In the spring, it rains a lot but it usually doesn’t flood.
And in the winter, it snows, but we’re not snowed in.

That is, until the snows started about two weeks ago. The first night, it was kind of fun. It was a Friday night, so we all holed in with our beers, our movies and plenty of milk, bread and toilet paper to keep any families happy.

One foot of snow later, thousands of us were sitting in the dark. The rest of us didn’t have cable television that worked. We’re not hardy people here in Ohio, and we’ve got short attention spans. It doesn’t take long before we start getting bored — usually about a half hour after the lights go out, in fact. But that’s usually okay, because, again, we don’t have extreme weather patterns here. A weekend snow is plowed away by Monday, and life goes on as usual.Yeah, right.
It has not stopped snowing here in more than two weeks. The kids have only gone to school one day. I have two 100-pound Labs that normally love playing in the snow.
It’s up to their chests now. The thrill is gone.
Our parking lots have snow mountains in them. We actually had someone get in trouble with the law a couple of days ago for smacking someone with a snow shovel who had dared to take his dug-out on-street parking space.
And the fun goes on.
The latest Facebook rumor going on amongst my contacts and friends is that there is a mammoth snowstorm coming. The biggest snow in years! We’re getting 40 inches of snow in one night! Fifty inches! It won’t all melt until JULY, for heaven’s sake!
So being the kind of geeky computer blogging person I am, I decided that enough was enough of the rumors. I decided to go on an Internet search and find some of the more creative ways other people around the country are passing their snowbound days.
And now in addition to being bored, I’m impressed and intimidated by the sites and articles I’ve found. You folks have some great ways of passing your snowed-in days.
So here’s some funnies I’ve found so far:

http://www.snowpanic.com/ This blog’s owners say they’ve been tracking the  “Snowpocalypse” since 2009, and freely invite visitors to send in some of the best examples of panic and dismay brought about because of the ongoing snow falls. There’s photos of bread aisles where the bread’s all been sold, tales of neighborhood people threatening plow drivers with bodily harm, and many more all-too-funny examples of the ways these snow storms are causing panic in even the more seasoned weather watchers. Pretty funny stuff!

http://vondrook.com OK, I love a good zombie movie. So when I came across this very creative snow post, “In Preparation of Snowstorm, Citizens Go Out for Eggs, Cannibalism,” I naturally had to stop to enjoy it.  After all, how can you pass up an article that starts out “As a major winter storm was heading towards the east coast, citizens ventured to their nearest grocery stores in hopes of stocking up on foodstuffs, which typically turned into violent bloodshed and cannibalism … The lines were long, sure, but at least everyone was patient; that is, until, the Weather Service declared a ‘Winter Storm Watch.’ After that, it was every man, woman, and child for themselves.” Very funny stuff! And so descriptive of the lines I see at the local grocery store every time the forecasters get too excited.

And if you think you’re safe from ridicule, you’re not, as long as so many people have cell phones with cameras on them. Don’t believe me? Check out this slice of life photograph of snow panic at the grocery store.

What’s really great about all these blogs and bloggers? They’ve taken what the rest of us only sit around and complain about, and made something entertaining out of it.  Those blogs might not make their owners a lot of money, but they are entertaining, they get lots of traffic, and best of all, they’re good examples of what blogging is really all about — using the Internet to communicate the goings-on of the day.

Seen any good winter blogs lately? We’d love to hear about them!

Oh, God, It’s Snowing Again!


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The following snapshots are taken from various reputed blogs and websites. The copyright year(s) in all of them are outdated. The aim of publishing this is fun and humour and not sarcasm. All snapshots were taken on 12 February 11 AM IST.

Google blogs do not update copyright year(s) in the footer. The main Google sites however have the latest update but not the blogs.

The official Google blog is dated 2009

The Gmail blog is dated 2008

The Google Chrome blog says 2009

The Google student blog is dated 2008

The Google Analytics blog is dated 2009

The Google Website Optimizer blog is dated2008

Gator Crossing, the HostGator blog is dated 2009.

The Twitter blog is dated 2009

The Softlayer blog is dated 2008

Who is hosting this dot com (both the homepage and blog) is dated 2007-2009

Snapshots:10 Popular Blogs that have not updated the Copyright notice year(s)


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However, last weekend when I strolled through Times Square I realized just how much technology and blogging have changed the world.  Looking up I saw one of the massive billboards and saw a job opportunity for a blogger.  That’s right a Charmin is offering high end public restrooms for the holiday season and they need 5 Charmin Brand Ambassadors who will “greet, entertain and blog about their experience.”  That’s right, Times Square, once home to porn shops and peep shows will now have public restrooms where you will be encouraged to take photos and people will be blogging about what goes on in the Charmin Restrooms.

If you don’t believe me, check out this video to get a sneak pee peek.  Unfortunately, the auditions have already been held – so you, like me, have missed your opportunity to become the ultimate “bathroom blogger” and perhaps one of the best paid bloggers.

Just that morning I had read that the American Eagle store in Times Square was about to announce plans to turn the 25-story electronic billboard above its flagship store (once the home to a Howard Johnson’s restaurant) into a social-media message board.  Starting on November 19th, anyone who buys something in the American Eagle store, even just a pair of socks, will have the opportunity to have their photo and a message posted on the billboard.  So, what was once one of the ultimate signs of success, can now be bought for just $6.50 – the price of the cheapest item in the American Eagle store.

As I walked through Times Square I wondered what these changes really mean.  Can this be interpreted as a powerful sign that companies are realizing the value of social media?  Or is this another sign that privacy in our world is dwindling to all time lows?

Is this a sign that no longer is the media elitist with just a few having a voice, having a billboard in Times Square?  Or is this a sign that blogging and technology have gone too far – that things that were once unique and special are just becoming common run of the mill events?

If you make it to New York City this winter – then you know now where to stop when the “need” hits you.  If you aren’t traveling to the Big Apple, just keep an eye out for the upcoming blog enjoythego.com.  In the interim – join the conversation – are social media, technology and blogging taking us to new heights or new lows?

Just don’t forget to flush when you are done thinking!

Blogging Future – Down the Drain?


A selection of e-books to help you improve as a blogger. Find out more at www.bloggingtips.com/books/

Your blog, site, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, or any other networking site will reflect who you are, but this isn’t always a good thing. It’s always a good idea to separate business from pleasure, and the same goes for your web presence.

One of the ways that you can keep your Friday night personal is to have different accounts for the different parts of your life. Famous writers have Facebook and MySpace pages dedicated to their writing so that readers can become fans. They use these usernames for anyone who might know them, but they themselves do not know the person in question. When you have a separate account on social networking sites for your personal life, you will limit the access the world has to your indiscretions. You can do the same thing for Twitter and only allow people you know to gain access to the photos of one too many margaritas.

When it comes to blogging and your site, or the site that you work for, it’s important to clarify your goals. Are you writing because you want to or because you’re getting paid and someone expects you do do something a certain way by a certain time?

If you’re writing because you want to write, then you can write whatever you want right? Wrong. Even though you may have a fun site with a silly blog that talks about weird nonsensical ideas, that doesn’t mean that you should divulge important information about yourself. Sure, let your readers know who you are, let them see the fun side, but know the boundaries. Know when you’re going too far when expressing yourself because one wrong post can send you to blogging purgatory. Just kidding. But if you say something that you shouldn’t have said, and the wrong person finds out, your site and blog will suffer.

If you’re writing for a site or keeping a blog because someone is paying you for it, then don’t talk about the best sandwich in the world and why unless that’s what you’re supposed to be writing about. You need to think about this: is your opinion really important? Does it matter what YOU think, or does your boss just want you to write something and keep you quiet about everything else? Most of the time when we write for people, we need to be very professional. This doesn’t mean that we can’t have fun writing, blogging, or commenting on the web, it just means that there is a time and a place for everything and with the digital age, many of us have forgotten about this.

To be on the safe side so your boss doesn’t see that photo of you drinking out of the toilet, separate your business web presence and personal web presence.

Personal Versus Professional


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In either case, this ban affects blogs hosted on the *blogspot.com subdomain (approximately 275 million) and also those who use a custom domain for their Blogger blogs (statistics of which are very difficult to gather). Here are the results of accessibility tests from WebsitePulse which show whether sites are accessible from within China:

According to logs from Herdict Web, Blogger powered sites have been blocked from around the 16th of May onwards; even today, there are dozens of references via Twitter from those in China who are unable to publish to their blogs or access websites they wish to visit:

What can we do to work around this ban, ensuring those in China can publish their blogs and access the sites they want to read?

For bloggers in China who want to publish new posts

Bloggers in China are unable to access their Blogger dashboard by regular means. However, there are other services which can still be accessed that can publish to Blogger on your behalf.

Post by email

Blogger has offered the “Mail to Blogger” service for quite some time, enabling bloggers to publish new posts while on the move. This enables us to write an email to our secret “Mail to Blogger” address which is then automatically published on our sites.

The only downside to this is that the Mail to Blogger address must be set up from within the Blogger dashboard, so this service is only possible for China-based bloggers who have already set up their email address.

A possible alternative is Posterous, which you can set up as a third party “Mail to Blogger” client using your blog’s unique ID number (which can also be found in the source code of your blog’s feed).

Auto-post via Facebook or Ping.fm

BlogIt is an app for Facebook which enables you to update multiple blogs and status feeds from your Facebook profile. Once you have installed this app in your Facebook profile, you will need to authorize use of your Blogger account (through Google hosted pages), after which you can update your blog via Facebook any time you like.

Ping.fm is another alternative, offering a simple solution to update your Blogger blog (and other social profiles) from a single application. Using Ping.fm you can update via the web, IM, email and other third party applications. It is advisable to use Ping.fm for short posts only as no formatting options are enabled.

To read Blogger powered blogs from within China

For those wishing to read their favourite Blogger powered blogs from within China, here are a couple of possible solutions:

Translate Blogger blogs

Using Google Translate or Babelfish, you can circumvent the restrictions by viewing Blogger blogs in a translated page. This ensures that the URL of the site you are reading is based on a different server.

Choose to translate from Chinese to English (or whichever translation you prefer) and paste the complete URL of the blog you wish to read. The blog will then be accessible for you to browse recent posts or archives with ease:

Unfortunately this does not appear to work when attempting to access the Blogger home page, so this workaround will not enable you to post from the Blogger dashboard.

Subscribe to “banned” blogs using an RSS reader

It is also possible to read updates from your favourite sites by reading in an RSS reader. Sign up to use Google Reader, BlogLines or Newsgator (none of which appear to be banned in China) and add the URL of the default feed for the Blogger blog you wish to read. This will be in the following format: http://your-favourite-blog.blogspot.com/atom.xml.

You will then be able to read the latest updates from your favourite blogs, though unfortunately it may be impossible to comment on these posts since this requires access to Blogger servers.

Digital Inspiration also offers some interesting techniques to access banned sites from within China in this post.

How to find out if your blog is banned in China

The simplest way to discover if your blog (or website) is inaccessible from within China is to use this free tool from WebSitePulse. Paste the URL of your blog in the window and hit enter. After a few moments, you will be presented with results which show if your blog can be accessed from China and comparitively with other servers from different continents.

How to find out if your ISP is blocking Blogger blogs

To discover if you will be able to access Blogger powered blogs through your internet service provider, it is advisable to ping blogspot.com using your computer’s DOS ping tool.

If you use Windows, you can do this by clicking the “Start” button and choosing the “run” command. Type “cmd” into the box and hit “enter”. Then type ping blogspot.com into the black box followed by enter.

For unrestricted access to blogspot.com through your ISP, you will see something like this on your screen:

Pinging blogspot.blogger.com [208.73.210.121] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 208.73.210.121: bytes=32 time=329ms TTL=239

Ping statistics for 208.73.210.121:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 294ms, Maximum = 337ms, Average = 323ms

In cases where the URL is blocked, you will likely receive a message like “Ping request could not find the host. Please check and try again.

Final thoughts

It seems unlikely that Blogger powered sites will be accessible from within China in the close future, though as we have seen before, such restrictions are usually lifted after a period of time.

I hope the information and tips in this article assist those who need to post to their blogs or read Blogger powered sites from within China. Please feel free to offer your own suggestions and comments below.

China’s Ban on Blogger Blogs (and Possible Workarounds)


A selection of e-books to help you improve as a blogger. Find out more at www.bloggingtips.com/books/

On Tuesday John got taken into Hospital because he had gallblabber stones. Incase any readers doubted that he was blogging from his sick bed, he posted again a few hours later to prove that he really was blogging from hospital.

John was able to do this by using his 3G iPhone as a router so that he could connect his Mac Air to the internet. I was more surprised that the hospital let patients use their laptop and mobile in the hospital. At my local hospital you have to switch off your mobile phone incase it conflicts with any of the machines (though many people don’t!).

This is a great example of how dedicated some high profile bloggers are. I think that a lot of new bloggers see the flashy lifestyle of travelling, hotels and fast cars that successful bloggers lead and assume that the blogger got lucky.

Nothing could be further from the truth. All the high profile bloggers I know of got there through hard work, networking and dedication, and it took them years to get to the position they are in. Something which I think we all have to remember.

Anyways, here’s a video of John from his hospital bed explaining the situation. Enjoy

That’s What I Call Dedication!


A selection of e-books to help you improve as a blogger. Find out more at www.bloggingtips.com/books/

Apparently the blog was setup for a school assessment. A part of me is encouraged by a kid so young getting into blogging though a big part of me thinks that the kid should be out in the playground playing with other kids instead of being stuck inside working on a computer. Perhaps I am wrong to make this assumption.

Anyways, here’s the news clip from NBC

Link : The world’s next great sage: A 7-year-old blogger (via Gypsy Bandito)

Pint Sized Blogger Receives Letter From Obama


A selection of e-books to help you improve as a blogger. Find out more at www.bloggingtips.com/books/

The Usual Suspects

• Problogger
• ShoeMoney
• Chris Brogan
• DoshDosh
• Lorelle on WordPress

Some You May Not Have Heard About (Yet)

• Big Satchurday: Liz is a web developer who works from home. She specialises in enabling small business owners to do more for themselves on the internet, providing encouragement, a sympathetic ear, but most importantly, training.
• Blogger Buster: BloggingTips.com’s own writer, Amanda, runs this site. Blogger Buster is a resource blog for bloggers, offering hints, hacks, tips and tricks to help enhance your blogging experience.
• Blogging Basics 101: This is one of my blogs where I write tips and instructions for beginning bloggers.
• Blogthority: Authority Blogging Concepts and Services.
• Webgrrls: Insight, Information and Inspiration on women’s careers, business, technology and the Industry.
• The Edublogger: Discussion of emerging technologies on edublogs.

Writing Blogs

• Confident Writing: A blog site full of writing tips and virtual coaching from Joanna Young. It’s a site not just for writers but for anyone who wants or needs to write with confidence.
• Copyblogger: Copywriting tips for online marketing success.
• Plagiarism Today: This site covers content theft, copyright infringement, and plagiarism.
• The Writer’s Technology Companion: Tools, tips, and technology for productive writers.
• Write to Done: The craft and art of writing.

What’s In My Feed Reader


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Tung built up WPDesigner into one of the most popular Wordpress design blogs on the net but earlier this year he decided to go travelling for a while and decided to sell up. He got a good price for his blog but unfortunately, the new owner has not touched the site in the last 6 months.

A month or so before he sold up Tung started a themes club. For a $5 yearly fee you were supposed to get access to at least 12 premium themes but because he sold the site shortly after launching the club there was only ever 4 themes available. However, Michael Castilla today reported that Tung has refunded his $5 fee and will be refunding who signed up for the themes club.

This is the right thing to do. Tung was under no obligation to do this as it was the new owners fault for not updating the site so kudos to the Small Potato for this gesture.

If you paid to be a member of the themes club and you haven’t received a refund as yet, please leave a comment here. If you still haven’t received one after a week or so I’ll do my best to look into it for you guys.

Link : Small Potato Refunds ThemeClub Members

* This news story was found via Jeffro’s Blog. Thanks Jeff

Small Potato Refunds WPDesigner ThemeClub Members


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Blog Action Day 2008 Poverty from Blog Action Day on Vimeo.

One Laptop Per Child

One of the best projects I have seen which aims to reduce poverty is the non-profit organisation One Laptop Per Child. The OLPC mission statement is

To eliminate poverty and create world peace by providing education to the poorest and most remote children on the planet by making them more active in their own learning, through collaborative and creative activities, connected to the Internet, with their own laptop, as a human right and cost free to them.

I am a big fan of this initiative and a great believer that more education will help those in developing countries and in developed countries too. Education opens doors and gives you many opportunities in life that many of us sometimes take for granted.

The OLPC’s main focus is the development of their XO-1 laptop, sometimes referred to as the $100 laptop. Although quite basic by modern standards, it is still a very functional computer and boasts a webcam, microphone and wi-fi.

The laptop runs on linux and will run at only 2 or 3 watts. It runs on open source software and is able to display e-books as well. With electronic prices dropping every year they hope to release the XO-2 in 2010 at a cost of $75 each.

There has been some criticism regarding the project though I think that at the very least this is a big step in the right direction

Blog Action Day

Did you post about ? If so, please leave a comment with a link to the post

Link : Blog Action Day

Blog Action Day : Poverty


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The main areas of the community are :

• Photo section : This will give our users their own personal photo albums. These albums can be configured to store photos, videos, or any other file types we may choose to allow. Users can interact by commenting on each others photos and viewing their friends’ recent updates.
• Blogs Section : This will give each of our users their own personal blog.
• Groups Section : This will let our users create their own groups. These groups encourage interactivity between users based on mutual interests and characteristics. Users can become leaders, create private groups, invite members, browse each other’s memberships, and much more.
• Events Section :
  This will let our users create events. Each user is given their own personal calendar with which they can plan events and invite other users to join. When users receive invitations to events, they can specify an RSVP. Each event will have its own main page where users can post comments and interact.
• Chat Section : A live chatroom.
• Classifieds Section : This will allow our users to post classified listings. Our users will also be able to search for other listings via a “browse marketplace” area, and each users’ listings will appear on their profile.

The community is still quite new however I’m sure that once the Bloghology magazine comes out in December it will grow quickly. I recommend checking it out

Link : Bloghology Community

Bloghology Launch Blog Community


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Maybe someday BloggingTips will break the 1 million mark

TechCrunch has over 1 million RSS subscribers


A selection of e-books to help you improve as a blogger. Find out more at www.bloggingtips.com/books/

Apparently an initial run of 40,000 copies will be available 4 times a year. Subscription for the printed version will cost $20 a year in Europe and €30 a year everywhere else. I would love to subscribe regularly to a blogging magazine so I hope that it proves to be a success. Perhaps by only publishing every quarter they will be able to put a lot more pages in the magazine.

I get about 4 or 5 affiliate related magazines sent to me every other month and although they are worth reading, I don’t think I’d bother paying for them. This is mainly because most of the magazines I get delivered have ads plastered all over it and most articles and interviews seem like an excuse to promote a company or product. Let’s hope this magazine doesn’t do the same.

I do hope I’m wrong and that my skepticism is way off target as there is definately a market for a blogging publication. If they make sure the magazine isn’t oversaturated by ads and make sure it has some substance I think they will be onto a winner, plus you need to remember the affiliate industry runs a little differently from the blogging one so maybe I shouldn’t be so skeptical in the first place. And with bloggers such as Stephan Millar and Ann Smarty contributing I’m sure it will be worth a read.

Thankfully, bloggers can receive the digital version of the magazine for free. All you need to do is subscribe via the link below. I’m going to sign up to the printed version so I’ll let you guys know what it’s like when the magazine is delivered. Apparently they are giving out 2,500 copies of the magazine at this years Blog World Expo so if you are attending the event remember to pick up a copy

Link : Subscribe to Bloghology

Bloghology Blogging Magazine Launched


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It is very rare for a blogger to get to that level without hiring other people however there are a few exceptions. The most notable one is Perez Hilton, the celebrity gossip blogger who I’m sure you are all aware of.

I was always aware that Perez had huge levels of traffic and consequently a huge amount of income to go with it however I didn’t realise how much until Zac Johnson posted today that Perez is making over $54,000 every day. Read that back and let it sink in : he makes $54,000 every day through his blog. Zac also mentions that Perez does have one employee, his sister. However, when you compare his blog to the other massive blogs on the net I don’t think there are many with just one employee.

Of course, the majority of us will not see such a huge income but it’s a great feat to inspire to and does show you how much can be made from blogging if it is done right

Become a millionaire with your blog


A selection of e-books to help you improve as a blogger. Find out more at www.bloggingtips.com/books/

I was curious as to how they got this growth so I checked FeedCompare and noticed that on July 24th the number of subscribers jumped from 3,737 to 12,031.

The next day the count dropped to 8,917 and today it stands at 5,992. No doubt it will drop again tomorrow and get closer to the true count of 3,500-4,000 subscribers.

I remember ShoeMoney’s count jumped in the last day of his competition with John Chow though I don’t recall how he achieved this. His count also decreased after the competition so perhaps JohnCow used the same tactic. I’m not entirely sure how this was done though I am a little curious

Have you seen a blogs subscriber count make such a big jump like this?

How did John Cow manage to get 8294 more subscribers in one day?


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