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More Domain Hacks and Cool International Domains

Bored with your .com? Are you over your .org?

In a world where “capturing the .com” is generally thought of as necessary for brand success, a few proud rebels stand apart from the rest. We are the domain hackers, and we make the internet more fun for everyone.

Remember Del.icio.us? That is one early example of domain hacking. I’ve talked about it here before, too.

Today, we’ll just look at the .so domain extension, from Somalia. Here are a few that I found were available, along with ideas for what they could possibly be used for:

  • virtuo.so (a musician’s personal site)
  • espres.so (coffee or fast news)
  • youare.so, (you are so… what?)
  • iam.so (/hot /cool /witty, etc.)
  • thats.so (/trendy /typical)

Here are a couple of other, non-Somalian, domains that are available at the time of this writing (.gy is from Guyana):

  • fog.gy (San Francisco? London?)
  • futu.ro (obviously it’s about the future. Also futurolo.gy)
  • pr.odi.gy
  • slan.gy (urbindictionary competitor?)
  • tan.gy

I think that’s enough for today. If you want to purchase any of these domains, head on over to 101Domain (my preferred international domain registrar, I used them to register this site) and get it taken care of.

Thanks for reading!

PS – I found several cool websites while researching this post. Here are the three coolest:

  1. wasa.bi
  2. syzy.gy
  3. zom.bi
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2010: Year In Review

Hi there! Welcome to a new decade. We’re glad you decided to join us, here in the future.

Anyone who knows me could probably tell you how much I like “the future” (answer: quite a lot), but I’ve been pretty hesitant about predicting my own future. I may have developed the tendency to not plan too far in the future from two places:

  1. Tim Ferriss. In “The 4-Hour Work Week”, Ferriss suggests that it’s difficult if nigh impossible to keep plans for 6+ months. Mostly, I agree with this, but I intend to challenge it.
  2. My Job. Working for The Art of Charm is exciting, nerve-racking, challenging, and fulfilling, all at once. Most of all, it has taught me how working for a (relatively) small business is a very dynamic process, and not too much is set in stone.

Whatever the reason, I’m going to break the habit of not-planning somewhat and set down some predictions as to what might transpire in my life this year. But first, Seth Godin told me to write about what we “Shipped” in 2010.

Not a bad year at all, if you ask me!

That’s all for now. I want to publish this post so I can start writing the next one.

###

PS: I tried to fix the comments. I’m sorry they were broken. Ow! Don’t hit me! That’s abuse! They should be working now. Please leave your thoughts below.

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Cool Domain Names: Fan.gs And More

So, as you well know by now, I’m a proponent of non-standard domain names. I registered my domain with 101Domain and it was super-easy. I just today was browsing around to see what new domains are coming out (.xxx! Really!) and I found the .gs domain from South Georgia… it provides excellent possibility! See for yourself:

(I’ve checked, and these domains are available as of 3:30pm PST 2/11/2011)

  • ban.gs
  • fan.gs
  • bootle.gs
  • plasticba.gs
  • 3kin.gs
  • angelwin.gs
  • flyingpi.gs
  • thon.gs & g-strin.gs

Cool, right? That was a rhetorical question. I can’t even hear you when you respond to those questions, silly goose!

Full disclosure, I’m an affiliate for 101Domain, so if you buy any domain names from them, I get a small amount.

BTW – I had originally bought this domain with the hope of ranking for my name, which turns out to be really difficult. However, today, I just found out that if you Google for “alex weber is awesome”, this site is the first hit! Sweet!

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Being Unfriendly on Facebook

Who Will You Unfriend Today?

Disclaimer: I take no responsibility for the actions that you take after reading this post. In fact, even landing on this page without reading this disclaimer absolves Alex Weber of any and all responsibility for your actions, past and future. Furthermore, this page is mainly a #rant and not meant to be seen as advice.

Here are my qualifications for when to…

  1. Remove someone from my Facebook news feed
  2. Un-friend them on Facebook completely
  3. Hang out less in person with someone

The first part is easy.

If you write predominantly negative updates on Facebook or Twitter, I don’t want to see it.

Everyone has ups and downs, and I understand that. However, the fact that we had two classes together in High School does not mean that I want to hear that your “boo” is cheating on you, or that you got fired, or that the weather is bad.

Here’s my point: If you predominantly post negativity, I will filter it so it doesn’t infect my brain.

It’s been shown that Happiness is Contagious and I’m pretty sure negativity works that way too.

You may think “Alex, you’re a ig ol’ stick in the mud! We just wanna vent sometimes!”

I understand venting as a short-term thing. I’m talking about repeated negativity, weighted with how well I know someone (how much we actually interact, message, talk, see each other IRL etc.)

My criteria for IRL friends:

This is not a hard list, but more of a set of criteria that I feel is important with my IRL friendships. Continue reading “Being Unfriendly on Facebook”

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This Post Isn’t About The Holidays

I know it’s Winter Holiday Season, but shut up. I’ll get to that later. Maybe.

I did a really satisfying small project today. First, some backstory and musical accompaniment…

Alex Weber, The DJ

Years ago, I was a Superfamous World-class DJ who was loved and feared far and wide.

(I thought I told you to shut up, just go with me on this one, OK?)

So, while I was busy being awesome, I met Jordan from The Art of Charm and he was so impressed with my unique combination of exessive charisma, social grace, and total nerdiness that he basically pleaded with me for like a year to join his company and help them be more awesome. Something like that.

Being as legendar-ily amazing and infinitely compassionate as I was am, I could not refuse. So I set aside my diamond-encrusted platinum-plated SL-1200s and joined The Art of Charm in their quest to teach men everywhere the Way of Excellence.

Mine was way cooler. It had diamonds.

Over time, my immense fame and reputation has dwindled. However, I was presented with an unique opportunity recently: Join forces with DJ Vandelay and Xiaoyu to form… Something Awesome That Has No Official Name!

This is pretty much awesome, and I’m really excited at the chance to DJ live again.

Something Like A Tragedy Strikes! Continue reading “This Post Isn’t About The Holidays”

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Party Team Extreme

Alex Weber wants YOU! for Party Team Extreme

This post isn’t for the faint of heart–or liver.

Alex Weber wants YOU! for Party Team Extreme
Do you have what it takes... to be a member of PARTY TEAM EXTREME?

I’ve been kicking this idea around for a while to make a list of the biggest/best/awesomest parties and festivals from all around the world, and systematically attending them. You’ll find the current list at the bottom of this post, and I encourage you to suggest others!

So what about the PARTY TEAM? Well, if you’re the jet-setting, adventure-seeking, pretty-bitchin-awesome type of person, I invite you to come along for this rad journey. You don’t have to come for all of the events, but I’d love to assemble a crew who can descend on any festival whether it’s Mardi Gras, Carnival, or La Tomatina and GO HARD. Like I said before: DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES?

If you’re reading this, you just might…

If you want to learn more, the list of events is below. I’m arranging them in a rough order of how I’m thinking of attending them, starting with US/Canada events and moving farther abroad. Anything past the first two or three is not in any sort of order other than how soon I found them. Continue reading “Party Team Extreme”

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Let’s talk about CSS, baby

Okay, I have a bone to pick with you, Internet. Can we please agree to code our HTML attributes (class, id) in a better way?

Here’s my position: hyphens are superior to underscores

I can back this up with at least two arguments.

  1. In most text editors that I’ve used, keyboard shortcuts CTRL+Left/Right/Backspace will skip over underscores, but not hyphens. So that means if I’m trying to traverse (via keyboard, like a good computer ninja) over 
    some_long_ass_CSS_class_name_someone_wrote

    then I’ll have to succumb to trying to guess how long to hold Left/Right… or worse yet, use the mouse!

  2. It’s an extra keystroke to type an underscore. Over the course of one small project, this might not seem a lot, but if it’s your craft & profession, This is a lot of extra keystrokes. Plus, it would speed up your probably-inevitable-RSI.

MailChimp, I’m looking at you!

As much as I love MailChimp, I was frustrated when trying to style their embeddable signup form. All these underscores!

Agree/Disagree?

I’m going to start using this format for writing my code. In fact, I already have. If you look at my recently redesigned homepage and inspect the first image on the page (me standing in the subway) you’ll see the link surrounding it is class=”pants-toggle” and the image itself has class “no-pants”.

If you dig on this, implement it yourself. Either way, I want to hear what you think in the comments.

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Gadgets, Tigers, and A DJ Mix From Outer Space

Oh boy, do I have lots of fun stuff for you today!

First, I’m not sure if you know this… but I’m an avid (to say the least) gadget-blog reader. I regularly surf several of them to see what’s hot in upcoming technology. Can’t we all just be living in the future already?! So, I found the following video via The Singularity Hub. It’s a parody of a Microsoft concept vid.

Watch and enjoy:

Then, have a listen to this mysterious DJ mix from “Felix YZ”, who is definitely not just a pseudonym of mine. Did you see how it says on Soundcloud that I captured the stream from a low-earth-orbiting party satellite? You can’t just make up awesome stuff like that.

Carrying on… Stay with me here, children, we have a lot to get through today!

Did you know there’s a totally righteous place in Thailand where you can chill out with Tigers? (Not the Detroit-based Major League Baseball team, but the jungle cats that are so Officially Bad-Ass that they needed to be capitalized.) Continue reading “Gadgets, Tigers, and A DJ Mix From Outer Space”

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Where Should I Live Next?

One very cool thing about living in this day and age (especially considering my primary skillset of computer-nerding) is that I feel like I can pretty much go anywhere.

I was fortunate in that my Mom took me for a few trips while I was growing up–I remember visiting Ecuador and St. Martin very vividly. If you haven’t been to either, I just remember that Ecuador has tiny streets and a lot of poverty, and St. Martin was a beach paradise where I first got comfortable speaking French.

However, unlimited choice can be stressful. I really like traveling, but I can’t just visit every country in the world, right? Plus, someone else is already doing that. Continue reading “Where Should I Live Next?”

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About Girls

There’s something I have to tell you. It’s not a very popular viewpoint, and I hope you won’t think less of me after I say it. They’re weird, and sometimes difficult to decode. This might sound weird, but… I like cats.

Wait–I mean, I like girls!

It’s so easy to get them confused sometimes.

You see, growing up, my mom and I were always a cat family. Cats, of course, are well known for their ability to turn normally sensible and intelligent people into what are essentially two-year-olds with a better vocabulary. I myself have been known to tell my feline friends, “you’re so adorable,” or indeed to have discussions (mostly one-sided) about the finer points of how they like to have their ears scratched… Except for the occasional paw-swat.

With some practice, I now consider myself to be pretty darn good at understanding our fuzzy friends. Given the average kitty and perhaps an hour of time, we will become fast friends–that is,until she is distracted, spooked, or food becomes part of the equation. As cool as I am, I could never compete with cat food.

It’s pretty much the same with women. I still can’t compete with food, but with some study and a lot of practice, I now consider myself decently proficient with people in general, including women. It wasn’t always easy, though… I have often found myself very confused by a girl’s actions. I don’t mind this anymore–in fact I think It’s part of what makes girls so magical (we never quite understand them!)

For instance, a girlfriend of mine used to remark, “Don’t be jealous of my (thing)!”
Here’s what it looks like in context: Continue reading “About Girls”