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  5 Steps to Take Before you Monetize Your Blog . 1.) Get your traffic going. Some PR companies/ media agencies want your pageviews around 15,000/month before they’ll give you sponsored posts. This is by no means across the board, but many bloggers wonder why they don’t make any money at first. You know your work is awesome, but others need to know it, too! Give it time, and keep writing fantastic content! It was a solid 2 years before I started seeing any worthwhile income. 2.) Take a hard look at your blog’s content Speaking of fantastic content, make sure that you have it! There are very few bloggers who make it “big time” solely doting on their beautiful children and trips to the park! Now that’s not to say don’t ever write those kinds of posts- those ARE important because they make the blogger relatable to their audience. But most bloggers who are financially successful give helpful information on their blogs- a lot. For example, lots of people find my blog by looking

How to see everything Google knows about you Cadie Thompson, Tech Insider Adam Berry / Getty It’s no secret that Google knows a lot about its users. The tech giant  collects tons of data about you , including your search history, location, and voice searches that help improve Google's services and provide relevant ads. However, you might be surprised to know Google can easily take a look at all of the data it has on you. In October,  The Guardian  pointed out that every audio command made using an Android phone is recorded and can easily be accessed and played back by visiting the Activity Settings in Google. The same thing can be done if you are an iPhone user and use voice commands with a Google app. This, of course, isn’t the only thing you might be surprised to find when you take a look at your Google account settings. Last June, Google created a hub called  “My Account”  where users can easily view the information the company is collecting an

    Rihanna Sent Her Fans Free Pizza for Waiting in the Rain by ashleyhoffman41 Rihanna, who releases a new Rihanna-endorsed thing 75,239 times a week, will probably have loyal fans for a while. But she'll definitely always have fans in the concertgoers who got free pizza pies and towels for lining up in the rain at her show Wednesday at Emirates Old Trafford Stadium. Fans posted pictures of the special delivery of pizza boxes they got for braving the soggy weather. It wasn't fancy pizza, but it was free and appreciated. Rihsus is known for being totally in touch with populace on social media, which explains why she knew that getting wet while you're waiting in line in the rain is one of the most challenging experiences a fan could endure. Earlier Wednesday, the singer promoted Star Trek in a heartfelt video, but if the free pizza was really her move, then this is her best contribution to mankind all day.     RIH SENT US PIZZA pic.twitter.com/qbdLTOkmQT     — Ashlyn (@MakeY

The most interesting ideas in architecture right now by TED Guest Author Architecture expos are often futurist fantasias of design -- but this year's Venice Biennale explores how humanity's first art can house (and treat) us all better. So-called "starchitecture," flashy buildings designed by high-profile architects, has been the face of the industry for decades now. But at this year's Venice Biennale of Architecture, an expo celebrating the very best architecture participating countries have to offer, some more interesting ideas emerged. This Biennale is more about building a better world than a better building, with participants (who include not just countries but universities, NGOs and private firms) addressing issues such as poverty, disease, segregation, access to sanitation and pollution. Take a look. Let architects be

    How to Convince People to Invest In Your Startup by laurencovello Recently, I rode the Amtrak across America, visiting 12 cities coast to coast. In each city, I met dozens of entrepreneurs — credible, legit ones — eager to start their first business, but were struggling to raise the money to do so. It was an eye-opening experience. I’ve taken for granted the vibrant ecosystem in Silicon Valley, and was reminded that the rest of the country is different. While more difficult outside of major tech hubs, it’s always possible to raise funding, and a recent law change will soon help even more. Here are some concrete tips for first-time founders. 1. Do the thing you say you’re going to do. Investors are turned off by excuses. Your most important task make potential investors feel that you are going to get things done no matter what. Investors back those that prove they can do a lot with a little; those that are a force of nature. The best way to appear formidable is to actually be formid

    Here’s What Facebook’s Big New Change Really Means by Alex Fitzpatrick Facebook, the world's largest social network, is constantly engaged in an algorithmic balancing act. The mathematical calisthenics serve just one purpose: Keeping you, me, and Facebook's other 1.65 billion users coming back for more. After all, every time we visit, Facebook gets another fraction of a cent in advertising revenue. Pretty soon, that adds up to real money — $5.2 billion in the most recent quarter. Everything Facebook does, then, can best be understood as a means to find new users or getting the existing ones to stick around. To that end, the Menlo Park, Calif. firm announced on Wednesday significant changes to how it picks what visitors see on their News Feed, Facebook's term for the stream of updates that essentially function as its homepage. More frequent will be the baby photos from your high school friends and career updates from your distant cousin. Less common will be articles and

    Emile Weaver and the Dangers of Denial by kirstensalyer2015 A former college student was recently sentenced to life in prison without parole for killing her newborn daughter and disposing her in a trash bag in April. In her defense, Emile Weaver said she was in denial about the pregnancy and thought the child was already dead when she put her in the bag. Some people might look at the 21-year-old who committed this heinous act and see a person with an extreme sense of entitlement or a psychopath with a disregard for life—a convicted murderer. They might say that she’s the epitome of irresponsibility. I'll leave specific judgment to her courtroom. But it is worth exploring the possibility of the role of denial in instances like this. Research shows there’s extensive debate regarding the reliability of people’s memories: how do we know that what people remember is real? And perhaps no aspect of cognitive development and functioning has been as rift with contention as the “forgetti

Here’s What Jon Snow’s True Parentage Reveals About His Family Tree on Game of Thrones by meganmccluskey Warning: This post contains spoilers for the sixth season of Game of Thrones . Following the revelation that Jon Snow is not Ned Stark's bastard — but rather the son of his sister Lyanna — in Sunday's season six finale of Game of Thrones , viewers were left wondering about the identity of the former Lord Commander's father. However, they didn't have to wait too long to find out the answer, as HBO released an infographic Tuesday that seemed to confirm the popular R+L=J theory — i.e., that Rhaegar Targaryen is actually Jon's dear old dad. This is a twist that many fans — particularly book readers — have been waiting to see validated for quite some time. And in the world of Thrones — where so much is dependent upon family name — it will undoubted

Black holes and the prospects for measuring gravitational waves Date: June 15, 2016 Source: Royal Astronomical Society (RAS) Summary: The supermassive black holes found at the centre of every galaxy, including our own Milky Way, may, on average, be smaller than we thought, according to new work. New research suggests that the gravitational waves produced when they merge will be harder to detect than previously assumed. FULL STORY An artist's concept of a supermassive black hole at the centre of a galaxy. Credit: NASA – JPL/Caltech The supermassive black holes found at the centre of every galaxy, including our own Milky Way, may, on average, be smaller than we thought, according to work led by University of Southampton astronomer Dr Francesco Shankar. If he and his colleagues are right, then the gravitational waves produced when they merge will be harder to detect than previously assumed. The international team of scientists publish their

Physicists measured something new in the radioactive decay of neutrons The experiment inspired theorists; future ones could reveal new physics Date: June 14, 2016 Source: National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Summary: New research has enhanced scientists' understanding of how free neutrons decay into other particles. The work provides the first measurement of the energy spectrum of the photons that are released in the otherwise extensively measured process known as neutron beta decay. The details of this decay process are important because they help to explain the observed amounts of hydrogen and other light atoms created just after the Big Bang. Share: FULL STORY When a free neutron (green) undergoes a process known as beta decay, it produces a proton (red), an antineutrino (gold) and an electron (blue), as well as a photon (white). An experiment at NIST measured the range of energies that a given photon pr

Did gravitational wave detector find dark matter? Johns Hopkins scientists offer hypothesis to solve longstanding mystery in physics Date: June 15, 2016 Source: Johns Hopkins University Summary: When an astronomical observatory detected two black holes colliding in deep space, scientists celebrated confirmation of Einstein's prediction of gravitational waves. A team of astrophysicists wondered something else: Had the experiment found the "dark matter" that makes up most of the mass of the universe? FULL STORY This image depicts two black holes just moments before they collided and merged with each other, releasing energy in the form of gravitational waves. On Dec. 26, 2015, after traveling for 1.4 billion years, the waves reached Earth and set off the twin LIGO detectors. This marks the second time that LIGO has detected gravitational waves, providing further confirmation of Einstein's general theory of relativity and securing

A 'Star Wars' laser bullet -- this is what it really looks like Date: October 22, 2014 Source: Institute of Physical Chemistry of the Polish Academy of Sciences Summary: Action-packed science-fiction movies often feature colourful laser bolts. But what would a real laser missile look like during flight, if we could only make it out? How would it illuminate its surroundings? FULL STORY A light pulse fired from a 10 TW laser, dispersing into water vapor. The blue glow is laser light. The source of the other colors is mainly plasma fiber (filament) arising as a result of ionized matter, located in the air in the path of the light pulse. The laser with parametric amplifier NOPCPA was designed and constructed at the Laser Centre of the Institute of Physical Chemistry of the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Faculty of Physics at the University of Warsaw. Credit: IPC PAS Action-packed science-fiction movies often feature colourful laser b