Two beaches were closed due to the unconfirmed reports of a large shark sighting, which is suprisingly similar to the movie where they had to close the beach during the fourth of july holiday at Amity Island. The sighting missed the holiday weekend, but how bizarre is that? I can hear Roy Scheider now, “Get out of the water!”

If you are planning in trip to Martha’s Vineyard this weekend, be sure to bring your shark repellant and your sunscreen.

Since my last post, the Callen brothers have posted on their blog that Blinkweb com has had over 20,000 websites created on their platform. I was curious what people were doing, so I typed in some of the big keyword terms for sub-domains (ie. makemoneyonline.blinkweb.com) and I saw a lot of empty sites. It’s like a big parking lot over there. Most of the domains I typed in at Blinkweb were not sites at all, just placeholders. Some of the ones that did have something up were just a blank template. One or two that I found had actual a site setup.

That doesn’t mean that no actual sites were created with Blinkweb for legitimate use, but knowing what I know about how the internet marketer mind works, it is pretty obvious that people just went to town registering as many Blinkweb sub-domains as they could as fast as possible. They want to lock down the “money” subdomains at Blinkweb for possible future use.

Blinkweb also has the ability to create a site and download it as a zip file so maybe that is what everyone is doing with their sites. I poked around with the Blinkweb software myself but did not spend too much time with it to do a real Blinkweb Review. I prefer to use Wordpress for my own websites almost across the board. I can see the appeal for making sales letters though, I just don’t use them at this point in time. Maybe some day when I decide to sell out and make an ebook or have something to sell.  For now I’ll stick with Adsense and affiliate programs.

I wish there was some Blinkweb affiliate program to review that would allow us to make some money off the Blinkweb program, but for now nothing seems to be in the works. They have enough of a client base and reach to stay away from that, at least for now. Why give away affiliate sales when you can launch alone first and keep all the initial sales. Blinkweb does sell domains and hosting so there is some opportunity to earn income from the service. Hopefully they have a plan for a Blinkweb affilaite program so I can do a new Blinkweb Review.

It’s too bad their racist, anti-American father says things like he “hates the white man” and that he is “not even an American” because those types of comments show how he raised his daughters. They must have some of those feeling deeply rooted in their belief systems too. What does that have to do with Tennis? I have no idea. I think the sisters are excellent tennis players and they obviously deserve all their wins. There is just something about their father that disappoints and annoys me so I thought I’d mention it.

The Williams sisters faced off in the Wimbledon Final today and Venus Williams has beaten her sister Serena Williams to take the women’s Wimbledon final today. It was their first Grand Slam championship in five years. Venus and Serena Williams faced each other in the Wimbledon final for the third time in their careers. It was the seventh time the Williams sisters have battled in a Grand Slam final with the younger Serena holding a 5-1 record over her older sister Venus Williams.

Congratulations to Venus and Serena Williams, especially Venus for her win. The Williams Sisters will be around for a long time to come.

I’ll be looking into whether or not users can create their own Blinkweb Template. There are still a lot of unanswered questions about how the Blinkweb Templates will work. It is possible that they will have certain templates available with the free service and others available for a fee, or users may be given Blinkweb Template Design specs so they can make their own.

I almost get the impression that Brand and Matt Callen are trying to make a Wordpress-like scenario where people will be making templates for Blinkweb and sharing them around, just like Wordpress templates are.

The Blinkweb software can be used to create sales lettes or mini-sites, full websites and blogs. So sharing how to create and import a Blinkweb Template with users might be a good idea.

What would you like to see Blinkweb do for their templates?

This post originally from http://noovy.com, please stop by and visit us.

Sadly, I was not one of those 1,200 people. I stepped out to get the mail and by the time I got back to my desk, the Blinkweb Tester doors were closed. I shot a quick email to Matt Callen, like many other people did, and they explained:

Thanks for checking it out. I’m sorry about that, but the demand for
Blinkweb is very large. Over 20,000 people were told about Blinkweb the
instant it went live.

However, in just a couple more days we’ll have it PERMANENTLY open. Sign up
for the relaunch notification located on the bottom right hand side of the
homepage and you will be notified when Blinkweb is open permanently. It
should only be a couple days.

I’m sorry for the inconvenience, but in order to ensure that Blinkweb is
fully capable of handling the amount of users we expect, we needed to cap
the initial launch to 1,000 users.

I was able to check out some of the site however and it looks great, especially the Blinkweb Templates which have a very professional look to them, which is something I was concerned about. I look forward to the Blinkweb Re-Launch after their load testing is complete. That is a very important step and I’m glad the Callen’s decided to start off with a limited number of Blinkweb users.

Since the beginning of March, the FBI has arrested over 400 people in a sting dubbed “Operation Malicious Mortgage.” On just one day, yesterday, sixty people, including real estate players in Chicago, Miami and Houston. Hundreds of people were swept up in these mortgage fraud arrests. Matthew Tannin and Ralph Cioffi were arrested and charged with conspiracy, mortgage fraud and wire fraud and possibly other charges.

Since March 1, a total of 406 people have been arrested in Operation Malicious Mortgage that saw 144 cases across the country. FBI Director Robert Mueller and Deputy Attorney General Mark Filip have announced the national crackdown which has been dubbed Operation Malicious Mortgage, this afternoon in Washington.

The charges against Matthew Tannin and Ralph Cioffi that the FBI have officially stated is lying to their shareholders when the managers knew that their hedge fund was in the toilet. This is fraud plain and simple. This hedge fund was known to make all or most of their big bets on sub prime mortgage related securities. PErsonally, I hope they get locked up for a long, long time. I am feeling their actions in my daily life as are many other people. The credit crisis will continue to get worse and I’m glad to see the FBI and the Justice Department getting so involved with Operation Malicious Mortgage and take such aggressive action.

Tim Russert was also the recipient of 48 honorary doctorates. He took over at “Meet the Press” in December 1991. “Meet the Press” is now in its 60th year and is the longest-running program in the history of television.

Further details on Tim Russert’s death are not available at this time. Russert had an incredibly successful career and did what he loved to do right up until the very end. All the news anchors covering this story are practically tearing up as they tell their stories about Tim Russert. Tom Brokaw in particular.

Tim’s wife, Maureen Orth, is a writer for Vanity Fair. He also has a son, Luke who he was very close with. Tim was a bog believer in transparency and was not afraid to let people see how he did his job. He always pulled out his white board to show his audience what he was talking about.

Tim Russert received numerous honors and recognitions in his career. Here are some from MSNBC:

In 2008, Time Magazine named Tim Russert one of the 100 most influential people in the world. That is an impressive title to hold.

In 2005, Tim Russert was awarded an Emmy for his role in the coverage of the funeral of President Ronald Reagan. His “Meet the Press” interviews with George W. Bush and Al Gore in 2000 won the Radio and Television Correspondents’ highest honor, the Joan S. Barone Award, and the Annenberg Center’s Walter Cronkite Award.

Russert wrote two books — “Big Russ and Me” in 2004 and “Wisdom of Our Fathers” in 2006 — both of which were New York Times best-sellers.

Russert’s March 2000 interview of Sen. John McCain shared the 2001 Edward R. Murrow Award for Overall Excellence in Television Journalism. He was also the recipient of the John Peter Zenger Award, the American Legion Journalism Award, the Veterans of Foreign Wars News Media Award, the Congressional Medal of Honor Society Journalism Award, the Allen H. Neuharth Award for Excellence in Journalism, the David Brinkley Award for Excellence in Communication and the Catholic Academy for Communication’s Gabriel Award. He was a member of the Broadcasting & Cable Hall of Fame.

Russert was a trustee of the Freedom Forum’s Newseum and a member of the board of directors of the Greater Washington Boys and Girls Club, and America’s Promise — Alliance for Youth.

In 1995, the National Father’s Day Committee named him “Father of the Year,” Parents magazine honored him as “Dream Dad” in 1998, and in 2001 the National Fatherhood Initiative also recognized him as Father of the Year.

Irish America magazine named him one of the top 100 Irish Americans in the country, and he was selected as a Fellow of the Commission of European Communities.

Tim Russert will be missed by many, many people. More to come on this somber news.

]]> http://noovy.com/generalnews/tim-russert-dead-at-58-collapses-at/feed/ 0 http://noovy.com/generalnews/crane-accident-at-new-dallas-cowboys-stadium/ http://noovy.com/generalnews/crane-accident-at-new-dallas-cowboys-stadium/#comments Thu, 12 Jun 2008 19:59:31 +0000 Noovy http://noovy.com/?p=7 A crane came loose from its base and caused a collapse at the new Dallas Cowboys Stadium that is under contruction in Texas. This would be the latest in a string of crane collapses happening around the country. News is still coming in on this incident so stay posted for ore info as it becomes available.

According to the Dallas News:

Three people were injured Thursday afternoon after a crane accident at the new Cowboys stadium construction site in Arlington.

The three were transported to local hospitals. The accident was reported about 2 p.m.

No more details were immediately available.

The accident comes a day after a construction worker killed in Dallas when a hook snapped off a crane at a construction project behind the Stoneleigh Hotel.

Omar Wray, 37, of Irving, was killed at a construction site on Maple Avenue in Dallas when he was struck by the crane’s hook. He was employed by TXI of Dallas.

The incident occurred after Mr. Wray and a co-worker had dumped cement into a bucket that was attached to a crane to be moved, said Maurice Osborn, a TXI spokesman. “They had completed that process and the drivers were preparing the truck to leave the site.”

More news to come soon so stay tuned.

Hybrid cars cost more than traditional cars and the increased costs is most certainly a factor with the economy the way it is. People can’t afford them. AFS Trinity managed to built a hybrid car system which achieves close to 150 mpg (miles per gallon). AFS Trinity has built their hybrid system into two prototype Saturn Vue Hybrid SUVs thus far.

AFS Trinity says their 150 mpg engine hybrid system will only cost about $8,600 more than typical hybrid vehicle costs. At current gas prices, the additonal cost of the AFS Trinity 150 mpg car system will pay for itself within only a couple year of driving the vehicle. If gas prices continue to rise, even sooner.

AFS Trinity’s chief executive officer, Edward W. Furia says his company gets around typical Hybrid Car battery problem by adding ultra capacitors to its batteries. These devices deliver little bursts of energy, powering the hybrid car when it accelerates and protecting the battery at the same time.

The Saturn Vue Hybrid SUV prototype is the first 150mpg hybrid car from AFS Trinity.