The Lady Programmer

What comes into your mind when you hear the words “universal remote”, “media player” and “online backup”?

Most of you would say – hey, there’s nothing new with this stuff. Some tech-savvy individuals would even cite a media player or two that might probably be better than Windows Media Player.

True, you might not be needing to hear news. To the mainstream consumers, knowing the coolest gadgets before you buy is best researched through authority blogs like Gadget Advisor.

The universal remote

When I first heard about this universal remote gadget, I was under the impression that there is nothing new to it. Not until I read that Logitech Harmony Universal Remote Control eliminates all those numerous remote control clutter at home. If you have a DVD player, a TV and a sound system and other gadgets you could end up with a lot of remote controls. Having this universal remote is a good solution to this clutter.

have multiple remotes? eliminate all of these – by Logitech

A good media player

There are a lot of networked media players around, but this DViCo TViX M-6500A Network Media Player one got an internal hard drive that does not need any external power and supports a lot of file formats. It can be connected to a USB port where files can be transferred to and from, plus some slots for USB flash drive for additional playback. This network media player works well on HDTV too – almost.

network media player (on my wishlist) by DViCo

An online backup service

I had been using IDrive for several months. One big thing that I like on this is that I don’t get to babysit on my backups. It had eliminated downtime due to backup maintenance. That downtime can be used for regular blogging duties or freelance work. IDrive simply performs automatic backups which are stored on my 2GB free online account.

I have not tried Mozy Pro and Intronis SureIT and I have not plans of doing backup online with these other two. I am very much happy with using IDrive on my personal home PC.

no babysitting on backup – my IDrive interface

Cutting Through the Cutting Edge

These are just some of the things that you will see in Gadget Advisor. I definitely agree that they had handpicked the best gadgets in the market and made good reviews on it. Do you often wonder which equipment or gadget is the best in the market? Gadget Advisor just might give you a good idea.

I still got other opportunities to make some cash out of blogging. I never got money yet from these services, but I have seen some people successfully earning some cash from it.

Unlike PayPerPost, SocialSpark and Sponsored Reviews, I have yet to see payment proof out from these sites.

1. Smorty
Here is one paid review network that can even accept Filipino language blog – if you have a blog written out in Filipino. I had not been active with them, probably because my blog had not met their standards UPDATE: I just got one of my blogs approved in Smorty, probably after doing this post . I can only submit one blog at a time; for me to submit for another one, I had to do five successful paid posts with them.

Anyway, Smorty seemed to be a good site to earn from paid reviews. It seemed also good for building backlinks by writing exchange reviews with other bloggers.

Probably the most visible sign that Smorty has a good reputation is their active forum. The Filipino community is also active with Smorty, so Pinoys will not have any difficulty meeting other bloggers. I’ve also witnessed some big Filipino bloggers endorse Smorty by putting up widgets in their blogs.

Blog flipping is a very common trade in the forums. If you are seeking for high PR blogs to buy then the Smorty forum is probably a good site to look for sellers.

2. Blogsvertise
I have two blogs approved with them. Blog approval is fast – I think it is faster than PPP, SocialSpark or Sponsored Reviews – but this approval is done manually. Unlike Smorty, Blogsvertise accepts a number of blogs in their system.

The greatest strength of this site is that it offers diverse options of making money, not only from paid reviews:

• blog entries – which allows a blogger to do paid reviews
• blog homepage textlink – which allows a blogger to put up side links
• blog homepage banner – which allows a blogger to put up ad space banners, and the
• experimental video ad entries – where a blogger is required to do a Youtube video of himself. Blogsvertise gives higher payouts for this effort.

I have yet to see if Blogsvertise is really a good site or not. Although their system is automated, I am impressed at their prompt customer support service. I am not very much active with them since they offer lower payout for every paid review. There seemed to be some opportunities that require “nofollow” links; for interested bloggers who do not like to lose their Google pagerank.

3. LoudLaunch
One thing that I like about LoudLaunch is its cool, streamlined design. I think they overdid the simplicity though; the site had neither forum nor blog, so I can just judge this site from what I see. These forums or blog could be a lot helpful for LoudLaunch.

Anyway, there had been some payment proofs posted around for this site. The same set of bloggers mentioned that most of the opportunities offered are on travel and mortgages.

I had already submitted two blogs with them but these blogs are still waiting to be approved.

4. PayU2Blog
When I do my daily Entrecard drops, I come across a few EC bloggers who had been happy with PayU2Blog. These bloggers posted out payment proofs in their blogs, so I guess PayU2Blog is a pretty legit paid blogging site. I got this blog submitted a long time but I never get past the front page. I must have a blog approved before I could get in.

5. BloggerWave
Although one of my blogs got approved, I never got to write with BloggerWave because there seemed to be less opportunities posted with the site. I don’t think BloggerWave makes it a sustainable means to earn from paid blogging because I have seen a lot of bloggers complain about delayed payments. They pay, but expect it to be given over several months.

6. ReviewMe
ReviewMe seemed to be very picky in approving blogs. My previous PR4 blog got disapproved several times because I didn’t traffic. I was getting one or two visitors, and on most days, none, with that old blog. I think ReviewMe wants bloggers who can maintain a combination of good Google PR, Alexa traffic, RSS subscribers and good Technorati count.

No wonder ReviewMe is an attractive site to “professional bloggers” – those big time bloggers who had a big network of blog subscribers. Like SocialSpark, bloggers are required to disclose that their reviews are given out from ReviewMe.

7. BuyBlogReviews

I just had one of my blogs approved with BuyBlogReviews and started getting emails on some opportunities. I think BuyBlogReviews is a lot similar to Sponsored Reviews – except that bloggers are required to disclose their paid reviews with a widget similar to the one used in SocialSpark.

Payment Methods

All the review sites that I had mentioned give out payments by Paypal. I will not go into detail about Paypal: I have a series of posts written about this payment method which is now fully functional in any Philippine bank account unlike a year ago. Please look into these series of posts on Paypal withdrawals to any Philippine bank account, which I update regularly.

One tip for Payoneer card holders, if you got a Payoneer Mastercard through oDesk, Freelancer, Elance then you can try linking your existing Payoneer Mastercard so you do not have to request for a new card. I had successfully linked my ReviewMe account with oDesk debit Mastercard, so I don’t need to request for a separate card from Payoneer (and pay for it).

I’m sure you have encountered other sites that lets you earn money from blogging. Share it to everyone by leaving a comment below.

I have a problem right now. Not a big one, but I don’t want to be a big disappointment to the recent EC droppers that I have right now. As you’ve noticed I am a humble member of the U-drop-I-follow movement.

I just could not return all your drops. I have been getting more than 300 Entrecard drops in my account for five consecutive days!

I guess I am now one among those who reached Entrecard nirvana of getting more than the maximum allowed drops per day. My highest number of drops reached 390 on the 6th of October, and I’ve broken the barrier since the 4th of October. The last bar shows a lower value because it represents the number of drops done as I am writing this post (13 hours since the last reset).

more than 300 drops in the previous 5 days

I think this has something to do with the sudden increase of advert clicks. I did not adopt any strategy except to advertise on active EC blogs.

advert clicks increase

Organic clicks looked consistent, so I am convinced that advertising did the trick.

organic clicks: no change

My daily 300 EC drops had almost been consistent. I haven’t reached the drop master status. Probably because there are some days where I could not complete the drops (remember the typhoon?) and a few days when I was not able to drop at all.

daily 300 drops

In case you’re wondering, I have already written out some Entrecard tips that I use to accomplish those 300 drops. I have two blogs that I promote in Entrecard; I’ve managed to do all those 600 drops in just over an hour – and bookmark those that I want to comment on or put them into my feed reader so that I could revisit those blogs.

I call myself a paranoid before I entered the world of blogging. I’m afraid to trust the internet. Although I have started my career in IT (instead of pursuing my original course as an engineer), I immersed myself with all the IT magazines that I could read. I learned about the perils of using the internet.

These words blared out at me: hacking, password theft, online security breach

These antivirus, firewall and software manufacturers have to come up with ways to make it easier for the end user. Zone Alarm did not work for me as a personal firewall, I find BitDefender and Kaspersky antiviruses with built-in firewalls consuming much of my PC’s resources. Right now I dumped my ESET Smart Security and used the one with out any built-in firewall instead. Why? Because its built-in firewall blocked me off from using the internet, and I had mistakenly blamed it on my good performing ISP.

Comodo Free Firewall is probably a good alternative to those that I have used so far. I guess their mission on making a trusted internet for the end users worked well for them. When I checked CNET, my favorite download site for almost a decade, their free firewall software is the second most downloaded firewall software next to Zone Alarm.

Right now, I’m taking this Free Comodo Firewall for a spin. I turned off my default Windows XP firewall then proceeded with the installation. The interface of this firewall look a bit advanced, so I think ordinary users might get lost at first.

first look at Comodo after installation

I think that using third party firewall like Comodo is a suitable option than relying on old Microsoft to patch up vulnerabilities in their Windows firewall, which comes in every Windows XP package. I guess hackers and virus writers figured out ways to always take out that Windows firewall’s defenses. Not all network administrators and home PC users want to perform those pesky Windows updates.

I’d probably stick with Comodo’s firewall for a while, and see how it fared. I still like Windows XP but I think the Windows XP firewall lacks the security that I need. I am one among those people who need to check seemingly secure bank accounts and Paypal money.

Comodo is not limited to their famous free firewall product: they also have antivirus malware, antivirus and if you are designing a secure website, they can also provide Comodo HackerProof certificate authority.

If you are writing for site like SocialSpark, PayPerPost and SponsoredReviews.com, bloggers often run into problems when these bloggers performed an upgrade to using a custom domain.

I could still use the old URL and statistics with PayPerPost and Sponsored Reviews.com. SocialSpark is an entirely different story: I could not submit my posts even if I used the old URL that I had registered with them.

photo credit: stevekrh19 (SXC)

The Problem with SocialSpark

I had taken a SocialSpark opportunity recently but I could not submit my recent post because of the URL change. To most bloggers, this situation can be frustrating and some bloggers may blog about their frustrations that accompany new domain changes. SocialSpark is still on BETA, so their automated review system is not perfected yet and it relies on community feedback to build their system.

Immediately, I had gone to IZEA Help section to find any write ups and FAQs about domain URL changes with SocialSpark. I have not found any so I decided to write a short love note to Customer Love, requesting for two things:

• change the URL registered with them from http://theladyprogrammer.blogspot.com to http://www.theladyprogrammer.com
• approve a recently opportunity that was rejected outright at auto approval

I did not get an immediate response with them because I submitted a help ticket during the weekend. The recently opportunity that I had with them had even expired. What I did was to reopen the resolved tickets to Customer Love just to have those requests approved. I was so happy when they had fulfilled all my requests above. Customer Love seemed to love me!

photo credit: weirdvis (SXC)

There is only one more problem that I had encountered with SocialSpark, so I had to reopen the resolved ticket again. My blog has lost its statistics so I ended up not qualified for the opportunities that I was once qualified for. It seemed to me that the right statistics for the daily visitors and Alexa rankings are not properly reflected in my new account, so I needed those clarifications.

Change URL Requests with PayPerPost

Since PayPerPost still remains as the huge paid review site, I had encountered so many bloggers blog about their domain changes and their successful arrangement with PayPerPost. I had tried my hands too, when I had to request for a URL change on one of my older blogs. The system with PPP is simple: simply write to Customer Love to request for a change in URL. Their technical support will make all the corresponding URL changes in their database. All the blog statistics with the new domain will be reflected in one’s PPP account.

Change URL Request with Sponsored Reviews

URL change policy is different in SponsoredReviews.com because it has a different policy on URL change requests. One has to delete the old blog that uses the old URL first, then resubmit the blog that uses the new URL. This will still require manual review by the SponsoredReviews.com. I don’t like this arrangement, because I had gotten some good feedback ratings from some advertisers.

I have noticed that the old URL still works with SponsoredReviews.com, so I still get opportunities using the old URL instead.

Have you encountered headaches with other paid review services?