I'm curious how much it really matters. I can see it being a big deal for email, but for organic traffic I'm not convinced. Most domain squatters don't have anything up on the site, have a adsense landing page or something extremely outdated. Assuming your site has even mild success, your search engine ranking will be much, much higher. Sadly, the email issue is probably a show-stopper.
Also, I don't think a lot of people actually type the domain in the address bar. They're either clicking a link or searching.
The real question here is, can you pull a dropbox? Trademark the name, launch your site, get popular, then just take away the .com if the owner somehow infringes on your mark. Is this a valid precedent or do you have to have boat-loads of cash to actually make this work?
In any case, it's probably just easier to choose a different name. I just emailed someone yesterday about a .com domain name and he wanted $20k. Seems like the dropbox method might be easier.
Wow, the metro dogs are particularly interesting. I can see myself "adopting" one that shared my commute.
...they definitely do clean the city. They keep the population of rats down.
I wonder if the dogs have learned to relieve themselves in places more acceptable to people or if the people just tolerate it. Piles of crap on the train is not very appealing.
The legal jargon is the first grievance, which I obviously have to just accept as part of the game, but the ambiguity of it is what I have difficulty accepting. Does this clause prevent me from pursuing my own ventures during this time? Is everything I do during this time claimable by them?
rising out of, or in connection with, performing the Services
This bit seems to limit it to whatever I happen to be doing for them, but as this story, currently on the front page of HN shows, even lawyers have difficulty nailing it all down.
For example, if I come up with some clever little bit of javascript that does something interesting, does it mean I can never use that for any purpose ever again? It's terribly ambiguous and limiting. I don't expect to take the job because I am currently working on my own projects and have no concrete way of defending myself against them claiming all of my work.
The second problem I have is this phrase:
Consultant also agrees to promptly make full written disclosure to the Company of any Inventions...
WTF does that mean? Even if it is limited to the "inventions" I "invent" for them, does that mean I'm supposed to immediately write some kind of disclosure after I "invent" something and give it to them? It's ridiculous. Let's assume this refers to my existing "inventions", not developed during the contract term, which I don't think it does. In that case, how could I possibly expect to protect myself? What if I forget to list one of my "inventions". They can claim it? I honestly don't think all of the doubt is even worth the time and effort to nail it all down.
I should pay a lawyer to go over it, but I already know I will require some lines to be removed, which will probably negate their interest in hiring me and thus make paying a lawyer a complete waste of money.
I understand the motivations for these kinds of contracts, but it puts all of the burden on the consultant and gives the overall impression that they can bend you over on a whim and screw you royally. It's basically making me not interested in the job, especially since I have my own things I want to work on. Initially, I recognized that my particular skills were exactly what they needed and it would be a pleasant job, but the "pleasant" part is quickly disappearing.
I'm probably just too uptight about this kind of stuff.
Funny seeing this. I'm currently reviewing a NDA & contract for a consulting gig and came across this gem:
Recipient agrees that any violation or threatened violation of this Agreement will cause irreparable injury to COMPANY, entitling COMPANY to obtain injunctive relief in addition to all legal remedies without showing or proving any actual damage and without any bond required to be posted.
without showing or proving any actual damage
yeah, whatever.
Consultant agrees that all right, title, and interest in
and to any copyrightable material, notes, records, drawings, designs, inventions, improvements,
developments, discoveries and trade secrets conceived, discovered, authored, invented, developed or
reduced to practice by Consultant, solely or in collaboration with others, during the term of this
Agreement and arising out of, or in connection with, performing the Services under this Agreement and
any copyrights, patents, trade secrets, mask work rights or other intellectual property rights relating to the
foregoing (collectively, “Inventions”), are the sole property of the Company. Consultant also agrees to
promptly make full written disclosure to the Company of any Inventions and to deliver and assign (or
cause to be assigned) and hereby irrevocably assigns fully to the Company all right, title and interest in
and to the Inventions.
I probably won't be getting the job due to crossing off all of this crap.
Some old Piers Anthony/David Eddings books from my 14yr old son, which was possibly one of the most personal gifts anyone has ever given me. My daughter got me a laminated Spanish vocab foldout which was really awesome because I've been meaning to make up my own. Finally spending a Christmas with my European wife was the best though. ;)
My gift to us all as a family was to go see Avatar in IMAX 3D tonight. It was amazing.
If you are young and just starting, try to find a position with a web dev company who uses the technologies you want to learn. Pick an agile company who doesn't need a load of sign-offs to get something done. Don't worry about your $/hr. Worry about what you can learn.
Basically I'm trying to get you to find a good mentor. You can learn more in 1 week from a good mentor than you can by reading PDFs and blog posts for two years.
I think this is pretty significant advice. My daughter broke her foot one day before getting on a plane to Barcelona, where we planned on doing a lot of swimming, I had a waterproof cast cover over-nighted and they sent two. One for me and a free one for the foot doctor. The product worked so well, it literally saved our vacation and I couldn't say enough good things to the doctor when we got back. I'm sure giving the free sample to the doctor was a win for them, especially considering the doctor had never heard of the product.
I don't know if you can do that with posterous or not, but I know WordPress is used for a lot of sites whose content relies heavily on images. peopleofwalmart.com would be a example.
Blogger, WordPress.com, Posterous, Tumblr, Weebly, TypePad, etc... are all good choices, each with their own pluses and minuses. If you get to the point where you want more flexibility, and customization with your choice of plugins, please give Flooha a try, it's free. http://flooha.com You can upgrade later to a traditional web hosting account with control panel, ssh, email, backups, cron jobs, forwarders, statistics, file manager, and more if you like the service.
If you have questions, look me up on Google Talk as "flooha", or email me at matt [at] flooha [dot] com.
No doubt. I've heard the 1% rule, which mirrors my own experience, but I've never heard the "5% rule of thumb". Also, what defines a "really sweet offer"?
Checking it out now. One thing. When I click on the ? next to the "targeting score link" it just takes me to the top of the page. The tool tip is "How is this calculated?", but I'm not seeing the info after clicking the link.
I'm particularly interested in the keyword distiller.
edit: I forgot to mention that I really like the design. Nice and clean.
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1058437
I'm curious how much it really matters. I can see it being a big deal for email, but for organic traffic I'm not convinced. Most domain squatters don't have anything up on the site, have a adsense landing page or something extremely outdated. Assuming your site has even mild success, your search engine ranking will be much, much higher. Sadly, the email issue is probably a show-stopper.
Also, I don't think a lot of people actually type the domain in the address bar. They're either clicking a link or searching.
The real question here is, can you pull a dropbox? Trademark the name, launch your site, get popular, then just take away the .com if the owner somehow infringes on your mark. Is this a valid precedent or do you have to have boat-loads of cash to actually make this work?
In any case, it's probably just easier to choose a different name. I just emailed someone yesterday about a .com domain name and he wanted $20k. Seems like the dropbox method might be easier.