Recently I wrote about Freebies4Webmasters. I signed up, submitted 3 web pages for ad placement and gained approval. I was paid 10 pounds (around $20) after the first month and my blog post resulted in 10 referrals.

Then the problems started. My approved referrals should have earned me 100 pounds so far. Instead, my approved web pages mysteriously disappeared from the system around the time Freebies4Webmasters decided they were not accepting any new publishers.

I have been patient and tolerant up to this point but after 5 unanswered emails I am sensing a stone wall of scamminess.

I will keep the ads up for one more week, on the off chance I receive a reply. Kind of like Waiting for Godot. If I don't receive a response by then it will be bye bye Freebies4Webmasters. I feel quite cheated as I know many have received payments larger than the ones owed to me at this time. The exchange rate would have approximated to $233 plus around $10 per month as an automatic payment. Not happy. Needless to say I will not be recommending this site to fellow bloggers.

:-(

technorati tags: freebies4webmasters ads scam

I received a rather amusing email this morning - for a brief moment I thought it was for real. It is not unusual for me to get direct emails for various projects. However further reading exposed the extent of my wrongness:


I have a project I want you to run with us. It involves exportation of 100,000 barrels of crude oil daily from Kirkuk, Iraq.

If you are interested, email me.

Mr. Yan.


Hmm. Well thank you, Mr Yan, I appreciate your offer. As a humble blogger however, I do not happen to have room for 100,000 lazy barrels of crude oil in my garden shed. In fact, last time I checked I did not have room for a single barrel.

Why you would be still hoarding such a valuable resource is beyond me. You could have exported when oil prices were at their peak. I'm sorry, Mr Yan, you missed your chance. If you will just check the latest figures, the current price for oil is $61.04. What you should have done is tapped into your seemingly unlimited oil reserve in March 2008. $150 per barrel! Ah, the tragedy of hindsight.

Exporting from where? Iraq, you say. Gee, let me think...

Much as I would like to travel to a volatile region during wartime on the basis of a spam email, I think I'll pass. Thank you so much for your kind offer, not that I will respond because you are probably camping out in some evil hovel wherever on earth it is that spammers like to slither. But I can't help being a little disappointed. All my dreams of becoming an oil baroness. My backyard oil refinery will have to wait. *sigh*











Thus endeth my exploits at international business.

technorati tags: spam scam email crude oil

If you are like me, ie. camped in front of the computer wide eyed and open mouthed, watching the pretty blue and red colours appear across the states, you might like to view the incoming results for the US Election 2008 on the following links:


BBC News US Election 2008 Results Map

This map requires Flash, but you will see the results as the votes are counted state by state.



SBS World News US Election Results 2008

The SBS World news map features a zoom to individual states to see the breakdown of votes by county.



CNN US Election Results 2008

Updated frequently, detailed information state by state.



Business Day NZ Latest US Election Results 2008

Updated less frequently, this coverage contains text updates and election results map.



P.S. I have no fingernails left.

technorati tags: US Election Results Coverage 2008 Barack Obama Joe Biden John McCainSarah Palin