Monthly Archives: April 2008

Google, Internet, SEO

Seomul Davis knows nothing about SEO

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Today I received one of those awful spam emails trying to tell me how to SEO a website. I usually delete them, but occasionally read a few extracts just to see what the gist of the message is. The one I received today had me in hysterics. It’s from some idiot called Seomul Davis, and it’s blatantly clear he knows absolutely nothing about SEO.

He’s written an article on the top ten myths in SEO, and some of his ‘myths’ are quite frightening. Let me begin…

From: SEO News [seo@seo-news.com]
Subject: Organic SEO Top 10 Myths

Organic SEO Top 10 Myths
By Seomul Davis (c) 2008

There are many SEO myths circulating on the Internet. These misconceptions are often crazy and while some are based on partial reality, others have spread due to the lack of being proved wrong.

OK, fair enough start. There are a lot of myths on the Internet about SEO due to people not knowing what they’re talking about… sadly Seomul Davis is one such person.

Organic SEO Myth 3: For higher rankings, update your website regularly. Regular updating of your content pages may certainly increase the crawl rate for search engines, but not your website rankings. Only update your website content if it is necessary and not because search engines will like it any better. As a matter of fact, the highest ranked websites on Google are those that haven’t been updated in years!

Oh you have got to be kidding me? You couldn’t be more wrong, you could try, but you’d fail. Content is the single most important aspect to SEO. Fresh, original, unique content. Anyone who listens to this idiot will find themselves nowhere, more importantly no one will find them… in Google at least.

What’s more interesting is that Seomul Davis contradicts himself in an article he wrote here:

If rising high on the SERPs is your goal, then update your content as often as you can, but on a regular basis. Google, MSN, and Yahoo! reward regular updating with higher SE rankings.

So which is it? Does content increase your rankings, or does it have no effect? I know the answer, you obviously don’t.

Organic SEO Myth 7: Header tags or H1 should be used to ensure high ranking. There is no evidence to prove this. However, this is one of the most common myths. You can reach top Google positioning without H1 but they certainly don’t hurt so use H tags correctly.

There’s no evidence to prove that H1 tags help your ranking? OK mate, you believe what you want. I hope no one else believes you, for their sake.

Organic SEO Myth 10: Your pages should be optimized for the long tail keywords. This is not true. Nowadays, long-tail keyword phrases are no longer effective as not many pages use them and not many people search using long tails. You can include these keywords in blogs or even an article, but that is not really optimization.

Long tail keywords are no longer effective? Oh for fuck’s sake. This guy is a fucking muppet. Long tail keywords are vital for SEO, not least because you get a higher conversion rate with them. Seomul Davis… you’re a moron.

I absolutely loved this last paragraph though.

Remember don’t go spreading any SEO myths that you believe may be true. Test it yourself several times on different websites before reaching any conclusion as there are other factors involved as well.

No, you’re right there. Don’t go spreading myths that you believe to be true. Shame you don’t take your own advice, idiot. If you want to spout your shit on your own website then fine, but don’t email this crap to me.

Internet

Man jailed for selling sperm to lesbians

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The BBC has reported how John Gonzalez has been jailed for fraud due to his website mannotincluded.com, which was setup to sell sperm to lesbians.

Nice work if you can get it.

The founder of a website offering sperm to lesbians wanting children has been jailed for 16 months for fraud at Wood Green Crown Court in north London.

Now, what I want to know is what exactly do they mean by ‘fraud’? I know he was doing something dodgy with the cash side of things, but was we committing fraud with the product as well? Were the lesbians provided sour cream instead of love juice? Have any of the lesbians complained?

If you’re a lesbian and you’ve bough some man fat from the Internet, have you been satisfied? Let me know here.

Also, the website has now been switched off by the server, and it’s a PR4 domain… I’ll buy that if John Gonzalez needs a few quid. I’ve thought about selling my offshoots myself.

Internet

Facebook says ‘up yours’ to US and Canadian fans of Scrabble

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OK, so that’s not the actual words Facebook used to Americans and Canadians, but I so rarely see news like this I wanted to put my own slant on it. Usually we see offers and services (like YouTube’s scheme were you earn money for videos you’ve uploaded) that are available to North America and Canada only. This time, it’s the exact reverse, due to the bickering between Hasbro, Mattel and the developers of Scrabulous.

You may remember that Scrabulous is a Scrabble type game (any similarities between Scrabble and Scrabulous are purely coincidental) available to members of Facebook. Both Mattel and Hasbro were narked by the game, because they own the rights to Scrabble (Hasbro in the US and Canada, Mattel in the small market known as the rest of the World).

Rather than take the intelligent, common sense decision and try to buy Scrabulous (and it’s 200,000 registered, targeted userbase) Mattel and Hasbro went all legal and decided to blow air at them. Clever guys, well done.

Now, after the dust has settled, and Scrabulous is still on Facebook and chugging along nicely (my flatmate has been playing it, as he does with every Facebook fad) Mattel, through RealNetworks, have introduced an official version of the game.

Recently, a division of RealNetworks introduced ‘Scrabble by Mattel’ on the leading social networking site. The game is though, technically available only to players outside the US and Canada.

Though of course, because Hasbro aren’t involved it can’t infringe on their copyrights, so is unavailable to US and Canada based residents.

Someone’s gonna have to get to grips with this whole territory thing in relation to the Internet, it just doesn’t work.

Rants

Carcraft Complaints

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Several years ago, back in 2004, I was looking to buy a new car. My Ford Capri had decided enough was enough and it’s daily 80 mile round trip from Newport to Bristol was too much for it. Being the ‘over the top’ person I am I looked to a BMW Z3 for my second car.

No sense letting the grass grow eh?

So, armed with my Parkers guide price for each model dating back to 1996, and the average mileage to expect for the year, I looked around a few garages for a Z3. One such garage I looked at was the Carcraft centre in Newport. Now, before I went I researched on the Internet (as I do) and read an awful lot of negative comments about Carcraft. Many of the comments said the same thing; their cars were over priced and well over average mileage.

I thought I’d give them a chance anyway.

I went in and was immediately set upon by this car dealer who wouldn’t let me enter the warehouse until I’d given him my name, address and phone number. No matter how much I said I wasn’t interested, he wouldn’t take no for an answer. Reluctantly I gave him the info he wanted and proceeded to look at the cars.

They had a few BMW Z3 models, one in particular I quite liked the look of however the price was high for the age and it had some damage to the drivers side front panel.

When I inquired further I found the Mileage was 20,000 miles over average for the year. I figured there was some room to barter here, with the mileage and the scratches to the bodywork.

I approached a salesman and explained my position, how I’d researched the value of the car and the average mileage, then told him what I thought the car was worth.

Do you know, he didn’t even reply to me. He just turned his back and walked away. I couldn’t believe how rude this guy was. Not a word. He wasn’t even a junior, he was a senior salesman as I’d been told I needed to speak to him if I wanted to discuss the price.

It seems what I’d read on line was true. Carcraft sell high mileage cars for extortionate prices. They rely on people struggling to get finance in order to rip them off with their ‘offers’.

Has anyone else had any experience with Carcraft? I’d love to know if my experience was a typical one.

I later bought a Z3 from a garage in Bristol, £3,000 cheaper than the one in Carcraft, no damage and with over 30,000 less miles on the clock.

Internet

Iraq Internet Scam

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It’s been a while since I’ve received any of those Nigerian email scams that pretend to be from the sons of wealthy land owners whose father’s have been killed by the government, wanting to deposit $200 USD into my bank account. They’re always worth a read for a comical nature of the grammar, and the fact that they’re clearly aimed at Americans… because Americans on the whole, tend to be stupid.

Well, I’ve just had one about Iraq, and this one comes with a website! Brilliant. I love the part of this email where the guy says ‘I am an American’ as though that somehow makes what he says all the more credible.

Twat.

Hello, Greetings to you, I know this might come to you as a surprise, but I want to make two things clear before moving forward. I am not asking you for any money; neither should you think that this is a scam. All I seek from you, is your honesty and sincerity in a business deal that’s going to bring fort mutual benefit worth 50 Million British Pounds. (G.B.P).

I am an American and a member of The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), our committee is in charge of contracts awards and payment for all contractors who executes contracts in the rebuilding of Iraq. We are currently in London for the payment of some contractors who executed contracts in Iraq. For more details about our operations visit the website: http://www.rebuild-iraq-expo.com

There was an over draft contract we just discovered for 50 Million GBP and with our influence in this panel we can successfully present you/or your company to claim the above funds. We have agreed to share the money thus: 1. 40% is for You. 2. 60% for us (the officials) Please note that this transaction is 100% risk free and we hope to commence the transfer latest seven (7) banking days from the date of receipt of the above information from you in your next reply. your contact name/company’s name if any, your telephone and fax number(s).

The above information will enable us write letters of claim and job description respectively. This way, we will use your name or company’s name to re-apply for payment and re-award the contract in your company’s name. We are looking forward to doing this business with you and solicit your confidentiality in this transaction.

Thanks. Yours faithfully, Mr Gary Howard Wolf.

Obviously this is a scam, anyone with even half a brain can see that, but I know some people will be falling over themselves to send this guy their details. Hopefully, by pasting this email here anyone caught in two minds will Google Mr Gary Howard Wolf, find this website and realise how stupid they almost were.

I live in hope.

CSA

CSA have cost £1.7 BILLION so far

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The Child Support Agency, those idiots who can’t get any information correct and refuse to speak to me, have cost the UK tax payer £1.7 BILLION since they were set up. This figure has been reached after their latest expense to me and you from their impending computer upgrade, which is said to cost £320 MILLION.

Read this at the CSA Complaints website, CSAHell.com.

Good job they’re value for money eh?

Internet, Rants

Paedophiles forced to hand over their email addresses

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According to the the BBC website, the government has unveiled plans to stop sex offenders and paedophiles from accessing websites such as Facebook, MySpace and Bebo. Their genius idea is to collect the email addresses from the sex offenders and tell the websites to block them.

Sex offenders’ e-mail addresses are to be passed to social networking sites like Facebook and Bebo to prevent them contacting children.

Under government proposals, offenders who do not give police their address – or give a false one – would face up to five years in jail.

This is a marvellous plan with one possible drawback. It’s bollocks. Have the government not heard of Hotmail? Do they not realise that anyone can get a free email address from tens of thousands of different websites in seconds?

Are they all morons?

Well yes they are, in fact that they went on to say:

However, BBC home affairs correspondent Danny Shaw said ministers admitted that details of the system were still to be worked out, including how it would work with websites based abroad over which the UK has no jurisdiction.

Both Facebook and MySpace are based in California.

Fuck me. Details are still to be worked out? What utter wankshaft came up with this ill conceived idea? They’re going to waste our money gathering email addresses of a reported 30,000 sex offenders, who could get a new email address in seconds, and then ask websites to waste their time blocking the email addresses? But they can’t ask websites that are based outside the UK, which of course almost all social networking sites are.

Please, for the love of all that’s alcoholic, don’t announce dumb fuck ideas like this without first asking someone who knows even the first fucking thing about the Internet.

Google, Internet

Pub Quiz, nerd style

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This evening I’ll be going to the (not so) local pub for the pub quiz. A quiz that when I last went we finished dead last. This time however is going to be different as I aim to cheat like a Mexican.

I’ll be taking my Ipaq Smartphone and ensuring that Team Google wins the day.

Now I wouldn’t normally cheat you understand, but when we finished dead last before it wasn’t due to our intellectual superiors defeating us, or because anyone else cheated, it was because the quiz focused on the topical subjects of TV, which pop star was shagging who and what happened on the last series of Big Brother.

You know, useless shit.

I resented losing to someone who managed to spell every single word on their sheet incorrectly. It was a bloody embarrassment. This time will be different.

Though I imagine I’ll just get pissed and forget to Google anything.