I am sure if you are a Smortian, you would know that there’s a star rating for bloggers. If not mistaken, every new Smortian starts with four stars and with each task that was accepted and submitted, stars are awarded which could elevate or reduce the stars.

Well, everyone is fine with that. However, the strangest thing with this star rating is that even if you do not do anything at all, there is no activity at all, your stars rating could still tumble. What was amazing to me was tat I used to have 4/5 stars but after two months of ZERO activities in Smorty, except in the forum, my rating fell to ZERO.

That’s GRAND! Now not only do we have to worry about eating Google’s eggs, we have to worry about being served eggs by marketplaces like Smorty.

This morning, while checking the traffic starts, I came across this person from Singapore who landed at my blog from searching for Kuku chiao.

My god! Where got people search for kuku chiao online wan??? LOL I think this person must be a pervert lah! And I wonder why he landed here! Must be the post I wrote on Namewee and his Negarakuku song! Geee taint my blog only, don’t you think so?

I don’t know what’s up with him. Perhaps he has been going around the blogosphere looking for Edison Chen’s kuku chiao LOL If he was, then I am sorry I don’t have them!

Earlier today, Microsoft finally gave up on its bid for Yahoo! Microsoft felt that Yahoo! was demanding too much, for at least US$37 per share, when it was only ready to bid at $31 per share when the offer was first made in January, 2008. FYI, Yahoo! shares closed at $28.67 on Friday, the last trading session.

Apparently, now that the deal has been called off, both parties are relieved that they can now “move on”. Yahoo! has big plans, maybe in collaboration with Goog, that was why top executives and shareholders felt that they were undervalued by Microsoft.

On the other hand, Microsoft felt that Yahoo! was asking too much, BUT with or without Yahoo!, Microsoft will continue to proceed and expand their web advertising strategies.

Of course, as a web publisher, I welcome more competitive web advertising services. It’s time to break the stranglehold of certain web companies, don’t you think so too?

My traffic has recently fallen rather drastically. I put it down to my laziness to network. Well, that is my problem from the beginning but lately, that has coupled with my laziness to blog. Yeah, as you can see, I have not been updating my blogs as diligently as I used to. I would say that I was demotivated for a little while and then real life got in the way too.

I have heard that some people have received tremendous traffic from Twitter but I did not register because there’s nothing interesting enough in my life to share like that so I thought that I would rather not send more junk out to the web that I already am.

But just now, I received a free copy of an eBook and video file called Twitter It that supposedly teach us how to take advantage of the ready traffic from Twitter.

I have yet to read the instructions or even watched the video but the good thing is that I could slap y name to the product and sell it for a profit. So I’d probably try it out to see if it works as good as it claims.

I received an email notice from Exabytes about their important policy changes that will be in effect from 1st May, 2008. By the way, I think ALL policy changes are important. Is it not so?

Anyway, I am no longer a customer of Exabytes, have not been for a year or so, if not mistaken, but they still continue to send me email updates and a greeting card through the mail. Once, they even billed me! That’s awful business blunder, me thinks.

From the important policy changes, I think the really important point to note is that they no longer allow email hosted with them to be forwarded to free email accounts or online groups.

I used to use this feature of theirs but no longer. I tell you, setting it up was such a hassle, I think I wrote more than ten emails to them. Why can’t they make it simpler? I’m glad they have decided to do away with it!

I am not sure if you read about Alexa’s new methodology, or if anyone even cares about Alexa anymore LOL but then since they changed the way they track traffic to our blogs and not depend entirely on which browser is installed with the Alexa toolbar and which isn’t, I have seen a vast improvement in the Alexa readings of most of my blogs.

For some blogs, I see a reduction of a few hundred thousand! I hope they stay that way. I know they make no difference anywhere anymore whether they are high or low because many advertisers and marketplaces do not care about our Alexa readings but it makes me feel good seeing the low numbers.

How ever the new Alexa methodology works and how it affects our blogs and websites [ I did read the technical details but I did not GET IT], I don’t care as long as I do not have awfully high readings!

I received an invitation code from Register.com whereby we can save 15% off our order from them. The code is 15OFF4 to be applied at check out. This code is valid until 30th April, 2008.

I have no idea how many times this code could be used, if it is only for me to use or anyone could use it. But there’s no hard trying.

Personally, I will not be using it and I do not intend to buy anything from them. Their prices are on the high side, don’t you agree. Why? I don’t know. I buy all my domains from NameCheap.com

If you are going to use this invitation code, do let me know via Comment if this works for you. It will be helpful to other readers. Thank you!