Personal
Am I A Geek?
Bloggers for Obama: Lemmings for Something Shiny?
Let me take a moment and potentially do something mildly stupid: step my foot into politics. No, I’m not going to pull a Dave Winer on ya and go all political, don’t worry. 
We’re in the election season and that means we’re seeing lots of politics online. Since I follow social media, I can clearly which of the candidates seems to be the favorite of the blogosphere: Barack Obama.
Obama is young, certainly different than Bush, and his campaign has shown a knack for reaching the younger crowd and taking advantage of the Internet and social media. He has an enticing message. He puts forth a good image.
So, does Apple, though. Bloggers love to follow and write about Apple. Apple is great at marketing and fostering an image. Bloggers go gaga over it and write about it. Are they doing the same with Obama? Are they just going gaga over an image that Obama portrays? A result of good marketing?
And don’t think for a moment it isn’t an image. When Apple is trying to generate hype for a new release, they play bloggers like chess pieces. They get bloggers into endless speculation about it and it generates massive coverage in the blogosphere. The Obama campaign does the exact same thing. And they’re good at it. But, it doesn’t mean all the hype is based on reality.
I’d like to hope that bloggers are more likely to dig deep for the facts than a mainstream journalist. A journalist might rip into a blogger for being unprofessional, for not fact-checking, etc. But, in this case, what’s the difference? None. Too many people are going gaga over Obama as if he is the second coming. And if people don’t bother to actively try to look through the marketing hype about this guy, you could end up electing a mirage.
I have no doubt Barack Obama is a good man. I have no reason not to like him. But, when I see bloggers so blindly vouch for the guy, and so eagerly blame Bush for anything and everything and find every possible fault in John McCain, it doesn’t seem like bloggers are doing their job. They’re being lemmings for something shiny.
I’m not a political blogger and I’m not going to start. I follow tech, not politics. But, as a professional blogger who wants to see blogging recognized as the profession it is, I do not want to see bloggers as a whole turn into blind lapdogs for the latest shiny political figure. There is already enough bias in political coverage.
My Blog Was Hacked (I Think) – The Story
Part of having a website online – especially a popular one – is that, well, shit happens. And it can become a target for hackers. I am not sure if what happened to PCMECH was a result of intentional hacking or something else. Nonetheless, PCMECH was down for close to 16 hours.
The only reason it was down so long is because I was away from the office and in an area in Central Florida where I had no cell phone coverage. I can get online here, however I didn’t check my email until this morning at around 8 AM. It looks like PCMECH died around 4:30 PM yesterday.
Oh, and yes, waking up to find out first thing that the entire world is beating down your door because your website is offline isn’t much fun. If that doesn’t wake you up, nothing will. I had emails. I have tweets. I had it all. Everybody was asking what was happening, yet there I was up in Central Florida enjoying myself with no idea what was happening.
My perfect Saturday morning. Using the MacBook to restore PCMECH.
Showing my Dad what I’m doing. Why I’m smiling? I have no idea.
Still not exactly sure what transpired, but I’ll get to the bottom of it. For one reason or the other, the main site database got corrupted. Wordpress, because it could not detect the data properly, was defaulting to the installation script (which was still on the server). The public was then seeing the Wordpress installation script rather than the regular website. And, yes, people WERE running the install script on the database which was, of course, making a huge mess. So, I immediately started a database restore and had my web host delve into the server logs. My host (Pair Networks) did a fantastic job at springing to action early on a Saturday morning. Took a couple hours of back-and-forth, but we got PCMECH back online with with minimal data loss. Had to do a database restore and a bunch of repairing of tables.
What I’m about to impart is so obvious here that I slap myself for not doing it earlier. Install a self-hosted Wordpress? Don’t be a jackass. Delete the install.php and the upgrade.php files. Despite whatever may have set off this chain of events, the damage would have been less severe had those files not been public and web accessible.
Yeah, even people who’ve been doing this for awhile make dumbass mistakes some times.
Playing With the Layout
I am playing around with a design change on this website. Things might look a bit weird as I fine-tune things. You can catch the name and link to the theme in the footer (pretty nice theme). Now, I am doing my customizations.
So bear with me. Thanks for playing.
Out With the Old, In With The New
Since this is also a personal blog, I sometimes will talk about purely personal things. And this post will be case in point.
I finally upgraded my car. For the last 7 years, I have been driving a 1997 Honda Accord SE. It now has 161,000 miles on it. While the car sure isn’t going to turn any heads, it is simply the most dependable car I have ever owned. It is a tank. I simply could not be one of those people who drives a car until it falls apart because, said simply, this car probably would never fall apart. With an owner that drives it right, I can easily see that car doing 250,000+ miles.
But, yes, I needed an upgrade. Not only did I WANT an upgrade, but it was getting to the point that it was almost an embarrassment to drive up to a meeting in my Honda. It isn’t that it looked bad, but it was just OLD. It is hard to appear successful at what you do when you’re driving a car that is 12 years old.
I had been eyeing the Acura TL for a long time. The car echos my personality and I find it sexy as hell. It is a very luxurious car while, at the same time, being sporty, fast and nimble. It is the perfect balance. I don’t like granny cars. But, I don’t want to drive a car that is loud and obnoxious, either.
So, I finally decided to take action and I purchased a used Acura TL. It is a 2004, but the car is frickin’ gorgeous. It barely has a scratch on it and was obviously impeccably maintained. It also helps that I got the car for about $2,000 less than blue book value – AND they offered me full market price for my old Honda. I got a good deal on this thing.
As a tech guy, this car rubs me right. It has integrated Bluetooth as well as in-dash GPS. The car has a lot of intelligence to it.
So, yeah, I’m happy with the move. And, once again, I have to pinch myself that I actually am able to buy a car like this while having a job that doesn’t even feel like a job. Yet another reason why I love what I do.
Turning 30. My Wish.
My reaction? Ehh.
And that pretty much sums it up.
I turned 30 yesterday. As you get older, birthdays are just days. Even the so-called “big 3-0″ doesn’t seem like a big deal to me. We went out to breakfast. I spent the day working. Then in the evening, I took the night off, ate like hell and watched recorded episodes of “So You Think You Can Dance” on the DVR. Works for me.
Life changes. I’m a pro blogger. I truly enjoy what I do. My wife is gorgeous and I still can’t figure out why she married me. And my daughter is such a gift. I’m not foolish enough to think that making a wish before blowing out a birthday candle is going to magically make it come true, but I do believe in the power of the spirit to will things into reality.
And this is the first birthday where my wish had absolutely nothing to do with me. My wish is for…
How Hard Do Bloggers Work?
I had an interesting (and frustrating) conversation (aka argument) with my wife last night. To anybody with kids, this will probably sound all too familiar.
My wife is a stay-at-home mom and that means she is pretty much with our 4 month old daughter all the time. This is a necessary and downright invaluable job. The fact that we don’t have to put our daughter into a daycare is simple awesome. But, from mom’s viewpoint, the job can seem claustrophobic. And that leads to arguments that I’m not helping her enough.
For my part, I am a professional blogger and I make my entire living by running a blog site. This is HARD WORK. My wife would prefer that I work a “normal” 9-5 schedule. That isn’t very workable as a blogger. I’m trying to GROW my business and I simply can’t do that working 9-5. So, I am a blogger trying desperately to balance our my family life with my business life. I really enjoy what I do for a living. I also, of course, like spending time with my family.
My typical day is that I start work around 9 AM. I work all day (with a break for lunch) until around 6 – 6:30. I then hang out until around 8 – 8:30, at which time I will usually do a little work at night out on my laptop with my family. At night, it is a bit of an integrated life. I try to spend time with the family and work at the same time.
So, bloggers, how do you balance your business time with your family time? How long do you work per day?
Pro blogging isn’t a picnic. It can be rewarding, but it is a constant race to stay on top of what is happening, raise traffic, look for and develop new revenue models, keep your subscribers happy, answer emails, yada yada and more yada.
Oh, and don’t get me wrong. My wife and I are cool now. But, the problem is that she has essentially NO reality with what I do for a living. To her, I just sit there and pound on keys and stare at my screen. She has no idea what I’m doing. So, I guess another portion of my question would be this: How do pro bloggers deal with their significant others who know nothing about blogging?
Feel free to post a comment and DO TELL!
Taking the Daily Dosage of Fukitol
Last night, I went to bed with a fever. I held out long enough to finish the PCMech live show on Wednesday night. Of course, I was high on Tylenol because I had a headache. Then, immediately after the show ended, my body ached and I felt cold. Yep, a fever. So, I turned in early.
Today, I’m feeling a lot better. Got some work done on PCMech this morning. After lunch, didn’t feel like doing much.
You ever had one of those days where you have so much to do, but you don’t want to do any of it? It is a feeling of confused overwhelm. Things aren’t going right, or so it seems. That was me today.
I needed a dose of Fukitol.
So, I took it easy this afternoon. I spent some time cleaning up my office (always helps me to get organized when I feel like that) and didn’t really push myself to get much done.
Sometimes, it is just necessary to stop working and take a breath. I am always much more productive if I just stop and smell the roses than if I force myself to work.
Fukitol. It works wonders.
The $60 Hotel
You get what you pay for.
This old adage is and always will be true. And one thing that proves it is the hotel I am sitting in right now. I am sitting in the Quality Inn over in Kissimmee, FL. My wife is over here to take a test for her engineering career and I came over to stay with the baby in the room. She booked this place and, yes, it was $60/night.
It is fine for our purposes, but so far I have observed the following:
- Some hairs in my bed.
- A cigaratte burn in my sheets.
- The remote control does not work for the TV.
- The wifi access is questionable. On and off. Frustrating as hell.
- Door barely closes all the way. You have to almost ram your body into it.
- A blood stain on one of the towels. Yeah, lovely.
- The coffee maker had some gunk to clean out before I dare use it.
- The frickin’ table I am using on this laptop on right now has uneven legs and moves every time I touch it. Actually caused me to almost spill my cheap-ass coffee on my expensive MacBook Pro.
Yep, you certainly do get what you pay for.
Why I Do It
That’s why.
And quite frankly, the fact that I can make enough money to provide a good living for this little lady – all by blogging – is just the best.
I'm David Risley. I've been making my living as a blogger for over a decade. Blogging is my business and how I support my family. With this blog, I'm just gettin' REAL and telling you how this business works. 
