X-Elerated Warcraft Guides Review

X-Elerated Warcraft Guides Review:




Welcome to my insider's review of the X-Elerated Warcraft Gaming Guides. My name is Morgan Hascall. I consider myself a professional gamer and I've been playing World of Warcraft since vanilla released over six years ago. It has been a long, sometimes tedious, but always exciting road. I've done it all; from participating in hardcore raiding with top guilds on my server to being a dedicated arena player, dominating the 2200+ bracket, from Alliance to Horde on every class in the game across every expansion that has been released, including Cataclysm.

You would think after all that, that I'd have gotten bored of World of Warcraft. Even with my years of experience, even with my plethora of technical knowledge and game mechanics, even with the countless days I've logged into that game - I was still missing something. It dawned on me one day when I was doing my dailies trying to prepare for a raid a few months ago. I remember opening my shaman's backpack and seeing 200g...200 measly gold. I remember getting depressed just thinking about having to do dailies and farm herbs for the rest of the afternoon just to make enough to buy all the flasks, potions, and gold for repairs I would need for the night's raid.

Have you ever logged into Cataclysm and seen someone say "you're doing it wrong" in trade chat? Well that's how I felt. I was doing it wrong. I had no clue where all the time had gone - and I had nothing to show for it. I realized I had no gold to my name, even though I had multiple 85's. The alts I had didn't have any professions because I felt it was too time consuming and costly to level them, I didn't have an heirlooms, I didn't have a damn thing to show for all the years of game time I had logged into World of Warcraft. It was just upsetting, one of those moments in life where you stop and just think about what you could of done, what you should have done, to put yourself in a better position for the future.

That was when I went online and found a review similar to this one about the X-Elerated Warcaft Guides, World of Warcraft: Cataclysm gaming guides. I guess it was one of those things that you just throw three-sheets-to-the-wind and try. What would it hurt? I called it an early birthday gift to myself to validate the purchase in my head, because I was pretty skeptical even though the review I read had been great.

I bought the complete set of guides, which includes the leveling guides for both Alliance and Horde (since I play both sides), the Gold Making Guide, the Daily Quest Guide, the Talent Guide, the Professions Guide, and the Mount Guide, all for $67. That is seven guides for $67 which comes out to be about $10 dollars per guide which is tons cheaper than any other product I've looked (Zygor, Dugi, etc). If you bought all the guides separately it would be roughly $111, not to mention you get free, lifetime updates in X-Elerated's exclusive members only area.

Let me just say, it was worth every penny. As soon as I downloaded the guides I wanted to give it a test run to see if the sales claims they made about making all this gold and leveling from 1-85 in a matter of days were true. X-Elerated has a 60 day return policy so I figured if it sucked I'd just return it. That definitely wasn't the case.

I started up a new character, a human priest, and began my journey; following the guide step-by-step along with the readings from gold guide that came with the complete X-Elerated Warcraft Guide package I bought. The guides were extremely easy to follow. They are written expertly by the guide team at X-Elerated and in four days /played, just like they claimed, my priest was sitting at 85 with Insciption and Herbalism both maxed at 525, 1,500 gold and her epic flying mount. A day and a half later I acquired a little over 8,200 gold through the gold guide, and was almost capped for honor points, with which I immediately bought some nice PvP gear with! It was just fantastic. Again, I've leveled a ton of characters in my life but never any this successfully. Never have I ended up with so much gold, my epic flying mount, two maxed primary professions, and honor points...after five days.

Of course with all good things come downsides.  Not many in this case. The addons kind of slowed my computer down a bit, only because it's old as dirt and has no RAM. That and it was tedious trying to follow the guides down to the wire. There is a lot of information you have to remember.

The amount of work that must have gone into formulating all those guides and mapping out the fastest, most efficient way quest while still power leveling your professions AND making heaps of gold must have taken a ton of work. With hindsight 20/20 I look back now and realize I actually got a fantastic bargain. The value of how much time and effort I saved combined with the outcome of my character when I got to 85 completely outweighed the $67 I paid. Just a week after I finished that priest I was doing the first few bosses in Firelands 10m. It was fantastic.

All-in-all, the team at X-Elerated produced a truly amazing product and as a veteran of the World of Warcraft community for over six years I can say this is hands down the best guide on the market. The price was very affordable and I felt the product had paid itself off after only a week of using it, and knowing that I have it forever, including any new updates they apply to the guide as World of Warcraft: Cataclysm progresses. World of Warcraft feels like a completely different game to me now. I'd highly recommend it to anyone looking to get the most out of their World of Warcraft gaming experience!


Bottom line: highly recommended.

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SEO Writing Basics

Hi writers :)

Today's subject is all about the basics of SEO writing, or Search Engine Optimization. But what does that even mean? The internet as it stands today is a bustling worldwide market. It's literally a world of its own. There are opportunities everywhere to make a living, and SEO writing is one of the many opportunities you'll undoubtedly encounter in your journey across the web.

SEO writing is a new form of writing that has emerged in the last decade or so. Search Engine Optimization is the art of writing precise, to-the-point articles, based on a niche idea that if written properly will attract search engine traffic. This is important if the website is to be successful, and is the basis for building any sort of following, whether it be for your business or just to share your opinions and ideas, the content is what drives the machine.

SEO writing direcly applies to affiliate marketing, search engine marketing, and almost everything that can earn you income utilizing the internet. It is the very basic of the basics, and to make money on the internet this is one skill you absolutely must have.

If you're really serious about SEO writing I highly recommend checking this out:

SEOPressor. 
In my opinion it's probably the best investment you could make to improve your work and start making your blogs and your writing REALLY stand out.

SEO Writing Basics

Originality
The success of your SEO writing is faceted by the originality of the articles you write. Your articles must be 100% original and unique. If you copy directly from other content, search engines will pick that up and give poor rankings to your reproduced content - consider it a spam filter. This is not to say that you should avoid researching. Proper research of the topic of your SEO writing should be performed diligently and accurately, and then translated into your own words with your own opinions. Good research and your unique SEO writing directly translates into good, solid, original content.

Keywords and Keyword Usage
Another key to SEO success is using keywords. You should pick a handful of keywords that directly correlate to your topic. The keywords need to be arguably between 2%-8% of the total amount of words you write, inserted into the article well spaced, and relevantly used. This is extremely important and word counters are an absolute must if you are trying to get into SEO writing.

Keyword Tool 
A must-have keyword search tool product for your SEO writing. Well worth the cost and pays itself off quickly.

Your keywords again must be relevant and present in your article! Include keywords in the title of the article as well as throughout the text of the article.

Word Count
Articles should be NO less than 300 words. However, if your SEO writing is getting really long (1200+ words) you are probably writing about too many ideas and should rethink your article and make it more precise, and about one subject.

These are really the basics of SEO writing. Originality, keyword and keyword usage, and word count are the three main things of SEO writing. Good grammar and a nice writing style that is pleasant to readers never hurt either. There are many great tools in the above links that can help you get an edge over the ridiculous amount of competition out there, and can help get your article read by many.

Best of wishes :)
M.Hascall

Creative Inspirational: Using Sound to Inspire Your Words

Good morning writers!

Welcome to the first Unicorn Walrus inspirational. I'll be doing this every morning, writing whatever is on my mind in hopes that by the grace of the whatever it is you believe in that you will finally write. Something, anything...

It's always so hard to find that inspiration, you know? I even have trouble and I've been writing fairly consistently for most of my life. I struggle to stay inspired, it's a full-time job and regardless of what you write, inspiration and motivation are two basics you have to have down to have any success at writing.

If you're uninspired your writing will be bland and if you're unmotivated you won't exist as a writer at all. The latter will be a subject for a future inspirational.  Right now let's discuss the idea of being uninspired, and some ways you could rekindle that long lost flame of yours.

Doing Hard Drugs
Hard drugs and hallucinogens like heroine, meth, and acid are bad for you. Don't do them. (You didn't really think I'd recommend that, did you? Haha.)

Who invited this guy?

Okay, okay. In all seriousness there are quite a few artists (yes, as a writer you are indeed an artist) who turn to drugs to reach their subconscious. I do not promote this idea myself, but look at Hunter S. Thompson...to each their own I guess, but I've got my own methods. And no it isn't black tar heroine.

I use music...it's kind of like a drug in its own right (I'm a huge music enthusiast). Like colors as I explained in the previous post, music also evokes emotions, thoughts, feelings, memories, moods, and inspiration. Some could argue that the added "noise" hurts their writing more than helps it, but for me it's quite the opposite. Every morning when wake up and see my wife off to work I have my pot of coffee while my Pandora stirs the nests of the tenants around my apartment, and I write.

The music forces my mind to be creative. It evokes emotions of whichever I choose, because I have control of what I listen to. When I'm writing fiction with a dark, sadistic twist I'll put on a Tool playlist (if Maynard doesn't inspire you, you've got some bigger issues buddy.) If I'm writing a heartbreaking scene in a story I'll put on the most atrocious love song of all time, something that just brings back the most horrid, soul-shearing memories of my life; those are the emotions I strive to write by as a writer. Feelings I have felt, and ones I can apply with absolute confidence to my work. Music will always have this effect, after all - almost all songs are derived from writings of some sort. If words inspire music, shouldn't music inspire words? Even instrumental pieces with no lyrics still tend to draw these feelings out of us.

Take something as simple as whales songs as an example. You know those audio recordings of whales? Yeah those. Give it a listen and be conscious of your emotional state. I can almost promise you'll gain an overwhelming feeling of something, maybe mysteriousness from these leviathan and their strange language? Perhaps it will inspire the beauty and majestic grace of your words, that they will flow unto the page, much like the everlasting delta melds so perfectly, so precisely into the great expanse of the sea.

Understand then, that music can and should play a large part in your never ending quest for personal inspiration. Even if you aren't a writer you should try to inspire yourself for life in general. Inspiration leads to new people, new experiences, and an abundance of different walks of life. But as a writer, I'd strongly recommend applying this personal practice of listening to music as a source of inspiration for your writing. It has helped me time and time again, and is usually a quick-fix for almost all cases of writer's block I've ever encountered.

Happy writing :)
M. Hascall

Writing Exercise: Using Color to Inspire Creative Writing

It's pretty common knowledge that colors have psychology behind them.

"Colors, like features, follow the changes of the emotions." - Pablo Picasso

Artists and visual designers of all kinds fully understand the effects of color on the mind, and how they bring out emotion in people. Not only to the people viewing the art, but to the artists themselves as they paint. As a writer, you are an artist. Your words create pictures, circumstances, emotion, and vivid imagery (or at least they should). No matter what you are writing, you are always writing for the most very basic of emotions. But printed copy is almost always in black, so how can you, as a writer, use color to your advantage besides using it as a descriptor?

This is where I'd like to explore the concept of writing in color - literally. Getting a box of colored pencils, and writing your work in color BEFORE you print it out. If you prefer to write on computer rather than by hand, just change the color of your text as you write, and once you're finished change it all back to black so it meets the industry standards.

Kinda confused? Let's go through an example of how color can be applied to your writing to inspire a more creative side of your work. 

Let's say we're writing an influential piece on some political stance - saving baby seals from gruesome clubbing genocides perhaps? Sounds good. You're kind of on the fence about the entire concept of clubbing a baby seal and how wrong it is, i.e., you don't really care...(not that anyone could NOT care about that issue, it's a baby seal, FIGHT THE MACHINE). However you still have to write about it because that's what your client wants. Baby freaking seals. So you aren't sure how to get passionate about the poor little things...try writing in color. We want to get our readers to fall in love with baby seals, so we first have to fall in love with baby seals ourselves. 

We will choose pink as our color of choice for this.

 Pink (not red) is the prime color of choice to evoke psychological emotions of love, kind and gentle feelings, and overall passion and genuine appreciation. You might see on a television show that a criminal is housed in a pink cell. There's a reason for that! It's to soothe them, to calm them down. Again colors have a real effect on people. So we open up our word processor, change to a dark background and our text color to pink so we can still read what we're typing, and write our faces off. Staring at pink text as we write instills us with above said emotions, but just for that brief period when we are writing. Our words won't be pink when they're published, but rather during drafting, so we can infuse them with those feelings we're evoking by using color. Now your article about baby seals is no longer monotone and bland because you wrote it in black and white, now it's full of passion, love, and adoration through the purest emotion your heart could muster - all because you wrote it in pink.

Clearly it probably won't be that dramatic, but it is an interesting concept to think about. Seems like a fun writing exercise to me, so give it a try and comment back with any effects writing in color had on you.

• Figure out what basic emotions you are trying to portray through your piece of work.
• Find out which color represents what emotion.
• Pick your color(s) accordingly. 
• Write!
• Doing a love scene? Write it in pink. Introducing a character who is the warm, happy and full of energy? Try orange!

Color psychology is real, and I'm curious to see how this fun exercise could affect my own writing, and yours! :)

Freelance Writing Job: Demand Media Studios

I was browsing the web for some new freelance writing jobs and found Demand Media Studios. To my delight it actually looks legit (I can't tell you how many bogus jobs I sift through in a day). Demand Media Studios seems to be an Associated Content with their pay on steroids, as they claim to offer $15-$25 as upfront payment for each article you write whereas Associated Content typically pays new producers much less until they build their clout.

Demand Studio's actually requires qualifications of the writers they hire, another tip-off that they're a little more upscale than the beginning content producer sites such as AC. Be prepared to submit a resume as well as a piece of published work (or a writing sample if you aren't published yet)..

The good news is if you get accepted into the freelance writing community of Demand Media Studios you'll have plenty of work and you'll get paid for it twice a week. You get your byline on all submissions you write so you'll steadily build your profile if you're diligent with your work as well as make some decent money.

They have quite an editing system too. The articles you write for Demand Studios are edited by copy editors they hire. When you first begin the company sets you up with one of their senior copy editors. You will have to write three different articles and submit them to your senior editor for review. If all three check good, you'll have the ability to take on up to 10 assignments at one time.

Demand Media Studios also offers their writers the "Writer's Revenue Share Program." This program is essentially a program for the freelancer writer who would rather get paid based on the long-term effects of their works. This means that you don't get an up-front payment, but you will be paid once a month for your articles (if they earn more than $10) for as long as it keeps generating revenue (from ads, click-through's, etc).
They offer articles that pay by the revenue share program based on if they think it will be popular or not, so you can safely assume that taking a writing assignment that pays via revenue share will make you more than an up-front payment would.

I'm really excited to try this out myself. I think I'll work on digging up my resume and doing some updating and see if I can't hop on board and make some extra income.

Cheers :)
M. Hascall

iPad 2 - What's all the hype about?

Alright maybe I'm behind the times or something but I've been listening to the world shouting in ecstasy over the brilliance of the iPad 2, my wife especially - the woman is a fiend when it comes to electronics and gadgets, specifically sound and audio equipment, she's worked in that industry her entire life. I've come to realize that if my hunny bear thinks it's amazing, more often than not it will most assuredly be the greatest thing ever.

Apple iPad 2 (16GB, Wifi, Black)

I will, without regret and doubt buy one of these. But for me, I have to figure out exactly what I'm buying, for the sole purpose of validating my purchase to anyone that deems it uncouth. Let's do our defensive research shall we? So that we may liberate our souls with the validity of our purchase before all who would oppose us.

iPad 2 specs: will I get my workout for the week toting this thing around?
Doubtful. The iPad 2 surprisingly weighs in at only 1.3 lbs, which is nice because it's just heavy enough that you'll know when you have it and when you don't. I tend to lose my cellphone a lot because it's too light to feel it in my pocket, I simply just don't know if I have it or don't, and when I'm unaware of something I tend to forget about it, luckily at 601g I'll thankfully never have that problem with my iPad. FYI the weights will vary by a few grams depending on what specs you get, if you purchase a case and amenities with it, but nothing too significant. It's a difference of several grams.

The iPad 2 is 9.5 " tall, 7.31" wide, and just over a quarter of an inch thick. Which isn't bad at all - very reasonable considering the outstanding functionality and operating power contained withing the iPad 2.

16GB and 32GB and 64GB, oh my!
Three storage options available, but which to pick? You should evaluate your personal needs and buy the iPad 2 that has appropriate storage capacity. Personally I'll probably go for the 64GB. I have tons of stuff to put on there. Movies, music, budgets, excel files, short stories, random musings, idea's galore...there's an ongoing list.

Internet Accessibility
There are two different options when it comes to internet for your iPad 2. You can either get just Wi-Fi and Bluetooth or you can get the more expensive version with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth AND 3G by Verizon or ATT (your choice). Honestly I can't stand public wireless. Here in Minneapolis it tends to be slower than 3G networks and makes me want to dig my eyes out of their sockets with plastic spoons and feed them to my friends cat, Captain Marmalade. I will definitely pay the difference and get the 3G model as I value my sight.

Other Fun iPad 2 Stuff
My main concerns are size of the iPad 2, the weight, storage capacity and internet capability. All the other awesome stuff they come with is just a bonus in my eyes.

The iPad 2 boasts a sweet 1GHz dual-core Apple A5. Stuff like gyro stabilizers and accelerometer's I don't really care about. Are iPad 2's really miniature spaceships that congregate in the skies after we go to bed? I mean really. But besides its flight capability it comes with other cool options. Stuff like 5.1 surround sound pass-through if you buy the extra adapter, up to
1080p video out (again if you purchase the extra cable) and the ability to view almost any type of document out there [pdf files, power points, spreadsheets, rich text, html, .docx, and lots of different picture types]. You can also turn it into an e-reader just by downloading a simple app.

All-in-all, Apple iPad 2 is pretty fantastic. Another brilliant machine by Apple. :)

Cheers,
M.Hascall

Freelance Writing Job: Associated Content

Great opportunity here for anyone that stops by looking for some freelance writing gigs.

The company is Associated Content, a long standing media platform now run by the Yahoo! Contributor Network. I've been freelance writing for them off and on since 2006 and they are nothing short of spectacular especially for the beginning freelancer.

It's a simple (and free) process to join. It only takes several minutes and you're able to start writing and building your repertoire of articles and begin building a name for yourself.

More good news: It's almost as simple to write for them as it is to sign up!

Things to know:

• You can write about almost anything you could ever think of and get paid for it!
• Articles have a broad range as far as how much you will earn on upfront payments.
• You will earn residual income month by month the more you write based on how many views your articles get. (Lots of popular articles getting lots of hits daily = some savvy pocket change!)
• There are writing guidelines, see them here: AC Writing Guidelines and be sure to adhere to them.
• If you're into creating audio and video, you can also get paid for that as well!
• Research, research, research...but don't plagiarize! 

Earnings are a bit slow when you're first starting. But, if you're diligent about your work and you write a well researched article with a not-too-crowded-with-keywords-but-SEO-optimized-article you'll get paid top dollar every time. You'll have an interface once you are signed up where you'll get assignments from AC. Don't feel restricted by those, you can still come up with your own ideas and write about them and get paid for them. 

Always keep in mind that when you write for any online media company you are more often than not trying to drive traffic to their site. Search engines are going to be your new best friend if this seems like the life for you and I highly recommend getting familiar with Search Engine Optimization (SEO) writing.

So go check it out if you haven't already. Be sure to visit back with comments on your experience with Associated Content and possibly tips others would find useful! 

Happy writing!

Morgan