This site offers themes and extensions for Joomla. There’s a membership involved, but it’s pretty cheap: around $100 a year or around $500 for developers (you can use and modify the themes and the code inside). I haven’t used Joomla for more than 2 years now, but i still subscribe to this membership in order to get the new themes. Why?

Well, cause they are great. They look amazing, are coded pretty well (could be tweaked though) and come with great JS animations suitable for displaying featured posts on your site’s home page for example. Some of you may say there’s nothing special about their themes, but since I’m not a professional coder or a designer, i find them very useful and, like i already said, an inspiration source.

And now, here are the top 3 JS slideshows i found with their help and i plan to use (in a modified way of course) on my future sites:

1. the cell displaying 4 featured posts with thumb, description and big picture (from this theme)

1. the gallery box (from this theme)

1. a more classic way of displaying featured posts (from this theme)

And there are others too. If you’re not impressed by these things or if you know better examples that do the same thing, please please be a sport and leave the links via a comment. Thanks in advance.

©2012 Mike's Quarter - technology and cool gadgets blog. All Rights Reserved.

Similar posts you might like

It was kind of hard at first, cause most stores had no consoles left after Black Friday. But i found a nice collection of accessories for great prices (some even discounted). You can see them in the slide show below: 

Then I kept searching, cause i needed mainly the console and not the accessories for it. I found this site, where there were quite a couple of Wiis for sale, but the prices were pretty big considering they were used.

So i kept searching. I didn’t think it would be so hard to find a bloody Nintendo Wii for sale online for a good price, but it seems it was: if a found it for the budget i had in mind, it was out of stock. But…

In the end i found it. Where? On Amazon of course. And how much does it cost? Well, i won’t tell you: Just click the link bellow and find out

The best online deal for the Nintendo Wii

Of course, you can always choose other options too, like the Sony PlayStation 3 or the Xbox 360. But i doubt any of them will give you a gaming experience similar to the Nintendo Wii. And sales numbers are a proof for that too.

©2012 Mike's Quarter - technology and cool gadgets blog. All Rights Reserved.

Similar posts you might enjoy

• Acer AspireRevo – powerfull minicomputer with Nvidia Ion inside
• Diablo 3 – the end of my social life is here
• GTA IV star, Niko Bellic, wants more money
• Halo 3 sucks
• Too much gaming might get you like this

According to Wikipedia, "a blog (a contraction of the term "Web log") is a web site, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order ".

What does this mean? A blog is just a site, where the owner posts whatever he or she wants: text, pictures, videos, etc. Each thing written is called a post, and the posts are displayed in reverse-chronological order – the latest post is the first in the list.

What’s the difference between a blog and o regular website? Well, there are a few. First of all, a blog is content biased, but a site can have many purposes: can be a newspaper’s online edition, an online shop, a video sharing site, a social service, etc. So, you can mostly compare blogs to content websites. But there are still differences.

A couple of years ago, blogs were the thing that revolutionised the online content. Content sites were clambered and over stuffed with information. Readers wanted an easier way to digest all that information, with a lighter simpler layout. And that was given by the frugal blogs: a big column with posts , a comments box , a menu and a search bar. That was all they had. Nowadays, some of the biggest content sites are built on the same simple principles of a blog: Engadget.com , thehuffingtonpost.com , gizmodo.com . Big online newspapers also adopted the light blog look too: wsj.com , nytimes.com .

Blogs have come a long way since their beginning, nowadays being the most popular way of displaying online content and a symbol of the WEB 2.0 episode. They can display content, pictures, videos, services, animations, etc. But blogging is still in its early days, there are still lots of things to come and evolve.

That’s it for the first step of our journey. In the next post, you’re going to learn a couple of things about how to start blogging.

©2012 Mike's Quarter - technology and cool gadgets blog. All Rights Reserved.

Similar posts you might enjoy

• 25 styles of blogging
• Do you qualify as a good blogger?
• 5 Free Wordpress Themes You Could Pay For
• Twitter applications you must use
• The key to a successful newsletter

On 3 sites i used to have the following color schemes:

Background: white

Title: blue

Url: blue

and i had the following CTR:

Site1: 4.15

Site2: 1.47

Site3: 4.34

After i changed the schemes, here are the results:

Site1: new CTR: 3.06

New scheme: Background: black , Title: blue, Url: red

Site2: new CTR: 0.2

New scheme: Background: orange , Title: blue, Url: red

Site3: new CTR: 3.7

New scheme: Background: white , Title: blue, Url: red

All these ads spots were 336 x 280 boxes placed just above the post like in this blog. The new CTRs are the average of the values measured in the last 7 days while the old ones are averages measured in the week before the test (so that’s for the previous week). Together with the CTRs, the eCPM values dropped too.

So, here are the conclusions:

* blended ads are better than emphasized ones, at least for the 336 x 280 box placed above the post in the top focus zone

* Blue is the color asociated with the link and people are more likely to click your ads if you use blue (as seen int est number 3, where all that was changed was the color of the small link, from blue to red)

* CTR drops brings also eCPM drops (but that’s not a rule)

From this small experiment i did not find better color schemes but a worse one. Now I’m moving forward for new schemes hoping i will improve my initial CTR. Testing and retesting will bring results on the long time. Keep in touch for more results.

©2012 Mike's Quarter - technology and cool gadgets blog. All Rights Reserved.

Similar posts you might enjoy

• Adsense earnings going down?
• Do you have a plan?
• When do you know it’s time to give up?
• A CRM software to manage your sale leads
• GTA IV star, Niko Bellic, wants more money

Anyway, i was wondering the other night how hard can it be to create a successful start-up? And then something stroke me: Why don’t you plan your own start-up? Why don’t people start more start-ups? Is it too difficult or nobody loves adventure anymore? So let’s think about that and make a list of possible problems you might meet if you plan your own start-up.

The idea

Like in most online businesses, everything starts with an idea. It does not have to be brilliant and unique, but is has to be better and bring something new to the market. Of course, most of the guys (and girls) planning a start-up get stuck here: they fail to get an idea good enough to worth the effort.

The age

Actually, nobody says there is a perfect age margin for brilliant stat-up owners. No, you can be 18 years old but also 50, and succeed. What really matters here is maturity, the ability to face challenges and the mentality of a winner. Some people posses this skills and don’t run away with their tails between the legs when struck by problems, while others stand still and try to solve and out-pass the impasse. Now, which ones do you think are the winners?

Lack of commitment

This can be translated as laziness. Most people really enjoy freedom so they are kind of reluctant to commit to something for a long time. But every project requires hundreds of hard worked hours and unslept nights, but hey, nobody said it would be simple. So if you’re not the kind willing to work his ass off in order to succeed, than perhaps you daily 9 to 5 job is exactly what you need.

Already wealthy enough

This is a mentality perfectly suited for my country. If i already have lots of money from home, why should i work? Why can’t i just spend daddy’s moneys and be happy already? Start-ups might be stressful. Spending money coming from somebody else sure isn’t…

No dime in the pocket

On the other hand, there is this other problem. Some persons are committed, have the great idea, are willing to work but… they don’t have a time. And since every business needs an investment, this problem would cut lots of wings… But if you really believe in your idea, there are solutions: find partners, find financing, borrow money, etc

Fear of failure

I myself face this problem. Fear of failure stops many from even beginning working on their start-up ideas. What if i will fail, what if i will loose all the money I’ll invest, what if all the time spent will be in vain? Well, that might happen, but you won’t live to find out if you don’t even have the guts to start, would you? So stop complaining, start acting! And if you’ll fail this time, it’s important no to give up: next time you’ll do better and you’ll use all the experience earned now.

You love your 9 to 5 job

Well, you’re a coward. You settle with you 9 to 5 job, working in you cubical, doing the same boring things all day long, every day, every year. If that’s the case, i’m sorry to say that, but you’re a lost cause my friend…

Of course, we could be rumbling on this subject for hours. We’re just finding excuses. Cause in the end, if you really want to start a new Internet project and are willing to work for its success, you just have to do it and don’t look back

©2012 Mike's Quarter - technology and cool gadgets blog. All Rights Reserved.

Similar posts you might enjoy

• Economy and Internet trends for 2008-2013
• Learn how to write a good CV
• Quick question: Popup marketing – works or is it just anoying?
• Moreniche – earn $45 just for singing in
• A couple of whys