Website news for December 2011

Here are the website news for December 2011.

Name change for the blog in the beginning of January 2012

Since I now cover Spain and Canary Islands. A name change is needed for this blog. That name change is going to take place in the beginning of January 2012. The new name is going to reflect the area that I cover daily in this blog. This change is because I plan to move to Canary Islands (hopefully) in about 10 years time or so.

Changes in advertisement setup

I am going to change the display of the Amazon ads that I have here. Since I try to have ads from most of the language areas in Europe (that Amazon supports) there are many ads and they take a lot of space following it. So instead of using large banners. I am going to replace them with smaller banners or just ads boxes. Google Adsense are going to remain in the same size however as they have been on this blog.

Donations

This blog is free, so are all the information that I put forward here (all that is from me is under CC Licence). For that reason I depend on donations to do my work properly. There is also cost of hosting, living, computer hardware that I have to pay. I am not only living on this blog. But I do have social benefits as I am born with Asperger’s syndrome. Before people start to make a stereotype out of me, I must say that this is really mild version of Asperger’s syndrome that I have. But it has its challenges on times in the people department. But as social welfare goes, it is small amount and when I start to rent apartment again and all that. It is not going to last that long over the month.

My plan also to move back to Denmark have created the situation that I am now saving as much money that I can in order to pay for the moving cost to Denmark (more details later on in this blog post). For that reason I am broke so to speak. Thanks to some great donations last month have eased that pressure somewhat. But I am also trying to save the donations up for the move to Denmark. However, it has proven to be difficult trying to save up money with all the hardware failures that I have been having during the past two months. But that should be more or less over now. I at least hope so. I have only delayed one hardware upgrade until I move to Denmark. That is on my server computer. It needs a hard drive replacement. The hard drive is dying in that computer. But because it is going to be turned off after two weeks and is going to remain offline for the next few months until I move back to Denmark. I figured that it should be in good order (at least I hope so).

During the past two months I have had to replace old hardware that was on its last hours. This has both cut into my savings and told the sad story on how I have been avoiding proper hardware maintenance due to lack of money. To this day I have already lost data (nothing that was not able to get again, for most part) due to lack of replacing old hardware. This all comes down to the reason that I have been really broke for a long time, due to lack of proper income for what I want to do. This blog and my other writer work is a way for me to get out of that cycle of problems. But I am going to work hard on that goal to get off social welfare forever. Since I have grown tired of being poor and not to live my life as I want.

I also want to let people know that with growing geophone network the cost of running such network is going to increase. For the long time now I have been able to have that cost close to zero. But I am not sure for how long I can run it close to cost free. For at least one new geophone station that I am planning and hoping to get up and running in the new year I am going to have to buy a mobile modem (GSM/3G) and subscription (around €10 an month) so I can get data from it. As there is no good other connections in the area. There are going to be at least two geohone network stations like that I plan in coming months.

Geophone network

In December I plan to setup and start two new geophone stations. This geophone stations are going to be located in Eyrarbakki (a small village close to SISZ). The second one is going to be located on a farm named Skeiðflöt, it is located south of Mýrdasljökull but is inside the Katla volcano system that extends a little bit to the south in that area. I am not sure when the geophone stations go up. But it is going to be sometimes after 13 December, 2011. At least I hope so. But this is the plan now and I hope that it holds.

The new geophone stations are going to increase the sensitivity from ML1.9 at Hengill volcano (from Hekla volcano geophone) down to ML0.0 (or about that). For Katla volcano. I am going to be able to record earthquakes down to ML0.0, along with tremor spikes and other stuff like that. For the moment I can barely see earthquakes down to ML1.8 in Katla volcano. Overall, this is going to give me a lot better picture on what is going on in Katla volcano, in real time also.

For the year 2012 I am planning a geophone station at my mom and dad farm. Since now there is a mobile signal that I can use. The cost layout of that would be geophone + computer (I have already bought the computer) + GSM/3G modem and the subscription with that. I am going to post more details on that when the time comes.

Volcanoforum.eu is up and running

The volcanoforum.eu is now up and running. I am still setting up and looking for bugs. But it is ready for people to start registering on it and take part in the discussions. A volcano and earthquake related sections on the forum are going to appear soon. I am not yet done fine tuning the forum. So be patient on that front. But for the most part, it should be working now without any issue at all. At least I hope so.

Moving back to Denmark

In the year 2012 I am going to move back to Denmark. For the moment I am collecting all my money (that I can spare) for the apartment costs, moving cost and all that needs to be paid when I move between countries. I also plan to buy me a new television when I move to Denmark. So I am also collecting for that. For this reason, I am a bit depended on donations for the moment. I not sure yet when I move back to Denmark. But the search for the apartment starts in the early months of the new year of 2012.

Because of that. I do not have any apartment in Iceland and after December I am not going to have any good internet connection. For that reason my main computers are going to be turned off until I can move back to Denmark. This is going to limit me a little bit on what I can work on. But I am going the best I can with this. At least I have my laptop to work on (I should not fail, I hope anyway).

School is finished

I am now finished with school. All that is left are two tests. After that I move from the dorm where I have been living for the past few months. When that is over I move back to my mom and dad until I can get a apartment in Denmark. This all takes few months from start to finish. I do not think that there is anything else to say in this monthly web site news about this blog.

If there is something that I forgot. I am just going to add it later in a update to this blog post.