As a part of this simplification process, I’ve also begun reviewing the advertising programs that I use on my suite of websites (this one included). The truth is that the only advertising program that I currently use that has ever generated sustained income over a number of years is Google Adsense. However, like any good webmaster I’ve tried to increase earnings by utilizing other program such as Amazon.com Associates, LinkShare, and Text-Link-Ads. Which brings me to this entry on the blog…

I’ve decided to cancel my LinkShare account. The truth is that this program doesn’t really generate any income for those websites that aren’t bringing in a massive amount of hits. I don’t want to talk inside baseball, but if JerseySmarts.com brings in 250 – 500 hits, then that’s a good day. LinkShare really isn’t made for a website like this one. Heck, even combining a bunch of different websites into my account didn’t help. My suite of websites brings in a few thousand hits per day – tens of thousands of hits per month – and the program still didn’t generate a dime.

So, instead of clogging up my websites with advertisements that don’t really generate any income for me, I’ve decided to cancel my LinkShare account and do some de-cluttering for your viewing pleasure! Actually, the LinkShare advertisements came off of this particular account about a month ago; they came off of my other websites a few weeks ago.

The next on my list to take a look at is this Amazon.com Associates program. Yes, I’ve had some people purchase items by using the Amazon.com Associates links that I embed in my entries and that I advertise around these and my other sites. However, I still haven’t seen a check from this program so I’m not sure if I want to continue using it. Anyway, I’d say that Amazon.com Associates has at least another 6 to 12 months for me to make any decision.

In the mean time, check out New Jersey Carpet Cleaning for the best carpet cleaning in the Garden State!

What happened to AIM? Could it be that the rise of social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace (with their built-in messaging systems) have rendered AIM, ICQ, and Yahoo! Messenger useless? Maybe the fact that text/picture messages and Blackberries are ubiquitous in today’s society also hinders AIM’s growth. Seems logical.

Granted, I understand that I first started using AIM over ten years ago (probably closer to 15 years ago) when I was a young teenager. Since I’m in my late 20’s these days, I guess that most of the people that I talked to on AIM are either now on my text message list or are a Facebook friend. It would appear that I don’t need AIM any more, actually, since I rarely sign on anyway.

And as I’ve written on JerseySmarts.com a few times already, I’ve been very interested in paring down the software that sits dormant on my laptop. In the last month I’ve removed a bunch of this unneeded software that has been taking up precious disk space. A week or two ago I uninstalled Google Chrome because I rarely used it (plus I’ve already become so accustomed to Mozilla Firefox) and earlier today I uninstalled Yahoo! Messenger since I haven’t used it in over a year. When looking around my computer, I found the old “AOL Instant Messenger” program which was replaced with AOL’s current AIM program…so I removed the old program since I hadn’t used it since the spring of 2006. Also, I purchased a discounted copy of Microsoft Office Ultimate 2007, which prompted me to uninstall OpenOffice.org from Sun Microsystems. Could AIM be next on the list of programs to be deleted? I’m not sure.

I think that I’d like to keep at least one of each of the major programs (one instant messenger program, one major non-Microsoft browser, one major office productivity suite, etc), so AIM may stay around on that fact alone. But the truth remains that even if the program does stay on my computer it’ll probably be a rarely used piece of software.

Isn’t it amazing how the internet and electronic communication have changed?

Second, I absolutely hate the way that MySpace pages can be overly manipulated. I was friends with some people who chose to completely screw up their MySpace pages to the point where you’d need a 50″ screen on an ultra high resolution just to see the entire page at once. Completely ridiculous. That’s one of the features that I like about Facebook – it doesn’t allow you to break their basic format (and I hope they never move in that direction).

As for the cancellation process on MySpace, I found it to be overly cumbersome. You have to choose to “cancel” your account two or three times and then when you get the e-mail confirmation, you have to click on a link and confirm the cancellation again. I’m sure the News Corp lawyers that run the legal end of MySpace have some reason for that process, but it’s a bit ridiculous. Just let people cancel and move on already.

So now that I’m off of MySpace and LinkedIn, I think that I’m only on Facebook. I have to go and check whether or not I have any outstanding online profiles at Yahoo, but I should be good at this point. I’m considering whether or not to get rid of the Google photo album, too. There is only a limited amount of space available and it’s a little annoying to upload pictures to both Facebook and Google. I guess I’ll rest on that one a little bit longer, too.

In the last year I’ve merged both of my blogs into the one that you’re reading now and deleted unnecessary profiles at MySpace, LinkedIn, and Plaxo. Frankly, after a while it just gets to be too much. I think that this is the fate that Twitter has ahead of it. By the way, has anyone noticed how Twitter is essentially the new AIM for a younger generation? Just an observation.

No more MySpace!

I’ve begun to think about whether or not my LinkedIn profile is even worth it. LinkedIn is supposed to be for people who are trying to reconnect, but generally in a business sense. However, Facebook pretty much offers the same service. So I’m not sure if it’s worth it to keep a LinkedIn page up and running. Sure, I have some nice recommendations of my work on the LinkedIn page, but I can always get that somewhere on Facebook.

Well, this post is being written on the heels of deleting my account at LinkedIn. Overall, I just didn’t see the need to try to maintain an additional networking “profile” at LinkedIn. Yes, I had a lot of “connections,” but I didn’t see much of a value in the LinkedIn membership. Everyone who I was connected to was either someone that I was already connected to on Facebook or someone from my fraternity that I never met because he went to a school out in the Midwest or the West Coast. Sure, it’s cool that we were in the same organization, but if you’re connecting with me on LinkedIn and you’re either out of work or engaged in a career that doesn’t cross mine at all, then it’s really a useless connection.

Side note – I had so many connections that I couldn’t automatically delete my account! Apparently, if you have more than 100 connections (I think I had 105), an actual human being has to okay the deletion of your account. For some reason I find that interesting.

That’s another social networking site down…which one could be next?

hey my name is jill im 28 and i like to hang out and meet new ppl i am with the most wondful guy name bob he my life and now i be came a wondful aunt and she also my lil gurl(tanisha) i love her with all my heart. i have 6 tattoes i have 3 priceing

How can anyone write something so incredibly stupid, look at it, and say, “Yes. That’s what I want the world to know about me.” Are you serious?! “I am with the most wondful guy.” Really? Wondful? Is this a new word that I wasn’t alerted to? Wondful? Couldn’t squeeze out that “er” could you? Idiot…

Oh, and this “wondful” guy means a lot to you because “he my life.” He my life?! What? Couldn’t manage to pop out an “is” or “completes” or “enhances” or any word at all? Moron…

Hold on, folks. I have to go vomit.

Back.

But wait! Not only is this guy that this moron is with “wondful” but apparently she, herself, is a “wondful” aunt! Oh, how marvelous!? A “wondful” aunt who has a “wondful” guy on her arm. Life is awesome!!!

And not only is she a “wondful” aunt, but she loves her “gurl.” Really? Your “gurl?” Just couldn’t manage to push the key located directly next to the “u” on the keyboard, huh? Dummy…

However, for me the best part of this drivel – the part that forced me to write this post – was the last line where this “wondful” dummy writes, “i have 6 tattoes i have 3 priceing.” No shit? You have 6 tattoes, huh? And what exactly is a tattoe? Is that a tattoo on your toe? If so, why does one need six of them? But better yet, what is a “priceing?”

Many, many years ago I worked for PathMark in the Price Integrity Department. My job was to put the prices up on the shelves. Some people said I was pricing the items. However, this dummy “have 3 priceing.” So, clearly, what this dolt is talking about doesn’t match what I used to do for a part-time job. Hmmm… Perhaps she meant to say that she has three piercings? Nooo… NO ONE could be so stupid that they write “priceing” and mean to really write “piercing.” Right? RIGHT?

Folks, I put this up there because a bunch of my friends (and readers of this blog) are beginning to have children. That’s great. Kids are awesome. However, please, please, please stay on top of your child’s education! No, I’m not suggesting that you become one of these overprotective parents who don’t allow their children to form their own personalities. What I AM suggesting, though, is that if you do not keep an eye on your child’s education and do as much reading to your child as possible in their early, formative years, then you may wind up with the moron that we see above.

The moral of the story is to read to your child and to get them engaged in reading and writing early on in life. You wouldn’t want them growing up thinking that their life is “wondful” when it could be wonderful.

As for something like Twitter, I have no idea why anyone would be so crazy about that service. From what I can tell, Twitter allows people to post periodic updates on what they’re doing. If you’re “following” (i.e. “friends with”) that person, then you get updated as to what they’ve uploaded.

Really?

Is that what we choose to spend our time doing these days? How self-important must someone be to think that they need to update the world on their status every few minutes? Better yet – who has the time in their day to put up so many updates?! “I just got to work,” “My job stinks,” “Can’t wait for lunch break,” “End of the day is coming,” “Driving home now,” “Making dinner,” “Getting ready for sleep to do it all again tomorrow.”

SHUT UP, ASSHOLE! No one gives a shit about following your tweets about your mundane life!

The big competition in social networking sites seems to be Facebook and MySpace. I think what draws people to Facebook is that it isn’t as flexible as MySpace and, thus, not as potentially annoying. There is nothing more aggravating than going to someone’s MySpace page and having them blare the latest death metal song at you or some type of mopey, stupid love song. If it wasn’t for the fact that one or two of my family members are on MySpace and not Facebook, I’d delete my MySpace account completely and stick to Facebook.

I’ve begun to think about whether or not my LinkedIn profile is even worth it. LinkedIn is supposed to be for people who are trying to reconnect, but generally in a business sense. However, Facebook pretty much offers the same service. So I’m not sure if it’s worth it to keep a LinkedIn page up and running. Sure, I have some nice recommendations of my work on the LinkedIn page, but I can always get that somewhere on Facebook.

Anyway, I wonder what other people think about the social networking sites. Do we really need to have so many of them out there or have we reached overkill? I think it’s probably time to thin out the number of social networking sites out there…

Over the last few days I’ve been electronically accosted by a former associate who is more than two decades older than I am. This hasn’t been a malicious attack, rather it is simply this person finally figuring out how to use MySpace among other online social networking tools. Since they’ve figured out how these things work, I now have the joy of being e-mailed with “Join Facebook!” e-mails on all of my e-mail accounts. Like I really need someone to tell me that I should join LinkedIn again. I’m already on these friggin’ things! Lay off!

Anyway, what I’m saying here is that if you’re not accustomed to how these social networking sites work, then here’s the deal. If you send a friend an invite to join a social networking site – one invite is enough. Chances are that they are already on one of the big three (MySpace, Facebook, or LinkedIn). They don’t need you sending them invites to these things over and over again at a variety of e-mail addresses. Just relax and be normal!