I've been in a domain buying mood lately and decided to purchase 404ts.com to complement my primary but longer domain 404techsupport.com. While thinking about having a short URL for the sake of convenience, what else am I supposed to do with it than setup a URL shortening service? Similar to Bit.ly, TinyURL, Is.Gd, and the dozens of other sites out there that provide URL … [Read more...]
Jimmy John’s Lesson on Instant Communication and the Problem with Rumors
Apparently a rumor was going around that made its way into a "press alert" saying Jimmy John's was going to have $1 sandwiches on July 1st in the Champaign and Charleston, IL areas as part of a customer appreciation day. This press alert made its way to a local newspaper writer who put the information out on Twitter. The newspaper she works for then retweeted the information … [Read more...]
Microsoft Research’s Sleep Proxy
Saving energy through IT in an enterprise environment almost always comes at the expense of trading off something else. It could be security by not keeping machines on for patching, it could be accessibility by not keeping machines on for remote access, it could be inconvenience by having to wait for your computer to boot up and complete all of its start up tasks, or it could … [Read more...]
Google Gets Into the Spirit of the World Cup, pt 2.
Google has another easter egg up its sleeve related to the World Cup beyond the previously mentioned one you would find at the bottom of Google's Search results. This time the trick comes from YouTube. If you are watching any World Cup-related video, you'll notice a new button near the bottom-right corner that looks like a soccer ball. You can see it for yourself with this … [Read more...]
Turning Down Technorati Media and Looking for Ad Networks for Small Sites
If you've visited 404 Tech Support recently, you'll have noticed a few additional ads. One was on the right column and another was on the home page following the most recent article. These ads were provided by Technorati Media. Today, after testing the ads for the past week , I have removed all Technorati Media ads and will not be going back to the service. I'm very … [Read more...]