AlanAllport.Com

Archive for the ‘Stuff’ Category

Whoops, seem to have failed to post here again in a long time! Have to try to remedy that going into 2012.

Hope you had a great Christmas, if you celebrate that particular festival. Completely passed me by this year. Started to feel pretty poorly starting about half ten to quarter to eleven on Christmas Eve night and then I had an upset stomach all night and didn’t manage to get any sleep – not much fun!

The only thing that passed my lips all day on Christmas day was mineral water – the irony that in most respects this was probably the healthiest Christmas I’ve ever spent has not escaped me! Thanks to my detox Christmas and fast for a few days.

Anyway, I hope that 2012 is a happy and healthy one for me (and for you!)

Have a think about what you want to do next year in the final few days of this one – I always find this time of year is good for getting your head straight about the things you want to change about your life going forward – so I’d recommend you try to find some time to do just that.

I’ve been doing some thinking about my use of some of the Web properties I own and I’ve decided to turn this blog into personal only – i.e. non-Internet marketing business related.

So anything that is about me, my thoughts, what I’m doing, books I’ve read, films I’ve watched, music I’m listening to, will appear on this blog.

So, where will my Internet marketing-related stuff now be posted? It will reside here:

http://www.alanallport.org/blog.

Hope you’ll check it out.

Well the day has arrived and I’ve waved goodbye to BT. Wasn’t notified when it was going to happen – just waited for my BT connection to die and assumed that was the right time to break out the new Talk Talk wireless router and connect it up to the phone line.

I’m writing this via the new connection, so I’m pleased to report, despite my trepidation, everything has been fine and dandy – no problems at all to report (well, took a little time to get my Sony Vaio P-Series 8″ netbook set up for the new connection, but after about 10 to 15 minutes of ‘playing’ managed to get that to connect too). So I now have 2 PCS, 1 netbook and a 5″ tablet all set up to use my new broadband connection – yippee!

The best part is that I didn’t have to let a cd-rom anywhere near any of my machines so no chance of any nasty, unwanted applications being installed – it was a simple as switching on the wireless router, letting the wireless receiver in each of my devices pick up the signal and typing in the provided security key. Yes, I know it always should be as simple as this, but it’s easy to expect the worst, isn’t it? Most of us who’ve used technology for any length of time know that sod’s law often rears its ugly head if we’re expecting everything to go smoothly. For this reason I often expect there to be some little glitches just so that it’s a pleasant surprise if everything goes alright!

The connection did drop once, a few minutes after initially connecting, but I’ve been told that whilst everything settles down to find the optimum speed for this connection, I can expect a few up and down speed ratings and the odd dropped connection over the next 10 days or so. Fingers crossed that nothing major goes wrong and I end up with a stable, reasonably fast connection.

I’ve done a quick initial speed check Online and I’m pleasantly surprised by the figure of 6.4meg given. We’re out in the sticks and aren’t blessed with the best phone line in the world – the telephone provider BT, only warrants it for 5.5meg, so that’s not too bad. To be fair, I was getting 6 – 7 meg from BT themselves, but their service at peak times has not been good – dropping to 2 – 3meg on a regular basis. I think they regarded me as a high bandwidth user and throttled the connection at peak times – hope this one’s better. I’m supposed to be being given a 40gig monthly download limit and at a price that is almost a quarter of what I was paying to BT (for the first year at least).

Anyway, it’s always nerve-wracking making a change to something you rely on enormously, particularly when, for all its faults, my old broadband service was pretty reliable. Just hope this one proves to be the same.

Wish me luck!

As a follow up to my last post, I’m pleased to confirm that my new Talk Talk wireless router for my new broadband connection has arrived.

So, I guess panic over. Checked the box and everything seems to be there – the router itself with connection cable to phone line, 2 ADSL filters, a power supply and an ethernet cable in case the wireless connection has a problem. There’s also an instruction booklet and a cd-rom for installing on my computer.

According to the instructions, it shouldn’t take more than 20 minutes maximum to get everything running. I’m neither a technophobe or a technical incompetent, so I’m certainly hoping that it doesn’t prove to be too taxing to get everything working and connected – it’s certainly not something I haven’t done before successfully anyway.

I have a few devices now that I’ll have to set up to use the connection, so it won’t be quite as quick as only getting everything up and running on one computer, but I would certainly hope that it doesn’t take longer than an hour to get the four devices connected and running that I want to use on this connection.

I know that the switchover from my old provider is due to take place tomorrow, but the only fly in the ointment is that I haven’t been given a time when – all I’m being told is that it could be ‘any time up to midnight’. Ok, so I guess I just keep using my existing connection until it stops working.

Wish me luck!

My broadband wireless Internet is due to change to a new Internet Service Provider tomorrow – and I admit that I’m feeling a little nervous – well, more than a little nervous actually!

My nervousness is not being helped by the fact that the broadband wireless router for this new service hasn’t arrived as yet and with my old service being disconnected tomorrow, I obviously at least want to have all of the equipment that I’m going to need for any chance of a smooth changeover all ready and waiting for me to hook up.

I’m certainly going to be waiting with baited breath today and early tomorrow to see if anything turns up. I guess if the worse comes to the worst I still do have a couple of mobile broadband services that I can use to tide me over, so I shouldn’t be entirely Internet-less thank goodness.

The only real reason for making the change is to save some money – my new provider has given me a much better deal with a much lower price for a much better download quota.

I’m in the UK and for those who’re interested I’m changing from BT (British Telecom) to Talk Talk (formerly Tiscali). I have to say that I’ve never really liked BT very much – I’ve always felt that were overpriced for what they delivered and was persuaded to change from my previous broadband provider (which was Tiscali, interesting enough) by a sales phone call. This is very unusual for me, I don’t normally agree to stuff from receiving a cold-call phone call (and I don’t really recommend it).

Anyway, wish me luck that I don’t get left without Internet access during the transition!

I’ll update you with how it goes in due course.

Well, here we are, another new year has just started. Where do they all go to, eh?

Now is the time when traditionally we’re all encouraged to make resolutions of what we’re aiming to achieve over the coming year. Now, I must admit I’m not exactly huge on New Year’s Resolutions, I don’t usually bother, but I can see that it’s probably not a bad idea to choose this specific time to make some plans about exactly what you intend to get done either personally, professionally or both.

Of course, most people make those plans and give themselves the warm, fuzzy feeling inside as a result, like just making the plans themselves is equivalent to having done something. But, of course, you haven’t actually DONE anything by making a plan to do something have you? No, if those plans are going to come to anything concrete, you have to follow through with them and turn them into tangible success.

So, I want you to make yourself a promise that this is the year when you get something off the ground as far as that Internet marketing business you’ve been promising yourself goes. Make yourself that you’re going to follow through and take action this time and not allow the inevitable road blocks to completely derail you as you have in the post. This time promise yourself that you are going to work your way through all of the problems you face because you owe it to yourself and your family to do so.

I’m definitely planning on 2011 being my best year yet Online and I’m determined that I will not let anything knock me off course this year. I’ll be unveiling some exciting stuff soon so stay tuned to find out what that is and I promise as I go through the year that I’ll be providing a lot of valuable free stuff to help you out in your Internet marketing business.

Best Wishes

Alan

Don’t Just Dream It – Do It!

I’ve just received a notification from a fellow Internet marketer, Adrian Ling, that he’s received a new phishing scam via an email purporting to be about an order he’d placed with Online retailer Amazon.

Now at this time of the year a lot of us are placing orders with Amazon – which is precisely why these particular scam artists are using this tactic right now.

Be very careful which emails you choose to open – better to be safe than sorry.

If you do happen to open the email and something looks fishy (or should that be phishy?) about it, then be very careful not to click on any links within it.

A tactic I use is to hover my mouse pointer over the link and look at the bottom left corner of my browser window where you will see the actual Web address you’ll be taken to should you click the link – in a scam email this will definitely be different from the legitimate-looking link the scammers have put in the email body.

Anyway, be careful out there – it can be a very dodgy world we live in Online.

To check out the full story, go to Adrian Ling’s blog by clicking here.

Well here we are again – a few inches of snow and Britain grinds to a halt – well not quite but almost. We really don’t cope very well at all with the white stuff from the skies.

After the last really bad snow earlier this year (just where has this year gone?) we were promised by those in power that they would look into how our entire transport infrastructure seems to come crashing down whenever we have adverse weather conditions of a winter variety, with a view to ensuring that we would be better prepared ‘next time’.

Well, I guess now is next time, and are we better prepared? Not so’s you’d notice, no. I really do not know what we elect/pay these clowns for (the politicians that is). Once again, while they’ve had their well-publicised snouts in the trough, they do absolutely nothing constructive whatsoever and we, the ordinary people, have to do it all ourselves as usual. Anyway, in the spirit of goodwill to all men (and women) that should pervade at this festive time of year, I think I’ll leave it there.

And in the spirit of  ’here we go again’, yes, I’ve left the bulk of my Christmas shopping to the last minute as well. Not quite as last minute as the Christmas Eve rush of days of yore, but late enough.

So, what have I done today? Walked into Wolverhampton through the snow, that’s what – a journey of about six miles each way. It even started snowing again on the way back when I was laden down with bags.

Good thing is, the effort I made in the adverse conditions seems to have concentrated my mind and I’ve managed to get all of my shopping finished. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have done this had there been no snow on the ground – I would probably have made at least another two trips this week. As it is, I have no intention of attempting anything other than strictly local shopping for the remainder of this week – I’m staying tucked up at home, thank you very much.

If you celebrate Christmas  (or any other festival at this time of year come to that), I hope your preparations have been a little less eventful than mine and that you get some time just to relax and enjoy family and friends over the next couple of weeks.

If you’re here now and have been here before you might just notice that my blog looks a little different today.

I was getting a little bored with the previous theme so I decided to design a new one last night. Installed it this morning without too many hiccups. Did an update to WordPress 3 at the same time and wondered if I’d messed things up completely – got a ‘Site Is Undergoing Maintenance’ message when I tried to view my blog (if you did too then I apologise). Anyway, all seems well again now – although I did have a frantic few minutes backing up the database, just in case I had to do a completely new install – ah, the joys of Website ownership, eh?

Anyway, it’s a simple little theme – ‘cos I’m a simple guy and don’t really like anything too fussy. I did toy with the idea of installing one of those new slick, professional themes like Flexsqueeze, but decided against it. I don’t profess to be a great designer when it comes to color co-ordination and all that jazz, so if you don’t find it easy on the eyes, I’m sorry. I can always change it again later without too much hassle – I guess that’s the beauty of WordPress as a blogging/Website-building platform.

I’m changing focus with my Internet marketing business at the moment, got a lot of new stuff in the pipeline and I intend to start giving out a lot of excellent quality information for free, so watch out for that if you’re interested in starting – or improving – an Internet business of your own. I highly recommend getting something going that brings in an income via the Internet, I really do – particularly in these precarious times in the traditional job market.

So, stay tuned for lots of exciting developments!

The football (or should that be soccer?) World Cup has started in South Africa. The first two games have been played – both ending in draws.

Waiting for the opening England game tonight and also looking forward to Argentina versus Nigeria today also.

It’s a once every four years event that I always enjoy watching so I’m going to try to catch as many games as I can over the next three weeks of the tournament so my work schedule is going to take some sort of battering.

I’m a bit worried about England defensively – we don’t even know who our number one goalkeeper is! The best England teams of the past were built on a solid defence that was marshalled by a very strong and usually vocal personality in goal. This is lacking at the moment.

Up front we definitely have one of the best players in the world right now in Wayne Rooney, so if the service is good enough then I’m sure he will be. And we have some decent ball-playing and creative midfielders in the likes of Stephen Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Gareth Barry to provide the supply for the attack – it’s just that defence. We’ll see.

The opening game between South Africa and Mexico seemed to be a good one. Only managed to catch some of the radio commentary on this and catch some tv highlights later. It ended in a 1 – 1 draw with the hosts South Africa scoring a superb goal that was equalised late on by Mexico. Mexico had the lion’s share of the possession in the first half but, typically for Mexico, didn’t really have a cutting edge to convert that into goals.

The second game between France and Uruguay wasn’t really a particularly good match. I was able to watch all of this. I wanted Uruguay to win – I really like their striker Diego Forlan. Anyway a fairly lacklustre 0 – 0 draw was all this game could muster. France were unable to make anything significant happen even when Uruguay were reduced to ten men after having a player sent off.

I really struggle to understand how the French manager, Domenech, has managed to be in the job for 6 years given that his tactical nous always seems to be so poor – he just doesn’t seem to be able to make the best use of the players at his disposal by reacting to how a game is unfolding abd changing things accordingly. France were truly dire at the last European Championships and don’t look much better here on this evidence. We’ll see if they can improve.

Anyway, getting ready to watch all of today’s three matches – South Korea v Greece, Argentina v Nigeria and then, the big one, England v USA – my brother in law’s invited me round for a beer or two tonight so no doubt plenty of shouting at the tv will ensue!