If you need a nice class that will clean pretty much anything for your PHP app, grab this class. Here’s the summary from the developer:

This class can filter input of stray or malicious PHP, Javascript or HTML tags and to prevent cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks. It should be used to filter input supplied by the user, such as an HTML code entered in form fields.

I have tried to make this class as easy as possible to use. You have control over the filter process unlike other alternatives, and can input a string or an entire array to be cleaned (such as $_POST).

** SQL Injection feature has been added.

I’ve used this in several sites. Mostly I pass all of POSTS, GET and REQUEST through this class before working with the content.

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Marco Polo Didn’t Go There: Stories and Revelations from One Decade as a Postmodern Travel Writer

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Everybody is talking about how the new Facebook Platform is the mana from heaven. But after the dust settles, and emotions and hormones stabilize, and this hits the users I think it’ll be a surprise at the results from this new platform. I have been using Facebook from the day that the network for my university opened. Here are the reasons that I think the new platform will not become the holy grail.

1. Facebook WAS the anti-myspace.com - MySpace is like a spam dump, it was hot when it launched because it satisfied a lot of hungry egos, but now people are realizing that it’s not a really meaningful way to connect with people in a controlled environment. With Facebook opening up everything to new companies, there’s going to be an infusion of new services and products that might appear useful or provide benefits but are really just time wasters and spam masquerading as such. If I want to read DIGG, I’ll read DIGG at their site, I don’t want it appearing in my news feed or anywhere else.
2. My Data is being Shared - Although the applications will “live” on facebook.com, data is shared with the third party. What will happened with my data?
3. Take care of basics - All of these few applications are supposed to take it to the next level, but I can’t even turn on my Facebook Mobile text because facebook doesn’t have an agreement with T-Mobile. It’s disappointing to see other things developed when the basics are not been met. “They have no bread”, “Then, give ‘em cake”.
4. Irrelevance - Reading DIGG or playing with another app is not something that most people will want to do on Facebook, and this is not because they might not find it useful, but because most facebook users are not the A-Type-Geek people. Most don’t care and are not in the technology fields. Facebook worked for a long time because they it was simple and it was relevant to what people wanted to do, which was to connect with other people.
5. Use their own product - if facebook is so good, why don’t they profile their users and release this first to the tech people and then everybody else will maybe follow along? Of course they won’t do this, they will launch it for everybody at once and there will be a backlash to so much hitting at once.
6. Facebook has no choice - Facebook has not choice but to innovate because their return on advertising is really low. They can’t justify or charge a lot of money for their ads because nobody clicks on them, so they have to produce new products and new services that advertisers can seek in as maybe being something half useful, but ultimately it’s to increase the ROI.
7. Getting banned - Myspace is banned in many companies and organizations because it is seen as a time waster, Facebook had the image of being more a networking and connecting type of a site. With the launch of the Platform and the many times wasters that will be included in this, many more organizations will end up blocking it just for this reason.

I do want to say that I’m a big fan of Facebook and what they are trying to accomplish, but we need to approach this in a level headed manner. Realizing that Facebook is in all this to make a profit and grow while appearing to be useful and providing value.

Sidenote: When you add an application it lists it in your feed so that others see it, but when you stop using and delete an application it does NOT appear in your feed. Interesting.

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Michael will be blogging live the launch of the new Facebook Platform.

Facebook’s strategy is almost the polar opposite from MySpace. While MySpace frets over third party widgets, alternatively shutting them down or acquiring them, Facebook is now opening up its core functions to all outside developers.

The question that I want to have an answer to is what kind of protection do the developers get from Facebook, if Facebook does decides to get into the same area as the developer or the app provider.

Update: Facebook launches “Causes” for nonprofit type of groups to raise money and support other social causes.

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I was browsing on my laptop and noticed that Google is different on my laptop than it is on my Desktop and other computers, and it looks like they are launching or partially testing their new look. This is what it looks, like. Click through for a full picture:

The New Google Look


What’s New:

1. Search results included from other sources, including news sources, blogs and Google Groups.
2. More polished look. Some of the horizontal lines are now bars and have more shading.
3. The links under the search bar only show up if there are results in that area, such as Google Groups.

TechCrunch is talking about other changes coming to Google.

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Mark Fletcher posts his 15 Startup Commandments, which are rules that startups should follow.

My favorites are:

2: Stealth startups suck. You’re not working on the Manhattan Project, Einstein. Get something out as quickly as possible and promote the hell out of it.
8: The size of your startup is not a reflection of your manhood. More employees does not make you more of a man (or woman as the case may be).
9: You have to be wrong in the head to start a company. But we have all the fun.
10: Starting a company will teach you what it’s like to be a manic depressive. They, at least, can take medication.

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I want to somewhat set the direction for this site as a guide for myself and for the readers.

Before we go further, if you can please read this story on richdad.com, then come back. I’m not going to summarize it here because it has a bigger impact when read from the first person, in the raw mode.

The focus of this site is to write about things that mater to entrepreneurs, start up people, hungry people, hackers and seekers.

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I had to move from the WordpressLab.com domain because Matt contact me and told me that it’s a registered trademark and as a long term decision, I think moving it away from the wordpress domain makes sense.

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If you have a blog and want a very simple but sophisticated theme for your Wordpress blog, you can use Hemingway Reloaded. It’s on based on Hemingway by Kyle. If you come across any bugs, please let us know. Here’s the screen capture:

>> DOWNLOAD BLOG THEME

>> DOWNLOAD BLOG THEME

MOVING NOTE: We had to move from Wordpresslab.com blog to this domain (startup365.com) because “wordpress” is a registered trademark.

Contact: startup365@gmail.com

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