ZhunZi

Good deals going on now from LetsTalk.com

2011-03-04T18:10:00.005-05:00

Receive 5% off the entire shopping cart up to $25 on LetsTalk.com. Use coupon code 'LTCART5' Expires 3/31/11

25% off Accessories with Phone and Plan Use Coupon Code "LTSAVE25" expires 3/31/11

Save up to $200 on a NEW smartphone at LetsTalk!

Unfortunately, no iPhones through letstalk, but if you're looking for android phones, they have the best deals for new customers that I've found.

Droid X

2010-08-05T22:33:00.005-04:00

It's been a long time since I posted, and a long time since I've gotten a new gadget. So I thought I might take care of both at once. I've been wanting an android phone for a while now. I didn't like the motorola droid when it came out because of that keyboard (which I don't need, why waste space). Then the incredible came out, but I didn't like the screen's performance outside. Then, finally there is a phone I can dig. The Droid X looks awesome!

I started looking around for deals (BTW, I highly recommend slickdeals.net if you don't already visit there). I found out that letstalk.com has a $50 discount going on now (bring the price down to $150), plus a $30 bill credit! Sweet! I'm going to buy!

BTW, here is a pretty cool video comparing the iPhone 4 and the Droid X

Nature Cleanse wrap-up: 60 days, what happened?

2009-08-11T22:27:00.009-04:00

Hi all, thanks for reading. I kind of fell off the CPA bandwagon on 7/23 and turned off my google campaigns. My initial plan was to let it run for 60 days, but I didn't have enough time to watch every day and do proper analysis (work, life & family got a little chaotic for a bit).

During the period of 6/12 and 7/23 or 42 days, I conducted an experiment in CPA with a product called Nature Cleanse. There was a lot of tweaking work the first week, but for most of the campaign it was just sit back and watch. I did try to use yahoo keywords mid-campaign, and spent far too much money with them for no results. For this product, google adwords seemed to be the right choice.

So here is the summary report:

Earnings	Google	Yahoo	GoDaddy	Profit	ROI	Daily Profit
$256	$116.09	$65.49	$11.17	$63.25	32.8%	$1.50

If I wouldn't have blow so much at yahoo (in fact, one day was over $34, for nothing!!) this would have been a much better ROI campaign.

Will I do it again you ask? Oh heck yea, I just want to make sure Copeac is actually going to pay me. They have a $100/mo minimum, so my first month I didn't get paid since I only earned $96, but month two should be rolling around here so and I should have enough for a paycheck. I can't wait to see what happens.

Did I learn a lot? Oh heck yea! I'll definitely do things slightly differently next time.

Is this a legit biz? I'm still on the fence. None of my sells ever came from a click through, however click through volume from google definitely affected the number of products I sold. Does that sound strange? All my sells came from someone typing in "Nature Cleanse Trial" into google and finding my landing page, and buying from there. Once I turned off my google ads, people ironically stopped typing Nature Cleanse Trial into google. One IP address actually signed up 2 times!! I just don't get it. My only guesses are that someone saw my add, and then searched on the landing page name keywords to look for reviews or something similar and bought based on a good google page rank. This is a little discouraging because I'd really like them to trust the click and drive them that way. I need to work on how I phrase my ads maybe.

7/1 Update on Nature Cleanse

2009-07-01T22:25:00.005-04:00

Right after I posted that last blog entry, I ended up with 2 more sales on Nature Cleanse, wow! I think I may just leave this campaign alone (google seems to have stopped slapping me) and see what it can do. I've done no more work on it since my last report, only watch the money go in (commissions) and out (adwords).

Date	Commissions	PPC Costs	Godaddy Costs	Landing Page?
06/30/2009		$2.44		Yes
07/01/2009	$64.00	$1.77		Yes

To date (including all my mistakes) on this campaign, I'm at $160 revenue, $85.57 expense, $74.43 profit (46.5%). My target profit should be around 50% (from what I've read), and I'm getting pretty close even with some serious mistakes.

If I could just figure out how to get more clicks!! Maybe it's time to start playing with Yahoo and Bing and other traffic sources.

Update on Nature Cleanse

2009-06-30T23:23:00.008-04:00

So the Nature Cleanse Trial through Copeac has been going well. I am making a slight profit with it, and quite happy with my lessons learned. The big thing I learned was to have a landing page!! I was able to get my click costs cut in half, unfortunately I'm having a hard time getting traffic on the keywords I can afford (some are priced way to high in the $2-10 per click range). The cheapest keyword ironically is just a simple plain "colon", unfortunately I get a lot of unrelated traffic there and it's hard to filter out just those looking for the body part colon and some health product to use with it.

Here are my up to date stats on this campaign:

Date	Commissions	PPC Costs	Godaddy Costs	Landing Page?
06/12/2009	$32.00	$49.03 (sale was in the first $20)		No
06/13/2009			11.17	Yes
06/14/2009		$2.09		Yes
06/15/2009		$.27		Yes
06/16/2009		$1.13		Yes
06/20/2009		$1.05		Yes
06/21/2009		$1.18		Yes
06/22/2009		$0.90		Yes
06/23/2009		$3.69		Yes
06/24/2009	$32.00	$3.69		Yes
06/27/2009		$5.29		Yes
06/28/2009		$1.85		Yes
06/29/2009	$32.00	$2.02		Yes

So far, I'm at a net profit of $14.64, however you can tell that I'm doing much better between click 2 and click 3, where the cost to convert was $9.16 and commission was $32.

Also, something important to notice here is how drastically my PPC costs changed after I spent the $11.17 at godaddy to get a landing page (and that costs covers 2 months worth of hosting!!). I can't emphasis enough, if you're serious about marketing a product, get your own landing page!

Lessons Learned:
Spending a few bucks on a landing page is worth it's weight in gold. You have to keep an eye on google, I did have a couple of google "slaps" where they basically made my keyword costs way to high and I had to re-start my campaign by tweaking it a bit. That's what explains the few dead dates with no clicks. And probably the last tip I learned, when you buy a landing page, make it a little generic. I named mine NatureCleanseTrial.com which means I basically can only market Nature Cleanse on there. I probably should have considered getting something more generic like ColonCleanseCentral.com or something along those lines (this example is already registered, and setup basically how I should have set it up).

For those keeping track, I've probably put about 10 hours into the nature cleanse promotion, leaving me making around $1.40/hr. Not all that exciting, and I'm not quitting my day job anytime soon, but I like to think the education I'm getting while doing this experiment has been amazing. I can't believe how much I know about this little known world now.

Experiments in PPC & CPA

2009-06-15T21:58:00.005-04:00

I'm doing some experiments with PPC arbitrage, or sometimes known as traffic brokering, or in the industry terms, CPA (Cost Per Action). Basically the idea is to find a product to help sell, and take a commission on it. If your strategy works well, you pay less for advertising/marketing than you make in commission, and you're left with your profit as the difference.

The problem is that there are a ton of crappy products out there, a lot of scams, a lot of spammy stuff, but I've found some good networks of solid products that I can at least (on the surface) believe are not scams. Most are these As Seen on TV style products. I mean, if there is a store dedicated in the mall to them, how bad can they really be.

The first one I'm testing with is called Nature Cleanse, and it's a all natural colon cleanse system that you subscribe to monthly mailings. The first month is free, you only pay shipping and handling. I've bought several similar colon cleanse products in the past and have had good experience with them, so this seems right up my alley.

I also have a Nature Cleanse Trial blog going as well.

Tinkering with PPC Internet Marketing again

2009-06-11T22:53:00.007-04:00

Back last year, I experimented a bit with Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising with Google and a few different products on Clickbank.com and Amazon.com. I only lost money, but I did learn a lot about the world of internet marketing. Luckily I only lost about $50, so it wasn't a crushing defeat for me. I kind of put it on the back burner as something I knew was possible to make money with, but I just hadn't quite figured it out yet. I only sold a few things through amazon and never made a profit on it, and clickbank was a total waste of my money. I never sold a SINGLE ITEM!! UGH!

This year while networking with real estate investors, I ran across a guy online who was showing his affiliate accounts and Bank of America small business accounts in videos where he was clearing $20-50k a day (after google, yahoo, and msn expenses). I figured I had to have another shot at this.

I started doing more research with clickbank and decided to go with their top 2 products and try to market them. Here are the details of those tests.

Date	PPC Expense	Commissions	Product
06/07/2009	$2.00	$11.98	Twitter Traffic Machine
06/08/2009	$15.68	$0	Twitter Traffic Machine
06/09/2009	$12.38	$0	Twitter Traffic Machine
06/09/2009	$7.44	$42.13	Clickbank Code
06/10/2009	$37.48	$0	Clickbank Code

As you can see I experienced beginners luck on both of them on the first day, and the addiction drove me wild. I spent well more than my earnings (commissions column) to try and get the second sale on both those products for nothing!! UGH!! How frustrating.

Lessons Learned:
I was a bit too eager, I was doing direct linking instead of getting my own landing page (as almost every profitable PPC or CPA advertiser will tell you that you need). I think this led to higher than normal google adwords costs (twitter traffic machine was 34 clicks at ~$0.88/ea, clickbank code was 71 clicks at ~$0.63). I think if I could have got my click costs at $.40 or less for CBC and $.20 or less for TTM, I could have made them profitable.

Overall, I'm very satisfied I was actually able to convert some products, which I was NEVER able to do last year. Like I said, I've learned a lot. Net loss = $20.87.

Credit Card Abitrage is Back: Citi Cards No Fees 0% Offer

2009-04-01T23:37:00.010-04:00

I was surprised to get a 0% balance transfer offer with no balance transfer fee today from Citi Cards. Lately they seem to all be 3% fee and have gone from $99 caps to no caps. It seemed like the days of no fees were well gone, as I hadn't gotten an offer like that in over 9mos. What a difference from having them regularly 2-3/mo from any number of banks for years. Does this mean that the credit markets are turning back up, or that Citi is just desperate to get more customers in their card business?

In any case, I'll take free money for 12 months any day of the week. The arbitrage benefits aren't as good these days: high yield savings are pretty low, and heloc payments aren't bad either with prime at 3.25%. Like I said, free money. It's very easy to make $300-400 off the deal still even in a bad yield market.

New Photos and Video

2008-05-29T07:20:00.003-04:00

It's been far too long since I uploaded photos and videos. I'm happy to say that everything is up to date now:

Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/zhunzi/

Videos: http://youtube.com/profile_videos?user=zhunzi

In other news fronts, I'm nearly done with my an adwords experiment. It's not going as well as I liked, and I'll write more about that later. I've been reading a few books, trying to soak up as much information about time management and making money as possible.

The reading list:

Jim Cramer - Real Money (currently reading)

Robert Kiyosaki - Who Took My Money

Robert Kiyosaki - Choose to Be Rich

Tim Ferriss - The Four Hour Work Week

Prosper Arbitrage?

2008-04-19T21:34:00.012-04:00

First off, if you haven't seen Prosper.com yet, you should. I get absolutely no commission for telling you that.

When I first saw prosper, I thought it was great. I deposited $50 and lent out my first partial loan at 19%. I'm still getting payments from the person, and they're on target to pay me back the complete $50+interest at around $1.80/mo. My only complaint about the company is that you get locked into these 3 year loans. There aren't any means for folks to take out various term lengths, so that you could essentially stack your money as you would in CD investments. The only way to have a constant flow of funds that can be available immediately is to just continually fund small portions of loans each month over the next 3 years. That's kind of annoying.

All that being said, I work for a large bank, and I know how they make money. One of the main ways is to lend money on one side, and convince folks to deposit money (usually by paying them interest) on the other side. They always lend for more than they pay. It's pure arbitrage. I also know that there is often very little margin in it for banks. They need LOTS of customers to make it work. So I got to thinking, could an individual make arbitrage work at Prosper? I searched around and sure enough, there are plenty of folks lending money at 5-6% in order to then lend that money out again at 15-20% to make a profit. Unfortunately, I'm not sure it's a great living. Look at the chart I created below based on $5000 being borrowed at 6%. You need to get a very high return (which is hard, because the higher the rate, the riskier the customer).

$5000 Arbitrage	Personal Loan @ 6%	Lend Out @ 12%	Lend Out @ 18%
Interest + is in, - is out	-475.96	978.6	1507.46
Income minus Expenses		502.64	1031.5
Income minus Expenses / 36 months		13.96	28.65
Income minus Taxes (25%) minus Expenses		257.99	654.64
Income minus Taxes (25%) minus Expenses / 36		7.16	18.18

So if you could borrow at 6% and lend at 18% with no mishaps, you would make roughly $18.18/mo off a $5000 arbitrage after taxes. To be honest, managing between 10-100 loans (depending on how large your contributions per loan is) is not going to be worth $18.18 of your time. Not unless you say live in a seriously deprived location where that might buy you a royal lifestyle for the week. In which case, you probably don't have good credit, nor access to the internet. The numbers scale linerally, so if you wanted to aim for making $1818/mo you'd need to lend 100x the $5000 or $500,000 to be exact. Now that to me, looks like A LOT of risk!

My thoughts: Arbitrage doesn't work at Prosper.

googhydr-20, who are you?

2008-04-19T20:59:00.003-04:00

I've been researching different ways to make money on the web using arbitrage. I've used credit card arbitrage for a long time (it's how I paid off my 6 years of college debt in 2 years, but that's a story for another day). Credit Card arbitrage is getting harder to do because too many people know about it, and because the prime rate is so low and cards rarely offer free balance transfers anymore, so what you can make per month on it is nominal and not worth my time anymore. So I've started looking for a new slight of hand to make a few extra bucks here and there.

The thing I've read a lot about recently and have been doing some research on is adwords arbitrage using google adwords. In doing some various tests, there seems to be someone out there that is a step ahead of me at every turn. With the big ole internet, I'm pretty used to that. In fact, there are usually thousands ahead of me. Everywhere I turn I keep seeing one particular amazon associate id (googhydr-20, and of also googhydr-21 on amazon.co.uk). This person seems to have tagged every single amazon product and nearly ever possible google search keyword! I'm amazed! I can only guess that this person, whoever they are have managed to amass a large fortune for themselves.

Oddly enough, nobody else has written about this person that I can tell. I googled googhydr and googhydr-20 just to confirm, and all I can find is 3 pages of links where folks have copy/pasted the URL into their blog to talk about a product. They're all random folks too so I don't think they even realize they're giving this person some free press. So it makes me start to wonder... [tinkly music should play here, but I was too lazy to search for some in creative commons] Is this possibly Google's ID? Are they getting amazon referral fees for forwarding traffic to amazon (probably at the tick of 8-10% per amazon transaction)? I tried to figure out what the tracking ID stood for, but the best I can come up with for googhydr is "Google Hider."

In any case, I found this amazing, and since nobody has managed to write about it, I decided it was my time.

More on my forays in arbitrage to come.

Oh, and if you want to help me out. Click on the Amazon spinner below. I picked out a few interesting songs that I'd heard today, and I thought you might like as well. Amazon has an amazing MP3 store now with DRM-Free music (can I hear a wooo hooo?) priced at a great price (.89-.99 per track). And even better, I get 10% commission if I can point people to go there and buy.

Charlotte Plans to spray Foray 48B on the city!

2008-02-28T16:15:00.002-05:00

I just submitted the story to digg, but I can't believe that Charlotte is planning on spraying a pesticide all over the city!

Digg Link

Blackberries on the Beach

2007-09-21T22:34:00.001-04:00

Just a quick update. I ended up going with a Blackberry Worldphone 8830. Probably one of the biggest deciding factors was that work would pay for it, where I'd be out $600 iPhone. It didn't help that AT&T was dropping 80% of my calls at the time, and my work email was overflowing! It all made perfect sense at the time. Even so, I love the blackberry. It's made my work life much easier. I am a little disappointed that they block 3rd party apps. I had google maps installed on there initially before syncing it up with the blackberry gateway server at work, and it was VERY sweet. About a week after syncing, a policy was pushed down to my blackberry and google maps was wiped off. :( I'm also a little disappointed that Verizon turns off the built in GPS device inside the phone. They want to sell you their own GPS enabled service for $10/mo I guess.

Over labor day, we went to Top Sail Beach. We had quite the blast. Due to unforeseen circumstances, my in-laws couldn't make it, so we ended up inviting some of our friends from the natural living groups we're a part of in town. Did I say we had a blast?!?! I've never made a huge sand sculpture before (only small ones), so it was quite fun having a few folks to help out with a mega sand turtle.

It only took a few minutes for the kids to climb all over it and crush it (we snapped a picture of them all on top). Of course then a few hours later it was just a nice flat piece of sand, thanks to the ocean.

I must admit, I did bring my blackberry on the beach and checked out the headlines while basking in the sun. Ah...

Lots of updates

2007-07-12T23:16:00.002-04:00

Well, it's been a while, so I want to do a few quick updates. Since my last post the Abby and I have taken a trip to San Francisco, Yosemite, Oak Island, and recently went camping just outside of Statesville, NC in a town called Hiddenite. I must admit, there wasn't much up there in Hiddenite, but it was quiet. All the rest of the vacations were a blast and were filled with lots of pictures (see my flickr site).

I've also been thinking more and more about learning a stringed instrument. I really wanted to learn the banjo, but they're just so big. I found that you can play some cool stuff on ukulele's so I bought a cheap chinese one off ebay for just under US$30 shipped (Mahalo brand). Abby loves it! I also found a very cool program for windows to help me tune it called AP Tuner. There are a ton of free lessons on the web and a ukulele podcast too! Tiny Tim, look out!

I've also been watching a neat wine podcast called winelibrary tv. It's pretty cool and there is also a social networking site it links into called cork'd. I'm in there as ZhunZi of course. :) Friend me up.

I also tracked down an old graduate school buddy of mine (Jerome Leveque) who managed to slip off and get married while I wasn't watching.

Anyway, more news to come...

Daniel

Future of cell phones

2007-02-22T21:47:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking a bit recently about the future of cell phones and the new functionality they will take on besides just placing telephone calls. One thing that has really caught my attention is their use as a GPS/Navigation device. Two phones (the Apple iPhone and the Samsung u740) recently have really made me start to think on the possibilities.

What if cell phones had the ability to send a beacon. Imagine if you will, you're at a party and you want to explain to a friend how to get there. You just send them a MMS message with your GPS coordinates, and their phone accepts them and navigates you to the location, whether you're 100 kilometers or 10 meters away. Or imagine if while on the phone with someone, both of you could be moving in a direction towards each other and meet halfway with the help of your cells? What about a 3-way calling situation? I think the next few years are going to bring about some exciting innovation in the cellular space. I'm looking forward to it.

For now, my Nokia 6820 is still holding out. I hope to have something new by this summer. I'm holding out to see if the iPhone is all that it promises to be.

== UPDATE 9/21/2007 ==
After much frustration with dropped calls on AT&T recently, I decided not to risk 600 bones on an iPhone locked on an AT&T network. In a way I'm glad I didn't, 2 months later they reduced the price by $200. I ended up getting a Blackberry 8830 Worldphone on Verizon. I'm very happy with it. Ironically, while watching InDigital Episode 25 I saw where Helio released my idea on their phones before I ever posted that blog entry. I swear I had never heard of it, but I'm glad to know that there are companies out there thinking of these great mashups. Helio calls it Buddy Beacon.

Wow! My account is still active.

2007-01-10T23:32:00.000-05:00

I haven't posted here in over a year! Wow. It's amazing my account is still even active! In any case, lots has happened with me, and my online presence.

#1) Google bought blogger.com - totally cool
#2) Textamerica started charging for moblogs - this stinks. But it has forced me to give Flickr (now a Yahoo property) a try now. I actually like Flickr much better other than the learning curve is still there. Check out my new image blog at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/zhunzi
#3) Abby is now 2 years old (see flickr site), my myth tv I gave up on and it's packed away in a box (we moved in 2006). I'm not certain what I want to do with it yet.
#4) Finally - Apple has announced their iPhone and it's amazing looking. Other than the $500 price point holding them back from the mass markets, I think this phone is going to be a big hit!

Anyway, I will try to post more frequently than once every 1.5 years.

- ZhunZi

MythTV Update: Just Images

2005-07-31T21:37:00.000-04:00

I finally posted a few images of the hardware work on my textamerica account. As you can see, my daughter Abigail was actively involved.

MythTV Update 3: Remote Works

2005-07-19T07:31:00.000-04:00

After much battling, I finally got my remote control to work. It seems the PVR-250 Model 980 comes with the same remote as the PVR-350. If you look underneath the batteries, you'll see the model number is A415-HPG.

I followed the instructions in this thread, and was able to get it up and running. HURRAY!

/etc/lirc/lircd.conf


 #
 # this config file was automatically generated
 # using lirc-0.7.0(any) on Sun Nov 28 20:25:09 2004
 #
 # contributed by
 #
 # brand:   Hauppauge 350
 # Created: G.J. Werler (The Netherlands)
 # Project: Mythtv Fedora Pundit-R www.mythtvportal.com
 # Date:    2004/11/28
 # model no. of remote control: Hauppauge A415-HPG
 # devices being controlled by this remote: PVR-350
 #
 
 begin remote
 
   name  Hauppauge_350
   bits           13
   flags RC5|CONST_LENGTH
   eps            30
   aeps          100
 
   one           969   811
   zero          969   811
   plead        1097
   gap          114605
   toggle_bit      2
 
 
       begin codes
          Go                       0x00000000000017BB
           Power                    0x00000000000017BD
          TV                       0x000000000000179C
           Videos                   0x0000000000001798
           Music                    0x0000000000001799
           Pictures                 0x000000000000179A
           Guide                    0x000000000000179B
           Radio                    0x000000000000178C
          Up                       0x0000000000001794
          Left                     0x0000000000001796
           Right                    0x0000000000001797
          Down                     0x0000000000001795
          OK                       0x00000000000017A5
           Back/Exit                0x000000000000179F
           Menu/i                   0x000000000000178D
          Vol+                     0x0000000000001790
          Vol-                     0x0000000000001791
           Prev.Ch                  0x0000000000001792
          Mute                     0x000000000000178F
          Ch+                      0x00000000000017A0
          Ch-                      0x00000000000017A1
           Record                   0x00000000000017B7
          Stop                     0x00000000000017B6
           Rewind                   0x00000000000017B2
          Play                     0x00000000000017B5
           Forward                  0x00000000000017B4
           Replay/SkipBackward      0x00000000000017A4
           Pause                    0x00000000000017B0
           SkipForward              0x000000000000179E
 
          1                        0x0000000000001781
          2                        0x0000000000001782
          3                        0x0000000000001783
          4                        0x0000000000001784
          5                        0x0000000000001785
          6                        0x0000000000001786
          7                        0x0000000000001787
          8                        0x0000000000001788
          9                        0x0000000000001789
           Asterix                  0x000000000000178A
          0                        0x0000000000001780
          #                        0x000000000000178E
          Red                      0x000000000000178B
           Green                    0x00000000000017AE
           Yellow                   0x00000000000017B8
          Blue                     0x00000000000017A9
       end codes
 
 end remote

/home/mythtv/.mythtv/lircrc


 # lircrc.example.HauppaugeSilver-nativelirc
 # 2005-01-27, Russell Salerno
 # mailto:rsalern5@optonline.net
 # Save this file in ~/.mythtv/lircrc
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = Off
     config = Esc
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = Go
 # Swap the PiP windows
     config = N
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 1
     config = 1
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 2
     config = 2
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 3
     config = 3
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 4
     config = 4
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 5
     config = 5
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 6
     config = 6
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 7
     config = 7
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 8
     config = 8
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 9
     config = 9
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = Back/Exit
     config = Esc
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = 0
     config = 0
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = menu/i
     config = M
 end
 
 # Below are keys used with the Hauppauge Silver remote
 
 begin
    prog = mythtv
 # This is the Red key
 # We'll use it for "Delete"
    button = Red
    config = D
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mythtv
 # This is the Green key
 # We'll use it for "Information"
    button = Green
    config = I
 end
 
 begin
   prog = mythtv
 # This is the Blue key
 # Use it for the sleep timer
   button = Blue
   config = F8
 end
 
 begin
   prog = mythtv
 # This is the Yellow key
 # adjust video
   button = Yellow
   config = F
 end
 
 
 # Note the "repeat =" strings in the volume and channel.
 # This means that if you hold down the key, every nth instance will be
 # passed.  This depends on your system, so you may want to increase or
 # decrease this and see what happens.  repeat = 1 is probably too
 # fast.
 
 begin
   prog = mythtv
   button = vol-
   repeat = 3
   config = F10
 end
 
 begin
   prog = mythtv
   button = vol+
   repeat = 3
   config = F11
 end
 
 begin
   prog = mythtv
   button = Ch+
   config = Up
 end
 
 begin
   prog = mythtv
   button = Ch-
   repeat = 3
   config = Down
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = Up
 # This is the "up" on the central diamond
     repeat = 3
     config = Up
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = Down
 # This is the "down" on the central diamond
     repeat = 3
     config = Down
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
 #    button = Vol-
     button = Left
 # This is the "left" on the central diamond
     repeat = 3
     config = Left
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
 #    button = Vol+
     button = Right
 # This is the "right" on the central diamond
     repeat = 3
     config = Right
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
 # Middle button on the diamond
     button = Ok
     config = Return
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = Mute
     config = F9
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mythtv
 # Change focus for PiP (to change channel in the other window)
    button = Blank
    config = B
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mythtv
 # Toggle PiP on/off
    button = Full
    config = V
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = Rew
     config = Left
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = Play
     config = P
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = FFW
     config = Right
 end
 
 begin
   prog = mythtv
   button = Record
   config = R
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mythtv
 # Teletext
    button = Stop
    config = T
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mythtv
     button = pause
     config = P
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mythtv
    button = Replay
 # Use for backwards commercial skip
     config = Q
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mythtv
    button = Skip
 # Use for forward commercial skip
     config = Z
 end
 
 #MPlayer
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = Off
    config = quit
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = MENU
    config = osd
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = Rew
    config = seek -10
    repeat = 1
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = FFW
    config = seek +10
    repeat = 1
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = Replay
    config = seek -60
    repeat = 1
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = Skip
    config = seek +60
    repeat = 1
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mplayer
     button = Pause
     config = pause
 end
 
 begin
     prog = mplayer
     button = Play
     config = pause
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = BACK
    config = quit
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = VOL+
    config = volume +1
    repeat = 1
 end
 
 begin
    prog = mplayer
    button = VOL-
    config = volume -1
    repeat = 1
 end
 
 begin
    prog=mplayer
    button=Mute
    config=mute
 end

MythTV Update 2

2005-07-12T07:02:00.000-04:00

Forgot about all my paranoia about the model 980 card, the thing works out of the box with the newest release of KnoppMyth. It was a piece of cake. I've got it up and running and recording TV now with the standard install. Now it's tweak time! :)

MythTV Update 1

2005-07-07T19:58:00.000-04:00

Well, I think I have all the components now to get this thing working. I found an article on how to get myth working with the model 980 card here:

http://www.byopvr.com/Sections+index-req-viewarticle-artid-13-page-1.html

I ended up and went over budget a little bit because I chose a more expensive case than I really needed. I really liked the small form factor case, and it was worth going ~$100 over budget. The AOpen EZ18 case with built in motherboard is awesome. It's got an nVidia MX onboard video that can support 2 (count them, 2) monitors, and 1 S-Video out. It also has built in firewire, and a nice little flip down fronts that obscure an optical drive that's color doesn't match.

AOpen EZ18 [$159.99 after $20 mail-in rebate @ NewEgg.com]
AMD Athlon XP 2600+ [$77.99 @ NewEgg.com]
Corsair 512mb PC3200 RAM [$39.50 @ NewEgg.com]
Maxtor 200gb HD [$69.99 w/free shipping @ Outpost.com]
Hauppauge PVR-250 Model 980 Video Capture/Tuner Card [$125.99 w/free shipping @ Buy.com]

I managed to time a few of my purchases just right to get some great deals. My advice is just watch for deals. Two days after my PVR-250 arrived, buy.com had a dual tuner hauppauge for just $5 more than I paid. I was a bit dismayed, but oh well. I think I hit some great deals on the AOpen box & the hard drive. I'll eventually replace the 250 with a dual tuner, especially if I can find a deal like buy.com had last week. The downfall of going with the SFF case is that it only has 1 PCI slot. So my second tuner either has to be on 1 card, or I have to go with a firewire device.

In order to install KnoppMyth, I had to borrow my DVD drive from my other desktop. I'll eventually put a DVD Burner in this case, but again, waiting on the right deal.

Total cost so far: $520.35*

* - I could have saved about $15 by not splurging on 2-day shipping and expedited handling on my newegg order. I was on vacation when I ordered it and I wanted to get it ASAP so I could tinker.

Starting my MythTV project

2005-06-28T13:44:00.000-04:00

I'm finally going to do it. I've been looking at building a MythTV box for over a year now. I just never could motivate myself to take the first step.

Last week I purchased a PVR-250 Model 980 from buy.com, and just last night I saw a $70 200gb harddrive on Outpost.com, so I went ahead and bought that as well.

I've already discovered by reading in some forums that the PVR-250 I bought which I thought would be an easy match for Myth is a newer model chipset (980) and they (Myth coders) haven't worked out all the glitches with it yet. Hopefully the great open source coders that are working on Myth will have it solved by the time I get all the hardware in place. The PVR-250 is the most widely used card of Myth users, so I think they'll be on top of it fast. I was trying to avoid the MCE chipset because I read about problems with it, but it seems those are all resolved now. The issue currently is around the 980 chipset that I just bought. Oh well, my first miscalculation, I'm sure there will be more to come.

I still need to buy a case, motherboard, processor, ram, and video card (output). I'll keep you up to date on my progress.

Hacking Defined

2005-06-19T22:08:00.000-04:00

I found an interesting site just the other day. It's called Hacking Defined. They do a nice demo of cracking a WEP key in just a few minutes here:

http://whoppix.hackingdefined.com/Whoppix-wepcrack.html

I've seen a similar demo done on From the Shadows StashBox 3.0, but this attack was super fast.

How to become a millionaire

2005-06-17T09:07:00.000-04:00

I found this very nice presentation the other day. It was very inspiring. I think all I really need to do to become a millionaire is try. I just have to get off my lazy butt and do it. :)

http://marshallbrain.com/million.htm

Digg

2005-06-17T09:03:00.000-04:00

I'm still working on ways to balance life and blogging. :) In any case, I've added my diggs to the right column. Digg is a very neat site that I've been reading for sometime now. I don't even read Slashdot anymore.

Digg stories bubble to the top based on how many people are interested in them. So when I digg a story (and it shows up in my right column) I basically +1 the story's score. So not always the most recent news is front page, sometimes it takes a few days to bubble to the top.

Speed up Firefox

2004-12-27T10:41:00.000-05:00

I found this neat article on "hack a day" that will speed up Firefox on broadband connections.

I haven't been able to notice a tremendous difference, but here's the text from the tip with some slight modifications by me:

1.Type "about:config" into the address bar and hit return. Scroll down and look for the following entries:

network.http.pipelining
network.http.proxy.pipelining
network.http.pipelining.maxrequests

Normally the browser will make one request to a web page at a time. When you enable pipelining it will make several at once, which really speeds up page loading.

2. Alter the entries as follows by double clicking on the entry:

Set "network.http.pipelining" to "true"

Set "network.http.proxy.pipelining" to "true"

Set "network.http.pipelining.maxrequests" to some number like 30. This means it will make 30 requests at once.

3. Lastly right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it "nglayout.initialpaint.delay" and set its value to "0". This value is the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it receives.

Welcome to the world: Abigail Kalea Rymer

2004-12-15T05:00:00.001-05:00

I want to welcome my daughter Abigail Kalea Rymer into the world. She was born Dec 15th, 2004 at 1:31am EST. She weighed 6lbs 8.4oz and measured 19.5 inches long.

Just as I figured...

2004-12-08T21:35:00.000-05:00

Just as I figured. After the music industry lobbied so hard for the DMCA, made examples of poor teenagers who just wanted to listen to their favorite artists and sued them for thousands, guess what?!

Monday (12/6/2004) a survey of recording artists revealed that the internet has padded their pockets. 43% of the artists said that peer-to-peer networks actually helped promote their work!

Creativity should be free to express itself... viva la restistance!

Robojo Speaks

2004-12-07T22:36:00.000-05:00

My friend Robert Jones just started a new blog. His rants are entertaining to say the least!

URL: Robojo Speaks

Neat remote hack

2004-11-23T17:17:00.000-05:00

I just discovered a very neat hack I have to tell you about. With the help of a Griffin Total Remote you can record IR remote control signals as sound (wav file for example). Then plug the total remote into any audio playback gadget (mp3 player, iPod, PocketPC, etc) and control devices 100ft away! That's awesome!

I saw a video of someone on engadget.com using the device to record a TV-B-Gone device's signals and then save it into his iPod. Suddenly his iPod could turn off any TV in 100ft.

New pictures on shutterfly

2004-11-23T12:11:00.000-05:00

We have some new albums available now on shutterfly:

Tate Lewis' birth 11.14.2004
Pumpkin Carving 10.24.2004
Baby Shower 10.02.2004

Friends New Additions

2004-11-14T19:10:00.000-05:00

Our friends Scott & Melanie Lewis had their first child today. His name is Tate Lewis and you can see pictures of him on the Lewis's second new addition (their website):

http://www.nclewis.com/

Here is a picture I took from my phone cam:

Our baby is not far behind. Abigail Rymer is due Dec 21, 2004.

DHTML book coming soon

2004-11-10T12:07:00.000-05:00

My friend Jason Cranford Teague's new book is being released very soon. It's going to the printers next week. Just so you know why I'm promoting it, it's because I wrote chapter 10 on databases. I'm excited to announce that this is my first time being published!

I know Jason has worked very hard on this book, and I can say that writing technical books is no easy task. I hope anyone who works in the web would consider this book for your bookshelf.

Thanks to Jason for giving me this opportunity.

Man kills himself over election results

2004-11-08T07:21:00.000-05:00

I was horrified to read about a 25 year old man from the state of Georgia that killed himself over the weekend. He went up to the 9/11 ground zero site and took his own life because of the recent Bush re-election.

Article on CNN: http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/11/07/ground.zero.suicide.ap/index.html

I have been very depressed about the recent elections myself, and I've been trying to learn how to deal with another 4 years under this crazy president. My only inspiration is that as Americans, we've lived under much worse times. My nephew just recently discovered in researching the family history that my ancestors were brought here in bondage as indentured servants. My point here is that no matter what setbacks we may face, whether they are enslavement, a bad economic policy, or even a bad war, we as Americans must find the strength to more forward and live a life that is something worthy of pride. So today and everyday going forward, we should stand tall, and be proud of who we are, and create a world for our children that is better than our own.

Intelligent people voted for Kerry?

2004-11-05T13:16:00.000-05:00

I've read a lot of interesting things about this election on the web in the last few days, but this has got to be the best link sent to me yet:

http://attenuation.net/files/iq.htm

It seems that the states with the highest average IQs all voted for Kerry. Once the average state IQ falls below 99 they become definite Bush supporters. So really it's to the republican party's advantage to keep people stupid.

I found this image on Bushflash.com as well... I love it:

Dubya Wins!

2004-11-03T17:51:00.000-05:00

Each time we elect a president, I like to try and think ahead a bit and see what things are likely to happen. Obviously, I'm no expert; this is just my gut feeling on the situation at hand. Now that I have this blog, I think this is the perfect place to express it.

My predictions for the next 4 years...

1. Debt Increase - The US National Debt which is currently $7.4 trillion will exceed $15 trillion. There appears to be no end in sight for the current 2 occupations (Iraq & Afghanistan). I can only guess that we will continue to spend at our current rate or higher.

2. More tax cuts for the rich - If it wasn't already a sweet enough deal for those who make $1mil+/yr, it's going to get better. Who will pay? Those of us who make $250k or less a year. Our day-to-day expenses (gas, food, clothing, etc) will continue to go up, our salaries will stay flat or go down, and we might get 1-3% shaved off our tax bill which Bush will say is a tax cut for the middle class (whoo hooo), but we will experience a net decrease in spending power. My only advice is to suddenly find a job paying $1mil+. Good luck, because 5-10% of you will probably lose your job to outsourcing.

3. Another Occupation - Dubya will get bored with Iraq and Afghanistan and decide to invade another "Evil Doer" nation. This of course will increase point #1 above (the national debt), but also some how or another improve his approval rating. Everyone seems to love a good war against "evil."

4. Education fallout - The no child left behind act has been his claim to fame as far as education goes, however it's not really working. Charlotte alone has lost over $10mil in federal funded programs for at-risk kids. Bush just says that it's working, and everyone seems to believe him. Soon enough the truth will come out that it's a failing program and by then it's already too late for our youth. Luckily, we will have the military for them to join since we will be in dire need of bodies to help with point #3 above (the new occupation). You could probably send your child to private school (and get a tax break for it in the next couple years [another prediction]) if you could only afford it. However because of point #2 above, you will find it harder and harder to come up with additional money. Your only choices are to find a high paying job, increase your personal debt or suffer through failing public schools.

5. Increase in Crime - Fewer available jobs paying less money only means more crime. It's not rocket science.

Sorry for all the negativity, but I just don't see the next 4 years as very bright. We'll check back in 4 years to see how close I come.

Tax break for offshoring tech jobs

2004-10-26T07:39:00.000-04:00

It seems George Bush has given a major tax cut (from 35% to 5.25%) for those tech companies who are using offshoring for "research and development." uh huh...

"Bush Signs Tech Tax Break" on internetnews.com

Blogshares?

2004-10-25T21:29:00.000-04:00

I accidentally discovered this game called BlogShares. It basically puts values on various blogs and people buy and sell the blogs like stocks. I was googling someone and the #1 hit was a link to his blog from BlogShares. I just happened to search for my blog, and sure enough:

zhunzi.blogspot.com

In fact, several of my friends blogs were listed!

New Vodaphone V602 sees through clothes :)

2004-10-25T07:32:00.000-04:00

The new Vodaphone V602 has been having problems in Japan. It seems it can be adapted with a ~US$180 night vision device and be used to see through clothing. Finally tech has caught up with every guy's fantasy....

Article on The Times Online
Article on Podgadget
Article on Engadget

Key chain TV remote control

2004-10-20T18:01:00.000-04:00

For some reason, I can see the amount of tape on the front of public TVs increasing...

CNN Link: Key chain remote control turns off TVs

This guy has invented a keychain that will turn on or off about any TV. Perfect for wrecking havoc in your favorite sports bar.

Canadian Tech Hero

2004-10-11T08:53:00.000-04:00

I discovered this article about a Canadian guy named Andrew Greig who has a sweet home setup. He's running VoIP that travels with him on his PDA, MythTV with tons of recorded shows. And best of all, he shares all of this and internet bandwith with his neighbors. They all use VoIP thru his VoIP PBX, and are able to watch both live and recorded shows through his MythTV server setup. It's a must read for any geek.

http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20040930.html

Thank you Mr. Cheney

2004-10-06T07:30:00.000-04:00

Thank you for pointing me to 2 great websites:

Factcheck.com (aka www.GeorgeSoros.com)

Factcheck.org

Pitcairn Island

2004-10-05T17:10:00.000-04:00

I am always curious about islands that nobody has heard of. Sometimes I will look at my world map, and just find an island, and then do some research on it to try and figure out if anyone lives there and if they do, what is their life like.

Today I was reading CNN and there was a big scandal brewing on the little Pitcairn Island. I became very curiuos about this island, and the people who lived there. I decided to check on CIA World Factbook first (one of my favorite places to read actually). It peaked my interest even more, so I decided to Google it.

In any case, I encourage everyone to read a little about it. Seems like a very interesting lifestyle choice that these people make to live here. It's definitely a life much simplier than the busy stress inducing world of big city life.

Nokia 6820 and Debates

2004-09-30T19:00:00.000-04:00

I got a new Nokia 6820 today. I love it. You'll notice I now have a moblog on the side nav.

Don't forget to watch the debates tonight!

How do you step on your own hand?

2004-09-06T20:30:00.000-04:00

I ran into some more interesting information about copyright recently and thought I'd pass it along.

The government finds out it's hard to speak when you have duct tape on your mouth:
Pentagon Censors Gov't Openness Videotape

I also found an interesting organization that is working towards releasing creative works under a license specified by its creator. The organization is called Creative Commons.

Electoral Vote Predictor

2004-08-30T16:09:00.000-04:00

Electoral Vote Predictor 2004: Kerry 249 Bush 232

http://www.electoral-vote.com/

Personalized stamp

2004-08-17T20:12:00.000-04:00

I just found a site that lets you order personalized stamps. They look pretty neat!

http://photo.stamps.com/

Fundrace.org

2004-08-12T21:52:00.000-04:00

Just a quick entry to promote a neat site I've been watching for a few months. My friend Jason turned me on to this site.

www.fundrace.org

They have some really neat maps of where political contributions are coming from.

The new campaign ad

2004-08-12T21:16:00.000-04:00

I thought it might be interesting to write a bit about the future of political campaign ads. I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 a few weeks ago. Then of course I went and rented Bowling for Columbine and Roger and Me.

Michael Moore is a genius. He has taken the concept of Reality TV and put an activist's spin on it. I love it. In a world were most candidates pay for expensive advertising slots, the future of political advertising may change into a model where we (the voters) actually go to the movie theater and pay to watch such advertising. Only the future will tell, but the thought of it is provoking!

I think if Michael Moore were running for president, I would vote for him after paying to seeing his 3 movies! Come to think of it... maybe that is that how Reagan and Schwarzenegger fell into place so easily? After all, Arnold was famous for quoting his movies during his campaign!

Quick hit: new .NET blog

2004-07-12T11:32:00.000-04:00

A buddy of mine is starting a .NET blog. If you're interested, check it out:

http://www.spinnetblog.blogspot.com/

Cheap MP3s Revisited

2004-06-25T09:40:00.000-04:00

In seaching on the legality of AllofMP3.com I found a few good links:

Interview with Vadim Mamotin (CIO of AllofMP3.com)

Russian Music Site Declared Illegal in Australia

Interview with Roman Bahanets, assistant to the lawyer of ROMS

Section of a FAQ about whether AllofMP3.com is legal in your country
Overall, this is a good FAQ, but this one particular section was quite interesting.

Mozilla

2004-06-09T22:17:00.000-04:00

Yet another hole in IE was found today. My god people, download Firefox. I've been using it for a few months and absolutely love it!

The Future of Information

2004-06-03T21:40:00.000-04:00

We are starting on the trail of the information age. There are so many things that are changing the way we think about, deal with, and absorb information.

There are those who want information to be free, and for it to be a team building experience. The open source movement is a great example of this. It reminds me of Star Trek. Everyone seems to be working towards some greater cause, yet their modus operandi isn't to become rich in the process. It's simply to create a better world for those who come after us.

There are those who are strong believers in copyright, and are fighting for extensions to copyright law, the DMCA, the Pirate Act, and I'm sure many more licensing and protection measures for the information they produce.

It is my belief that information wants to be free. Often you will see me saying "Information should be free, viva la resistance!" Maybe I'm naive, but I have a very hard time understanding copyright and ownership of information. Where does it begin, where does it end? If you read my blog, and talk about an idea I expressed here, do I own that thought that you just stole from my blog? I THINK NOT! This is how humans work. We communicate to share information. If we weren't meant to freely share information, we would not have the gift of communication, or we'd have some sort of metering system built into our physiology to measure how much energy you must transfer to me in order for me to speak to you.

Recently there was an article posted on ZD's News titled "Are developers stealing code?" This is getting crazy! That link I just created to ZD News... Well, not only did I read the article and stole the idea which fueled this article, but I also stole the concept of a hyperlink from the w3.org site, and created a link to it. I can't deal with this madness! Before long, I'll be paying royalties to my previous employers in order to mention their name and the work I did there on my resume.

Where does information begin? American Heritage Dictionary defines information, as it relates to computer science, as "Processed, stored, or transmitted data." So that seems that I'm advocating that all things processed, stored or transmitted should be free? Well yes! The data should be free. I can understand if you want to charge me for the service of transmittal, but the actual data itself should be free. I think the Russians at allofmp3 understand this. Hopefully American's will catch up. After all, we did specially engineer a pen to work in space while our comrads across the way just used a pencil instead.

Vive la resistance & sink the Pirate act in it's tracks

Cheap MP3s? iTunes & Walmart: Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid!

2004-06-03T09:04:00.000-04:00

There seems to be a lot of raving lately about the Russian music site that is offering all sorts of high quality MP3 downloads at $.01-.02 per megabyte. YES, you read that right! For a while there was some concern that they may just be building up information for a big fraud attack, but now they're accepting paypal payments, so the only information you're giving up is your email address.

How is this legal you may ask? As far as I understand, it's completely legal within the confines of Russian law. How that affects us here in the US in using the site, I'm not sure. It seems like a gray area of international law that I'm not qualified to answer.

Bush...

2004-06-02T13:56:00.000-04:00

http://www.rototillerman.com/Politics/BushAds/Seriously.mpg

Amen sista!

Vacations

2004-06-02T13:55:00.000-04:00

Vacations are very important. Don't forget to use all your vacation time each year and change the american standard of living!

http://iwantmyvacation.com/

First Post

2004-06-02T10:47:00.000-04:00

This is the first posting to my up and coming blog.