Mar 31
Article Reviews #2 - More Feedreading Goodness
I think it's going to take me a while to go through all my feeds and pick out the things I want to write about. After that, I'll probably start searching for specific topics from blogs I may or may not be subscribed to. There's an endless supply of good stuff out there, enough to keep me busy forever.
- Andy Beard rhetorically asked about "Alexa Rating Changes?" Of the blogs I read and check the Alexa graphs for, most have been seeing a decline. I was going to tell Andy that Alexa is pure, unadulterated crap, but he threatened to "…flag as spam any comment questioning whether Alexa data has any value…". My pings already get flagged as spam by Akismet. I don't need to have my comments disappearing into the nether as well.
- Claire at A little piece of me pointed to an article she wrote concerning British speak, at a blog called British Speak, titled "The Story with the rude words" after being prodded to contribute. Do Brits really talk like that? I could figure out by the context what a lot of it meant, but some of it was indecipherable.
- It looks like Brook Durant is busy elsewhere. Nevertheless, he wrote an interesting article back on March 6, 2008, about earning a living on craigslist at A Blog about Nothing. An interesting experiment would be to offer writing services via the craigslist "writing/editing/translation" (wet) category, or possibly the "small biz ads" (biz) category.
- Wow! That's a big rabbit! Truthie at Absolutely True celebrated the 1-year anniversary of her blog on Easter this year and included a picture of a humongous rabbit. If that's a real rabbit, it could be a mutant from outer space! Or maybe Bugs Bunny.
- Todd Morris, at his Success with Todd blog, wrote about how his candle monkey blog got hacked. Luckily, Google (yes, the evil Google) told him about it. I have a theory that most of the hacking on WordPress blogs comes from other users on the same shared servers. If you have multiple blogs on the same account and one gets hacked, I'm willing to bet the others will follow unless the first one is caught right away.
- When I created this blog, I had a heck of a time getting the header image aligned the way I wanted it, tearing up the style sheet along the way. Take a look at how Costa explained inserting a new header image at Blog Gigs. I can't even remember what I did, so never ask me how… ever.
- Rocky John of Blogging Mix says contentment has no place in the blogosphere. In my opinion, a person who's content with his or her blog will not last. When you have goals socially, financially or otherwise in connection with your blogging, you stand a much better chance of continuing with it over the long term.
- Maurice, at his Cayman Host Blog, wrote about how not to run a forum. The unfortunate fact is that forums are only as good as their moderators, just like blogs are only as good as their writers.
- Ram Karthik, one of multiple authors at Freelance Folder, wrote a step by step guide to writing about stuff you know very little about. He mentioned article directories and ebooks, but there are a few more sources you should consider, including Wikipedia. A Wikipedia article may not be a real authority, but you can glean a lot of information from the sources listed at the bottom.
- JD at I Do Things has a crush on a cartoon character. I wonder if she's had a psychological evaluation lately. I'm joking of course, but cartoon crushes are usually reserved for prepubescent males. You don't believe me? Watch what boys are drawing sometime.

March 31st, 2008 at 6:48 am
Hi RT,
Good point about the shared hosting. I shouldn't have a worry there though, as I took pretty drastic measures and moved the site to an entirely different server. It turns out the the problem was in just one post … some how one of those "no script" jobs had gotten right into the middle of one of my paragraphs. I really should have caught it sooner, as it was actually pretty obvious as soon as I went looking for something that wasn't right.
Thanks for the link back btw. I'm off to take skateboarding pictures of my son, but I'll definitely drop back by later to check out the other links you posted.
Todd
Todd Morris's last blog post..I Started Blogging Just Over A Year Ago
April 3rd, 2008 at 8:29 pm
Hey! Is that you, RT? Thanks for the review! You'd be surprised how much I really do have in common with prepubescent boys. Might make a good post, actually…
JD at I Do Things's last blog post..I Have Scoliosis so you don’t have to
April 3rd, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Yup, it be me.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:18 am
Hi Todd,
Thanks for the link to my little rant - I'm known to have them occasionally
First time at your blog, but I'll put you in my Snarfer and check back soon.
April 19th, 2008 at 10:02 am
Yes I've been "busy" working on a couple of other blogs (and real life) but wanted to thank you for the mention.
I've personally made a good chunk of change from Craig's List. In fact Craig's List and word of mouth have been the only place I've advertised my IT consulting services up until recently and I've definitely added some weight to my wallet that way. I think writing could potentially be a great way to earn some extra money, particularly for bloggers.
A Blog about Nothings last blog post… Video: Ball Python strikes