Swollen Pickles

Another Google Bomb has been dropped, and I'm warning you, Tom Cruise will not be happy! If you've never heard of a Google Bomb before, it is when people try to influence the Google search results via linking and anchor text in order to associate a search term with a website. Actually Wikipedia probably describe it better:

A Google bomb (also referred to as a 'link bomb') is Internet slang for a certain kind of attempt to influence the ranking of a given page in results returned by the Google search engine, often with humorous or political intentions. Because of the way that Google's algorithm works, a page will be ranked higher if the sites that link to that page use consistent anchor text. A Google bomb is created if a large number of sites link to the page in this manner.

The latest Google Bomb has hit the Church of Scientology. What do I mean? Well head on over to Google and do a search for "Dangerous Cult" and check out the first search result.

Just in case the Scientologists have taken legal action to have this Google Bomb defused by the time this post goes live, I took the liberty of taking a screenshot. Here t'is.

I'm not sure that is a keyword the Church of Scientology would like to rank highly for. What do you think?

Credit where it's due, I found out about this one when browsing "Gorilla Sushi", who have taken the Entrecard spot on Swollen Pickles a couple of times now.

3x PDA Stylus Touch Pen for HTC Magic Google Ion I O G2

US $6.63

16m

A million people have probably said it a million times better than I can, but just in case it hasn't been made clear to you yet, the film 'Juno' is brilliant.

Juno is the story of a sixteen year old girl, Juno, played by Ellen Page (Shadowcat/Kitty Pryde from X-Men 3), who discovers that she is pregnant following an evening of "sexual intercourse" with her best friend Bleeker, played by Michael Cera (George Michael Bluth from Arrested Development).

After overcoming the initial feelings of disbelief, Juno decides she will have an abortion. She quickly changes her mind when she bumps into a class mate, and pro-life protester, out front of the abortion clinic, and learns that her unborn child may already have fingernails. After consulting with her cheerleader friend, Leah (who has an unhealthy fascination for school teachers), Juno decides to put her baby up for adoption.

When confronted with the news, Juno's father and step mother are surprised that a) their daughter is pregnant and b) she'd had "sexual intercourse" with Bleeker. After getting over his initial desire to go an "punch that Bleeker kid in the weiner", Juno dad is quite supportive, as is her step mother. The relationship between Juno and her father and step mother is a highlight of the film. Typical Holywood teen pregnancy cliches are kept to an absolute minimum.

Responding to an ad in the local 'Penny Saver', Juno meets Mark and Vanessa (played by Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner). An odd relationship forms between Juno and the expectant parents, Mark in particular. As the day of the birth draws closer, all sorts of relationship based tension begins to build. Will Juno be able to give up her child? Will Juno hook up with Mark? Will Bleeker get another chance with Juno? Will I be able to stop laughing at the "pork sword" line? So many questions.

I believe that the word "quirky" was created in order for me to describe the movie Juno. It's a comedy, with tinges of drama, however it never goes down the path of predictability. Ellen Page is brilliant as Juno, firing off sharp tongued barbs like a ninja tossing ninja stars. There are a lot of laugh out loud moments in this film and the dialogue throughout the movie is solid gold.

Overall, Juno is an awesome 'feel good' comedy, that deals with some serious issues in an entertaining way. I have no problems at all in awarding this movie the highest Swollen Pickles accolade, I give it 5 pickles out of 5.

Desktop Home Hamburger Phone Telephone in Juno Movie

0 Bid

US $15.03

4h 24m

DVD Sale movie Juno

0 Bid

US $1.99

9h 55m

JUNO Movie Soundtrack CD JAPAN ONLY MINT C1840

0 Bid

US $14.00

14h 54m

It took me a couple of weeks but I have finally updated my goals for the 2008 calender year. You can view the 2008 goal page here, or just click on 'Goals' in the top navigation bar.

In a nutshell, here are the goals I have set for 2008:

1. Develop Swollen Pickles into a website that can generate $350 per month.
2. Develop Swollen Pickles to the point where it receives 30,000 unique visits per month.
3. Develop Digital Burn into a website that can generate $150 per month.
4. Develop Digital Burn to the point where it receives 15,000 unique visits per month.
5. Develop Motor Dude into a website that can generate $50 per month.
6. Develop Motor Dude to the point where it receives 7,500 unique visits per month.
7. Achieve my goal weight of 85kgs.

You'll noticed that I kept this years set of goals focused primarily on web stuff. I may have been a little optimistic in terms of the financial goals for a couple of these sites, but if I don't try, I'll never get there. If you're wondering how I arrived at the dollar figures, it was largely based on what I thought was achieveable given the growth in the past 12 months. Also if I averaged those figures over a year, then it would go close to paying my rent, and having a roof over your head is a good thing!

There's also a new, highly classified, uber top secret, project I'm working on at the moment, however I haven't included that in the list as yet. Perhaps I will once it launches.

In other news, I recently forked out the cash for the Pro version of the phpBay plugin. It cost me $49.95 US, but based on the performance of the Lite version, I'll have made my money back on it within a couple of weeks.

Every so often, you'll stumble across a story that makes you sit up and scratch your head in amazement. Most of these sorts of stories involve stupid people, doing stupid stuff. I decided to search for 'stupid people' on YouTube, and this post is the result.

Here's a nice little news clip that's up on YouTube, featuring what has been described as "the dumbest cop ever". I guess calling 911 wasn't his whilst high on his own homemade hash cookies was the smartest move.

Here's a guy that's earned the title of "dumbest bank robber ever". I'll let you watch it and make up your own mind.

There's no shortage of dumb celebrities. I'm not sure of her IQ, but Katie Couric doesn't sound all that intelligent on this one.

There's always good ol' Corey.

When you talk stupid, it's tough to go past the world famous Miss South Carolina.

That's all for now.

Happy Australia Day people! Hope you're having a good one, whether you're cooking a barbie with beer in hand, perched on an esky watching the cricket, or walking along the beach wondering why your thongs are making that squeeking noise.

A couple of aussie things to cross off my aussie 'to do' list today.

Firstly, I need to give a plug to the Aussie Bloggers Forum. Why? Cos it's aussie!

Secondly, I need to give a plug to the Aussie Bloggers Blog. Why? Cos it's aussie!

Thirdly, I need to give a plug to lamb. Why? Cos it's Aussie, and Sam Kekovich is doing his best to make sure lamb isn't forgotten on this most Aussiest of days.

Here's some of slammin' Sam's fine work in the promotion of lamb. This first one is Sam's 2007 address to the nation.

Here's Sam campaigned for the introduction of Australian Week to replace Australian Day. 

 

I thought it about time to highlight the top 5 blogs referring the most traffic to SwollenPickles.com over the past month. So here we go...

Number 1: Wormbrain

Wormbrain dominated the field in the past thirty days and has proven to be a referral champion. He's also teaching the world stuff, such as how to make a stop motion animated picture. Good stuff.

Number 2: Digital Burn

Yes, technically I'm my second biggest referral. Gee, I'm a total legend. Recently I found a nice, free and legal classical music album download.

Number 3: Blogpond

Traffic from Meg's Blogpond  dried up a little over the last 30 days... oh the puns, the puns! Yet found some aussie gold with some Peter Russell Clarke goodness.

Number 4: On Blogging Australia

Andrew is one of the people behind the Aussie Bloggers Forum, he's also been working on a map of his mind! I did my mind map the other day, it was just a straight line... I wonder what that means?

Number 5: Quit Your Day Job

This is a cool blog that pretty much covers off a lot of my interests. For the geeks, check out top ten fictional space ships. Every one loves a top ten list!

Plus, a special thanks to Lani for giving me a couple of good tips to help me fix some minor CSS headaches I was having with the new theme. Lani has just kick started a new blog, Blogging Personal, so go check it out.

If you've watched the Melbourne news over the past week or two, then you'll no doubt have heard of the sixteen year old "party boi" Corey Delaney. If you've been living under a rock, or just aren't from around Melbourne, then party boi Corey organised a house party while his parents were on holidays. It was reported that the party was attended by around 500 gate crashers and ended with an estimated $20,000 damages bill. Corey then went on to polarize public opinion due to his apparent lack of remorse for the whole mess, as well as his general 'image', which was a cross between homeless surfer dude and Lindsey Lohan pre-rehab. He's gone on to 'C' grade celebrity status, reportedly selling his story and fielding job offers from night clubs to organize under-age discos. All entertaining I guess, unless of course you are Corey's parents and/or neighbours.

He's also gone on to inspire a few websites. My personal favourite is www.slapcorey.com in which the aim is to see how far you can slap Corey down his Narre Warren street.

The real kicker came today when some larrikin has decided to put Corey's party house up for sale on domain.com.au for the princely sum of $20,000 (to cover the damages bill). Again, very entertaining, unless you are Corey's parents! It'll be interesting to see how long the link stays live for. Never fear, I took screen shots and cut them together, to give it the authentic 'just opened in the browser' feel. Click the super sized thumbnail below to open the full image in a new window (it's a large image).

You really need to be able to speak the language of the 'kidz' to underztandz wot iz being said, but youse should get da picture.