Please follow this link and sign the petition to from extradition to the USA. Richard has broke no laws in either country he simply, like this site, like other sites, like search engines has linked to websites.

Please read this post about Links vs Sharing files to understand the case, or click here to sign the petition.

Please also share this post, and the petition. Thank You.

Back in 2008 I wrote my “seo tips” series which covered the SEO Basics. Last week I announced that I was going to begin work rewriting those articles, and this is the official announcement of the new series. The Starters Guide to SEO.

Over the coming months the guide will look at the concepts and techniques surrounding search engine optimisation today. We will take a journey through the world of SEO, looking at everything from the why search optimisation is important to how you as a website owner can leverage your audience both on the website and in social media. We’ll also take a look at core concepts of SEO including an insight into current coding standards and why content is more than just a few words on a page. Of course, this list isn’t exhaustive and as such do feel free to leave a comment or tweet me @andykinsey about what you would like to see in the starters guide to seo.

Each section of the SEO starters guide 2012 will be posted as an article here on SEOAndy and later the complete guide will be available for download as an e-book.

–

Also, If you would be interested in writing a section for the guide as a guest author please do let me know. The section list is already 50+ strong so the more authors the merrier.

In the March 2012 edition of .Net Magazine, the worlds best selling web design and dev magazine, I am lucky enough to have taken part in the “design build off”.

My design brief was to create a mock-up of an Intranet for anything of choice, from myself to a bluechip company. I decided to base my design around a hospice I work with, Willow Wood. The objective: to examine both the design and technology in use and the reasons for using such technology from HTML5 & CSS to Large Fonts and Accessibility Features.

If you want to take a look at the build-off pages and .net mag subscribe via their site
or visit a shop (such as WHSmiths).

You can follow .net on twitter @netmag

If you would like me to design and build an intranet for your business, visit andykinsey.co.uk today.

As many of you know SEOAndy is part of Andy Kinsey Designs, which also offers website design and graphic design services. Today I launched a referral scheme for those divisions, within a few hours I’ve had about 15 “affiliates” sign up.

The premise is simple, refer a friend and earn up to £25 per new client.

To get started all affiliates need to do is send me a few details and they can instantly start referring and begin to cash in on clients they refer.

Referrals are free to come via word of mouth, email, facebook, twitter etc – all the referred company  / person needs to do is let me know they are being referred and by who in the first contact we have about their project.

Why am I doing this?

This is a great question, an put simply I am looking to expand the business.

I currently juggle everything from initial contact, to the main work load to marketing the business and beyond. I want to be able to employ another person to help out, and also as back up such that if I am ever again the business doesn’t stop working for any period of time.

In addition to this, many of my clients and friends refer new clients to me. I want to say thank you to those refers for such amazing friendship and loyalty.

Want to know more?

If you would like to know more or would like to join the referral scheme please visit http://andykinsey.co.uk/refer/

Any questions you can email me via that site or leave a comment below.

–

Notes:

1) I will be adding seo services to this website and AKD website, plus adding them to the referral scheme in the coming weeks.

2) I will be issuing ad banners in coming weeks.

3) Each month I will be offering a prize to the person / company who refers the most number of clients successfully. 

In this post at the risk of becoming a news type I wanted to clear some crap up about the latest round of privacy updates from Google. Over the past few 24 hours I’ve read countless articles and opinions about how “scary” this is and with lots of news lets claiming a “backlash” against Google which just fuels the whole scary thing…

So in this post I am going to tell you why things have changed and what has changed that you need to know. Remember as you read this 99% of what is in this new document already existed, it was just duplicated across many other privacy policies and is now integrated into 1 (instead of over 70).

First, the changes to Google’s privacy policy will not happen until March 1st. So if you really want to leave Google you can do, no rush – just visit the Data Liberation website to find out how to get it out – its easy.

Second, the changes mean that Google won’t need you to sign in 25 times to get between Google Products etc – Think about facebook which has you ALWAYS signed in … not just on facebook but across the web. Google is just talking about on Google websites like YouTube and Google+ … seamless integration for you and setting across the board. Of course this also means more personalisation of what is on the page you are viewing, but in a world of increasing social influence is this really so scary? Again think of facebook always telling you what your friends have “liked” even though you never asked. At least with Google you have to be searching for something relevant to that…

Third, As i mentioned most of the policies already existed in one or more of over 70 documents. Google has always been fair with data and this won’t change. What will change is we will actually get a single document which will be nicer to read and make more sense – this is something regulators and consumers across the globe have called for since about 2006… I just wish other companies would now follow suit (BING?).

Fourth, the new policy includes further features for the New (which has been around for a while) and .  If you’ve not met them before take a look there is some interesting stuff in there (including data liberation stuff). In addition to this you will be able to share things with a lot more ease, thanks to new buttons appearing across the sites (and the new toolbar on the top of each property).

Fifth, unlike many of our large internet companies, Google is clearly now committed to being open and responsible (even more than previously) when it comes to information about you and me. If you would like to know more about the Google Privacy changes visit the information page.

The idea of blogging for myself, and others in the “internet world” is about giving people the inside track on what is going on. For example this blog gives you the inside track on SEO helping you and your websites to move forward in the race to be an all star number one google hit. Corporate Blogs are usually about a PR person giving you a load of poop about how amazing a company they are, but Adidas have broken from the norm with the launch of their first corporate blog, the adidas group blog.

Launched on August 1st 2011 – according to Jan Runau, the adidas Group’s Chief Corporate Communication Officer, the purpose of the blog is to “to provide authentic insights and additional background about our company“.

Since it’s launch the blog has done just that. It has had a fair few employees from various departments writing posts on everything from everyday tasks to new projects to the experience of working for the Adidas Group. The blog it must be said is fairly revealing and does give you a great insight into the workings of this global company.

Actually the blog launched internally in August and on 17th November went live to the public. This raises the question of why this was done, was the blog meant to be internal only originally or were they building up content such that the blog be a more fore-filling experience. I suspect it was the later. It was a very clever marketing move and means that visitors to this “new” blog can find lots of information to engage with – very well done to Jan and the marketing team on that one.

Now whilst Jan says it is meant to reveal lots of internal activity you can be assured everything is vetted on this and other such corporate blogs from global brands. So don’t expect to see an employee talking about bad experience, because it just won’t happen. To me this is a bit of a shame, I am sure the marketing team wanted to show transparency in their workings (without of course revealing trade secrets)  but that I believe can’t be done in this kind of “closed wall” everything vetted environment … we can only hope the team aren’t to strict in letting a few things through.

This blog launch has left me with a few questions about corporate blogging, and maybe you can help. Should a company blog just the good stuff, or should they blog the good and bad things? Personally I think honesty is the best policy and the warts’n’all approach should be taken with corporate blogs – as long as the good out weighs the bad that is. What do you think?