So I’m settled in Thailand.

Beautiful country with the nicest people I’ve met anywhere on Earth. Its a very peaceful country with great weather and its ridiculously affordable too. I’ve been here 2 months and I estimate it costs roughly 15-20% of what it costs in LA or DC (my last 2 residences) to live here. Dinner for the wife and I usually costs $2 US and our 4 bedroom townhouse costs us $100 US a month to rent.

Anyways, enough about Thailand. Its time to get back to work on this blog! I’ve been spending a lot of my time writing on my stock market Blog - Penny Stalker - since the world economy is in upheaval. There are tons and tons of affordable stocks right now, so working on my portfolio has been nearly a full time job.

This post, albeit a short one, because I have to catch up on my real work of webmastering a couple dozen sites, is about a great new Web 2.0 software I ran across. The name is Dolphin. Its free and chock full of features including video sharing, blogging, user profiles, commenting, classifieds, etc. It even has its own chat system for instant messages.

The reason I mention it here is because Dolphin allows you to own your very own video sharing community. I’ve been working on two installs for clients over the last month. The technical process of installation is pretty complex, but managing the site is easy.

If you’d like me to install a copy for you, hit me up on my website - masteryan.com.

2008 has been a crazy year so far for me. A few new clients, lots of travel, and oh yea, I’m moving to Thailand this week. Lotsa fun and little time to blog.

Excuses aside, I planned to write about this guy Kevin Nalts (see his website or on YouTube) the next time I blogged here. He just gave me a reason to do it today. Nalts is a “self-proclaimed viral-video genius” who’s really good at creating viral videos and getting them viewed by tons of people. Some of his videos are hilarious, like Farting in Public, Googleheads (thumbs up!!), and GPS on PMS.

The reason I wrote about Nalts today, instead of a few weeks from now when I felt like it, is Nalts just published a new eBook called, “How to Become Popular on YouTube Without Any Talent.” Its a free and very informative eBook that explains how YouTube works, common pitfalls of the site, and how to get millions of people to watch your videos.

You can download the ebook here:
How to Become Popular on YouTube Without Any Talent

Oh yea, a little blog news update: Thailand blocks thousands of websites, including most of YouTube. So its possible I won’t be able to surf YouTube from Thailand. I’ll let you know how that goes..

I’ve been watching the TV show Jericho for free on CBS Innertube. The story line is that several US cities were destroyed by hydrogen suitcase bombs planted by terrorists. Jericho is a small town outside of Denver trying to cope with this disaster and the degrading state of the country. Homeland Security is featured in the show, and they do as terrible a job as you would expect.

 So, it got me thinking, what is the actual plan if this happens?

First, Homeland Security wants you to be prepared. They’ve created a preparedness website to help you plan for a disaster. It includes helpful tips on preparing your family, even for everyday things like fires, floods, and power outtages.

The Pentagon’s plan is to prevent an attack by nuking any foreign hostiles before they can attack the US. This of course wouldn’t prevent the attack shown in Jericho (or a 9/11 type attack either), since the weapons used in the show were smuggled into the US and triggered locally (and by the way, Bush already has a plan to nuke Iran). A domestic prevention is unlikely, since a majority of US military & federal resources are scooping up oil the Middle East. Also, considering how many Mexicans I saw in California last month, I’d say our borders are anything by secure. 

If or when our infrastructure is destroyed by a disaster, things will fall apart rapidly. I think there won’t be any plan that will effectively work because people go crazy and get primitive when faced with a traumatic experience. Just look at what happened in New Orleans. Not to mention all the crime and corruption that happened AFTER the goverment responded. 

What are we supposed to do? Build bunkers & collect an arsenal?

The best resource I’ve found for preparing yourself for any disaster, including airplane hijackings, armed robbery, or a nuclear attack is Secrets of Survival. If you are paranoid or just like to be prepared, that site will give you all the insights and info you need to know.

Beyond that, be good to your neighbors (including the foreign ones) so this doesn’t happen!

College is expensive. Education at a top-rated University is even more expensive — if you can get in. Well now you can. Many Universities are posting their full lectures online for FREE. Now you can extend your education without paying a dime (or leaving your bedroom).

Of course, as my co-worker pointed out, you don’t get a diploma with that education. So you’ll have to decide whether you want a nice piece of paper to frame, or you want to get smarter. Here’s some resources for you..

Universities with Free Videos:

MIT OpenCourseWare Site
Apple iTune U (28 colleges)
UC Berkeley on YouTube
Princeton University Lectures
European Graduate School
Brookhaven National Laboratory

Other Good Educational Links:

Global Public Environmental Lectures
Education Podcast List
Expert Village (21,000+ How-to Videos)

And something silly,
Professor Lectures 98 Hours to Set World Record
 

Seems like everybody’s got a YouTube channel these days, and if they don’t they should! Millions of people spend hours a day watching online videos, but advertisers still waste most of their money on TV? Doesn’t make sense to me. I never watch the actual TV box now that I can see pretty much any TV show online for free — at my convenience.

 What’s that have to do with this post? Nothing really, just ranting. I ran across the Ford Models YouTube channel today. Kinda boring actually, but some of the models are really hot. Like the video of Tara Stiles doing Yoga or the Butt Workout with Kim Strother. There are over 400 videos posted on this channel.

So, if you’re a surfer, check out the channel. If you are a modeling agency, model, or other business in the business of hot chicks, get them on YouTube so we can see them!

Ford Models YouTube Channel

Queen Elizabeth of England has opened a YouTube channel to post the Royal video archive of the UK. Today they have the Queen’s 1957 Christmas speech posted, which she talks about, well, I don’t really know what she’s talking about. Canada, the world changing, or something. On Christmas day (tomorrow), at 3pm GMT, you’ll be able to watch her 2007 speech to her humble people. All I can say is, why is there still a queen in that country? Does anyone living there care? I guess being American, I don’t really have much respect for England. Our Empire is much better lol.

visit The Royal Channel

watch a funny video, YouTube is My Life

or a good homemade music video, It Will be OK

Just ran across the new NBC website. They have free episodes of every show on the NBC network. The shows only go back 2 weeks (at most), and they have commercials where the commercials normally go, but still, its FREE!! Heck of a lot better than buying episodes off iTunes, which was a big news deal a few months back when NBC pulled their shows from the iTunes Store.

I haven’t quite figured out how to rip the shows to my ipod so I can watch them while I’m running, but I’m working on it. I’m thinking maybe rip the screen with SnagIt and render it with Windows Movie Maker, although that seems like a lot of work. Maybe some hack in Russia will do it for me for $3 an hour (message me if interested lol).

Now all NBC has to do is start shooting a few more entertaining shows and this could be the best thing since YouTube.

watch free episodes on NBC

screenshot of Las Vegas on NBC.com

UPDATE: After watching NBC.com episodes on the site daily for about a week, I have some observations:

1. Use Internet Explorer. Lots of problems with Firefox, like bad buffering, freezes when put into fullscreen mode, and if you pause a video to watch later, it just repeats the same scene over and over again when you come back to it.
2. This one is for the NBC ad staff - Flash ads should be small in file size. The commercial breaks are only 30 seconds (nice feature!), so some of the ads take 20 seconds or more to load. One example I saw was an interractive Nissan ad. By the time it loaded, there wasn’t any time to interract with the rollover info boxes places all over the vehicle. Looked like great graphics, but totally ineffective.
3. Some shows only have the latest few episodes, so watch them while you can (for free that is).

I always liked Britney Spears. Sexy and a good singer. The paparazzi of course can’t get enough of her. They criticize her every move, like their lives are so much better. Which member of the media hasn’t had a few benders? The girl has a plan, and my guess (since she’s smart and rich) is that her plan was to stay in the media’s lenses while she popped out a couple babies and recorded another album. No one at that level makes stupid mistakes. Even Lindsey Lohan and Paris Hilton make moves to keep their media presence high.

It seems Britney does know what she’s doing. Her new record Blackout, with hit singles Piece of Me & Gimme More, had huge first month sales (I thought everyone hated her? lol) and peaked at #2 on the Billboard album charts. Good job Britney.

Billboard discography/review of Britney Spears Blackout

Britney Spears - Billboard Singles Chart History

Britney Spears - Billboard Album Chart History

Go watch “Piece of Me” video at YouTube

Official Britney Spears website

Time came out with their top 10 viral videos of the year. No explanation of what makes them the top videos. I think its views, but who knows when it comes to mainstream media deciding on things. It usually has something to do with money.

here’s all 10 of them on my YouTube playlist

the Time article

I just ran across this bubble type navigation in YouTube and I don’t know what its called. I can’t find it in the YouTube Help pages but its pretty cool. This new navigation allows you to discover videos visually through their relationship with other videos. To use this navigation, click the fullscreen button (bottom right button in video player) and then click the triangle tree button in the fullscreen player (bottom left next to play button). A bunch of bubbles will appear on the screen with the video you are watching in the center. Rolling your mouse around the screen allows you to explore the entire YouTube video library visually. Hours of viewing pleasure without going back to the main site! Its hard to see from the screenshot but my example is a bunch of kittens playing in a tissue box. Click below to watch it.

kittens in a tissue box