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I’m finally home and unpacked from my trip to Maryland. I had a pretty good time visiting and a suggestion for anyone else, Carroll County in Maryland is a beautiful place, like driving through a rain forest. While I was there I stopped at Hershey Park in Pennsylvania, played in the ocean at Bethany Beach, Delaware (actually there were dolphins probably 50 feet from us), and visit a lot of my relatives that I haven’t seen in way too long. I think I ended up taking about 400+ pictures so I can’t post them all, but I’ll show you a few. Enjoy!

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It’s that time again. Another peek into the list of my favorite reads on making money online and website marketing. Here we go:

Jim Boykin

This guy seems like one smart cookie when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO) the “whitehat” way. He obviously believes in building honest, long-lasting rankings in search engines…and after all, isn’t that what you want? As full of info and entertaining as his posts are, I really have it bookmarked for his “SEO Tools by webuildpages” at the near-bottom of the sidebar. They are pretty useful and not generics I’ve seen other places.

Net Business Blog

Net Business Blog is a blog about making money online (wow…not many of those. that was sarcasm.) that was started about six months ago by Matt Coddington and is probably the fastest growing blog I’ve seen. In those six months he took a blog from zero to making a decent living and then selling the site for $50,000 $13,000. Not bad for six months of work (give or take). The new owner, Adie Cooke, seems fairly knowledgeable on the whole making money online thing as well and I haven’t seen a decline in the quality of posts since takeover. Matt still guest writes (if you can call it “guest” writing when you started the site…) every now and then. It’s definitely worth reading.

Half’s SEO Notebook

Everything SEO and internet marketing related is found here. When I’m reading this blog I almost feel like I’m listening to a professor at school, not because it’s boring at all, but because he has so much knowledge. I don’t think I even know where to start pointing you, but his latest article is VERY informational article on understanding PageRank distribution . Another post of his that I actually read often is “If You Lack Motivation, Read This“. It’s an awesome collection of motivational quotes that keeps me on track from time to time.

It’s that time again! I told you guys this wasn’t going away because I really enjoy it. Right now I’m probably in an airport in Salt Lake City, but thanks to WordPress’ amazing abilities I was able to write this up a little beforehand for you to enjoy now. I’ve got some awesome picks for you today.

The Legion of Doom

The Legion of Doom is a mash-up band. They take lyrics and music from other artists and make really cool sounding remixes. The “band” is actually a couple of sound engineers that have worked on some music you may have heard of (Senses Fail and the Saw II Soundtrack to name a few). These guys have good taste in music too. You’ll see artists like Coheed, Saves the Day, Dashboard Confessionals, Senses Fail, Thrice, Green Day and Alkaline Trio featured in their mash-ups. You can check out their music on their website (www.the-legion-of-doom.com), on Last.fm, or at PureVolume.

Between the Trees

Between the Trees is a five-member band of 18 to 21-year-old guys that came together in 2005. They have a completely unique and awesome sound in my opinion. The indie-rock group has accomplished a lot in the last two years and has some songs that are I believe could be chart-destined if they got into the right places. I don’t know how to talk better about these guys, so here’s a quote from their MySpace profile:

 

But an even greater truth stands Between the Trees … literally.

It’s in the name itself – specifically, in the space staked out by its suggestion of beginning and end.

“One tree represents where time and existence begins,” ventures lead singer Ryan Kirkland. “The other is the end of everything. Between them is the time we’re given on Earth. What matters is what we do with that time.”

You can’t get simpler – or more profound – than that. And it’s not only the starting point for what you hear from these five guys. It’s also the creed that’s driven them to accomplish something extraordinary.

To appreciate this, as you spin The Story and The Song, remember this: Just two years ago, as the group was coming together, most of its members hadn’t even begun to master their instruments.

To listen to some of their tunes or check out their bio, you can go to the band’s official website (www.betweenthetrees.net), PureVolume, or MySpace Music.

Right now I should be sleeping, but you know how it is the night before you’re supposed to go on vacation right? Yeah…too much to do. Well I’m writing this post to let people know that I will be enjoying myself (mostly) computer free for a week. No worries, I’ve stashed a few posts away to keep you entertained (don’t forget Cool Music Tuesday! and Free Link Friday!). This post is also to anounce that I have a new toy on the site. It’s a plugin called wp-quotes. So, while I am gone (and perhaps permanently), every time you visit the site you will see a new motivational quote to help keep you going. I know, you’re welcome.

Enjoy everyone! I know I will!

One of the hardest things to do in blogging is to stay motivated and add new content regularly. That’s the reason for my “Cool Music Tuesday” feature, as well as this next one starting today: “Free Link Friday”. Almost every blog has their form of linkbait going on. Free Link Friday is mine. For now I will simply be giving you readers a glimpse of my personal bookmarks, my favorite sites. You may not see how it is linkbait yet, but in time you will. So let’s get on with it.

 Blue Hat SEO

One of my all-time favorite reads. He doesn’t update a LOT, but enough to keep me interested. And his tips/techniques are pure gold. He also has a nice little indexing tool for webmasters called QUIT. Sometime next week he’ll be releasing his private webmaster tools for a $100/month subscription price. Both are worth taking a look at.

 Jon Waraas

I guess I’m kind of obligated to this one because Jon is a good friend of mine for something like 6 or 7 years. He’s also my room mate and pretty good at making money here at home. It’s actually him that’s given me any motivation at all to try the whole make money online thing. His blog is mostly about his personal experiences and just random stuff, which I think is what a blog is really supposed to be: just about the author. I used to know how much he made online, but I don’t think I could even fathom it now because he’s come a long ways lately. He recently entered an SEO contest and, working with Eli from the above Blue Hat SEO, has pulled into first place in a contest with a winnings pot of $9000. Not too shabby.

 Dot Com Will

The third link for today is maybe a little less known, but a very good read. Will has had a lack of updates recently (come on Will, we want more content!), but if you check out his archives he has some amazing articles. The one that got me hooked was his post on Adsense Arbitrage. It details fairly well how to set up an arbi site. He also has a bunch more that, like I said, are definitely worth a read.

I use Xerpi to bookmark all my favorites. I wrote a post on the site a little bit back and fell in love with it. If anyone signs up and uses the site, feel free to add me. My username is cody.

If you’ve ever bought music from the iTunes Store, then you probably get an email every week exclaiming that it’s “New Music Tuesday!”. I’m one of those people that gets these and I decided to steal the idea and give it my own little twist: introducing “Cool Music Tuesday!”. Rarely do you get to see the lesser-known bands and singers debut, and this gives me a reason to endlessly search for cool, new music (something I already do anyways). Alrighty, let’s get down to it.

Say Anything

These guys are awesome. They have a very punk-ish sound, but are funny as hell to listen to. Their lyrics are advanced (they obviously have a good vocabulary) and comedic. It’s the perfect goof-off music when you’re in the mood. You can demo tracks of theirs on the band website (www.sayanythingmusic.com), on PureVolume, or at DogHouse Records.

From the Doghouse Records Website:

Matching both the bristling intensity and gooey pop grandeur of John Vanderslice’s Cellar Door, Bemis’ first album follows in a lineage of stabbing but melodic rock and roll including Husker Du, Jawbreaker and, at times, even Elvis Costello. Produced by the incomparable Tim O’Heir (Dinosaur Jr, Sebadoh, the The All-American Rejects) with arrangements by Stephen Trask (Hedwig and the Angry Inch) and conceived as a rock opera, the resulting record follows the switchbacks and hairpin turns of personal narrative – like Bright Eyes’ Fevers and Mirrors but with the unwavering enthusiasm and crunchy momentum of Phantom Planet. Say Anything Is a Real Boy hardly sounds like the work of one person, and so to capture the full impact live, Bemis has enlisted Coby Linder on drums, Kevin Seaton on bass and Casper Adams on guitar. The band’s first tour found them sharing stages with The Get-Up Kids, Dashboard Confessional, Cave-In and Thrice, playing smart, inspired rock and roll beyond the pale of simplistic genre labels. This is your late summer soundtrack – the perfect companion to the bittersweet feeling of good times in the waning sunshine.

That’s all for today because I just want to see how this goes. More will come next Tuesday. And don’t forget to leave me your feedback.

While browsing around I found out that iTunes announced last week that they are now selling a DRM-free version of certain titles (I assume all will be added soon) called iTunes Plus. The Plus titles cost 30 cents more at $1.29 a pop, but you are free to put them on as many devices as you want. Did Apple really crumble and give-in to all those that whine about DRM not being fair to users? Not exactly, there’s a catch. Whenever you buy a song from the iTunes Store, your information (email, username, etc) is tagged in the file for the DRM to work correctly. The drawback with iTunes Plus, although it is DRM-free, is that all that information is still stored within the file. This means that if you share your music with a friend and they share with a friend and so on, you’re also sharing all your information. Kind of a neat trick huh? This lets you have the freedom to put the music you purchase on any device you want, but unless you want your info out there for everyone to see, you’ll keep it to yourself.

Personally I agree with this strategy, but I’m sure lots of people will be raising hell over it. Already I’ve read one article that seems to be against Apple’s new format, but if you read his user’s comments you’ll find a lot of them take the same stance I do. Read the article here: iTunes Plus: DRM-free, but Invades Your Privacy.