how did i do?
more questions?
more screencasts?
let me know!

my weigh in on Monday 2nd March was at 120 Kilograms {264.5 pounds / 18.9 stone}
so i had lost another 2 Kilos in that week. {that’s 4.4 pounds / 0.3 stone}
i’ve lost a total of 8 kilos since valentines day {17.6 pounds / 1.2 stone}
another 32 kilograms to go.

no measurements this week as well… might be a monthly thing.

on the exercise tip: not much. i need to buy a bike helmet that fits my humungous head. if i try to wear a helmet made for a “normal headed person” it looks like putting a thimble on top of an orange; ridiculous. so i need to go helmet shopping. {and bike seat shopping too}

looking ahead: over the next week / 10 days it is going to be a hard week. we have a LOT of family and friends arriving up here to visit & stay with us. there will be a lot of celebrating and a lot of eating… i will do my best. my goal is not to go backwards… i just don’t want to put on any weight….

DOIT09!

THRU YOU | Kutiman mixes YouTube

and because some of you illiterate num nums might not go there let me explain what i am sending you to:

this incredibly talented dude went out into the wild wild west that is YouTube and found random – unrelated videos of people doing their music, playing, singing, whatever and then he remixed their videos into incredible music! my explanation might not sound cool, but trust me, go watch it. it blew my mind.

your friendly neighborhood awesomeness,
dj paine

the mysterious Frodo’s Ghost from Geelong Australia:
the blog: http://frodosghost.com
his twitter: http://twitter.com/frodosghost

Mighty Sean / Abzoloot from the Gold Coast Australia:
his twitter account: http://twitter.com/abzloot

The Facebook Page!

And lastly, i hate to do it but i got to…
i am calling out one Mr Evan Peet from Sydney Australia. He has been talking the talk… but we don’t see any walking the walk from him… i think he’s gotten scared of competing against us amazing people. as usual; the Sydney-sider is WEAK! so put down that kebab Evan and DO IT 2009!

THE GOAL:
by the end of 2009 i want to get down to 88 Kilograms / 194 Pounds / 13.8 Stone.
that means i gotta loose 40 Kilograms / 88 Pounds / 6.3 Stone.
roughly that is 31% of what i currently weigh! nearly one third of my body. wow.
So that is where i am at as of now.

THE PLAN:
this week i am concentrating on two things: cutting the addiction to eating crap / drinking anything other than water. and putting my new bike together. – For christmas i got a massive box from benita – it is a men’s pushbike i have to put together {from benita “here you are my love…. hint hint”}. more serious exercise will be introduced in the coming weeks…
i might even visit my doctor and get some blood tests for all my current state of health.

JOIN IN:
there are a few dudes around the world that are kicking into this DO IT 2009. we would love you to join in too to keep us and your self accountable and record your journey. If you don’t have your own blog {or don’t want to post about weight loss on your current one} just head over to Wordpress or Tumblr and start up a new blog for yourself, or even just get yourself a Twitter account & post your updates! please tag it all with #DOIT09
if Facebook is your thing; check out our DOIT09 Facebook Page {short URL www.bit.ly/doit09}

LET’S DO IT IN 2009!!

anyway here is everything you need to know, and help with this worst fire tragedy ever down here in Australia…

LEARN:
wikipedia – 2009 Victorian Bushfires.

ABC australia’s coverage of the Bush Fires

News.com.au ’s coverage of the Bush fires

DONATIONS:
RED CROSS DONATIONS

Salvation Army Donations

LISTEN / RADIO COVERAGE:

LISTEN to ABC national news radio online
local radio station 774 has a twitter feed

MAPS:

a google map showing where there is active fires in victoria

Google Map of Fires – mash up from the CFA

ONLINE / TWITTER:

@RicRaftis from twitter has created a Victorian Bushfires Blog/Site

search the hashtag #bushfire on twitter search

The CFA {Country Fire Authority} has an RSS feed of their statewide Incident Summary

and one last thought….
up here in my home state of QLD there is thunderstorms and flooding…. sigh

What is it?
this is an open challenge to the everyone online. Lose Weight. Lose Inches. Do It. Stop procrastinating and we will do it together. This is not a diet or a way to do it, this is just using your existing blogs, websites, social networks, twitter accounts, whatever we can to keep each other on track.
No prizes, no trophies, just everyone encouraging one another and keeping each other in check. Whatever that takes, Do It. For me it will be having a great time communicating online with everyone who wants to be involved.

February 14th 2009 is the D-DAY.
you have 10 days to get your stuff in order. eat all the bad junk food you want. get it out of your system {or would that be in your system?} because come Feb 14th 2009 you WEIGH IN & MEASURE UP. Pull out the measuring tape and get it around your waist, get it around your stomach, pull out all your stats and publish it somewhere, anywhere. it could be on your own blog, facebook, myspace, flickr, twitter, whatever. I have been talking to a few friends around the world and we thought about creating a special blog or website, a service or something… but it came to me a couple of days ago: with tagging, linking, hashtags, facebook etc why bother creating something like that? why not let everyone just Do It? and we can all link to each other, we can all tag and hashtag our journey as we DO IT in 2009!

Online:
join us on Facebook on the Do It 2009 Page.
{short link is www.bit.ly/doit09 }

come and be my friend on Facebook.
on Twitter www.twitter.com/djp72

the twitter hashtag is #doit09

the flickr / vimeo tag is doit09

and all my blogging about it will be found here: http://www.djp72.net/blog/tag/doit09/

that’s it.
get ready.
and please TELL SOMEONE. Invite your friends and family to join us.
i’ll see ya back here or hear from you on Feb 14th.
In the meantime read up online about healthy ways of losing weight and work out exactly what is your GOAL. Together we can Do It in 2009.

and we also went on a big family car trip down to Geelong & back…
much to write about… lots happening. in the meantime follow along onTwitter, or my catch all Tumblr.

so… anyway… all the best to Barack, i hope he really digs into the true faith in this job. i hope he does well. i just hope he doesn’t start believing his own hype and i hope the american people settle down and realise he is just a man, by all accounts a very smart dude and someone who should be able to do the job well…. but he’s not the saviour and he’s not the antichrist. he’s just a president. who gives a flying fig about the amount and type of melanin he has. it does not matter. it’s all about the job he does. after all being a politician is just a job. a dirty dirty job that usually only insane power crazy people might want….

here’s to the future, we’ll see what happens.

i am not a political type person…. but i am interested in the results of the election in the USA today. it seems the americans have a choice of two christians:
a} seriously insane old, war loving, white dude who actually has a sense of humour and a lifetime of experience, and would look and feel right at home in Dr Stranglove.
b} seriously super intelligent middle aged black dude, who is just crazy for killing babies, has very little experience, and obviously believes his own righteous hype.

or as i keep it in the shorthand of my mind: that crazy funny old guy or that unfunny uber nerd….

wow…. this is the best that you can spew forth america?

coming from someone on the other side of the planet, who has no vested interest… coming at it purely as someone who wants some good laughs, i’m sorta rooting for the underdog, the insane old dude. at least he makes me laugh. can you imagine how earnest and contrite it will become with brainiac at the helm?

i miss President Jed Bartlett…

part two: the positive.

as i already mentioned in my last post, we signed up to sponsor a child thru world vision australia. we did what is called a special request, we asked for a boy the same age as our oldest son Drummond, give or take a month and we also wanted him to be from South Africa {my wife Benita is South African coloured}. so after a few weeks we got XOLO in the mail….

you can see a bigger version of that here
it isn’t the world’s greatest picture of XOLO, it’s a janky pixelated washed out picture of an unhappy looking little guy, as a photographer i long to go over and take pics of a lot of the kids i see come through our displays… anyway inside the XOLO’s picture folder it has his stats:

you can see a bigger, readable version of his stats here

So we have had little XOLO’s picture folder in the kitchen with us, Drummond has been learning all about him and has gotten with the programme straight away, he has been putting aside part of his pocket money for XOLO and he even get’s a mention every now and then in Drum’s bedtime prayers.

We’ve been meaning to write to him, have the boys draw him a picture, take a picture, etc etc, but things have been busy over the last month.

Today on the 15th October, it is the actual day of Blog Action Day on Poverty, so this morning i was thinking about whether i will blog anything about the subject… and then in today’s mail there is a cool looking envelope:

my mind was seriously on everything else under the sun and i had no idea who could be sending us a letter from SA, it must be Benita’s relatives or something… and then we opened it and was knocked out that it was a letter from our sponsor child XOLO!

Well XOLO is about to turn 5 so it’s not written by him of course, it’s actually written by one of the WV co-ordinators there in SA, the hand writing is a little tricky, but we now know that he lives with his 72 year old grandma who has bad eyesight. he lives in a little village with a well that is about 20km’s from the closest town, XOLO’s mum is away in Durban looking for work, no mention of XOLO’s father.

talk about timing, God has a great sense of comedic timing. on the actual day i receive the letter from my sponsor child. classic. so of course that has moved me to write today. and come to the conclusion of what i think we should do about poverty…
HOW DO WE RESPOND TO POVERTY?
by doing something!
something tangible, personal, and ongoing. and the most common sense thing i can see to do is make a difference in one child’s life.
it costs about $1.50 a day.
$10 a week.
you blow more than $10 a week on crappy take away food, coffees and drinks that are killing you. i don’t care who you are, you can afford $10 a week to save the life of a child.

if you want to save a child’s life with your spare change please contact me. i can help you make it happen today. don’t just blog links to resources or read the thousands of blogs out there posting about the problem, and though it’s helpful i think just giving a one time donation is not as powerful as actually connecting with an actual child in need personally.
do something. sponsor a child. i’d love to help you make that happen. there is nothing in it for me, i get no commissions, i get no gold stars, i get nothing out of it other than joy of making it happen.

part one: the negative.

like you i have grown up in “average” conditions in a western country and pretty much live everyday thinking how life would be better if i only had more stuff; if i only could afford that new MacBook Pro… i can’t wait till that new 5D Mark II camera comes out… etc etc… and if you work for yourself then you know the joys of wondering how you will pay rent next week when you have no work coming in… this is the stuff of our lives, committing to going on a diet tomorrow but tonight i will cruise through mcdonalds drive thru for one last fast food meal. we are wrapped in our own worlds doing the best we can…

and like you i’ve grown up seeing starving children on my TV and hoping that one day i could make a difference, do something, anything.

but here’s the killer, MOST people {including myself} NEVER do ANYTHING. oh yes we are full of good intentions and we promise ourselves that one day we will get around it. {just like that diet, or that gym membership} and that is the killer. we just don’t actually do anything. we can justify spending hundreds of dollars on films, DVD’s, albums, phone bills and the stuff we “need”, but we just never quite get around to looking into sponsoring that child, donating that money or finding about that organisation.

for years i’ve been planning on doing something, and it never eventuated. until this year when i saw a job advertised for a part-time “display co-ordinator” on the Gold Coast for World Vision Australia. i had no idea what it entailed or exactly why i was doing it, but i applied, then got rejected, then got an interview, then got the job, then got the training, then was on the job…. and THEN i finally got a sponsor child.

yes it wasn’t until my first shift actually on the job that i actually signed up to sponsor a child.

my very part time {2 shifts a week of around 5 hours each, for about a six week “campaign” and then two or three weeks off and then another campaign} job with World Vision is what they call the grunt work, the face work, the rubber on the road work: i stand at a table covered in sponsor children in shopping centres and malls and try to get total strangers to stop and sponsor a needy child through World Vision. it’s pretty much the best and worst job i’ve ever had. i couldn’t even imagine what it would be like doing this job full time….

this job is actually lifting me to new ends of thinking too much and seeing life as this weird existential experience. i mean i stand in the middle of a shopping centre, surrounded by shops selling all sorts of useless crap and pampering services, the whole mall is designed to make people want to shop, and each shop within the mall is screaming out for attention with latest sparkly beads for sale, and here i am standing in front of a few card tables with a bunch of childrens pictures from around the world. it is seriously like sending out a Amish farmer in his horse and buggy to compete in the formula 1 grand prix… on a good day i like to think of it as David out to fight Goliath.

sometimes it is hard to not look at the entire western civilisation as some disgusting monstrosity, an example of the pinnacle of selfishness… i cannot tell you how many times i have watched a woman refuse to even return a “hello” to me when she realises what i am there for, only to walk straight to the display window of jewellery store. or to see couples in the twenties ignore you with their Boost juice and shopping bags in their hands. i cannot tell you how many families have walked past and said something along the lines of “we couldn’t afford it” and each of the children is chomping down on lollies while sitting in shopping trolleys laden with food, toys and the latest XBox games.

by far my “favourite” top two responses from the public walking past in shopping centres are:
The Head Snapper & The Concerned Lips.
The Head Snapper is someone who is usually slowly walking thru the Mall/Centre in that shopping induced haze, they are not in a hurry, they are just idly walking and gazing around when their gaze slowly lands onto our World Vision display and before they can help it they are staring at all these children’s faces, they are trapped by all the orange of the sponsor children’s little cardboard picture folders. then all of a sudden they realise that i am there, a human being who wants them to actually do something about it, and they realise exactly what they are looking at. and then: WHA-CRACK! they snap their heads away from me and the display so fast i can almost feel the whiplash.
The Concerned Lips is someone who walks past and maybe nods at you and the stand, but they have no intention of stopping so they give you that i-am-concerned-so-i-will-tighten-my-lips-a-little-and-give-a-concerned-tilt-to-my-head look, if you are really lucky they will even give you one of those and even a slight concerned moan or sigh as they slightly pause at a child’s picture…

check this commercial that World Vision Australia did for April 2008:

I LOVE THAT ADVERT!

but can i be straight up honest with you?
getting the everyday jo public to sign up for a sponsor a child is HARD. REALLY HARD! and even though i’m pretty new to it all, it’s getting harder every week.
personally i think the whole world vision approach at the shopping centres is a bit soft, i would love to do something radical and have massive banners and television displays with really confronting messages and images. we cannot compete for peoples attention in a shopping centre, but we could get attention with the “rude” reality of truth and the power of contrast. Big signs that say “SAVE CHILDREN NOW” or “YOUR CONCERNED LOOKS DON’T FILL HUNGRY BELLIES” or “STOP FEELING GUILTY, DO SOMETHING GOOD”… i know, i know we’d be booted out of the centres with a chorus of boos. because people don’t like to feel judged.

that commercial above is excellent in my opinion, it gives it to people straight, BUT the advert was considered a flop because jo public complained because it was too judgemental. people don’t want to feel like World Vision or the little starving children are judging them. well the bad news for such people is that they have already been judged, and they have been found wanting. history will look book at our generations with disgust, how can we in the west be spending so much on ourselves when we could easily make a massive blow to poverty? 700 billion just from the USA to bail out the rich crooks and banks? 70 billion just from China on the Olympics? we sit back in the glow of our televisions while Africa, the most amazing country on earth, implodes….

so how do i go on? what will keep us from throwing our hands up in the air and saying “too hard!”? stay tuned for part two: the positive.

i apologise in advance for the embarrassing music in my itunes collection.

and as if that isn’t busy enough 6 days, this coming saturday i wake up very early and fly out of sydney down to melbourne where i will be photographing a wedding on the day! this is a last minute booking {2 weeks ago!}, but it should be a really cool wedding. the couple loves my work so that is always a big help. i will try and catch up with the werribee cronies that night, sleep in geelong and then get up early sunday morning and fly back up to sydney and back out to the stump…

and i am going to be up most of the night trying to get a few clients jobs out of the door before i go!

so i will be updating the blog when i can, i will be Pinging, Twittering & Flickring as usual… stay tuned!

For starters let me state the obvious: the user experience with Yahoo is HORRIFIC. the main yahoo home page is like someone ate every magazine and newspaper in the store and then threw up a website. it is totally confusing, services all over the place, news, weather, ads… but the worst thing is the stupid “region” thing. i get to experience the scintillating “YAHOO!7″: australia’s version of yahoo. i don’t want to experience the dumb aussie site just because i am in australia! anyway, i don’t want to talk about that today, i want to talk about my experience with Yahoo! 360°….

when Yahoo! 360° first started i joined up and played with it for a few months, got bored and then i deleted my account. {mistake} but recently, due to great usefull services like Ping.fm, Yahoo! 360° is looking like it might be fun to use. so i head over to sign up and basically i can’t {details later}, so after trying everything i can, i look for help and the closest thing to help i can find is “Yahoo! Answers”, where yahoo get’s everyday schmucks to answer their help calls for them. i could find people who had the same problem, but nothing i could find in the “answers” actually helped. so i asked my own question {after being forced to “join” answers} – and you can read it “after the jump”-

here is what i wrote:

so i wrote to customer care:

G’day! i used to have a 360 account, i deleted it ages ago and now i would like to start one again, every time i try to “get started” with 360, it tells me that “SORRY, this email is already being used” i have gone into my account and i have added three new, never before used with yahoo, email address’; {that are all mine real email address}  – but no matter what email address i use, it always says “sorry this email is already being used” i have emptied the cache, reset my browser, signed in and out, tried everything i’ve found on answers here…. nothing.
help!!
thanks

their oh-so-human reply:

“Hello,

Thank you for writing to Yahoo! 360°. We appreciate your comments regarding Yahoo! 360. Please visit our product blog at and provide us your feedback at: http://blog.360.yahoo.com/product_360

It is through users’ feedback that we are able to continue to make improvements. Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! 360.

For assistance with all Yahoo! services, please visit: http://help.yahoo.com/  ”
so i went over to the blog, and tried and sent them another email:

“hello.
you obviously did not read my email at all. I CANNOT SIGN UP TO 360!!!!!!!!
how the heck am i supposed to “provide feedback” on a 360 blog that only allows comments from 360 members?!?!?!???? come on!
please someone actually help me here, don’t just give me automated responses….
read my problem below and help!

thanks! dj paine”

yahoo’s reply:

“Hello,

Thank you for writing to Yahoo! 360°. We appreciate your comments regarding Yahoo! 360. Please visit our product blog at and provide us your feedback at: http://blog.360.yahoo.com/product_360

It is through users’ feedback that we are able to continue to make improvements. Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! 360.

For assistance with all Yahoo! services, please visit: http://help.yahoo.com/  ”

AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!!!!!!

comments and suggestions welcomed!

from the story: {emphasis from me}
“The U.S. financial crisis making global waves is no excuse for governments and companies to walk away from helping the world’s poor, former U.S. President Bill Clinton and rocker Bono said on Wednesday.
As Congress debates a White House-proposed $700 billion bailout for the worst financial crisis since the Depression of the 1930s, Bono questioned why wealthy countries had not been able to come up with enough aid for the world’s problems.
“It is extraordinary to me that you can find $700 billion to save Wall Street and the entire G8 can’t find $25 billion to save 25,000 children who die every day of preventable treatable disease and hunger,” the U2 lead singer told Clinton’s fourth annual philanthropic summit in New York. “That’s mad, that is mad.”
The Group of Eight wealthy nations vowed in 2005 to raise annual aid levels $50 billion by 2010, $25 billion of which was to go to Africa. But under current spending plans, the G8 will fall $40 billion short, according to a June report by the Africa Progress Panel set up to monitor implementation.
“Bankruptcy is a serious business and we all know people who have lost their jobs,” Bono said, referring to the bankruptcy declared by Wall Street investment bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. “But this is moral bankruptcy.”

“Hi DJ Paine,

Thanks for the write up about RedBubble on your website – it’s always nice to see artists and creatives taking an interest.

I hope you don’t mind but I left a rather extensive comment on your post. It appears one of our casual staff members responded to your email and I’ve replied to several of the questions she was unable to answer fully. Please feel free to give us a call on 1300 ________ if you have any further questions. We’re always happy to have a chat or partake in a recorded interview if you’d like.

Thanks again for the write up. Much appreciated

Jo O’Brien “

cool. i’ve seen some of Jo’s photography artworks on redbubble in the past, so it’s alway nice when you make some sort of connection “through the ether”… and you KNOW that when i get the podcasting working again on this blog i will be taking Jo up on the offer of an interview… next time i’m in melbourne shooting i might even try to get a tour of the redbubble HQ.

anyway, as mentioned in the email Jo left an extensive comment on the previous post, i’ve copied it here….

can i use my own web address {as mentioned?}
2) There are also members who point their domain name at their BubbleSite or RedBubble portfolio which is a cool way of having it both ways. Other artists use their RedBubble portfolio or BubbleSite as their main internet address to give clients.

what is the domain name structure like
3) When you create a free BubbleSite, your username forms part of your personal BubbleSite domain. i.e http://username.redbubble.com which takes your customers to your page and shop, free from links to the community or other artists

how flexible are your “slideshows”? are they embed-able?
5) We offer a simple flash slideshow widget for members to use on their blogs, websites, MySpace, Facebook etc. We’re always looking at other ways to show off member’s art and help people promote themselves, for example the PAX mosaic http://www.redbubble.com/mosaic/pax

self fulfilment, how easy is that to do? what percentages do you take for that?
6) There are certainly members who sell original artworks and crafts through their RedBubble portfolios. These entrepreneurial individuals self manage their advertising, transactions and fulfillment and just use RedBubble as a platform for showing their art. Self fulfillment is not something built into RedBubble’s functionality, and as such RedBubble doesn’t take a percentage, but it’s encouraging to see artists promoting and selling their original artworks.

do you do “sets within sets” – or “albums” within “sets”
8) Sets are definitely available on BubbleSites. I’ve also seen many members use unique ‘tags’ to create sets of their art. RedBubble also has groups where groups of artists who work together as a collective can group their works together and exhibit it online together.

can i sell my images as digital downloads?
9) While RedBubble does not currently facilitate sales of electronic files, it is what you make of it. I’ve certainly heard stories of people being found on RedBubble by businesses who then approached them directly to do a deal. It happens.

payment methods- how easy is it for my clients to pay online and offline?
10) We accept a number of cards, PayPal, direct debit (in some cases) and have a sales telephone number for customers within Australia. We also offer gift certificates which is a nice way to let friends and family choose their own gift.

custom price lists? how easy is that to do?
12) You can choose a different percentage mark up for every image you upload to RedBubble. So it’s easy to have different prices for all your different works.

i am on the Gold Coast of Australia, how would that hinder or help my experience with you?
14) You live on the Gold Coast. All that sunshine must be good for the creative spirit! (I write this from Melbourne amidst an icy, shower speckled morning!) RedBubble has shipped artwork to over 70 countries around the globe http://www.redbubble.com/buyers_booth

why should i choose you?
15) Because we stand for artists. For the work they create. For the audiences they inspire. For the buyers they move.

Jo O’Brien
RedBubble Addict & Community Support

according to the wikipedia: Martin Hosking is a co-founder and Executive Chairman of RedBubble. The other co-founders were Paul Vanzella and Peter Styles. RedBubble is: ”an online marketplace for artists and art lovers. Membership of the site is free, artists retain their copyright, set their own prices and choose which products they want to sell (prints, t-shirts and gift cards). In keeping with the evolution of the web, RedBubble is fostering community above and beyond transactional interaction.” Since launching in February 2007, RedBubble has become one of the most successful websites to come out of Australia. Simon Baker, CEO of RealEstate.com.au, has been appointed non-executive director.

so they are a unknown “aussie success story” so far… which is awesome. i know they might not be what i am looking for in client galleries but i know i will be using them in the future for at least one other project i am working on…

but let me just have a little rant for a moment: RedBubble have the infrastructure and the know how… why don’t they start a service for australian pro photographers!?!? they could take on companies like smugmug, zenfolio etc here in Australia and CLEAN UP. there is such a gaping hole for this type of service here in Australia! seriously the couple of australian companies who are doing similar services to what i am looking for are absolutely pathetic… {there will be a coming entry about them soon} RedBubble have the potential to come out kill that market in Australia! i just wish they would. it would have to be under another name, but how cool would that be?

anyway…. click on to read RedBubble’s response to my email…

Hi DJ Paine,

Ok! Let’s see how we go:

1} private client login
No, but you can give your clients your direct URL so that they can find you easily.

2} can i use my own web address {as mentioned?}
You can place/advertise your own web address on your profile page, but if you want to be a part of RedBubble you will be supplied with a RedBubble address.

3} what is the domain name structure like – i’d love to use simple domain names for my clients. for example: wwwphotographsof.me/clientname  -  wwwphotographsof.me/johnnyb   -   wwwphotographsof.me/bobby
This isn’t really applicable on our site, however there is a further site that you can develop on RedBubble called a bubblesite.  Within this you have the ability to group your images, so you could group your images by client name if you chose.

4} how much space does you company provide?
At this stage unlimited, but we do ask that you only upload what you consider to be your best work.

5} how flexible are your “slideshows”? are they embed-able? 
We don’t have a slideshow option.

6} self fulfilment, how easy is that to do? what percentages do you take for that?
I’m sorry but I don’t really understand this question!

7} i know anyone can do a screen capture of any images online, but how do you protect my images online? can people just right click and copy? 
We have added a feature that you can select to disable the right click copy option on your work.  We also have an option to watermark your work for the higher resolution images.

8} do you do “sets within sets” – or “albums” within “sets” – for example i would love to have my long term clients have multiple sets online and the domain name structure make sense for that – so if my client Susie Q. knows her page with me is wwwphotographsof.me/susieq and she comes to me every year so her albums / sets are under that umbrella – example wwwphotographsof.me/susieq/2008 wwwphotographsof.me/susieq/2009 – hope that makes sense…
Again, not on RedBubble, but you could on the further Bubblesite.

9} can i sell my images as digital downloads?
No, we only sell physical works at this stage.

10} payment methods- how easy is it for my clients to pay online and offline?
We accept Mastercard, Visa and Paypal.

11} how do i get my money? how do you pay me?
You can choose to be paid directly into your bank account or by check.

12} custom price lists? how easy is that to do?
We don’t offer this, but it would be easy enough for you to produce yourself and then place on your profile page.

13} can i upload my original raw images for back up? size limits for uploading?
We aren’t really a back up system.  If you do ever wish to have your images sent to you there is a fee.  Our upload limit for each image is 60MB.

14} i am on the Gold Coast of Australia, how would that hinder or help my experience with you?
Not at all, we are based in Melbourne, Australia and we produce art for artists all over the world with a client base of over 70,000.

and finally….
15} why should i choose you?
This is of course entirely up to you and your needs.  Our service is completely free, you are not charged for joining and there are no hidden or ongoing costs.

I have supplied one link for you to have a look at as it explains our site very well.  If you decide to join up you will be sent another email with further information, including further links to help you set up your site.

http://www.redbubble.com/groups/redbubble/forums/2/topics/1

I hope this answers your questions, please let us know if there is any further assistance you require.

Kind Regards,

Clare

anyway, there are now 6 players in the mix, 4 of which i have heard back from already…. the journey continues!

if you have nor idea what a “red” movie camera is then head over to red.com

anyway, the dude who created red cameras posted on the red user forums the following:

anyway, this response is from the 4th company in the 5 i emailed. it came after 13 hours and i appreciate the simple “to the point” reply.…

From:     info@bigblackbag.com
Date:     20 September 2008 5:37:09 AM

Hello D.J. Paine

I will try to answer all the questions here as best as I can, if I missed something or if there are any other questions let us know.   I just want to mention that we have developed a new system that we are referring to as the V2 system.  Currently what we are advertising is the V1 version which you see through our site.  There are two sites on our samples page that are created in the V2 version.  One being Eric Horn in the photographers section.  So, that said there are certain capabilities you will find in V2 and not the V1, hence the creation of V2.  What we offer here at Big Black Bag is a seven day free trial (more days if requested) but if you wish to sign on for this we will give you access to the V2 version to try out.

1. private client login in available
2. you can use your own web address
3. we don’t host sub domains
4. 100mb with V1 and 200mb with V2 but you can purchase more disc space if needed.
5. slide shows are not embed-able
6. We do not take any percentages
7. we can only recommend watermarking your images for added protection
8. We can only create folders within the V2 version so your client can have their own gallery that can be password protected, but I might have missed you hear and we can revisit this if needed.  Or you might want to check out our Event Proofing package.
9. you can sell you images as digital downloads but that would be done through a public gallery on your site.
10. you set us a Paypal account so the transactions are with you, your client and Paypal
11. Paypal
12.  Our Event Proofing Package might help with this
13. we have sizing recommendations, 72 dpi, RGB, jpeg. PNG for example, just that one file gets uploaded
14.  We have several customers from Australia
15.  because most of these things can be full filled at a reasonable price.

If there was something missed, or if you want to set up a trail with a  V2 account, let us know.  We are in the office Monday to Friday Eastern Standard time 9 to 5.

Sincerely,
Robert Malinowski
www.BigBlackBag.com
support@bigblackbag.com
Toll Free in USA & Canada: 1-888-755-8518

so the response came after about 12 hours, and i am very impressed that the reply is inline within my email. top marks… check out the reply.

From:     general@support.exposuremanager.com
Date:     20 September 2008 5:02:20 AM

Hello D.J.

Thank you for expressing interest in Exposure Manager.

I will attempt (inline, below) to answer all your questions directly.
Please do not take offense if I provide an answer and then also supply a
link.  If is not a way of bailing out or being impersonal, but in many
situations, there will be an Knowledgebase article that will completely
answer your question or supplement my answer.  We’ve gone to a great
deal of time and effort to make them complete, and there will be some
answers that are already there for the “picking!” 

OK… please scroll down to my answers inline below….

Regards,
Bruce Fairclough, Director, Customer Support
ExposureManager.com – Focus on Sales

so… questions:
{in no order of importance}

1} private client login

Yes you can password protect any gallery.  We offer a “password hint” to
field, as well, which is helpful to let people get in once they arrive
at that gallery.
http://faq.exposuremanager.com/2007/02/password_protec.html

2} can i use my own web address {as mentioned?}
Normally, yes.  We use domain mapping to accomplish this.  Here are some
potential web strategies:
http://faq.exposuremanager.com/2007/02/basic_web_strat.html

3} what is the domain name structure like – i’d love to use simple
domain names for my clients. for example: wwwphotographsof.me/
clientname  -  wwwphotographsof.me/johnnyb   -   wwwphotographsof.me/
bobby

Here is an example of one of my own galleries:
http://theallseeinglens.exposuremanager.com/g/dream_girls_solo

It is even more simplified if you adopt your own domain mapping from
your domain name.

4} how much space does you company provide?
With the “Event Account” – unlimited.  ($99.95/yr. USD)

5} how flexible are your “slideshows”? are they embed-able?
Not really.  It is a limited slideshow feature…  If you click on my
link above, you’ll be able to see how it works.

6} self fulfilment, how easy is that to do? what percentages do you
take for that?
We take the same percentage for self-fulfillment as all other
fulfillment.  The commission is 10%.  That includes the normal 3% credit
card processing fee.

7} i know anyone can do a screen capture of any images online, but how
do you protect my images online? can people just right click and copy?

We offer a choice in each gallery to disable right clicking… And of
course, we offer watermarking.  (Either text or image)

8} do you do “sets within sets” – or “albums” within “sets” – for
example i would love to have my long term clients have multiple sets
online and the domain name structure make sense for that – so if my
client Susie Q. knows her page with me is wwwphotographsof.me/susieq
and she comes to me every year so her albums / sets are under that
umbrella – example wwwphotographsof.me/susieq/2008 wwwphotographsof.me/
susieq/2009 – hope that makes sense…

Not sure if I totally understand.  We don’t use the term “Sets”.  You
could set up a parent gallery for “Susie Q. and then add sub-galleries
for her each time you do a photo shoot for her.  The URL to the parent
gallery for Susie Q would (could) remain the same.

9} can i sell my images as digital downloads?

Yes.  We offer that

10} payment methods- how easy is it for my clients to pay online and
offline?

They pay online via major credit cards.  (Visa, MC, Amex, Discover.)  If
they pay you directly online, you can give them a pre-sale voucher and
let them pick out what they have already paid for.

11} how do i get my money? how do you pay me?

We send out payments for the previous month in the first week of the month.

12} custom price lists? how easy is that to do?

VERY!  We call them pricesheets, and you can set up and save as many
predetermined pricesheets as you want.

13} can i upload my original raw images for back up? size limits for
uploading?

We only accept JPGs and do not take Tiffs or RAW.  More on our workflow
here:
http://faq.exposuremanager.com/2006/05/what_are_my_wor.html

14} i am on the Gold Coast of Australia, how would that hinder or help
my experience with you?

We do send everything out of Southern California for our print
fulfillment.  That may mean that self-fulfillment is more favorable for
you.  Another feature to consider – we conduct all business in US
Dollars only.

and finally….
15} why should i choose you?

We do have great support and we offer a really flexible gallery solution
for the value.

ok, proving the “you have not because you ask not” principal – the next reply to my very long email was from the very popular SmugMug. the reply i got was around 6 hours after i sent the email, which is still very prompt and is enough time to see that someone has actually read it. so even though they are “second” – so far this response is the best.

the smugmug support person took the time to answer every question “inline” within my email! awesome. they win points for that. so to see the amazing response keep reading….

From:     smugmug.com
Date:     19 September 2008 11:04:08

Thank you for contacting SmugMug. I’ll answer your questions inline within your original email.

I hope this has helped.  If you have any questions, please let us know.

Best Regards,
Sebastian
http://www.smugmug.com/help

djp photography wrote:
so… questions:
{in no order of importance}

1} private client login
Sure, you can set a password for any of your galleries. For additional privacy, you could set the gallery to unlisted and it won’t show up on your homepage. Then you would be able to send the link to the gallery and they would be able to view the photos after entering the password. More on that is here:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/private-albums
2} can i use my own web address {as mentioned?}
Definitely. You would just need to point your domain to domains.smugmug.com using a CNAME record. You don’t have to transfer your domain or anything. It sounds a bit technical, but don’t worry, our domain expert Doc would be happy to assist you with that. For some detailed instructions on how to do the setup for a selected number of domain registrars, go here:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/professional-accounts

3} what is the domain name structure like – i’d love to use simple domain names for my clients. for example: wwwphotographsof.me/clientname  -  wwwphotographsof.me/johnnyb   -   wwwphotographsof.me/bobby
If you have more than one gallery for a client, you could create a custom category to which the link would look exactly as your examples above.

Links to individual galleries have use the following scheme:
http://www.moonriverphotography.com/gallery/634937_G88Gj

There is a customization available that allows you to create short links with plain names, too. We can give you the links to how implement this for your own use.
4} how much space does you company provide?
Unlimited. You can upload as many photos as you would like to as long as you keep them to the following file specifications:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/upload-photos

When say unlimited, we mean it. We have users with just a couple thousands of photos and we also users that have hundred thousands of photos.
5} how flexible are your “slideshows”? are they embed-able?
Yes, you can embed slideshows for galleries, individual keywords etc. Many of our Pro users like to embed a slideshow on their homepage, as well. Here’s an example:
www.moonriverphotography.com

In the same way, slideshows can be embedded on other websites.
6} self fulfilment, how easy is that to do? what percentages do you take for that?
Self fulfilment is currently not available through our shopping cart. We would love to offer you that, but at the moment, you could only have it by embedding a third party shopping cart, like Google Checkout or PayPal on your site. Here’s how to do that:
http://wiki.smugmug.net/display/SmugMug/Add+Google+Checkout+or+Paypal

Most of our Pro users actually love our all inclusive service. We take care of all orders done through our shopping cart. If your customer has any troubles with an order, we handle it. If they aren’t happy with the prints they received, we have our print experts look at the order and if necessary our experts will manually correct any photos that need fixing and we would send of a free reprint. It’s all part of our guarantee:
http://www.smugmug.com/prints/our-guarantee.mg

For orders done through the SmugMug shopping cart using your custom pricing, we take 15% for all customer support and credit card processing included. You get to keep 85% of the profits. More on that is here:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/print-pricing
7} i know anyone can do a screen capture of any images online, but how do you protect my images online? can people just right click and copy?
We give you the choice to enable right click protection on your galleries. Furthermore, you are in charge on what display sizes are available to your visitors.
I’m sure that you are aware of that right-click protection is just a basic protection and that’s why we offer our far more effective watermarking. It allows you to create custom watermarks that would be applied to the display copies of your photos. The originals would remain unwatermarked to allow print copies. More on image security can be found here:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/image-protection

8} do you do “sets within sets” – or “albums” within “sets” – for example i would love to have my long term clients have multiple sets online and the domain name structure make sense for that – so if my client Susie Q. knows her page with me is wwwphotographsof.me/susieq and she comes to me every year so her albums / sets are under that umbrella – example wwwphotographsof.me/susieq/2008 wwwphotographsof.me/susieq/2009 – hope that makes sense…
As I’ve mentioned above, you could create custom categories for your clients. Those categories can include subcategories as well that would provide another level of hierarchy to allow for the yearly structure you mention. Links to subcategories include the category name, so for the above example it would look like this:
www.photographsof.me/susieq/34634
(the subcategory number is automatically given and can’t be changed)

The once your client goes to a gallery, the structure would revert to the following:
www.photographsof.me/gallery/3454553_G88Gj
The gallery ID (3454553) is again something that you can’t influence, which is followed by the gallery key (G88Gj) that is added for security reasons to make it almost impossible to guess the link to galleries.
9} can i sell my images as digital downloads?
Of course. We have to different licenses: for personal usage and for commercial usage, which can be priced differently. In addition, each license offers three different image sizes: 1Mpix, 4Mpix and original size. The licenses along with more details are here:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/sell-digital-downloads
10} payment methods- how easy is it for my clients to pay online and offline?
Paying online is currently the only way via our shopping cart. We accept all major credit cards:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/payment.mg

If you would like to, you could have your visitors allow you to email what photos they would like to order and then place the order for them to be drop-shipped to their address.
11} how do i get my money? how do you pay me?
We pay you via check to the address that is listed on your account. We mail checks every beginning of the month. Depending on how much money you have earned, you get a check quarterly, monthly or whenever you request a check manually. The details on that are here:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/reporting
12} custom price lists? how easy is that to do?
You can just setup a portfolio pricing that would be the new default pricing for your account. If you do that you won’t have to worry about having to price every new gallery that you create. Only if you choose to price a gallery differently, you would have to set the pricing on it.
Pricing can be set for any product individually and if you don’t want to offer a certain product, just set it to 0.00 .
Here’s a list of all our products:
http://www.smugmug.com/prints/catalog.mg

More details on pricing are here:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/print-pricing

13} can i upload my original raw images for back up? size limits for uploading?
If you get a SmugVault, you can do that. You only pay extra for the amount of storage and bandwidth you use on your SmugVault. The Vault is provided by Amazon and costs $1 per month. To help you navigate in your SmugVault, you can have us create previews on SmugMug of your Vault items and they can be browsed like regular SmugMug galleries by you. More details on SmugVault can be found here:
http://www.smugmug.com/help/smugvault
14} i am on the Gold Coast of Australia, how would that hinder or help my experience with you?
The speed browsing SmugMug galleries should be great as we just recently added a speed boost for SmugMug that uses local servers to serve up public galleries. You can compare the speed between these two links:
http://cmac.smugmug.com/gallery/2504559_f3ta9#131481399_ZnZmK
http://www.smugmug.com/gallery/2504559_f3ta9#131481399_ZnZmK

Right now, custom domains don’t have the speedboost, but we plan on adding those too.

All orders on SmugMug are shipped from our lab in Georgia, USA. Therefore, shipping to Australia can take a bit longer than for orders going to the US. Luckily we have an array of shipping options, which are listed here:
http://www.smugmug.com/prints/shipping.mg

and finally….
15} why should i choose you?
We think there are lots of good reasons     Here are a few!

1) SmugMug is 100% ad-free and spam-free.  It’s just you and SmugMug. No popups, pop-unders, side bar advertising, nothing.  It’s just you and SmugMug.  Period.

2) With SmugMug, you have unlimited storage of our accepted file types.  50 photos, 5,000 photos, 50megs or 50gigs.  It’s up to you!  Want a place to store your RAW, .tiff, .psd, .pdf, Word docs, etc?  No problem.  Enter SmugVault:  http://www.smugmug.com/help/smugvault.

3) SmugMug has unlimited uploading and downloading bandwidth.  We’ll never shut your site down because you uploaded too much too fast, or had too many viewers.

4) We never alter your original images.  We don’t downsize them to save on space, and force you to display tiny copies on your site.  Original, full resolution images can be displayed on your site if you choose. This servers as a great back-up solution as well.  We store the photos in at least three states, and short of immense natural disaster, your photos are always safe.  We also don’t EVER ‘force’ you to order prints.  Many services will allow you to upload your photos, but you’ll need to buy prints or products within a timeframe (1 month to 1 year, depending on the photo site) or they’ll either downsize your images, delete them, or even close your account.

5) We have unrivaled customer support.  They don’t call us Support Heroes for nothin’!      And every response is from a real, live person, 365 days a year, nights, weekends, all holidays, and nearly around the clock.  We’re all ‘regular guys’ and photographers, and we’re willing to help with just about anything.

6) We have many many looks and feels for your SmugMug site and galleries, including themes and display styles not found anywhere else. At the Power and Pro subscription levels, all of these are even fully customizable as it your entire site.

7) PRIVACY, PRIVACY, PRIVACY!  Each of your SmugMug galleries can be individually made unlisted (invisible) AND/OR password protected.  YOU decide who has access to your photos and to what level.  You can also protect your entire site with an entry/viewing password.  Another feature not offered anywhere else on the planet (that we’re aware of at this time, although copycats are sure to pop up) is the ability to decide how search engines such as Google and Yahoo search your site. You have the ability to shut ‘em down totally, so they can’t index or list a thing, or make your site highly visible for publicity.  Again, it’s totally up to you!

8) through 1000) I really could go on and on.  SmugMug is very very feature-rich, and we listen.  If there’s something we’re lacking, we listen to our customers and do our very best to provide what our customers want and need.  We’re not a cold, profit-driven corporation that only has our interests at heart.  We’re photographers who USE SmugMug, and want it to be what you want it to be – an affordable, gorgeous, easy to use solution for every photographer, from grandma to pro.

now keep in mind that my email was sent on 19 September 2008 4:04:41 PM. the first reply i got was from Zenfolio – less than 5 minutes later – hmmmm….. prompt reply is one thing but…. so zenfolio win the award for the first reply but let’s have a look at their reply:

{note i am finally using the “insert more” tag so my blog page doesn’t assault your good sense with great big long entries…. so as they say in the blogging world: read the email after the jump…}

From: support@zenfolio.com
Date: 19 September 2008 4:09:12 PM

Hello DJ Paine,

Zenfolio does not provide hosting, you will need to sign up with a hosting company to host your domain name ( i.e. GoDaddy, Yahoo ). If you already have a domain name then you will have to set up a CNAME to map your domain name to Zenfolio. Here are instructions on how to do that: http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=preferences/custom-domain

If you are not comfortable setting this up on your own please forward these instructions to your domain name provider and they will know what to do with it.

Here are some examples of photographers who are using Zenfolio on the back end for their websites:

Choco Studio: http://chocostudio.com/ Creative Capture: http://creativecapturesofct.com/ Fabio Ventura: http://www.fabioventura.com/

The plan that you will have to sign up for is the Premium Plan ( $100/year ). Here is a link to our membership page which will outline benefits of each plan: http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/features.aspx

Also here is a link to our demo account in case you want to see one: demo.zenfolio.com

I would suggest creating a trial account so you could get familiarized with our tools/features. Trail account is absolutely free for two weeks in duration and it is equivalent to our Premium level membership. To sign up please visit this link: https://www.zenfolio.com/zf/signup/plans.aspx

I believe by creating a trial account you will get most of your questions answered, if you have any specific questions please feel free to contact me and I will be more then glad to help you out.

Best Regards,

-Jason

Zenfolio Customer Support