The web is a wheel…
May 21, 2008
Image via Wikipedia
Or - what goes up, must come down - but eventually, it’ll come back up again. Note - if you’re reading this blog for writing insight, skip to the end, past the links 
I was randomly surfing this week, based on some Zemanta posts on one of posts I was writing (I’m liking Zemanta more and more) - and I came across an interesting little tidbit, that I’d been emailed in a different format. So I went back, found the email and am now stewing mildly.
A plugin that’s not a plugin?
April 2, 2008
Image from Wikipedia
Normally, I save my ‘tech’ talk for other blogs - but I thought this warranted sharing.
I don’t know who recommended it to me, but I’ve found this really awesome plugin called ‘Zemanta‘ It installs into your browser, and is a tool that ’suggests’ images and articles to you as you’re writing posts.
It might not sound like much, but I’ve spent the last three weeks trying to work out how to add images and make sure I’m pcoviding decent links to people. And Zemanta is a great step towards that.
Can yahoo pipes actually HELP your blogging?
March 10, 2008
Recently, I discovered a cool API that Yahoo had set up called ‘Yahoo Pipes’. Basically, what it does is ‘pipe’ feeds together into one ‘uber feed’, like connecting up a lot of little pipes to the main line.
It then spits that main line out in order of posts, into one feed, over however many blogs you’ve added to it.
The beauty of it is I can add any RSS based feed to it, and then republish it on ANY website I choose - so, any blog, free article site that I publish my work on, forum that allows me to grab feeds and more - and et voila, I’m able to combine it all into one constantly updating and evolving data stream that lets people see what I’m writing, where, and how its going.
How to blog series - sample article - Where do I start with blogging?
March 6, 2008
It has become THE single biggest web crazes online, and I was one of the first people to actually vocalise using blogging as a business model on Ryze and other online forums (and I so wish I’d followed through that thought too), so I’ve been doing this for several years now - and every year, it evolves that little bit more.
Critiquing a website
January 31, 2008
Increasingly people are discovering that putting together a basic web page is incredibly simple. It’s easy to take your information, drop it into a template and tweak. But when people come around to launching their sites and requesting critiques I think there are a couple of things that may speed up this process and allow them to get and give better feedback.
Anatomy of a blog
January 24, 2008
Blogs have several necessary and needed elements. It used to be enough to place static posts on your site - now, people have designed reams and reams of scripts, designed to do everything, except, possibly, what you expect.
The most common question I’m asked about blogging is ‘what IS a blog exactly?’
A blog is a weblog. Nothing more, nothing less.
So, what are the best functions - the definitional attributes of a blog?