we make no money on this article or referral. Their two fee based services are Copyscape Premium, which comes at $0.05 per search and CopySentry which is a subscription based service for $4.95 per month. The CopySentry service is especially interesting as it continually monitors the Web for any content which appears to be a plagiarism or copyright infringement and notifies the subscriber upon detection.

I recommend their services and if you are an active Internet publisher, I would encourage you to check with them often to ensure that your copy stays where it belongs - securely in your hands.

After almost nine months the 3.3 version of phpLD (PHP Link Directory) was released on January 17th, last week. David, the phpLD Administrator posted on the phpLD boards:

After nearly 9 months since the release or phpLD version 3.2, we are pleased to announce the release of version 3.3. Many users have now tested the beta, as well as upgraded from 3.2, and we feel that we have reached a very stable version, and hope that you will find this latest release the best ever!

Here are some important links and info for those wishing to get started with 3.3:
1. Screenshots and Preview - here you can read about and view some of the new features of 3.3
2. Template Changes - if you are a template maker or have a template that needs upgrading, here is a guide to the changes needed in the smarty code for your template files.
3. How to Upgrade - if you are running an earlier version and wish to upgrade, we have provided some detailed instructions for how to do it, though we also recommend getting professional help when possible.
4. Download it! - You just need to login to the phpLD user area and download the files to get started. Login on the left side of the homepage of this site, and then click on My Downloads.

Thanks to everyone for your support and patience. We are hopeful that we have placed even more important tools in your hands that will lead you to having a successful site that you enjoy running. We will be immediately starting into the next version of phpLD, and promise to get the next one faster (though surely a few months still).

Best Wishes,
phpLD Team

(note: we are announcing this in the supporters forum first, and then we will expand the announcement in the coming days)

There was a patched release on January 18, which is available in the download area of the PHP Link Directory site - if you have the purchased version. For the most part the release has been very solid. I am extremely pleased with what they have done with addition of Article Submit, New Page Creation, and other similar features. We will soon be announcing our phpLD driven directory. We hope you will all take time to visit and provide feedback once we do!

 

I think I will work on this list for this year…

Hannah Montana / Miley Cyrus - Who?!?!

Good grief! I cannot keep up with my kids - Yesterday was crazy in Austin, TX as Hannah Montana / Miley Cyrus showed up for her concert here, along with Aly & A.J.

All this fuss over a teenage singer… So many people including myself think it is madness the way some parents spoil their children spending hundreds of dollars on tickets for what amounts to a children’s show.

However, there is something to be said about “gladdening the heart of a child.”

Bottom line - I am proud of my daughter, she is a great, kind, polite, considerate girl at all times (well, most of the time…) She never came to us begging to go to this event, she realized that we did not have the money to spend on something like this especially with all of her girlfriends at school talking about how much scalped tickets were costing the people who were going. My wife had mentioned something to me about a week ago that it might be something that our daughter might want to go to, so I spoke with her about it and she told me that she thought it would be fun, but that she knew she would not be able to go. I really was very proud that she had come to that “realization” on her own - she has a great head on her shoulders.

So, yesterday was like any other day until I received a call from my wife that a friend of ours had an extra ticket, but it was separate from the family that was going. Of course, we were not going to let our ten year old daughter sit by herself in a concert, but, it started me thinking about how I would love to do this for her (be able to send her to something which she would remember for years…) so I started searching the internet for tickets.

I found tickets being sold by “internet scalpers” - companies which profit off of ticket shoppers by purchasing hundreds of tickets at a time, as soon as they go on sale. Two tickets behind the stage at the Frank Erwin Center were going for $350 last night from these sellers (the original price for the same tickets were about $105 - not each, but for two). We looked on Craigslist and it was full of offers for tickets if you paid hundreds of dollars per seat. Basically, I had given up and then thought of a totally crazy idea and tried one more thing - I did a search on Google for Hannah Montana Frank Erwin… (so crazy, it just might work…) - and found a site - Texas Box Office - they were selling plenty of tickets in good seats for face value - a friend of mine couldn’t believe his eyes - he had paid about $300 for two tickets earlier in the week from a “Craigslist benefactor” (I use the term very sarcastically).

We purchased our 2 tickets from Texas Box Office for $153 which included taxes and fees - that was the final price for seats which were in front of the stage in section 45. To my mind, still a lot of money - but, my daughter had a great time, she is a great girl and her heart was definitely “gladdened” *grins*

Inspired by Magic Dude from Tubelounge.com I thought I might get “in touch” with some of my past and begin publishing a weekly article having to do with the way I paid for college and the beer I drank there… MAGIC

Enjoy

Okay - flat out - I’m not getting paid for this review by Samsung, I have no affiliation that I know of with them, but I have got nothing but good things to say about this 20 inch widescreen 1680 x 1050 panel.

I bought my first one as soon as it came out - the same time I bought the Gateway GT5468 - I wrote about in Computers SUCK! Now, Let Me Tell You How I Really Feel…

The panel has been operating with no issues at all for the past 7 months. This thing kicks butt! Mine had a $249 pricepoint and depending on where you buy it (got mine at Fry’s), but I still don’t think there are any other panels out there offering the specs this one does.

About 2 months ago, I was in the market for another panel, so I went out shopping and again, for the money there was simply no other panel out there offering the specs that the Samsung SyncMaster 206BW has. The main specs I looked at, which seem to me to be the ones that make the most difference image quality wise were, Response Time - how quickly images are refreshed / redrawn on the screen; Image Contrast - a measure of the difference in pixel brightness from black to white; Type of input - Wanted to make sure I had both RGB & DVI available; Max Resolution - How much desktop “Real Estate” I could expect to get (in other words, it doesn’t matter if you have a 5000 inch display if the max resolution is 640 x 480…)

• Response Time: 2ms
• Image Contrast Ration: 800:1 / 3000:1 (dynamic)
• Max Resolution: 1680 x 1050 which was good enough, but, I have to admit, I wish this was 1920 x 1200 - but that is the only item I wish was improved on this panel.
• DVI & RGB

Compare this with another larger panel the Acer AL2216WBD, which while larger is the closest price range lcd monitor from CNETs Top Rated LCD Monitors is seriously lacking with:

• Response Time: 5ms
• Image Contrast: 700:1
• Max Resolution: 1680 x 1050
• Signal Input: DVI-D, VGA

And another on the CNET Editors’ Top Monitors, the HP W2007 ($260 - $284 current pricerange) with:

• Response Time: 5ms
• Image Contrast: 1000:1
• Max Resolution: 1680 x 1050
• Signal Input: VGA - but, according to CNET specs, this display does have a DVI-Digitaligital connection… so not sure what the full story is here.

Let me know what you think.