"South Park" recently aired an episode showcasing a bunch of YouTube celebrities and how they were all theoretical multi-millionaires. I think the guy who sang "Chocolate Rain" is supposed to be $100,000,000 richer, at least according to the show. So how does that work?

In the old days, you'd be in the real, physical world, and set up a stage. Then you'd get on that stage and perform. And people would pay to see you do it. So if everybody pays $1, and you have an audience of 100, you just made $100.

Now, with the internet, we can all show our performance to many, many more people with incredible ease. So, if 100 million people see your $1 show, then you are theoretically $100 million richer!

But this is where the problem is. (From here on might be excruciating because I guess I'm spelling out what many consider to be common sense.)

You perform for a camera. Save your video. Upload it to YouTube. It becomes Google's property. Google shows advertisements. Every time a viewer of your video clicks an ad, Google makes money.

Google is stealing our Theoretical Dollars!

It gets interesting though. The $1 show is now free for the audience. Whoever clicks an ad generates revenue, but one click is usually worth less than a dollar. Say 20 cents.

So 100 million people watch your video. One million (one in a hundred) click. Twenty cents per click times 1 million clicks = 20 million cents, = $200,000.

100 million viewers = $200,000, for Google not you.

If you set up your own site, then you could collect. For every hundred viewers (audience members), you get 20 cents. (Or $2 if you're on the ball.)

BUT!

You don't have to pay to see all the other shows…

So it's like you're a Rock God, and in your contract it stipulates that you'll receive only 1/500 of your normal salary, because the rest covers lavish "complimentary" trips to all the other rock concerts in the world, ever. Sweet…

I've lately started thinking about something I've been noticing for a while. I once loaded up a huge single web page. It was very, very long. Or should I say tall? Anyway, I was using IE, and it took forever. When I tried it in Firefox, it was a lot faster. Scrolling down on that page in IE was torture. It would freeze up, then load like 1/8 of the area you wanted to be on, on top of the 7/8 remaining of the other area that was fading — but fading way too slowly! Scrolling in FF was super fast. And that got me thinking.

I realized that while IE seems to divide its resources over all the content at once, FF uses its resources to focus solely on what it thinks you want. So when you load a big page in IE, it keeps tabs on everything, slowing it down. But when you load the same page in FF, it only pays attention to what is in the viewing area, and all the content above and below just goes into limbo, off into the ether, and doesn't take up any excess processing power. (At least this is my non-technical hippy-speak theory.)

I've learned that this rule extends to embedded YouTube videos. This is where the mouse movement comes in. That DSRL theme song was taking forever to load in FF. Then I moved my mouse, and all of a sudden the gray download progress bar jumped ahead. Yes! I stopped moving the mouse; the bar stopped moving. I moved my mouse a little, the bar moved a little. I moved my mouse a lot, continually, and the bar then went into a stead load.

Huh. Let's try loading the same page in IE. Ok, see the video, good, click to play (since it won't load without first getting that go-ahead), ok, now pause, and BAM! It immediately loads up lightning quick. What do you know? IE seems superior in this regard.

So I must say I do enjoy FF's focus-oriented loading better than IE's, but when it comes to embedded videos, it seems like a hassle to have to wave your mouse in front of the video just to get it to load. Maybe FF already knows about this and is working on it…

There are lots of people out there who have become very wealthy with the internet, just by thinking ahead. These people came up with new ideas and techniques that very few others were thinking about. Lots of times it's easy to see someone's success and wish you could duplicate it. The internet is moving so fast these days that duplication can be hard to accomplish. It takes just a couple of years for a brilliant idea to be all used up, with little money left to be made. Many lament the fact that they can't do what the wealthy and successful people did. But you can!

There are stories about domainers, people who specialize in buying, selling, and monetizing domain names. If you owned candy.com, you'd be sitting pretty. Tons of people type their search terms right into their browser's address bar. So if someone wanted candy, they might just type in "candy" or candy.com and get taken to your site, which would just be a parked page. Then they'd see ads. They might click on one, and you've just made a few cents. With such a generic term like "candy," lots and lots of people do the same thing, and all end up arriving to your site as type-in traffic. So you've got heaps of traffic, which equates to heaps of clicks, and heaps of money. Good deal!

That's the kind of thing that attracts so many to domaining. It's the prospect of setting yourself up with a few good domain names, and then sitting back while they earn you money. But there's a problem. Most (or more likely all) of the key generic term domain names are taken! Darn, wish that industry was still young…

See, right there is an example of discovering a past success with making money online, getting enthusiastic and interested, and then realizing that most of the really big opportunities are gone. But there is a hidden truth that many people often overlook.

In other stories of domainers, there's a tale of a man who thought ahead. He set himself up with self-made software programs that would buy up massive amounts of domains. He was doing this before practically anyone else, and was able to get his hands on highly valuable domain names after they expired and were re-released for sale. He made millions.

So here's the deal. Most people focus on the actions he took. He bought domains, made millions. But with the internet moving so fast, actions get old fairly quickly. What we can do to adjust for this is to focus on his thought process. He thought ahead, and made millions. That's what we need to do.

Take YouTube as another example. When it was brand new, only a handful of people knew about it. Not many others were thinking about video sharing. File sharing was growing, but video sharing wasn't being talked about much. YouTube's creators had a vision, saw a need, and built a site to fill it. Their thinking was ahead of most people's. So now that we all know about YouTube, we're caught up right? Don't be so sure… There are still new ideas out there that most people haven't even thought of yet.

Some people would say, "Man! I wish I had thought of that. I should have invented YouTube! But it's too late. All the good ideas are taken!"

People have been saying there is nothing new to be made for hundreds of years, and yet we keep advancing! There are some individuals who are constantly looking for the next big idea. They don't buy in to the "It's too late, the opportunities are taken," mentality. They know that the real money to be made is on the cutting edge, and where there are no opportunities, they make them.

People who think ahead get ahead.

On my browser's toolbar, I've bookmarked all of these sites in one folder, seeing as how they tend to come in handy fairly often. Some much more so than others. I had assumed that most other web surfers were similarly aware of these great sites, since they're so useful in finding practically whatever you have in mind. But today the thought occurred to me that there are probably a few people who aren't familiar with one or two (or more) of these helpful resources. So, without further ado, I present THE LIST:

1. Google - The mother of all Search Engines. My favorite part is that most pages are cached, so if the site is currently down or has undergone a major change, you can still see what came up in the results, with all your search terms highlighted.
2. Wikipedia - The user-generated online encyclopedia of everything. Some say that the "truth" found here is only what everybody agrees upon. And that's probably correct. But for most subjects, Wikipedia is a simple, dependable resource that can inform and educate in a hurry.
3. YouTube - Now owned by Google, YouTube is where to search for video clips from shows, movies, the news, and everywhere else. Eyewitness reports are often quickly uploaded to YouTube, so if a news story didn't provide the live footage you wanted, YouTube just might have it. It's also a decent place to find the occasional song, as some users upload whole tracks with album covers as the visual.
4. Dictionary.com - Much easier than using a conventional dictionary, as it's not heavy and you don't have to flip through page after page! Just type in your word or phrase, and even if you don't get the spelling right, you'll usually find just what you're looking for.
5. Thesaurus.com - Sister site of Dictionary.com, Thesaurus.com comes in major handy when you need to find another word for something. You'll never have to use, apply, or expend the same word twice.
6. IMDb - The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) has detailed files on all movies, past, present, and even future! Who's that actor? Were there any goofs? When's the sequel? Just go to IMDb. There's even a forum and special features for registered users.
7. Internet Archive - Featuring the WayBack Machine, which keeps a record of every incarnation of a web page since that page's creation. You can go back in time and see the earliest form of pretty much any site. It can be extremely helpful when a page isn't currently available or no longer exists. Check out an early archive of Google. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.
8. Acronym Finder - The next time you see a strange abbreviation, you can quickly and easily find out what it means. Pretty much every conceivable meaning of each acronym is listed, so all you need to do is find the one that fits the context.
9. Amazon.com - You can buy almost anything online, and Amazon.com is a great place to do it. They used to be mostly focused on books, but in recent times have broadened their horizons tremendously. Now they sell pretty much everything! Not only are the prices low, but free shipping is offered in many cases. One of the best features is the Customer Reviews section for each product. The next time you hear about a hot new item and need to find out the pros and cons from real users, just go to Amazon.com.
10. eBay - Here you can brave rapidly-growing world of consumer-to-consumer sales. Shopping eBay is riskier than Amazon, but there's definite potential to find some really great deals. What's more, some products that aren't listed at Amazon can be found at eBay. It's a great resource when you need to learn about a hard-to-find item or a mystery object.
11. Dogpile - A search engine that compiles results from Google, Yahoo, Live Search, and Ask. I used to use it until I found that it didn't offer the same caching of pages that Google provides. But Dogpile does have an "Audio Search" option that is supremely helpful. Whether you're searching for a clip of a radio interview, a song, or a sound effect, Dogpile's Audio Search is usually pretty helpful. It may take some time to find an audio link that works, but once you do, it's usually well worth it. And if you run out of options, you might try plugging the bogus links into the Internet Archive. The audio file may just be saved there.
12. Urban Dictionary - Dictionary.com is fine for "normal" speech, but what about all those new slang terms? Urban Dictionary is basically a WikiDictionary, where users add and define new words and phrases. The next time you hear a strange word that sounds like it was born yesterday, you can look it up at the Urban Dictionary.
13. OldVersion.com - This site features downloads of previously-released versions of popular software, including instant messengers, file-sharing platforms, web browsers, file unzippers, and graphics programs. When the new version isn't as good as the old one, or is too expensive, you can usually get the old one for free at OldVersion.com.
14. Alta Vista Babel Fish Translation - This is a killer resource that allows you to translate a block of text or an entire web page from one major language to another. The results aren't always word-perfect, but they'll usually provide you with enough information to understand what was written. The whole-page translation feature is amazing. If you're ever searching for something and it looks like you've found it, but it's written in a foreign language, you can clarify things with Alta Vista Babel Fish.
15. Google Blog Search - I just learned about this today. You can search for blogs that are written about or contain information on specific topics. Instead of just using Google to find out what websites are saying, you can use Google Blog Search to find out what people are saying on their blogs. So if you want a more down-to-earth take on something, this could be the site for you.

That's it! These are what I believe to be the top 15 online search resources. The internet has incredible informative power, if you know where to look. I hope I mentioned at least a couple of sites that you weren't fully aware of. Happy digital trails!

I haven't been visiting YouTube as often as I used to, so yesterday I thought I'd check it out. None of the videos really caught my eye, except for one with an interesting thumbnail. The image was of a logo that looked a little like this:

I thought, "Wow, what's that about?" Watching the video, I learned that it was a satire on all the negative comments out there on YouTube. A lot of people have been known to not put a lot of thought into what they say when they're feeling mean. iHate is a fictitious service that can correct that, by eliminating the need to come up with actual comments through a system that will generate them for you.

The video really was hilarious. And I just saw someone's post that now there's actually a real iHate, apparently in the same satiric spirit! It blew my mind…