Author Archive
Is Tim Tebow Pregnant With Jeremy Lin’s Baby? Kate Upton Says, “Maybe!”
Posted by: chilly17 in How The Internet Works, Pop Culture on March 7th, 2012
Even with today's technology, cleaning cropping stuff out of a photo to merge with another photo is difficult (especially for those who've come to shun attention to detail)
Many in attendance at the iPad 3 launch couldn’t help but ask: is that a baby bump on Tim Tebow, virgin? And could Jeremy Lin (Knicks), newly minted global symbol of perseverance and acceptance, not to mention subject of approximately 20 billion stupid puns, possibly be the father? While the prospects of a Lin Tebow gay romance seemed like a marketing dream, many observers felt such a pairing unlinkly and perhaps linpossible. SI covergirl Kate Upton felt otherwise after her brief meeting with the (allegedly) virginal Tebow and noting that he did not immediately make an effort to become “special friends” with her. Later, while discussing the Facebook IPO with Mitt Romney (Republican), Kate Upton – who is hot - realized that she was actually thinking of MTV’s Snooki, who actually did attempt to touch her in her bathing suit areas (which, judging from the cover of SI, required some precision). When asked if Snooki pregnant, awesome DJ Skrillex declared himself ready for the Ruffneck bass. It is unclear what that means. Weighing in on the Tim Tebow and Jeremy Lin matter, Sofia Vergara – naked except for jeans, presumably undergarments and a borrowed Kim Kardashian Reggie Bush jersey – confirmed that it was indeed Snooki pregnant.
Later,
Expectations vs. Reality
A lot of people ask me, “Hey, Chilly, how’s it going? You still living the dream?” This forces me to ponder how many 43 year olds dream about living at home and occasionally helping their dad urinate. It’s not so bad though – the Sriracha at Wal-Mart here in Arkansas goes for $2.66, compared to, if I recall correctly, $18 at Gristedes. (Don’t worry, I’m already working on this arb opportunity; next time in NYC I’m bringing twenty cases of Sriracha with me and will sell them on the sidewalk for $4. I’m partnering with a gentleman who’s an expert in marketing used DVDs and cell phone accessories.)
Given that this site is just over three years old now, it’s probably time to reflect upon my post-banking path. (I almost typed in “genuflect” there, because I momentarily thought it meant to genuinely reflect. I think I’m getting stupider. I thought iPad Boggle was supposed to sharpen your intellect?) I’ll be honest: I predicted nothing short of meteoric success for myself in whatever endeavor I decided to pursue after getting canned. For those of you who have read about my many previous occupations, you might ask yourself “why the hell did he think he would be hugely successful when he’s only been average/below average, at best, in his previous jobs?” The answer (that I tell myself) is that I never really tried all that hard before, because I never really felt all that invested in anything. They were all just jobs. Now – elusive freedom in hand – I would focus my energies like never before, creating either sardonic-yet-enlightening-in-a-non-meaningful-way masterpieces of internet writing or performing myriad backtesting analyses to confirm/tighten my trading strategy and generate mucho cashflow. (This is all detailed more thoroughly in my thus-far-unpublished trogger manifesto.)
Instead of all that, I mostly just kind of f*cked around. Results could kindly be described as tepid. But the way I understand it, it takes about twenty years to become a successful internet writer, so I’m really only 15% down the path. Just getting started on my journey. If I don’t see some results in another 15-17 years, I’m totally dumping this site. The upside is, I’ve learned a lot about SEO (that’s search engine optimization for you nEwBs out there. That’s how we internet people really talk, all cool and stuff with random capitals and in-the-know slang.) In fact, I’m going to be using my newfound SEO knowledge to kickstart this motherf*cker in the near future. On the trading front, I’m thinking my “hope for the best” approach will really generate some serious alpha going forward. So it is all good in the hood, but there is certainly room for improvement (to quote virtually any of my performance reviews.)
Later,
Chilly17
Modest Site Redesign In Progress
Posted by: chilly17 in Daily Grind on February 23rd, 2012
I have been meaning to make some stylistic changes to this site for some time, unfortunately my busy schedule (the rest of the internet isn’t going to read itself) has prevented me from sitting down and really understanding how to improve the user experience here at WaPo. Luckily, I stumbled upon knowledge from a group of internet marketing gurus (fun fact: I took zero marketing classes at business school) that really know how to make a website crackle.
One of the things that the gurus highly recommend is increasing your site’s profile on social networking sites. Apparently a key element to creating a real sense of community amongst your readers is to seamlessly integrate the various social platforms within the readers’ interactions with your site itself. However, as with many things in life, there must be a balance to your efforts – generally, it seems, subtlety will be rewarded. Readers don’t necessarily want to be bombarded with reminders of their other virtual “obligations” such as foursquaring that they are at PetSmart shopping for hamster sweaters or updating their secret AshleyMadison profile. But in this contemporary age, a gentle reminder, or “call to action” can go a long way in increasing a sites value in today’s currency of “Likes,” “Recommends” and “Not Bads.”
Implementing these concepts in a visually compelling way does not come easily to me, given my limited knowledge of HTML and really anything other than googling endlessly for answers to questions like “Why the f*ck is the spacing so f*cked up on wordpress? why doesn’t it just put a space where i put a space?? Why???”
Couple my coding ineptitiude with being a bit of a newcomer to the concept of social media – having long preferred nonsocial media such as watching bumfights and arguing with internet strangers over whether Drive made any fucking sense whatsoever – has made revamping the site a daunting task. However, I think I’m finally starting to understand a little bit how this whole thing works. For example, Twitter is much more powerful platform for receiving unwanted advertisements for unneeded services than email has ever been. It is also phenomenal for receiving unsolicited Follows from fictional females – you can even see their fictional faces, a personal touch that email subject lines only wish they could offer.
So I’m hoping that some of my small changes will impart a kind of subliminal “call to action” – where you, the reader, are so ensconsced in the thought-provoking content relating to food, feet or ugly babies, that you barely notice the hint of request in the air. Just because this site does not have a product to sell, really – other than inane thoughts from an uninformed person – doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be some marketing going on up in here. A careful evaluation of my traffic quality indicates there is opportunity, verified by feedback from the internet marketing gurus.
Looking at my stats last month, my traffic broke down like this:
- Human visitors: 6
- Romanian spambots: 5,207
- Comment spambots: 1,312 (thanks, Akismet!)
- People who misspelled bakedpotato.com
With traffic like that, it’s clearly time to focus on monetization. Sure, one way would be to sell out to a major corporation or media conglomerate, but I really want to protect the integrity of the site, and my ability to not do anything for weeks at a time if I so desire. Similarly, a public stock offering would subject me to the whims of shareholders, and I cannot be sure that each of my six human readers would agree to serve on my Board of Directors. I will have to figure out an approach that is neither cumbersome nor detracts from the aesthetics of the site, but encourages readers to do things that cause me to get money, traffic, or perhaps even additional Follow requests from imaginary females on the Twitter. Maybe another iPad giveaway? I’ll keep thinking about it, there must be some mutually beneficial way to get things done around here and keep this place looking sweet as always.
Hard-hitting new post hopefully by Friday. Friday of which week TBD.
Later,
Chilly17
