How to get paid for your original domain name!

You went to a domain registrar and you spent a lot of time thinking of that perfect domain name. After many many tries, you found the one that you like, and you have no doubt that it will be successful. You set it up and throw up a holding page on it and start to plan your new website around it. You get a lot of work done and the concept is really starting to take shape. That's when you get the email:


Dear Sir or Madam,
It has come to our attention that you own XXXXXX.com. We own that trademark and we want you to release the domain immediately.

Sincerely,
Big Business

Ok, so that's not exactly what the email says, but it's the general idea. What do you do? Surely this big company could take you to the cleaners and they would probably win in court. Do you roll over and just hand it to them? Hell no you don't. You make some money is what you do.

You reply back to the company with:

Dear Big Business,
I legally purchased this domain name and I have done a lot of work on the concept that I plan to launch under it. I have spent countless hours and a bit of money getting the design together. The name is integral to the concept and I'd rather keep it. If,however, you would be willing to compensate me for the time and money I have invested already, I will be happy to release the domain name to you.

Sincerely,
Me

This is the scariest part. You send that and you're thinking to yourself, "What the hell did I just do? This company is going to roll right over me." Well, you would be wrong, and I will tell you why. If this company really wants this domain name, they will get it one way or the other. How you play your cards here is crucial. You see, it would cost them a tidy sum to sue you for it. Your goal here is ask for a bit less than it might cost them to litigate. They don't want to take legal action. They want you to release the domain in the quickest, and more importantly, the quietest way you can. They don't want bad press associated with the domain name. That would devalue the domain, and potentially their brand. No big company wants to have the image of a bullying big company. Trust me, I personally know this works with big business. I have dealt with this with some of the biggest players in the industry.

So what next??? They will most likely want to appraise the domain. Let this happen, but, at all costs, DO NOT RELEASE OWNERSHIP OF THE DOMAIN. If you do, they can take it legally and pay you nothing. After they appraise the domain, they will send you an email like this:

Dear Sir or Madam,
We have appraised the domain and would like to offer you $200 for it.

Sincerely,
Big Business

Wow!! That's not bad, but remember how bargaining works. They are giving you the classic low ball offer. They will pay more, but they aren't just going to throw out the first big offer. They're gonna make you work for it, and rightly so. You would do the same thing. So here is what you send back to them. Please don't copy these word for word, chances are, big business will be reading this as well.

Dear Big Business,
$200 does not cover my time and investment so far on this project. I cannot release the domain to you at a loss. I believe that $1000 will adequately reimburse me for time and effort. Please realize that in transferring my domain name to you, I will have to rethink my entire business model.

Sincerely,
Me

This is the counter-offer portion of the argument, and here is where things should get interesting. They will either counter your counter offer, or they will threaten legal action. Don't be scared if they do. It will cost them a bit more than $1000 to sue you, and it just doesn't make good business sense. Just keep going back and forth until you think that you have reached a fair price. Only when you have received correspondance indicating that legal proceedings have begun, should you start to worry, and also not that even if you DO get this letter, know that the option still exists to settle out of court.

The key here is to not be intimidated. Keep in mind what is going to be in their best interest. You DON'T have to roll over and take it. Also realize that the company may call you a domain squatter. Don't be offended. You just need to make sure that you at least have a "concept under construction" page at the domain name to prove that you have a project in mind for it. Make sure that you do this, so that if it does go to court, and you want to fight it, you at least had something there. If you just bought the domain and kept it to yourself, it looks like you bought it with the intention of trying to sell it for big money.

Even if that is the case, you need to look legit. No one knows what you are up to except for you, and no one has the right to force a domain from you. I personally know that this works, you just have to keep your senses about you and make smart decisions!!

Pictures of Martian running around? You decide!

So there are these images that were taken by NASA 4 years ago floating around the internet. Some have said that it looks like a humanoid figure moving about the surface of the Red Planet. I, for one think that even if it's not, it's very interesting. Rocks don't typically form in shapes like this, and the 'skin' color would be indicative of a creature that evolved on a world with little protection from UV rays.

My thought is, hmmm, Nasa knows where the picture was taken. Why not go back and have another look now? If the formation is still there, then obviously it isn't alive. Nothing really moves around on Mars except for the dust, so if it isn't, then this could be the most reputable picture of an alien that we've ever been witness to. Very cool stuff! If you couple this picture with the Space.com article from 2001, and Mars is getting to be a far more interesting place than we first imagined.

Link to original article here.

People Better Than They Think They Are

I read blogs, news sites, parody sites, newspapers, and even watch a little tv. I have found that there is one common denominator among them all. They all try to tell people that they need help, that they aren't good enough, and that the world will give them a free lunch if they cry loudly enough. I know I sound like a cold hearted bastard, but let me tell you my story.

I was a bad kid who grew up with a great mom who loved me and worked her ass off to make sure that we kids never knew how poor we really were. She worked crap minimum wage jobs during the year and then froze her ass off stripping tobacco in the winter so that we would have Christmas presents to open. I didn't make that any easier for her by being a crap kid that couldn't stay out of trouble. I watched my mom go from welfare mom, to college graduate in just a couple of years and then life got easier.

As I got older, freedom called out to me and I moved away from home. I lived in a one bedroom trailer out of state with 5 other guys and whoever else needed a place to crash. We had the quintessential party house. Drugs and women, women and drugs. It was truly a beautiful thing. I lived there for a year and then moved back in with mom. Now mom is great, but with the time I was away, she got used to not having me, the smart-assed kid around. So I moved in with my grandma. Then one day my ex-girlfriend from out of state called me and asked if she could come up. I told her she could, but we couldn't stay at my grandma's. We had a little bit of money so she, her friend, and I rented a hotel room. I got a shit job as a waiter so that I could use my tips to pay for the hotel daily. She got a job at a convenience store and that's where the proverbial shit hit the fan. We robbed that place.

With the $8000 we got, we bought a piece of crap car for $400 and sped off to desinations unknown, which ended up being Canada. We lived there for a year, surviving off of what we could steal. Finally, with my assumed name, I got a job, and promptly got caught as an illegal alien. Now let me just take this second to sing the praises of the Canadian penal system. They put me in this cell block that had a big 'ol tv room with armchairs, great food, and free smokes. I dragged out my stay for a couple of months because it was wintertime in Manitoba and frankly, it was fucking cold. Finally I made a deal that would put me over the border into North Dakota with a light windbreaker, no money, no hat, and no way home. When I say they put me over the border, I mean that they drove me to the Canadian border, put me on the American side, and left me. Apparently, near the border, no one wants to pick up a hitchhiker because I walked a good 70 miles until I got a ride.

Now at this time, I was convinced that I couldn't go home, so I headed for San Fransisco, California. The weather there would be constantly bearable and there would be some public assistance that I could get so that my lazy ass wouldn't have to work. So after much hitchhiking around the Midwest, I finally made it to California. After a few days, I had discovered public assistance and intravenous drugs. I also found someone who was willing to let me sell drugs for them. I was a great drug dealer, and I could have made a lot of money, but I spent it all on the same drugs I was selling, crystal meth. I slept on the sidewalk for a year. I stayed jacked up on dope for 3 years. I eventually worked my way up to selling pounds of the stuff a week. I made enough so that I could stay high on drugs all I wanted and could afford a one room studio in Pacific Heights for a whopping $1200 a month rent. After that fell through, and it always does with easy money, I was back on the street. Finally I decided at the age of 22 to get my ass off drugs and move back home, come what may. I got a job as a security guard at a church and with my first check, bought a bus ticket back to Kentucky.

It was when I got back that I started working at crap factory jobs. I couldn't make enough money to live on, so I had to live with my mom. That didn't last long. I eventually met a girl and moved in with her. We stayed together for 4 years. In that time she made sure to write a bad check nearly every day. I finally got rid of that mess and met the girl of my dreams. We moved in together and I decided to get my ass back in school and study my passion, technology. I graduated Summa Cum Laude after one year of study and landed a job with a prominent web hosting firm where I am now. I've been married for 2 years, together for 3. I am making enough money to live comfortably, and life is good.

I tell you all this to make the point that, if I can do it, anyone can. I was the laziest son-of-a-bitch that you ever met. I never depended on anyone for anything. I used my public assistance money to buy drugs, and nothing more. With enough determination, anyone can make it. ANYONE! This is why I have no sympathy for anyone who hasn't figured it out yet. With just a little perseverance, anyone can succeed. You just have to be willing to have less for a little while. Most people can't do that. The immediate satisfaction of getting things the easy way is too strong. People don't need a helping hand as much as they need tough love. Then, live or die, come what may, it's their fault. Yes life can deal you some major shit, it's how you deal with it that makes all the difference in the world!

Martin Luther King Junior Day, The Misplaced Holiday

Martin Luther King Junior Day. Celebrated the third Monday of each January as a homage to the non-violent activist and the civil rights movement, it has become a national holiday for minorities to celebrate how far they have come, and for others to learn about so that history does not repeat it's self.

Unfortunately, coupled with black history month, it has become a holiday that does the exact opposite of it's intent. Rather than educating everyone, it alienates minorities. Minorities want to be equal, with equal rights, equal treatment, and equal lifestyles. So why would they choose to set themselves apart from everyone else? What would minorities think of having a white history month? Would they see it as racist? What if we had an all white college? Surely that wouldn't be acceptable. What I am driving at is that if these things aren't acceptable for the majority, then why is it acceptable for minorities? Surely this is not the equality that they have been fighting so hard for. What is ok for them is not ok for everyone else?? That sounds like the very thing that MLK was fighting against! He died for that very principle.

I am not saying to ignore this day. I am saying use it and black history month as a humanity history holiday. Use it as a marker of how far we have come in learning to live together peacefully while we celebrate everything we have accomplished as a race, one race, the human race!

Cloverfield - Reviewed by a Godzilla Fan

Well folks, I've gone to see Cloverfield, and I must say I am pleasantly surprised at how great of a movie that it is. It starts out very slow, but quickly escalates into pandemonium. It has everything that you could want from a monster movie, told from the perspective of the fleeing public. That's where I want to begin this review.

In every monster movie you've ever seen, it's the perspective of the government or other agency trying to stop the monster that you see. In this movie, you take on the role of one of the ant-like specs that is running like hell away from the monster. So you never find out where it's from, why it's here, or even what exactly that it is. This is part of the genius. You don't really have time to contemplate all of that, you're too busy trying to find someplace you can hide and pray that it doesn't find you.

So those of you who haven't seen it probably want to know what the monster looks like. Well you're not going to hear it from me. All you need to know is that it's definitely not the tyrannosaurus-like creature that we are all used to. It also has, what I can only describe as fleas falling from it killing people. I won't tell you when it happens in the movie, but someone actually explodes into a flying mass of blood and gore. This is classic.

It's also where this movie gets a lot of it's charm. You see, I come from a monster movie heritage. I LOVE all of the old Godzilla movies, with the exception of the Hollywood abortion that they made us sit through in 1998. We all know what makes Godzilla movies great. They don't take themselves seriously, they don't over complicate the plot, and they are lots of fun to watch. Cloverfield doesn't disappoint here either. It constantly delivers cliche after cliche without getting campy.

Yes you should go see this movie. Take some dramamine though. The camera work will make you motion sick if you're prone to it. So go right now, get really stoned, and go see Cloverfield!!

Gadget Friday: SanDisk Sansa TakeTV Video Player

Well, here we are at yet another Friday. So enough of me bitching about the rest of the world, and on to the gadgets. I ran across one that isn't very new, but not a lot of people know about it and I think it's just cool. It's the SanDisk Sansa TakeTV Video Player. This thing is sweet.

It's a small video player, about the size of a candy bar, that you plug into your pc via USB. Then you dump your movie on it just like it was a flash drive. Then you take it over to your tv, plug in the AV cables, detach the remote control and enjoy your movie on your TV!!! Is that fuckin cool or what?? Of course this leads a couple of extra places like, jacking it into your office projector.

It comes in 4gb ($99) and an 8gb ($149) models respectively. Specs from the Sandisk site are below.

Feature List

• Connects to any PC:
  
  • USB 2.0 compliant
  • Works with Mac, Linux, Windows Vista and Windows XP
• Connects to any standard TV – Supported AV Outputs:
  
  • Composite Video
  • Analog Stereo
  • S-Video
• Remote control—for use in the comfort of your living room
• Compact convenient and lightweight:
• Supports .AVI format with either MPEG-4, DivX or xVid codec
• Supports NTSC and PAL color systems
• Resolution of up to 720x576 (D1) at a bitrate of up to 7Mbps.
• 4:3 and 16:9 aspect ratios and a range of viewing modes
• DivX (Home Theater profile) certified
• DivX DRM compliant
• Standard replaceable remote control battery

Minimum System Requirements

• Mac, Linux, Windows® XP or Windows Vista™ operating system
• USB 1.1 or USB 2.0
• TV with either s-video or composite (CVBS) video inputs

Package Contents

• TakeTV™ player
• TakeTV™ remote control (battery included)
• TakeTV™ cradle w/intergrated cables (composite/s-video)
• AC power adapter

4GB*	8GB*
5 hours** of video	10 hours** of video

* 1 gigabyte (GB) = 1 billion bytes. Some of the listed capacity is used for formatting and other functions, and thus is not available for data storage.
** Video capacity based on MPEG-4 1.5-Mbps video at 720x480 pixel resolution combined with 128-Kbps audio. Actual capacity varies by content.


How fuckin cool is that?? Video of it in action below!

The Iditarod is brutal to dogs......no shit!

In response to this article.

The Iditarod is a race that spans over 1150 miles of some of the roughest and most beautiful terrain on the planet. Mushers and their prized dog teams race this old mail and supply route over many many days of long hours and sub-zero temperatures. Arguably, it is one of the most challenging endurance races on the planet, both for the mushers, and for the dogs. It has a long tradition of being one of the more brutal sporting events in the world. People and dogs have died during this race.

Now we have the sentiment going around that this is brutal on the dogs. No shit! These dogs are bred and trained for their entire lives to run this race. They are happiest when they are hooked up and pulling. Ask any musher worth his salt and they will tell you how much they love their dogs. Is the Iditarod cruel? No. While we are at it, we might as well go ahead and end horse-racing, or any animal race for that matter. Oh wait. What about the Tour de France bike race? Surely that must be cruel to the people riding in it. How about the rodeo? Circuses must be havens of cruelty as well.

This race is not unique. These dogs are beasts of burden. It just happens that these people love their dogs very very much. What people get out of trying to demonize these events is beyond me. Yes the dogs are whipped until they learn their job, yes MANY dogs die during training, racing, or post race. This is a hard fact of life to stomach, but is IS a fact of life in these extreme conditions. No one thinks twice about a trained lion being whipped. No one blinks an eye when a horse is whipped. You touchy feely bleeding hearts are going to end everything that is either slightly offensive, or leaves less than a fuzzy feeling on your heart.

The worry over cloned meat is absolutely useless. There is a technology that is far more newsworthy.

 

Ok, one of the original articles is here. Yeah, I know that the FDA was just making it's official acknowledgment that cloned animals are safe to eat. My response is...."No shit!" I mean, who really needed that? The cloning process doesn't introduce any new chemicals, nor does it involve any kind of radiation that might contaminate the animal. Basically, there is nothing new here.
The animal is the same as it would be if it were the genetic twin of the other, because, in fact, IT IS THE GENETIC TWIN of the original animal.

My next question is, with the expense of cloning being as astronomical as it is, and considering the fact that only a very very very small percentage of cloned animals live at all past birth, why the hell would you make one just to eat it anyway? The best use of this technology is for copying 'perfect' specimens of animals to be used in breeding operations. This way you never have to loose the traits that you have developed with your breeding, or could go back to square one if something went awry in subsequent generations. It would give breeders an 'undo' in the real world. Cool huh?? So why all this talk about eating cloned animals anyway??

Why talk about it at all when there is a far more compelling technology that deserves the public attention. Cultured meat. What is cultured meat? It is quite literally, muscle and fat cells of an animal that can be grown and propagated indefinitely to literally grow meat with no animal at all. That's right, no bones, no blood. Think of the implications. Vegetarians who won't eat meat because of the cruelty aspect could now eat away with a clear conscience. Personally, I would make meat curtains. lol Read more about cultured meat here.
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Steve Jobs Keynote highlights. There's a good one and it's not Randy Newman.

Ok, so yes, I'm pretty much a Microsoft guy, but I can appreciate innovation in any flavor. It was in that spirit that I decided to watch the keynote. You know, I almost forgot how charismatic Steve Jobs is. He talks up a good game. He even ribs MS on one hand by reading the accolades for Leopard from someone at PC Magazine, and thanks them almost in the same breath for releasing Office natively on Intel.

All of that aside, he jumped into a product called Time Capsule that I wish like hell that we had on the MS platform. It works with Time Machine to create backups of your system WIRELESSLY to a WIRELESS SERVER GRADE HARD DRIVE!!! Screw the Macbook Air, screw the updates for the iPhone and iPod, and screw Randy Newman. This announcement alone was worth the entire keynote. There's a 500GB model for $299, and a 1TB model for $499!!

Did anyone else notice how the free update for the iPhone will cost iPod users $20 and it's not even the same feature rich upgrade as is on the iPhone. C'mon Steve, who do you think is going to pay $20 for this update, when they can jailbreak their iPod and make it do so much more than that?