One thing I’ve learned in my short time with the blogs is that it’s all about hitting the news streams. Well, my coverage of today’s Apple event may not even be currently visible in the American Google news stream, but I’m #1 in Australia! (click the image for a larger view)
Still cool, but oddly funny at the same time.
As you may have all noticed, I’ve gone image happy. I think it’s a side effect of all my professional blogging and every one wants images with their stories, so I’m just used to doing it now. Do you like it? Hate it? Indifferent? Leave your thoughts in the comments.
For the first time ever, I have actually renewed my contract with a webhost as opposed to looking for greener pastures the second it ended!
My contract with DreamHost isn’t actually up until November, but I had the extra funds this week to renew for two years, getting me the best price, so I did it. Not only did I renew, I upped my package to their third tier of packages. With my accumulated time with them already, I have 441GB of storage (which grows by 2GB a week) and 5TB of bandwidth a month (which grows by 32GB a week).
Yes, those are insane stats, but besides SeanPAune.com, I am also hosting BAMForBeginners.com and BAMipedia.com on this account, and I have plans for more sites to be added. So… I planned ahead.
Overall I’ve been very happy here, there’s been a few hiccups, as there are with any host, but they are always super responsive and very generous with their solutions. The worst incident was a severe lag on all my sites, and even though they found the culprit on my server (it wasn’t me), they offered to move me to another rack with no hesitation. That actually is a lot of work, but they didn’t even blink at it.
So, I’m here for at least two more years, with a ton of storage and bandwidth!
Almost two weeks ago I asked RSS – Is it for me?, and now I’m back with an answer…
It is.
I have NO clue why I didn’t see how much it would speed up my life. Add in that since that time I landed two more writing jobs, I have next to no time to visit sites for fun right now. I simply leave Google Reader open in one of my Firefox tabs, and it handily tells me when there’s a new post. I can keep up with the sites I’m working on, my friends, and… well, I was an idiot. I admit it. I wish I had started using it ages ago, but for whatever reason, I didn’t.
So, if you’ve been on the fence post, get off of it, RSS WILL simplify your day immensely! (and while you’re at it, you could always subscribe to my feed… pretty please…)
A little while back I made a post about having joined the website SeeJackShop.com as a writer. Well, I’m still there, but now I can announce I have also joined the staff of Tech.Blorge.com. You can check out my very first post here, it’s about the new BlackBerry 8820 that was just announced. (I want this SO bad)
This is going to be a daily gig, but the pieces are fairly short, so it shouldn’t be much of a strain. I am also in talks with another site that I just sent a sample piece to. If I get that one, I’m going to stop looking around as I think three sites will be enough work on top of my day job!
I have to admit I am a little shocked at how well this has fallen together. I’ve been looking for a little less than a month for professional writing jobs, and I’ve landed two for sure. Color me surprised.
And, by the way, Shari asked me in her comments if these were “real jobs” where I am actually handed money… yes… they are.
A little while ago I made a post that I would be doing sponsored posts every now and then. Don’t bother looking for it, I deleted it. This is not revisionist history as I am admitting here I did it, but, when the time came to pull the trigger and do my first one… I couldn’t.
Now, let me state, I am not slamming people who do them, more power to you, but I came to the conclusion it was not the right thing for THIS blog. I write many reviews on various forms of media, and if I started selling off such things, it would make all of my content questionable. When I make a post like the Uniden Cordless Phones commentary, I want you to know I posted that out of a sincere love for the product, and not because someone paid me to do it.
Obviously I have no problem with monetizing a blog, as evidenced by the ads in my right column. They bring in next to no revenue, to be honest, if I get a sale a month, I’m amazed, but I believe in those merchants, so I have their ads up. If I start letting in any old advertisement, especially in the form of a post, it will cheapen my entire blog.
I also came to some conclusions about my feelings on blogging as of late, mainly due to my involvement in the Blog Project:Three contest; I need to take this more seriously. After four years of doing this, floundering for a direction, I have come to a point I need to add a more serious tone. Does this mean no more humor? Please, it’s me, do you think I can go more than a day without cracking wise? No, I can’t. I will, however, strive to sprinkle more posts of relevance here and there.
Another deciding factor for me was adding my Feedburner RSS Feed, showing me just how many people are subscribing to my feed. While the number is low currently, is it fair to them to fill their RSS inbox with what amounts to spam? No, it’s not. We all hate spam in the various forms it takes, and this would have been no better.
So, in short, it was silly of me to have even considered it, and it will not be happening on this blog at any point in the future.
Roy recently wrote a piece about cleaning up his RSS feeds that got me to finally add Feedburner to run my own RSS feed. When you add in what I wrote in my blog contest entry about sparsely updated blogs, it got me to finally get off my butt and start adding the blogs I read to Google Reader.
I’m not entirely sure I like this.
I always understood the concept of RSS, and how it works, and, in theory, it’s a great idea. I do have a few nitpicks though:
I know I am always singing the praises of technology, but I just don’t know if RSS is for me or not.
Anyone have thoughts to add on this?
Time to place my votes in the Blog Project:Three Final List!
Three Things to Do Before You Click Publish (and One Thing to Do After) by Jacqueline
3+1 Things Blogger’s Should Never Ever Do. by Arpit
3 Reasons Why I dont Like GMail by Nirmal
Top 3 Ways to Avoid a Crowd at Disney World by Winnetta
3 really simple ways to speed up your blog by Hans
Make your WordPress blog more Search Engine friendly by Shankar
There ya go folks, enjoy! For the original site, go here.
The other day I made my entry in to the Daily Blog Tips Blog Project:Three contest. The final list of entrants is now up, be sure to check them all out! I will be voting for my faves in the next day or two.
As part of Daily Blog Tips Blog Project:Three contest, I thought I would give a short list, three items to be precise, of ways to get me to not want to return to your blog. Consider these helpful hints to keep your most precious commodity, your loyal readers, coming back.
1. In-Text Advertising – There is nothing I hate more than seeing those infernal double lines under random words in a blog post. Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with monetizing your blog, I do it myself, but I think anything that pops up and obstructs your view of the actual post is a bad idea. I have never once clicked on one of those ads, and I never will. Your content is king; an ad popping up and covering your content makes no sense.
3. Frequency of updates – If you don’t update frequently, why should I bother coming back to check? If you can’t take the time to make an update, why should I continue checking for one?
Just a few tips to make sure your readers have an easy, and pleasant, time reading your blog.
