Now that wordpress.com has an in house subscription service you can let people subscribe to your blog by adding the blog subscription widget, and the instructions for setting up email updates through Feedburner have been removed from the wordpress.com support documentation.  As I have been receiving requests from those who do wish to use Feedburner I  have revived the instructions formerly available and have posted them below.

RSS in Plain English

A short explanation of RSS and how it helps you save time reading the web. This video comes in an unbranded “presentation quality” version that can be licensed for use in the workplace. (If you are not accustomed to using an RSS feedreader you will benefit from watching this video, first.)

Subscribe through Feedburner (Setting up Email updates for your readers)

These instructions result in offering readers the opportunity to obtain email ions result in offering readers the ability to subscribe to your blog by email.
1. Go to FeedBurner www.feedburner.com/fb/a/home
2. Register there.
3. Burn your feed.
Your feed address is your blog name with /feed at the end. Like this – example.wordpress.com/feed
4. Click ‘My Feeds’ at the top of the screen on the left
5. Click the name of your feed
6. Click the Publicize tab
7. Click the ‘Email Subscriptions’ in the left column
8. Choose FeedBurner, FeedBlitz, or Rmail to be your feed-via-email service provider.
9. Click ‘Activate’
10. You’ll be taken to the next page where you’ll need to scroll down to find the ‘Subscription Link Code‘ and copy the code in the box underneath
11. Paste that code into a text widget on your blog
12. Remember to save your options at FeedBurner!
13. That’s all there is to it. You are now offering email subscriptions!

Notes:

• You cannot redirect your feed to Feedburner.
• Questions about the email service should go to FeedBurner.
• Offering email updates might cause a drop in feed stats if people switche ability to subscribe to your blog by email.

Related posts found in this blog:
How to Become Better Blogger 1

Thanks to the internet, we can use the power of computers at a completely different location, have all the computing power needed and it’s all secure, backed up and made accessible through the web. The key to cloud computing is that you only pay for what you use. The excellent video from Common Craft explains the basics of cloud computing: how it works and why it makes sense for businesses.

The term “cloud computing” encompasses many areas of tech, including software as a service, a software distribution method pioneered by Salesforce.com about a decade ago. It also includes newer avenues such as hardware as a service, a way to order storage and server capacity on demand from Amazon and others. What all these cloud computing services have in common, though, is that they’re all delivered over the Internet, on demand, from massive data centers. — How Cloud Computing Is Changing the World

In fact, cloud computing holds the potential to dramatically change the businesses that adopt it, even if the technologies are only used internally. While these possibilities are only now starting to become clear, we can get a decent sense of these now –Eight ways that cloud computing will change business

A PDF report based on an ongoing survey released last month by the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA) summarizes both the benefits and potential pitfalls of cloud computing, and makes recommendationd to businesses on how to minimize risk. Cloud Computing: Benefits, Risks and Recommendations for Information Security (PDF).

The Cloud Computing in Plain English Video
Using a simple story of a growing florist business, this video explains the basics of cloud computing: how it works and why it makes sense for businesses
and individuals.

• The difference between on-site computing and cloud computing
• The financial benefits of cloud computing
• What makes cloud computing secure and efficient
• How cloud computing impacts consumers

View the video introduction 3 minutes..

Related posts found in this blog:
Blogging and Business Trends
Blogging is Big: Blogging Statistics
Business Blogging Poised for Growth

Here’s an interesting update on the roll-out of WordPress.com Christmas Goodies in the form of new features:

Customize your WordPress blog with Typekit fonts December 22, 2009
Got a blog at WordPress.com? Now you can use Typekit! We’ve just rolled out a way to easily use fonts on the world’s largest blogging platform. With Typekit and WordPress working together, customizing the look of the nearly 10 million blogs they host now takes just a few clicks. Log into your WordPress dashboard and click …

from the official TypeKit blog

Related posts found in this blog:

Free Christmas blog headers and graphics

Free Christmas countdown tickers for your blog

The free hosted users of wordpress.com have many free features on their blogs and the list of features is growing longer day by day. This year we have already had some Christmas goodies made available to us and I’m not referring to the return of a favorite ie. a little snow for the holidays. We now have wordpress.com holiday desktop wallpaper in seven different sizes, and more goodies are on the way.

More goodies?

A Typekit Font section has appeared under Appearance  on our dashboards.  There we see:

Typekit is the easiest way to use real fonts on your website, just enter your Typekit ID and you’ll be able to choose from hundreds of fonts some available for free, and some available for a subscription fee.

In addition look for an announcement post soon, but yes; there are expanded features (crop, rotate, flip, and resize) for image editing under development that will most assuredly be welcomed.

Yesterday, the geotagging feature introduced just last month was also expanded to include – Email Geolocation

If you haven’t already tried our post by email feature then it makes blog publishing as simple as sending an email. Configure your blog, write an email, and we’ll do the rest. You can add photos and videos in your email and they’ll all be included, regardless of whether you send them from your home computer, your office, or a cellphone.

During the holiday season, the hours for support have been changed so do keep that in mind when filing your support tickets.

We will be closing support for one week in order to spend time with our families whilst trying not to overcook the turkey, coping with relatives, and staying sane.

Let’s all share in the spirit of peace and hope this holiday season, and carry our mutual desires for health and happiness for all, into the new year.

Related posts found in this blog:

Free Christmas blog headers and graphics

Free Christmas countdown tickers for your blog

If you self host wordpress when you visit your dashboard you will notice that  WordPress 2.9 is available This is a major upgrade, and brings some new features like a built-in image editor, database optimization, easier video integration, batch plugin update and a trashbin.

I’ve been do busy with holiday preparations that I haven’t been on top of the blogging, computers and technology news.  Today I took some time out and read these articles:

StumbleUpon’s recent upgrade dramatically changes the online sharing game. Some Stumblrs are looking to jump ship, sniffing out other social media like FaceBook for the first time. –  Sorting, Saving and Tossing StumbleUpon Friends

You check your traffic every day but all you find are tumbleweeds blowing across the landscape of your blog. Well, there’s a reason you’re not building readership. Your blog sucks.  — 10 Reasons Why Your Blog Sucks

Earlier this week on TechCrunch, Michael Arrington wrote an alarmed post about “fast food content that will surely, over time, destroy the mom and pop operations that hand craft their content today.” Mom and pop operations and hand-crafted content sounds an awful lot like you and me, doesn’t it? –  Should We Be Worried About Fast Food Content?

Move over Google, Apple is moving over to Microsoft’s Bing, sorry! Microsoft launched a Bing app, approved by Apple and ready for download for the iPhone and iPod touch on Apple’s App Store. The application is free. –Bing App for iPhone Launched

The FireFound add-on for the Firefox browser adds tracking and remote wipe features that can help with lost or stolen computers. — Don’t Lose Everything When You Lose a Laptop

Despite the recession, Mac sales continue unabated.  …  many consumers are probably celebrating their first holiday season as Mac users. I’ve compiled this list of gifts for the new Mac user and checked it twice. I’ve chosen software, hardware, books and more that are all under $100, with many costing less than $50. – Cool Stuff – Gifts for new Mac users

Facebook wants you to share.  Facebook encourages you to share.  If you do not want to share, why are you on Facebook? Having said that… Facebook has done a lot to give you control over the information you can share, but it has also opened some doors or “privacy holes”. — Facebook’s Privacy Settings – what’s the fuss about?

Ten privacy groups have filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission over recent changes to Facebook’s privacy policy.Led by the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), the groups criticize Facebook for changes that made previously private information public. –  Facebook Target of FTC Privacy Complaint

In 2010, email marketing is going to be increasingly important to businesses wanting to build strong relationships with their customers. –(video – 10 tips for optimal e-zine success.)  How to get results from e-zines

You have to completely desire success in order to attract it into your life completely. Otherwise, you will always find yourself falling short of your potential. — A Positive Mindset is the Key to Success

Readers, do you have any news to share?

Due to the extended dimensions that the blogging phenomenon has achieved, one can hardly image the richness of tools that bloggers may use to improve the performance of their pages in the web circuit. What tools should one look for? First of all you need to select a specific platform to set up for the blog, then other tools complete the picture in case you want to include photos or videos. Last but not least, you definitely need some special software to allow you to easily moderate the comments and fight unwanted mails, labeled as spam.

Let’s take a look at the way some tools can help you post entries on the blog with the help of the platforms. Due to the wide variety of available software, format may vary, nevertheless the working principle is the same: type the title and the text you want to accompany it in the platform. Not all tools provide italics, bold and large font sizes, and you may have to get this by using HTML in order to achieve the desired results. In case you have to copy-paste Microsoft Word text, you need to check whether the blogging platform allows it without interference with RSS feeds.

In order to upload videos and pictures on the blog we have to mention Adobe Photoshop as one of the best tools here; yet, you may have to resize the images in order to make them easy to download by visitors. Furthermore, such tools enable you to align the photos in the way that matches your entry best. Embed multimedia files are also widely used by bloggers, mainly with the help of third-hand utilities like those offered by YouTube. All you have to do is include a JavaScript in the posts in order to allow the blog users to access the photo or video files you upload.

The RSS support may also prove crucial for the success of a blog, particularly since most Internet users are mainly concerned with accessing blog content via RSS feeds. You can find a variety of RSS formats available, not to mention that most tools include some sort of RSS help. To make sure you really get what you want, and the blog looks professional to the targeted audience, it is advisable that you should check the RSS formats a special software offers before actually purchasing or installing it.

There are dozens of important consumer trends worth noting at any given time of the year.  The global recession hasn’t ended and will affect the trends in buying patterns for years to come. Tracking consumer trends  is  a way to gain inspiration for  profitable new goods and services to develop, and showcase in your business blog, when you are ready to offer them to your clients and customers  in 2010. 

Assessment

If you are looking towards improving your business and your blog, begin by doing your homework. Use all the tools you can to assess where you are at, and to compare both your quantitative and qualitative information to that of your competitors.

1. Check your demographics. Has your audience (client, customers) base changed or expanded?
2. Are your sales and your blog traffic going up or down?
3. What are the  ‘trending’ topics in your own business, your blog, and in your niche?
4. How effective is your brand promotion?

Reference containing links to tools Blogging: Learning SEO is worth the effort

Comparative Research

What are your competitors doing more effectively than you are doing?

1. To find blogs on any topic, industry or trend, use keyword and keyword phrase searches and blog search engines like Technorati, Google Blog Search, Yahoo blog search, Bing blog search and similar search. Don’t forget to use niche search engines as well.
2. Use keyword searches and ‘consumer trends’ to start a flow of information from Google Alerts, Twitter Search.
3. Expand your knowledge base by using Google Reader, Bloglines or any other RSS aggregator like Netvibes to acquire an inflow of information from feeds from every source you want to track.
4. Do keyword searched of  social media sites and social networks, forums, directories,  and online groups.
5. Subscribe to relevant free newsletters. For example when you subscribe to the eMarketer Daily Newsletter, you get a free insider’s look at the latest eMarketer analysis. Two new articles with eMarketer charts are delivered to your inbox each weekday morning.
6. Also search for all information that is relevant to the business of online marketing and media such as whitepapers, best practices guides, and research briefs.

Blogging is big and business blogging is poised for growth

A new blog is launched every second, but despite business blogging being the hot marketing term of the moment, blogs are read by fewer only 14% of US internet users. Over 90% of both small and large businesses still do not have a blog, but the situation is poised to change as companies discover the benefits of blogging. Now is the time to smarten up your website and add a blog or improve what you have.

Free Resource

Business Blogging for Dummies is 38-page report provides you with a step-by-step blueprint for building a valuable business blog. It sets out the 20 mistakes to avoid making. Note:  There are how to tutorial posts in this blog that ensure you won’t make those mistakes.

Has the age of persuasion become the age of invasion?

Relevance meets the Real Time Web
As the changes roll out Google is taking on Bing’s Twitter deal and Twitter itself with updates from Facebook and Twitter. The video demonstrates how real-time search was supposed to work was released, but not to rave reviews.

Google has added real-time results to its search results pages for desktop computers, iPhone, and Android devices. Google’s real-time search capability is being made possible in part through a series of content partnerships. Having recently struck a deal with Twitter to index tweets, Google has also entered into partnerships with Facebook, MySpace, FriendFeed, Jaiku, and Identi.ca to include public information in Google’s real-time index. Google Search Goes Real Time

In Google Releases Real-Time Reputation Problem Lisa Barone says:

I recommend reading Rae’s post Google Enables Real Time Spam and More to get a full understanding of how Google’s current implementation opens Pandora’s Box to widespread spam and even dangerous behavior that may affect your children. However, I wanted to talk about it from a brand and reputation management perspective. If you were the type of business that was slow to monitor what people were saying about you, you’re probably just got far worse.

Real Time Search

Discover breaking news on the web with real-time updates from news, blogs and social networks.

Related posts found in this blog:
How to Become a Better Blogger 2: Online Privacy
How to Become a Better Blogger 5: Your Online Presence
Blogging: Online presence and authenticity
Google Search Predictions
Protect Yourself from Online Identity Theft

Sean Weigold Ferguson from Orlando, Florida asks Matt Cutts of Google:”What do predict will be the big changes to “search” as we know it today over the next 3 years? What are some of today’s trends that you believe will believe will shape the future of Google search?”

Hat Tip to Chris Crum
Read also:
Marissa Mayer Talks Google Search, Chrome, Online News And More At Le Web
Google Search Appliance Goes Tweet Crazy

Aviary is a powerful suite of browser-based design tools for people who create.  This addon for quick screen capture  will perform a screen capture and then open the image instantly in a basic image editor where you can do markup (draw arrows and rectangles), edit (crop, rotate and resize) and get the exact pixel colors of the image.

Features include:

• Full or partial screen capture of all webpages and images (even Flash, in FF3.6+).
• Save to desktop, host online, or edit in Aviary design apps. You have 5 to choose from.
• Quick launch 5 Aviary design apps: Image editor, markup editor, vector editor, color palette editor & effects editor.

Phoenix Image Editor

From basic image retouching to complex effects, Phoenix delivers the key features of a desktop image editor with the simplicity and accessibility of a web-based application.  Edit your images with undo and redo, brushes, magic wand, and blend modes. Work with layers, groups, and layer masks. Intuitive drag and drop interface.

Collaborate with other users. Follow step-by-step tutorials to learn new skills.
Import from popular photo-sharing sites Import images from Flickr, Picasa, and Facebook.  Use your Phoenix creations in other Aviary tools.

Try Out Aviary» Download Firefox Add-ON

It’s free to try the complementary suite of creation tools or sign up.

Related posts found in this blog:
Ten Free Online Image Compression and Optimization Programs
Images: Optimizing, Pre-sizing and Resizing

more about navigating through your WordPress admin page

Let’s look at each menu item, starting with your account. But first, let’s pay homage to the goddess Caffeina with a cup of coffee so neither one of us falls asleep. I’m serious.  If you have not done any of this before and you hate reading manuals, do what you have to to prop yourself up. I’ll try to make it as painless as possible!

Look for the following navigation bar:

You will be learning about how to navigate through your account as well as each blog you have set up through this account. There are so many reference tools and articles about how to blog, who to blog and even what kind of software to use, that it can be overwhelming.

Okay, so lets assume that you don’t give a rat’s ass about writing code and you are here with me because you just want to start pouring your heart out. Not that writing code isn’t important, but thanks to the people who developed WordPress and love to write code, you don’t have to! Ready? Make more coffee if you need to, but let’s begin with My Account.

Each of the above items relate to your primary account. (If you need a reminder, scroll over each section for more detail.)

1. Global Dashboard
2. Stats
3. Blog Surfer
4. Tag Surfer
5. My Comments
6. My Blogs
7. Edit Profile
8. Support
9. WordPress.com
10. Log Out
    

staying in control of your blog

Why is the Dashboard important?

First of all, let’s address what the heck the dashboard really is.  Simply put, the dashboard of your WordPress blog is the control panel.

Think of your car. What is on the dashboard of your car? You’ll see the speedometer, gas gauge, odometer and any other doodad that helps you control your vehicle or  monitor your performance. The complexity of the dashboard may vary depending on the type of vehicle or how much money you spent in an effort to impress and influence friends – or show off the size of your carbon footprint.

With your car, you have a way to monitor how fast you are going, how much gas you have and far you’ve already gone. Said in another way, using your words perhaps: “How the heck am I going to drive this sucker and where can I find out how fast I’m driving and who is following me?” Well, the same may be true for here your blog.

• How do I find my dashboard?
• What does it look like?
• What’s on the dashboard?
• Why is this important to me?

Okay, so let’s take your questions, one by one.

click image for larger view

How do I find my Dashboard?

There are a few ways to get there.

• Before you first login, include /login or /wp-admin after your blog name
• After you login to your blog, roll your cursor over My Dashboards at the top of your screen and select the appropriate blog (you can create multiple blogs under one user name)

What does it look like?

Click on the image above for a larger view. Each category expands as below.

click image for larger view

What’s on the dashboard?

Sidebar Navigation

• Blog Stats
• Blog Surfer
• Readomattic
• Tag Surfer
• My Blogs
• Subscriptions
• Upgrades
• Domains
• Posts
• Media
• Links
• Pages
• Comments
• Ratings
• Polls
• Appearance
• Users
• Tools
• Settings

• Right Now: tells you at a glance how many posts, comments, categories, tags and widgets on your blog you have and how many spam messages were stopped. Each of those items are linked so you can review, edit or delete.
• Recent Comments: puts comments in a log showing the title and a key phrase. This section enables you to Unapprove, Reply, Edit, mark as Spam or Trash.
• Incoming Links: when another site links to yours, you’ll be notified here.
  
• Your Stuff: your comments, posts and edits
  
• What’s Hot: WordPress news, top posts, top blogs, fastest growing blogs and most recent posts
  
• Quick Press: for writing a quick post when you don’t need the whole menu of options
  
• Recent Drafts: anything that is still in draft stage and not published to your blog yet.
  
• Stats: basically tells you how much traffic your blog is getting and which posts or pages are getting the most views.

Tell me again, why is this important to me…

This is your control panel and it has the tools to help you to steer your blog in a particular direction .

It would seem that it is only possible to add tags to posts and not to pages within WordPress.

Does anyone know otherwise?

or does this only relate to the Jentri template?

As I wrote previously, I really like my Adobe Contribute CS4 over Microsoft Live Writer 14.0.x but it seems that on WordPress on both the Windows 7 and on the brand new Vista machine that there is some sort of glitch with Adobe Contribute even after the hours of investigating and speaking with support – Kind of like the “He said, She said” bullshit here.

From losing the editing theme in Contribute and getting erroneous errors from everything to image, file, and theme permission “freaks” that are identical to whatever theme I choose that is stock through this service on either machine, it didn’t matter. I got the sporadic problems in either operating environment.

A quick install of the latest MS Live Writer and I was back in business without any of these errors. Sure, you bet I Googled, I Binged, and it seems that Adobe was saying some sort of “Administrative Server Error” and of course, WordPress says, “It’s an Adobe Application issue.”

One thing is for sure, I don’t get these problems with MS Live Writer, and unlike my more ‘advanced’ Contribute which is NOT free, it works flawless and I have my reflective glass effect back.

Some folks might not think it’s a big deal, but it is with me. I like things to work right out of the box, as advertised such as my new Desktop that I have here which I find out that Windows 7 Ultimate x64 doesn’t work well and damn!

I really like Windows 7 Ultimate and I have that on three other machines which works flawless without so much of any kind of glitch, bar Adobe’s Contribute CS4 with WordPress and damn it on that one too.

I found out that Vista Ultimate x64 is much more reliable on this brand new HP desktop and that is because of the Chipset Drivers that is beyond Microsoft’s control. This has everything to do with the manufacturer and nothing to do with the folks at Redmond.

One thing I do like, you know me, most days I can find a silver lining in a dark cloud among the impending tornado coming down upon me is that there was some older software that I really like. I mean this software is less than a year old, such as Norton SystemWorks Premium 2009 and of course, Symantec’s Small Business EndPoint Security.

If you can imagine this, I actually have a dear friend in Great Falls, Montana. Yeah, I lived there for over ten years but I wasn’t allowed to know, visit, and ultimately, pester her. This wonderful woman has had some “issues” with her PC in the past. I wrote an article on my overall experience with MS Windows 7 which is phenomenal up to this point. Like her and so many folks out here, Michelle doesn’t seem to have a problem with Vista SP1 or SP2. I know I didn’t with Vista Ultimate x64 SP1 or SP2 to be specific.

I know how she feels in regards to just paying for software and with Windows 7 there are some things that you may own in recently purchased software that will not work. I know this from a personal standpoint. I know some folks complain about Symantec and Norton, made from the same company. I have been with these folks now since the early 1990’s in the least and never really had a problem especially with the Symantec business or corporate line of products.

I remember my heart sinking when Windows RTM was released in August for us “Beta-Testers” and found out painfully I might add, that Ghost 14.0 SP2, EndPoint Security, and Norton SystemWorks 2009 does not work – Fuck!

Now that sucked…

I got over it with the release of Ghost 15 that made the pain a little more bearable. So it didn’t break my heart that Windows 7 due to a third party driver made it nearly impossible to run and I have to stick with Vista x64 SP2. In fact, it seems that Windows 7 may indeed be what many are saying, “Vista SP3.”

Odd though…

Service Packs are free, but Windows 7 costs and a bit more than some people realize. Now, as I said, I love Windows 7 especially that the RTM was free for me to an extent – But did I pay!

Truth be told with the cost of software upgrade of Norton Ghost 15, and I just bought 14 last summer, shit, I am kind of getting tired of the ride, boys and girls!

There are not so hidden costs like my buddy Michelle pointed out with re-purchasing new versions of the same old thing that is working just fine. I understand that millions of people also certainly feel the same way.

In the end everyone usually finds some sort of balance with things and I know that as far as operating systems goes I am going join the fleet of all those that will wait to upgrade when they purchase a new machine as an operating system is concerned her for me. Time I step off the carousel and please, I am dizzy enough already.

It really sucks that Contribute took a solid dump in the drink. Not to worry, it won’t stop me blogging and it certainly has nothing to do with my writing.

You Know The Deal…

Who cares about Designing a new WordPress template?

That’s okay sweetie, you don’t have to know! You may fall into one of a few categories if you are reading this article:

♦ Luddite
♦ Novice
♦ Experience Blogger
♦ Design Lurker

For the Luddite:

You might not even be sure if blogging is for you. Afterall, why would you want to put your private thoughts online? That’s okay. You don’t have to blog, but if you are curious, there are lots of things to consider, but here’s a start:

• What would you write about?
• Who is your intended audience?
• What will you name your blog

There is something for everyone. You could write a blog that is only for you and your family. Whether we like it or not, the technology is changing.

For the Novice Blogger:

How do I change my blog template?

Once you have entered your WordPress world, find your Dashboard.  Once you find your Dashboard, scroll down to to the word Appearance.

Here are some links to FREE templates that you can use:

• New to Word Press – Where to Start
• WordPress Free Themes Directory

A word for Designers lurking on this page:

If you have a design you would like to submit to the WordPress Directory for the world to use, contact them and shine like the star that you are! What are you waiting for?

• WordPress Theme Submission
  

Linking to a survey that will open on another page:

coming soon…

Well, that’s what it’s really all about isn’t it. We want people to read our posts. We want them to buy our products. We want them to want us – okay, maybe that’s going TOO far.

At the risk of sounding a little off color here, the magic of PollDaddy helps you to create polls to add to your blog or site for FREE.

On behalf of all those for whom writing code sends them into a coma, thanks to all those wicked smarty pants over at PollDaddy for the work you have done to make this product available.

It’s so easy and affordable! Did I mention its FREE?!

(if you need a little help in figuring out how to load it on your page after creating it, click here.)

Tools ‹ My F*N Blog — WordPress.

All images ought to be optimized and re-sized prior to uploading them into your blog. When you decrease the file size for images before you insert them into your blog, uploads and pages will load faster,  you can fit more images into the same space, and using the correct tools means you will not compromise the quality of the image.

I have previously reviewed and blogged about several free image optimization and resizing  programs bloggers can download and use locally. This post is aimed at the programs  that are available to us online.

The image I use above is an example:  Original Image 962 x 762  -179 KB

(Optimized in 0.14 seconds) using Image Optimizer

Types of Images

• JPG works best for images with gradients such as photographs.
• GIF are best for blocks of repetitive color including logos, line art, and illustrations with type.
• PNG should be used to preserve partial transparency and a large amount of colors. PNG images often take up more space, so try the GIF format first to see if it works well for your image. From: Media Library » Image Optimization

(1) GIFWorks! Free Online GIF eTools
An online GIF image editor for optimizing, adding effects, re-sizing, button making and more features. Create your own special effects with any GIF — even animated ones! Resize it, colorize it, optimize it, and jazzercise it — then save it and take it with you.

(2) Image Optimizer – Using this online service, you can resize, compress and optimize your image files online for free.  It’s fast. Compress images in bulk. You can now download image optimizer on your computer and resize and compress your images with a single click.

(3) iResize.com is a fast and free, simple-to-use online image resizing tool. With the increase of megapixels in today’s newest digital cameras, e-mailing or posting your photos on the web can prove to be quite the task. Luckily, our free web tool allows you to easily reduce the size of your photo by pixels and bytes. There is nothing to download or install. iResize.com is completely web-based and works in all of your favorite web browsers and operating systems.

(4) myImager.com – Online Image Editor – free everything online image editor. Upload or call images from anywhere on the web and edit them freely with the the dozens of tools and filters that we offer! This is a 100% free service, offered by the great people at Cool Archive. There are image file size limits. Files can not be larger than 500 KBytes. Also, all images are deleted daily at 12:00 AM PST due to limited hard drive space. So please save the images to your own computer after you are done.

(5) Online Image Optimizer- GIF, JPG, and PNG
Image Optimizer lets you easily optimize your gifs, animated gifs, jpgs, and pngs, so they load as fast as possible on your site.  Furthermore, you can easily convert from one image type to another. Upload Size limit: 300 kB.

(6) Pic Resize – PicResize supports JPEG, GIF, and PNG image format.There are  options for resizing: 25%, 50%, 75% and 100% and you can  customize any size. Special effects can be applied as well.

(7) Reduce load time by optimizing graphics with GifBot
Reducing image size will reduce download time.

(8) Shrink Pictures – Original images can be up to 6Meg in size means you can use photos direct from your 8 megapixel Digital Camera. Original image can be jpg, gif or png one image at a time. All resized images are automatically converted to jpg.

When you need to resize more than 1 photo at a time use BatchPhoto. This free trial software is capable of not only resizing a batch of photos it can also do several other tasks to your batch of photos as well such as renaming.

(9) Smush.it™ - Smush.it uses optimization techniques specific to image format to remove unnecessary bytes from image files. It is a “lossless” tool, which means it optimizes the images without changing their look or visual quality. After Smush.it runs on a web page it reports how many bytes would be saved by optimizing the page’s images and provides a downloadable zip file with the minimized image files. Yahoo! YSlow Smush.it is included with YSlow and is no longer available as a separate download.  Note: Try it out online  (*Limit to 5 images).

(10) Web Resizer is a  free online image resizer that helps you optimize photos for web or email. Easy to use. Reduce image size; crop photos; sharpen; resize – change width and height; rotate;adjust contrast, brightness, saturation; convert photo to black and white; add a border; no registration required.

Related posts found in this blog:
Images: Optimizing, Pre-sizing and Resizing
WordPress bloggers working with images
Uploading and inserting images in the new wordpress.com
Inserting images full sized in the new wordporess.com
More on inserting images full sized in the new wordpress.com
Image editing and preparation tips Part 1
Image editing and preparation tips Part 2

         As with every other written piece, there are ways to secure that your blog post is of premium quality. Since writing compelling, high quality content is the only way to have a go at a blog salary, you must be very particular about such detail.
        You should keep it in mind whenever you are starting to make a post. For starters, you need to make it clear what you are supposed to be writing about. If you are specific on the topic that you are doing, you will easily find the right resources and the right words to build the article. Naturally, blog sites created for profit talk about a narrow topic in a wide perspective. Each blog post is created to stand alone but it is, even subtly, interconnected to the other posts. Write each post as an individual essay that makes sense to the main topic of your blog anyway. Also, you need to consider that your readers are not couchies who can stand with their eyes glued on a single article so make it short. An average length for a blog entry should be between 400 to 1000 words. Anything beyond that would appear boring to the reader no matter how much sense it makes. While minding about your article length, you must never lose that aim for quality. Make sure that you use concise phrases. Providing elaborate introductions will not do much more than just lengthening your article and increasing the number of words you are using. The next important aspect about writing blogs for profit lies on the credibility of your statements. If you are talking about anything apart reading and reading and reading whatever you can get your hands into. Reading written articles can teach you a lot in writing your own. Then do some research on a topic that you are passionate about in the first place. A topic that interests you must be your top choice so you would not get bored about writing. If you see any potential, you can easily have a go as you constantly find ways to beef up your chances for big profit through established marketing strategies.
www.bloggingtools.biz

I’ve been telling you about AlphaInventions.com for a while now, but I want to revisit the utility because Cheru Jackson, the programmer and genius behind the app, has revamped how it looks and maybe how it works.  He’s also interested in feedback to see how it can be further improved.

AlphaInventions is a rotational blog reader which allows users to view many different blogs, stop on those of interest and input their own.  There are a couple of ways to do that, but the best way is to donate to their cause and get a place of honor in their system.  Other methods include writing a nice blog post about them and simply bumping someone out of line in the queue with your own URL.  (No one’s feelings get hurt; it’s allowed.)

AlphaInventions is a good way to get some immediate exposure to your blog.  You all know what a hit-count whore I am, so it’s no surprise I write a post like this every once in a while.  Besides, I think it’s neat tool and I don’t mind pimping it, even if it doesn’t generate a lot of traffic (and to date, no new readers I know of).

Then again, my blog’s kind of mundane and unfocused.  Those of you with more purposeful and intent blogs might find there are people who want to read about what you’ve got to say.  Poets, get on board with it.  Get yourself out there, in front of people.  Poetry seems very popular with blog readers and seems to draw a lot of attention anyway, especially when you’re good at it (just look at my buddy Jaymie’s blog for a great example!).  Writers, see if you can hook someone with your wordsmithing, and maybe you can find someone of interest yourself to follow.  The thing to remember is, this isn’t going to flood your blog with subscribers and readers; but it can expose you to others who are of similar interest.  That might lead to mutual commenting and watching.  Networking is still king for exposure.

It’s a great tool and Cheru has a Facebook page you can follow too.  Give it shot, it’s nifty cool and clever.

Hope you all had a great weekend!

-JDT-

All original content © 2009 DarcKnyt
ALL rights reserved.

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All over the internet we see people saying they have an invitation to try out Google Wave, or crying the blues because they haven’t received one as yet. The two videos below Google Wave Developer Preview at Google I/O 2009 and  Google Wave Overview explain what riding the wave is all about.  It’s an open source personal communication and collaborative tool.

In nutshell Google Wave is a real time communication platform that can be used in these ways:

• as a messaging system;
• as a collaboration tool for projects;
• as a way to share and commentary and discussion on photos and videos;
• as a wiki with shared data being editable by anyone who wants to contribute.

Google Wave can be extended using gadgets and robots. The range of applications and gadgets offer more options, for example, collaborative maps and a Twitter tool.

Google Wave Resources

• Wavety.com – The Complete, Up-to-Date, List of Google Wave Gadgets and Robots
• Create your own Google Wave apps
• The Complete Guide to Google Wave by Gina Trapani with Adam Pash.

High quality popular blogs set the pace for all other related and similar blogs in any niche. Link popularity is the total number of  blogs that link to a blog, and major search engines now factor link popularity into their relevancy algorithms. Consequently,  increasing the number of high quality, relevant sites which link to your site will improve your search engine rankings, and  that’s why  it’s an integral part of any link building strategy.  Therefore, locating high quality  similar blogs is an important step to becoming a better blogger.

PageRank Explained

PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page’s value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves “important” weigh more heavily and help to make other pages “important.”

Seven ways to benefit

In a nutshell locating and visiting high quality similar blogs frequently will assist you to:

• locate and link to authoritative posts in order to backlink to them in your own posts;
• leave meaningful comments on posts and create relationships with like minded bloggers;
• determine which blogs similar blogs to yours link to;
• determine where inbound links to similar blogs are coming from;
• learn valuable tips for improving your blog theme, structure and post content;
• develop an effective link building strategy that encourages bloggers with blogs that link to similar blogs, to also link to yours;
• determine who comprises a potential readership  in order to develop an effective link building strategy aimed at increasing targeted reader traffic to your blog.

This article will introduce you an interesting way of finding high quality blogs related to your own – similar site search.  It’s free tool that’s easy to use. You can  find similar sites to add to your favorite websites by simply entering the URL.

About Similar Site Search

Similar site search is mainly based on user annotations or tags on websites. For a given url, the search engine will find websites that have the closest tag match. Therefore, the accuracy of the search result heavily depends on the accuracy of the tags. We consider the tags on a website to be more accurate when the site is tagged by more users. You can help by tagging websites in our search engine.

About the Confidence Level

low : The site being searched has been tagged less than 50 times. Tag based search is used. We suggest you add tags when you find tags are not accurate.
medium : The site being searched has been tagged less than 100 times. Tag based search is used. Starting from this level, the search result probably will satisfy most users.
high : The site being searched has been tagged more than 100 times. Tag based search is used. Adding tags will have little impact on the search results. However, you can use search options to let search engine ignore certain tags.

About the Similarity Score

Similarity score ranges from 0% to 100%, with bigger number meaning higher similarity. This score is only a suggestive number whose accuracy depends on the confidence level. We consider the following factors when computing the similarity: tag similarity, number of matched tags, and number of tags.

There is also an experimental Firefox add-on download link and a bookmarklet link.

Example: Results for onecoolsite.wordpress.com

Other means of locating similar blogs

• Google Blog Search
• Keyword searches of  Google, Yahoo, and Bing ( add +wordpress or + typepad,  etc. to your searches)
• Keyword searches using niche search engines
• Keyword searches of blog directories and forums
• Keyword search twitter
• Keyword search friendfeed
• Bloglines is an aggregator of syndicated feeds, and as most blogs publish an RSS feed automatically, it’s a good place to search for quality resources.

Note: If you need some help understanding what SEO is about and links to some resources you can use, then a good place to start the learning process is by reading this recent post:  Blogging: Learning SEO is worth the effort . The resources  in that post you use to determine the status of your own blog can also be used to assess similar blogs.

The Golden Rule of Networking is:  Give before expecting to receive.

Effective networking is built a foundation of building relationships leading to reciprocity.  In other words, if  you want bloggers  with similar blogs to  link to your posts, then link to their posts first.  If you want them to comment on and/or promote your posts, then comment on their posts and promote them first.

Related posts found in this blog:
Understanding Backlinks
Understanding Reciprocal and Non-Reciprocal Links
Natural Linking Strategy for Bloggers
Getting the Perfect Link
SEO Basics for on Page Optimization