Ghacks was founded three years ago on a rainy October evening. Back then I had no plans to become a full time blogger and earn my money from blogging but every now and then life turns out to be sweet and give you chances if you only look out for them. It took more than 18 month before I fully realized the potential of Ghacks. It was back then that I started making plans to quit my day job and become a full time blogger.
It took another seven month until I finally quit my day job and started blogging full time. Ghacks has seen some tremendous change in those three years. From a site with a few hundred visitors per day to a website that’s coming close to 30000. That’s a huge leap if you consider that the site did not have a marketing budget and that all growth was natural.
The main reason was probably mouth to mouth advertisement from guys that like my site. I know that you are out there and tell other people about my site because you like it and I would like to thank you for that.
Ghacks would not be what it is without you and the rest of the readers and visitors. To celebrate the third birthday I thought I donate ten Ghacks shirts to lucky readers who post a comment in this thread. I like to hear your opinion about the future of Ghacks. Should I add a new category, new topics, concentrate on something, write more, less, longer, shorter. Everything that comes to your mind is important to me.
You can pick the black or red shirt. Both are made of an exceptional quality (I have to know, I got four of them that I wear regularly)
Good luck to everyone and happy birthday to Ghacks!
Related posts:
Ghacks Birthday Competition RoundupHappy Birthday Thread
Thunderbird Birthday Reminder
Ghacks Christmas Giveaway Announcement
Full Time Blogging
How You Can Help Ghacks
Ghacks wishes everyone a happy new year
Today is my birthday
Happy Birthday GHacks.
You help to keep ourselves updated.
Keep up the good work.
Congrats, Martin! :)
I wonder where my blog is going to stand in three years.
Congratz! And keep it up!
Happy birthday！
I just subscribe to your blog today！
Happy birthday! I hope many more to come.
As a gift, I think you’ll find these 3 links interesting:
Blogging for dollars:
http://www.slate.com/id/2201325/
How I make money online:
http://www.clicknewz.com/1122/how-i-make-money-online-part-2-an-inside-look/
The Best Tips On Getting More Traffic to Your Website:
http://www.buzzblogger.com/the-best-tips-on-getting-more-traffic-to-your-website/
btw: I don’t need another t-shirt unless you decide to make long sleeve ones.
really, you’re doing a fantastic job here. good number of articles, good length, great topics. i’m a fan of software so naturally that’s what i’d love to see more of, you really have a knack for finding great stuff!
the only thing missing is a good community of commenters. with so many daily visits, i’m surprised most topics only see 2-3 comments. there is plenty of interesting stuff here to discuss, so why doesn’t anyone participate?
one change i would like to see is the ability to preview comments before posting them. i like to have a read over things before i hit ’submit’, and most blogs/forums have a preview feature, which makes it easier.
oh, and please make the header link to the homepage. i always click on it and wonder why nothing is happening. then i remember that i have to click the Home button on the nav bar :)
Happy birthday
I hope that you are always health, and write more
happy birthday and keep up the good work!
Happy Birthday gHacks!! I remember when I first came across this blog. I think I was looking for a way to find mp3’s through google.. And well, I started reading a few other posts and got hooked!
I agree with garbanzo, I can’t understand why there aren’t more comments. Then again, I’m glad this isn’t just another slashdot ;) their amount of comments is overwhelming! Having said that, I’ll make sure to comment more in the future :)
Keep up the good work Martin!
Congratulations,gHacks! You talk about you created it three years ago, I am curious about why you took this domain ghacks.net? Does it mean something? Especially spell gHacks, not Ghacks. Google Hack? Get Hack or Go Hack? Good job!
Happy Birthday!
What I like about Ghacks is things you don’t see on other sites, e.g. small but useful programs, registry tweaks and hacking (oh and don’t foget the nice promotions). More of those – you’re success will be assured :)
I love the black TSh.
Happy birthday to all of you at gHacks
Just keep doing what you are doing,it`s working well!
Happy birthday,Ghacks!
Dear Martin, congrats to your anniversary. I’ve been reading your posts for a good two years now and I’m looking forward every new day for every new ghacks-articles. Very good topics, very good mixture, very well written.
Keep up the excellent work for the next (fifty)three years!
btw: I use rssowl-feedreader and it doesn’t display the images in your feed.
Happy birthday Ghacks!
Congrats Martin.
I check everyday your blogs since dec. 2005, when I was looking for a gmail invite.
A pretty good marketing campaign without a marketing budget.
A very good job indeed.
Happy Birthday!
Glad you keeping this blog in such good shape :)
To be honest with you, there was one change that I didn’t like – games on separate blog, which isn’t often updated. Game for weekend was best option IMHO. Now I have to put 2 blogs in RSS reader, unnecessarily.
Anyway – in the future maybe you can categorize more your blog. Each category with own icon, then visitors can for example ignore categories they don’t like.
BTW: choose me :D Last time there was a t-shirt to win I didn’t manage to write down my comment on time :(
Greetings from Poland, good luck with developing blog in the future :)
hah incredible i am a daily reader of your blog for nearly 2 years now and just a second ago I realised that ghacks was “born” on that same day as i was:) only my was 21 not 3 yrs ago! Martin i wish u and ghacks all the best, keep up the good work and remember that evolving is the best part of living even for a blog:) congratulations for having one of the best blogs on the net!
happy birthday!! doesn’t just seem like yesterday that you were starting out. time sure flies by.
again, congrats!!
Happy B-day Martin. I wish you many more to come and many more good surprises from life.
I think the success is due to your personality – I felt from the beginning that I am talking (reading?) to a decent human being, someone I would be glad to meet in person (call me if you get to Israel!). I always got the feeling you are trustworthy – and I have indeed never been disappointed with the advice you gave here.
The size of the articles is important too – you manage to give enough information in very small packages which is important as we all suffer from info overload, I’m sure.
The only thing that bothers me is the search function – I find it difficult to locate articles I know I read here a few months or years ago.
All the best,
Yogi.
Happy Birthday Ghacks,
Just one suggestion, if I may: Please put in a some more screenshots or logos or any type pf stock images in your posts, sometimes all text with only an image or two seems monotonous.
Happy birthday Ghacks.
Your blog feed has been a keeper in my RSS reader since years. I like the fact that you really write about novel topics (not just reposts or silly top lists like we see everywhere on the web). I also like the fact that some of your posts are based on your actual day-to-day experience with the blog (for example “how to deal with huge apache log files”). It sets a more personal and reflective tone, which is refreshing.
Greetings from France, I wish Ghacks the best for the years to come !
Happy birthday gh
heh, switched to lin a while ago, this is the only win blog I keept in me reader:)
keep it up!
Long Live Ghacks..Great blog..I am a regular reader since one year
Happy birthday guys! Definitely one of the top tech blogs. Always up there in my GReader feeds as having a very high percentage of starred posts.
Hallo Ghacks, Happy birthday number 3 and many happy returns. Hopefully becomes the quality, which is already very good, much – and much better, and grows ghacks into the most easy to read and important website
Happy birthday Ghacks !!!
A site with tech news every! day is really wonderfull. You write great articles and you have eye for new software and technology. Keep up the good work and we’ll keep on visiting and reading ghacks.net daily …
Greets from a small Belgian blogger (compucated.be)
what about a poll for the readers?
or a top 20 for best software?
Happy Birthday Ghacks and thank you for keep us up to date on all the cool stuff on the internet! I hope you continue to get better and grow.
You’re doing a great job. I visit your site every day. Keep up the good work ! Oops. And happy birthday too !
a very hearty congratz on your blog’s B’day :D
Keep roking with your amazing & useful articles..
Happy Birthday!
How about writing 10 Tips to Amateur Tech Bloggers?
Congratulations, you are doing a fantastic work here. I second two of the fellows’ suggestions: more community or social access, and a post about sucessful blogging. I don’t like the so notorious adsense in the main article, that’s the place for a nice image, I think. Remember that if I win a shirt please let it be anything but red, it’s a nice color but here means you worship the Prez. No way.
thanks for the links jojo!!!
Congratulations, Martin. I’m one of those that tells everyone who asks computer-related questions about Ghacks.
And I’m opting out of the tee shirt competition since I already have one.
Keep up the excellent work!
Dong 10!
Congratz man!
Happy Birth day
I must admit, after founding Ghacks blog, I have been more aware of interesting things happening all over the internet… Without Ghacks, I’ve would miss _alot_ of cool things here and there… Thank You!
And Happy Birthday! Hopefully you’ll stay online few more years…
w00t!
Congrats Martin, Happy Birthday Ghack. Another daily visitor here.
Like to see your reviews, open source or freeware, the longer and the more the better. Tweaks or tips are always good too.
Nice Blog..I enjoy reading your posts.
Wish Ghacks a very Happy Birthday Martin, I have been following Ghacks since its inception and have been pretty much hooked onto it. Keep up the good work and wish you best of luck for everything :)
Happy Birthday! Keep up the good work.
Happy bday Ghacks!
Been a reader for awhile, gotta love the site!
Happy birthday site. Can’t say much else other than please keep the work up so I can appear to know stuff about computers.
thanks man
Hey, happy birthday! Congrats and keep the hits coming!
Congrats!
I love your posts!
Martin and the rest of the Ghacks community, Happy Birthday!
All the best,
Steve Ragan
The Tech Herald
Happy Birthday GHacks, been an avid reader for nearly 2 years now and missed reading the site daily while we were without power recently (Hurricane Ike)
Happy Birthday Ghack! keep up the latest post!
Happy Birthday Ghacks!
A very happy birthday to you, gHacks!
Happy third anniversary, gHacks ^_^
Hoooray~ So have anyone sent a birthday present to gHacks?
Happy Birthday.
Keep up the good work.
I always start my online session by checking out Ghacks.It’s addictive and awesome.
Thank You & Happy Birthday, you deserve it
“So have anyone sent a birthday present to gHacks?”
yea tons of clicks on ads :o)
good continuation
Ahh, suddenly loads of comments on a post, it’d be nice if more people posted comments regularly like this.
Been reading gHacks before you did it full time and I’ve always liked the varied mix of articles. Keep it up and I hope it continues to grow.
Happy B Day.
hi martin..happy BD ghacks!! you have managed to keep the exceptional quality of this blog intact over the years..
ps i did not receive the tshirt from the last competition :(
Happy belated birthday! Ghacks is one of my favorite blogs, one thing i would like to suggest you to add would be more opensource alternatives to the commercial apps and tutorials (linux related).
I am frequent reader of ghacks, I wish a belated happy b’day to ghacks.
I also write blog on computer tips and tricks, some of my articles were linked by ghacks i would like to thank ghacks.net for that.
please give me a ghacks.net blackt-shirt
I’m already proud owner of Ghacks T-shirt :)
I think it’s all OK with Ghacks now. If I have some ideas, or, maybe, guess post – I will write to you.
Congrats Martin :)
Love your blog!
Finally.
The fisrt feed I read on GReader, and sometimes the only one.
Write. Only this. OK?
Two birthdays on October 3rd! My second daughter was born on October 3rd, 2008! That’s why I haven’t been commenting (or reading).
While I love my Ghacks shirt and it get compliments wherever I go, I hope that some other new readers win one and spread the word.
I’d like to see more articles about Firefox and Linux / Ubuntu. The only Windows software articles that I read are the ones that run portably, that is, without installing. I use those only when using Windows machines at the university, or when fixing friends’ Windows machines (the few that are left on Windows).
Thanks! Happy birthday!
Thank you for providing us such precious information!
A visit from Hunan,China.
Chinese:
感谢您为我们提供了如此宝贵的信息！
Hi MArtiN,
HAPPY BiRTHday fOR ghACks.
I never myself consider lucky. But i would lov to have a t-shirts of Ghacks.
Shafi
I know I’m a bit late, but happy birthday mate – I hope gHacks is still here in 3 years!