You may have noticed some design elements changing on the site. They are less an effort on my part to spiff things up than they are a reflection of new stuff I’m learning about how to use Movable Type, stylesheets, and other web tools. One of the new things is the Category archives, and the list of links to each one. Another is the sidebar appearing in archives beyond the main page. The site will continue to change in small ways like these over the next few weeks.

I was also introduced to a program by Amazon.com. Before now, when I mentioned a book, I would always link to the page where the book is sold at Amazon.com; it occurred to me that if someone bought a book through that link, it would be nice to get credit. To my surprise, such a thing is possible. The membership allows me to have integrated click-through links to Amazon’s site; I decided to use it as a possible way of generating income to cover the cost of maintaining the site. If someone (other than family or friends, dang) clicks through that link and buys the recommended book or other item immediately or within 24 hours, Amazon pays a commission, depending on the item and how the order was made after the link was followed (immediate purchases is best for credit).

Since the site became more visited, I wanted a way to ask for contributions, but I don’t like asking people to fork over money. The Amazon deal seemed like a good way to compromise, as the book or DVD bought via this site doesn’t cost the buyer any more than usual, but it nevertheless generates income here. In an attempt to keep the main page from being too commercial, I only feature one book or DVD on the sidebar, with links to a page with recommended media and reviews of the same. We’ll see how it goes.

I am learning about a lot of this as I help set up a new web site, xpat.org, which Sako Eaton and myself are building. Not yet fully completed, the site will consolidate our political commentary, and, over time, we hope to welcome several other commentators to the site. But for now, we have to get things set up; Sako is teaching me quite a bit I had not done before, and necessity is teaching me the rest. We hope to inaugurate the site on September 11th, for obvious reasons. It should be fun. I’ll continue to post the best stuff here as well as there, but most of my day-by-day commentary will move to the new site, leaving this blog a little more open for stuff on Japan and my personal experiences.