As a Wordsfinder API user, I received the heads up from them regarding their new free service called Orchid Box. Orchid Box is a free Google Page Rank crawler that provides us with information on more than just the Google Page Rank of our website or blog.

Orchid Box does the following:

Check up to 60 pages’ Page Rank

and more.

I have to say that even though I am no longer interested to check the Google Page Rank of any of my websites or blogs now since Google tanked them, even by association, I find Orchid Box more relevant to me that other Google Page Rank checking tool since Orchid Box helps to diagnose SEO problems of a site, if any, since it replicates Google bots and the way they navigate a site.

I am so envious of my friends whose parents have take to the web like ducks to water. My parents, on the other hand, are not comfortable using the computer and internet and I have to guide them over and over again. I don’t have the time nor patience. I have to admit that I am not teacher material, which unfortunately, makes them even more afraid of the computer. SIGH!

My father is a little better than my mother so right now I am teaching him to consult the web for any information that he wants. I told him that the web is his best friend and he should use the search engines should he require information on whatever topics. of course, we should sieve the information ourselves, especially when it comes to alternative news.

Using the search engine, he could look for information like New Jersey or Las Vegas Accounting Firm, for example, even if he has never been to these two cities before or has any contacts there who could assist in providing such information.

A little while back, I wrote about reading a survey that says that Facebook is the stickiest website, beating even Google.

I think after a few months of doing nothing but play games on Facebook, I could attest to that! That’s right. These past few months, i have been rather addicted to playing games on Facebook like pet society, restaurant city, mafia wars, sorority life and street racing.

This means that I practically am logged into my Facebook account the whole day, night and even in the wee hours of the morning. In fact, I am logged in the whole time my computer is connected to the internet.

In fact, if I wanted any work to get done at all, I would have to close my browser so that Facebook and all the other games on Facebok are closed as well. Thinking about this I only play those games on Facebook and no where else. I guess if Facebook server is down for a little while I would in fact be most happy without the temptation to log in and play and waste good time and end up without doing actual work and be productive.

My friend, Sam, told me that he’s been having issues with the company server. He told me that management isn’t making his work any easier because of a restricted budget. He proposed to upgrade to a better server but his proposal was rejected. Sam says that he hopes for better luck next year. NEXT YEAR? I wonder how he would be able to work well with the daily frustrations!

Last evening, I came across low cost dedicated server hosting packages offered by SingleHop which I think would meet his budget. Of course, if he would like to upgrade to the fastest and most powerful Quadcore Dedicated Server Core2Quad Q9650 he could do that with SingleHop as well. It’s not really expensive, just $249 per month. The most affordable would be $189 per month only.

I don’t know what dedicated hosting server Sam is currently using right now, but whether it is Linux, Microsoft Windows dedicated hosting or cluster configuration, SingleHop would be able to meet his requirements.

Also, with SingleHop, clients could opt for flexible managed hosting or fully managed hosting solutions. Flexible managed hosting means that clients only pay for whatever services they need while fully managed means that SingleHop will take care of everything.

One thing is for sure, though. A company runs better with a faster and improved dedicated hosting server.

I was a little surprised to read about ComScore’s latest survey results which shows that Yahoo! Mail still commands the largest email market share, ahead of Microsoft’s Windows Live Mail and Google’s Gmail. Although Google’s Gmail had the highest jump in growth over the past year at 46%, Yahoo! Mail also grew by 22%. Not too shabby, eh?

I thought that Gmail would surely surpass all other web based email services already seeing how so many people are migrating their email to Gmail, except for those who are not able to get used to Gmail’s unique threaded conversations.

Personally, I am in the process of abandoning Yahoo! Mail already, not because I don’t like it but because I have had to deal with log in errors which make my inbox inaccessible and also with extreme deluge of spam mail. The only thing that’s delaying my progress is, yes, you got it, LOG IN PROBLEMS!

I received a phishing email purportedly from “Windows Live Team” with the email address dhb79@hotmail.com (yes, SPAM them!) saying that this email has been sent to all Hotmail account holders and they are doing “housekeeping” by closing down inactive Hotmail accounts and if we would like to keep our Hotmail account, we are to reply to them within two weeks with the following information:

* Hotmail ID: …………………………
* Password: …………………………..
* Date of Birth: ……………………….
* Country Or Territory: …………….

Well, you know, no matter how obvious some things look, there would surely be people who would fall into this trap, perhaps due to fear that their account would really be closed or something.

Anyway, this is just an alert to let everyone know that there is an email like this in circulation and that we should be careful in what comes through our mail box. Always avoid clicking on links in email, even if they are from people we know.

My sister asked me to check out a program which promises payment for people who submit links for Google. According to this program, Google is the paymaster. My wanted to try it out as it is only US$1.99 shipping for the starter kit.

I have not tried any such programs before because most of these are only open to residents in the United States but as far as I know, there are no programs that are paid by Google for submitting links to Google.

However, I have read that there are companies which pay people to submit AdWord text for their clients and they call such work “data entry” but these programs certainly are not paid by Google itself.

I cautioned my sister not about such programs after doing research online since to make payment of US$1.99, she would have to disclose her credit card information. I read that there are unscrupulous companies which will then charge the credit cards of buyers US$5 (or so) every month.