Outside the Box

The LGBT Series: Protect Marriage, Protect Children, Prohibit Divorce

Another genius move by the LGBT side.  It’s a very passive-aggressive way to take their words and shove it down their own throats.  It you haven’t had a chance to see this video or sign the petition, do so now.  This is a pretty short entry, but I’m pretty sure that the video says it all.

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Nick’s Blog: Dance Laugh Your Ass Off

If you haven’t seen the advertisements for the new show on Oxygen called “Dance Your Ass Off”, you definitely need to.  Not only is it extremely funny to watch, it’s even more funny to think of the poor sap that came up with the idea.  First off, if you’re working out hardcore and trying to lose weight, you’re not going to have a correct representation of your weight loss because you’re gaining muscle.  Muscle weighs more than fat, so in judging only by weight, you’re essentually screwing over those people who are really gaining the muscle.  Also, a panel of judges?  Honestly?  Honestly.  This is just like the other two dancing shows on other networks, except with a twist of “The Biggest Loser” thrown in.  Ugh.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m all for weight loss.  Completely, totally, 100% for healthier, skinnier people.  But to lose weight by dancing on television?  That’s just a joke.  I feel bad for the poor people who will take part on this show. The Biggest Loser is an inspirational show which helps inspire Americans to drop the weight, work out, take a jog once in a while, and stop going to the Golden Arches.  They try to have an inspirational moment in this video, but they fail horribly.  Watch the videos that are being posted on YouTube.

Now, let me say this before I get yelled at by everybody for making fun of people trying to lose weight; I respect the effort.  But seriously.  Seriously.  Think about it.  Dancing your ass off, literally, on television?  It’s for the fame, not for the actual weight loss.  And the only reason Oxygen is doing it is for money, of course.  In my opinion, it’s degrading towards heavier people.

It’s really sad that people are trying to monetize our overweight country.  For people who’re already pissed that I’m laughing my ass off at this show, here’s an idea; Why don’t we make a show that, in each episode, shows a behind-the-scenes look at all fast food restaurants such as Wendies, Arby’s, McDonald’s, Burger King, and every other fast food chain.  They can disect the food down to the basic nutrition and show how 75% of what we eat is just total and utter shit.  That’d be a good series.

Like I said, I’m all for weight loss, but this is too far.

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Nick’s Blog: Spanish Love Song

It seems like all of my recent “Nick’s Blog” posts are funny videos, so I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to post this one.  I found it to be especially hillarious for a few reasons; First, the guy singing is hillarious.  The moves, the props, everything.  Fuuuu-nny.  Next, the actual lines that he says are even better.  If you’ve ever taken an intro to Spanish class, you’ll understand every word.  Take a look.

It’s sad how amused I was at that video.  There is a sequal to this video, but I refuse to watch it; I’m usually let down.  If someone wants to watch it first and then post how it was, that’d be perfect.

While you’re here, click the “Help Now!” button  on the right sidebar.  Rate the Sprint clip, and then Sprint will donate a small amount towards suicide prevention.  It only takes a minute, and better yet, it’s free!

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The LGBT Series: Where It Began

For any of you who have seen the award-winning movie Milk, you know that these current times are way better then in past years; however, we can’t stop fighting until every gay man or woman can marry, adopt children, and be accepted into everyday culture without a second glance.  Here is a very inspirational video from Harvey Milk.

If you’re currently running a GSA, a good idea for a popcorn-and-movie night would be to rent Milk.  It is for a more adult crowd, but regardless of the sex and language, it’s a phenomenal movie.  It will inspire your GSA to keep on fighting and shoot for the stars, not only for themselves, but for every gay individual in the world.

While you’re here, please help support suicide prevention and click the “Help Now!” button on the right sidebar.  It’s free and will only take a minute of your time; Sprint will then donate a small amount to the charity “To Write Love On Her Arms”.  Thanks.

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The LGBT Series: Proposition 8, The Musical

This is a perfect example of thinking outside the box.  Not only did they use art to inspire the thoughts and feelings against the ludacris Proposition 8 in California (banning gay marriage, just in case you live under a rock), but they also stirred up a lot of religious controversy when they pointed out the obvious double-talk that religion does.  If you haven’t had the opportunity to see this wonderful and hillarious video, watch below.

The best part of this musical isn’t the punny, witty humor or the catchy show-tune-like music.  The best part in my opinion is that fact that everyone in this musical is famous.  Jack Black is a very popular actor, adored by hundreds upon thousands of people.  Neil Patrick Harris is loved by teens and adults alike because of his role in Malcolm in the Middle.  Then there is Sarah Chalke who plays Elliot on the hit comedy Scrubs.

I think this is a great step toward marriage equality, and it makes me extremely happy to see just how popular this video has become.  Keep spreading the word– We’re almost there!

While you’re here, make sure to help support suicide prevention and rate the video on the right-hand side of this page; Sprint will donate a small amount of money to “To Write Love On Her Arms”.  For more info, check out my post here.

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Just the Facts: How to Make Money Using Your Blog

This is a concept that sounds crazy to some people.  Can you really make money by blogging?  The simple answer: Some people can.

Blogging is a passion for some people.  If you can post a good, rich, meaningful blog, then you can make money from it.  Why not make extra cash on the side doing something that you already do and love?  The answer was simple for me.  Sites such as WordPress are great sites to start on.  I currently host my site on GoDaddy.com.  It costs about $5 a month, but I went for the discount and bought hosting for the entire year.  It ended up costing me a little less than $60 bucks.  My domain name “MLMOutsideTheBox.com” cost me two dollars when I bought hosting for a year, and I also plan on getting other URLs that forward to this site to build more traffic.  WordPress.org is a great site to host a blog.  I originally started off at WordPress.com with my blog; however, WordPress.com doesn’t allow you to place ads on your site.  I had around ten or fifteen entries when I decided to monetize my blog, and thanks the the “export” feature that WordPress offers, I was able to download a simple XML file with all of my posts, media, drafts, comments, and tags to my computer.  Then, when I bought my hosting from GoDaddy.com, all I had to do was install the “WordPress” program that GoDaddy.com supported, upload the XML file, and in a matter of minutes, my blog was uploaded.  With WordPress.org, you can also download programs that take care of placing your Ads throughout your site.  That way, you don’t have to worry about putting them throughout your posts or having more than three Adsense ads per page.  Very handy.

It’s Not for Everyone

Blogging is just like any other online business.  99 out of 100 people will try and fail horribly.  You have to know at least something about the internet, marketing, tagging, SEO, and so much more.  If you don’t know, then you’re at a very large disadvantage already.  Marketing your Blog is key.  You can do this in a number of different ways.  Make sure to tag each and every one of your blog posts every time.  It doesn’t matter if you’re writing something insanely simple, make sure to tag at least two or three things.  This way, people who are searching for “Eliza Dushku” might happen to stumble across your rant of how good the episode of Dollhouse was the other night, leading them to the rest of your blog.  SEO is also an amazing way to boost your ratings on major search engines.  I have a very close friend who professionally markets my website.  If you would like to check out his rates, click here.  Make sure people are linking back to your site; Google uses backlinks and tags to rate your site.  To check the amount of backlinks to your site, go to google, then search for your address in quotation marks.  For example, I would use “nickreitz.com” in the searchbar.  The amount of links that are shown are the number of people linking back to your website.  The higher the number, the more traffic to your website, the more exposure, and the snowball effect continues to grow and grow and grow.

I added a plugin called “Share/Save Button” to my blog.  You can see it if you scroll to the end of this post.  It lets people bookmark, e-mail, and share my posts with friends or other social bookmarking sites.  Every time I post a new entry, I share it with a few social bookmarking sites such as Digg, Delicious, StumbleUpon, and half of the other sites listed.  This way, it exposes my site multiple times to multiple different avenues of people.  I recommend doing this to your site as well.

Chances are, if you’re a n00b to the internet, then you probably won’t be able to see a lot of progress at first.  It takes months for a site to become a known presence, and after a few weeks, most bloggers either give up or loose interest in blogging, which helps to weed out the bad bloggers from the good ones.

Utilizing Your Ads

After your blog has taken off, the next step is making money.  Apply for Google Adsense.  Once you have been accepted, you can post ads on your website.  If you think that this is immoral or wrong, then stop reading here, since you’re wasting your time.  You obviously want your ads to flow with the site, so read through the material that Google supplies you with and be smart.  If you just asked yourself, “Am I smart enough to do this?”, stop reading and give up.  For the rest of you, continue.

I use google adsense throughout my posts.  As you can see in this article, they are arranged near the top, middle, and bottom of the article.  This way, if people are reading, they also glance at the articles.  If they see something that peaks their interests, they can click three separate times in the article.  As of 6/27/2009, I’m making about five cents a day from Google Adsense, and that’s from only being on this site for a little over two weeks.  Not bad, I’d say.  My first goal from Google Adsense is to be able to pay for my hosting, URLs, and other expenses from just my ads.  I want to be able to upgrade to a larger hosting plan with more bandwidth as my traffic continues to grow.

Other Ad Sites

Having Google Adsense is great, but it limits the amount of money you can make on your blog.  I’ve been experimenting with other Ad sites as well, and recently added Chitika to my site as well.  I’m able to run Chitika along with my Google Adsense ads, and they have multiple features that Google doesn’t.  Plus, it doubles my chances of getting clicks, as it has a feature that only shows up when people access my Blog from search engines.  It takes their searches and displays other results.  I’m then paid when people click these ads, meaning someone could only stay on my blog for a few seconds, yet could still earn me a little bit of cash.  Chitika

To sign up for Chitika, click here and get started today.  It took two hours for them to approve my blog, and I had ads placed throughout my blog in a matter of a half hour after that.  Again, with WordPress.org, I was able to install yet another plug in that took care of placing Chitika ads throughout my posts.  No Hassle!

Another good site to use is Logical Media.

The Perks of Monetizing Your Blog

The biggest perk, of course, is extra income.  There are also some really important other things that people don’t think about.  Noone can ever fire you from your blog; it’s a great form of job security.  Even if you’re only making ten bucks a week on your blog, that is ten dollars that you don’t have to worry about.  If, for some reason, a certain ad avenue you are pursuing (for example Google Adsense) begins to fail, it’s easy to just switch to any of the other countless sites that offer the same type of advertising.

Another perk of monetizing your blog is it is a win-win situation.  People understand that blogging takes time, energy, and if you own your own site, money as well.  They understand that you have bills to pay, mouths to feed, and a limited amount of time, so 99% of people don’t care if you place ads on your site.  The 1% that might care aren’t that important anyway– One out of a hundred is a relatively insignificant amount.

The last perk of placing ads on your site is that it is passive.  You could go on vacation and your blog will continue to make you money.  You could not post a blog for a week and still get paid as if you were.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t know of too many positions (minus CEO’s and Presidents of large companies) that carry those perks.  This is especially useful when your site gains more and more returning readers, as the word will continue to spread about your site, your backlinks will keep adding up, and your snowball will continue to roll down the never-ending snowhill, all while you sleep!

Don’t Give Up On Your Blog

Don’t give up on your blog just because you don’t see results in a few weeks or months.  Most blogs take months to actually take off.  You need to develope an active reader base who will continue to come back to your site, link back to your site, and tell other people about it as well.  The longer your site is up, active, and being talked about, the more backlinks you will accumulate, and the snowball effect will continue to occur.  Like I said, if you’re looking for a quick buck, this isn’t the right way for you.  If you love writing, blog already, and are looking for a way to make a little income, this is your niche.

Backlinks

In order to start directing people to your site, you’ll need backlinks.  It is one of the ways that Search Engines rank sites; the more backlinks, the more important your site is.  Here is a great link to help submit your site to twenty search engines.  Just click this link here: Search Engine Submission – AddMe .  If you’re using wordpress, another great thing to have is the Add to Any: Share/Bookmark/Email Button plugin.  It makes it easy for people to Digg your posts, post your links on Twitter, and so much more.  

Leave a Handprint

On a slightly more serious note, as soon as you monetize your blog, you should consider giving back.  This isn’t always in the form of cash donations, either; something as simple as adding a SocialVibe widget in your sidebar can help.  On both of my sites, I’m currently supporting “Stand Up 2 Cancer” on MLM: Outside the Box and “To Write Love On Her Arms” on my Blog.  This way, the more traffic I receive, the more people will click the “Help Now!” button on the widget, and the more money will be donated to the two causes that are closest to my heart.  The best part about SocialVibe, however, isn’t the fact that they raise money for the charity of your choice.  The best part is it’s free to both the person hosting it on their blog AND to my visitors!  The only catch is that you actually have to click the “Help Now!” button and rate a video from the current sponsor.

Questions?  Comments?

If you have any questions or comments, feel free to e-mail them to Nick@MLMOutsideTheBox.com or leave them in the “Comments” section below.  Happy Blogging!

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Nick’s Blog: The End of Edward

I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of this Twilight rage that’s going around.  Edward is a creeper, plain and simple.  And now, thanks to our own Buffy the Vampire Slayer, he’s gone for good.  Whoever made this is my hero.

Oh, how fulfilling.

While you’re here, make sure to help support suicide prevention and rate the video on the right-hand side of this page; Sprint will donate a small amount of money to “To Write Love On Her Arms”.  For more info, check out my post here.

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Nick’s Blog: The Top Five Disney Movie Songs of All Time

This is a completely musical perspective on the movies.  I’m a devout athiest, yet you’ll see “The Prince of Egypt” on my list.  Feel free to comment on this- disagree, agree, fight, whatever.  I was to hear your opinions.  If there is enough talk, I might even start a poll of sorts.  If I can find youtube clips of the songs, I will link them.  Here goes:

Disney Movie Five: Aladdin

One of the best, but unfortunitely, way too overplayed.  The most well known song is “A Whole New World“, of course; however, one of my other favorites are “Prince Ali“.  Not only am I really surprised that someone like Robin Williams can sing so well, but the son is actually really good.  The chorus is catchy, the tune isn’t simple, and the ending leaves you very up beat.  One of my favorites.

Disney Movie Four: Lion King

The Lion King is another classic, but a genius one at that.  The Circle of Life still to this day gives me goosebumps when I hear it.  When you watch the movie with the song, the effect is completely phenominal.  The movie also has some amazing songs like Can You Feel the Love Tonight? and Hakuna Matata.  Can You Feel the Love Tonight is another of Disney’s killer long songs, it makes me tear up every time I watch it.

Disney Movie Three: Beauty and the Beast

Beauty and the Beast not only teaches kids to not be selfish or judge a book by its cover, it also contains some pretty smashing songs.  Belle and Be Our Guest are two of my personal favorites, but yet again, Disney hits it out of the park with a Tale as Old As Time, another classic love song, backed up by Something There.  When the movie accompanies the song, Belle’s yellow dress leaves a great image in your mind for the rest of your life.

Disney Movie Two: Pocahontas

One of my all time favorites.  Not only does Paint With All the Colors of the Wind teach about protecting the environment, but also to not be hasty about judging people or situations.  Around The River Bend,  Listen with Your Heart (short but sweet!), and Steady as the Beating Drum are all phenomenal songs, but my personal favorite is Savages. It sums up how people really feel about people different from themselves, and it’s extremely depressing but true.

The Best Disney Movie: The Prince of Egypt

The Prince of Egypt has some of the best songs ever.  Plagues is completely amazing, and along with the movie, it’s even better.  Deliver Us gives me goosebumps every time I hear it because of the combination of the music, the singing, and the actual movie.  My all-time favorite, the song that makes me cry at times, would be There Can Be Miracles (When You Believe).  This song is completely, absolutely, amazingly beautiful.  There have been lots of remakes, but none even come close to Michelle Pfeiffer and Sally Dworsky’s duo.  If this surprises you, again, it has nothing to do with God or religion.  It’s just a work of art; the music is phenominal.  If you’ve never seen “The Prince of Egypt”, you should see it.  It’s a spectacular movie.  Another few songs worth mentioning are In Heaven’s Eyes and Playing with The Big Boys Now

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The LGBT Series: Top 5 Hottest Men of ‘08-’09

As much as I hate to admit it, I can’t help but make this list.  This is a list of the top five hottest men of the 2008-2009 fiscal year.  Why the fiscal year, you ask?  Well, to answer your question with a question, why not the fiscal year?

Number Five: Milo Ventimiglia

Milo, who plays Peter Petrelli on NBC’s Heroes, definitely is in the top five hottest men of this year.  Milo, who had a short bout of bad-long hair, has a great body, is a spectacular actor, and is the best hero/villian/human/mutant ever.

Milo Ventimiglia

Number Four: Brad Pitt

Call me cliche, but Brad Pitt is still one of my personal favorites.  No matter if he is an assassin (Mr. and Mrs. Smith) or a professional theif (Oceans 11, 12, 13), he’s still drop dead gorgeous, ringing him in as number four.

Nick's Number Four: Brad Pitt

Number Three: Paul Walker

Paul Walker difinitely has a spot in my top three hottest men.  Despite his questionable acting, his face, body, and attitude is a huge turn on for gay men and straight women alike.  Good job, Paul.

Paul Walker

Number Two: Chad Michael Murray

Formerly Lucas Scott of One Tree Hill, Chad Michael Murray is number two on the list of the hottest men.  As Lucas Scott, his personality, good looks, and stunning choice in women make him eye candy for any and everyone.  Good job, Luke.

Chad Michael Murray

Number One Hottest Guy in ‘09: Matt Damon

Matt is definitely my number one hottest guy in 09.  No matter what series; Oceans, Bourne, or getting bumped from Jimmy Kimmel,  I always wish that I was fucking Matt Damon.

Matt Damon: People's Sexiest Man

Despite being People’s Sexiest Man as well, Matt Damon also shares most of my viewpoints.  Sarah Palin scares the shit out of him and he supports marriage equality.  What more could you want in a man?  Oh, Matt.

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I’ve added even more features to make the site more adequate.

First, the site is now accessible via your mobile phone.  You can read up-to-date posts on the go, as well as comment on the posts.  Also, I’m currently in the process of adding blogcasts to the site.

Also, I added a “Donate” page for anyone who would want to donate to keeping this site up and functional.  I’ve added Chitika Ads as well to help generate more income in conjunction with Google Adsense; I don’t want to ever have to pay for site hosting, domain names, or anything else out of my pocket ever again.

More information will come soon; stay tuned!

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