Welcome To Devils Workshop

How-To Leave FeedBurner Without Loosing Your Subscribers!

Rahul Bansal — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 12:14:15 +0000

Many bloggers/publishers fear that they will loose control over their feeds by using a third-party feed service like FeedBurner. This post is an attempt to answer their doubts. I hope it will help all FeedBurner users at some point in time.

About FeedBurner Feed Subscribers…

There are two ways people subscribe to your feeds at FeedBurner,

Via FeedBurner email service
Using some feed reader or aggregator. Choice between online and desktop reader doesn’t matter much.

Subscriber who use third party service like RSS-2-MAIL or RSS-2-SMS will fall under second category as they use your FeedBurner feed URL. So, essentially we need to take care of two types of subscribers.

First FeedBurner Email service…

FeedBurner allows you to export email addresses of all subscribers in Excel and CSV format. So at the time of leaving FeedBurner, you won’t loose a single FeedBurner email subscriber for your feed.

To Export FeedBurner Email Address List:

Log into FeedBurner account and select feed of your interest.
Click on Publicize Tab. Select Email Subscriptions option from left side.
Scroll down Email Subscriptions page, you will see View Subscribers Details option. Click on it.
Page will expand and you will see small Export links. Click on desired file format. A file with subscribers list will be downloaded to your PC.

Now you can use this subscribers file with other feed-to-email delivery service like FeedBlitz. There are many ways to use it so will post best of them in future.

At this point you have secured all your email subscribers. If you are still in doubt about this part, check official FeedBurner Email help page.

Now subscribers using Feed Readers

In Feed Readers world, your feeds only identity is its URL. So control over feed URL decides your fate.

Technically if you can keep your feed URL same while moving from one service to another, you will not loose any subscriber.

Thankfully, FeedBurner runs a service named MyBrand which gives you ultimate control over your Feed URL. It was paid service till Google acquired FeedBurner and also it requires knowledge of editing DNS record at your domain host, so many people never used it or are completely unaware about it.

I will come to MyBrand later. Lets first handle more obvious situation where our feed URL contains feedburner.com in its address, ex: http://feeds.feedburner.com/rb286

FeedBurner redirect option

When you delete your FeedBurner feed, you can use an option to redirect your feed. The redirection service will be given for a month for free. One month is again divided in two phases on timeline as below:

Day 1-15: HTTP 301 "Permanent Redirect"

Any requests for the FeedBurner feed are sent an HTTP 301 "Permanent Redirect" response back to your source feed. This will cause most feed readers to forget the FeedBurner URL and use the new URL from that point on. Your subscribers will not notice anything.

Day 16-30: Manual Redirect

At this point FeedBurner return a valid feed that contains a single item that says "This feed is no longer active. A new feed is located at (source feed URL here)". Subscriber can manually click on URL and change their subscription.

After 30 days: "Feed Not Found" response.

Your feed is permanently removed and any requests will receive a "Feed Not Found" response.

This means subscribers who are using non-standard Feed readers or services like RSS-2-Email, etc will be lost. Also in rare case, if somebody uses desktop reader and for some reason fails to check updates in above 30-days windows will also loose track.

Now about non-standard feed readers, they represent very small section. As in following graph, only 6% of my readers use other readers. Please note that other does not mean non-standard readers. It may contain many standard feed-reader with small proportion of subscribers.

So in the end we can safely assume, our ~ 98% readers will migrate in the worst case. Of course, number will slightly vary depending on your feed readers distributions graph.

Only problem with this redirect option is that you can not redirect FeedBurner feed to a new third-party feed service. It only redirects to your source feed. But following sequence solves this problem too.

First use original source feed address to create a new feed service URL.
Then go to FeedBurner and select Edit Feed Details option. Now in Original Feed field put new feed URL you created in step 1.
Save changes and delete FeedBurner feed, with redirect option enabled.

This will redirect FeedBurner feed to new feed URL! I tested entire scenario and redirect starts immediately. So your feed will have no down-time while using this type of hack.

MyBrand Service…

Cool, you are still reading. Its ok, everyone want 100% results!

MyBrand service allows you to use your domain alias for feedburner feed. Using this service, I have created a domain alias http://feeds.devilsworkshop.org/rb286 for my feed http://feeds.feedburner.com/rb286.

Now if all of my subscriber uses http://feeds.devilsworkshop.org/rb286 then while leaving feedburner, I can configure this URL to redirect to my source feed or new feed at any address.

In my case, when I started MyBrand was paid service so as of now my subscribers are divided. But if you are starting new then you can use this for complete control over feed.

To Use MyBrand Service:

As I mentioned earlier, even if this service is free now, in order to use it, you need rights and knowledge to edit CNAME record. CNAME records can be found in DNS settings area under admin panel at your domain host.

For more info check official MyBrand Overview and FAQ and MyBrand Tech Support FAQ. MyBrand FAQ pages provides only GoDaddy CNAME editing example. For other services refer to this Google help page.

Thats ALL! If you are still in doubt feel free to ask!

I guess this post answers your question Chris.

Further Reading...

Orkut Buyukkokten, creator of Orkut marries his boyfriend

Rahul Bansal — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 07:08:43 +0000

Orkut Buyukkokten, creator of Orkut is married to his boyfriend Derek Holbrook recently. It was expected as the California Supreme Court has made gay marriages legal recently. The ceremony was witnessed by Marissa Mayer, the Vice President of Search Product and User Experience at Google.

In the above picture, form left to right you can see Derek, Marissa and Orkut himself. (Photo by Drew Altizer via SFluxe)

When we tried to figure out who is Derek Holbrook, first Google result taken us to Derek’s facebook profile. I guess now two are married, Derek may consider deleting facebook profile in order to strengthen bond with Orkut.

From their scrapbooks it seems that they got married around July 1.

You can use Orkut’s or his boyfriend Derek’s scrapbook to send your greetings to them. Most of their scraps are in Portuguese. I used Google translator to translate some of them and shocked to see that some orkut users showing displeasure on this marriage. Some of them even posted some of their personal pics on Internet. Don’t ask for links!

About Orkut Buyukkokten: Wikipedia | Stanford Homepage

(via ValleyWag)

Further Reading...

End of Orkuts Status Update Message Image Hack!

Rahul Bansal — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 15:05:07 +0000

Over the last two weeks, Orkut status update message image hack created a lot of buzz. Few orkut users including me, used orkut medal images to make profile look Orkut certified. But as with many other hacks, this also stopped working now.

Official emoticons still work but they now uses orkut custom codes, something which should have been done in the first place!

Anyway I also hope all other tag which was waiting for an XSS attack also fixed now and our safety is restored on orkut, at least for next few days!

The purpose of informing you about this via a separate blog post is that do not fall for spam scraps on orkut which will start claiming about similar hacks soon. Just don’t waste anytime of this bug. Its done! if it comes again we will inform you.

You may subscribe to our Orkut feed or email newsletter to get latest updates about orkut news and hacks. Thanks Sauravjit for updates.

Further Reading...

Airtel Started iPhone Pre-registration in India!

Rahul Bansal — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 14:56:20 +0000

After Vodafone iPhone Pre-registration campaign, Airtel also joined the party by starting their own online booking for iPhone.

If you are Airtel subscriber and don’t want to switch to Vodafone for iPhone then you may register for iPhone with Airtel. I have registered with both operators to make sure that I get iPhone as early as possible.

Airtel unlike Vodafone provides online registration facility only. To register head over to Airtel-iPhone registration page.

Link: Register iPhone with Airtel

Related: Register iPhone with Vodafone

Further Reading...

Join Kontera in July to Get 100% Revenue Share

Rahul Bansal — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 11:58:27 +0000

Kontera ad-network announced an exciting deal for new publishers, bloggers. If you join Kontera in this July month, you will get 100% revenue share for rest of the month. Its double of 50% revenue share that Kontera gives normally.

Important Note…

In order to get 100% revenue share, you must sign-up for Kontera using this promotional page. If you sign-up from main page you will loose 50% extra revenue.

In case you are hearing about Kontera for the first time, it is a type of ad-network which can be used with Google Adsense and many other advertising network.

They have many plugins which nicely integrates with existing platforms like blogger, wordpress, drupal, etc. Details about them are here. Thanks Vered for tip!

Link: Signup for Kontera

Further Reading...

Google Talk for iPhone and iPod Touch Launched

Rahul Bansal — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 08:10:46 +0000

Google launched their famous Google Talk chat client for Apple’s iPhone and iPod touch mobile handsets.

Just visit www.google.com/talk from your iPhone or go to this page and enter your mobile number there. Google will send you download link on your iPhone directly.

If you like new Google Talk interface for iPhones, then you can use its Google Talk Gadget version from your browser, specially from Firefox sidebar, thanks to Amit Agarwal. Just use the following links.

For Google Accounts / Gmail users:

http://talkgadget.google.com/talkgadget/m

For Google Apps:

http://hostedtalkgadget.google.com/a/mydomain.com/talkgadget/m

Till now Google Talk client was only available for Windows based operating system. This launch came as a little surprise to me as I am waiting from long for an official Google Talk client for Mac OS.

I use Adium on Mac for chat but it doesn’t support Google Talks invisible status feature, which I need more often than any other feature.

Thanks for tip Martin.

Link: Google Talk for iPhone

Further Reading...

Buying a New Mobile? Check Out These Sites!

dreamz — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 08:42:37 +0000

For how many times you want to buy a mobile (or for that matter any other gadget) but you are in a dilemma. Don’t worry since we live in WEB 2.0 era, so you can utilize the web by following these simple steps:

STEP 1- Check the prices of mobile through these sites considering your budget.
http://www.fonearena.com/mobile_phone_pricelist.html
http://www.india-cellular.com/Handset-Prices.htm
http://www.indiagsm.com/phone_prices.php
http://mobilephone-price.blogspot.com/

STEP 2- Read detailed specs of your shortlisted mobiles & distinguish them on this basis.
http://www.indiagsm.com/
http://www.compareindia.com/products.php?sectionid=23
http://www.fonearena.com/brands.php
http://www.gsmarena.com/

STEP 3- If you are still on crossroads, see expert reviews of the mobiles.
http://www.mobile-review.com *
http://www.mobileburn.com/
http://reviews.cnet.com/cell-phones/
http://www.phonearena.com/ *
http://www.gsmarena.com/reviews.php3 *
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/reviews/phones/
http://www.trustedreviews.com/mobile-phones/
http://www.tech2.com/india/mobile/
http://www.techtree.com/techtree/jsp/list.jsp?list=prodcat_review_cathome&prodcat_id=451
http://www.phonegg.com/

(*-Recommended)

[Editors Note: This post is by dreamz (aka Nitansh), new author at Devils Workshop. Devils Workshop is opened for all bloggers again. If you want to join Devils Workshop as author register here]

Further Reading...

AdSense Referrals Program will be Replaced with Google Affiliate Network

Rahul Bansal — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 18:58:00 +0000

AdSense Referral Programs which many publisher use to display download firefox button, Google Pack and other product ads, will be retiring is last week of August.

If used with technique like named anchor trick, one can earn decent income from Adsense Referrals. Adsense Referrals currently amounts to 10% of total income. My 80% of referral income share comes from firefox downloads.

By retiring product referrals, Google is not leaving their share of affiliate marketing business. A new service, Google Affiliate Network is launched as part of Google’s DoubleClick Performics Affiliate Network acquisition. You can signup for Google Affiliate Network here.

There are many things which are not clear yet…

What will happen to Google Products and specially firefox?If you remember these 4-5 product was there before third-party products started appearing into AdSense referral program. Will these product be moved to new Affiliate Network or will they given there special status back?
AdSense blog post hints about “advertisers targeting users located in the United States.” What will happen to non-US visitors?

What will happen to pending conversions?

AdSense official help page answered this question with following information,

Starting the last week of August, we’ll no longer be serving referral ads on your website, and no further clicks will be recorded. If a user completes the advertiser’s required action within 30 days of clicking on your ad, earnings will accrue to your account through the end of September. After that time, you will no longer be able to earn money from referral ads. Your payments won’t be affected; you’ll continue to be paid once you’ve reached the payment threshold.

Thanks Gaurav for update

What you need to do now…

You have to remove codes from your site for sure latest by August end. But if you want to keep records about your referrals earnings for whatever reason, you must go to advance report section of Adsense, create reports and download them to your desktop. As all information regarding referral earning will be wiped out form Adsense database.

There are around 50 days left before Adsense referral will retire now. In meantime you can signup for new Google Affiliate Network as well as other alternatives like commission junction, etc.

Link: Official AdSense Post About Adsense Retirement

Further Reading...

Orkut Search Filters Gone Missing!

Rahul Bansal — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 13:40:18 +0000

Two month back, Orkut community search feature was broken. Now filters gone missing from orkuts user search feature.

If you never used it, orkut filters can be used smartly to refine search results very nicely. Long time back I even posted one orkut dating trick which uses search filters to find right match for you!

I am not sure if Orkut has removed these filters completely or it just gone missing in a recent update. It may happen that filters may come back with some improvements. Whatever is the reason maybe, Orkut never showed any love for search related feature.

I wonder what Sergey Brin & Larry Page (Google co-founders) will do to Orkut Buyukkokten (orkut creator), if they come to know about later’s love for search features!

Further Reading...

Dreamhost Referral Program – Earn More Than Your Webhosting Bills!

Rahul Bansal — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 12:16:30 +0000

Last month, I completed 1 year on Dreamhost. As webhosting bill is my only expense apart from domain registrations, I thought about checking how paid-webhosting service costing me. Shocking, I earned much more using Dreamhost referral program than what I paid initially.

First Spendings…

I started with 2 year plan with price tag of $190. As I was new on Internet, I never heard about promo-codes. So I failed to save $97, which I could save using promo-codes in circulation at that time. Anyway so my total expense on webhosting till date is $190 which also includes one free-domain registration as part of any plan on Dreamhost. So $190 for 2 year, means $95 per year is web-hosting cost.

Now Earnings…

I earn, as of now, $47 on each referral and $5 when people I refer, refer to someone else. I also have option to go for another referral system which pays more in long run! So I refer 2 people in a year, I get my all spending back!

In last one year, many people signed up for Dreamhost using my promo code DW50 or by clicking on Dreamhost ads on this site. So I will be earning much more than $190 in 2 years. By the way I can withdraw my earnings anytime in-between.

Also, last month Dreamhost sent me 5 special promo codes where each of them pays $97 commission. I posted them here. Till now 3 of them are used earning me $291 extra.

Why Dreamhost Referral Program is Successful?

There are many reason. First, Dreamhost is the best webhost in shared webhosting world. They have best support team and largest user base which operate as a community and help you every time you get stuck while using any of Dreamhost feature. Yes, Dreamhost provides so many feature that I wonder if one person knows everything beforehand!

What you can do?

Promote Dreamhost actively.
Use referral link everytime you link to Dreamhost. ex: http://www.dreamhost.com/r.cgi?302379
Show referral ads in sidebar, etc.
Create promo code which are easier to remember.
Write post about Dreamhost like this.

Why people will use promo code?

Because promo code offer them heavy discount. As an example, DW50 will offer $50 discount on your bill, similarly those 5 special promo code meant to offer $200 discount. So if a person doesn’t want to use your promo code, then he will loose nice discount!

What else…

Most webhost offers referral/affiliate program like this. Even if you don’t want to go for Dreamhost, use your favorite paid webhost’s affiliate program tactfully. I am not sure if it will work as good as Dreamhost’s referral program working for me!

Link: Dreamhost

Further Reading...