Update: Sitemeter.com is back (nearly)

As of this morning, sitemeter’s whois information is back to what it should be. So it looks like they were lucky and got their domain name back quickly.

If you’re still being redirected to the SmartName site then it’s likely just a DNS Time To Live issue and you just have to wait a while for it to update (or run ipconfig /flushdns or reboot)

Welcome back Sitemeter

Did Sitemeter forget to reregister sitemeter.com

Just went to sitemeter.com and it’s not Site Meter

Whois info shows the domain name sitemeter.com was due to expire 03-April-2013, looks like someone else registered it.

Could be time to change all my counters since this kind of thing can take years to sort out if ever.

Normally when domains expire they go into a holding pattern for a while before they’re finally released and available to be registered again however it looks like someone swooped in and snapped it up straight away. This could get messy.

Print Your Own Balance Bracelet / Power Band

Guaranteed to be just as effective as any other Balance Bracelet or Power Band available. Provides just as much extra balance, power and energy as any other bracelet on the market.

Save money, make your own balance bracelet

Simply print out the image below, cut out and attach to your wrist using an appropriate method (Stapling to body and MIG welding are not considered appropriate in this instance)

For anyone not aware, all these power bands have been proven not to work; the tests the sellers use to demonstrate their power are old carnival tricks.

Gold Price Drop – Money moving back into Stocks

There’s only so much money in the world and investors move it around between a number of investment options including stocks and shares, property and gold or other precious metals.

With the stock market and housing market taking a big hit the price of gold rocketed as investors rushed to put their money somewhere it could make a profit. Now, with the stock market recovered and prices rising the price of gold is dropping.

Down from a high of over $1900 per ounce to under $1600, a drop of around 16%, it seems likely that as stock prices continue to rise the price of gold will keep going down.

Please remind me the next time the stock market crashes to quickly buy some gold – thanks!

The Center for Innovation, Testing and Evaluation – is it a hoax?

“Pegasus Global Holdings” – not to be confused with “Pegasus – Global Holdings” (note the hypen) have proposed the building of the “Center for Innovation, Testing and Evaluation”; a people-less town with complete infrastructure to test such high tech devices as “… automated washing machines and self-flushing toilets”

The company barely seems to exist, the executive bios make great claims that simply don’t seem to stand up – googling the executives finds virtually nothing.

Their head office is at “1875 ”I” Street, NW, Suite 500 Washington, DC 20006″ which isn’t e real office, it’s a fully serviced virtual office provided by Regus (http://www.regus.com/virtualoffices/us/Herndon.html), designed to make it look impressive. Their Virginia address is also a Regus managed virtual office (http://www.regus.com/locations/US/VA/Reston/VirginiaRestonRestonTownCenterI.htm) and their London office is also a managed office owned by a company named “Executive Offices Group” (http://www.executiveoffices.co.uk/west-end-mayfair-belgravia-serviced-offices/st-jamess-square-sw1/)

So this apparently huge global company doesn’t have a single real office and their executives are virtually untraceable – they don’t even have a Wikipedia page for the company. They do exist and have a real product for countering IED threats called the Jukebox Alpha but according to released military documents “As a result of market research and testing of Pegasus’s device in December 2008, the Army found that Pegasus did not have a device that would satisfy the agency’s technical requirements. In fact, the Army found that Pegasus’s Jukebox Alpha Upgrade device could not counter most of the threat bands that the Army required” – http://www.gao.gov/decisions/bidpro/4004223.pdf

The whole concept for the project is flawed – by removing people from the equation you’ve removed the most important component of the test – the human factor.

How can all insurance companies claim they can save you money?

You’ve seen the adverts, they all follow a similar script

Drivers who switch from insurance company x to insurance company y save on average ??? dollars. Then insurance company y also claim that if you switch to them from company x you save about the same so how is this possible?

Here’s an example of how this works
100 customers of company x call company y for an insurance quote, half the quotes are higher and half are lower. The half for whom the quote is higher say no thanks, the half that get a lower quote say yes (possibly…)

Note the advert said that customers who switch to them save on average…, not customers who call them save on average…

The fact is that on average, company x and company y charge around the same though it will vary depending on various attributes. All the advert is telling you is that it’s worthwhile shopping around, they just twist that to make themselves sound cheaper.

Earlier I noted that if the quote is lower the customer will only switch sometimes, the reason for this is that if you are told you will save $5 per year, do you go through the trouble of switching providers? probably not.
So now there is a new variable, how much cheaper does the quote have to be for you to be persuaded to switch? Would you switch from Geico to a lesser known provider for less than $100?

So if the ad says drivers who switch from State Farm save on average $400 and drivers who switch from Geico save $350, does this mean Geico is on average cheaper than State Farm or that Geico customers will switch for less?

Survive the job cuts, work for a phone company

There are some things people will / can give up and some things they wont when times are hard. Some things are much harder than others and even much more inconvenient. Since most phone users are on set plans it’s not even very easy to reduce your costs, you can go onto a lower plan but you don’t normally save all that much and one month where you go over your minutes can wipe out the savings.

Not buying a new car is easy, cutting down the number of times you go out is easy, buying less new clothes / accessories is easy.

Right now you want to be working for a phone company, an internet / TV provider or as a mechanic. However, as soon as the recession is over there will be a huge boom in car sales as all the people who have been holding off buying a car rush out to replace their ancient 5 year old cars. Also since a load of auto sales places have gone bust the remaining ones will do even better.