Rob Bell's Notes from a Yorkshire Internet Megalomaniac

Bimble-Gate

My use of the word ‘Bimbling’, when asked what I’d been doing this afternoon, earlier almost caused an intellectual ruckus when I was accused of inventing my own word by a friend who would not accept this as a valid description of my activity! After the initial disagreement over whether it’s a word or not, I took to the web for clarification!

An internet search reveals definitions in the Urban Dictionary and Wiktionary which confirmed my understanding of the definition of the word – To wander in a happy but slightly disengaged state, though with some harmless or ineffective intent – I had been doing exactly that online this afternoon!

He still wouldn’t accept it was a real world unless the Oxford Dictionary confirmed it – and the only free version of that I found online is the concise version – which doesn’t include it!

When two more friends arrived they were asked if they knew what bimbling was – one did and it’s a word he uses quite a bit.

The other, however, thought it was another new one of the multitude of social networks he often sees me using when he’s here! Anyone decides to set up a Web 2.0 app and calls it Bimbling – I want shares!

So we were no closer to achieving a majority decision… and we’re still not! So it’s time to ask you!

We agreed in the end to compromise and use the terms ‘coloquialism’ and regional dialect to describe it, but I wonder how far the term ‘bimbling’ reaches beyond my home city of Wakefield in the UK – do any of the foreign readers among you recognise it? Have you heard it before?

So what do you think – valid word (as per scrabble rules) or not? Add your comments below…

The Wisdom of Seth

“Thing is, most of the stuff you do online doesnt cost money” so begins a great post by Seth Godin about the leverage individuals have online… if they do it right and don’t spend too much time bimbling – my choice of words, not Seth’s!

I like Seth Godin, he seems to talk a lot of sense about modern marketing. I’ve ordered 3 of his books for Christmas! None of the bookshops near me stock him though – no call for business authors here in Wakefield apparently!!!

Ah well, over to Amazon we go!!!

Here are some of Seth Godin’s Books on Amazon.com:

Here are the same Seth Godin Books on Amazon.co.uk:

Last Shopping Weekend before Xmas, it was quiet in town this afternoon though. Everyone’s skint!

Rob

It’s taken Five Cold Weeks, Four Engineers, three French Hens, two Totalled Hubs and a Partridge in a Pear Tree but I finally have a stable Internet connection once again – although it’s not quite 8Mb anymore which is strange considering I live less than half a mile from the nearest exchange. Still, considering it got as bad as 8Kb while I’ve been having trouble I’m not going to complain too loudly about having 7.9Mb! Turned out to be a problem with my phone line rather than just the Internet, but how it came about is still a mystery!

One of my hard drives decided to corrupt the day I got my connection back ironically, so that’s taken 3 days to recover all the data on and will take several more to get everything back into the right directories. No indication what caused that, so that’s another mystery.

So I’m now in the World of catch-up, working feverishly to get back up-to-date with projects. A few good solid days at the keyboard have helped, although it was difficult to get back into the swing after a few weeks of very little work or effort. I fell back into my historical role as a PC gamer and part-time couch potato rather too easily. For some reason it’s not as easy to fall back out of that state!

Unfortunately the lack of Internet put my book plans on the backburner until after Christmas when it will once again become my main project. It also wrecked my participation in the £100m Challenge, although I’m still intent on watching all the training once I’m caught up.

Anyway, back to work now – normal service will be resumed shortly!

Rob

Hi readers,

You’ve perhaps noticed a lack of posting over the lasty couple of weeks, wondered if I had some blog malaise keeping me from writing. Nothing like that I’m happy to report, but I currently have real problems with my phone and internet connection at home – and I knew I used it a lot but for 2 weeks, I’ve felt like I’ve been missing a limb. They’re hoping to fix it finally on Monday, so fingers crossed….

I’ve been unable to access any of my sites, networks, applications. My router keeps dropping at random interval – it cant hold the connection. The speed varies between the 8mb/s I’m supposed to get and the ridiculously slow 542b/s – aaagh!!! And it has been a really tough 2 weeks! The worst part about the whole experience has been dealing with my service provider’s call centre. After over an hour on the phone today, to get nothing at all sorted, I’m afraid to say I lost my cool, called the guy an idiot and insisted to be put through to a senior manager. 5 minutes later, I’ve got an engineer booked for Monday – yay mean Rob!!!

I’ve managed by immersing myself completely in X3 Terran Conflict, but sometimes I wish it was multiplayer, cos Space is a lonely place!

I’m also  running some Internet courses as a bit of volunteer work very soon, I took the disaster that was losing my internet, and decided to work some more on offline stuff – nice to deal with people rather than letters and numbers once in a while!

Hoping to be back really soon,

Rob, on his mates PC

Today’s been a bit of a rubbish day – my back has been really painful all day, so I’ve been mostly laid up – it’s 4am here and it’s the first time I been on this today! I’m concious I haven’t posted since my database disaster, so wanted to give you an update.

My book’s about half ready – tomorrow (Thursday) is when it’s supposed to be ready for but I think It’ll be closer to Saturday providing I can sit at this chair tomorrow…

I’ve been experimenting quite a bit more on Squidoo, trying out different modules and developing a few pages… of the 6 that I’ve started this week, only one is published – as they’ve had to take a back seat to my book completion, but you can see that at http://www.Squidoo.com/freshbooks – leave a comment there and let me know what you think. Remember to leave your comment in my debate and vote in the poll.

Do you already know and use Squidoo? Leave a comment with your lens address, and I’ll go look at them and give you stars.

Through my research I’ve come into contact with lots of web applications with fantastic benefits for the users – some will grow to be very useful, but others are already there… They’ll all be in my book – even the ones that are still in beta if they’re next-gen functional and useful for building your business and increasing your subscribers. I’ve been privileged to help test some really excellent stuff, and I’ll tell you all about it.

I didn’t win the TV in the Phase 1 Video Contest for my DotComSecrets challenge, but the winner and his family were very deserving of the award as their video was mint! I’m just really pleased to have been in the top 10, I hate being on film -but the people who voted for me obviously don’t hate me on video, and that feels good.

Right back to bed now – pain stops play!

Rob

Originally submitted by rob 5 days ago

After running my ASK campaign for almost 2 weeks so far, I’ve got a reasonable selection of questions. I also set up google alerts, and upped my use of a lot of internet marketing forums, observing which questions were asked the most.

From this data, I now have the outline for my product – and a name!

Presenting “Take Over the World for Free” – taa daaa (if you were thinking of stealing the .com before I bought it, it’s too late!)

I’m not prepared to give too many details out about it on a public blog yet, but it’s basically a guide to building a business online using only free resources! It’s targeted at Offline Business Owners, the Self-Employed, Internet Marketers – in fact, anyone who wants to enhance their business through the global wealth builder known as the Internet.

Whether you own a car plant or a car yard, a window company or a window cleaners, a stately home or a hovel in a state – this guide is for you.

It’s important for me that this product be useful to people who’ve never done any marketing online as much as it is for people who have, or are struggling. I want local business owners to be able to take the guide and establish their own profiles and communities online, I want societies to be able to spread their messages to wider communities, and I want individuals to empower themselves using some great, free tools and resources.

My Sales Funnel looks like this right now -

1. Summary Book covering general themes and promoting actual book(free)
2. Take Over the World for Free (large manual)
3. Take Over the World Members Programme (membership site, affiliate features, profiles, forums, access to online training of tools in book)
4. DVD/Home Study Course
5. Take Over the World Megalomaniac System (Membership site from where system is easily deployed – regularly updated as a web application)

So that’s 4 paid product levels and a 5th Free intro to the materials. I’m not sure how I’m going to get the Megalomaniac System built yet – but I’ll find a way!

I’ve bought the domain ‘robbelllinks.com’ which I’m going to use as a resources page so people can get to the tools and sites I’m using in the guide without having to keep typing them in themselves.

I’m really happy with the way things are going at the moment – research went well, I’m upbeat about the subjects – I know where to find the experts I need to ensure this is stellar content, and I’m about to start reaching out to them. I’ve obviously hesitant that I can do it all in time – it’s been so long since I last wrote a book I have newbie jitters all over again.

10 day countdown begins today – Beta v1 ready by 30th Oct
I’m feeling the pressure a little with Russell’s deadline, I haven’t worked to any really tight timescales for a little while. Just means I’m going to have to sort this falling asleep/waking up thing out – psh, like I can sort that lifelong problem out this week – I’ve got all-nighters to pull!

On a lighter note, I’m WELL CHUFFED to currently be number 6 in the Phase 1 Video Contest!!! That TV would look mighty fine in front of my eyes, compared to the one I have now that a friend gave me when he was going to throw it out! The only High Def in my house is the PC Monitor! The only thing that makes me a little hesitant is the question of whether it’s PAL compatible – or solely an NTSC box – why we can’t just have the same television standard these days I do not know.

You can still vote for me at http://contest.dotcomsecrets.com/voting.php?_v=95

Rob