I set a few of my domains up on Google's AdSense for Domains.  After looking at the pages that it produces I am left wondering, isn't this exactly what Google has said for years and years that it doesn't want?  Low quality pages with no real content to speak of and a bunch of PAID links? 

I guess ad revenue is what drives the big G now days.

I am starting to work on a lot of new things so I decided to get organized a little better.  Hooked up Google Calendar, made it private and shared it with only a few people, not public which is super important.  I sync'd it with my Outlook and iPhone via Outlook.  Not so big on Google Mobile Sync right now.  I have heard some horror stories.  So I put a couple of new items in my calendar.

Also working on an outline for either an e-book or a series of blog posts.  Not sure which yet, but am pretty excited about it.  Lot of research to do and content to write.

I am working on a couple of new programming projects as well.  They are all in the design phase right now but coming together nicely.  Good to build stuff for myself.  Pretty excited about 3 of the projects.  Think they will be solid.

Also working on learning some stuff about penetration testing of applications, unit testing and methods to produce better and more secure products.  As well as Java. 

This is going to be a good year for expanding my skills.  Love learning new things.

So I have been listening to a lot of podcasts lately.  One of the best and absolutely most interesting one is from PaulDotCom.com.  These guys are pretty damn funny which keeps it entertaining especially since the podcast is about technology security.

As a programmer I have learned a lot about writing better code and tools to use to test the programs and websites that I write.

Anybody that programs, is into security or basically has a home network should check out the podcast and the website.

Got to love their shirts.  "Hack Naked"

I was supposed to get a call today from a manager from XM radio to talk about the issue I am having with them.  Guess what, no call!  Amazing. 

Earlier I got an email from them saying my account was canceled.  So I called them.  Talked to a guy that actually wanted to fix the issue this time.  So he did what I asked.  I got my service for the money that I already paid and working on getting my money back for the over charges.

They do have the worst customer service ever though.  Can't see how this company will be in business more than another year or two at this rate. 

Actually while I was on the call the guy I was talking to put me on hold because one of the guys behind him was yelling at another customer.  Got to love that.

Not happy, but better than yesterday.

So I have had XM radio for almost 5 years.  I pay for it a year at a time.  Always on time.  You would think that they would treat a customer like this well.  Nope, not at XM.  I sold my old Corvette to my father a couple of years ago when I got my new one.  He transferred the XM service to his account, well little did I know that XM didn't take that radio off my account.  So they have been double dipping. 

I called tonight because I know that my car is paid up.  I got an email saying my service would be shut off if I didn't pay my balance.  I talked to one girl saw that the '06 Corvette was on two accounts and removed that radio from my account and credited what was "due" back to my account.  She then transferred me to another woman who was supposed to look stuff up and figure out the radios and credits.  She did no such thing.  She told me it is not possible for one radio to be on two accounts.  Said I was never double charged.  All this without looking at my father's account to see that the same radio was on there and paid through next year.

What she did do was try and charge me another $84 through next May.  I paid $77 through November 09 last November.  She said I couldn't stay on my current plan because I only have one radio, so I needed to give them another $84.  Mean while she was telling me full price for 1 year with one radio is $142 but she is trying to get another $84 which would take my out of pocket for one radio this year to $161.  Not to mention the over charges for the other Vette, which according to her can't happen.

So I was explaining my stance on not giving them another dollar till November and she transferred me to hold then another lady picked up.  This poor woman gets me and I am really angry now.  I kept it cool, but with a stern voice, not abusive to the person on the phone at all.

So I am waiting for a manger to call me.  3 weeks ago when I was trying to solve this issue, a manager was supposed to call.  Never happened.  So I am waiting for them to just shut my radio off.

I plan to write a letter to the FTC, FCC, my senators and representatives.  This is why Sirius and XM should never have been allowed to merge.  The new company doesn't care, they have the market and are screwing the customer every which way they can.

Sirus/XM Radio is losing customers left and right, this is exactly why.  Last quarter they LOST customers.  They said it was because the auto industry has slowed.  Guess what maybe it is the complete lack of customer service and accountability that the company is displaying.  I guess they must need to pay Howard this month and need me to kick in a bunch of extra so they can keep him around or something.

XM Radio owes me money and an appology for the monster run around.  All this today and no resolution.  Don't let them have your card to run as needed.  They will run it over and over again.

This doesn't even touch the changes of programming that happened where I lost my 3 favorite stations in favor of the crap Sirius version.

I'll blog more about this later if they call me back or if my radio that IS PAID FOR THROUGH NOVEMBER gets turned off.  Sirius/XM Radio customer service SUCKS!

I have been doing some open source programming lately, actually more of contributing to some open source projects.  It is a real change from what I am used to and a lot of fun once that mindset got changed.

Today I found this extremely cool site, koders.com, it is a search engine of a ton of open source code.  Very nice tool.  They have an addin for Eclipse and Visual Studio so you can search from the IDE.  Great idea!

I am excited to use it in the new future.

Since I was a little kid I have always watched the Indy 500 and the month of May that leads up to the race.  Over the years the month has shrunk and changes have been made that I didn't always agree with.  My issue this year, they moved all the coverage to Versus.  I missed pole day completely this year.  You know if they had advertised that all the 500 coverage would be on Versus then maybe the guys that don't really care for Indy car racing anymore would know that they could watch 6+ hours a day of Indy 500 qualifying.

I think Tony George has once again dropped the ball but what else is new?

How did Phil Hellmuth make it so long in the 2008 WSOP?  All they show on ESPN is him getting rolled and winning little pots.  I think someone at ESPN doesn't like Phil or they just like showing him melt down, which honestly is getting really old.