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Josh Lam dot Com I\'m a 17 year old Internet Entrepreneur, Web Designer, Blogger and Student. Read more on my About page.

25 January 2010 ~ 3 Comments

Win an Apple iPad with MyLikes

MyLikes is a brand new Twitter Advertising Network. If you sign up for a MyLikes account, you’ll get a chance to win the Apple iPad. Simple.

Here’s how it’s different from the 12 other networks:

MyLikes makes it extremely easy for you to earn money from Twitter ads, regardless of how big or small your number of followers figure is. I understand that the other networks that I have introduced in the past may be more suited to people with large number of followers (e.g. Sponsored Tweetsad.ly) where they pay you per tweet.

With MyLikes (similar to RevTwt), they pay you per click. And it’s not just $0.001 per click or something ridiculously low. They pay a whopping $0.5 a click. Two clicks could buy you a McDonald’s burger already.

There are already a number of “opportunities” available – unlike other networks where the advertiser contacts you with an offer. You can start earning right away!

Here’s something about MyLikes that’s also unheard of: No minimum payout amount. You could cash out with if you have $0.5, or when you have $100. It’s up to you. Payments are to your PayPal account.

How do I know it’s not another scam? Well here’s why:
1. I have personally received payment from MyLikes. I didn’t “hear” it from my friend’s cousin’s mom’s sister that she received a payment.

2. The company MyLikes is actually founded by two ex-Googlers,  the former tech lead for AdSense, Arvind Sundararajan and his wife Bindu Reddy, the former head of product management for Google Apps. That’s right. I told you you their names. You could knock on their door demanding your money :)

3. Discloses are compulsory. MyLikes won’t be a company that the FTC will be chasing anything soon for its non-compliance of its rules.

4. Their system only allows you to tweet up to one ad per day. This will reduce the chances of you spamming your followers, as well as allowing your account to be potentially suspended by Twitter.

So where’s my Apple Tablet?

If you sign up for a MyLikes account, you’ll get a chance to win the Apple Tablet. That’s it.

The catch? You have to sign up to MyLikes before February 28th. And if Apple doesn’t release a Tablet by April 15th, you’ll get a MacBook Pro. Done.

Sign Up for MyLikes

P.S. Remember to connect your Twitter account to MyLikes to start earning!

How’s your earnings amount? Tell me in the comments below.

Popularity: 6% [?]

01 January 2010 ~ 58 Comments

Three Steps to Make Money Online and Beat the Recession

Josh here: Happy New Year guys, thanks for all your awesome support over 2009. Have a great 2010, and here’s the first blog post of the year! Want to Guest Post? Contact me.

This is a guest post by Danny Topping.dollarsign

Since 2007, the world economy has been going downhill with banks and large corporations needing help and many companies closing their doors. As a result, many people have lots their jobs, and thus a way to bring home money to support their families. Lots of folks have found since then that the ability to make money online will help supplement an income or in many cases replace it all together. People have learned ways to make money online and quit their full time jobs.

This is not easy to do, but can be done with three simple steps.

First, one must do some research. There are many business and money making opportunities on the internet and it would serve you best to research this first. Go to websites that you like and follow people who are successful at making money on the internet. Follow what they do, watch them for the changes they make to their websites, blogs, videos, and press releases. This should show you how they make money online and it is important to constantly be thinking about what they are doing, and if you think it could be something you do also.

Second, copy and replicate those who are successful on the internet by planning. Learn how they make money online, and stalk them. You cannot be successful if you are not copying and replicating those who have gotten there first. In this step, decisions must be made. Things like signing up for opportunities, paying entry fees or starter package fees, and creating accounts with blogs and videos and article sites. Do not expect to be generating income in this step. This is the game plan and the starting point for where you will be taking your online endeavors. Do not do too much in this stage because you will end up getting burnt out and you will not make money online.

Third and lastly, you must take action on your plan. Whether it is writing articles, creating videos, posting to blogs, or sending postcards you must take action in order to receive results. Do not expect to just sit back and relax at this stage but once things get going and moving in the right direction, your plan will get easier to do as you master it and do it over and over. This is where you will make money online and watch the cash roll in.

Danny Topping is an Internet Marketing guru and is loving the Home Income Alliance opportunity by teaching you how to make money online. You can learn more by visiting his website at: http://www.MakeRealMoneySolutions.com

If you want to stop working for someone else and finally start working for yourself by making money online, go to: http://www.MakeRealMoneySolutions.com

Popularity: 14% [?]

24 December 2009 ~ 11 Comments

I Got A Free iPod for Christmas..

First of all, Merry Christmas to everyone! Happy Holidays!

I got the new iPod nano for free from VK.com, Russia’s biggest Social Network. I used my Social Media presence to get it, as usual. And it’s awesome. Blows my iPod touch aside. Seriously. The video camera quality is pretty good for it’s size, and the built-in FM Radio and Pedometer is a bonus.I love how the Pedometer syncs with the Nike+ Active online service, shown below. It has to be the most motivating thing for you to ditch your car and start walking everywhere. Even more than you wife, yes.

Alright. Back to the Making Money Online part. Let’s just say I’ve made more this December than I am ever made in any other month.

P.S. My iPod is better than John Chow’s Kindle for Christmas :)

What did you get for Christmas?

Popularity: 6% [?]

30 November 2009 ~ 14 Comments

How Internet Entrepreneurship Will Save The Planet

This is a guest post by Tim Smythe.
al-gore-internet1As of June 2009 there were over 1.6 billion people using the Internet with a world population of almost 6.8 billion. This means that only 25% of the world is using the Internet! WOW the world has just barely started to plug into the Internet! Use of the Internet is up 362% worldwide since 2000 alone. This is great news for any Internet entrepreneurs that want to explore opportunities in social media or web based business’. There are still billions of opportunities yet to be had on the Internet! Throughout modern history every great invention has taking 30 years or more to really hit its mark. The Internet is less than 27 years old so if you think of the Internet in terms of car we are still in the first model year Internet Protocol ver.4 or (IPv4). This version has been in use for the past 20 years. The Next Generation Internet(NGI) or IPv6 is still in its infancy stages but once in place will certainly change and revolutionize the way the Internet looks and operates. This major change to the Internet will equal opportunity, so if your not sure if you want to try an Internet based opportunity understand this the Internet has only just begun to effect human kind!computer_waste But what does all this mean in terms of the environment? Well if you look at it terms of our carbon foot print the Internet has saved millions of trees from being used as paper and has let millions of people work from home. In the future the Internet will be integrated with every thing we own from our homes and cars to our coffee makers making them more energy efficient.

The only negative right now is that the Internet takes computers to connect to it. Computers are filled with toxic chemicals,carcinogens, and heavy metals and millions of them are ending up in land fills in the U.S. and China. There are several ways to out there to recycle your old computer. Most manufactures have recycle programs that you can use or you can turn to things like E-bays Rethink program and the EPA’s Ecycling website for information on how to recycle your computer the right way. The good news is that a study done in 2005 found out that over 70% of all old computers were being recycled or being given to developing nations. That’s the second highest recycle percentage of any product second only to the car.Laptop and eco

So lets all find new ways to make money on the Internet and recycle our old computers together we might just Save the Planet!
GREEN GNOME OUT!

Tim Smythe is a Las Vegas native environmentalist, blogger, internet entrepreneur, and local business owner. You can follow him on Twitter @onegreengnome.

Popularity: 5% [?]

17 November 2009 ~ 5 Comments

Ad.ly vs. Sponsored Tweets: Twitter Advertising Showdown

You want to make money from Twitter. You joined all 12 networks mentioned in this blog post and see that you’ll get the highest paying offers from Ad.ly or Sponsored Tweets. Here’s a comparison and my recommendation on which one you should use.

Both sites insist on disclaimers in each advertising tweet. Each Ad.ly tweet will usually have a “(Ad)”, while the disclaimer from Sponsored Tweets are customizable, with tags like “#spon”, “ad” or “sponsored”.  This is the same for the tweet too, where Sponsored Tweets will allow you to customize the message (allowing it to be approved by the advertiser) that are tweeted. Yes, some people disagree to tweeting ads, but

You can cash out to PayPal when you reach $50 on both networks, but only Ad.ly offers a cheque option.

Ad.ly – So far I’ve made $152
Ad.ly is the latest Twitter Advertising network, having just launched on the 22nd of September. Similar to Sponsored Tweets below, this service mostly caters to high end advertisers (my two advertisers were Microsoft and NBC) wanting to connect with medium to high-end Twitter users. In fact, founder and CEO Sean Rad says that he wants Ad.ly to be the Federated Media for Twitter. They have an impressive list of high-profile celebrities, including Kim Kardashian, Brooke Burke, Nicole Richie, Brody Jenner, Dr. Drew and Samantha Ronson. ad.ly also allows you to donate a portion of your earnings to a charity of your choice. Their launch party video is shown below:

Sponsored Tweets – So far I’ve made $315.18
SponTwtsSponsored Tweets is IZEA’s brand new advertising network. IZEA is a social media marketing company and the world leader in sponsored conversations. IZEA operates a network of over 250000 bloggers and 25000 advertisers. Izea has numerous sponsored advertising networks prior to SponsoredTweets, including PayPerPost and SocialSpark. This being said, SponsoredTweets is geared more towards Web Celebrities like John Chow and Shoemoney, although smaller tweeters will still get opportunities.

Yes. I’ve made more from Sponsored Tweets than Ad.ly. But Ad.ly is a newer network, without the backing of a parent advertising company with an expertise in Internet Marketing (yet).

Here’s the conclusion. Sign up for both Ad.ly and Sponsored Tweets. But look out for Ad.ly, which are backed by large advertisers like Sony Pictures, Universal Pictures, NBC, Nestle and Microsoft. A bigger company will usually mean a bigger advertising budget, and thus more offers available to you. For example, my advertisers are NBC and Microsoft. Ad.ly also has these “limited time” offers, where you’ll have to accept the ad within 24 hours. Check your email often! :)

Sign Up for Ad.ly

Sign Up for Sponsored Tweets

To Your Success,
Josh Lam

Have you made anything from Ad.ly or Sponsored Tweets? Which one do you prefer? Comment below.

Popularity: 9% [?]

27 October 2009 ~ 112 Comments

Spotify Invites: I Have Loads!

UPDATE: You don’t need an invite anymore. Here’s how you get Spotify without an invite:  Use this web proxy with a French IP address and  enter this URL: https://www.spotify.com/en/get-started/. Click yes to the warning and sign up using the Zip Code “69008″. Download the Spotify client and sign in. Done.

This isn’t Entrepreneurial at all. But in case you didn’t know, Spotify is the best free music streaming service ever. In my words:

It’s like having your whole iTunes library (but more), without the GB’s on your hard drive. And you can take it anywhere. It’s free and legal too, unlike your LimeWire music collection.

Eww, streaming. I hate streaming. That’s what I thought. But once you try Spotify, you’ll never to back to listening to YouTube videos. Period.

So why isn’t everyone using Spotify if it’s so great then?
1. Because you have to in Sweden, Norway, Finland, the United Kingdom, France or Spain. I sorted that excuse out for you already. Read this blog post “How To: Access Spotify from Anywhere!“.

2. You need to be invited.
Leave a comment below (enter your real email address in the email box) and I’ll send you an Invite within 24 hours. Excuse gone too. Don’t worry if I run out. I have loads (i.e. 100+) to giveaway.

I wrote this blog post after a bunch of Finnish people kept asking me for Spotify invites. Direct quote from one of them: “you are somekind of legend here cause my friend told about you and that you can help :) ”.

In Finnish: Kirjoitin tämän artikkelin jälkeen joukko Suomen kansan kysyi minulta Spotify kutsuu. Suora lainaus yhdeltä heistä: “Olet somekind tarujen tässä syy ystäväni kertoi sinusta ja että voit auttaa :) ”. No, haluan antaa kaikille Spotify kutsuu. Niin jätä kommentti, ja lähetän sinulle yhden.

Popularity: 53% [?]

05 October 2009 ~ 22 Comments

HideIpVPN: Free UK and US VPN (50 Invites!)

Want to watch Hulu? Or BBC iPlayer? Use Spotify or Pandora? How about all of

them? These web services check your IP address to determine which country you are. For example, Hulu can only be used within the United States. In order to bypass this restriction, you’ll need to “trick” the website into believing you’re in Unites States, you can use an US IP address. There are two main ways: Web-proxies and VPN services. Web-proxies are often unreliable, show adverts and slow. Meanwhile, many VPN services requires a monthly fee to use. Well now you can with HideIpVPN. HideIpVPN is a brand new, and the only VPN service with an US and UK server.

What makes HideIpVPN special?

Advantages
- Hides your real IP address – provides a level of security and anonymity.
- Secure connection between your PC and the Internet (128-2048bit)
- Encrypts and compresses all traffic including Email, IRC, FTP, DNS, VOIP, instant messengers.

- Bypasses your ISP’s traffic shaping, including traffic throttling.
- No Logs are kept
- Anonymous Internet Surfing
- Amazing High Speed
Unlike HotSpot Shield, the speed is awesome. I got 1.5Mb/s using their UK server.
- Access sites restricted to US and UK residents.
This means you get the best of worlds across the pond. You get to use UK sites (BBC iPlayer, Spotify) and US sites (Hulu, Pandora, ABC, Fox, Amazon Video on Demand etc).
- No additional software is required (using the PPTP protocol)
- Works on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.

Disadvantages
Yes. There’s always bad news.
- No P2P or Torrenting allowed.
Which means you can’t download The.Taking.of.Pendlum.123.DVDRip.MAXSPEED.torrent using HideIpVPN. Nor OpenOffice.org. Sorry.
- Only 100 free accounts are available per month on a first come, first serve basis.
- Free Service only has PPTP, not OpenVPN which is more secure.

Premium Service
HideIpVPN also offers a premium service with OpenVPN, rather that the free PPTP, which is more secure. If you need more security, I suggest using this plan. In summary, you’ll get:

- OpenVPN access (instead of the less secure PPTP)
- Dedicated static IP UK/US Addresses.
- Faster transfer speeds

Exclusive Invites!
Now when I mean free, yes it’s free. But HideIpVPN only provides 100 free accounts per month and the October ones are all gone already. But here’s the good news. Josh Lam dot com has 50 Invites for the free HideIpVPN
service. How do you get them? Follow the instructions below:
1. Use this special link.
2. When checking out, use the promo code “JOSHLAM”.
3. The cost of the product will be $0. Continue checking out.

Popularity: 28% [?]

20 September 2009 ~ 29 Comments

Comparison: The 12 Twitter Advertising Networks (Update)

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20/10 Update: Added ad.ly and updated new earnings amount

Make Money by Tweeting Adverts

1. RevTwtSo far I’ve made $121.51
Although RevTwt’s website does look like a scam, I’ll admit it’s not a scam. RevTwt advertising are placed as a tweet, which is displayed on your Twitter Profile. There are no disclaimers for the ads, so your followers may find it hard to distinguish between ads and real tweets. Unlike Magpie though, RevTwt pays per click, not per view (a.k.a. Pay-Per-Tweet). This allows the system to be more open to click fraud, similar to Google AdSense, although their system in place seems to be able to detect fraud pretty well, by looking at RevTwt’s Twitter profile. If you have over 8,000 followers, you become part of RevTwt’s Elite program, with higher paying ads up to $0.20 per click. Normal adverts pays around $0.05 per click.
I recommend this for twitter accounts with low number of followers.

2. Be-A-MagpieSo far I’ve made $429.70
Be-A-Magpie, a company located in Germany, places relevant advert “tweets” which are placed along with your existing tweets. They pay according to 4 different models: pay per view, pay per click, pay per lead and pay per sale. Just like any other Entrepreneurial Teenager would do, I signed up for this service (with a sub account) to experiment with it. At first, the adverts were about Magpie itself, or Magpie’s parent company’s other product called Stock Pilot. And then I discovered they paid an extremely high €20-30 per pay-per-view tweet. You can cash out after you reach €50. Now, simple maths can tell you that with only 2 magpie tweets, you can get up to €50 in your PayPal already! So you might be asking, I made $429.70 (or €323.90) from something as simple as this? Well, it’s the truth. Read the blog post about Magpie, with the PayPal payment proof.
Recommended for European (especially German) twitter accounts with a usage of German in >30% of your tweets. (Ja, kein problem? Gut.)

3. Sponsored Tweets – So far I’ve made $251.30
SponTwts Sponsored Tweets is IZEA’s brand new advertising network. IZEA is a social media marketing company and the world leader in sponsored conversations. IZEA operates a network of over 250000 bloggers and 25000 advertisers. Izea has numerous sponsored advertising networks prior to SponsoredTweets, including PayPerPost and SocialSpark. This being said, SponsoredTweets is geared more towards Web Celebrities like John Chow and Shoemoney, although smaller tweeters will still get opportunities.
Recommended for those with high number of followers (ie. 10,000+).

4. TwittAd – So far I’ve made $407.96
TwittAd is the original (and the first) Twitter advertising network. Currently, the payment system Twittadis “Pay Per Opportunity”,where you sell your background and allow 3 advertising tweet on your twitter account for a sett time (usually 7 days). Although there aren’t many opportunities, once in a while an opportunity once pop up, and it can be quite high paying too (one was $100! for just 7 days).
Recommended for those with a medium number of followers (ie. in the thousands).

5. ad.ly – S0 far I’ve made $152
ad.ly, not to be confused with adf.ly below, is the latest Twitter Advertising network, having just launched on the 22nd of September. Again, similar to Sponsored Tweets above, this service mostly caters to high end advertisers (my two advertisers were Microsoft and NBC) wanting to connect with celebrities and other high-end Twitter users. In fact, founder and CEO Sean Rad says that he wants Ad.ly to be the Federated Media for Twitter. They have an impressive list of high-profile celebrities, including Kim Kardashian, Brooke Burke, Nicole Richie, Brody Jenner, Dr. Drew and Samantha Ronson. ad.ly also allows you to donate a portion of your earnings to a charity of your choice (similar to AdCause).
Recommended for those with high number of followers (ie. 10,000+).

6. PayMeTweets
PayMeTweets pays you to retweet sponsors. In my opinion, they pay so ridiculously  low (less than $0.100 CPM per retweet, or less than $0.10 per 1000 followers) it’s not even worth it. With my @joshlam account (with 45,000+ followers), the ads pay $0.20-$0.80, which is really low when compared to Sponsored Tweets ($110 per tweet) or Magpie (€32/$46 per tweet).

7. TweetROI
Unlike PayMeTweets,  the payment terms are more reasonable. The highest tweet pays $2.5, and with a $50 payout, this isn’t too bad. Similarly to the other smaller advertising networks, there doesn’t seem like many opportunities available.

8. AdCause
AdCause is a Twitter advertising network with a twist. They allow you to donate a portion (or all of) your earnings to a specific charity of your choice. While this seems like a good idea, there doesn’t seem like a load of advertisers on this network once again.

9. twiverttwivert
Twivert is a Pay Per Click advertising network, similar to RevTwt above. On average, the payment terms is $0.01 per click. Sign up though this promotional link to get a $5 bonus. Overall, the payout is one of the lowest compared to the other networks, although the earning potential seems quite low.

Make money by Shortening URL’s

10. adf.ly
Adf.ly or “AdFly” is a Pay-Per-Impression advertising network. Unlike other networks, adf.ly shows an ad while your visitor is being transfer to their link – which might be an annoyance to your followers. Payment is based on CPM, with up to $1.5CPM for US visitors to $0.50CPM for International Visitors. View this sample shortened link http://adf.ly/59/joshlam where an ad (in my case this was simply adf.ly’s website) is shown before being redirected to joshlam.com. Notice the “Skip Ad” button at the top right.

11. Tweetbucks
Tweetbucks allow you to make money via affiliate links, abet Tweetbucks will take a portion of the affiliate earnings per sale. To tweetbucksbe honest, this is really a lazy man’s way to not signing up to ClickBank, Commission Junction or Amazon Associates and just create the links yourself. By signing up to these networks yourself, no third-party will take a portion of your earnings, which will mean more money for you.

12. adjix.com
Those shortened URL’s contain an iFrame which contains ads. The payouts are quite low compared to the two other service I mentioned above. I only suggest using Adjix if you have a large base of followers, otherwise you’ll find it quite hard to monetize this service. Personally, I don’t actually like this service much.

(13. Revtwt)
Revtwt has been previously mentioned above as a Pay-Per-Click network, but they also allow you to make money by Shortening Links.

shortened URL’s contain an iFrame which contains ads. The payouts are quite low compared to the two other service I metioned above. I
only suggest using Adjix if you have a large base of followers, otherwise you’ll find it quite hard to monetize this service. Personally, I don’t actually like this service much.

Popularity: 46% [?]

15 September 2009 ~ 4 Comments

You know you’re popular when..

..someone completely rip-offs your blog post.

f147257eed322e93528c8b371c5ca5e4

http://tiluk.blogspot.com/2009/09/dapat-duit-dari-twitter.html

Doesn’t that article look exactly my article here? That’s because whoever owns tiluk.blogspot.com completely ripped it off my blog, without permission at all. There’s not even a link to my blog or article. I only realised it’s been copied by checking the inbound links of joshlam.com, where the PayPal image is hosted in the article.

Meanwhile, I’ve just sent a DMCA takedown notice to Google. Hopefully they’ll take down this website soon.

Popularity: 7% [?]

01 August 2009 ~ 11 Comments

I’ve made my First $1000 Online!

That’s right, today, the 1th of August is a milestone! I’ve made a total of US$1058.77 from the Internet (With absolutely no initial investment at all!) It only seemed like yesterday that I’ve made my first ever $100 on the 8th March 2009, with my first Google AdSense cheque. Remember, this is not an instant feat; I started all the way back in October last year. There’s no thing in life that’s completely instant (even ramen takes 3 minutes to cook). I can teach you how to be like me, but in the end, it all comes down to your patience.

So what’s next? My next goal is to reach $10,000 by next year, which is a lot of money. No I’m not money crazy like the guy it the picture above :) , as I haven’t even spent much of my money yet, except for bills to keep my website going, and lending money to help friends start their own websites as well.

Oh well, I’m going to have a new blog post soon about how I made $1000 online. Watch out for it, meanwhile, do me a favor and subscribe to my blog :)

New to Josh’s Blog? Make sure you follow my RSS feed so you don’t miss anymore cool stuff!

Popularity: 11% [?]