For-Profit Colleges Flunk Test, Lobby to Make it EasierPrivate, for-profit colleges, like Phoenix University, get a lot of Federal money — but when the government tried to make sure it wasn’t wasting that money, the colleges fought back:
via For-Profit Colleges Flunk Test, Lobby to Make it Easier.
The search engine optimization community has spent the last two years in a panic. SEO people flood our Internet with spam links and fake Twitter bots and paid traffic, to help bad websites look more popular than they are, to deliver fake viewers to web ads.
They now spend their lives on the run, Google nipping at their heels. Their biggest project? Removing all the spam links on websites like this one—the spam links that they put there.
In early 2011, Google issued an update to its search algorithm—they called it "Panda"—that elevated social media and news sites. Sites both big and small, usually spammy and sometimes not, saw major decline in their Google traffic. Companies like About and Mahalo and eHow cratered. Google said they wanted for "the 'good guys' making great sites for users, not just algorithms, to see their effort rewarded."
With all of the Free SEO options available to business owners, how can you tell what is worth your time. Let's face it, just because you have a free tool, you or someone in your company is going to have to use it, and that costs at bare minimum, company resources. After all at the end of the day, TIME is money. In this blog I am going to be discussing some of the best free SEO options available on the internet.
SEO or Search Engine Optimization is the implementation of the "rules" that search engines have set forth to rank in the top of their search results for any given topic, your search phrase. A search phrase is any word entered by a potential customer searching for your product on the internet.
Recently I came across a few articles that mentioned the CSS !important declarations, and there was a little bit of confusion over what they actually did, and how they could be used, as expressed in the user comments on those articles so here are some resources via Everything You Need to Know About !important CSS Declarations | Impressive Webs. and also… What are the implications of using “!important” in CSS? at Stackoverflow
I have been using WordPress for about six years. Different themes, plugins, and code editors have come and gone through this huge learning process as I have developed hundreds of websites, but the one constant for me has been the Firefox add-on Firebug.
It’s the only tool that I have stuck with throughout those years because I have been able to learn so much with Firebug and build projects so much faster by using it.
If you have never used a web inspector like Firebug before, what it does is allow you to bridge the gap between the source code and the rendered out page in your browser. You can look at each bit of code interactively and see how it fits into the page, adjusting the code in the inspector and seeing the updates live in your browser.
This is as close as you can realistically get to a WYSIWYG experience like Dreamweaver when you are building something as complex as a WordPress theme.
In this Firebug screencast I talk about Firebug and other inspectors, show you how to use Firebug to inspect a site, tweak CSS, fix JavaScript bugs, and build faster sites. Watch the video at the below link or read on for more info at: Inspecting WordPress With Firebug | Josh Leuze.
Pitching to a new client can be challenging for a variety of reasons. Designers must walk a fine line that entails winning the client without compromising their own needs and values. The willingness to do whatever it takes to make the potential client happy seems like a great attitude and a noble, prudent approach, but it doesn’t always have a fairly tale ending. The problem is, if we don’t watch what we say, we can end up making our new project an absolute nightmare. There are some things that we should simply never say to our clients in order to avoid headaches further down the road. read more…5 Things to Never Say to Clients.
$var = "Sample Text !!";
echo '$var'; //Outputs $var
echo "$var"; //Outputs Sample Text!!
?>
Now does that mean we should use double quotes always ? NO !! You must be wondering why ? Well , it's obvious that double quotes will require some more overhead since it does processing , so it will take some more time than single quotes . If there is a single line to be printed or so then this is not an issue , but suppose you have a loop that iterates a million times , what then ? It will be that extra time multiplied by a million !!
Suppose you have something inside the loop which is as follows :-
echo "Item Number :- $item";
Then write it as :-
echo 'Item Number :-'.$item;
In case of larger iterations this method should work more quickly than the previous one !!
read more via WebDevFunda: When to use double quotes and single quotes in php ?.
There is one type of content that can help us get out of the vortex of homework, homework, homework: TED Talks. Featuring presentations from some of the most brilliant minds in the world, TED Talks cover every topic under the sun in an easy-to-understand and inspiring way.
read more via 15 Phenomenal TED Talks You Need to Watch Today…and/or the next day and the next as time permits.
Republicans have held up meaningful student loan reform by running out the clock and demanding we actually increase student loan costs. Now the deadline has passed, and people seeking an education are facing skyrocketing costs.
We need comprehensive reform, but in the meantime, Congress must extend the 3.4% rate for another year.
The Senate will vote on the extension on July 10th. Tell Congress to pass the extension now by adding your name.
via Democracy For America – Extend the 3.4% rate for our students.
read more via MoveOn.org Civic Action.
The interest rate on federal subsidized Stafford student loans is set to increase from 3.4% to 6.8% on July 1st. If Congress doesn't act soon, millions of college students will see their student loan payments jump.
Some argue that it's too expensive to keep government loans at low interest rates, but the federal government makes low interest loans all the time – just not to everyone. Big banks can borrow money through the Federal Reserve discount window at a rate of about 0.75%.
The biggest banks in the country – the ones that wrecked our economy and cost millions of Americans their jobs – pay next to nothing on their debt, while students pay nine times as much. That isn't right. read more via MoveOn Petitions – Give students the same interest rates on loans as the big banks.
related stories:
University of Aarhus student Julian lays out a few of the reasons he thinks Universities in Denmark are superior to those in the USA. Controversy! Ana and Jayar consider moving to Europe.
via Paid to Study: Denmark University Student Rubs it In – YouTube.
Evernote makes it easy to remember things big and small from your everyday life using your computer, phone, tablet and the web.
via Use Evernote to save and sync notes, web pages, files, images, and more. | Evernote.
Across every domain — business, politics, news, entertainment, academia, government, war — the internet has radically shifted the balance of power so that small organizations now compete on equal footing with bigger rivals. In fact, in some ways being big has become a disadvantage.That’s the basic premise of Nicco Mele’s The End of Big: How the Internet Makes David the New Goliath, which serves as a call to arms for anyone running or working for, a small- to medium-sized business. For inbound marketers, his book has quite a few takeaways.
via 'The End of Big': Nicco Mele on the Rise of Small Businesses.
Scott Gerber is a superconnector. He knows a lot of people, and he works hard to introduce the right ones to each other. Recently profiled in Fast Company, Scott, pictured here with co-founder Ryan Paugh of the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC), is the author of Never Get a Real Job. But he's practically made a job out of connecting others. I met Scott about a year ago, through the YEC, and also know him through our investments together in Gen Y Capital. In just a year, Scott's been instrumental in connecting me to an investor, to a business partner, and three times to the media.
Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point, one of my favorite books, defined "connectors" as "the people in a community who know large numbers of people and who are in the habit of making introductions." Scott is such a connector. In fact, he's the best networker I've ever met, so I asked Scott for his tips about how to network. The secrets are out, below:
read more via 9 Networking Secrets From a Superconnector | LinkedIn.
Forget about your job title or profession – everyone is looking for ways to be more productive at work. It’s time to set down your gallon-sized container of coffee, toss out your three-page to-do list, and put an end to those ridiculously long emails you’ve been sending.
Experiencing a highly productive workday can feel euphoric. But contrary to popular belief, simply checking tasks off your to-do list isn’t really an indication of productivity. Truly productive people aren’t focused on doing more things; this is actually the opposite of productivity. If you really want to be productive, you’ve got to make a point to do fewer things.
read more via 8 Things Productive People Do During the Workday | LinkedIn.
For the past 30 years my company has been involved in creating over 2,500 different performance-based job descriptions that define the actual work a person needs to do to be considered successful. Based on preparing these performance-based job descriptions for jobs like camp counselor at the YMCA, accountants and engineers from staff to VPs, mid- and senior-level executives in industries ranging from automotive and aerospace to construction and consumer products, I can conclude that there are only four different jobs in the whole world.
Everything starts with an idea. This is the first of the four jobs – the Thinkers. Builders convert these ideas into reality. This the second job. Improvers make this reality better. This is the third job. Producers do the work over and over again, delivering quality goods and services to the company’s customers in a repeatable manner. This is the fourth job. And then the process begins again with new ideas and new ways of doing business being developed as the old ones become stale.
read more via There Are Only Four Jobs in the Whole World – Are You in the Right One? | LinkedIn.
Chris from Chrislema.com recently created a very useful infographic that I’d like to share with you today. It’s about choosing a Membership plugin, and it’s the best guide I’ve come across till now. Hope you find it useful.
via How to Choose the Best WordPress Membership Plugin : WPMayor.