Jofaba.com Site Journal

State of affairs

2007-01-16T10:25:00.000-05:00

I've been trying to think of the best way to update Jofaba.com with some news about the sudden drop in new content, but everything I type up makes it sound like I'm closing up shop and just can't handle updating the site anymore. At first, I couldn't figure out why it kept sounding that way, but then I went through a couple pages of posts and realized that I still haven't established the genre of the site yet. It still seems like a gamer blog.

I'll admit that I got overzealous with my Google rankings and surge in visitors, and I felt that I owed it to my nearly 50% of returning visitors to keep the site updated with information that would be helpful. I had planned on following up the holiday season with news about how the consoles did, which games tanked, and links to cool sites that I've discovered popping up all over the place dedicated to so-called Next-Gen gaming, but... I quickly brushed those thoughts aside. If that's what I was planning on doing with Jofaba.com, then I might as well just turn my front page into an RSS feed.

If I find a site that I like and want to share, then I'll try to do a link exchange with them and let them know that I write articles and would like them to consider hiring me(for free or, in the future, for a fee) on a freelance basis. Or I'll just name drop here, in my blog, since it's the more appropriate place to do that anyway.

So, what's to come of Jofaba.com in the coming months? Not much. I no longer have advertising on the page, so I have no particular reason to obsess over my daily numbers. Now that the site exists, albeit in a raw beta-esque format, I can shift my focus back towards the real meat and potatoes of what's supposed to be there.

Unfortunately, I can't announce that I'm really in the market yet to do game/console reviews. The only consoles in my house right now is a classic NES in my little brother's room, and I believe that we have a Sega masterstation or similarly fossilized device hidden in the basement. As for computer gaming, well, I'm selling my computer while it's still worth something. Since you can't rent computer games, and new releases cost upwards of $50 each, it's just not economically feasible to try and specialize in computer-based game reviews.

If I do manage to find a buyer for my computer, then I can take that money and put it towards consoles. The key factor in this switch is that console games are easily rented for review, so instead of a $50 budget, I'll only need more like $4.

Does that mean that computer gaming isn't in Jofaba.com's future? Of course not. Once I've secured a real-world job and have paid off some of the debt that I've accumulated since my move, then I can start saving up for a DX10 computer that will be as equally kickass as my current computer is.

So that's all for now. Until I can afford to review games I will be easing back into some fiction writing. The first stuff that I publish on my site will be mostly exercises and examples. I probably won't update the front page of Jofaba.com for those, but I'll mention them here. I'll save the main page updates for full stories and stuff that I'm really proud of.

Check back often, and thanks for your support.
~ JFBartalomy

Rocky Balboa Movie Review

2007-01-02T16:49:00.000-05:00

I haven't updated Jofaba.com's front page to reflect this yet, but here's a sneak peak at my first official movie review. I know that it's not that great, and that I focus more on Stallone than the movie itself, but they'll get better in time. Let me know what you think.

http://www.jofaba.com/?q=node/100

PS. I can't wait until I've got clean urls. I hate using the "?q" function.

Last Minute Guerilla PS3 & Wii Shopping News & Advice

2006-12-21T22:06:00.000-05:00

That's the title of the post that I put up today. I hope it's usefull and if it helps at least one person secure a Wii or PS3 for the holiday season then the work of writing it up and doing the research was worth it. The next couple of days are going to be hectic for a lot of people, especially with Christmas Eve falling on a "circular sale" Sunday and so many "hot items" on so many lists this year, so be safe out there and try not to turn all Hulk in some store thats run out of what you wanted.

Luckily, or however you want to look at it, I am flat ass broke, so I haven't had to deal with much of the end-year insanity. I've got $21 to my name and no job, but I'm no Scrooge. I plan to suffer through the DT's so that I can at least buy my parents a Christmas card and get my newly aquired little brother a toy. If that's not saying "I love you" then I don't know what does.

Happy Holidays, and see you on the other side of the celebrations.

~ JFBartalomy

Google Modivation

2006-12-20T10:39:00.000-05:00

The anticipation is over and the numbers are in: Jofaba.com has doubled in traffic since being listed on Google! Not only that, but my Analytics is proving to be quite the invaluable little piece of software. I wasn't sure if I liked how it separated Google hits from the rest, but now I see the benefit. The "Overall Keyword Conversion" option tells me so much about my new readers and what they're looking for. For example, there was 24 unique keyword combinations entered into Google that led to my site,and I was suprised to see how many of them landed me on the front page!

That said, it really did modivate me. I spent the rest of yesterday cleaning the site up some more, mostly unifying the appearance, and I completed and posted the second installment to the master console list of contests and giveaways that I've been working on.

I've been putting a lot of thought into whether or not I should reintroduce my Google ads, and I've decided to wait it out. Even if I start making $20 a month now (which would be a 10X improvement), I don't think it's worth interfering with my user's experience and turning potential readers off. Now that I've got full exposure with the major search engines, I'm going to focus on developing the content that the site was designed for: writing reviews, and getting back into writing and sharing my fiction writing. In fact, I think that the next content that I will publish will be a short story that I'm transcribing from paper. I'm finding it hard to refrain from editing as I go along, but I'll do my best.

~ JFBartalomy

Jofaba.com hits the big time: Google.com!

2006-12-18T16:51:00.000-05:00

No joke, I've been checking my Google Webmaster Tools account ten times a day waiting for the moment that my webpage would get indexed for the first time, and this afternoon it finally happened! And, I've actually got some great keyword returns. For example, if you type "Wii Contests" into Google, I'm the NUMBER ONE RANK! Oh that's a rush. It's also a great modivator. I will absolutely be dedicating all day tomorrow to getting my official contests page up. It looks like things are about to get exciting. I already get a daily trickle from MSN and Yahoo. I can only imagine what Google will be like.

~ JFBartalomy

Jofaba..com Traffic Statistics

2006-12-18T12:43:00.000-05:00

In regards to my last post, "Priorities & Promises", I wanted to share some site traffic statistics that might help explain why I'm pushing my attention more towards site development instead of focusing on publishing content right now.

1) Google Analytics activated: November 3rd, late evening
2) Total: Visits: 1,899 Pageviews: 6,576 Average: 3.46 P/V (Unique Visits 1,187)
3) Best day: November 29th - Visits: 93 Pageviews: 182 Average: 1.96 P/V
4) November Unique Visits: 927
5) December Unique Visits: 287
6) December best day: December 15th: 41
7) December worst day: December 6th: 7
8) November average: 33
9) December average: 17

Out of the referring sources, out of 1,899 visits (not unique), 783 came from websites that I am a member at, and most likely were linked to direct images or personal pages, such as my body art and computer sections.

609 direct links are hard to factor in because it's unsure of where they come from, but obviously they can't be discounted (someone might tell their friend about the site and type it into chat or im or into a browser etc).

Even with the direct links, that's 1,116 in nearly 2 months of active statistics gathering. Remember, these are not unique views. I'm not sure how to get unique views for referrals yet. That's not terrible, and I'm not removing the sites that I'm a member of because those visitors don't count, I'm just trying to get an idea of how organic my visits are. Ultimately, you want to see visits coming from all over the net. But as it is, right now there's only been 15 unknown and unsolicited sites linking to me, for a total of 50 visits through word of mouth advertising by my readers. Still, don't get me wrong, I'm NOT complaining. I'm very pleased with how things have gone so far. This is only to illustrate the statistics, how a good couple of weeks helped to increase my popularity, and that with my current lull, I should focus on making the site the best that it can be in preparation for the next surge (presumably once I'm indexed by Google, get clean urls, activate a membership service, free of course, and start adding real content).

~ JFBartalomy

Priorities & Promises

2006-12-18T12:20:00.000-05:00

There's currently a conflict over at Jofaba.com between priorities and promises. I have a bad habit of making grand promises in hopes that I'll be forced to fufill them, since I consider myself to be a "man of my word". The problem is that I almost always fail to deliver.

Right now, I have two looming projects for the site which are terribly terribly behind. The first is my media review of EA's Battlefield 2142. Today marks exactly three months since the game's official release, and with just one week left until December, I have, by all means, exhausted the window of opportunity of publication relevance.

I shot a little high with that article because I lack basic art skills required to give the kind of presentation that I had envisioned. This is also the shortcoming that is delaying the second project; the console contest list. Technically, I've linked to about 98% of all the contests that will be on the lists, but the presentation was supposed to be similar to my PS3 page. It's not a lack of modivation or time; it's simply a lack of skill.

The other concern is about my priorities. Even if I spend all week writing up a killer review with lots of media, and complete the console giveaway pages, I don't have much other content to put up until I've completed the site. So, I've decided to scrap the Battlefield 2142 review, although the portal page, or something similar, will probably debut sometime in January of '07. The Wii console list, on the other hand, whether behind or not, has to get up ASAP, so it looks like I have a busy week ahead of me.

The most pressing matter of all though is building the site. I'm really digging the new design, and it's only got a few quirks to work out. I can now focus on building the actual pages and making them more organized and managable. The bad news is that I'm working against the clock, but someone ripped off the hands. I'm waiting to be indexed by Google, and who knows when that will happen. I only have one affiliate link back to me, and to be honest I'm not activily searching out any more until the theme of my site is established.

Speaking of which, I really should end this post at this point and get to work. Check back for updates, and if you've got time, please post in the comments here or over at the Jofaba.com forums about how you think the site is coming along, and if you have any suggestions.

~ JFBartalomy

(Identity) Crisis At Jofaba.com

2006-12-18T12:08:00.000-05:00

NOTE: In researching how to gain attention so that Google will finally index me, I came across a wonderful article that only made one mistake. Or at least I think it was a mistake; it suggested Bloglines.com as a place for offsite blogging. But after I set up an account, I was very disappointed with the quality of presentation. I originally wrote this post for Bloglines, and you can see it here if you wish: http://www.bloglines.com/blog/Jofaba/ ,but after seeing that, I decided that it was time to resurrect this page. It's more professional and appealing visually, and I love the interface. This post is about the current state of my website, and my goals and plans. I know it's long, but if you're interested in me or my site then it might be worth a read. Thank you, and I look forward to your comments (if there are any).

Every morning I log into Google Analytics and hold my breath as the previous day's statistics load up. I've seen an steady loss of readership over the past month, and while I'm not completely naive to the cumulative reasons, it's still depressing. I was fooled by the sudden popularity of my site during the week after Halloween, where I updated my site in real-time with fixes to several problems with Electronic Arts software. I felt important, and confident about the success of my site. I still do, but only about the second part. Right now I feel about as important as my Google rank. And therein lies the source of my current problem.

I'm not on Google! I'll admit, it's been a couple of years since I've cared about my Google rank. Back when my site was just a place to showcase my fictional writing, I was the only “Bartalomy” and “Jofaba” on the entire internet, so I was understandably the #1 return. They're still pretty rare words, and I feel comfortable saying that about 98.5% of the matches you find are about me, but now that I've thrown my cards back into the publishing game, I've discovered that all previous indexing has mysteriously disappeared, and a direct link to my site cannot be found anywhere on Google.

Now, I understand that it takes a while for “new sites” to be indexed by Google. I also understand that getting as many links from other sites is the fastest way to get indexed, but it's still frustrating, especially since I have extremely good keyword rankings with both MSN and Yahoo. Considering that I use tons of Google services, it amazes me that the Googlebot is still ignoring me: Analytics, Adsense, Webmaster Tools, Verified, Google targeted Sitemap, Robots.txt implemented and tested... and still, as far as a great proportion of the world who uses Google knows, I simply do not exist.

Please understand that I am not looking for help or advice. I've already received it, and I've done my own share of research. I know that right now the only things I can do are 1) keep adding content and optimizing the site, 2) find legitimate link exchange partners, and 3) be patient. It's the waiting part that sucks. And it's not even about making money. Yet.

In 2 months I've made less than $1.70 with Adsense, so I turned it off today. It's left my site looking very botchy, but I'm going to be adding more modules this week to fill up the blank spots. I don't see a point in accosting the few readers that I have so that I can barely afford to replace the batteries in my mouse. And that's not to mention that my ads have never really been targeted correctly anyway. I mean... bronzed muscle bound eerily homo-erotic ads for power gyms on my Playstation 3 contest page? What keyword made the software think that THAT was appropriate?

Anyway, adding more content and cleaning the site up as I evolve are givens. The only other active campaign I can wage for a speedy Google indexing is link exchanging. What's unfortunate about that, is that it's made me realize that I'm not sure how to describe my site yet. Since it's so new and there's so little content, the topics I've posted about vary greatly. To date, it really doesn't seem like much more than a standard gamefan blog.

I made my early fame by posting software fixes to a game, but that was a fluke, and certainly isn't something I plan on doing very often. So that's not what my site is about. And while updates and news from the world of video games definitely interests me, I see little reason to regurgitate something that's available on dozens of other dedicated websites.

At my very core, I am a writer. My dream is to become a successful science-fiction writer, but that's a lot like saying you want to be a Senator, or teach in an Ivy League school. They are certainly obtainable goals, but they're still rarely accomplished by your average Joe. Yeah, I think that I have talent. I also think that I have a very unique imagination, and over the years I've snowballed some amazing stories that I'm very excited about writing... but the chances of me making a comfortable living by putting a book out every 2-3 years, (if I'm lucky), is laughable. I'll probably make more money selling scripts that never turn into movies than my first five books make during my lifetime. I'm not saying that books are a dying art form; I'm just saying that it pays less these days.

It's generally at this point in the conversation where I feel like I have to pause and explain myself because I'm afraid that there might be a misunderstanding.. It's the money thing. I don't want people to think that I write because I think it'll make me lots of money. Obviously I realize that that's not true. I write because I have to. It's an obsessive disorder of sorts. It's a cliché metaphor, but ideas clash inside my head like a permanent storm. Whether I write out the results or not doesn't necessarily matter, but it seems to help get rid of them. Of course that just means another storm pops up to fill the void, but at least it's a new idea and won't drive me completely insane from the monotony. So yes, I want to make money doing this, but only because I can't do much of anything else. I can't hold a standard 9-5 and still be up to the task of translating the stuff inside my head into a coherent story when I get home. I've tried it, and all it lead to was years of depression.

And that's why I want to expand my talent into other fields. Fields that are more commercially successful, such as movie and game reviews. Two forms of entertainment that I both love to talk about and escape into. A perfect marriage if you ask me. Well, if it works.

In the end, Jofaba.com will be the place where I attempt to prove myself as a writer. At first, I'll write and promote my own reviews, and try to get other sites interested in hiring me on a freelance basis. My goal is that, overtime, I will be able to inject myself into that position from a standard work environment, until I can fully support myself with my writing.

Wish me luck, and check back here for more peeks behind the curtain at Jofaba.com.

~ JFBartalomy

Back online

2006-12-18T12:07:00.000-05:00

It's been 15 months since I've posted here. I certinally don't expect anyone who used to visit this blog to notice an update, but I am resurrecting this page so that it can become a permanant part of my personal website: www.Jofaba.com

The site isn't fully developed yet. I'm actually trying to create a new theme using a free html template that I really liked, but cutting and pasting the code into a Drupal CMS system so that the site is more dynamic. I've got some content up, but right now I'm still in the growth stage. I'm not even on Google yet! But I do have the number one and two hits on several important key word searches for MSN and Yahoo on the topics that I have discussed (gaming related), and I am pretty sure that once I'm indexed by Google, things will get a lot more interesting. But regardless, I am back on Blogger/Blogspot, and although I've said it before and been proved a liar, I "plan on staying this time". But I keep learning, and forgetting, that making promises like that are a bad idea. So for now, I'll just say "hope to see you on the next post".

~ JFBartalomy