vaksel

because it seems like half the time, companies are partially bought for the talent...so if you can get a much better developer it helps adds to the valuation.

but yeah quite often it seems like these companies with thousands of developers...could be run with a 20 times smaller team

yeah but then all you have to do is get hit by a virus specifically designed for that one password manager and you lose everything

wow that's a whole other level of fraud.

NYC is a bad example, the real estate costs really sky rocketed over the past 25 years or so...so it's very possible that someone could have gotten one of those buildings on a $40K/yr teacher's salary.

Good luck doing that in this day and age

yeah

you'd think they'd want the CEO to be able to 100% focus on their startup

If for example the CEO's wife lost her job...$150K is suddenly not that much for a family. Do you really want your CEO to do consulting on the side to pay the bills instead of focusing on the startup?

you really need to set your expectations lower...give it at least 24 hours to hear back from them

why should Google get involved? seems like an overreach.

yes...but I'd bet they have a lot more recourse if they are a major Google customer...if a bug lowers your rankings..tough...but if you are a customer it'll get resolved.

my guess is that their research shows that at those prices they make the most money

and by them I mean Amazon...not the author.

A <$10 kindle purchase for Amazon...means that the person will spend extra to bring the cart up to $25 to get free shipping

yes...but all those stories would have boosted GoDaddy by quite a bit in rankings in Google

My guess is that this change is temporary and that someone at GoDaddy is calling their Google rep...and we'll see a fix shortly.

GoDaddy actually uses Adwords(and they rank #1...so they spend the most)...NameCheap doesn't appear to be(at least for the domain name search term). And they have a valid claim for being the biggest domain registrar...so Google loses nothing by playing the game and getting them to rank higher

could you write up a blog post for the author's experience with the publisher(i.e. reports/promos they did, your earnings per book etc).

well his revenue isn't over...most of that is fixed cost...his variable cost is very little.

So a year from now, that same book will still bring in similar revenues(he just has to keep up with the promos).

Meanwhile he can write 4 more books in that same period, and quadruple his income. The next year he can write 5 more, and a year after that he can write another 4.

And altogether they'll make the same income...especially if he builds a reputation for writing good guides, and will begin marketing to his existing customers("hey, if you liked my book on Unix...you'll love my book on Linux")

And so many books are written, because people are hoping to strike it rich. To be the next Harry Potter writer. Same with startups...the stats show that 90% of them fail...but people are still doing it hoping to make billions.

noone picks numbers out of thin air.

they do a/b testing to see what gets the most revenue.

Usually at $9...you only sell twice as much as you do at $30...so you actually lose money.

That's because to most people $30 or $9 makes very little difference

yeah agreed...I mean Yahoo bought Flickr for 35 million...so how is Instagram worth 28x that.

Musk started Space X at 30...and I seriously doubt Zuckerberg will be doing anything on that level in the next 3 years.

yeah you shouldn't need to have friends inside Google to get basic customer service

Youtube is a whole different kind of animal though.

this only makes sense if its recurring income(i.e. subscriptions) and if you aren't depending on any other service for that income.

if your $5K/mo comes mostly from Google traffic you can lose everything overnight.

i.e. I have a friend who had an affiliate site that was generating $20K/mo. Then the Google Panda update happened, and that went down to $1K overnight(well it took a few weeks). Last month that site generated a whopping $24 in revenue.

Google tends to be the biggest threat here.

Traffic? Can't lose out in Google search results.

Ad Revenue? Can't get banned from adsense(impossible...since all it takes is a competitor clicking a bunch of times on your ads)

Paid Traffic? Can't get banned from adwords...which can change their policies at any time.

Payments? Can't get banned by PayPal.

Basically what I'm trying to say, is that there is a TON of risk. And you need a huge cushion to feel comfortable. Personally I'd want a $30K/mo income in order to have a $4-5K/mo lifestyle...just to be on the safe side. To at least avoid the stress...that everything can be lost overnight.

That's why these big payouts should be preferable...since then there is no more risk(short of losing it all in financial crash)

i'd say manually, since part of their job is to put the resumes together.

supporting opposition to bills like this is only the first step.

there needs to be a campaign to make them pass a law or even an amendment to the constitution to prevent them from trying to slip by when noone is looking

they only need to get lucky once...and its a 100x harder to repeal a law than it is to implement it.

how do we know he did it just by following the program...and not by hiring a personal trainer and a personal chef...or by simply doing 4 hours of exercise every day?

since the other co-founder is a personal trainer...I'd imagine it was a bit more hands on, than just using a website.

there is a lot of financial incentive here to improve the shown results

business credit card...but I'd imagine, as long as the credit card # is different, the name itself shouldn't matter

There are hundreds of alternatives...none of them seem to get any major traction.

Most of it is due to the fact that only a tiny portion of people are actually affected...and because these alternatives offer much lower quality of advertisers...and much lower earnings.

alternatively, Google can be slapped with a class action lawsuit

I know their emails always say "we've refunded your money to the advertiser"...but has anyone seen proof of this? Any of you that advertise with Adwords Content...ever see a refund for any clicks?

I had a similar thing happen to me...to a point.

It was with adwords...it was back when I was just getting started and I did affiliate marketing. I promoted this weight loss clickbank book...it didn't pan out, so I paused the ads.

My mistake...TWO YEARS later, I get a notice that they've shut down the account with bots because apparently that type of advertising is no longer allowed. So my old approval got tossed...and my account got perma banned over something that happened 2 years prior.

I filed an appeal, and that got ignored.

So I just said screw it, and created a new account. If Google won't play by its own damn rules, and will apply rules retroactively, I don't see why anyone should follow the rule about no duplicate accounts.

So I just signed up for adwords with a po box and did everything via VPN to avoid getting banned for duplicate account(matched via ip address). And it worked just fine.

That's the thing, all this bullshit that Google does...only hurts legitimate publishers.

The black hatters(who these rules are actually supposed to be for) only get a slight slap on the wrist...since all they have to do is just pay $5 to get a legitimate approved Adsense/Adwords account. Then just continue doing whatever they were doing before.

it takes a while for carfax to receive info...so you flip it the moment you get it out of the body shop, you shouldn't be affected by it

but a lot of times the crashes don't affect the value that much...not many people actually use carfax.

only if you use the car exclusively for the business, and have a separate car that you use for your personal stuff.

+ I heard that deducting car leases is a huge red flag for the IRS.

leasing costs way more.

cars lose the most value in the first 3 years. So in those 3 years, you'll lose 50% of the car's value. Since leasing is basically just covering the cost of depreciation...you end up on the hook for the biggest loss in the car's life.

when you buy used and sell in the next 2 years, you only lose ~20%.

+ with leasing you are limited to 10-12K miles per year.

remember, for this thing we are talking about getting the best bang for your buck, while still getting something decent.

i.e. I'm leasing a CRV for my mom(don't want her to deal with repairs etc). It costs me $262/mo...so over 3 years it will cost me $9,432.

At a 20% loss...that same $9,432 loss...would have been the same as if I've gotten a used $47,160 3 year old car, then sold it 2 years later at a 20% loss.

A $47,160 3 year old used car would have been a $70-90K new car.

Some alternatives(used eBay with the buy it now and low miles):

Original MSRP is inside the ()...but with most of these cars you can add another 10-20% for options.

  2009 BMW M5($83,000)
  2009 Audi S5($60,000)
  2009 MB CLS550($71,000)
  2008 MB SL550($105,000)
  2008 MB CLS65 AMG($94,900)
  2008 Audi RS4($70,000)
  2008 Porsche 911($82,000)

Now which would you rather drive...a CRV...or any of those.

Yes your time is important, and you have to add that into the calculation.

I think that's been true in the past, but it's going to change as more and more college students end up moving back in with their parents after college.

I guess i should have mentioned that this relies on you actually having a good relationship with your kids.

So try to avoid beating them for fun...and you'll be fine.

I'm not talking about relying on your kids to pay your bills etc...but more of an extreme situation where you are just making sure you don't end up begging on the streets