Switching blogs

I'm switching my blog over to http://underthesun.hashpace.com. Got my own domain and prefer to have a wordpress solution which I have complete control over. If you need help with switching too, ping me there and I'll be glad to help.

One more free blog host down! – Vox

Whoa! , I can hear you say. Yes, it is. This comes to me as big news especially considering that a few other services were recently shut down (ipbfree.com, blogetery.com though it made its way back). For Vox, it looks like the team has tried to make it as painless as possible except for the fact that they are not giving out any information on why they are closing out all of a sudden. Potentially there is more than one reason why Vox is closing shop.

Failed Business Model:

That’s just the sophisticated way of saying that they were not making enough cash to pay their bills. Somehow, I doubt that this is the reason as other similar services like wordpress.com and posterous seem to be flourishing.

Legal Issues:

I wouldn’t rule this one off either. But again, its not very likely. At least in my books, Vox had a very good standing. I don’t look upon it as a place for people to share illegal/copyrighted stuff, especially ones so big to shut down Vox itself.

Considering this, in all likelihood it is probably a business decision. They’re moving over people who had Vox to a free typepad Basic account for now, and I’m sure that they expect a lot of them to start using the Pro accounts. This could work well for them, but considering that the people who are shifting were actually used to a free account for a long time, I get the feeling that they might be a little reluctant to pay, even if it is typePad.

Back on topic, if you were one of the people who had a Vox account, you are not in big trouble. You basically have a bunch of options in front of you and you can choose whichever suits you best.

Migrate to Typepad:

On this page, they’ve provided details on how to migrate to typepad. All your settings, videos, posts, comments will be migrated completely along with the library. Also, once Vox closes on Sep 30, 2010 , your old Vox pages will start redirecting to your typepad page. Once you trigger the migration, you can forget about it and it’ll all be handled on the back end.

Migrate to wordpress/posterous:

Here, there’s no automated way to do this. Get information from this page on how to import your Vox data into WordPress or posterous.

Looking at the options, it seems fairly obvious to me that the best option is to migrate to typepad, especially since they’re providing a free custom domain. If you’re an existing Vox customer, you know about how fragile these services are, and that you shouldn’t have risked building your online home in a sub-domain. Use this opportunity to buy your own domain name and use typepad custom domain feature to make sure you don’t land into this problem again. This is a little more important considering the fact that it looks like Vox will be redirecting your traffic to Typepad but not to WordPress or posterous.

So go ahead. Its time to make your move.

From: Hashblog

The Husband Store

A brand new store has just opened in New York City that sells Husbands. When women go to choose a husband, they have to follow the instructions at the entrance:

"You may visit this store ONLY ONCE! There are 6 floors and the value of the products increase as you ascend the flights. You may choose any item from a particular floor, or may choose to go up to the next floor, but you CANNOT go back down except to exit the building”

So, a woman goes to the Husband Store to find a husband.

-The 1st floor sign on the door reads: Floor 1 - These men have jobs
-The 2nd floor sign reads: Floor 2 - These men Have Jobs and Love Kids.
-The 3rd floor sign reads: Floor 3 - These men Have Jobs, Love Kids and are extremely good looking.

"Wow," she thinks, but feels compelled to keep going.

-She goes to the 4th floor and the sign reads: Floor 4 - These men Have Jobs, Love Kids, are Drop-dead Good Looking and Help with Housework.

"Oh, mercy me!" she exclaims, "I can hardly stand it!"

-Still, she goes to the 5th floor and sign reads: Floor 5 - These men Have Jobs, Love Kids, are Drop-dead Gorgeous, help with Housework and Have a Strong Romantic Streak.

She is so tempted to stay, but she goes to the 6th floor and the sign reads:

-Floor 6 - You are visitor 31,456,012 to this floor. There are no men on this floor. This floor exists solely as proof that women are impossible to please. Thank you for shopping at the Husband Store.

To avoid gender bias charges, the store's owner opens a New Wives store just across the street.

-The 1st first floor has wives that love sex.
-The 2nd floor has wives that love sex and have money.

-The 3rd - 6th floors have never been visited.

Tour Bus Driver

A tour bus driver is driving with a bus full of old aged pensioners when he is tapped on his shoulder by a little old lady.

She offers him a handful of peanuts, which he gratefully munches up.

After about 15 minutes, she taps him on the shoulder again and she hands the driver another handful of peanuts.

When she is about to hand him another batch again, he asks her "Why don't you eat the peanuts?"

"We can't chew them because we have no teeth", she replied.

"We just love the chocolate around them."

Dear Tide

Dear Tide:

I am writing to say what an excellent product you have! I've used it all of my married life, as my Mom always told me it was the best. Now that I am almost forty and with kids, I find it even better!

In fact, about a month ago, I spilled some red wine on my new white blouse. My inconsiderate and uncaring husband started to belittle me about how clumsy I was, and generally started becoming a pain in the neck. One thing led to another and somehow I ended up with his blood on my new white blouse! I grabbed my bottle of Tide with bleach alternative, to my surprise and satisfaction, all of the stains came out!

In fact, the stains came out so well the detectives who came by yesterday told me that the DNA tests on my blouse were negative and then my attorney called and said that I was no longer considered a suspect in the disappearance of my husband.

What a relief! Going through pre-menopause is bad enough without being a murder suspect! I thank you, once again, for having a great product.

Well, gotta go, have to write to the Hefty bag people.

The New Corvette

He got his brand new Corvette convertible out of the dealership. Taking off down the road, he floored it to 80 mph, enjoying the wind blowing through what little hair he had left. "Amazing," he thought as he flew down I-75, pushing the pedal even more. Looking in his rear view mirror, he saw the highway patrol behind him, blue lights
flashing and siren blaring.

He floored it to 100mph, then 110, then 120. Suddenly he thought, "What am I doing? I'm too old for this," and pulled over to await the Trooper's arrival.

Pulling in behind him, the Trooper walked up to the Corvette, looked at his watch and said, "Sir, my shift ends in 30 minutes.
Today is Friday.

If you can give me a reason for speeding that I've never heard before, I'll let you go."

The old gentleman paused. Then said, "Years ago, my wife ran off with a Florida State Trooper. I thought you were bringing her back."

"Have a good day, Sir," replied the Trooper

Spoons.

Last week, we took some friends out to a new restaurant, and noticed that the waiter who took our order carried a spoon in his shirt pocket. It seemed a little strange.

When the waiter brought our water and cutlery, I noticed he also had a spoon in his shirt pocket. Then I looked around and saw that all the staff had spoons in their pockets.

When the waiter came back to serve our soup I asked, "Why the spoon?" "Well, "he explained, "the restaurant’s owners hired Andersen Consulting to revamp all our processes. After several months of analysis, they concluded that the spoon was the most frequently dropped piece of cutlery. It represents a drop frequency of approximately 3 spoons per table per hour. If our staff are better prepared, we can reduce the number of trips back to the kitchen and save 15 man-hours per shift."

As luck would have it, I dropped my spoon and he was able to replace it with his spare. "I’ll get another spoon next time I go to the kitchen instead of making an extra trip to get it right now." I was impressed.

I also noticed that there was a string hanging out of the waiter’s zip on his trousers. Looking around, I noticed that all the waiters had the same string hanging from their flies. So before he walked off, I asked the waiter, "Excuse me, but can you tell me why you have that string right there?"

"Oh, certainly!" Then he lowered his voice. "Not everyone is so observant. That consulting firm I mentioned also found out that we can save time in the rest-room. By tying this string to the tip of you know what, we can pull it out without touching it and eliminate the need to wash our hands, shortening the time spent in the rest-room by 76.39 per cent."

I asked "After you get it out, how do you put it back?"

"Well," he whispered, "I don’t know about the others, but I use
the spoon."