Archive for April, 2007
« Previous EntriesPerformancing Goes pMetric
Sunday, April 29th, 2007
Over at Performancing they have relaunched their pMetrics service, this looks as though it could be very useful little service. I have been using a couple of plugins to monitor my site and so far they have been pretty useful, especially Counterize II, but I realize if I want to expand my blog at all I obviously need to look at something a bit more powerful.
Having taken a brief look at the service it definitely seems to one of the more comprehensive out there, even more so than Google analytics that I have been considering trying out.
The basic service is free, you just need to have set up an account with performancing.com, but this is not the full package and limits you to only 1000 page views per day, though that's hardly a problem for a site of my size.
The main benefits of paying out the $14.99 for a year (or $1.99 a month) is having an allowance for 10,000 page views per day, acess to your statistics via RSS, "Spy", outbound link tracking, and download tracking. You also get to have the text ads removed from your pMetrics homepage.
No doubt as new features are introduced they will mainly be for premium users, but lets hope there will also be some additions for the basic users. This is hardly a complaint though as the service they provide for free is already excellent.
Performancing have also allowed all new users a 21 day trial of the premium service, a very good way to find out which service is best for you.
They are also offering a free 12 month upgrade to the first 100 blogs that post a review of pMetrics, making sure it is of adequate length (250+ words) and is left up for the duration.
All in all this seems to be a very good service that I would recommend to any bloggers that are serious about their stats.
Thanks to the Blog Herald for the heads-up.
WordPress For Dummies Is One Step Closer
Friday, April 27th, 2007
Over on the Lisa Sabin-Wilson blog I saw some good news today, she has handed in her last round of submission for her new book "WordPress for Dummies
". Being a bit of a dummy myself, I know that I am going to find this an in-valuable resource.
The book is due for release September 24th, and though she is a first-time author I am sure this will be a big seller. She has vast experience in helping other WordPress users via her blog "A Girl In The World" and her blog hosting service, and this along with her WordPress design experience at E.Webscapes more than qualifies her as an author worth taking note of. You can see some of her design work at Technosailor, Women Trip and Vin Cache .
Make sure you reserve your copy early, I know I will! :-)
WordPress for Dummies
*Disclosure: Amazon.co.uk links are affiliate links*Blogger and Podcaster Magazine: Worth The Price Of Free Admission?
Saturday, April 21st, 2007
I don't know whether you caught the news or not, but there is now a magazine available from Larstan Publishing for those who are interested in the blogging and podcasting world.
The "Blogger & Podcaster" is a monthly magazine that is available for free as an online digital edition (though it can be cached to be read offline) and as a podcast. If you want to have a "real" magazine delivered then you can, though this will cost you $79 if you are in the US, $99 if you aren't.
I got a chance to read the digital first issue yesterday, lots of good stuff to try and absorb in its 48 pages, though obviously a fair chunk of the content was advertisement. Robert Scoble and Leo Laporte were interviewed this time out, but there are plenty of other great articles to peruse too. Overall, I thought that it was worth the price. :wink:
Have you tried this magazine yet? If so, what did you enjoy most, what would you like to see in future editions? Let us know in the comments.Twitter While You “Drive”
Sunday, April 15th, 2007
I had been resisting the urge to sign up for the latest web phenomenon, "Twitter", but no longer! Tonight Greg Yaitanes, the Director and executive producer of the new TV series "Drive", will be Twittering during the premiere of the show, basically a live commentary, and as I am a big fan of the star of this series, Nathan Fillion, and of the co-creator Tim Minear, I could no longer resist!
This seems to me to be by far one of the best ways this new service has been utilized so far, and I wonder what other new uses people will find for this.
For more information about "Drive" check out my Joss Whedon blog.
Do you Twitter? What is the best use you have found for this service so far?New In Opera 9.2
Sunday, April 15th, 2007
I installed the latest version of the Opera browser yesterday, I usually stick to Firefox but I like to check out how my blog looks in Opera when I make a few CSS changes or add a new plugin. With this latest version I must say that I like their new "Speed Dial" page that opens up when you click for a new tab. :smile:
The idea is obviously to keep your favourite pages at your fingertips, and I must say it seems to work pretty smoothly. The idea of using a webpage as you would the speed ial on your phone seems so obvious. . . once someone else has done it. The set-up is easy, you can just drag-and-drop your open tabs in to the numbered positions or just right click in the box and choose the url you want to add from your most frequently visited pages, you can even set it up so that the thumbnails reload every few seconds or whatever time you customize it to so you can keep an eye on several web pages at once if you feel the need to.
So far I haven't found a setting to be able to turn it off, some might still prefer to be able to just open to a blank page, but maybe they will build that option in to a later version.
Overall I was quite impressed with this update, though I think it will still remain my second option as a browser rather than my primary, I just love my Firefox too much! :wink:
Which is your favourite browser? Have you tried the latest Opera? If so what do you make of it?
File Sharing Comes To WordPress.com
Saturday, April 14th, 2007 Box.net have announced that their service is now available as a sidebar widget on the free WordPress.com blogs. This should be a very handy addition for the WordPress community, I know a couple of times in the past I have wanted an easy way to share a file on my Whedon's World blog and have ended up posting a link out to one of the other file sharing services, now I will be able to do it right on my own site.
You can see it in use on my Joss Whedon blog.
|
Awesome.Working With ibox
Sunday, April 8th, 2007 Well I tried to use the Slimbox on this site along with Sweet Titles, but unfortunately there seemed to be some conflict between the two, Sweet Titles stopped working if Slimbox was turned on. So now I have changed to the ibox, which I knew worked at the same time as Sweet Titles because I have used them both with a previous theme. Seems the most sensible thing to do. But one of the main reasons I implemented Slimbox was because I wanted to use the iMP Auto Slimbox plugin, saving me the hassle of remembering to add the rel=ibox tag every time I used an image, so I spent some time this weekend rewriting the plugin to work with ibox. Seems to work OK so far.
It even adjusts the picture size, another problem I was having with Slimbox, so all in al I am a happy (non-easter) Bunny! :-)
Themes Are The Theme
Saturday, April 7th, 2007 Is everyone talking about themes? I guess it's probably because my awareness has been raised as I am in the middle of changing my own theme, but as of late it appears as though every other post I read is looking at the subject. A couple of weeks ago there was a discussion over at Weblog Tools Collection looking at whether two or three column's was best. Mark had this to say:I personally prefer one column themes with a minimal second column. Most information that is put on my sidebar(s) is extraneous and could be placed elsewhere. I have also found that some of that information deters from the original content of the blog. The landing page concept is nice for search engine traffic where extra links and information on the content might help you draw in the user to explore some more. However, the face of the blog is cleaner and chock full of good stuff to read with lesser distractions.It's well worth clicking through to see the various comments, plenty of food for thought there. This weekend Lorelle On WordPress has also raised the issue. Her viewpoint?
I believe that above everything else, your blog must “look†like what you want it to look like. It must reflect who you are and what you blog about. The choice of how many sidebars the blog requires must service those points.I agree with most of the commenter's over there, it's not how many columns but how you use them. Overall I think that more than three columns can be a bit overwhelming, but all in all it is not how many columns you have, but making good use of them. Provide good content in your main column and make it easy for your readers to navigate your site with the side columns, keep them as uncluttered as possible. Obviously advertisements are the things that ruin most sites looks, this is where real care needs to be taken. So far I have not tried to monetize this site in any real way, a couple of affiliate links in posts but I have kept my sidebars clear. The sites that make real money out of blogging are the ones that manage to keep their blogs from becoming to cluttered, allowing their revenue sources to stand out without being too obtrusive, a neat trick but not easy to pull off. I guess this is why a lot of them have custom made themes. Which leads to the next point. Being discussed over at Pro Blogger is the subject of free themes versus custom made. Guest blogger Mathew Coddington from Net Business Blog had this to say:
At one point in every blogger’s career he or she has to make a choice between investing in a custom template or staying the course with a premade, downloadable template. There are important factors that you have to keep in mind with each ranging anywhere from funds to brandibility.Most commenter's seem to feel that the middle road is the best way to go, customize a theme you already like, which is the way I usually go. It doesn't take too much skill or time to turn a free download theme into something that no one else on the interweb has. And as a final point on the subject, more and more of the free WordPress themes you see on the WordPress Theme Viewer seem to be sponsored, and there were two posts about this that caught my interest. The Blog Herald looks at the pro's of sponsored themes:
I know several designers who give away WordPress themes to blog hosting services for free, so long as they get a link back to their sites. Now this seems to be a great business model for people who want to monetize their theme creations. Not all bloggers can afford to pay for your themes. But there are companies and businesses that would be willing to foot the bill. In the end, everyone’s happy: users get great themes, designers get good money, companies get inbound links.But there has been some negative thoughts about it too, as expressed by Small Potato over at WP Designer.com:
sponsored-theme designers are pushing it. Let me remind you I don’t have a problem with sponsored theme designers and the practice of theme sponsorship, as long as the designers make it clear to the users of what they’re downloading. However, sponsored theme designers are really pushing it. Some are blatantly spamming the theme viewer.Plenty of food for thought on both sides, but once again it seems to be not whatis being done but the way it is done. Anyway, enough from me, what are your thoughts? How many columns do you prefer? Would you pay for a customized theme? How do you feel about the sponsored themes that seem to be more and more prevalent? Let me know in your comments.
« Previous Entries
© 2008 | Lost in Cyberspace is Powered