One big contest at Feed Flare

Feed Flare is running their first contest with $500 cash to be won as well as other prizes totaling over $5,200 and 25,000 entrecard credits! Guess what, there contest will be ending on March 31st and the draw for the $500 cash and 25,000 entrecard credits will be done after the contest ended. Check out the other prizes below.

Here are the prizes:

1. Mini Unix web hosting package free for 1 year - Donated by BlurFur web hosting services (value - $70.00) - random draw
2. Advertising voucher with Bidvertiser worth $200.00 in free clicks (value - $200.00) - random draw
3. Blog branding package which includes (Favico, header, logo, 125×125 button) design package donated by Graphic Identity (value - $200.00) - random draw
4. Free advertising for one month in the form of a 125×125 button on Blogging Cents. (value - $35.00) - random draw
5. Win a free advertising spot on the “You Can Learn Series” blog in the form of a 125×125 ad button (value per spot - $5.00) - random draw
6. Exclusive Theme donated by Unique Blog Designs (value - $99.00) there is around 10 different themes you can chose from if you win - random draw
7. Win one of 2 copies of the “Written Promptly Everyday” E-Book donated by The Prompt Writer (value per book -$5.00) random draw
8. Win a copy of “How to launch a profitable free lancing business for under $50.00″ donated by the “Self Made Chick” (value - $12.00) random draw
9. Custom banner design and the size will be of your choice donated by Dat Money dot com (value - $50.00) random draw
10. One month free 125×125 advertising on Jason Boom dot com. (value - $20.00) random draw
11. Grand Prise - 25,000 Entrecard credits (one lump some, the largest amount to be given away in a contest to date) draw date is March 31st (value - not really sure but some where around $250.00 I think)
12. Bonus gifts - we have 200 pages on the “One Buck Wiki” to give away - the first two hundred contest enterer’s will be each given one page as a bonus gift just for entering our grand opening contest.You will still be able to win any of the other prizes we have as well. The current selling price for a page on the “One Buck Wiki” is $20.00 making this our largest prize package worth over $4000.00 in cash value.
13. Featured Grand Prise = $500.00 cash payable via PayPal with the draw date being March 31st.

Joining this contest is easy, you have to subscribe to Feed Flare by email, blog about this contest on your own blog and post 2 simple links provided to Feed Flare. For more information about this contest, follow this link:

It is party time at Feed Flare! Win $500 cash

Don't miss out on this now, I don't even want to imagine what is possible if I were lucky enough to win some major prizes through this contest! Good luck contesting :D

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Disclosure policy: Do you disclose or not?

The act of making something obvious

Just ignore the title, I am sure if you have not started disclosing your policy, you certainly will in the near future. Unless of course, you decide not to recommend anything to buy to your readers, in your blog post, in the sidebar, in the comment, anywhere in your blog, ever. Some of you may ask, what is disclosure? Let's see:

What is disclosure?

The act of making something obvious. Disclosing (divulging or explaining), the purpose and interests of a blogger in his/her published posts: written, audio or video.

Source: http://www.disclosurepolicy.org/

Apparently, if you market anything at all in your blog, which can be considered "word-of-mouth marketing" to US citizens, you are required by law to make disclosures of your relationship with your affiliate partners and forms of compensation that you receive from them. Otherwise, you may be subject to legal action for deceptive advertising. Remember, no matter how honestly or impartially you review a product, you might still be subjected to legal action unless you have a disclosure policy to protect yourself. Other advertisements you placed on your blog may contain promises such as "99.9% web hosting uptime", which you may not be able to verify and certainly, you do not want any part in the potential deceptive advertising charges!

Get protected now, generate your own disclosure policy
You don't have to seek the service of a lawyer to draw up your own disclosure policy. DisclosurePolicy.org was created and funded by PayPerPost to help you generate your own simple disclosure policy. You can select to create a disclosure policy that is meant for an individual blogger, a group of bloggers, or even a blog sponsored by a company or organization. It is hassle-free and will take only a few minutes of your time. I disclose here, that I do not have any affiliation with DisclosurePolicy.org and I do not receive any forms of compensation to recommend its service just for the sake of making something obvious.

Here is my disclosure policy if anyone is interested to read it. Undoubtedly, I am going to adopt the more professional disclosure policy generated by DisclosurePolicy.org, but I am really tempted to use this cheeky one below which I modified from the one generated for me:

This blog accepts forms of cash advertising, sponsorship, paid insertions or other forms of compensation.

The compensation received certainly influenced the advertising content, topics or posts made in this blog. Money is the source of all evil, how true!

The owner(s) of this blog is compensated to provide opinion on products, services, websites and various other topics. Even though the owner(s) of this blog receives meagre compensation for our posts or advertisements, we always adhere strictly to advertisers' guidelines to lead readers into believing our opinions, finding, beliefs, or experiences on those topics or products fabricated based on advertisers' wishes. The views and opinions expressed on this blog are not always purely the bloggers' own. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer, provider or party in question.

This blog does contain content which might present a conflict of interest. This content may not always be identified.

Hehe, anyone daring enough to use the disclosure policy I modified above? Certainly will score points with advertisers, but I pity the readers :D

So have you disclosed or not? What effects does a disclosure policy bring? Will your readers trust you less or appreciate you for being honest with them? Do you know any advertisers that explicitly demand you to make a disclosure policy? Please share with us your views, we will like to know! Thank you.

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Chipping in with a late late contest entry

It is really hard to resist a good easy contest with irresistible prizes up for grabs! Don't you think so? TysBlog.com is organizing its first entrecard credit contest and 3000 entrecard credits, $25, a blog review and permanent links are up for grabs too. There will only be 1 lucky winner though. To join this contest, you have to do 3 things which are to stumble the contest post, write a short post about the contest, subscribe to TysBlog.com feed by email. Hurry, the contest is ending on the 20th of March! Best of luck to all contestants :)

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Have you heard of HYIP?

Have you heard of HYIP? It stands for High Yield Investment Program. It is basically an investment program that seems too good to be true. By offering high interest rates return for money invested, such program easily attract people who want to strike it rich instantly. The interest rate may range 5-250% a month. Originally such program is conducted in real life but with the recent advent of making money online craze and e-currency facilities, more and more of HYIP programs are emerging on the internet.

Did I not mention that the offer of HYIP seem too good to be true? I found an online HYIP program, that pays 1.1% daily interest for investment of 5-1000USD during 180 business days. By doing simple calculation, I found out that with an initial investment of 5USD, I can get raw profit of almost 200% after 180 business days! Before you start asking me to provide you with the URL of this program, you have to take note that many HYIPs have been proven to be scams, they either disappear with your money or make it difficult for you to withdraw your earnings until the big day of their disappearance. Therefore you can also associate HYIP with high risk investment plan.

There are probably some genuine, stable and interesting HYIPs out there. Their business models are usually based on investing customers' money on forex, sports betting, metal trading and other profitable businesses.

How are the scam HYIPs operated? The scam HYIPs are usually Ponzi schemes, they do not really invest customers' money on any businesses but they will create an illusion that they are generating revenue by investing in undisclosed business ventures. The truth is, they will pay high interest rates to existing customers from newest members' invested money. This is done initially to gain members trusts, to create a stable image for themselves and to encourage even more investments from the greedy masses who want to make easy money. In the end, they will encourage members to invest the interest earned too and almost all the members at the bottom of the scheme will not be seeing their hard earned money anymore.

E-currencies has made it possible for new HYIP to emerge on the internet and attract members from countries all around the world. The collection and payment of funds have also been made simpler, there is simply no contact between members and HYIP runners. Undoubtedly, the security risk is also higher in this scenario because the average web users certainly wouldn't enjoy tracing scam HYIP runners.

Therefore, when it comes to e-currencies and personal information on the web, you ought to be more careful. Be especially cautious when you are promised something out of the ordinary, because all scams sound that way.

Take note that I don't mean that all HYIPs are scams. I have found some HYIPs sites and also some HYIPs monitoring sites, and apparently there are a few stable and honest HYIPs on the internet now. However I am reluctant to share the details here lest I unintentionally lead you to scam programs. Besides, I could not vouch for any of these programs as I myself do not really have the funds to invest. I may run a review of the HYIPs monitoring sites, if the respond to this post is good.

Before ending this post, I ask that any readers who have experience in HYIPs to come out to comment on this post and share your experience. You can share the genuine paying HYIPs or caution other users from joining a program that smells of scam. Would really appreciate that! Thank you and happy investing :)

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Everyone is a winner contest

MindBlogger is running his second contest. There's no doubt a lot of contests being run this month. I will be joining a few more, in the hope of grabbing something big out of the contest craze right now. Now, back to MindBlogger's contest, he doesn't promise everyone a prize, but there will be at least 10 winners with various prizes being offered, so in my opinion it is almost like everyone is a winner. I like this kind of contest, because more people have a chance of winning something (a little consolation prize is better than nothing to show for your efforts, right?).

OK, the real name of the contest is "1650 ECs + a FREE Blog Header + 12 Free Ads" Contest. Too long in my opinion, but good description and great prizes! Here are the prizes on offer:

• 1st Place: 1000 entrecard credits + a FREE customized blog header + a FREE 125×125 ad on MindBlogger for one week + a FREE Text Link Ad on MindBlogger for one month
• 2nd Place: 200 entrecard credits + a FREE 125×125 ad on MindBlogger for one week + a Text Link Ad on MindBlogger for one month
• 3rd Place: 100 entrecard credits + a Text Link Ad on MindBlogger for one month! Wait..

It doesn’t stop there! From 4th place to 10th Place, 7 lucky bloggers will win a FREE Text Link Ad for one month each, and 50 entrecard credits each!

So it sums up to 1650 ECs, a FREE customized blog header and 12 FREE Ads! In addition to that, every blogger entering the contest and earning more than 6 entries will get a permanent linkback from the follow-up post(s) MindBlogger does about this contest.

The prize I am really looking forward to winning is of course the first prize, because I would like to have a customized header (I have a poor designing skills, you may say :D ). You have to be a blogger and own a blog to join this contest. The ways to join are pretty standard, stumbling, digging the contest post, subscribe to MindBlogger via RSS or email, add him to your Technorati favorites and blogging about the contest like I am doing right now. One last thing, if you are interested to join, please take note that the closing date is 18th of March at 1200H (GMT). I really have a knack for joining contests only at the eleventh hour, I know :)

So good luck to everyone who joins this contest and for more information about this contest, visit the link below:

"1650 ECs + a FREE Blog Header + 12 Free Ads" Contest

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Grateful yet hungry for more

My dear friends, kindly allow me to veer off topic here. This month has been really incredible for me thus far! First I won 3500 entrecard credits, then just yesterday I got rewarded with $20 via PayPal by responding to Scott's $20 blogging challenge. I thank this opportunity to thank Scott Wainner for his generosity. Yes, I am grateful to be so well rewarded, yet I am hungry for even more.

I will continue to enter a few more worthwhile contests and try to improve this blog further with the winnings (hope luck will still be with me :D). Anyway, as of right now, I am also in position to win another 1000 entrecard credits. See the Garfield picture up there? Yeah I drew it and used it to participate in a Draw Your Favorite Cartoons Contest. It really does reflect my feelings right now. Unfortunately, there are only 2 competitors in this contest including me, so I am in with a real chance to win the credits. Hopefully you will follow the above link and vote for my entry if and only if you think my drawing is better than the other competitor's because I believe in honest competition! The voting for the better entry is due to end tommorow, 10th March 2008. So come on, the more votes, the better. For anyone who so much as visited that link, I thank you for your time :)

Lastly, I'll like to say that I have great plans for this blog and they will be implemented as soon as possible, probably more and better articles, more customizations, more user-friendly and more rewarding for the visitors and readers, yes you. You might have noticed me using the selective expandable post blogger hack, this is only the first of many customizations I am going to implement. Hope you like the new organizations better. If this blog is useful to you in any way, I sincerely hope that you will consider participating actively in this blog's activity and subscribing to my RSS feed or email subscription. Thanks and see you again soon!

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Support longevity research

What is longevity research? It is a modern research to discover the means to delay or completely suspend the aging process and possibly lengthen human lifespan as much as possible. Of course, the final aim of the research is to delay or evade natural death. Some people will inevitably ask, "Why do we want to prolong human lifespan? What is the purpose and value of living continuously, when we will be suffering everyday from rheumatism and other old-age related complications?"

To answer those questions, allow me to quote from Scott's article:

Longevity research is not just the idea of living longer, but the idea of biologically living as a 20-something indefinitely without experiencing age related disease or decay. We should be able to live every day in full vibrant health, fully expecting to wake up the next morning, until an asteroid hits us every 65 Million years or so or until an 18 wheeler runs a red light and smacks us.

Just by reading the above Utopian sentences, no doubt many people will agree that longevity research is a noble cause which should be made the #1 priority of humankind. However, in reality there are many obstacles and setbacks. Besides religious protests, the biggest problem for longevity research - the lack of knowledge about the aging process itself.

Many theories have been proposed, attempting to explain the exact mechanisms of aging, and although all of them seem logical, until now there is not one safe and effective method to arrest the aging process. Some of the more logical theories are:

Telomere Theory

Telomeres (structures at the ends of chromosomes) have experimentally been shown to shorten with each successive cell division. Shortened telomeres activate a mechanism that prevents further cell multiplication. This may be an important mechanism of aging in tissues like bone marrow and the arterial lining where active cell division is necessary.

Wear-and-Tear theory

The idea that changes associated with aging are the result of chance damage that accumulates over time.

Somatic Mutation Theory

The biological theory that aging results from damage to the genetic integrity of the body’s cells.

Aging-Clock Theory

The theory that aging results from a preprogrammed sequence, as in a clock, built into the operation of the nervous or endocrine system of the body. In rapidly dividing cells the shortening of the telomeres would provide just such a clock.

Taken from Wikipedia: Aging (life cycle)

Based on these ideas and the daily advancement of science, it should not be long before we are able to arrest the aging process, especially with the help of biochemical and pharmaceutical studies. In the worst-case scenario where altering the natural aging process is not viable or may cause harm to human, our next best hope will be stem cell research, where young undifferentiated cells can be used to replace the old, pathological and harmful cells and organs of our bodies.

If indeed humankind is capable of finding a miracle cure for aging, I hope the cure would be found in the next 20-30 years, so that I am not too old yet and can still enjoy life as an immortal with the bodily functions and health of a 50-year-old.

I support longevity research 100%, and I demand that serious considerations be given to this issue! More money should be invested in causes like this, instead of wasting money on pointless wars and space travels. Just think of the possibilities of a lifespan of a few hundred years in fairly good health! Who wouldn't want that? How about you? Do you support longevity research? What are your views about longevity and immortality?

This post is written to express my support for longevity research and in response to Scott's $20 Blogging Challenge. If you have similar views, you can also make a blog post of your own and earn $20 from Scott. Find out more at W Revenue dot Com.

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5 Things To Consider When Guest Blogging

What is the latest trend on the blogosphere? Of course, it is contest guest blogging! Many bloggers now either guest post on other people's blogs or are requesting others to guest post on theirs. The recent increased interest in guest blogging prompted me to write this post. I will not be going into the advantages or disadvantages of guest blogging here, because I am sure, if done appropriately, guest blogging will only benefit and never harm you. Instead, I will like to remind bloggers who are considering guest posting to take the following 5 things into consideration when deciding to guest post on someone else's blogs:

1) Editing by blog owner
As we all know, it is very important for guest blogger to project the right image on the first impression. The audience that you are trying to impress is not that of your own, you are performing magic on other people's land, and you will want to perform it right the first time around to attract some readers to your own blog. Therefore, before guest posting on other people's blog, make sure to confirm with blog owner that editing of the article submitted will be minimal. You certainly don't wish to have your article edited so much, that its original meaning and intents are distorted. If this happens, not only will you give the wrong image to the readers, you might even be associated with unpleasant names, and mind you, this reputation might haunt you forever! You might be denied a second chance to guest post at other blogs if you have a bad reputation.

2) Credit where it is due
Guest posting will usually benefit both the blog owner and guest poster. Keeping that in mind, guest posters should at least demand from the blog owners to credit them at the beginning or end of the article. You deserve that much! Some blog owners even pay guest bloggers to write on their blogs. Remember, ask for credit, include a link to your own blog if you have one (otherwise leave your email), and even promote your own feed in your guest post, just bargain and confirm with blog owners which of those are allowed. I would say that the minimum standard is a credit line with a link back to author's site.

3) Backlink
You may think that this item is similar to the second one above, but really, it is not! Blog owners may easily agree to give you credit to the guest post as well as a backlink to your own blog, but take care to ask whether the link will be NoFollow or DoFollow. Usually, NoFollow links are used in the comment section, but they are now also being used in some paid reviews. As for guest post, I believe the blog owner have nothing to lose by providing a DoFollow link, they most probably won't be penalized by search engine companies like Google because a guest post link is not a paid post! However, some blog owners are stubborn and will insist on their policies, so you better ask before you submit. If at all possible, always demand a DoFollow link because it will help you in the ranking of your site (be it Google pagerank, Alexa or even Technorati rank...).

4) Affiliate link
While most blog owners do not mind giving you a backlink in your guest post, they might not allow an affiliate link. What is an affiliate link? It is a link to promote a certain product, while at the same time earning you certain benefits like points or commissions. If you are guest posting for an internet marketing blog, it is probably only right to promote an internet-based product, and naturally many of those products have affiliate systems, and you have a lot to lose if you are not allowed to post your affiliate link there! This is because according to standard guest posting agreement, you are not allowed to publish the same post on anywhere else, not even your own blog, in that case, how else could you promote your affiliate products? So it is better to ask explicitly whether affiliate link is allowed, better be safe than to be sorry. In the worst case scenario, if you intend to publish your guest post at someone's blog regardless of whether an affiliate link is allowed, you have to at least make sure that the blog owner do not put in his affiliate link for the same product on your guest post (unlikely, but who knows? call me paranoia but there's a lot to gain from a good affiliate program).

5) Copyright and ownership of the guest post
This issue is rather complicated and I do not really have the expertise to tell you whether you have full ownership of your guest post which is published on another blog. However, I believe that there should be mutual understanding between blog owner and guest blogger that:

• Author of the post is responsible for his opinion in the post
• The same article should not be published by the author on anywhere else
• Blog owner is not supposed to alter or modify the post and resubmit it anywhere else

Usually we do not ask explicitly for the blog owner to adhere to these agreements but eventually if you article is copied, you might have to take certain actions like giving warning to those who copy it, asking them to remove the copied article, asking them to give credit to you as the original author and so on.

Well, there goes the 5 things which you have to be cautious about when you are guest blogging. Unfortunately there are indeed risks and certain shortcomings involved with guest blogging, but done carefully, the benefits will certainly outweigh the disadvantages, especially in the long run! Happy Guest Blogging :D

Do you have any other problems with guest blogging? What are other considerations you make when you guest blog? If you have any opinion about guest blogging at all, we want to hear about it, please leave your comment here. Thank you in advance :)

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I won my first blogging contest

Wow, yesterday was an unbelievable day for me! I managed to win 3500 entrecard credits from Marko's contest. Unfortunately I could not include a screenshot of the credits transfer, but I confirm here that I have received the credits and would like to take this opportunity to thank Marko, not only for this contest but also for his kind friendship. Guess what? Marko is only 13 years old, but he knows blogging like the back of his hand, you should visit him to gain more blogging tips, I even subscribed to his feed.

So, besides thanking Marko, the main reason for this post, is to ask for your suggestions as to how should I spend the 3500 entrecard credits which I have won? Should I spend them to advertise on popular blogs? Should I organize my own contest with these credits? Or should I sell the credits for money via Paypal, or just keep them until I have a great plan? What is your suggestions and your advice? I would like to hear from you. You know want your views known here. Please do, please do!

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Win a Ford Escape just by searching

What is your favorite search engine? Mine is of course, the search-engine giant Google. I bet Google search engine has been doing a wonderful job for most of you too. What could beat a search engine that returns accurate results? Well this can! If you are at least 13 years old and living in the United States, you might want to read on so as not to miss the offer of a lifetime. Do Americans even read this blog? Show me your hands please...

Well apparently, search engine companies earn money by providing search results as well as relevant sponsored links. So, some third-party companies like My Search Funds pay users a percentage of the revenue from sponsored links to search, while others like Blingo reward their users with random prizes when they search.


Blingo claimed that a Ford Escape is up for grabs, and so far a total of 66,491 prizes have been given out! Why is this the best deal? This is because Blingo's result is powered by Google, you don't have to give up your favorite search engine and at the same time, stand a chance to win many fabulous prizes. Another thing worth mentioning is, you don't even need to register your name, nor your email, to be able to use Blingo! Just visit the site, search and provide your mailing information if you happen to strike the jackpot. Sounds nice? Head on to Blingo now!

In case you haven't noticed, this is not an affiliate promotion post, look at the links I provided, there is no affiliate ID. In truth, there is an affiliate system there, that is if a friend that you referred to Blingo wins a prize, you win the same prize too, even if it is a Ford Escape!!! Unfortunately, I could not be an affiliate because I do not live in the US. If indeed you guys manage to win anything there after reading this post, do consider buying me some post cards :D

Don't live in the US and still inexplicably managed to read till here? Fine, I have a surprise for you too. If you happen to have close friends or family members residing in US and have their addresses and personal details handy, you can try your luck in Blingo and surprise your beloved ones with gifts and prizes by entering their details when you win! Think of yearly greeting card sent in a Ford Escape, hehe...

That's all for now. Happy searching and winning. Would like to hear from you if you had won before in Blingo or if you win after reading this post :)

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