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c0rkie How to Clean Up Your Online Reputation Sep 13, 2007 1:49 AM FYI ! For those who are still relatively new to the world wide web and still has time to prevent this from happening, keep a clean online image of yourself when using the internet. But for those who have been surfing the web for a while now (10+ years maybe?) and may have created a persona a bit risque for the real world to handle, make sure your online reputation hasn't gone completely out of your control. Things can come back and bite you back in the ass! We have celebrity gossip to remind us of this fact all too well. Learn to prevent! :) How to Clean Up Your Online Reputation by Allan Hoffman Monster Tech Jobs Expert Maybe it wasn’t such a great idea to post that video from your bachelor party in Vegas. Or to include a recipe for pot brownies in your otherwise above-board food blog. Or to rant about your former employer -- specifically, about the CEO’s bad haircut and body odor -- on an industry message board. Maybe it wasn’t such a great idea to do any of the other infinitely creative, breathtakingly easy and completely dumb things the Internet allows you to do with just a few keystrokes and mouse clicks. But you did, and now you’re sorry as you head out into the job market with an online reputation to repair. No one knows how many job candidates worry about how their online reputation can affect their job prospects, but anecdotal evidence suggests that more people are realizing that what they do online -- and what others say about them online -- can play a role in determining whether they get hired or fired. Post a video, and it may be online forever -- no matter how stupid it makes you look. The same goes for blog posts, forum discussions, photo albums and even emails you send to friends. (You never know what will spread from the private sphere to the public realm.) The point is painfully obvious: You need to be thoughtful and deliberate when conducting your life online. But what happens when it’s too late? Here’s how you can attempt to undo the damage. Scope Out the Damage First, determine what damaging information exists. Enter your name at Google, MSN and Yahoo and see what turns up in the first four or five pages of results. Anything troubling? Mark it for action. Then sign up for the alerts available at spots like Google Alerts; when information about you is added or updated, you’ll find out via email. Monitoring your reputation in this manner is time-consuming, so you may want assistance. ReputationDefender provides members with monthly search reports that detail the information available about them on blogs, photo and video sites, news sources and social networking hubs like Facebook and MySpace. Memberships start at $9.95 per month under a 24-month plan. An item doesn’t need to be outrageous to hurt your job prospects. “If it raises a shadow of a doubt about the candidate, the employer is not going to hire that person,” says Ross Chanin, vice president of operations for ReputationDefender. Bury It So you did something stupid -- maybe a month ago, maybe a decade ago. Now you want to make sure no one finds that record of your stupidity. Scott Allen, coauthor of The Virtual Handshake: Opening Doors and Closing Deals Online, advocates burying the bad with the good. That means creating new content about yourself, such as a blog or Web site. “It’s not that you can make the stuff disappear,” he says. “It’s that you make so much more good stuff that you can’t find the bad stuff.” Just be sure you create worthwhile material. If possible, Allen says, publish your writing at respected sources, such as industry publications. After all, publishing your own material goes only so far. “If it’s obvious it came from you, it can only do so much,” he says. Request Removal You may be able to have the material removed, but remember that much of what appears online is archived at the Internet Archive, a nonprofit initiative designed to be a resource for historians and researchers. If you believe you have a strong case to have material removed, don’t come out swinging. “That can cause more bad PR for you,” Allen says. Instead, take a soft stance: Explain your reasons for wanting the material removed and assume the owner of the site (or the owner’s representative) is reasonable and will listen. If the information is inaccurate, defamatory or libelous, point that out. Just be sure to learn as much as possible about the site before making your move. If you’re dealing with an in-your-face blog, sending an email to the blogger requesting that something about you be removed can backfire. Bloggers have been known to post those emails, so be aware that your request could end up casting more unfavorable attention on you. As for search engines, don’t bother. You won’t have any luck asking them to rig their results in your favor. Hire a Service A growing number of services can help you manage or clean up your online reputation. Along with ReputationDefender, these services include Defendmyname and Naymz. ReputationDefender’s reports, for instance, include a “destroy” option; choose that, and for $29.95, ReputationDefender will attempt to have a particular item about you removed. “We aim to save our clients time,” Chanin says. “We can do in two or three hours what it might take you from 72 to 96 hours [to do].” But managing your reputation doesn’t always come cheap. ReputationDefender offers another level of service for $10,000. Under this plan, the company uses a variety of tactics to improve your online rep and ensure that the positive material about you rises to the top of search-engine results. Reputation matters, and if you’re not diligent, you may end up paying a very high price. http://content.monster.com/articles/3471/19226/1/home.aspx
c0rkie Gamers aren't destined to be Losers with no game in Love. Sep 11, 2007 6:51 AM The following article explores how gamers connect on a more personal level in which would develop into sustainable intimate relationships. Whoever said games are a waste of time haven't fully understood just how beneficial (based on points the article brought up) this form of entertainment is - if you're into this type of activity of course. Don't force yourself to play if you despise gaming lol. State of Play: The game of love By Margaret Robertson Video game consultant and writer Avatars are not always the best guide to the player behind them People play games for many reasons, but increasing numbers are finding that they are a great way to size up potential partners. These days, the media is full of tales of people who fall in love online. The wave that started in chatrooms has swept across internet dating sites and crashed against the shores of Azeroth, Vana'diel and Norrath. Hundreds, probably thousands, of players can attest that they met their partners or spouses in the worlds of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XI and EverQuest. A few more have darker tales to tell of romances that led to obsession or that were founded in deceit or infidelity. For a while, it was a taboo. Couples steeled themselves against the inevitable silence that followed the announcement "we met online". Now, it's commonplace: any silence following that kind of declaration will be based on boredom, not embarrassment. The speed of that acceptance has meant that a fundamental question doesn't often get asked: just what is it about online games that makes them a good place to hook up? They do, of course, share some of the aspects that make online dating in general successful: it's a quick, efficient way to encounter a large number of potential suitors, all without having to expose yourself too acutely. And there's a good chance that by picking a game that appeals to your particular tastes you've already limited that pool of potentials to people you have something in common with. But surely, that's where the advantages end. You don't see anything real of someone in a game, not so much as a photo. You don't get a real name, or even a real gender, as often as not. Conversation can be cumbersome and stilted, and your range of action can be severely limited. But while information may be sparse in online relationships, insight abounds. There's an intimacy available in games that the real world takes time to match. Warcraft is a world where you can right-click on someone you've just met and inspect their underwear. Imagine how that ability would change how you responded to someone who offered to buy you a drink in a bar. What conclusions would you draw about a mighty, armour-laden warrior who is secretly wearing a pink silk shirt under his plate-mail carapace? How would you judge a seemingly level-headed priestess when you notice she's stuck with a low-level robe that offers little protection but matches her hair? So far, so shallow. But can a game clue you in to more important character traits? A good stint in an MMO (Massively Multiplayer Online game) can give you a very accurate reading on, say, how someone handles their money. It's easy to assess the difference between a carefree impulse buyer and a number-crunching investor who knows how to play the auction house - much more revealing that whether or not someone offers to "go Dutch" on a first date. Or how about tricky social situations? Games are full of awkwardness: persistent beggars hassling you for money or inept but enthusiastic players who need to be jettisoned from a squad if you're to have any hope of success. Games do not need much help to get players connecting How a new acquaintance deals with those situations shows you far more about them than spending an evening listening to carefully calculated anecdotes and well-worn jokes. And all this is before you get to the actual game; there are few more revealing processes than watching someone play. You can easily gauge some of the slipperiest aspects of human nature by observing someone's tactics. Are they a risk-taker? Do they panic under pressure? Do they respond to failure with frustration or creativity? Are they a gracious winner or a griping loser? A loner or a team-player? Perfectionist or bodger? Is winning all that matters, or will they risk death to pull a prank or tell a joke? Dinner and a movie may well give you a chance to check out the basics - minor details like physical appearance, age, sex, gender and race - but it's hard to beat a game for how much it will show you of someone's character, and how quickly. Dating in the real world is all too often reminiscent of the way French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupery describes in his book The Little Prince meeting adults who only care about jobs and houses and money, golf and politics and neckties. They never ask about essential matters, he laments, and so he never discusses them with such people; no talk of boa constrictors or primeval forests or stars, of butterflies and games and rose-brick houses. It's taken more than 50 years for games to catch up with him, but it's hard not feel that he would approve of the exploration, friendship and whimsy that they now offer. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6976167.stm
c0rkie Naive Girls Dating Assholes - What's the positive in that? Sep 10, 2007 11:46 PM Miss Sandra Werner requested a blog entry that doesn't require her to do any work (ie. the Sugar Activity posts lol) ^^ I wrote the following in a personal blog and thought I'd share this train of thought of mine with my fellow sugar addicts. asshole is censored cause Teamsugar bleeps it out lol Naive Girls Dating Assholes - What's the positive in that? hindsight is 20/20. & hindsight tells me this is a win-win situation (in the long run and perhaps for the most part). naive girl dates asshole * asshole hurts naive girl naive girl cries boo hoo hoo naive girl becomes a jaded girl asshole (re)meets jaded girl asshole feels remorse asshole apologizes to jaded girl jaded girl becomes realistic girl asshole becomes reformed asshole the end. * disclaimer: this is to say the particular asshole had a heart to start with. & that the naive girl had some sort of significance in the asshole's life.
c0rkie Men want hot women, study confirms Sep 4, 2007 10:11 PM This CNN article CRACKED ME UP!!!!! yes, from CNN.com! Hahhahaha!!! They need this to be scientifically proven?! Men want hot women, study confirms WASHINGTON (AP) -- Science is confirming what most women know: When given the choice for a mate, men go for good looks. In the dating game, men know what they want. And guys won't be surprised to learn that women are much choosier about partners than they are. "Just because people say they're looking for a particular set of characteristics in a mate, someone like themselves, doesn't mean that is what they'll end up choosing," Peter M. Todd, of the cognitive science program at Indiana University, Bloomington, said in a telephone interview. Researchers led by Todd report that in Tuesday's edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that their study found humans were similar to most other mammals, "following Darwin's principle of choosy females and competitive males, even if humans say something different." Their study involved 26 men and 20 women in Munich, Germany. Participants ranged in age from 26 to their early 40s and took part in "speed dating," short meetings of three to seven minutes in which people chat, then move on to meet another dater. Afterward, participants check off the people they'd like to meet again, and dates can be arranged between pairs who select one another. Speed dating let researchers look at a lot of mate choices in a short time, Todd said. In the study, participants were asked before the session to fill out a questionnaire about what they were looking for in a mate, listing such categories as wealth and status, family commitment, physical appearance, healthiness and attractiveness. After the session, the researchers compared what the participants said they were looking for with the people they actually chose to ask for another date. Men's choices did not reflect their stated preferences, the researchers concluded. Instead, men appeared to base their decisions mostly on the women's physical attractiveness. The men also appeared to be much less choosy. Men tended to select nearly every woman above a certain minimum attractiveness threshold, Todd said. Women's actual choices, like men's, did not reflect their stated preferences, but they made more discriminating choices, the researchers found. The scientists said women were aware of the importance of their own attractiveness to men, and adjusted their expectations to select the more desirable guys. "Women made offers to men who had overall qualities that were on a par with the women's self-rated attractiveness. They didn't greatly overshoot their attractiveness," Todd said, "because part of the goal for women is to choose men who would stay with them." But, he added, "they didn't go lower. They knew what they could get and aimed for that level." So, it turns out, the women's attractiveness influenced the choices of the men and the women. http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/science/09/04/dating.mating.ap/index.html
c0rkie Bigger Boobies due to Birth Control Pills Sep 3, 2007 5:49 AM I went back on the pill after a 3 year hiatus. The 1st time I was on it years ago, I didn't experience changes with my body whatsoever except lack of cramps when it came period time. For some reason, this time my breasts are affected by the hormones. Not that I am complaining about the size increase - just sucks it's more achy now due to the swelling. Although it's not really THAT much of a size difference but at least it is now a fuller SIZE A :D Woohoo! Time to go purchase some new lingerie to celebrate ;) hahaha! The boyfriend would be quite pleased when he sees me... 25 days from now! Wow... It's really coming up and I am so not even ready yet! SO many things to do beforehand... time is going to fly by! I just know it... it's already the 3rd of September! What happened to August?! I still can't believe it's been 3 whole months since I've last seen him in the flesh. Time sure flies! I hope things between us hasn't changed. That'd be really sad. :( Ok, onto happier thoughts! Let the countdown begin! :D Yah yah!

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How to Clean Up Your Online Reputation Gamers aren't destined to be Losers with no game in Love. Naive Girls Dating Assholes - What's the positive in that? Men want hot women, study confirms

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just a place to organize my blog entries - the ones with words hahaha!



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