Solveeczema is hosted!

I purchased a hosting package for Solveeczema.org in March, but didn’t have time to transfer the files.  But as of tonight, Solveeczema.org is hosted on Network Solutions and is no longer unsupported (and, frankly, almost impossible to revise) on Comcast!

Thanks to the generosity of a few users last year who helped defray some of the costs through their donations, I was able to contemplate doing this.   Now I can actually make changes to the site again!  The hosting package is multi-year, too.

The old site will remain at Comcast until I can spend an afternoon with them on the phone figuring out how to remove it, because I haven’t been able to access Comcast using a browser for over a year now.  And Google and other search engines may still bring up that address.  But I had been using email forwarding from Solveeczema.org from the start, and all of the articles used the domain name.

The only people who may be affected are those who bookmarked the URL at Comcast  — Solveeczema used to forward to it.  They’ll have to re-bookmark Solveeczema.org

I am thrilled!  It has been SO difficult and time consuming to make any changes to this site up til now.  I have so many things to add, including revelations on dry skin from my personal bar soap observations that you won’t find anywhere else.

Stay tuned…

Not my ads (redux)

I moved this blog to WordPress from VOX, even though VOX was easier at the time and had better tools, because I thought I could get away from the ads they put on my blog.  Unfortunately, the ads appear as if they are associated with my content, and Google ads uses words from the content to choose the ads — thus products advertised could be dangerous to people who need my site, and at the very least, promote things I might recommend against.

I just looked at one of my blog pages, the Master List of Bar Soap Recommendations page, and lo and behold, there is a Google ad right below my post and before the comment section.

Those are not my ads, they are WordPress.com’s Google ads; Solveeczema does not endorse or benefit from them.  The ads may promote products that I would recommend against.

I am trying to update the site soon.  Along with the updates, it appears I will be moving my blog.  Stay tuned!

Hosting for Solveeczema

I finally got a web hosting package for Solveeczema.org

It may take a few weeks to get things up and running — especially since my computer went down in a power outage and I have to recover the data (the site files) before I can upload them to the new host.  Unfortunately, I can’t get the existing files from the Comcast site because I have been unable to log in using a browser ever since they upgraded their site last year.

Details, details…

The hosting package is for several years, so once it is up and running on the new host, it should be — for the first time since Solveeczema went online — easier to change and improve.

Wanted: Angel

Happy New Year!

Solveeczema has always been a hobby for me — an important one, but nevertheless, something I was never able to devote enough time to.  Getting the site going took over a year and very real personal sacrifice.  I had a lot of help, too.  But once I’d written the initial articles about our experience, I felt a responsibility to the hundreds of people who wrote asking for more information.

The feedback I’ve gotten since then has been amazing — there is nothing like hearing you have helped to suddenly and dramatically make a child’s life better — which has kept me thinking about how to take this endeavor beyond this simple amateur web site.

Just keeping the site over the years has been more than I bargained for.  Beyond the costs, I haven’t been able to keep up with email, I have had perpetual problems with updates because the site is published on Comcast, and making updates and changes has been an exercise in extreme patience (and sometimes futility).  This past year, Comcast changed its home page and along with its “improvements”, I lost the ability to log on to my accounts using a browser, any browser, at all.  I have been unable to check my spam folders or to update the Solveeczema site since.

A Solveeczema user recently made a donation large enough for me to consider a real web hosting package through Network Solutions for a year.  I am hopeful I can do this in January or February.  This will significantly help when I have updates to the site, but it won’t improve my time or my ability to reach or help more people by much.   My ultimate goal is a study, scientific support for a solution.

I haven’t written about that much because there are still many hurdles, but I have over the years been slowly taking concrete steps toward this goal.  A number of people early on offered (indeterminate) financial support for a study, but I wasn’t in a position to take them up on it.  That’s changing.

If you have benefited from Solveeczema and are in a position to be an angel — of the beneficent winged type as opposed to the early venture capital type — please contact me through the Solveeczema web site for a proposal.  (Click on the “feedback” link under “Questions and Feedback” on the Solveeczema home page.)

Rates of eczema, allergy, and asthma continue to rise worldwide, and I believe I can pinpoint why.  If you have used this site to good effect, you know I am serious.  Rates of eczema in some towns in Sweden have now topped 40% (researchers determined it to be something about the indoor home environment…)  The amount of effort and money going into developing, testing, and evaluating just “measurement instruments” for eczema severity and quality of life is staggering.

I hope somewhere out there is an angel who sees the promise of demonstrating a true solution as worth a small fraction of that.

Blog Rules and Sponsorship

I just heard a news story on the radio that the FTC has approved new rules applying to blogs that review or recommend products in relationship to commercial activity and potential sponsorships.

I don’t know if I have to make a statement if I DON’T have any sponsorships, but I’ll restate it just in case:

Solveeczema.org and Solve Eczema’s Blog are entirely volunteer and non-profit.  I have never received any payment for listing, suggesting, reviewing, or linking to any product.  I have never even received any product samples, despite their having been occasionally offered!  (Wait, I have received some free samples at the local farmer’s market, but I have not listed that vendor’s products on my site or blog — though I may, once I have a chance to properly try them out.  If so, I will comply with rules to state that they were samples, but it will not affect my review in any case.)  All of the soaps on Solveeczema’s Blog Master List, for example, were purchased by me prior to my trying them.

Although, Jill Schoff credits Solveeczema.org as the inspiration for her book Green Up Your Cleanup,  I did not receive a free copy of the book (and I haven’t asked for one, small press authors have to pay for copies they give out from their own pockets — but I will unapologetically hint that I would happily accept one if offered!)

To be absolutely nitpicky about disclosure:  one of the soap flake makers I list on Solveeczema.org made a donation when I asked on Solve Eczema’s Blog to help defray expenses to keep my site online — which helped and for which I was grateful — but it did not in any way change my recommendation for the product or my site.  It was a similar order of magnitude as private donations from parent-users.  I had been recommending that maker for years already, without any contact with them and I personally actually use a different brand of soap flakes (which is clear on my site).  To this day, I have not tried that maker’s products, but based on the underlying issues outlined on Solveeczema.org, I will continue to recommend them — especially since I have heard from parents who have used that maker’s soap flakes in their eczema removal process and I have heard only good feedback about them.

Not that I haven’t considered monetizing the site.  There is a lot of money to be made from Google ads and sponsored links, especially where allergy and eczema are concerned.  I frankly still mostly pay for the expenses of this endeavor out of my own pocket and have thought a lot over the years since it began how I could monetize it so I could afford to do more with it to help far more people.  If I ever monetized in any way, it would be clearly announced and spelled out on my site — regardless of the FCC and their rules.

Lastly, in case people aren’t aware, per WordPress rules, WordPress.com bloggers are not even allowed to have sponsored links or ads, it’s a condition of getting the benefit of their free blog software.

Elephant Pharmacy closes doors

With all the business shakeups and closings of this financial crisis, I suppose no one is immune.  I will miss Elephant Pharmacy the most.   Yesterday they closed their doors and declared bankruptcy.

Where are the angel investors?  This is an amazing business concept.  Very loyal customers, judging by the local buzz.

I found most of my bar soap products here, including the one we use now for showering, unscented Sappo Hill.

And it was a great traditional PHARMACY, too.  If the pharmacy side couldn’t keep the business afloat, we are indeed in hard times…