If you want to start your own virtual store out there on the Web, you don’t have to go through all the hard work of setting up a shopping cart, lining up shippers, processing credit cards and all those other headaches that are often involved with e-commerce.  You could sign up with one of these free online storefronts instead.  While they might take a cut of the profits, in the long term – they might also save you money too. Cafe Press Now Cafe Press is probably the one service I am the most familiar with so I will start with it first.  Back around Christmas time I used Cafe Press not to mass market my goods, but to instead create some simple Web Hosting Show swag to give away to friends and family members.  At Cafe Press you can create your own posters, mugs, tote bags, t-shirts, hoodies, hats, bumper stickers and more.  Then, to make a little money – you just hike up their basic price for the goods you are selling.  Anything extra made (minus the costs of the goods) is yours to keep. Zazzle Like Cafe Press, Zazzle is another online service that lets you set up a free online store in a matter of minutes.  All you have to do is upload your logos or images, decide what products you want to print them on, and then point people to the storefront URL.  They too have a large assortment of products to slap your image on, and their shipping is a little ‘bit faster than Cafe Press too.

“A new book by Dr. Konstantinos Komaitis (Lecturer in Law at the University of Strathclyde) provides a passionate yet legalistic and well-researched overview of the legal, institutional and ethical problems caused by the clash between domain names and trademarks,” writes Milton Mueller on the Internet Governance Project blog. Mueller then says in his review that “this is really the first decent book-length treatment of what is now a decade and a half of legal and political conflict between domain name registrants and trademark holders.” One of the key points of the book according to Mueller is where Komaitis says “domain names are a form of property, and the property rights held by domain name registrants need to be recognized in law – independently of, and carefully distinguished from, the limited rights associated with trademark protection.” To read more of this review of Dr.

We all complain day after day.  We complain about little things.  We complain about big things.  We complain about things that do not make any sense.  In web hosting, the main thing we complain about is the relationship between a web host and a customer (or vice versa depending on which side of the fence you are on) .  Today, we have a very special guest that will help us all curb our complaining habits. Download the Web Hosting Show, Episode 211! Running Time: 7 minutes | File Size: 3.14 MB Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip

Once you’ve got your hosting account set up, you need to set about getting your site or blog built, and one of the big decisions you’ll need to make include the choice of web hosting templates. A template is a shell that your web site resides within, the look that is evident to the public at large when they bring up your site

A new book has listed some of the more amusing domain names registered, although for the registrant it can be quite embarrassing, according to a report in London’s Daily Telegraph. Businesses have naively registered the domain names without realising that when words are combined into a domain name they can be read differently. According to the report, the book lists more than 150 “slurls” or slur URLs.

I recently came accross a beautiful typography book from the 1920’s at an auction. It was suggested that I scan all the pages in and make them available on my website for download. I thought it was a great idea and thought about making either an ebook available for download for a few bucks or making money off of ads on the pages (both to recoup the massive amount of bandwith that would be used.)
What are the lagalities when dealing with this sort of matter? When does a book actually go out of copywrite and when it becomes public domain, in what ways are you able to duplicate it and make money?

I being playing around with the Apple iPad for a little over a week and although I like it everyday more I use it I would say its definitely not a game changer out of the box  like the iPod or the iPhone were, but it sure will be one day. When your talking about the iPad, the discussion has to start with it as a e-book reader and the natural comparison to Amazon’s Kindle. Although actually there is no comparison; the iPad Kicks the Kindle’s ass

One of the most important aspects of taking care of a site’s search ‘appropriateness’ is knowing what can get you penalized by Google (or any other search engine for that matter).  Knowing how to assess the situation correctly so that you can tell if you have just been served a penalty can help you significantly to get the site back at the top for your search terms. Unfortunately, it’s a sure thing that Google is not going to publish the criteria it uses for deciding who gets penalized

I have been reading the book Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t by Jim Collins and it is essentially a study that was done over a number of years that looked at companies that went from good to great and those that didn’t…it also goes over similarities and differences between those companies that went from Good to Great and those that didn’t… A common theme throughout the book is culture, leadership and the people….and how it plays a factor in companies going from Good to Great…. I literally put down the book and head out for a haircut to SuperCuts (i need a simple buzz and trim haircut) at 4:50pm on a Sunday…when I get there four hairstylist are working and I already begin to hear one or two say….”This is my last haircut, then I can’t do more, I gotta get out of here”…..then the phone rings….”Don’t answer it, tell them we are closed at 5….I need to get out of here”….all this time I am sitting waiting for a haircut and clearly don’t want one of the “unhappy” SuperCuts team members cutting my hair (too bad as I am an excellent tipper!).  Bottom line, if this was Boss Undercover, SuperCuts management would NOT be happy….trust me! To the contrary, my wife and I recently founded our own 501(c)3 non-profit charity called ODASH …..I went to Chase bank to setup the proper bank accounts and as I was leaving the bank my cell phone rang and it was Chase congratulating me on my recent incorporation of ODASH and asked if I had any banking needs….quite a different experience that what I ad with SuperCuts…I actually thought Chase was monitoring me from their parking lot before they made the call…LOL  Bottom line is that I had a much more positive customer experience with Chase – thank you Chase! This entry was posted on Sunday, March 28th, 2010 at 11:26 am and is filed under Entrepreneurship .

Click here to RSVP to WHIR Events: New York City – March 25, 2010 Chicago – April 22, 2010 Toronto – May 20, 2010 Five Most Recent Posts News: CA to Buy Performance and Availability Monitoring Solutions Firm Nimsoft for $350M News: CloudLinuxOS Added as a Standard Operating System for VPS.NET’s Entire Line of Cloud Offerings News: Savvis Names North Asia MD, Expands Cloud Infrastructure in Asia (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — In an effort to extend CA’s ability to meet the unique IT management needs of “emerging enterprises” and managed service providers, IT management software company CA Inc. ( www.ca.com ) has signed a definitive agreement to buy IT performance and availability monitoring solutions provider Nimsoft, Inc.