Who did this?	Bilgin Ozkan
	Spawn on:	June 04, 1976
	Location:	Melbourne, Australia
	Marital Status:	Married
	Music:	Rock. Contemporary, Modern... whatever rock. Something for Kate, Dave Matthews Band, Our Lady Peace, Pearl Jam, R.E.M. etc.
	Can we see?	Gallery Old gallery

The Details

I have been accused so many times of being an arrogant bastard because I keep an online journal. Pictures have been a regular part of my internet presence as well, but an About Me page?! No...
I have had a personal homepage this way or another since 1997 but never a decent, proper, about page.

I don't know if this is going to be any different either. I just figure that if strangers are reading my journal, maybe providing general information about the author is the right thing to do. Most definitely the ethical thing.

Here goes...

The Bio

Born in Melbourne, Australia in an unknown hour on the 4th of June '76. You'd think I was Australian, because you know, the name reeks Anglo Saxon, but in fact, I am Turkish. Well, origin-wise, because I feel more Australian than Turkish really and in essence I like the utopian idea of being a global citizen.

I have had a mixed upbringing, I saw and ate pretty much Australian till the age of 10 and then my parents decide we should return 'home' back to Turkey. So father goes to Turkey and buys a house and a shop 2 years in advance, and in '86 I am told it is time to go.

I lived in Turkey till I was 19 and at that age I decided I would come downunder on my own and study. I was here till 1998 when I had to go back again to Turkey.
I am from Alanya in Turkey, which is arguably the most popular holiday resort on the Mediterranean coast.
Tourism being the main industry, in 2002, I became a fully certified, officially licensed professional tourist guide (I am emphasizing on it because it is such a hard title to get :). Although I have been a tour guide since 2000.

I am also a self-proclaimed web/graphic designer. I was the IT Consultant for a travel company in my last job in Turkey. I was responsible for everything cyberspace. I was also building and maintaining web sites for local hotels and resorts in Turkey, I did about a dozen of that.

I am a married man now, much to the surprise of pretty much everyone I know on this planet. But I am a very happy and a very in love married man since July 20, 2002 . Sevim has her own web site and her own flickr account .

Finally in December 2002 Sevim and I moved to Melbourne to live the rest of our lives... hopefully.

I work for a company called Radio Parts Group. I do the advertising, graphic design, package design, web design etc. etc. I love my job, and I love what I do. Pay me more money though.

The Web Log

This web log, online journal or whatever you call it has not been useful to the masses at all. The only useful thing I have done is probably a tutorial on how to turn your computer to a web server with the 'good stuff'. I will not enlighten you with mesmerizing topics, nor will I convey interesting news stories. This web log has been about me, me and me!
My reader base has primarily been close friends who worry about me and who wonder what the heck is up with my life. And because I am so slack with e-mailing people and keeping in touch, what better way to let you do all the dirty work?

The first ever entry that started the web log dates to September 26, 2000. I have had more of a journal approach rather than the "here's an interesting site" definition of a web log.
I write honestly, but there are subject matters that I prefer not to touch here, for obvious reasons. I have a private journal for that which is only for authorized people.

This site is was hosted with below10 host . They are cheap, fast, and reliable and have one of the best customer service teams I have seen. They get back to you with lightening speed with all your questions answered. I got all my hosting through them in my job in Turkey and I have never been let down.
In June 2003 I changed my host to Total Choice Hosting ... why? Because they were cheaper and provided more features. I recommend them both.

The Tools

For publishing I used blogger for the first couple of years but then it became out-dated and limited, so I switched to Grey Matter , and finally to MovableType .

I use Dreamweaver to build the pages. I use Textpad as a text editor only when I need absolute control and full detail, otherwise I strongly believe it is un-wise not to use a WYSIWYG editor to say, build a table. It's just simply not efficient at all.

I use Photoshop for the graphics, TopStyle Pro for the style-sheets... Filezilla to upload.

This site does not validate as anything, because I got on with a bad start and there is really no need for it at the moment (2007 Update: There is now a need for it. And I am one day hoping to go CSS all the way. Just need the time!) Until geeks that are dying to read my journal on their palm pilots (2007 Update: PocketPC baybee) start writing death threats to me, I intend not to bother either ((2007 Update: Didn't I just contradict that?). My demographic uses IE, Mozilla and Opera on which the site displays just fine. But the next major re-design of this site will be fully compliant I swear!

Geez, you read all this?!

Updated on July 27, 2007