is happily being the wheel rather than a rusty old spoke
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Nope. They don't actually use Euro's in the UK. I don't know if they're the only European nation not to do so, but kinda think maybe they are.
Check the Forex menu button.
A GBP (Great Britain Pound or "Pound Sterling") is currently worth $2.084.
A Euro is currently worth $1.45
The Pound has really been on a bit of a tear. Good for me in one way in that my ADVFN holdings have been increasing in value even when the price doesn't change. Bad for me in another way because the real value to the mother ship of our Dollar-based profits is eroding at the same rate.
Although one would think (hope) that they're punishment is already delivered by noledgeable people going to there profile and figgering if they are spelling is know good, perhaps they air stock picks our know good iether.
We've got a 250k-word dictionary in the database. Perhaps we could use it and profile text to provide premium members a calculated cred score so we can quickly recognize the contrarian indicators.
Seems more scientific and certainly kinder than "Bob likes this stock? Okay, I'll short it."
Though the latter sure is lucrative!
The atrocious spelling in the profile should be cause for some kind of Administrative action, shouldn't it?
Correct.
If a person has an annual subscription and it automatically renews, and then they discover it automatically renewed and don't want to remain a member, will they get a refund?
We're still discussing the finer details of the refund policy for those who forget to cancel. We'll get the verbiage included on the Subscription page when the time comes.
We'll make sure that, for example, if a person who is asking for a refund of a renewed subscription obviously hasn't been using the site for a while when they got renewed, we'll give it to them.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but IHub does not refund any money at this time - right? At least based on the posts on this board, I often read about not getting a refund if someone wants to "quit" the service.
Largely correct. We evaluate each request on a case by case basis and we've given refunds, but don't want to publicly give the criteria we use. We do try to be fair, though.
Most refund requests that I've been aware of (I'm not directly in that loop -- our Admins are) have been when someone's been sanctioned in some way for misbehavior. In those cases, it's very cut and dry. No refund.
That is semi-reasonable IF the person specifically chose to sign up. However, we all know automatic renewals (which, BTW, is a great business decision) happen without the person realizing it quite often. In that case, the person should have the ability to cancel (say, within 30 days) and receive a refund IMO.
Largely agree, but with a bigger timeframe in the case of automatic renewals, since it can take more than 30 days to get the credit card statement and see the charge.
As you know, though, freedom of choice has always been a biggie issue for us so we're making sure that non-recurring subscriptions are available. They're just not as cheap a date. Well, except for the 3-year which is the cheapest on a cost-per-day basis.
I like it a lot!
There's a history of alias changes as part of the entire Admin history on accounts, but I'm not sure how far back it goes. I believe Dave implemented it, since Admin tools are his bag.
Based on your post, I am getting the feeling that IHUB may soon go the way of SI and start charging grandfathered and lifetime members for some features even though at the time the grandfathered and lifetime members joined they were told that they would have access to ALL features.
Is that the case?
No. We stopped offering lifetime memberships here as soon as I came aboard in 2002, before too much damage could be done. Pay once and use forever is not a good business model. It's downright poisonous. Once everyone's subscribed and there's no more money coming in, it's time to shut off the machines.
In SI's case, nobody's ever shown me that grandfathered members were told that they'd have free access to any and all new features the site might ever have, and even if such a statement was made, that was 5 owners ago (The Dryers, Go2Net, InfoSpace, iHub, ADVFN).
Grandfathered and Lifetime members on SI have more features than they ever had under previous ownership, whether they opt for the Premium Plus package or not. But because Grandfathered and Lifetime members were and likely always would be the majority of the site's population, I added the Premium Plus optional features as a way to hopefully get some much-needed money into the coffers.
Though I'd do it if I could, it's just not possible to run message boards of this size as a hobby and they must pay their own way.
Fortunately for iHub, the pay-once model was abandoned early enough to prevent the huge financial problem SI had. Since most of iHub's users either see ads or pay for expiring subscriptions, the legacy Grandfathered and Lifetime members aren't the cost problem they were on SI, so there's no need for a "Premium Plus" model like the one that saved SI.
However, just to be clear, there are features that are available now such as realtime streaming quotes that aren't free to Grandfathered/Lifetime members, nor are they included in the current subscription packages. Those features require separate ADVFN subscriptions.
I'm coming out of lurker mode for a question.
Man, I need to find a way to get on the boards more often! I had no idea you were in lurker mode!
News about Subscriptions. Pass it on.
In the near future, likely days from now, we'll be changing to automatically renewing subscriptions. This means that any new subscriptions (once it takes effect) will automatically renew upon expiration unless you cancel via a link we'll provide.
This has no impact on current subscriptions or subscriptions purchased before recurring subscriptions go into effect.
This will affect all subscription levels but two. There will be a new one-month "trial" subscription priced at $19.95 that won't auto-renew and the 3-year subscriptions we already have won't auto-renew. The $12.95 one-month subscription will be among the recurring ones. As will the $29.95 quarterly, $49.95 semi-annual, and $89.95 annual.
As always, we won't store your credit card information so it can't be stolen or subpoena'd. Meatloaf is busy setting things up with the credit card processors so they'll do the recurring thing on their end. As soon as he gets it done and we've got the cancellation link in production, we'll make the switch and the Subscription page will clearly state that all but the one-month trial and 3-year subscription will automatically renew. He could have it done today or next week. Hard telling.
For Gift subscriptions, we'll set it up so the buyer can cancel the recipient's renewal. Cancellation of a subscription won't reduce the account level immediately. It'll just prevent automatic renewal and the account level will be reduced on expiration and the standard 5-day, 1-day, and expiration PM's will be sent. So if you buy someone a one-year subscription, you can cancel renewal and not be on the hook for the rest of their lives.
If you want to extend your subscription before recurring subscriptions go into effect (remember, on the day it goes into effect it will have no effect on past subscriptions, only future ones), keep in mind that new subscriptions have always been added to the end of current ones. So if your subscription expires on 12/12/07 and you buy an annual today, your new expiration date will be 12/12/08. The same is true of Gift subscriptions. So if you want to get someone a gift subscription or extend their current one, without going through the cancellation process, you should do it soon.
The same is true if you want to extend your own subscription before new subscriptions become auto-renewing. You should do it soon.
Again, any subscriptions still in effect when recurring subscriptions are implemented will NOT auto-renew. Only subscriptions purchased after recurring goes into effect.
You can extend your existing subscription by going to http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/subscribe.asp or visiting the Homepage and hitting the Subscribe link.
I've got Norton 360 running on my machine right now and didn't get any warnings going to any page here, including Favorites.
Could you let me know if Live Update makes the problem go away for you?
Symantec support is telling me that we're NOT in the phishing list and has sent your screenshot to his manager for a solution.
Symantec suggests that you run Live Update and see if it still does it. Waiting for an answer to my question about whether or not they just now removed us from the list.
And this guy, "Rajesh" is about the slowest typist I've ever encountered.
Is this for real or a PhotoShop special.
Need to know before I go stone-age on the nice folks at Symantec.
Thought about it but didn't pull the trigger. Good thing. Steering clear now. Valuation is still rich by any metrics I respect, but they know how to turn a profit!
You survived the replacement without taking a sledgehammer to it all in frustration! Well done!
Or was it as easy as we'd hoped.
The guy who works on all the big equipment I break looked at the car and told me about that tool and that he's got it. I forgot to get it when I was picking up my dump truck just now, though.
The dump truck that I paid $4k for about 5 years ago and have recently spent $8k on repairs and mods, so now I've got $12k in a truck that might be worth $3k.
Says my 973 should be done in 2-3 weeks. Sure do hope so!
It's a community, Lisa. We're all in it together, whether it's using our collective wisdom to better our odds in the market, or volunteering an answer to a question posted to "None" if the intended recipient hasn't already.
Step up to the mic in an auditorium with thousands in attendance, ask a question of the crowd, and it's not unusual that more than one hand will go up.
I've been considering a number of options, including getting another Mustang of similar vintage for him to use as track toy with minor modifications, and rebuilding this one's engine so I can keep the serial numbers matching and correct since it's a one-owner car and should be valuable someday.
You just gave me another idea. Why not a Civic? Those suckers absolutely scoot around racetracks and the engines are pretty bullet-proof.
I'm going to have to dig around for a manual. I can't figure out how to disconnect the fuel lines on this thing so I can leave the fuel rail on the engine. Unbolted the exhaust and tranny tonight, so I think it's just down to fuel lines and motor mounts.
While rebuilding the engine, I'll clean up and restore the rest of the car. Such that I really don't want it used on the track anymore, except for when I sneak it up to Mustang Club events once a year. <g>
Its amazing how people answer questions that is not directed to them
iHub Members are a community and help each other out a lot. It's not remotely unusual and they are to be commended for it, not made fun of.
I guess they are looking for attention !!
Those who answer a stranger's question? Or those who ask a question repeatedly while refusing to direct it to the supposed recipient(s), then make fun of the people who are trying to help? I'm sure you mean the latter.
I guess its like most of the boards truth is something that's hard to find ! Just deception !!
Yep, I know this script. Your question, though it's none of your business, and the answer should've been so obvious that it needn't have been asked, has been answered. I'm sure it's just a matter of time before we see the rest of the agenda (I think it's revealed on page 5) takes you into off-topic territory, so I'll stop here so as not to encourage you.
You were told repeatedly that if you directed your question to an Admin rather than to nobody in general, you might have a better chance of getting a response.
Yeah, it's a pretty sweet deal, but like is true of nearly any occupation, it's not obvious to all just how much work and risk goes into someone being "lucky".
Is it what they do for a living ??
If so this is a sweet deal where do I sign up !! lol
1. Be or hire a programmer.
2. Buy a bunch of computers out of your own pocket and pay the monthly fee to have them hosted somewhere.
3. Work full-time yet unpaid for years while waiting for the population to grow to the point you can start paying yourself a few hundred dollars a month. This is not "Field of Dreams". If you build it, they *might* come, and if they do, they'll take their sweet ol' time getting here. Think years; not weeks or even months.
There are a lot of other details, but that's the basics.
Your questions read like there's an unspoken agenda behind them, but in the hopes I'm wrong and it won't lead to an unending string of other questions that are only barely related, I'll answer this one directly.
As did someone else.
Yes, this is what we do for a living.
To think otherwise, one would have to be either very naive about how grownups feed their families, or have zero idea just how big this place is. And the latter wouldn't surprise me. Our parent company is just now starting to REALLY get the picture, a year after acquiring us. Actually, so are we. It's difficult to quantify how big this is and when you do, it's difficult to grasp.
Upon further reflection, MUCH further reflection, I remembered that I actually had used the car previously this year. At an MCCI event at MAM, like I do every year. I think I might've also used it early in the season at HPT.
Meaning, it had coolant.
My dad doesn't read this site, that I know of, so I can smack-talk him here.
It's looking like it got money-shifted. As I was getting the engine ready for removal, and took a valve cover off out of morbid curiosity, I remembered riding with him once at HPT and instructing him at MAM, and in both instances, having to say "Dad!!! You're going to smack the valves into the pistons doing that!!!" He'd somehow developed a habit of downshifting as soon as he started braking, which was particularly noticeable at the ends of long straights. The first time he did it, I noticed the rev counter sweeping way past 7k.
I know he doesn't fit into this category, but I've had students who thought the rev limiter would cover their back when they did this. And just a couple of weeks ago, I was instructing a really good driver (fast hands) in a Cadillac CTS-V who was trying to heel/toe and was downshifting too early in the braking zone. Occasionally I run across people where I have to say "Let's not worry about heel/toe quite yet. Instead, downshift at the last possible moment, then road speed and revs are both down low enough to not matter as much."
Anyway, as I mentioned earlier either here or on SI, I was really puzzled by the rusty-water stain all over the firewall. Filling the radiator from the RV's hose couldn't cause that. And it couldn't have caused what I found when I got the car in the air. The same staining all the way back on the underside of the car.
I think the heater hose came off on the track or in the paddock. And I think it might've come off as a result of extreme heat/pressure. Factory non-screw clamp. And the quantity of water that apparently got all over the firewall and undercarriage is definitely inconsistent with a drained cooling system.
But the most damning evidence was found when I took off the left valve cover. The front two cylinders there couldn't make enough compression to be felt by my thumb over the spark plug hole and the 3rd only made 90 psi.
What I found when I took off the valve cover was a bunch of still-compressed springs and extremely loose rockers. Bent valves. And one pushrod was just barely poking up through the hole in the head. Pulled it out and it was bent pretty badly. Another isn't even visible through the hole. It likely broke and the pieces are laying under the intake manifold.
I'm not a happy camper right now. And will still have a good amount of mad going tomorrow, so I'm gonna take it out on the RV dealer who still hasn't sent me the replacement basement door for the rig they supposedly ordered when a test-driver ran it into something before I bought it a little over a month ago. There are some really major annoyances happening with that thing, some of which go beyond annoyance. Like the automatic generator start system that sometimes starts the generator and leaves it running until I turn it off, rather than the hour it's set for, or sometimes doesn't start at all. The house batteries were fully charged Sunday (when I'd discovered it'd started the generator 15 hours prior to my finding out it'd done so) and fully drained yesterday, despite there being nothing but standard parasitic loads going. No lights or anything.
So I'm gonna lose my temper with them on the phone tomorrow and hopefully not be as mad about the Mustang.
Then I'll have to figure out when I can drive the rig to Denver, hopefully not have to leave it more than a week (fly home and back out), and once I'm not as mad anymore, start shopping for either a long-block ($1655 + $400 core charge for a rebuild at one place I found), or a donor car. If my dad's gonna keep using this as a track car, not only do I need to stress the importance of not downshifting too soon (a telltale tach would've been nice right about now), I need to not sink too much money into the motor.
Have this one nearly out. Turning out to be a lot easier than I'd expected. 3 hours into it and all that's left is fuel lines, motor mounts, tranny mounts, exhaust, and finding the necessary bits and pieces for the cherry-picker.
Was tempted to just drop the racecar's engine into it since, hey, it's a racecar engine, and with the stock instake and exhaust pieces wouldn't make the insane power it makes in the racecar, and nobody seems to want to buy the racecar, but I'd be even more upset than I am now if that $8k motor got money-shifted.
That changes things slightly.
If the cooling system has had major attention and you weren't getting much heat BEFORE the attention or after, it narrows things down a bit. It's likely the controls for the heater core.
Look under the hood on the passenger side on the firewall. There will be two hoses going through the firewall. One of them might have a cable-operated valve. If it does, with the engine fully warm, move the valve fully one direction, check for heat (give it a good 15 seconds to really get going) and if there isn't any, move the valve fully the other direction and check again. Keep in mind when checking, you're also trying to figure out which direction opens the flow of water and which shuts it off. When it's shut off, it can take as long as a minute for the heater core to cool down enough that you know you've found the closed position.
If no (or little) heat either way, it's either the flapper valve in the heater core box or the heater core itself.
The flapper valve's control arm is usually accessible outside the box and if you're lucky, it's at the bottom rather than the top. If there was a water flow valve, keep it in the direction that produced the most heat and move the flapper control arm both directions until you feel the most heat.
With everything thusly set to maximum heat, and if you're sure the fan is running properly, if it's still not much heat, it's probably the heater core.
But heater cores usually leak; not clog. The few times I've encountered a clogged (partially clogged is enough to cause your problem) is when any kind of "stop leak" additive has been used (heater core passages are very small and this stuff can clog them) or the cooling system has been filled with with hose water rather than distilled water. The minerals typically found in tap water (especially in rural areas like mine) can dramatically impeded heat-transfer capabilities or even clog small passages like those found in heater cores.
I assumed, but you didn't say. Is your temperature gauge coming up to normal when the engine is sufficiently warm? If you don't have a gauge, the top radiator hose should be very hot and the heater hoses should be just as hot. If you can reach both heater hoses and have a water flow valve, checking to make sure one of the hoses doesn't remain cold in both positions is another test of the valve and heater core. If the hose that has the valve is cold and you rotate the valve and the hose becomes hot, you've just narrowed the problem down to whatever moves the valve.
Your van is in the era when some vehicles were using vacuum to move everything in accordance with your climate control settings but many were using cables. So it's hard to know which setup it's using.
However, with the engine idling and the fan turned off or to its lowest setting, get your hear as close to the controls as you can and listen for a hiss that's present when the engine is running but absent when you shut it off.
This might even be a good first test because though it might not be (often isn't) the only problem, if you hear hissing, you've got a cracked or broken vacuum line. The real bummer about this is that you could be losing vacuum but in the engine bay rather than at the controls. But more than once I've discovered a leaking (split) hose at the climate controls, wrapped it in electrical tape, and had a perfectly working system.
If you hear the hissing, you're usually going to have to remove the climate control panel to get at the hoses, but sometimes they're kind enough to give you access from underneath or have an easily-removed panel that gives you access.
With small engines, when the climate control isn't working properly and the engine also isn't idling perfectly, it's a dead giveaway that it's a vacuum line at or to the climate controls. Not the case with your big engine. That small of a vacuum leak generally isn't noticed by the engine.
One last thing (that only applies if the climate control uses engine vacuum) is to find the vacuum line at the climate control that goes back through the firewall. There will be only one. And it's not always easy to find. Disconnect it at the climate control and you should hear it hissing. Put your thumb over it and you should feel vacuum. If not, the break or disconnection is in the engine bay and you need only find it.
All of this vacuum stuff only applies if you've found and manipulated the water control and and heater box flappers and gotten good results and want to find out why the climate control isn't doing the job itself. But it's still a good idea to listen for the hiss first, as it's possible you will and an effective repair can be done with a bit of electrical tape or duct tape. Or if you're driving a Ford but have a BMW mindset, replacing the bad vacuum line.
My friend was Alan Staples and he was an instructor driving a white BMW M3.
The Mustang engine's not at all healthy. I compression-tested 5 cylinders and of the 3 that made any pressure at all, I got 60 psi from one and 90 from another. The other three weren't making any perceptible pressure when I put my thumb over the sparkplug holes.
Likely causes in order of likelihood:
1. Coolant low. An engine can get by on coolant level so low that it doesn't get up to the heater core, which usually has its water lines very high up.
2. Water flow valve stuck or disconnected from its actuator (cable?)
3. Temp control cable inside van disconnected from sliding/rotating switch? If not cable, check for a cracked, broken or disconnected vacuum line behind the climate control panel.
4. Check item 2 but for flapper door rather than water valve. The van could have one or the other or possibly (but not usually) both.
5. Heater core plugged. Disconnect both heater core lines at the firewall, run the garden hose into one end and see if it comes out the other end without too much resistance.
#1 happens more often than most people might think. Loss of heat is often the first symptom you're low on coolant.
With most cars, you should have a quick ritual in which you sit in the passenger seat waving a bottle of antifreeze around the glovebox area while whispering the names of as many different Ford models as you can think of before you start trouble-shooting, because the LAST thing you want it to be is the heater core. I used to work as a mechanic and that was always my most dreaded job.
However, on an Econoline, replacing the heater core really might not be that tough of a job. Should be plenty of room and you should be able to see everything. In foreign cars (and likely most modern American cars) you have to lay on your back on the passenger-side floor and just feel your way around for everything.
It's not true. People are often amazed at my ability to do large and complex calculations in my head but I've always maintained that I'm very poor at mathematics and unusually good at arithmetic. If it goes beyond +, -, /, *, and ^, I'm pretty lost.
http://siliconinvestor.advfn.com/readmsg.aspx?msgid=23913045
Hey, Tom, were you at the event at RA a week ago? A good friend of mine from KC was up there instructing.
I see you're using a user-specific CSS file.
Trying going to http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/my_css.asp, hitting "Save Changes", go back to the site, and see if the colors stabilize.
I know I'm #3, but could be 1 or 5. Can't wait to see who 5 is.
Yes. We're currently going through the throes of implementing UI changes on SI and we'll do the same on iHub once we've figured out what we're doing. Kinda like with the domain name change.
Well, hopefully this time the circle won't go all the way back around to where we're just a message-board again.
In all fairness to InfoSpace, we had good charts during their ownership of the site. They let us use them for 6 months after the purchase and didn't squawk when 6 months became 18 months.
ADVFN adds a huge area of offerings and expertise we (Dave, Matt, and I) didn't have that were necessary for us to be a supersite again.
Okay, after urinating myself non-stop for about half an hour, I'd put up a bigger building next to it, move the cars over to it one at a time, cleaning and cataloging them, then start in on restorations.
What a find! The story really smacks of urban legend but the photos do hint otherwise.
I'm actually starting to move the opposite direction. I haven't ridden a motorcycle in months and have decided I'm just not as much a bike nut as I used to be so I'm getting rid of all but one or two (keepers: 73 1/2 BMW R75/5 and maybe a 64 Honda 305 Dream), which will start showing up on eBay as soon as I get a chance to make them presentable, take pics, etc, and I'm going to lighten up somewhat on the cars. The specific ones I plan to get rid of soon are four Taurus SHO's (2 runners and 2 parts cars) and my old Mustang SCCA racecar.
Trying to simplify my after-work life because my work life has gotten much more complicated and I just don't have the time or resources for so many hobbies. Trying to get the hobbies down to mostly playing with Tonka Toys (for a couple more years then the biggest of them will be sold), and occasional open-tracking/driving schools or possibly back into SCCA racing.
Also planning to get rid of about a dozen guitars (mostly basses) because there are only a couple of basses and one guitar I find myself using all the time.
Speaking of Tonka Toys, the Cat 973 that was Lake Bermuda's most recent victim should be operational in about a week. Seems I chose the right time to bury it as the engine only had a few hundred hours left in it anyway. Complete rebuild and the machine should be as good as new, though the cost of the rebuild is a substantial portion of what I paid for the machine in the first place.
The stars are finally correctly aligned so that we're in a drought that has the lake dry enough to get serious about excavating the muck and I finally got started by putting the first load in the dump truck using the excavator and the truck didn't have enough clutch to pull itself back up the hill. Ending up having to empty it and it barely pulled itself back up the hill after getting a hefty nudge from the excavator. Hopefully taking it today to the place that's rebuilding the 973 where they said they can have the clutch replaced by tomorrow. Then hopefully things will stay dry long enough for me to really get started on excavation. Once I've got enough of it excavated down to rock and clay, rain won't be as big a barrier anymore.
The type of website usage that's preferred (sticky vs non-sticky) swings back and forth like the preference for centralized vs decentralized data processing but the wavelength is shorter.
Our users are WAY more engaged than on most websites, as shown by our pageviews per user. Sometimes that's a curse, sometimes it's a blessing. If you're focusing on branding, high engagement is what you're looking for. If you're focused on how many sales you can get per thousand ad impressions, you want low engagement.
Paying subscribers make up the minority of site users, so most users see the ads on message pages, where the heavy engagement is happening.
We offer our advertisers a bit of the best of both worlds. High engagement on the boards. Low engagement (but still high visitor counts) on pages like the homepage and quotes page (where everyone sees at least one ad, subscribers and non-subscribers alike).
I've always been convinced that advertisers and ad networks don't "get it" when it comes to just how high the level of engagement is on a message board, especially a top-5 Finance message-board. Most of our users aren't "visitors". They don't stop by briefly every now and then. They make themselves comfortable and stay, every day.
Some advertisers do get it, though. I think good examples are BullRunReport.com and StockPromoters.com, who are featured on the homepage. They've locked up those spots as exclusives so they can take advantage of the high visitor count, and are somewhat getting a branding effect because though their ads aren't seen multiple times per day per user, they're seen multiple times per month per user. If they'd take a chunk of the message-board inventory, I think they'd have optimum campaigns, combining the click-through effectiveness of the homepage spots with the branding aspect of being seen on the boards mulitple times per day per user.
In my experience, clickthrough rates (CTR) on homepage spots increase rather noticeably if an advertiser takes about 5-10% of our message-board inventory, though the message-board inventory itself doesn't get particularly high CTRs.
Regarding "It's ad dollars & site growth, no getting folks to hang around that counts.", that goes straight to my point about engagement only being valuable when advertisers are thinking about branding. When advertisers aren't focused on branding (which is the case most of the time) our engagement is a curse.
There are some advertisers (Fidelity and E*Trade stand out) who are always attentive to branding, and one doesn't need to hover over very many of the underlined-word ads to see that Microsoft is back to buying ad space, and whenever they participate, branding is the name of the game.
Especially tricky and risky when the volume is so light. Having to bet that when/if the volume returns to normal, it'll be with the price rising instead of declining.
I shorted a small amount of Google right before earnings. I'm not planning to cover for 3 months, if then, as I expect this to be a very bad quarter for them.
I've never gotten to see Nielsen data for us. Would like to. Same with ComScore.
I think Alexa is valid only for comparing ourselves now with ourselves in the past. Because of the tech-savvy nature of so much of our demographic, we tend not to be heavily populated with Alexa users, though I'm pretty tech-savvy and use the toolbar myself and don't use the ones from GOOG or YHOO. My guess is that our real "ranking" might be as much as twice as high as what Alexa reports.
I haven't read the article you linked to, but I would expect Nielsen to be substantially more accurate than Alexa.
I wonder if there's publicly available information regarding what percent of the internet universe uses Alexa and whether or not we can check on our end to see what percentage of our users use Alexa.
And I might have it all wrong in my assumption that the tech-savvy tend to avoid Alexa. It might be the other way around. throg.advfn.com is an internal-use-only server, yet comprises 3% of the Alexa-reported traffic for ADVFN, meaning the in-house geeks use it quite heavily.
In a similar vein, iHub now represents 8% of ADVFN's traffic according to Alexa. I'm nearly 100% positive that figure is a 3-month figure or at least 1 month. I think once we've been on the new domain name long enough to completely cover the period Alexa uses for that calculation, we're going to have about a 600 ranking in the States and will comprise around 40% of ADVFN's traffic. I think once Alexa finally catches up a bit (they're 3 days behind now rather than the typical 1), we're going to see iHub's percentage of total traffic go up pretty quickly.
Gradually getting filled and the spread has widened because all those shares available at 87 cents got bought. I'm not planning to increase my price to keep pace with the higher Ask, though. I'll let someone else do that.
I'm currently the best bid on HMB at 85 cents for a smallish position. No takers yet. The order isn't so much for the purpose of adding shares as to test the waters in this area and see if there're still many people left willing to sell it here.
The Ask has come down as well, but still has the same size (10k+ shares) to it. My gut tells me that what you're seeing and what I've been feeling hasn't come to fruition yet and may be a false alarm. Other chartists should've noticed and, as they so often do, make the chart a self-fulfilling prophecy.
One of the downsides of dealing with such a boring little company that doesn't do a lot of volume.
Hopefully the mention of options isn't too off-topic here. For my own personal tastes, I prefer options over penny-stocks because they have that same "could be a big gain or could be a total loss" aspect. With less exposure to untrue PR's and posts, SEC intervention, reverse splits, etc.
Looks like an 85-cent buying opportunity should be around the corner. Plenty of sellers, not many buyers, but both are being quite stubborn about their prices despite a pretty normal spread.
My other "fave" right now is ELN. We'll see how it plays out. I've made a very speculative bet on earnings (tomorrow morning) being a surprise. Bought OTM August calls.
BIIB announced the other day and they've really been on a tear since. And part of BIIB's good news should be ELN's good news as it's an important drug they co-market.
August $22.50 calls have been as low as 30 cents today (on the Ask) and that's where I've bought most of them. Currently $0.45x$0.50, but they're currently having an intraday spike that isn't remotely unusual for them and likely won't last.
Surprised to find HMB mentioned here since it's (for now) a NYSE stock.
It's currently one of the stocks I watch and trade most actively. I have a small amount of it in my main account and at the moment rather large positions in my trading accounts. Have been flipping blocks of it for nickel gains anytime there's enough volume that I can get fills without moving the price too much. Not easy, as the trading volume has been really low. I try to catch all I can at $0.85 even if it takes me to a stupidly overweight position, then lighten up to simply a large position anytime there are enough buyers at $0.92 or higher. Yesterday was an exception. Didn't sell any.
I don't know much about this company, but this is what I think I know:
1. Book value a bit over $3.00 per share.
2. No sub-prime exposure. Average credit score on their mortgages substantially above national average.
3. Since they're almost exclusively (until recently) Florida, they (in my opinion) initially got clubbed with the sub-prime bat, haven't recovered, and are further being punished for being in a weak real estate market.
4. I consider their mortgages relatively safe considering that because of where most of their mortgages are, they're dealing with borrowers who simply pay their bills. I can't imagine much foreclosure happening with this company.
5. On the flip side of that coin, there's ARMs and I would expect that most of their market is on fixed income because of their age.
6. On the edge of the same coin, I have no idea how many fixed-incomers who only have social security live in Florida. Would think they'd mostly be pensioners who (hopefully) didn't buy the most house they could afford while assuming their interest rates would never go up. How this figures into their mortgage portfolio mix, I have no idea.
7. At this rate, they're not going to be NYSE much longer. It wouldn't surprise me to see them sell some of their loans to get their stock price back up above the $1.00 level.
8. I'm told, but am not seeing it in black and white, that they've got enough cash to last them until the end of 08. Yahoo shows them having $52M cash and a negative cash flow last quarter of over $60M.
9. Institutional holdings and short position combined account for nearly all of the float. No window-dressing sales should be happening soon but also no compelling reason for shorts to cover either. Most of the short position was probably put on in the $2.00+ area.
I personally consider this one a good speculative play if one buys it cheaply enough, but trading is so thin on it you have to use limit orders. A market order for just a few thousand shares can move the price dramatically. And if you're trading a few thousand shares at a time, you have to watch the bid/ask and not put in your order until there's a large enough buyer or seller out there hoping you come along.
The price moves enough to make trading it possible and potentially profitable (because of its low price, gains of 8-10% possible in any given day if done right), but the thin volume makes it challenging.
Edit: I'm currently stupidly overweight because, though I'm no chartist, I've just had a gut feeling from watching it that it's more upward-inclined than downward now. I'm running into increasing competition to buy it below $0.90, and it's darned near impossible to find sellers at $0.85 anymore. And yesterday the buyers (temporarily) bid it up pretty high amid a dearth of sellers.
Also, after changing my rear end oil yesterday, I noticed some filings on the magnet. Not much, maybe enough to cover half a pinky fingernail if you smeared them out flat. That small an amount shouldn't be a problem, should it?
If it's the original grease, that much (or considerably more) would be expected. Clean the magnetic plug and put it back in and don't worry about it if there's less in a few thousand miles.
As an aside, these plugs are normally too dark on cars and some bikes to be very useful for visual inspection. When I encounter that, I buff them on the wire wheel followed by cloth to at least make them glossier for easier inspection.
I'm having idle issues after the engine heats up. Idles fine cold/cool, but drops lower and can't hold it when hot. Pops through the carbs sometimes - not often. Too rich??
Those symptoms are typically mutually exclusive.
Popping through the carbs is always either the timing is way off (so unlikely as to be not worth considering) or it's running so lean that the cylinder is getting so hot that the fuel/air mixture is igniting as soon as the intake valve opens. Lean-running produces a LOT of heat.
Rich, on the other hand, will usually result in popping in the exhaust as unspent fuel/air gets dumped into the exhaust and gets ignited by the next influx of spent mixture. Rich would also make the engine idle fine when cold and worsen as it gets warmer.
And rich would be in keeping with the diagnosis of foreign matter keeping the float needle open.
The only way I can imagine rich causing popping through the carbs would be a carb dumping a SERIOUS amount of fuel into the cylinder. In my few years working as a professional motorcycle mechanic and decades as an amateur, I've never seen that happen, though. But it seems at least possible to me.
I'd work on the bike assuming it's running rich, address that, and see what the outcome is. Especially seeing if it's more willing to idle hot.
Flushing the carbs might completely fix it. 50/50 shot.
You likely don't have one of these, but I've got a cooling system pressurizer (used to see if the cooling system is leaking down and hopefully show me where) with an adaptor to fit most motorcycle tanks. If the simple flushing doesn't work, I hook this up to the fuel tank, put about 10 psi in it, and repeat the process, hoping it'll kind of "power wash" the float needle.
Another option is to disconnect the fuel line at the petcock, adjust your air compressor to no more than about 30 psi, open the float bowl drains, and blow air through the line.
And one last approach is to do the flushing thing I described but put your hand over the gas cap opening and make just enough room for the air nozzle to fit between your hand and the tank and pressurize the tank that way.
Be careful not to pressurize the tank too much, though your hand can't typically hold back enough pressure to bulge the tank unless it's plastic.