ShoeMoney has a post of his favorite motivational movies. This is a great topic, and I love all of the movies he posted. I decided to list my favorites, and why I like them. These are my favorite motivational movies, not movies in general.

• Boiler Room: Also posted by Shoe, this is an amazing film about an illegal stock firm. The main character is the perfect example of a great businessman, as he sees a business opportunity in just about everything. I watch this movie about once a week, I love it.
• Glen Gary Glen Ross: A great flick about the world of sales and how to close the sale. Taught me ABC (Always Be Closing).
• Blow: Another illegal business venture, but motivating all the same. This is a great movie about a man who sells 85% of the United States’ cocaine in the 1970’s.

Check out these movies if you haven’t already, it will be worth it.

I just discovered BlogRush! It’s a great little widget that sits in your Wordpress sidebar and displays posts from other blogs. When someone from your blog clicks one of the post links, you get points that go towards getting posts from your blog displayed on other peoples BlogRush widgets. I just added this widget to my blog as you can see on, and I am looking forward to seeing how much extra traffic it brings me. Go download BlogRush now to boost your site’s visitors!

I have had problems with Google Analytics for a while now and finally got it fixed yesterday.  Turns out it was a mistake by me, I didn’t know you had to add -1 after your user account number (”UA-#####-1″).  Today was the first day I got to see the stats of my website, and it’s really nice to have.  I am able to see how many visitors, page views, etc. there were each day and also what country those visitors came from.

The DarkEye website gave me a lot of viewers after I submitted my site, so props to them.  If you run a website I highly recommend you check out Google Analytics to keep up with what’s going on.  It’s easy to install, and even easier to use.

What a great idea. These people mixed real-life products with the internet. Just think of how big Beanie Babies got, and then imagine if they had mixed their dolls with an interactive web game. Wow, they probably would have doubled their profits. Well, if they advertised.

That is the problem with Webkinz. As far as I have seen, they don’t advertise other than their own products. Why? Within the game you can shop for clothes, food, etc; why wouldn’t you get companies like Coke or Burger King to advertise your online food? Webkinz could at the very least DOUBLE their profits by doing this. I know that there are many companies out there that would gladly advertise their product to a huge demographic of children around the world. I know I would.

So while Webkinz had an amazing idea going into this, it seems that they are inexperienced with web marketing. Get with it Webkinz; work smarter, not harder.

Too many people now, not just in the web industry, but in just about every industry, aren’t charging enough for their time.  It takes a lot of time and effort to build a website, why not exchange that time and effort for some cash to pay the bills?  There are many people ruining it for everyone else.

If someone come to me and asks for an elaborate website with all the bells and whistles, I might think that it would be about $2,000 worth of work.  The same guy could probably go to some idiot who does half the quality of work as me (although the customer doesn’t know this until all is said and done) and get the same website for maybe $200.   Not only do I lose a customer, but the customer has to waste his time with some jack-ass who doesn’t give him what he needs, and on top of all that, the same jack-ass doesn’t even get paid enough to pay his own bills.

I know when I say $2,000 that might sound like a lot, but go do some research on prices of any professional web designer, and you will see that $2,000 is probably his starting price.  It takes a lot of time to build a website, and it takes a lot of skill, too.  Next time you think about building someone a website for a couple bucks, stop and think about how this effects not only you, but the entire industry.

I hear people every day talking about how they want to be an entrepreneur.  “I’m going to own my own business and become a millionaire.”  They act like it’s going to happen overnight, when in reality, it probably won’t happen at all.

I am going to be a millionaire.  I own my own business and want to continue to grow and start new businesses.  But I can tell you exactly how I’m going to do it.  I am already a freelance web designer.  It took time to learn what I know, but I didn’t give up and the work has paid itself off.  I can look at almost any program in just about any language and know what it’s going to do.  I have learned Java, C++, PHP, CSS, HTML, and Objective-C, and probably a couple more I am leaving out.  Even though I may not be and expert in those, just learning the basics has helped me to understand other programs and how they work.  I am excellent in CSS and HTML, and very good in PHP.

Being a freelance web designer could make me a millionaire if I market it well, but it’s not easy to be a freelancer these days, especially with all the idiots trying to get clients by offering to work for nothing.  That’s why I am thinking of new ideas to try every day, online and off.  Many people who do well online forget that they can take the money they earned online and put it into something like a restaurant or rental properties.

But the idea of this article is not to tell you all of the different things you should try, it’s about thinking of your own idea and going for it.  Ignore anyone who tells you you can’t do it, including your parents or spouse.  If you truly believe that it’s a good idea and that people will want it, try it.  You may end up bankrupt or you may end up rich, but you will always end  with  more knowledge than when you began.  That extra little bit of knowledge could be what makes your next project a huge success.

Benefit has posted a bulletin on MySpace asking for people to help in the development of his new website.  There has been talk for a while now that Benefit will be releasing his new album soon, so I guess this is in preparation for its release.  I have sent him an e-mail volunteering my services, so if you would like to do the same, here is a copy of his bulletin:

  Benefit is looking for talented people who want a chance to get involved and contribute their skills. This would essentially be an internship with Benefit’s production company where projects would be worked on remotely and coordinated over the internet. You will get a chance to build your portfolio and have your name associated with upcoming Benefit projects. Some of the skills being sought are listed below. If you interested or would like more information please submit examples of your work to: Info@BenefitOfficial.com

Graphic Art
Good with vector based graphic art and graphic design in general
Projects: Logo design, Tshirt design, Promo art, Web graphics
.
Web Design
Web design and web 2.0 standards, CSS, ASP.net, PHP, Flash
Projects: Music based web application, Standard web design
.
Audio Editing
Good with wave editors like CoolEdit, SoundForge, Wavelab
Projects: Preparing drums, slicing samples

If you have never heard of Benefit, I urge you to buy his CD on iTunes.  Also, Benefit, being the amazing artist that he is, promotes the free trade of music, so go on Limewire and download a song if you’d like to listen before you by.  He is the most amazing lyricist in the world, only comparable to Eminem.

If you like his music and would like to help him out, please volunteer your skills to the production of his new website.

Charles Mingus said it best, “Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.”

Many of these new “Web 2.0″ websites are trying to make everything in their design so complicated that the users just end up getting annoyed and leaving their site. By looking at my website and this blog’s theme, you can see that I practice simplicity in all of my designs.

I believe that I could take any complicated site on the web and make it simple and usable, without losing any function. There is no need for all of this complexity in web design. I just don’t understand; why would you want to scare away potential visitors?

I just finished the new design of rickykresslein.com! I am very happy with the way it came out, and I like it much more than the previous design. Check it out and leave comments to tell me what you think.  And yes, there is a blog redesign coming.

Today I StumbledUpon some great tips for Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  I learned alot from it, and it puts all of the information you need in one place, so if you are new to SEO techniques you can learn quickly.  Check it out.