As the world gathers for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, the Casino at bet365 is marking this great occasion with their own incredible £50,000 Going For Gold promotion.

Over the course of the Olympic Games there are 20 exciting Going for Gold events taking place at bet365 where players can compete for both cash prizes and medals. The more medals that you win, the higher up the leaderboard you are placed and greater your chance of winning the top prizes.

In each event, the top 100 players will each win a medal. The first 15 players will receive a Gold medal, the next 35 players will win a Silver medal and the next 50 will be rewarded with a Bronze medal. At the end of the competition, players will be awarded cash prizes according to their final position on the leaderboard and their status in the bet365 VIP Royalty Scheme.

“We’re aiming to emulate the spirit and excitement of the Olympic Games with this promotion” explains Tom Galanis, Casino Marketing Manager at bet365. “Here anyone from many nations is welcome to participate and compete for the glory of victory. Everyone has a chance of winning a medal plus the opportunity to win one of our great cash prizes.”

As well as the Going For Gold promotion which runs from the 9th to the 24th of August, there are many other reasons to visit the Casino at bet365. These include progressive jackpots on the slots worth hundreds of thousands of pounds, the thrill of live dealer Blackjack and Roulette, an excellent Royalty Scheme and a wealth of information to help improve your game.

So whether you’re Going for Gold this August or just want to experience heart pounding fun at one of the best casinos on the internet, remember that there’s always something for everyone in the Casino at bet365.

What are you waiting for?

Go for gold!

Ashleigh
x x x

After working as a freelance web designer for a while I’ve built up a nice client base and have half a dozen projects on the go as we speak. Because of this, I can’t exactly disappear for a month - nor would I want to as I love what I do. It is for this reason, and for convenience sake once I return to England, that I have decided to buy a laptop.

When I first decided that I wanted to buy a laptop I hit Google and began researching. I needed a system with decent graphics, enough ram to cope with using Photoshop, Dreamweaver and Flash simultaneously and enough harddrive to store PSDs, high resolution images and flash templates. After a week of research, I’ve decided to buy Acer’s Gemstone Blue 6920G. It does everything that I want and more - and it’s blue!

At one point I considered getting a MacBook as people seem to think Apple computers are the best for web design but seeing as I’m a Windows girl at heart I came back to Acer’s beautiful blue notebook. Plus, I could never get used to having a ‘one click’ only mouse!

Ashleigh
x x x

The result - Teal’c became quite aggressive towards Squall and began chasing him around their underwater atlantis and beating him up. To rectify this new problematic situation, my boyfriend and I went to the fish store and bought both Teal’c and Squall a friend each. We described the aggressive behaviour of the black molly and were told that it sounded like a typical isolated males behaviour. We ended up with a white female molly - which we named Vala - and a better understanding of how male and female fish differ. We also learnt how to tell them apart.

And you know what - it turns out.. Teal’c is a female! Dun dun dun.. Now re-named Teal’cette, the remaining fish are Squall, Vala (pictured in the cave) and Cloud 2.0 - a light yellow/pale blue fancy guppy.

Ashleigh
x x x

The short version of said story - I designed my first website when I was 11, went on to teach myself XHTML, CSS, PHP, Photoshop and Dreamweaver and after completing a certificate III in VET Multimedia I received a vocational award for my talent from the Australian government. I then studied a Diploma in Information Technology at university, worked as a junior web developer for 3 months, moved to England and now work as a freelance web designer full time.

They were so impressed with my work that they’re going to publish a couple of pages featuring me in issue 150 which is on sale on the 23rd of October, 2008.

Awesome!

Ashleigh
x x x

The bad news is that there’s a lot of competition when it comes to getting work. When I first started offering web design to people in exchange for money I got very little out of it in the monetary department. At one point I even found myself working for free just so I could get some experience.

With websites such as oDesk, Guru and RentaCoder that allow you to apply to web design jobs, I’d say that there are more opportunities to get web design work - but websites like this don’t make it any easier. I’ve often found that by quoting a reasonable price for a web design project I’ll be declined simply because I won’t work for $5 USD an hour or less. My minimum hourly rate is actually £10 which is more like $19 USD.

So - if it’s so hard to get work - what chance does a student or graduate have of getting their first few jobs? Well, for students and recent graduates in the UK, there is Student Gems, a website where businesses and individuals can find students to work on various jobs, including web design projects, by matching their needs with student skills. Though still in beta, the site has quite a following already so if you’re in the UK and looking for work, check it out!

Ashleigh
x x x