I started my Web page in 1997. I bought my first domain name, Wilstar.net, in 1998. A year or so later, Wilstar.com became available so I bought it as well, which had been my original first choice. Wilstar is a very old nickname of mine, dating back to the mid-1980s when I taught in Lake County, Indiana. My students gave it to me but no one could explain exactly why.
My first Web site consisted mainly of random links that I found interesting. It also included information about me and my family as well as some holiday information. I started with a Christmas page, which included MIDI Christmas songs and some history. I quickly expanded it to include the history and customs of nine holidays. I recently took a look back at my original home page via the Internet Wayback Machine, courtesy of archive.org. It was kind of cheesy by today's standards.
In the early 2000s I started to monetize my site with ValueClick ads. It was pretty holidaycentric by then. I had added three additional holidays, but my MIDI page was still my favorite. By 2005 I had discovered Google AdSense, which started making me more money than ValueClick. By 2006, it had actually become a small business and a decent source of extra income. People were flocking to my holiday pages in droves. I remember a few times just sitting in front of my my computer, clicking the "Reload" button on my old Netscape browser just to watch the counter increase. During the peak Christmas season one year it was going up by 10 or 15 page views every few of seconds.
But after the recession of 2008-09 visitors were becoming more scarce and profits started declining. So I pondered the notion of selling my site. I turned down a couple of low-ball offers during the year's between 2010 and 2012, but this past week I received an offer (again, rather low) that I decided to pursue with a counteroffer. It didn't take us much time to agree on a fair price, so the bottom line is, Wilstar.com and Wilstar.net and their content no longer belong to me.
I spent the last 15 years writing original content for Wilstar.com and I've spent many hours designing the site. I will miss doing that. I will also miss the steady flow of income it generated. But like everything else, the Web is changing and I decided to jump off and try something new.
I still have three other Web sites, including this blog. I have a site devoted to science subjects targeted to middle-school students, OurSciencePage.com. I have my Low Carb Pavilion site at LowCarbPavilion.com, which I've run for the past 12 years or more. And I just acquired a new domain name just for my personal and family use. So I'm definitely not out of the Web business. But my main site is now not under my control and I will miss tinkering with it. You can still visit it under its new ownership, though, at Wilstar.com.
Saturday, February 09, 2013
Saturday, February 02, 2013
USA for Africa or America?
Charity is a good thing. Most people who can afford it give to one or more of their favorite charities. Corporations can also be quite magnanimous that way. Tom's shoes is a company that was actually founded on the giving of shoes to children in developing countries.
But I can't help but notice that many of the children's charities that are advertised make their donations of money, food, and clothing to children in third-world nations, usually in Africa. I don't have a problem helping victims of natural disasters, regardless of what part of the globe they live in. But African children are not victims of a one-time natural disaster. They are victims of the geopolitical landscape. That means they are in constant need of help. But don't we have children we can help closer to home?
I get annoyed at the guy who comes on my TV screen every morning and begs me to sponsor a child in some third-world country. The commercial is replete with images of bony children looking all pitiful. It is maudlin. And I can't stand maudlin. But if they are going to beg for money to save some children, why not let it be our own children?
If we are going to give charitable contributions to those who are in need of help due to their socioeconomic conditions, there are millions of children in this country who could use those tens of thousands of shoes that go overseas, or the 30 bucks a month or so that goes to feed a child in Sub-Saharan Africa. It's only my opinion, but I am not in favor of sending resources to the needy in other countries as long as there are needy children here.
Let Africans take care of their own and let us take care of ours.
But I can't help but notice that many of the children's charities that are advertised make their donations of money, food, and clothing to children in third-world nations, usually in Africa. I don't have a problem helping victims of natural disasters, regardless of what part of the globe they live in. But African children are not victims of a one-time natural disaster. They are victims of the geopolitical landscape. That means they are in constant need of help. But don't we have children we can help closer to home?
I get annoyed at the guy who comes on my TV screen every morning and begs me to sponsor a child in some third-world country. The commercial is replete with images of bony children looking all pitiful. It is maudlin. And I can't stand maudlin. But if they are going to beg for money to save some children, why not let it be our own children?
If we are going to give charitable contributions to those who are in need of help due to their socioeconomic conditions, there are millions of children in this country who could use those tens of thousands of shoes that go overseas, or the 30 bucks a month or so that goes to feed a child in Sub-Saharan Africa. It's only my opinion, but I am not in favor of sending resources to the needy in other countries as long as there are needy children here.
Let Africans take care of their own and let us take care of ours.
Saturday, December 15, 2012
If the Shooting of Kids doesn't Cause Change, Nothing Will
This time it's much different. We've had mass shootings many times over the past few years and all of them were tragic. But this time most of the victims were innocent little kids - and a lot of them. This time something has to be done, and everybody knows what that something is.
There are those who say we have a culture of violence in this country and that is what contributes to these tragedies. I can't argue against that hypothesis because violence in video games, on TV, and certainly in rap music is ubiquitous. Who knows how much desensitizing the culture of violence has produced. But regardless of how much the culture of violence contributes, it couldn't contribute to any shootings if nobody had access to guns.
Some say it is because we have expelled God from our schools and if we only could bring prayer back into the classroom, the violence would surely stop. This hypothesis is irrational, naive and, frankly, incredibly stupid. For one thing, God has never been expelled, nor has prayer. Kids can pray all they want in school. So can teachers and administrators. The only thing they can't do is to organize a formal prayer in school and on school time. Secondly, I challenge anyone to provide me with any empirical evidence that prayer solves anything at all, other than perhaps making the believer feel better about himself or herself. It's a way to convince yourself that you're doing something without actually doing anything. Prayer is simply lazy. And if God could have prevented such tragedies but did not only because somebody didn't pray enough or pray from the right spot then what kind of evil god is he? No matter how much or little anyone prays in school, the only thing that would have prevented the shooting is if the perpetrator had no access to guns.
Some people say we need to stop stigmatizing the mentally ill so that they will find it easier to seek professional help. Maybe there are some people who are in denial about needing help, but is this what we're going to blame gun violence on? No matter how deluded or mentally challenged a person is, he is harmless to others if he doesn't have access to guns.
What we need to do is stop beating around the bush and place the blame squarely where it belongs. We have a gun culture and it is far too easy for almost anyone to get guns. Nobody needs a gun except the hunter who actually hunts to supply food for the table. If that is a lifestyle choice then maybe these people do need a shotgun or hunting rifle. But that's it. There is no reason whatsoever for anyone to own a handgun or any kind of automatic or semiautomatic weapon.
In my opinion, the Supreme Court misinterpreted the Second Amendment when it decided that states could not ban the purchase of guns. The phrase is clearly present for all to see: "...a well-regulated militia...." We no longer depend on a well-regulated militia to defend this country, and without that dependency, there is no necessity to own a gun. And if that's how SCOTUS is going to interpret it then what we really need to do is completely repeal the Second Amendment. We've repealed amendments before (the nineteenth, for example), so it is not without historical precedent. It needs to happen quickly and decisively.
I'm not naive enough to actually believe a repeal of the Second Amendment is at all likely. But it is what it will take, or something very close, to prevent mass shootings in the future.
Maybe we do have a culture of violence in this country, but without easy access to guns, a culture of violence kills no one. Maybe we should look more closely at helping those who are mentally ill to seek help. But without guns, the mentally ill can't shoot anybody can they? And without easy access to guns, those buffoons like Mike Huckabee would have less opportunity to spew their ridiculous notions about blaming lack of prayer in schools for all of society's ills.
Obama made it clear that something needs to be done, even if it is not politically expedient. I sincerely hope he has the guts to push for gun control legislation during his second term in office. Maybe he needs to draw a line in the sand now and make the midterm election a single-issue poll: Do Americans want uncontrolled gun access or do we want to grow up and decide that ownership of most types of guns is not necessary nor advisable.
There are those who say we have a culture of violence in this country and that is what contributes to these tragedies. I can't argue against that hypothesis because violence in video games, on TV, and certainly in rap music is ubiquitous. Who knows how much desensitizing the culture of violence has produced. But regardless of how much the culture of violence contributes, it couldn't contribute to any shootings if nobody had access to guns.
Some say it is because we have expelled God from our schools and if we only could bring prayer back into the classroom, the violence would surely stop. This hypothesis is irrational, naive and, frankly, incredibly stupid. For one thing, God has never been expelled, nor has prayer. Kids can pray all they want in school. So can teachers and administrators. The only thing they can't do is to organize a formal prayer in school and on school time. Secondly, I challenge anyone to provide me with any empirical evidence that prayer solves anything at all, other than perhaps making the believer feel better about himself or herself. It's a way to convince yourself that you're doing something without actually doing anything. Prayer is simply lazy. And if God could have prevented such tragedies but did not only because somebody didn't pray enough or pray from the right spot then what kind of evil god is he? No matter how much or little anyone prays in school, the only thing that would have prevented the shooting is if the perpetrator had no access to guns.
Some people say we need to stop stigmatizing the mentally ill so that they will find it easier to seek professional help. Maybe there are some people who are in denial about needing help, but is this what we're going to blame gun violence on? No matter how deluded or mentally challenged a person is, he is harmless to others if he doesn't have access to guns.
What we need to do is stop beating around the bush and place the blame squarely where it belongs. We have a gun culture and it is far too easy for almost anyone to get guns. Nobody needs a gun except the hunter who actually hunts to supply food for the table. If that is a lifestyle choice then maybe these people do need a shotgun or hunting rifle. But that's it. There is no reason whatsoever for anyone to own a handgun or any kind of automatic or semiautomatic weapon.
In my opinion, the Supreme Court misinterpreted the Second Amendment when it decided that states could not ban the purchase of guns. The phrase is clearly present for all to see: "...a well-regulated militia...." We no longer depend on a well-regulated militia to defend this country, and without that dependency, there is no necessity to own a gun. And if that's how SCOTUS is going to interpret it then what we really need to do is completely repeal the Second Amendment. We've repealed amendments before (the nineteenth, for example), so it is not without historical precedent. It needs to happen quickly and decisively.
I'm not naive enough to actually believe a repeal of the Second Amendment is at all likely. But it is what it will take, or something very close, to prevent mass shootings in the future.
Maybe we do have a culture of violence in this country, but without easy access to guns, a culture of violence kills no one. Maybe we should look more closely at helping those who are mentally ill to seek help. But without guns, the mentally ill can't shoot anybody can they? And without easy access to guns, those buffoons like Mike Huckabee would have less opportunity to spew their ridiculous notions about blaming lack of prayer in schools for all of society's ills.
Obama made it clear that something needs to be done, even if it is not politically expedient. I sincerely hope he has the guts to push for gun control legislation during his second term in office. Maybe he needs to draw a line in the sand now and make the midterm election a single-issue poll: Do Americans want uncontrolled gun access or do we want to grow up and decide that ownership of most types of guns is not necessary nor advisable.
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