Everybody out there knows you can use sites like RapidShare very easily share all kinds of content. It is also no secret that they probably have more than few illegal or copyrighted works on their web site. Being the interested citizen I am I started looking around their site to see what they do about these “bad” downloads.
From their news page, I found this interesting quote:
The security of personal data is very important to us, especially in these times. That’s the reason why we will not spy out the files that our clients faithfully upload onto RapidShare, not now nor in future.
That sounds a little fishy, but in the name of privacy concerns, I’ll cut them some slack.
RapidShare, of course, is against the distribution of illegal files and as soon as we are informed about illegal distribution, we delete these files and put them on a filter.
Ahh, that is better - they investigate claim of illegal or copyrighted files. So where do you go to report the abuse? I had to do some hunting around the page, but finally found it under Support > Abuse Contact. What do they require?
Please note that we only follow up messages that meet the following requirements: abuse@rapidshare.com.
Please provide us with your name, address and telephone number.
Explain which copyrighted material is affected.
If it a case of files with illegal contents, please describe the contents briefly in two or three points.
Please provide the exact and complete RapidShare download link of the file
Give details of the address of the webpage that published the link.
If there are several RapidShare links, please include all links with complete details in your message. Please do not send any attachments. Simply insert the details in text format into the message. (Example: http://rapidshare.com/files/123456/beispiel.jpg).
Please ensure that you can receive further enquiries from us at the e-mail address you are writing from.
Please only write to us in English or German.
That is insane! Explain to me why they need your phone number, address and name? Sure the rest of it is a little much too, but that kind of sounds silly. What happens if you don’t give them this full essay of abuse?
Anonymous or incomplete messages will not be dealt with.
Shame on RapidShare for falling down on the job here. I understand that investigating every claim might be a little hard, but heck - just search for “Rapidshare ‘insert name of media here’” and you will find all the proof you need.
Looking for another blogging script alternative? The neat thing about FlatPress is that they say it needs no database management system to work. Now, how the heck do they do that? You don’t need MySQL because FlatPress stores all of its content on text files. Some of the other features included are:
Standard-compliant (XHTML valid)
Plugin support
Widget system
Easy to customize with themes (powered by Smarty)
As you can see, it has all the usual bells and whistles most bloggers are looking for.
Looking for help using FlatPress? They have a very nice wiki available with tons of useful links and helpful information. They have forums too. To see FlatPress in action, go check out the FlatPress blog.
To get a good idea on what you can do to theme it, check out their test blog here:
You can download FlatPress for free, and give it a shot. If you are looking to support one of the many other free blog scripts out there, using FlatPress would be a great way to get started.
While a little light on documentation, Eggblog looks to be a nice alternative blogging script for those of you who might not want to follow the fold and use WordPress or one of the other more popular solutions out there.
Some of the features of Eggblog are:
easy to use web-based administration to add, edit and delete news articles
easy to use web-based configuration to manage your web site settings
WYSIWYG easy-to-use text editor for publishing or editing news articles
download themes to easily change the style, layout and colors of your site
I also like the forum feature, which is simple - yet unique. You can check it out (with examples) on Eggblog’s own web site. Check Eggblog out in action here:
The installation process looks pretty easy. You download it, edit the configuration files, and then you are done. They also have an installation guide to help you along the way. The server requirements are lightweight too. You only need to have a fairly modern version of PHP, MySQL, and the PHP-GD library. There are a number of different themes you can use too, just in case your not happy with the default one.
If you want to check out a demo of the script in action, be sure to visit this page for the login details. Eggblog might not have all the features that a script like WordPress might have, but it is a nice alternative if you want to move away from the fold.
There are a lot of blogging tools out there under the sun. One that does not get much credit, but I think is pretty nice is Dotclear. An open-source web publishing software, Dotclear has been around since 2002. The project’s purpose is to provide a user-friendly tool allowing anyone to publish on the web, regardless of their technical skills.
Some of the features included in Dotclear are:
Automated install
Fully customizable themes
User-friendly administration
Naturally optimized for search engines
You can read more about the many features of Dotclear over on their features page. Did I mention they promise you can get it up and running in a minute too?
If performance is your main concern, Dotclear is fast. It promises to be as responsive as possible, no mater the quantity of the blog. Need some help to get it going? They provide a pretty nice documentation guide to go along with as you customize it to fit your own needs.
Since it will not cost you a thing, Dotclear is definitely worth checking out.
Doesn’t hurt to plug your boss every once in a while, right? As a result of the three WordPress theme contests Lunarpages has had, they have had over 300 themes submitted to them. Now most people might toss all these great designs to the side - but not Lunarpages. They are providing them for free for anybody to download.
I am like a kid in a candy store when it comes to new tools and applications out there. I love to try them all. When push comes to shove though, only a few survive the cut as far as making it to the list of applications I actually use day to day.
Google Calendar - It might not be the prettiest girl at the dance, but boy does she know how to get down with her bad self. Google Calendar has never won points for beauty, but is more functional than anything else out there today. I use this one for just about every date reminder there is, from invoice due dates to birthdays.
MooURL - I probably could close my eyes and pick a link shortener out of a hat and come out with a winner. I won’t lie, I like MooURL.com just because the name makes me giggle.
Gmail - My e-mail situation is kind of oddly setup. I have all my external POP3 e-mail accounts plugged into Gmail, and then connect from Gmail to Thunderbird via IMAP. This way I can easily access my mail via the web or desktop, and a few other perks such as double spam filtering (counting what the server side Spam Assassin does, then put Gmail’s spam filtering on top of that).
Google Docs - Google Docs is one thing I just started using again, not too long ago. I needed to have a few documents easily accessible to me, no mater where I was - and Google Docs made that an easy thing to do.
Instapaper - This awesome site replaced my “read later” bookmark folder in Firefox. Using a simple bookmarklet, you can save any link to read later and the site itself gives you a neat list of links and the ability to “skip” (mark it read) or to mark the link unread. Very simple, and because of that, very effective.
Ping.fm - I use this web site to socialize myself. I can post a message out to Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and every other social network under the sun in one go. Great for promoting your work, or just to say hello on all the social networking sites out there.
Google Notebook - This I use a little differently than most. I store a lot of the information from work on this site, such as FAQ’s and hard to find information. That way I have it all in one spot (and it is searchable).
Google Reader - Boy, this is turning into an “I love Google” list, isn’t it? The reason I use Google Reader for all my RSS reading is due to the fact that I can make it “wide view” very easily, and all I need to do to browse the news is scroll down. Don’t need much else for news reading.
I’m always looking for something new to add to the list. I think the major problem is there isn’t anybody doing anything drastically new or different. It is just the different spin on the same idea (no mater what that idea might be). However, I could just be a picky person.
Everybody out there knows you can use sites like RapidShare very easily share all kinds of content. It is also no secret that they probably have more than few illegal or copyrighted works on their web site. Being the interested citizen I am I started looking around their site to see what they do about these “bad” downloads.
While a little light on documentation, 
I am like a kid in a candy store when it comes to new tools and applications out there. I love to try them all. When push comes to shove though, only a few survive the cut as far as making it to the list of applications I actually use day to day. 
