Melvin – Page 49

They Hacked This Blog And How My Determination Fixed it

by Melvin · Aug 29, 2008

Most of you probably know that this blog was hacked a couple of days ago. In fact, you can see in my archive page that there is a notice (until now) saying to just go directly to my posts instead of going to the homepage. Well, long story… (you may not want to read this because this is boring!)

The day started when I tried loggin in to my wordpress blog admin page. I was surprised to see that the my login wasn’t succesful so I retried it. But well still to no avail. I immediately pressed the forgot password and well my password was reset and I was able to login again. Being curious, I immedaitely visited my site and saw that I am hacked! Well, I was surprised at it that I wasn’t even able to take a screenshot of it (if everyone has, please give it to me 😉 ) I then panicked a bit mainly because obviously I know little with things like this and well its just that from my point of view I can do nothing by myself.

So I then turned to the busiest forum in the world, the digital point. I have made a thread there saying my site was hacked and I immediately got great responses. Some were saying that I should check for some shells, others are saying this and that and those. I also went through the teenager internet marketing forum, blog premiere. Many people have responded as well, but in a longer span of time. Jason pointed out saying that I should get the db from my host which is gator. Oh, yeah! I forgot I should have a conversation with my web host which should be done first and foremost. I immediately called them and talked (they were polite) and they say they would get back to me asap. The incident reminds me of the hacking of Carl Ocab’s site. When his site was hacked, what he did was to change host and update the nameservers and it became fine. The process is a little lengthy though.

I was busy all throughout the day. I then called Rajaie who could probably help me with this. he responded immediately (thats what friends are all about:-) ). He asked for my wp account and I immediately made one for him and made him an administrator. One clear thing is that I dont have a clear path of what to do. While waiting for him, I emailed Scocco of DBT, I tweeted Shoemoney, and the number of replies from dp kept on growing. I then revoked the admin privileges to Alkorani because I feel I should on a more clear direction.

Turned the PC off and think more. I had to be more focused and DETERMINED for it. The blog, well aside from having sold out ad spots, hundreds of readers, the main thing is that it’s a part of me. That’s why my name has on it. After 2 hours, turned the PC again, got reply from Scocco saying I should reinstall wordpress and load the backup. Problem is that my last backup was made way back June, wtf! I told him if there;s other solution? and he said none! I am a click away from removing wordpress and reinstalling it and loading an outdated backup but I said No! Then the great light came in and it seemed that in a blink of an eye I know the end of the tunnel is very close.

I, have searched on C99 shells and have found some of them on my public_html folder, then I also found suspicious files which I fearlessly deleted. Then still not fine~ oh shit! Then an idea popped out and well I changed my template back to the old and ugly Kubrick theme. I loaded it and to my surprise it loaded succesfully… Aha! The problem was on my template. Obviously, the site’s main page is the only one not functioning. What I did is look at the index.php and bingo! I have found out the culprit! I immediately restored the code back and it was back again. The rest was history…

What did I learn? Many things; always back up, never lose composure, trust yourself, and believe in your friends that you can do it, they add positive things. To all, thank you for the help, digital point, blog premiere, the bloggers I have contacted and everyone. A very great experience to me!

The Sponsor’s Post

by Melvin · Aug 27, 2008

Well this is follow up of the “thank you sponsors” post that started last month. I thought I would make a version of this every month (every time I feel lazy about posting something). I also had a thought to make different and creative titles every month. This month is a great month. I am pretty sold out in terms of advertising and text link and you’re gonna see some advertisers up their up to decades. 😉

For this month here are the free plugs. Note: I have been a little picky on advertisers. I had three calls for a casino ad and I turned it down. But well, I do accept adult advertising! 🙂

– Site that provides great stuffs and offers from the internet. Looks like a BANS site but then its not

– Myspace Friend Adder is a blackhat great tool for adding unlimited number of friends on Myspace without any hassle. We all know how good myspace is as a marketing tool right?
– The NetFool is a blog that promotes the make money online niche. Well, he’s tackling stock market and probably I think he has the best blog in the whole 15-25 years old kids industry! I’m serious.
– Again this one looked to be book for a decade here. PWP is a site for internet marketing newbies.
– We all know how Carl Ocab managed to brand himself online. Make sure to receive exclusive offers from him.
– Michael Corao has been doing SEO and I think his service worths a look.

Text Links

Legitimate Work At Home Jobs– A site with an enormous list of work at home jobs. Great find by the owner
Live Domain Name Chat – A site that provides chatting service for domain names
Hong Kong Wong – A blog by a great friend about all his personal experiences, thoughts and ramblings on some things.

Those are the advertisers for this period. You can just see the value that the advertisers get from me. Not only they get cheap rates, they do also get a lot of exposures. For the next month, my prices will drastically increase and I have stats to back it up. 🙂

The PepperJam Bloggers Incentive Program

by Melvin · Aug 25, 2008

Last July you probably have read that PepperJam Network is really one of my favorite affiliate network around the web. Last month I made $152 from it w/o using PPC and some risky advertising. All I did was to exert efforts on doing things that I can do myself. This month I though was pretty cool, the first 5 days of August netted me $52 and looking where things are heading, I became ecstatic.

pepperjam

So, what is this PJN Bloggers Incentive Program? It is simply a program wherein a blogger is get paid for writing a post about pepperjam for certain topics (like this one). Of course, you can’t just make a junk post and everything that you’ll write about them will be carefully reviewed. Then they’ll pay you a bonus $10 for doing it. And wait, you can do five a month, which means a residual $50 for you. Why they are doing this? Simple, bloggers are the lifeline of affiliate networks and well I can just imagine how much they are making from them. For me, it isn’t hard to endorse PJN because on my experience it has been a great money maker for me month and month and months. I have seen some of my friends make more than me and I haven’t heard some complaints about them.

Remember the July partnership that I had with PepperJam Network? Yes, actually they are paying accepted affiliates $10 just for signing up. If you didn’t know it has just been extended until August. Yes, August! A lot of people are always asking me, “can I get the $10 immediately?” of course not! I believe you have to wait for a month before you can take it. But why just wait if you can multiply it? Well, let’s see. I talked with their CEO about having some contest sponsored by them and they want to know more about it. Also I am doing an ebook about it.

Join Pepperjam Network today!

Can Blogs Help You Make Money?

by Melvin · Aug 23, 2008

Well this is a great question by one of my childhood friend. He was very curious about how blogs can help people make money. In all honesty, blogs CAN’T make you money, and although they can help, it’s just not as easy as people think. Why? Well blogs first and foremost is a place bloggers where stuck their own notes and what they are putting their is all based on their OWN experience and opinion. You see guys put “Making money with PPC” or maybe with Website Flipping or so but the truth is it’s based on their own experience (most of the time). They have done it well so they can recommend it and in this way they can help you learn and gain some knowledge about it. But their’s no way they’re helping you make money, or maybe they do but it’s still up to you.

I don’t really have problems with this but it’s just that what worked for others doesn’t mean will work with you (or doesn’t mean it won’t work for you). Yeah, they are plenty of blogs there that provide useful and superb resources. You can always read a good article about Pay Per Click and still suck at doing it. You can print a ebook about making money with articles but still fail. Bottom line is people do things differently and have different expertise. Or Maybe making money online is just not for you

The Importance of StartUp Income

by Melvin · Aug 17, 2008

I always like to go back to the old days wherein I used to struggle and almost “cry” trying hard ti make money online. Well, I still struggle today but never cry anymore. 😉 So I can say one thing that has really made me up on internet marketing is the startup income. During those hard times, I have the money to cover up all failing projects and dumb purchases. It’s also evident to see that when you’re carving up something online or even offline, you need to have some startup cash to cover your expenses. Jason always points it out in some of his post saying you have to work for some small income first to get you online for bigger things. I agree on that. Before I was doing some freelancing to cover up some PPC cost and advertising expenses. Of course its risky because you will 85% sure fail. But well I was more of yearning about learning that time.

Well, if you’re thinking how you can build some initial income here’s what I can suggest to you:

Forum Posting – This one is easy but you have to have hardwork. Forumsfirst pays $0.20 for each 40 word comment. They pay via paypal and the minimum is $10. If you type very fast (like me) and have a great WPM accuracy then a $10 can be easily made by an hour. Cool!
GPT – A while a back ago I asked Jim of the Netfool why he is promoting GPT sites. He responded saying because everyone can make money from it so easy. All you have to do is complete free offers. Check out The Net Fools GPT sites.
Freelancing – Before I used to embark a lot of time in this one. Before I used to have a good grammar before blogging made my grammar look atrocious! If you’re up on writing articles, coding and so then this one is for you.
Digital Point – Last month I made a post about how you can make a living on DP forum. Again DP has an enormous opportunity on making money. You can join contests, do some data entry jobs and boast yyour portfolio there. After all there is no middle man so you get a fair share of everything.

Of course there are tons of it but at least these are what I can say have worked for me well. At the end it is all about determination and hardwork. I guess it always pays off at the end.

Shoemoney Has A New Theme

by Melvin · Aug 16, 2008

Well the ever famous Shoemoney has his theme get tweaked a little. Though he never announced it, it’s obvious. He has been promoting his newsletters and well this is the first time he has done this one. If you feel you will benefit from it, then signing up is a must.

Well the blog’s theme is nice but well I still believe the old one is better. You can see his blog have it’s own frontpage wherein the three subheaders are shown whereas it isn’t when you’re reading the post on the link directly. I got some reasons why the former theme was better

Better Width, Better Spacing – In his previous template he had everything extended. In this recent one he had a margin at both sides. Well IMHO the better the spacing the better it looks…
No threaded comments anymore – Though this one can be installed, I still think the threaded comments is one of the better part of commenting system of blogs. In this blog there is no threaded plugin because it’s not functioning well. So while removing the threaded plugin can be a wise move to lessen junk comments, I can say it’s still valuable. Large blogs like shoemoney aren’t just blogs. They are like forums. People talk in it, exchange their 2 cents and well criticize each other. Thats why I feel it’s important.
Looks like MMO blog – With the new theme, shoe’s blog has become like most “make money online” blogs there. The structure reminds me of most mmo (junk) blogs in the industry. Shoe never claimed his blog as mmo neither as a “blogging know how-to” blog.

Well a new theme is a fresh start. Sometimes it helps your readers feel more refreshing. I don’t know, maybe Im the only one thinking the old theme of shoe was better. How bout you, do you think your theme is that good?