The criteria is very straight forward with very little restrictions on what we can actually do to win. You can get a list of rules under Mulley’s post.

The goal

By 3pm on 1st December have a new domain be in #1 position on Google.ie for the key term geansai gorm – simple!

At the moment there are very few results for the term geansai gorm so it will be interesting to see how the scuffle pans out over the next 4 weeks. 24 hours in and things are already starting to take shape.

It’s interesting to see what people are doing or more importantly, what they aren’t doing. Someone has already caught my eye by doing some domination tactics, I can take this bastard and he’s going down!

If you decide to take part then best of luck!

FYI: If you leave a comment on this blog linking to a geansai gorm site or use its keywords, I will remove your link and insert my own – fair game.

The full transcript will probably be published under Google Groups some time soon.

Richard Hearne has announced the dates of the next webmaster meet up to take place on October 31st the night before BarCamp Cork on November 1st.

So as before with the webmaster meet there are no rules, no special invite needed, you don’t even need to know anyone and its totally free. Just come along introduce yourself and have a chat, simple as that.

I am not 100% sure if the folks of BarCamp need to be informed if you are attending, I can’t see any mention of it on their site. If you fancy BarCamp Cork on 1st November and want more info go ahead and contact them directly, I’m sure they’ll provide everything you need.

You can read more about the BarCamp manifesto here and follow the Webmaster meet up discussion here.

Unfortunately for me both events fall on Halloween weekend and I am expected to be in Derry, dressed as a clown, for the cities biggest yearly event.

*update*

Pat Phelan is orgainising a Pre BarCamp Dinner so if you are ineterested drop him a comment to confirm. Also, Sabrina Dent is organising a Sunday mornning brunch which will be a great way to wrap up the weekend events.

As part of my web catch up I’ve decided to link out to posts that have caught my eye, similar to Damien Mulley’s fluffy links series. I had to give mine a different name though and thought up, better late than never links.

First I need to say thanks to Blacknight for sponsoring the last Irish Webmaster meet up. It was great meeting some of the crazy webmasters out there such as Michael  Wall (self proclaimed painter & decorator),  Jason Roe who actually believed Michael was a painter & decorator and caffeine addict James of I accept cookies and Forbairt Media. It was also great to see James Farrell get some 1-1 advice from Loiue of Eire Web design about a Google ranking issue. Did you ever solve that issue James?

I also had a quick chat with Richard Hearne (Red Cardinal) about his interests in user Experience and testing. As always Richard provides brilliant advice which you can read in his post providing 5 simple user experience steps for VHI.ie I have to admit that I’ve learned a lot from that post.

Cormac Moylan’s announcement that Omniserve has a competitor for their Google Rapid Inclusion Tool caught my eye. I’ve been following Omniserve’s claims on how they get their clients into Google with particular interest so I wasn’t surprised to see someone launch FluffyLinkulator.  If I can get the time I’ll probably do a full post on Omniserve’s Google Rapid Inclusion Tool and better ways on how to get a new site into search engines.

Hopefully I can rustle up another better late than never links post sometime this week. Pointless me promising a weekly occurrence at this stage.

So if you are in Dublin on August 9th and have some free time in the evening come along and enjoy the night.

When:  August 9th 2008
Where: Harbour Master in Dublin
Time: Arrivals from 7pm onwards

Some of the webmasters that have confirmed they will be attending are:

Richard Hearne
Michael Wall
James Larkin
louie
garycocs
David Behan
Leo Fogarty
Michael Flanagan
Cormac Moylan (to confirm)
Dave Davis
Gavin Doolan
Michael Morris

Like previous webmaster meetings in Dublin this list will grow, keep an eye on the official thread for more attendees.  I have yet to confirm if I can attend.

I’ve learned a lot about search engines and optimisation from Aaron so it’s great to see a local Irish search marketing consultant get the opportunity to interview Aarron about the SEO industry and provide a great insight from one professional to another.

See the Redfly Marketing interview with Aaron Wall of SEO Book

There are a few names on the guest list that I wouldn’t mind meeting up with for a small chat and certain powers above me are pushing that I volunteer to speak about Disaster Recovery & Protection.

If I am heading to Belfast you’d probably find me hanging around Michael Kitchen & Danielle McDougall of Aventure Web Host as I’ve few things to pick their brains about but also to try and grab the Micro server they are giving away for free I’ve been to their offices in Belfast on more than one occasion and they have always treated me to a really nice lunch. I’ll not go into all the help they have given me in the past but I will say they do what they do extremely well. It’s just a pity the boss man would prefer to sit at home and watch cartoons than to go out and meet up with some interesting people, like me.

I’ve also spied that Michael Wall from Codefixer Software will be attending and although I have never actually met him before we have previously exchanged emails on various subjects. Michael seems to be a sound bloke with a skill for coding so I’m sure it would be good to meet him face to face.

Anyone else that I should be keeping an eye out for?

If you are really interested in learning how to make money using LinkedIn read on.

LinkedIn isnt an easy market but there again you could try what some moron suggested:

Write an ebook about “How to make money using LinkedIn” and start to sell it here (on LinkedIn).

If you even consider it then you are thick as two planks, in my opinion anyway. No but seriously, if you really want to make money and have pondered all the above then I will suggest this site……just for you.

For me these type of tools come well into play before even starting a new site, they provide a better idea on what words we should be covering within a site.

I like the looks of the CPC store and how easy it would be to ‘bounce’ visitors onto the products getting paid for the clicks. It’s a very clean design and has very little clutter making it easier to see exactly what is being presented.

The store itself is extremely easy to setup, a few clicks and it’s done. After the store is created change the domain’s nameservers to reflect the ones that Chitika supply.

I’m sure this new service is going to open a few windows of opportunity so it’s probably worth throwing some time at it. I’ve been using Chitika’s services for 2 years now and it’s not bad, excellent for those with a technology site or blog.

If you are not a Chitika member already you can signup here, recommended if you have dormant domains or a tech site.