If any of you guys follow Digg closely, you might have noticed an amusing article to hit the homepage a few days ago called You Might Be Addicted to Digg If. If you’re a keen observer, you might have also noticed this list was hosted on a new startup site called ListZe. This is a fun project I built with a buddy of mine (Parker) to help fill an untapped market of social organization and list management.

Lots of people out there have great ideas of informative or comical information they’d like to toss out as a list and submit to digg or reddit, but they don’t want to setup a whole blog or website, and then get limited static functionality from it. ListZe is a bit different. On this site, anyone can create a list and add items to it. Then other members can come along and add their own items that might have been forgotten originally. This is a great social collaboration tool in itself. Next members can vote items on any list up and down, effectively sorting the list in decreasing order, polarizing the items with the best (usually the funniest) up top, and the worst items on the bottom.

It’s a great site that could prove very useful to a number of people. Here are a few example lists for you to see the kinds of lists we serve:
- Funny Bumper Stickers
- 2008 Presidential Candidates
- Funny Blonde Jokes
- Excuses for Sleeping at Work
- Funny AIM Away Messages
- The Best Movies of 2007
- Amazing but True Facts
- Fun things to do at Walmart
And many more. View the complete list.

Since launching Desktop Nexus, we’ve experienced astronomical growth. We’re now seeing over 20,000 downloads a day and visitors from all around the world. We’ve formed a number of partnerships, including one a content distribution agreement with Pixsy. We have over 11,200 wallpapers and are quickly approaching 2,000 users, contributing an overall total of 2,000,000 downloads. Wow!

Well, we’ve been working night and day for weeks now on something big for Desktop Nexus, and hopefully we’ll launch it by November 1st, so stay tuned.

Until then, here are a few popular galleries on the site the past few days:
- Ubuntu Wallpapers
- BMW Wallpaper
- Family Guy Wallpaper
- Car Wallpapers
- Hannah Montana Wallpaper
- Abstract Wallpapers
- BMW Wallpapers
- Car Backgrounds
- Mini Cooper Wallpaper
- Graffiti Wallpapers

So if anyone is looking for fresh desktop wallpapers, check out Desktop Nexus.

Yesterday I closed a large business deal, netting a nice profit. To treat myself, I picked up a new Movado. I’m not the biggest watch connaisseur, however I do appreciate a well made machine, and have started building a small collection. I’m also a firm believer that every man needs at least one nice watch.

I know it’s very traditional, but I didn’t have a Movado, so I figured start with the classic. I picked up a Movado Temo… a brand new line. The reason I chose this one was mainly the unique subtle triangle-design in the band.

(stock photo)

To see my actual watch (with horrible lighting), check out my Flickr set.

Now, you’re probably wondering about the 2nd part of the title, Hairballs. My wonderful girlfriend, Laura, is a huge animal person, and recently started her own blog, which she cleverly entitled Laura’s Hairball. The interface is a work in progress (sorry for the horrible photoshop on the cat), however it’s off to a nice start. She’s planning on using it as a general topic blog, discussing anything from current news to posting random jokes or pictures. Again, it’s still in it’s infancy, however if you swing by and leave her a comment, I’m sure she’d appreciate the feedback (and encourage her to post more frequently)! Good luck Laura!

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Tired of your desktop wallpaper? We can help!

Finally!

One of the most requested features for Google’s RSS Reader is probably search functionality. I complained about it a few months ago, and someone must have listened!

It’s very simple, and I question if it’s fully deployed to all users yet… however it is very functional. I don’t know how many hours I’ve spent digging through past feeds, searching Google Blog Search (to no avail), trying to find some interesting article I read weeks ago…. this feature is long overdue.

Now I can say without reservation in my opinion, Google RSS Reader is the best feed reader online.

I normally don’t track search engine trends or new product releases/updates… however to me, this is important. :p

Edit: Found the official Google post.

World of Warcraft is a game that should be classified as a drug. It might not be smoked, swallowed, or injected… but it’s symptoms are the exact same as an illegal drug. It is horribly addicting and is getting renowned for ruining lives.

The following are first-hand accounts of the devastation WoW has on it’s devoted players… all quotes are completely unedited and pulled from a number of online forum threads, discussing their experiences with WoW players. Posters and names are not included for anonymity.

I knew this guy in college that used to be really social. Had a hot girlfriend, lots of friends, was physically fit and looked decent.

He got WoW and within 6 months his girlfriend was gone. Started fucking his best friend who is also no longer his friend. Guy ended up gaining 30lbs and turned pale as a ghost. I went in his room and he had like 15 bottles of urine stacked up along his desk because he ‘couldnt leave the raid’

He had 20+ pizza boxes stacked up along the wall of his room. His room smelled like death. His sheets were stained brown from when he did sleep. he lost his job and flunked out of school. He lives at home with his parents now I think, I havent seen him in a year or so.

Im glad I never bought that game, cause I feel like I wouldve turned into something like the people in these stories. I never want to touch this game.

my MMO horror story:

…played for over 4 days straight, 103 hours.. was camping for a Ghoulsbane in Guk.. I only stopped after 103 hours because I fell out of my chair and passed out from exhustion .. spent the next 6 days in hospital .. still didn’t get the bloody sword.. a guildy gave me one off of one of their twinks..

my friends brother was married, had two children and a home and all that stuff.

he got hooked into wow and quit his job and stopped supporting his family.. his wife eventually left him and took the kids/house, he moved back in with his mother. the guy had met some girl in wow that lived 1000 miles away and actually disappeared to go meet her/live with her. fast forward a few months, my friend brings over his brothers computer asking if theres anything i can do to help find him. all they knew was he left to go meet a girl he met online.

well, i dug through the computer and found wow screenshots and chat logs of the girl and her name, and eventually found an address and we tracked him down.. but afaik it’s done no good, he’s still living with the girl he met in-game and has completely abandoned everything here. his ex-wife and children live with her mother i think.

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I’m burning through the last few hours of my vacation now, on the plane returning home. It was a great trip ““ seven days in an oceanfront house we rented on St. Croix, an island in the US Virgin Islands. The plane ride is four hours each way however, and because of my inability to be inefficient, I can’t sit around and spend eight hours reading gossip magazines or doing crosswords. After much deliberation, I decided the best way I could spend my time would be to work on gaining backlinks for Desktop Nexus, my recently launched company for desktop wallpapers.

The only problem is airplanes aren’t the best vehicle for wardriving, so no internet. No problem. I’ve decided to promote Desktop Nexus through guest posting. Over the past six or so hours, I’ve designed, outlined, and written lengthy, high quality posts targeted to a few specific industry authority blogs that accept guest posts. Now granted, I’ve never guest posted on any of their blogs, however I’m assuming if they get an email with the post attached, and with as high quality as they are, the blogger would have no reason not to run it. Good, free, unique content is hard to come by these days, haha. At the end of every post, I’ve included a few sentences about me, with a few links to this blog and Desktop Nexus, as is the industry accepted standard for author citations and credit. I figure if I can get 4-5 of the articles to run, that’ll be about 10 high PR, high authority backlinks, with targeted anchor text… plus the traffic I might get from readers clicking on the links themselves. It makes sense. When I’m at home or at the office, I rarely have time to sit down and actually think out good content, as I’m usually programming or working on something seemingly more wholesome. Granted I could have written Digg-bait posts for the Desktop Nexus blog and hoped one of them went popular, however that’s very risky and borderline dirty SEO. Plus, (and more importantly) it also feels nice to help out some of the larger blogs I follow every day, as well as their readers. If any of the thousands of potential readers in these blogs’ audience are genuinely helped or inspired by my posts, then I feel like I’ve done something worthy of this time.

I’m not a morning person. I never have been and I probably never will be, however recently for work I’ve been having to wake up early, and as such, I’ve put together a few tips that help me get by.

• Don’t eat breakfast - Just grab a glass of juice, and eat lunch early if you get hungry. When I eat a full meal in the morning, I feel weighed down and groggy all afternoon.
• Reward yourself - Tell yourself if you go to sleep early, you’ll get up a little earlier and swing by Starbucks, or some kind of reward. Motivate yourself to go to sleep early, as that’s the key.
• Don’t hit that snooze button - I know it’s tempting, and I know “a few more minutes won’t hurt anything,” however you must resist. You set your alarm for that time last night for a reason, and the voice of reason is dulled when you first wake up.
• Take a Shower - I’ve tried taking a shower in the evenings before I go to sleep, and in the mornings when I wake up… and I’ve found taking one in the morning works much better for me. That kick-starts my energy for the day, and without it, I’d never wake up.
• Play music while you’re getting ready - Some might not have this convenience (roommates, etc), however if you turn on the radio or TV while you’re getting ready, it helps get your mind thinking for the day, rather than enjoying it’s grogginess.
• Open your blinds before you go to sleep - What seems to be one of the smallest things makes a huge difference. If you open your blinds before you go to sleep, when your alarm goes off in the morning, the sun beaming in through those slats might just give you enough energy to smile and want to get up.
• Cherish the morning - There’s a certain empowering energy in being up early… the birds chirping, the dew in the air, serene tranquility… cherish it. Walk outside and take a deep breath. Learn to enjoy mornings, not dread them. They really aren’t so bad.

Hopefully these help you as well. Good luck!

I use almost all of Google’s products, but there are a few things, that if added, would make my life much easier. Additionally, I’ve included some of my “I wish Google would make…” items.

1. An already heavily requested feature… search within Google Reader. I read almost a hundred RSS feeds a day, and often times I’m wishing I could find a story I skimmed over again to show a friend… but it’s quite difficult.
2. Adsense integration with Google Analytics. I don’t use PPC campaigns so Adwords is useless to me, however I would be VERY interested in tracking my earnings with the ability to drill down to a page level. Google Analytics is a great, powerful system, and Adwords integration would be a nice touch.
3. Google Gears integration with Gmail. I love Gmail, but I find myself often wishing I could access it offline. I’ve setup Outlook (POP downloads) setup on my laptop, but I really don’t like the feel of it nearly as much as the Gmail web interface.
4. Google Gears integration with Google Docs and Spreadsheets. It would be great to simply have a link icon on my desktop that opened Google Docs, and no matter where I am (home, Starbucks, on a plane, etc.), I can always work on my documents whenever I’d like.
5. GDrive. I’d love an XDrive-style storage system run by G, where I can quickly toss any files I’d like, from MP3s to EXEs. Also knowing Google, I’m sure they’d be generous with space as well.
6. GoogOS. Okay, maybe I’m getting a bit far out now, but I’d LOVE a simple AJAX web interface with icons where I can open Google applications in smaller Meebo-style draggable CSS/JS windows. I would like a site I can go to, hit F11 to make it full screen, and no matter what computer I’m on, have access to everything in single one place.
7. Google Music Identifier. All the cell companies are doing it now (Cingular, Verizon’s V Cast Phone, etc)…. it’d be awesome if Google made a 1-800 number I could call, hold my phone up in a store or in my car, and have Google identify the artist and song for me. Bonus points if they automatically add a link to that Google Music page to my Google Notebook.
8. Google Accounting. Most of my daily operations are handed with Google’s systems (email, word processing, chat, search, etc)… but I’m still using QuickBooks to manage my finances. I’m sure they could easily create an easy-to-use personal expense tracking system, and even tie it into Google Checkout. I’d definitely use it.
9. Expand Google Blog Search to add trends and popularity. Without much work, they could become a direct competitor of Technorati and finally give them a run for their money. Google Blog Search is very bland and underdeveloped right now in my opinion. A little dedication to it would do wonders.
10. Folders in Gmail. I understand Google’s ideas for labeling emails and archiving… but I still like folders better… just drag emails and drop them in the right place. Very intuitive. I think this is one of the only flaws in Gmail and would be a radical (they seem hard-set on labels), but progressive modification.

Thanks G… if I could get these all done in the next few days, that’d be great. :p

I’ve found Diggers like statistics. I received a great response to my Most Powerful Sites on Digg and the last Most Powerful Members on Digg article, but those were only for a 30 day period (as long as Digg allows a visitor to go back). In another recent article submitted, I had a large number of people requesting a follow-up Most Powerful Member post, and since over a month has past, I’ve sat down and recalculated everything again.

These numbers are analyzing how many articles each top user got to the homepage (and not buried) from April 19th, 2007 to May 19th, 2007… the most powerful users on Digg.

I’ve also gone an additional step in this post and included how many friends each user has. A lot of people speculate one trick to help your articles get to the homepage is to build a large friend-base, and digging each other’s articles whenever one person submits something. That said, if anyone is feeling lonely, I’ll definitely be your friend. In the following list, I’ve excluded anyone with less than two articles hitting homepage. In the case of a tie, I ranked users with articles hitting homepage more recently higher.

Are you listed?

#1 MrBabyMan (383 Friends) — sixty four articles
#2 mklopez (153 Friends) — sixty articles
#3 Alexius (12 Friends) — fifty one articles
#4 skored (291 Friends) — forty three articles
#5 msaleem (548 Friends) — forty three articles
#6 supernova17 (135 Friends) — forty two articles
#7 moojj (510 Friends) — forty two articles
#8 IvanB (641 Friends) — thirty seven articles
#9 sepultura (170 Friends) — thirty two articles
#10 interg12 (933 Friends) — thirty articles
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