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A Blogger’s Bucket List

Written by User ImageJason Boom on January 22, 2008 – 11:33 am

  1. A Literal Bucket ListBe a guest blogger on JohnCow.com.
  2. Make more than $0.33 in AdSense revenue for one month.  
  3. Get mentioned by a news media outfit as a source.
  4. Sell all my available 125×125 ads space for $100 a piece.
  5. Blog about some topic  and have it catch like wildfire around the blogosphere.
  6. Do a video blog entry without sounding like an idiot.
  7. Make it to the top 100 favorites in Technorati.
  8. Have John Chow (or Cow) do a review of my blog without having to pay.
  9. Take over the Internet with EC credits, buying up ad real estate on hundreds of blogs all at once.
  10. Actually gain some traffic from BlogRush.
  11. Offer Darren Rowse free spelling lessons.
  12. Break a story on something relevant to millions of people. Have my server buckle under the traffic.
  13. Make it to the frontpage of DIGG!
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What’s in a Name?

Written by User ImageJason Boom on January 14, 2008 – 8:23 pm

Naming is the process of assigning a particular word or phrase to a particular object or property. This can be quite deliberate or a natural process that occurs in the flow of life as some phenomenon comes to the attention of the users of a language. Many new words or phrases come into existence during translation as attempts are made to express concepts from one language in another.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Name

Last night, I talked with my wife about my new blog, Geeks’ End. I wasn’t satisfied with the name, I told her. How will people relate to the name? Will they remember it for its simplicity or will it be forgotten for its tiresomeness? We talked a bit more, and we decided that I should choose a new name with a little more forethought. So that’s exactly what we did. We discussed the following criteria for my new domain name.

The domain name should…

  1. be memorable.
  2. have a meme that could be used to market the blog. (Geeks’ End was too confusing. I needed something that strung up lights and shocked you when you plugged in to the socket.)
  3. not be cheesy (too much).
  4. be easy to type.
  5. be available for purchase, preferably below the $50 range. (sorry blog.us, maybe next time)
  6. appeal to me! 

We both decided the meme would be my first name coupled with a word that conveyed excitement. I wanted people to feel the burst of energy when they came to my site. We went through a few variations, including Jason Nice, Jason Hardcore, until finally hitting on, Jason Boom. My wife came up with the name,like it popped through her eyeballs. Her eyes dancing with the idea of it. Jason Boom, I rolled the name around my mind for a while. I could have a character to make the blog more exciting, lively. I could market the blog using all the imagery of a explosions, bombs, fire. I loved it.

I’ve bought the www.jasonboom.com domain and transfered the www.geeksend.com site over to it. Wordpress migrated relatively simply. However, the site does have a few problems updating comment counts, and displaying the title correctly in the browser title bar.

Unfortunately, my RSS feed had to change on feedburner, so please resubscribe using the link on the right or below the post. And don’t forget to tell me what you think in the comment section.

UPDATE: I realize the title bar name wasn’t showing up because there was no value in the All in One SEO plugin field for title. It’s been fixed!

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Jason Boom’s Office

Written by User ImageJason Boom on January 12, 2008 – 4:01 pm

In the spirit of community, I’ve taken a picture of my home office. The majority of the furnishings came together during 2007. I’ve also shown the view of the shelves to my right, with the inspiring picture of the men working on a skyscraper. These men worked such dangerous jobs that no insurance company would cover them.

I use a Dell 19″ monitor with a Dell XPS 420 system, touting 2GB of RAM and 2.6 GHZ dual core processor. The laptop has a wide screen monitor and runs Windows XP (a fresh install - check later posts for more on that).  

Geeks' End Home Office

Jason Boom's Home Office Shelves

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The C|Net Editor Who Lost Life Still Helping Others

Written by User ImageJason Boom on January 12, 2008 – 1:18 pm

I must admit I was so engrossed in the James Kim story a little over a year ago. Every morning I would open up my favorite news site scouring the headlines for anything related to his story. This man was so much a hero in my eyes. When I heard the entire story, I was shocked and saddened by it all.

So when I glanced at Yahoo!’s frontpage today and noticed his name among the top stories, I couldn’t help but be interested. It appears those in James’ wake have found ways to turn this tragedy into a charitable opportunity for those who believe in the things he stood for. The James Kim Technology foundation helps bridge the gap between realized technology experience for the San Francisco public school youth.

The story of James Kim will always break my heart. In my eyes, he will always be a hero.

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