So What's Up With All This Copyright Stuff?
A member of a forum I frequent recently asked if all this copyright stuff you hear about online is what it’s cracked up to be. I mean really.
Is that something that has to be registered to be real? she asked.
Well, in a nutshell, yes. It’s very real and very serious. Just ask anyone who has poured their heart and soul into a website or book and had it stolen or copied.
I’ve experienced this personally a few years ago with a website I created for a client. She emailed me one day to say that her bakery website stats showed hits to certain graphics from another website. When she checked out the other site, she discovered her own design had been uploaded to it and changed around a bit to advertise a bake sale for a high school in Toronto.
After checking the WHOIS database for contact information, I called the high school principal to let her know what was going on. Within a day, the site was down.
But wow! What are they teaching kids up there..?!
Of course, we have our own copyright problems down here. It seems many people think that if something is on the Internet, it’s free for taking. Slightly better, but still wrong, other people think that if it’s not specifically marked as being copyrighted, then it’s free for taking. And yet others just don’t care. They figure if they can right click, then it must be free for all. Right? (And no, I’m not making this stuff up!)
To make things even murkier, people who hire designers or writers often think that what they have purchased automatically belongs to them and they can do anything they want with it. Right?
Wrong!
Let’s talk about the truth of copyright.
- As soon as a writer or designer creates something, it belongs to him.
- Naturally, there are exceptions. If a writer or designer creates something while as part of his duties as an employee of a company, then the copyright belongs to the company.
- The copyright that belongs to the writer or designer can be transferred via written contract from him to the buyer of the content or graphic or design.
Clear as mud?
Let’s say you’re a home business owner and you’ve decided to hire a web designer to create your website. Now, you’re still a really small business, so you don’t need a full-time web design employee. Not that you could afford one.
So you put your feelers out there and you find Jon Doe, web designer extraordinaire. He runs his own freelance web design business in your town and so you’re going contract with him to build your website. You read over the contract and it specifically states that you will receive full rights to all designs and content created for you by Jon Doe, as soon as you have paid your bill with him in full.
Sounds good, right? The project goes smoothly… you love the new site… you pay the bill… copyright is all yours.
A few weeks go by and then you get a cease and desist letter in the mail. You’re confused — you paid for your copyrights! How dare someone claim them as theirs.
Unfortunately, upon further investigation, you find that the graphics and content on your wonderful new website were actually created by someone else two years ago. And the copyrights to those creative works were never Jon’s to give away. Naturally, Jon has long since moved out of state and left no forwarding address.
Major. Bummer.
That’s a pretty drastic tale — but it has happened.
What does this mean for you?
First, you need to make absolutely certain you know who you’re working with.
Second, make sure you understand copyright laws. It’s bad enough when Jon runs off with your money. In my opinion, it would be worse to be the one caught lifting images off the Internet, or ripping entire websites.
Third, read the following resources to make sure you understand your rights for content you’ve created or hired others to create:
Ivan Hoffman, attorney, on copyright
Google Indexes Pages In Two Days
Remember my post from two days ago, about moving my site to this domain name?
As you can see, it’s just two days since I wrote that post and already, Google has included this site in their index. Needless to say, I pulled my hair out the entire two days I was waiting. Well, not really. But I did get some writing done, spent time at a friend’s house while the electricity was out, and spun across the road on the ice once. Woohoo!
Interestingly, if you do a Google search for “site:homebusinessgeeks.com” there are still no results. But if you search “homebusinessgeeks.com” then you get results, including this website. Of course, this will all work itself out in the coming days.
In the meantime, I’m going to work on my Twitter campaign. 
Work At Home Success Interview: Starting Over
Have you ever stopped one day and realized you’re ready to do something different?
I did.
It took me three years, but I sold my home-based business in August and am now starting this site as the foundation for my new business.
If you’d like to hear my story, check out this week’s podcast at Work At Home Success. Leslie Truex is a longtime, successful work at home business owner and she interviewed me after I responded to her request at Mom Masterminds.
Mom Masterminds is a forum where moms in Internet Marketing meet to learn from one another and work together to grow their businesses. I’ve been a member for three years and have developed wonderful friendships and partnerships. This mastermind group is filled with women who are serious about their businesses and about providing for their families. They are supportive and willing to go out on a limb for one another.
We also have a ton of free resources to help with anything from understanding how to setup an affiliate program to using WordPress to power your website. Even better, after you’ve paid your membership fee of $49.97 for 12 consecutive months, you’ll enjoy a lifetime free membership! What other membership forum lets you pay for just 12 months and stay forever for free when you’re done? (Yes, if you purchase a Mom Masterminds membership through one of my links on this site, I’ll receive a commission. Even so, I would not recommend MM if I wasn’t a member myself and if I didn’t think it was such an AWESOME group.)
Anyway, with the help of Mom Masterminds and other wonderful friends I’ve made online, I have been able to start, run and sell one successful business. And now I’m excited to start another. If you’d like to hear my story, just checkout Leslie’s podcast.
What's The Deal With PageRank, Anyway?
A member of a message board I frequent asked this questions:
What are the different tools for checking PR in Google?
Wow. I didn’t realize people were still interested in their PageRank. I remember, back in the day (As if I’m old enough to have a “day!”), we’d install PageRank tools bars and compare our sites against our competitors and talk about how ours were doing better than theirs and all the mistakes they were making.
Gee, what dweebs!
If only we’d known then what I know now:
PageRank doesn’t meant anything.
And I’m not wasting any more time checking it.
So, how do you know how well your site is doing in Google?
First, I recommend you sign up for Google’s Webmaster Central tools. This service will help you see what is going on with your site.
Second, what you need to worry about is how well you rank for the keyword phrases your customers will search when looking for your company.
So, if your PageRank is a 4, but you’re on page 152 for the keyword phrases your customers search, then you’ve got nothing.
But if you’re PageRank is 3, yet you’re the #1 listing for your keyword phrases (ex. organic wooden toys) then you’ve got it made.
Of course, this is assuming that a decent amount of customers are actually searching that keyword phrase and that those who use said keyword phrase are actually looking to buy. And it also assumes that once they arrive at your site, you actually give them a reason to buy.
Just so you know…
Keeping Google Happy When You Move To A New Domain
If you were paying any attention while I setup this website, you’ll notice that I changed the domain name a couple of days ago. Why?
I realized who I wanted to help and how I planned to help them. The original domain name worked better for a different purpose. Since I’d only had that domain name for a few weeks, I decided it would be better to switch now, than to spend a bunch of time branding and promoting the other name.
Anyway, I wanted to share with you how I went about making the switch, so that Google will be happy and will continue to index my site. (According to Google’s Webmaster Tools, the search engine had already started to index the old site.) Here is what I did:
Moving my WordPress site to a new domain
Since my site is powered by WordPress, I backed up the database and the home directory files to my computer. My host provides cPanel, so it was a fairly easy task.
Since my web host allows me to have access to WHM, I added the new domain name to my account: HomeBusinessGeeks.com.
Once I had setup the new site, I uploaded the database to it. The, naturally changed the name of the database from:
oldusername_olddatabase to newusername_olddatabase
This meant that before I loaded the home page files into the public_html directory, I had to edit my wp_config.php file to correct the database name and database username. Which reminds me — and I almost forgot this when I was moving the site. You’ll need to make sure you recreate the database username and password in your new cPanel account. Just use the information from your configuration file and make sure you give the user full privileges.
Once I had the database and files uploaded, I also went into phpMyAdmin and edited the options table so that WordPress would recognize the new domain name.
Tired yet?
At this point, the new site worked. I did have to make a few changes to some of my plugins, but I won’t go into those here, since you may not have them.
Making Google happy
Now, for the part where Google comes in. I’d like to preface this section by saying that I had already added the old address to Google Webmaster Tools and Google had already indexed several pages.
Following Google’s instructions on how to move to a new domain, I removed the old domain from my server, and set it up as an addon domain to the new site. I also specifically setup a permanent 301 redirect to pages that already ranked well in the search engines or had a link to them from another site.
Then I went to back to Google Webmaster Tools and followed their instructions on how to submit a change of address for a site.
Once I’d completed the form, as shown above, I arrived at this page:
So now, it’s hurry up and wait — see how long it takes Google to index the new site. In the meantime, if you have a site to move, this is how to do it and let Google know what you’re up to.
Top 5 Home Businesses To Start In A Recession
If you’re wanting to start a home business, a job-scarce recession seems to be the right time.
More job seekers are starting their own businesses this year than in the past four years, according to a report from Chicago-based Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Instead of enduring several more months of unemployment, almost 12 percent started their own businesses in the third quarter of 2009.
“The hope is that the momentum established in the second half of 2009
will carry into 2010, since new business development is considered
critical to a sustainable recovery,” according to the Challengar, Gray & Christmas report.
Personally, I don’t blame them. I’m going through the process of becoming a certified English and Journalism teacher. But with the status of our economy, both nationally and in Oklahoma, I’m not holding my breath that there will be teaching jobs available in the fall.
So I’m hanging my shingle out here — and doing some ghostwriting.
If you’d like to join in the entrepreneurial bandwagon, here are some home business ideas:
Social Media Marketing & Managment — Social media is huge right now, but many businesses still don’t know how to leverage it. If you have the skills, you can help businesses setup a social presence and reach out to their market.
Business Security — If you’re a techie geek, this one may be for you. Businesses have a growing need for better security. You can sell equipment online, including cameras, alarms, biometric systems. You can even provide installation or consultation services.
Senior care — Our aging boomers are looking for a little help around the house. You can base your operations out of your home, but travel to your client’s homes to renovate, clean, provide in-home care, run errands or prepare meals.
Green Businesses — Taking care of the planet is still a priority in spite of the recession. You can help families and businesses make measure their impact on on the environment and make earth friendly choices, create green products and offer environmentally friendly services and products for sale.
Pet Products — If the explosion of new shows on Animal Planet is any indication, pet ownership is more popular than ever. And people love pampering their fur babies. If you have an idea for the next best pet gadget, or organic pet food, you could have a winner.
Can Geeks Run A Business?
You know the stereotype. Taped bottle-thick glasses, Urkel knickers and a bowtie, right? Can’t talk to girls, gets nervous if someone so much as looks at him…
Can this geek run a business?
He may need a few years of therapy to get over that bow-tie, but YES!
Actually, geeks are perfectly suited to running businesses. Seriously. Who is better qualified to sell pens that write in outer space, than a geek who eats, breathes and sleeps those pens?
Who better to sell knitted baby pants, than a mom who is totally geeked about her yarn stash?
Geeks are people who inordinately passionate about something. It might be yarn, video games, cars, web design, sewing, blogging, etc. Geeks are the perfect people to turn what they love into a succesful business.
After all, you’re going to be spending a whole lot of time living with those space pens.
So what about you? What are you geeked about and how did you turn it into a business?
Making Some Quick Changes Around Here
As I’ve planned this blog and the direction I want to go with my business this year, I realized that “Geeks That Write” wasn’t where I need to be.
So, before I get to invested in it, I’m setting up HomeBusinessGeeks.com. If you’re reading this, then you’re at the new site. My focus will be on telling your stories — stories of people that are geeked about something and have turned this passion into a business.
Maybe you fell in love with baby slings, but didn’t like any on the market. So you made your own. Now, you’re earning a living from selling your slings.
Or perhaps you have a passion for cars and now you’re selling hard-to-find car parts on eBay to fund your drag racing habit.
I’m looking for you.
During the next few months, I’ll be asking for interviews — by audio, video and text — of people who are business geeks. I’ll also post as much information as I can for all of you business geeks in training. So if you have any questions, please let me know.
What should you do now?
Well, since I switched domains on you, there are a couple of things you may need to do:
- Check your feed reader. Make sure you’re still getting updates. You may need to just resubscribe.
- Follow my new twitter account @HomeBizGeeks
Welcome to my new home and I’m looking forward to hearing from you!
Debating PageRank And Other Googleness
It’s funny how the same search engine optimization questions keep coming up, over and over and over again. It’s especially amazing considering how many free and paid sources of SEO information are out there. Of course, one has to consider that many of those sources of info are wrong as well.
Anyway, someone over at Web Hosting Talk asked for recommendations on a tool to check his PageRank. Well, you know I couldn’t pass that up!
The WHT poster’s question that I thought really indicated what a lot of people this:
I thought PageRank had a direct impact on your Google ranking? So all else being the same a higher PageRank would increase your ranking?
What a lot of people don’t understand, including me until a few years ago, is that PageRank and SERP rank are two different things.
You can have a page with a low PageRank, appear higher in a particular search result (or search engine results page — SERP) than a page with a higher PageRank.
As a matter of fact, if you do a search for golf clubs for sale, using the SEO For Firefox plugin, you can clearly see that a PR 2 site outranks a PR 6 site for this listing.
(Click the image for a larger view.)
What does this mean for you?
What this means is that you shouldn’t waste your time worrying about your PageRank. And don’t look at your competitor’s sites and assume that, because your PR is higher, you’re outranking them on a SERP. Do your research. Find out what keyword phrases your customers are using and make sure you’re ranking well for them.
I Love My WordPress For iPhone App
I would love it even better if I could turn my iPhone sideways and type with both thumbs. And I just realized today that I can’t reply to comments with it. So if I’m out running errands and someone comments on a post, I have to wait until I’m home before I can reply to them. Frustrating!
Other than those two complaints, I love the app. I can manage multiple blogs, comments, pages and posts. Not a bad deal, really.
Good news! It appears as if the developers are planning to add this ability to the application. Yea!!!