kris brower

Originally published at krisbrower.com. You can comment here or there.

I have had a web site be on TV before, but never in the USA. My site was recently on MyFox Philly briefly in a segment about Cyber Monday and saving money online. Here is a link to the page that has the article and the video clip!

Update: It was on TV again! Also Terri’s consumer blog mentioned that my website was in Consumer Report’s Shop smart magazine.

Originally published at krisbrower.com. You can comment here or there.

One thing I needed when making my second facebook application is a simple way for users to invite your friends. I found a few examples, but none of them were really what I was looking for. This code uses the ajax multiple friend select box(<fb:multi-friend-input>) for inviting friends instead of a long list or a random list of all your friends. You will need facebook.php and facebookapi_php5_restlib.php from facebook_client.tar.gz. If you want to see this invite code in action add the need numbers application. Here is the code:

<?php

/////////////////////////////////////////////
// These are the variables you need to change
/////////////////////////////////////////////

// your app api key
$appapikey = ‘changeme’;
// your app secret
$appsecret = ‘changeme’;
// your callback url
$appcallbackurl = ‘http://website.tld/’;
// your facebook url of this page
$inviteurl = ‘http://app.facebook.com/app/invite.php’;

/////////////////////////////////////////////
// This is the beginning of the section which includes and set up the php5 rest lib
/////////////////////////////////////////////

require_once ‘facebook.php’;

$facebook = new Facebook($appapikey, $appsecret);
$user = $facebook->require_login();

//catch the exception that gets thrown if the cookie has an invalid session_key in it
try {
if (!$facebook->api_client->users_isAppAdded()) {
$facebook->redirect($facebook->get_add_url());
}
} catch (Exception $ex) {
//this will clear cookies for your application and redirect them to a login prompt
$facebook->set_user(null, null);
$facebook->redirect($appcallbackurl);
}

/////////////////////////////////////////////
// These are the variables may want to change
/////////////////////////////////////////////
// The title of your Invite message
$title = ‘You have been invited’;
// The body of your Invite message
$text = ‘<fb:name uid=”‘.$user.’” firstnameonly=”true” /> invited you to join this app. <fb:pronoun uid=”‘.$user.’” /> wants you to join.<fb:req-choice url=”‘.$facebook->get_add_url().’” label=”Add it” />’;
// The logo associated with your invite message
$logo = ‘http://website.com/logo.gif’;
// Success message for when invites succeeded
$iworked = ‘<fb:success><fb:message>Your invitations have been sent</fb:message></fb:success>’;
// Error message for when all invites have been used
$ierror = ‘<fb:error><fb:message>You are out of invites, try again tomorrow</fb:message></fb:error>’;

/////////////////////////////////////////////
// This is the beginning of the section that processes the invites
/////////////////////////////////////////////
if ($_POST[’ids’]) {
// Invite the friends that were selected.
$friends = array();
foreach ($_POST[’ids’] as $value) {
if (count($friends) < 10) {
$friends[count($friends)] = $value;
}
}
$tail = ‘&canvas’;
$url = $facebook->api_client->notifications_sendRequest($friends, $title, $text, $logo, true);

if(!$url){
// If the maximum number of invites has been reached
$facebook->redirect($inviteurl.”?i=1″);
exit;
}else{
$facebook->redirect($url.$tail);
exit;
}
}

if ($_GET[’sent’] == 1) {
// Display a message letting the user know invitations have been successfully sent.
echo $iworked;
}

if($i==”1″){
// Error message for when all invites have been used
echo $ierror;
}

/////////////////////////////////////////////
// This is the beginning of the actual invite form
/////////////////////////////////////////////
echo ‘<div style=”margin:20px”>
<h2>Invite some Friends</h2>
<form action=”‘.$inviteurl.’” method=”post”><fb:multi-friend-input width=”350px” border_color=”#8496ba” /><input type=”submit” value=”Invite” /></form>
</div>’;

?>

Originally published at krisbrower.com. You can comment here or there.

• Golden Poison Frog

“Its alkaloid poison, batrachotoxin, prevents nerves from transmitting impulses, leaving the muscles in an inactive state of contraction. This can lead to heart failure or fibrillation. It also lasts long after the frog has left the area; chickens and dogs have died from contact with a paper towel on which a frog had walked.[citation needed] One wild adult terribilis (meaning, ‘the terrible’) has enough poison to kill up to 100 adult humans, or up to 20,000 mice [1]. However, this poison is lost in captive-bred and raised frogs due to a lack of certain items in its diet, currently unknown, although new research has hinted that a beetle from the family Melyridae may be the key ingredient responsible for the frog’s lethal poison.” (source)

• Electric Eel

“Electric eel have three abdominal pairs of organs that produce electricity. They are the Main Organ, the Hunter’s Organ, and the Sachs’ Organ. These organs take up 4/5 of its body. Only the front 1/5 contains the vital organs.[citation needed] These organs are made of electrocytes lined up in series. The electrocytes are lined up so the current flows through them and produces an electrical charge. When the eel locates its prey, the brain sends a signal through the nervous system to the electric cells. This opens the ion channel, allowing positively-charged sodium to flow through, reversing the charges momentarily. By doing that it creates electricity, and fires it at its prey. The electric eel generates its characteristic electrical pulse in a manner similar to a battery, in which stacked plates produce an electrical charge. In the electric eel, some 5,000 to 6,000 stacked electroplaques are capable of producing a shock at up to 500 volts and 1 ampere of current (500 watts). The organs give the electric eel the ability to generate two types of electric organ discharges (EODs), low voltage and high voltage. The shock is deadly for an adult human and a large electric eel can shock a horse to death.” (source)

• Alligator

There were 351 known alligator attacks from 1948 - 2005 in Florida of which 16 were fatal. (source)

• Cassowary

“The 2004 edition of the Guinness World Records lists the cassowary as the world’s most dangerous bird. Normally cassowaries are very shy but when disturbed can lash out dangerously with their powerful legs. During World War II American and Australian troops stationed in New Guinea were warned to steer clear of the birds. They are capable of inflicting fatal injuries to an adult human. Usually, attacks are the result of provocation. Wounded or cornered birds are particularly dangerous. Cassowaries, deftly using their surroundings to conceal their movements, have been known to out-flank organized groups of human predators. Cassowaries are considered to be one of the most dangerous animals to keep in zoos, based on the frequency and severity of injuries incurred by zookeepers.” (source)

• Bears

“There were about 52 recorded deaths due to black bears between 1900 and 2003 and about 50 deaths due to brown bears and about 5 due to polar bears in the same period. The most recent data is the most reliable and complete, but does not necessarily include all of the fatal attacks that have occurred in North America.” (source)

• Cone Snail

“The bright colours and patterns of cone snails have led inquisitive people to pick them up and hold them in their hand for a while. This is not a safe thing to do, because the snail may fire its harpoon in self-defense. The “sting” of many of the smaller cone species is no worse than that of a bee or hornet sting, but in the case of a few of the larger tropical species, handling the snail can have tragic consequences. About 30 human deaths have been recorded from cone snail envenomation. One species, the Geography cone, Conus geographus, is also known colloquially as the “cigarette snail,” in the belief that the victim will have only enough time to smoke a cigarette before perishing. Especially in the case of these larger species of cone snail, the harpoon can penetrate gloves or even wetsuits.” (source)

• Lightning

“In the United States from 1980 through 1995, a total of 1318 deaths were attributed to lightning, (average: 82 deaths per year {range: 53-100 deaths}). Of the 1318 persons who died, 1125 (85%) were male, and 896 (68%) were aged 15-44 years. The annual death rate from lightning was highest among persons aged 15-19 years (6 deaths per 10,000,000 population; crude rate: 3 per 10,000,000). The greatest number of deaths attributable to lightning occurred in Florida and Texas (145 and 91, respectively), but New Mexico, Arizona, Arkansas, and Mississippi had the highest rates (10.0, 9.0, 9.0, and 9.0, respectively).” (source)

• Dendrocnide moroides

“Contact with the leaves or twigs causes the hollow silica-tipped hairs to penetrate the skin. The sting causes a painful stinging sensation which can last for days or even months and the injured area becomes covered with small red spots joining together to form a red, swollen mass. The sting is known to have killed one human, and it can also kill dogs and horses.” (source)

• Sharks

From 1990 to 2006 there have been 936 shark attacks worldwide of which 98 have been fatal. That is 58.5 attacks a year and 6.125 fatal attacks a year.(source)

• Box Jellyfish

“Chironex fleckeri appear to avoid human beings when they are close to them and so can be said to avoid stinging humans. Their sting is incredibly powerful and extensive stings can be rapidly fatal. The sting produces excruciating pain accompanied by an intense burning sensation (one victim famously described the pain as “like having a bucket of fire poured over you”[citation needed]), and the venom has multiple effects attacking the nervous system, heart and skin at the same time. While an appreciable amount of venom (about ten feet or three metres of tentacle) needs to be delivered in order to have a fatal effect on an adult human, the potently neurotoxic venom is extremely quick to act. Fatalities have been observed as little as four minutes after envenomation, notably quicker than any snake, insect or spider and prompting its description as the world’s deadliest venomous animal. Although an antivenom exists, treating a patient in time can be difficult or impossible.”(source)

For some more information you might want to check out the following links:

• Organisms that are dangerous to Humans
• Death due to Animal Attakcs

Originally published at krisbrower.com. You can comment here or there.

I just updated and fixed a few websites. The buy.com filler item finder was not working, but not it is. The problem was that the location of the datafee changed. This was all I had to do to fix the problem:

Find export.buyservices.com/DataFeed and replace with affiliate.datafeed.buyservices.com

I also updated the ebay sort by total price so that you can select whatever country you like. I am not sure if unicode will work in the search yet though. Anything that can be encoded in a url should work.

Originally published at krisbrower.com. You can comment here or there.

I was excited to find out that a story I submitted to the Amazon.co.uk Associate success story contest won an honorable(honourable) mention. You can read about it on their blog. My site is filleritem.com. I recieved a gift certificate for 50 pounds in my email(the contest said it was going to be 75). I sent them a quick email to see what was up this is how it reads:

I am really excited to have received an Honorable Mention in the contest. I hate to be a bother but both the contest post and the results post mention 75 pounds as opposed to the 50 I received. Can you please clarify.

http://affiliate-blog.amazon.co.uk/2007/06/earn_up_to_250_.html
http://affiliate-blog.amazon.co.uk/2007/07/amazoncouk-asso.html

thanks,
kris

We will see what happens. I feel awkward complaining about not recieving the correct prize.

 update: I recieved the full 75 pounds. Thanks!