Traditional Alexa Post

To my surprise Alexa site rankings have already been updated again. Once more, with a sigh of relief, I can report quite pleasing results.

I posted an update recently when I added a new site to the Tylee Health Education (THE) Network family of sites. The addition is our Health Products Site and it too has been updated and is now included in this traditional feature.

So here we go:


www.The-Health-Gazette.com moved up from: 88,908 to: 84,119

www.Healthy-Vitamin-Choice.com moved up from: 92,118 to: 88,782

www.Herb-Health-Guide.com moved up from: 121,466 to: 116,728

www.Education4Skills.com moved up from: 180,166 to: 175,051

www.HealthProductsSite.com moved up from: 2,790,500 to: 1,046,099

Naturally it feels good to have all of the sites moving up in the rankings. The astonishing improvement in HealthProductsSite.com probably reflects our ongoing publishing effort during the site launch rather than improvement in other visitor traffic, but hopefully we will see further improvements associated with real traffic quite soon.

The other sites haven't made any big moves but they are incrementally heading in the right direction so we may as well enjoy the resulting good feeling while it lasts :-)

I would like to be able to spend more time working on each of the above sites but my other commitments keep me just too busy for the time being. That will change in due course.

For now it is back to my other site development projects ...

Google PR Experts Thin on the Ground

Yesterday I began a small quest to uncover some details related to my PR 0 issue. It did'nt seem like a very big deal and I assumed that a search would reveal an appropriate forum where webmaster experts would immediately recognize the issue as something they'd encountered.

Of course my related assumption was that having located such a venue, people would be willing enough to offer some worthwhile free advice. After all, I do this all the time.

It turns out that it is much more difficult than I expected. There are two problems.

The first problem is that vast numbers of people appear to sprout forth their assorted ideas to account for just about everything even remotely Googlesque. That's fine, until you recognize that they really don't know what they're talking about and that for every pontificated notion their is an equal and opposite one on the next page. Could this be Newton's Law of Google Advice?

The second problem is that the people who probably do know the answer to my questions about the Google situation, operate in fairly rarefied air it seems. They have become the unreachables. Their knowledge and expertise is freely available, but only to one another. Evidently real Google knowledge is a status commodity, not to be given away too lightly.

Of course, playing this game is a wank. How can one tell if they really do know what they're talking about if they won't share it or expose it to public critique?

My conclusion is that it's all just too dificult to be bothered. Sooner or later I hope the big G gets its act together and allocates some page rank to my sites. In the meantime, I am content to get on with what counts regardless of Google, and leave Google to its calculations. As for the remote, alleged experts, well, they have just become totally irrelevant.

Perhaps PR is as one self-proclaimed "GoogleGuy" pronounced and Google is reported to have stated, merely for entertainment. I, for one, am happy to consider the Google Toolbar PR to have nothing more than entertainment value. I can also tell you that I'm not so desperate for entertainment as to need that!!

Expert Help Needed re PageRank

After considerable patience and some reflection I think it may be time to seek some expert advice on my Google PageRank issue. I cannot think of any reasons why my PR is still at zero.

My sites are reasonably new but that doesn't explain complete zero values since they have been well and truely found and indexed. That's what puzzles me. Almost all of my pages are "in" Google but the PR is still zero.

We aren't talking about crappy, spammy, software generated, adsense mania pages. All of them are professional standard, content rich and completely original and have no advertisements at all.

My Healthy-Vitamin-Choice home page did have the standard PR 1 when it was first indexed by Google. This sat there for some time while the other pages still had not been added. Now the other pages have been added, which means Google clearly has found them, but the PR at the recent update went from 1 to zero, which just doesn't make any sense at all.

None of my pages has ben banned. There is definitely no reason why they should be. They all have PR of zero, not the greyed out PR indicator of banned site.

Time is usually the answer. It takes time for Google to get around to updating the PR values. So why did the one site already with a temporary PR 1 go to PR 0 when the update occurred? I have even waited for a couple of weeks since the update to allow plenty of time.

So I just can't work it out. I have great sites with ample pages and several incoming links. They are known to and indexed by Google. Technically, they shouldn't be at zero, but they are. I'll just have to seek some expert input to try to find out what the story is.

I'll try a well ranked webmaster site and see what I can discover. Hopefully someone has some information that can help me fathom what is going on. I'll let you know what turn up.

New Site Launch Announcement

Well OK, it seems I am running a bit behind scedule with this site launch announcement but that's just the way it is. Remember those posts about being overloaded with projects? Need I say more...

Anyway, here is the announcement. Today I have added another site to the Tylee Health Education Network. Ta da! (c'mon, some kind of drum roll please :)

http://www.HealthProductsSite.com/

Yes, yes, I know, the name is a bit, well.. a bit... ummm... well, yes, it is. But it will have to do. After all, it is our health products site (as opposed to our many education sites).

I will add it to the Alexa site update tradition here at Woffling On so we can track its progress together. Won't that be fun!

Yeah well, maybe I should get out more ;-)

So, to catch up on my last post, this new site is currently ranked at 2,790,500.

Not great but not bad for a brand new site. It had its first content published yesterday, 27 September 2005. I can't say it is fully ready but it has some great products available already so its time has come.

Pop over and pay us a visit. It may be very good for your health.

Still Moving Up

Well it is always a pleasure to follow a tradition when things are still going one's way. So it is quite a pleasure to bring this little update to light.

Fortunately Alexa has provided this update quite quickly again. The last one, you may recall, seemed to be delayed for some time.

Anyway, here are the new details of our Alexa site rankings as of today's update. Happily all of them have climbed, even if not by very much.


www.The-Health-Gazette.com moved up from: 94,571 to: 88,908

www.Healthy-Vitamin-Choice.com moved up from: 93,898 to: 92,118

www.Herb-Health-Guide.com moved up from: 128,609 to: 121,466

www.Education4Skills.com moved up from: 184,969 to: 180,166

It is good to see that Education4Skills.com has climbed a little. I think it is really just a minor fluctuation around a consolidation area, so it isn't really much to become excited about. However, it is good to know it is still doing well.

To some extent a similar situation may well be developing with the other sites too. Obviously they can't just keep going up forever. However, I would be quite pleased if they could stabilize within the top 100,000 sites that Alexa maintains are quite accurately ranked. We shall have to wait and see.

I have another site to add to the list later today. It is brand new, with content just hours old as I type. I have one or two more pages to update and then it can be "unveiled" and announced to the world.

Stay tuned.

I Still Need to Delegate or Outsource

Things were looking brighter there for a short while when my son was able to help out. He does such fantastic work, and he's blazingly fast. Ahh.. to be younger hey? Well, I'm into anti-aging and know the real benefits but it still doesn't make me as effective as my son when it comes to moving through projects.

So, what can be done? The obvious choices are:

• Drop some projects to reduce the total workload
  
• Change the schedules to reduce the workload to a more manageable level
  
• Critically evaluate the workload components and restructure to simplify
  
• Delegate some objectives to spread the workload, lowering mine
• Outsource some of the workload altogether

It boils down to reducing volume, extending time, working smarter or somehow offloading. Far from being willing to drop any project, I already have additional projects in mind. This also makes extending the time less attractive since a quicker clear-up rate is desirable to open the way to new projects.

Each of the bottom three on the above list is sensible enough but requires at least a temporary diversion of effort. There is an on-cost in workload terms associated with implementing any and all of them.

Assuming I decide to bite the bullet, so to speak, and attempt to outsource, where do I start? I know how to locate outsourcing agencies but do I really want to deal with them? I don't think so, to be honest. So do I simply look someone up in the phone book? Nope, the work is to specialized. Advertise then? Gosh, it all starts to look like another project has crept in by stealth!

Well, it looks like I just have to press on. I had best stop woffling and get back to work. Big breath...

Travellers' Update

Well news has finally filtered through from the European oddyssy. I have heard from both my daughter and my son.

My daughter called from the consulate in London where she and her husband evidently had to do some administration to obtain access to their pre-arranged rent-a-car. My son-in-law had intended to take his driver's licence, but forgot. Understandable really, he was so amazingly busy right up to the moment of departure.

So my daughter called and asked me to go to her place, find their licences, photocopy them (fortunately they have a copier) and then wait for a call from the consulate with a fax number to which the copy could be sent. All went smoothly and took less than half an hour so presumably they are now off enjoying various parts of the UK.

My son emailed with details of their time together in Holland. Again, they all had a great time, though he noticed that his sister was clearly more in the tourist swing of things and didn't tire as quickly as he did!

They just missed going up the Dom tower in Utrecht because of a train delay from France, but everything else went smoothly enough. They visited various parts of Amsterdam, walked endless streets in old and newer districts and enjoyed some great canal trips by boat (or is it barge?).

They visited Rotterdam and took a trip by boat to the kinderdijk and took the obligatory photos of the 19 windmills. Indeed, my daughter evidently found that to be the highlight of her Netherands visit.

My son has some digital photos that he will send later today and evidently my son-in-law took quite a few film photos. They should be pretty good I think, as he's quite a good photographer.

I probably won't hear from my daughter again until she returns. Their European adventure end in about one week. Then it will be back home and back to work. The trip doesn't last all that long perhaps, but the memories can last a lifetime.

The Tradition Lives On!

Just when I had pretty much given up on that wonderful tradition here at Woffling On of citing the progress of some of my websites, in terms of Alexa rankings, I have more data. Whew! It's good to know that I haven't been totally put out to pasture.

So, how did I fare? Not too badly at all really. I am quietly pleased with the outcome.

Here are the details.

www.The-Health-Gazette.com moved up from: 144,350 to: 94,571

www.Healthy-Vitamin-Choice.com moved up from: 112,802 to: 93,898

www.Herb-Health-Guide.com moved up from: 187,889 to: 128,609

www.Education4Skills.com moved down from: 178,308 to: 184,969

Given that Alexa acknowledge some innacuracy in ranking beyond 100,000 it is very pleasing to have broken into the prestigious top 100k with two sites. This is especially the case given that the sites are not very old and I still have to work on promoting them.

Ranking of course refers to relative traffic volume. No doubt the secret to success in attracting and hopefully keeping traffic, which really means visitors, is to provide plenty of valuable information.

I know that my sites deliver excellent information on health and wellbeing. As a health promoter therefore, the above outcomes are quite pleasing. Of course I do realize that this is just the beginning. More content must be provided for more people. At least I appear to be moving in the right direction.

Thanks Alexa. I appreciate the feedback.

Do You Trust Google?

What a silly question hey... fancy asking if you trust Google? Everyone trusts the big G. Or so it would seem.

Let's see now, for just a quick sample we trust Google to:

• index our web sites so they can be found
• provide us with many services such as web and desktop search, email, etc
• monitor, calculate, collect and pay our dues from advertisers if we run Adsense
• keep our private details confidential

This list could be fleshed out quite handsomely without even trying too hard, but I think you get the point. We, certainly very many of us, do indeed trust Google. The evidence is in our behavior. How else could you explain what we do in the interactions listed above? Certainly there is abundant evidence that a lot of people place a lot of trust in the big G.

So, if you, like me, are someone with a relationship of trust in Google, tell me this: who is Google? You can correct this to what is Google if you like but a company is much more organic than just a thing, so I'm comfortable asking who is Google?

This is a much more important question than you might at first recognize. Google is not that nice couple of young, clever guys who followed their dream and beat the giants in the search engine world. That makes great copy in various permutations, but Google is now very much a corporate entity.

Some, perhaps even it's CEO (or is it really CEOs?), may feel that Google is theirs and perhaps some type of extension of themselves. The reality is that Google has sold out, umm, I mean been bought, by Wall Street. That is, it is now a public company and has taken on a truely corporate identity and the corporate culture that necessarily comes with that.

Corporate cultures, like any organizational culture, can do very strange things to people. The person one is as an individual, as a spouse or parent or volunteer worker or whatever, is not the same person one is as a corporate employee, at any level in the organization. Remember that.

So by all means go ahead and continue to trust Google. But be smart, keep a watching brief. Treat Google a bit like the ocean - don't turn your back on it. The editor of WebPro News today refers to the Google Print project and asks:

Google is receiving legal support for Google Print. Will this affect the way they index these collections?

The fact is that many of the original supporters of the project which involves Google scanning the total content of several libraries have changed their minds. They no longer think it is a good idea. Essentially, they have lost their trust in Google.

Trust is very important. Sometimes trust is taken for granted and sometimes advantage is taken because of it. Just raising your awareness of the issue of trust may help you to reflect on where yours is placed and why. That is a good thing to do from time to time.

Disturbing Health Trends! For Whom?

There is a global war being waged of which most people are blissfully unaware. I guess if there has to be a war, one people barely notice has to be the best type. Then again, stealth warfare can still create massive collateral damage so it may be worth waking a few people from their dreamlike slumber and confronting them with the real world.

The war I refer to is being waged between the pharmaceutical industry and real health promoters. That's right, interesting isn't it. If you are one of the ignorant majority (no offence intended, it's not your fault) then you may still live under the misapprehension that the pharmaceutical industry is about health.

Sorry to disappoint you. That industry is about a few things, but actually creating health is definitely not one of them. They are principally about money. To achieve this they are secondarily about disease. Achieving health is merely part of the public profile used to persuade the the not-too-deep thinkers and none-too-astute observers.

The pharmaceutical types are the people who make those politicians who smile warmly at children while snatching their candy, look like saints. You don't cross these people lightly and they have scared off, or worse, many a critic.

Their best puppets are the politicians and legislators of all types. Their favored tools include scientists (who are so easy to buy it's just not funny), jurists, licenced health practitioners, mainly orthodox medical practitioners (you know the one's - they take the hypocritic oath) and anyone viewed as in authority or able to wield power.

To the pharmaceutical industry's utter dismay, consumers are wising up to the tricks and coming to their senses. They are growing tired of all the promises of wonder drugs to heal all manner of disease and seeing that those drugs actually cause diseases. Any gains are, for the most part, at the expense of terrible and unwanted side-effects and then also cost a fortune.

A massive amount of money is being siphoned out of your pocket a dozen different ways and going into the pharmaceutical industry's coffers. It is not available for real disease prevention, nor for sensible research into treatments that will benefit people but cannot be pattented to maintain the pharmaceutical companies' power. It is not available to make roads safer to reduce the road toll, it is not available to educate people about healthy lifestyles (heaven forbid!). Getting the point?

Yes, people are beginning to see through the facade and recognize the industry for what it is. Those who have been the pharmaceutical industry's best supporters are worrying more. What if these actual health trends continue? What if people reduce or avoid useless and needless drugs in favor of lifestyle change, improved nutrition, better and cheaper treatments?

Well the pharmaceutical industry has seen this coming for years. They are not stupid. They have prepared contingency plans. They are quietly behind moves to restrict access to nutrient supplements by creating laws to prevent people buying them and others selling them. Sounds like the make believe rantings of some paranoid nutter doesn't it? A good script for Holywood (and don't they need those these days!) but surely not true.

Sorry, it is all true. I'm not a nutter and you can find more details easily. I won't even give you a specific link lest you think it's a trick. Just do a Google or similar search on Codex Alimentarius for starters.

Why are they so worried? Where is it exactly that an epidemic of good health is breaking out? Good questions, you have been paying attention.

Just take a look around the web for starters. More and more information actually about health, how to achieve and maintain it, is being provided. Alternative treatments that actually work are being made available. Just today I was reading a site that not only provides excellent health information, but a range of proven health promoting products too.

You can look at this wholebody dietary supplements site yourself. No, it isn't my site and I am not an affiliate for it either. When you visit, just notice the large number of medical and other health professional clinicians who swear by the efficacy of the products. It's true, we're not all bad, some of us actually do care. I have never heard physicians saying similar things about pharmaceutical drugs, even though they were bribed heavily to do so.

No wonder the backlash is mounting. Mark my words, more heated battles will follow.

General Catch-Up Woffle

It must be time for just a general woffle I think. Let me see, what can I banter on about?

Well, for a start, I can say "well done" to Google for their Blog Search tool. What a little beaut. I don't hesitate to say what's good and bad about the big G and this is definitely one on the good side of their ledger.

As for the happy travellers, I have had no update at all. However, Jenny assures me that by today they will be in England, having left The Continent behind. That's pretty old fashioned isn't it. I haven't heard anyone talk about "The Continent" for many years.

I still have no update of my Google Page Rank. They seem to have forgotten about me. C'est la vie.

I also have had no update on my Alexa site ranking either. Have I missed something? Did I maybe not get some important memo? Oh well, dems da breaks. Life goes on.

My search for quality health products continues. I have been finding some but they will take time to evaluate. Still more are needed to meet world wide requirements.

Ohhh.. I remember one issue from a long time ago. I was exploring hosting services and said I'd provide an update. If I recall correctly I did mention that I found a good reseller service for me but which I was keeping to myself. A bit unfair perhaps, but there are so many idiots around on the web, I really don't want them wrecking servers I may share.

Well I'll just provide these two very quickly for anyone who accidently stumbles upon this post. (Why else would you be here?) For complete beginners who need to succeed on their first web business venture I recommend Ken Evoy's SBI! approach at SiteSell.

For anyone who is up to managing their own linux based setup using cpanel I highly recommend the best value host on Earth. Yes, I'm very serious. If I told you the price and/or the inclusions you would think it was a scam, so I won't. It is a service I have multiple sites with and they are rock solid. If you don't want to use them, fine, all the better for me.

I never did update the digital camera situation either did I? That goes way back now. I got as far as saying it was between two particular cameras, one a Canon and the other a Kodak. Well, the fact is I became so busy I didn't get around to making a purchase, so when I find time I'll have to refresh my search before purchasing.

That's all the woffling time I have to update things with, so it's back to the grind stone.

Happy Travellers Update & Confronting My Cultural Bias

Back on September 9 I updated the holiday travel progress of my daughter and son-in-law. At that stage they were in Nice and had enjoyed every day of their journey. Today they are in Amsterdam.

Actually, they have met up with my son and daughter-in-law in The Netherlands and they will tour around various parts of Holland for the next few days before heading over to England to explore parts of the UK.

My daughter telephoned a couple of days ago and sounded just great, obviously happy and reassuringly energetic. Yes, we know just how tiring travelling can be, but she sounded full-of-beans, as the saying goes.

Evidently Paris went over quite well. My daughter said she could easily spend a month in Paris. She loved seeing the Mona Lisa and exploring The Louvre.

So what will the reports be from Holland I wonder. My parents visited there many years ago and enjoyed it very much. They had Dutch friends living nearby in Australia and I think that helped some how.

Since then I have found the Dutch to be very, umm, how can I put this... mixed. Yes, that's it, "mixed". Some are completely delightful, quite cultured and engaging. They are bright and friendly.

However, many are simply rude and offensive, lacking in even basic interpersonal skills and civility. They employ the defensive claim that culturally they simply prefer to "be direct and to say just what they think."

While that conveys some truth, the fact is they are mainly simply rude and offensive. It appears they have such high levels of self-centeredness that they are insensitive to the feelings of others, know this, and just don't care. They would prefer to justify or explain away their behavior than change it.

This isn't very politically correct is it? Here I am making broad generalizations about a cultural group. This may have me labelled a racist! Well, too bad. So be it. Call me what you like. Just tell me this: how is it that if I say "the Dutch are such a wonderful and friendly people" it is perfectly acceptable, yet if I say "the Dutch are rude and self-centered" it becomes racist?

The truth is that even highly educated, deeply caring, open and accepting individuals, like me, if completely honest, would admit that the broad variations that most certainly do exist between cultures, do create a distinct impression. The challenge then of course, is to deal with individuals on their personal merits rather than to prejudge them as members of that cultural group.

I believe I do that quite well. Those who try to adopt the moral high ground by claiming they form and hold no such broad cultural impressions are either liars (perhaps chiefly to themselves) or extremely lacking in observation and analytic skills, to say the least.

In any event, what I know of Dutch bureaucracy and cultural values informs my own views of The Netherlands. I hope my family travellers will find it an enjoyable place to visit.

Well, So Much for Tradition

Well, so much for that tradition of regularly updating my various sites' progress up the Alexa rankings. I will have to resort to my individual log files now, to monitor progress.

It may well be that the Alexa figures are not accurate above 100,000 but my daily and weekly figures had well and truely entered the sub 100,000 area so I felt quietly confident of ongoing improvement in my 3 monthly average rankings.

However, suddenly the updates just stopped. I was very impressed with the regularity and frequency of updates. It did seem worth creating my little cat-inspired tradition upon, but now ...nothing.

I don't know what the story is. Perhaps Alexa is upgrading or simply giving their crawlers a holiday. Who knows. Whatever the story, I have had no Alexa updates on any of the sites I was updating in this blog. Pitty really, I was quite enjoying that tradition while the rankings were improving so steadily.

Not to worry though. A quick check of some webmaster forums (or fora for the purists) indicates that not many people take the rankings seriously.

Seriously meaningful or not I was still enjoying watching them climb. I think the Alexa toolbar still offers real value and the capacity to easily click a link to obtain quite a bit of extra information about visited sites is very handy.

I will certainly keep the Alexa toolbar and just wait and watch occasionally to see if my rankings ever change again. As for the tradition of posting the results here, well why not. I might as well, since I started the practice. Just don't hold your breath waiting for the next post.

Google Who?

Well I understand that Google has performed its most recent updating of Page Rank values. Good for them. But, who are they? What are they? And why should I care?

Sounds like... yes, guess who didn't fare well in the last round of updates. Well, to be clear, it wasn't a big deal. The token PR 1 that my home page of just one site had been given as a new find, has vanished. My new ranking is therefore zero. Big deal.

But, hmmm this Google thing is a trifle weird if you ask me. I can't make any real sense of it. Yes, I do read and have actually quite a good understanding of the pros and cons of having a Google experience. I can calculate page rank according to the most widely circulated methods and I quite appreciate the vaue of Google SERP placement. But so what?

Not just to feel in good company, I simply have to acknowledge that far more people think they know how the big G's page ranking works than do in fact actually know. There's far too many self-professed Google experts who make up for quite a lot of gaps in their understanding of Google with a little creative licence. Net result: they parrot a lot of twaddle.

As I have said before, Google is quite overrated. Many internet marketers, those who actually do make their living online, gave up on working out Google a long time ago. I regularly hear them say "forget Google". I think they worked out that if Google had its way, it would not be a case of working out Google, but working for Google!

I can understand their point of view. Certainly I would agree that only a fool would base their online existence on pleasing Google. The big G is a multinational corporation now and has its own masters and its own agenda. To a mere mortal caught up in the web, Google could appear quite capricious. It is certainly not a sure foundation for any serious web based activity.

Add to this the observation that a multitude of so-called SEO "experts" and others we won't even bother labelling actually spend their lives hacking Google or in some means tricking the beast and it becomes even easier to realise that worrying too much about Google is a total waste of time.

Anyway, that will be quite enough woffling for now. I have to go and hide from the Google secret police, they're bound to track me down from this little post. I hear they're quite sensitive.

Father's Delight

At present I find myself rapidly approaching that overload situation I posted about just last month. I am currently managing several complex projects simultaneously and at times I almost lose track of what day it is. Been there?

This is not such a bad situation for someone who needs challenges, plenty of mental stimulation and who enjoys the content, processes and overall environment of the projects. But sometimes it can all get just a bit too much.

At that stage several possibilities emerge of course. With luck, these possibilities remain entirely elective. Well, maybe it is more good management than luck, but the point is that if decision making remains in control, one can activate various "relief valves" to, in the imortal words of John Farnham, "let the pressure down".

Of course, if wisdom does not prevail, eventually something out of control will supervene. All too often this is some form of health breakdown. Not an option for me, thanks very much!

So one might re-evaluate and reassign priorities, inventing a new time schedule for work performance and/or target completion dates. This is a pretty smart first step. Unfortunately it is one I find difficult to implement. Some can, some can't. I have some reluctance.

Of course, one could simply ditch one or more projects or downgrade them into smaller and less demanding exercises. Again, not always suitable and not an approach I favour.

Now there are other clever management strategies, but the best by far all involve some version of getting help. Simple isn't it; just delegate. Find staff. Whatever, just don't be left carrying the whole load alone.

Well, as ideal as the textbooks make such a strategy seem, it can actually involve adding a further project, namely, finding/hiring staff. Not a small undertaking at best and incredibly difficult when dealing with highly specialised projects.

So, is it too late? Is all lost?

No, not at all.

Fortunately my son has offered to help. Whew! I'm saved. And it's not just a 'lifeline offer' that gives me a lighter feeling for now but never actually comes to anything. He made the offer and immediately took up the strain. He was into it. And he works hard and fast. I can feel the burden lifting even as I type.

Now I'm feeling just great. Yes, I am now making much better progress and feeling better about that. And yes, I am relieved to have some pressure taken off. But it goes way, way beyond that. It is the utter delight that a father feels to be able to work with his son. That is priceless.

Health Products Search

I am having to spend quite some time in my search for quality health products with global accessibility. A quite extensive search resulting in sifting through loads of rubbish resulted, quite happily, in finding one excellent manufacturer of quality herbal health products. Their herbal cleanser is extremely good.

The only problem is that this herbal products supplier ships strictly to the US and Canada. That's great for residents of those two countries, but what about the reset of the world? That search continues.

I did also locate the world's very best manufacturer of nutriceutical fomulae. To my delight, they can and do ship globally. Their product designed to support longevity is simply brilliant. I will add them to my site soon but you could check them out on their own website now if you like.

I am regularly asked to recommend sources of quality products and the requests come from many places around the world. I am responding by creating a website that provides details of appropriate suppliers for a range of health products, such as:

• herbal health products
• vitamins and minerals
• other nutritional products
• products related to pure water
• products related to pure air
• products related to exercise and fitness
• various assistive devices
• and so on ...

The point is, I need to locate manufacturers that can meet my very high standards and I either need to find suppliers with a global reach or I must find sufficient to cover large areas of the globe.

This is proving to be quite a challenge and takes rather more time than I had hoped to spend. The trouble isn't finding suppliers, but finding quality.

Unlike the many marketers I regularly encounter who either don't care or simply lack the knowledge and skills to make informed judgements about quality when it comes to health products, I feel ethically obliged to put in the effort and make recommendations of a professional standard.

When my collection is at a suitable stage of development I will put the information on my HealthProductsSite.com and I can already see that it will be a work-in-progress for quite some time. Hopefully I can get something posted fairly soon.

Food Pyramid: Another Aussie Invention

There's no doubt about it, Aussies are an inventive bunch. The number and variety of Australian inventions used throughout the world is quite amazing.

Why 'amazing'? Well, the population only recently breached the 20 million mark, so there's not too many Australian's around. That must make the number of inventions per head quite an impressive figure when compared to countries with hundreds of millions, or billions of people.

Right now though I am talking about the Food Pyramid. Interestingly enough, I have never liked it. For years I worried my colleagues because I could never subscribe to the idea that it contained anything like the gospel of healthy eating that it claims to convey.

Without any intention of making this an "I told you so" post, I must say that I do feel vindicated at last. The version that I grew up with is history. Unfortunately, at the rate of updates getting through to the population in general and even specific key groups in particular, we will no doubt suffer more of the nonsensical 5 food group teaching for many years to come. Pitty really.

Nevertheless, the old one is gone. Unfortunately I cannot change my tune since the new one isn't much better. It is disturbing to see just how much powerful lobby groups can influence decision makers and reshape health facts.

Harvard University School of Public Health argues that in the US the agricultural lobby groups leaned on the USDA to influence the recent version of the updated food pyramid. Such pressure groups are everywhere.

What is the average person meant to do to learn sound, unbiased health information? It certainly isn't made easy is it. Even most health professionals simply sprout what they have been told (taught?) which in turn was simply an acceptable position after lobbying and decision making. Health politics is very, very big business. That means lots of money, lots of power and lots of corruption of truth.

Alas, getting back to that pyramid, it seems Aussies are to blame. According to Mr Shrapnel, a nutritionist who recently conducted some research in New Zealand, "the food pyramid is a recipe for deficiency". He went on to say:

“The concept of the Food Pyramid was created in Australia in the early 1970’s as ‘fat phobia’ began to dominate nutritional thinking. Nutritionists forgot that some fat is necessary in the diet to provide essential nutrients”

So well done Mr Shrapnel, you appear to have a penchant for stating the obvious and at least some of the truth. Yes, there is more to this story, but I'll save it for The Health Gazette.

Resonance, When it's Good to be In Sync

In my efforts to promote health and wellbeing I frequently find myself at odds with the orthodox so-called 'health' community of professionals. Yes, I am part of the community of health professionals, but I am very comfortable being one of the odd-bods who doesn't toe the party lines.

I say 'so-called' health professionals because in my opinion the vast majority of members are truely unworthy of the description. The fact is, they are mostly concerned with illness, injury and disease, not health at all.

This is a long-standing problem. Many years ago the World Health Organization (WHO) played its part in trying to show the error of their ways. The WHO did this by providing what may be regarded as an official definition of 'health'.

They said health is the state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease and infirmity. Why do you think they put it that way, with an emphasis in the last phrase that seems to be chiding or correcting errant views?

It is because so-called health professionals had become so focussed on disease that the positive concept of health had been lost. They had completely lost the game plan for promoting health and acted in such a way as to suggest that all they needed to do was eliminate disease and health would magically appear.

Complete rubbish. Health is most certainly not simply the absence of disease and it will not spontaneously appear with the removal of disease. But lets be quite clear here, they also fail to deliver on what they do focus on. Can you show me where on Earth health professionals have eliminated disease? No? Sad isn't it. We pay a very high price to be suckored by this massive medical con.

So you see I am what you might call different. I actually know what health is, what it looks and feels like, what its determinants are, how to achieve and boost it. Yes, I know about disease too, but that's not where I want to focus.

Being this different does present its challenges. It can be a bit lonely at times and sometimes one feels like a lone voice crying in the wilderness. So it is very, very encouraging when I find someone else who is on the same wavelength. Someone who presents views and takes consistent actions that are in tune with my own.

One such person is Warren Matthews and I highly recommend his newsletter. If you want to hear some real truth about health and disease and are interested in ways to significantly improve your health, read what he has to say and then take action. You will be very glad you did.

Remember, your health is your responsibility. Do something about it now, don't wait until it is too late.

Happy Travellers Now in Nice

Only five days and already another email from my daughter and son-in-law. Yes, email is wonderful.

This one comes from Nice in France where the happy travellers are loving the marinas (yes, we all love boats, it runs in the family) and the ready availability of fresh foods.

To my daughter's amazement, she is recalling some French. Good to know all those private school fees are paying off! She reports that reading signs and other text is fine and she can easily make herself understood in French, speaking to the locals. I say to rather than with since she says her understanding of spoken French is running at around 1 in 10 words, if that!

Hmmm... how much were those fees again? No, only kidding. It's to be expected isn't it. Unfortunately, on this visit there won't be enough time to "get her ear in" but it all sound like good fun.

This update says they are both really enjoying themselves and that they particularly enjoyed the Amalfi coast in Italy and that Positano was beautiful. I think I am developing a travel itch myself, or maybe it's just that spring has sprung here, so it coud be hay fever. Just kidding, I can make the differential diagnosis between the bite of the travel bug and hay fever.

One thing to note is that gluten free food was readily available in Italy but has been impossible to find in France. Need for that is another thing that runs in the family, unfortunately. Though it should be said that virtually everyone would be better off health-wise by avoiding gluten. But that's another story...

Search Engines Compared

There is plenty of talk these days about search engines. At least there is plenty of 'webchatter' for want of a more appropriate term. Whether on web pages, in forums (yes, I know the word is technically fora, but so few people seem to use the correct word these days 'forums' has grown to be at least equally correct), in ezines or newsletters, or wherever else, such 'noise' is everywhere.

I won't begin to attempt a summary here, that would be far too large an undertaking. Nor will I attempt to address the key themes. What I will do is to present a simple case study. Actually 'case study' sounds a bit grand for this, but that term will do for now.

I will use Herb-Health-Guide.com as the case in point. This is a site of mine that is quite new. I haven't done any aggressive promotion of the site. A couple of weeks or so ago I did submit the domain to about a half-dozen minor search engines and directories (I hope that doesn't offend anyone!). Prior to that, it had an inbound link from Education4Skills.com and one from Healthy-Vitamin-Choice.com, which had itself only been set up about a month before the Herb Health Guide site.

I did apply for DMOZ inclusion but that has fallen into the 'backlog' abbyss and nothing has happened with it as far as I know. In any event, the site is only a couple of months old (in terms of actually having any content published) so nothing can be expected from this overworked and understaffed directory at this time.

So what is the Herb Health Guide site like? I'm naturally biased, so you should go and see for yourself, but I'd say it is one of the best sites on the web for broadly accessible, quality health education pertaining to herbs. It is fully W3C compliant XHTML and has clear navigation and a clean, crisp look and feel. It recently added some dynamic content that updates three pages daily and 7 pages have randomly posted clinical case studies on each page load, to keep their content fresh and interesting.

Lets get to that search engine comparison then shall we. As of today, Thursday September 8, 2005 the following search engine listing results were found. I should point out that these were obtained using the SearchStatus 1.8 plugin by Craig Raw for Firefox 1.0.6 which executes the "site:herb-health-guide.com" query on the three major search engines.

The Results

Google contained 20 pages (Returned in 0.09 seconds)
MSN contained 80 pages (Returned in 0.1 seconds)
Yahoo! Search contained 141 pages (Returned in 0.31 seconds)

The differences are significant. The clear winner is Yahoo and the clear loser is Google.

Not only is Google far more cluttered with garbage sites than its competitors, it seems to be far slower and far less thorough when it comes to indexing quality informational sites. Increasingly Google is suffering from the many problems associated with its success, or so it would seem.

I have been a keen user and supporter of Google since its original appearance on the web, years ago while still teaching in the university sector. The big G's growth and development are quite astonishing. Now though, they face far bigger problems and issues and they no longer enjoy some of the ingredients that secured their past success. They do seem to regularly 'pull a rabbit out of a hat' and they will continue to need some magic if they hope to lay claim to being the premier search provider.

For now I am happy to be so well represented in the majors. All of them.

The Outlook is... Desperately Busy

Well spring has sprung in the southern hemisphere and fall has begun in the north. Times of different activities as people basically change, or prepare to change, gears for the coming extreme seasons of summer and winter respectively.

So, what gear am I adopting? A faster one perhaps, as things heat up? Yes, indeed. A faster one that will feel like "flat chat", "peddal to the metal" and "all systems go"! Or insert your own cliched phrases if you get my drift.

Why so busy? Simple; it's time to roll forward into the next major site project. Not that I feel totally comfortable with existing ones, but hey, nothing's perfect, it's time to move on.

Each added project becomes permanent (at least as far as that term can have any meaning in a world characterized mostly by rapid change) and adds to the total load. Each new project adds significantly, even dramatically, to the workload for at least two to four weeks. What fun! Or should that be: what fun?

So within a day or so I will be rolling forward straight into the next major project. The outlook is definitely for busy periods ahead. Actually, in the short term the outlook is indeed: desperately busy.

Still, some how I shall try to squeeze in a moment or two just to have a little woffle session. Just me and my little blog, the perfect listener.

Quite Fond of Drupal Now

Well it has to be said that Drupal has some rough edges, but my goodness, who cares! Having done a bit of real work with it now I must say that I have definitely become a fan. You may recall from earlier posts that this was by no means a foregone conclusion as far as I was concerned.

I am glad I stuck with it. If you are struggling and thinking of quitting I can only say this: give it a bit longer, it may grow on you too.

I find most of the (somewhat limited) built-in help messages to be quite good. Certainly they are much better than the tortuous mess that passes for online documentation of the system. Gosh, it needs some work. Let me be quick to give a "hats off" to the many contributors who have volunteered their time to establish as much as already exists (poor sensitive souls). Stirling effort! Don't stop, just cut and polish a little.

One area that needs a lot more work is the documentation of contributed modules. It would probably advance the cause of Drupal if a two-tier system were introduced. At one level the basics could be made available for folk who are quite capable of working out what to do with them, perhaps even how to further modify them, and so on.

The next level could be for much more polished and well documented modules. New users without the skills for level one could simply fish from this second level pond.

Actually, let's clarify that just a bit. There is already such a system of course in that a CVS version exists for the more techo folk and a collection of contributed modules is listed for everyone else. It is this collection that I think could be further divided. Either that, or contributors need to be encouraged to provide documentation of a certain quantity and quality before releasing their work.

Basically, if the Drupal community are keen to attract more users, the documentation is an area that must be improved. Yes, yes, I know, the Drupal community includes me too, so what have I done you ask? (My, you are a sensitive lot.) Well, nothing actually. We shall have to see what the future brings.

For now I am limited to waxing positive in my woffling in the hope it may encourage some who would otherwise quit or to attract back some who already have. It really is a very useful tool. If you have a need for a CMS or simply want to get a dynamic website up and running, give Drupal a fair tryout. You may just be very glad you did.

Aren't You Sick of those Keyword Adsense Marketers

I must say I have grown rather tired of the pathetic internet marketers who slap up worthless sites purely for the purpose of vending adsense and similar advertisements. Have you had enough too?

They use either websites or, very commonly now because it costs them nothng, free blogs. Blogger blogs are certainly targeted. I guess Google doesn't mind because, after all, they are serving Google's advertisements. In a sense therefore, since Google owns Blogger, it is aiding and abbeting the scoundrels and collecting the revenue.

It may be that these crazed marketers, or would-be marketers because I think one needs to actually be successful to claim the label, don't actually make more than a few dollars or even mere cents every month for their efforts. But for the big G, when you multiply those few dollars by the number of mug punters giving it a go, I'm sure it amounts to quite a tidy sum.

The prospects for seeing a reduction in this web pollution are therefore not too good I would venture to suggest. Damned shame that. I have really had quite enough of the worthless webspace cluttering up the search engine results.

Perhaps Google has become a Goliath. There may be several Davids honing their skills with small, themed, search engines who are able to generate revenue sufficient to be successful and who will win out over Google and the other big search providers by keeping their act clean.

I would much rather use a search engine that returned relevant results and wasn't cluttered with so much rubbish. Then I simply wouldn't have to land on those junk sites. This could save quite a bit of time and frustration.

Now if I stop using Google, no big deal. But if lots of people who are equally fed up stop using Google, that's quite a different story. The same applies to all of the search engines. They need plenty of us, just as we seem to need plenty of them.

Hmmm, maybe that's why Google is seriously diversifying. It no longer is totally dependent on search based income.

Email, What Delight

It's interesting how context changes words. Just a couple of days ago I was thinking of email with tones of lament as I reflected on the errant ways of would-be spam eliminators. But of course I love email, hence my expressed concern.

Today all is sunshine and light as I reflect on the joys of email. What a fantastic communications medium.

To what do I owe this happy disposition? The arrival of some spledid email of course. And what was that? Well, it was email from my daughter from an internet cafe in Rome.

Yes, it was very good to hear from her. It was especially good because not only do we now know that all is well, we also know that she is enjoying every minute of her travels on holiday. With her husband, she is spending over five weeks travelling through Italy, France, Holland and England.

There are some other countries through which they will pass of course too. For instance they flew directly from Sydney to Frankfurt.

Yes, it was very good to hear from them. It certainly highlights the value of email.

Another Alexa Update Already - In Honor of Cat's

How often does Alexa update their site traffic ranking? I'm not sure. Sometimes it seems to take forever - probably when I can't wait to see if a site has climbed. Mostly though, I must say they seem to be updated almost every other day.

It isn't that frequent of course, it just feels like it is at times. I've probably just become more aware of it lately because, in my delight at upward mobility, I started posting the results here on "Woffling On".

So, if I've learned anything from my beloved pussy cats it's this: anything done once that's good becomes an instant tradition! I've certainly been pleased with the changes lately so posting them here feels pretty good, so I'll make a tradition of it - at least until I change my mind. I also learned that from my cats. All people owned by a cat will understand.

So, how have I gone? Pretty well again actually. One site is consolidating while the others are steadily climbing. Last Monday I posted the following.

www.Healthy-Vitamin-Choice.com was at: 125,278 Now: 120,627
www.Herb-Health-Guide.com was at: 214,489 Now: 202,782
www.The-Health-Gazette.com was at: 188,274 Now: 163,873
www.Education4skills.com was at: 172,465 Now: 173,558

Now these are the updates for today.

www.Healthy-Vitamin-Choice.com was at: 120,627 Now: 112,802
www.Herb-Health-Guide.com was at: 202,782 Now: 187,889
www.The-Health-Gazette.com was at: 163,873 Now: 144,350
www.Education4skills.com was at: 173,558 Now: 178,308

Quite pleasing really. Still largely defying gravity. Must get back to writing content.

Ezine First Edition Almost Ready

Well the shadows lengthened and night has fallen on September 1st 2005 here in Australia. Today is my deadline for publishing the first ezine edition of The Health Gazette. Fortunately it is published from one of my US based servers so I still have some time up my sleeve.

It's just as well too. What a big job it is, trying to get a first edition "to press". All of the template choices, layout decisions and so on have to be made. Later editions simply need fresh content, although of course, some gradual modifications to the look and feel can always be in order if necessary.

It has taken quite some time to get the ezine, or newsletter if you prefer, actually this far advanced. First we were going to be publishing several newsletters, one for each of the Tylee Health Education network of sites, but that was clearly going to be too onerous.

In the end we chose to merge them into just one decent publication and to give it a centralised domain of its own from which it can serve the network. We took no advice on this, it was all our decision, so we're left with no one else to blame if it proves to have been a mistake to do it this way.{ ;-) That's fine though, we're into personal responsibility.

Well this was just a very short break to take a moment to relax (well, reflect, may be a better term). I must get back to publishing. If you want to know what all the effort is for, go to one of my domains, say Healthy-Vitamin-Choice.com and subscribe to The Health Gazette ezine edition.

On that page you'll also see some of The Health Gazette blog edition pulled by XML feed into the HTML page. It's all good stuff, take a look.