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Project 2 - VideoGameMusic.com Update 2 - Finished

Video Game Music is done. The only part missing was a header.

I used a contest on DigitalPoint to get it done for $20.

The winner was Zealot Designs with this logo:

Not bad for $20 and got to look at a lot of potential options and choose the one I liked most.

Tip: you can view any image on your live site using Firebug and inspect the image you want to change and edit the URL to any other image.

Project 4 - BookmarkingOptions.com - Because Delicious is Being Sold?Shut Down?

Bookmarking Options

The site is complete.

Data was collected about the providers I saw most mentioned across social media platforms. Important features were categorized and researched.

Instructions on how to backup/save bookmarks.

Project 3 - Buzz Scanner - Done(ish)

Buzz Scanner

What does Buzz Scanner do?

Buzz Scaner monitors 20 of the biggest brands (10 Tech, 10 Automotive) on Twitter and tracks their sentiment over time. 1 Hour and 24 Hour time frames are available.

It is a personally satisfying proof of concept that I wanted to build. I've played with the idea of Brand Monitoring for over a year and finally wanted to just build something in the space. A first step.

There is no monetization right now. But there are a few options if I decided to take it further in the future like creating a SaaS platform like all the rest. I think there is some consumer potential as well if you are monitoring content. Finding the *right* information is so valuable.

Project 3 - Buzz Scanner

Honestly, I am not quite sure what this will turn into. I've seen hundreds of buzz monitoring tools, I've written some stuff in the past to do data mining of this type of information.

I am thinking why not build something with a front end as well?

What I am planning:

1. Pull data from Twitter about pre-defined keywords (Brands)
2. Run Sentiment Analysis
3. Graph over time
.
.
.
#. Maybe put mashup other data (stock price)

How this makes money? Probably doesn't right away. Licensing the code, building something more complex/target a niche for a later version. Use it to build credibility to sell other services.

Project 2 - VideoGameMusic.com Update 1

Video Game Music is basically done.

The only thing missing is a header image to replace those silly looking coins.

Drupal Amazon Store module was a lot more painful than I expected. I had to:

  • hack around the default sorting
  • edit a lot of CSS to make it align properly (#edit-submit {margin-top:20px;} in amazon_store.css if anyone is having trouble)
  • hack the item processing because the thumbnails linked to the bigger picture for some reason instead of the item (amazon_store_search_results.tpl.php on line 54 change the print value to url("amazon_store/item/{$result->ASIN}"); instead of $result->LargeImage->URL;)
  • finally changing titles on pages from Amazon Store and Amazon Cart to something else in amazon_store.module (its in function amazon_store_menu()).

Drupal Amazon_Store Module - Default Sorting by Relevance (instead of best selling)

Posted in

As I was working on Video Game Music, I ran into a problem with the Amazon Store module.

It default sorts by best selling when you search. Good in most cases, but in a small niche like video game music I was getting popular stuff showing up that was completely unrelated. I thought perhaps I was missing an easy setting (I may still be). Nothing in the admin lets me change a default sort for search.

So, the hack that fixed it for me:

Line 533 of amazon_store.module:

  // Grab the URL args that we'll allow and put them in as parameters for Amazon search
extract($_GET,EXTR_PREFIX_ALL,"get");

Project 1 - AdProof.com - Update 1

Ad Proof - Ad Blocking Software and Reviews

It's live.

What's done:

  • Setup - Drupal 6 and CCK+Views worked like a charm
  • Content - there are 10 pieces of software listed to help you block ads and keep better privacy.
  • PPC Ads (Google AdSense)
  • Google Analytics

What's left:

  • Affiliate Programs - still signing up for/getting approved with various companies
  • Design - theme is installed, I modified header image, need a logo
  • Marketing - I realize I didn't include this in my last post, it needs some links and *real* content

What Didn't Work:

  • Reddit and Quora both failed me. I got one response on each saying AdBlockPlus. My personal opinion is it's a pretty damn good tool, but I thought there would be more options/responses. Maybe it was when I asked it or how I phrased/tagged. May try again later.

Project 2 - VideoGameMusic.com - E-Commerce Store using Amazon Affiliates

Video Game Music used to be a developed site using the Amazon API. I was using a script called Associate-o-Matic. It wasn't open source (encoded) and wasn't particularly friendly on the backend. My license ran out and Amazon changed the way their API works.

Long story short, the site has been broken for a while.

I want to get it functional again on something open source that I have a lot more control over.

Plan

  • Technical:

Drupal 6 with Amazon+Amazon Store

I may use CCK and Views again, not sure. I will probably use a youtube module of some sort. Need to see how well the Amazon store works and what sort of content I can include around it.

Standard other modules will probably be used again like Token, Pathauto, etc.

  • Monetization:

Project 1 - AdProof.com - Update 2

Logo is being designed at LogoNerds.

I searched around at a lot of options, I didn't want to troll the forums for someone because that's not really scalable. So I looked at companies. I used Logo Design Creation in the past but I found LogoNerds cheaper (27$ vs 39$) and it gives me 1 more concept (3 vs 2). The only downside is a potential for up to 2 more days in turnaround time (3 days vs 3-5 days).

Another interesting option if I wanted something more professional rather than a quick affiliate site I found was pre-made logos from Biz Logo. You pick a shape/design you like, browse the categories for something. Some really nice looking stuff in there and since it's pre-made, you're buying something you can see what you're getting.

Project 1 - AdProof.com - Ad Blocking Software Comparison

I want to start with something simple to warm up. This fits within my comfort level quite well because I have built many comparison sites before, for example:

Plan

  • Technical:

Drupal 6 with CCK+Views

This gives me the flexibility to create my own content types like 'Ad Blocker' which could consist of: Title, Description, Link, Operating System, Browser, Price, License, etc (That's my list of fields so far, but CCK allows me to change any time).

Views should let me display/sort the data any way I want.

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