Live Blogging WordCamp San Francisco 2009

I and Patrick Havens are live blogging as much of WordCamp San Francisco as we can. You can track it at WordCamp Report.

So far, the event has been very exciting, well produced, with some very hot speakers covering some great WordPress, social media, and content and community building. The big party tonight is an anniversary party and everyone is welcome to join.

See you there! Hugs are free!

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

WordCamp and WordPress Meetups – The Events Heard Round the World

This weekend is the granddaddy of WordCamps, WordCamp San Francisco 2009 on May 30, 2009. Registration is closed at over 700 attendees for this one day event packed with a ton of the top blogging, social media, search engine, business, and WordPress experts. I’ll be there, so be sure and find me for a hug.

That’s part of the joy and difference between a WordPress event and other social tech events. WordPressers serve up hugs, not just hand shakes. What I hear over and over again at these events is how we all know each other, so meeting face to face is just another step in the relationship process that began a few months to a few years ago. We’re already friends!

This year so far it has been my honor to be included and speaking at a variety of WordCamp events including WordCamp Las Vegas, WordCamp Whistler, WordCamp Toronto, and WordCamp Columbus, and you will probably find me rattling around WordCamp Dallas, WordCamp Portland, WordCamp Seattle, Netherlands – WordCamp NL, WordCamp Israel, and WordCamp/Podcamp Hawaii.

According to the WordPress Meetup Groups on Meetup.com, there are 32 Meetup Groups focused specifically on WordPress, representing 3,394 Members in 5 different countries among 32 Meetup groups in 28 different cities. There are almost 2,000 people interested in a WordPress event and meetup without a group near them.

Here is a list of the most popular WordPress-specific Meetup Groups on Meetup.com from around the world. The number next to some of the group names represents the current number of registered members.

• The London Bloggers Meetup Group (592)
• The New York City WordPress Meetup Group (415)
• NY Bloggers Meetup Group (354)
• Dallas/Fort Worth WordPress Meetup (296)
• The Austin WordPress Meetup Group (172)
• South Florida WordPress Meetup Group (164)
• Atlanta WordPress Users Group (147)
• The Bay Area WordPress Meetup (138)
• The Boston WordPress Meetup Group (110)
• The Chicago WordPress Meetup Group (97)
• The Vancouver WordPress Meetup Group
• The East Bay WordPress Meetup Group
• Las Vegas WordPress Meetup Group
• The New Jersey WordPress Meetup Group
• The Southern California WordPress Meetup Group
• Greater Charlotte Area WordPress Group
  

  Matt Mullenweg, Andy Skelton, Mark Jaquith at WordCamp San Francisco 2008

• The Scottsdale WordPress Meetup Group
• The Ferndale WordPress Meetup Group
• Raleigh WordPress Meetup Group
• OKC WordPress Users Group
• Singapore Blogger Meetup Group
• Seattle WordPress 2.0
• The Bonita Springs WordPress Meetup Group
• Gulf Coast Twitter/WordPress Group

While there are WordPress meetup groups around the world, there are a lot of people are shouting out for one in their area. Copenhagen (61 interested), Philadelphia (45), Houston, London, and Denver are among the many. Some of these have had or are about to have a WordCamp event, so why aren’t there regular WordPress meetups?

WordPress Meetup Groups on Meetup.com offers a map of all the places where there are WordPress events and activities and where ones are wanted. You can browse a list of cities hosting WordPress events or go directly to your region to find out where one is or who might be interested in putting one together.

What is the Difference Between a WordPress Meetup and WordCamp?

A WordPress Meetup is a frequent meeting of WordPress fans. If you would like to start a WordPress Meetup group, find a meeting place and announce it among your friends, and add a listing to the Yahoo Upcoming events for WordPress and WordPress Meetups Upcoming Events and tag them “WordPress Events” and “WordPress”, as many track WordPress event announcements there.

A WordPress Meetup allows locals to get together and learn from each other on how to use WordPress. There are formal WordPress meetups and informal ones, covering nothing but WordPress or including WordPress as part of other topics on web publishing and social media. WordPress meetups are usually held monthly or quarterly.

A WordCamp is a day or two long event with sponsors and dozens if not hundreds of WordPress fans gathering annually. WordCamp Toronto was the first, I believe, to have a three day WordCamp event, but there are no rules. It differs from a WordPress Meetup because it is offered rarely instead of regularly.

WordCamps were originally formatted on the Barcamp structure, loosely put together, grassroots gatherings of WordPress fans in a day long unconference style. While this works for some communities familiar with the unconference style, some stick with a more traditional conference format.

While a WordPress Meetup can cover any topics of interest to their members, a WordCamp event is focused on WordPress for the majority of the programs and workshops.

Many distinguish the two events based upon the length and speakers. WordPress Meetups tend to last a few hours where WordCamps are day long events. The speakers at WordCamps can come from your region or around the world.

How Do I Start a WordCamp or WordPress Meetup?

If you would like to sponsor or host a WordCamp, check out the new official site for tracking WordCamps is WordCamp Central, which includes instructions and guidelines for running a WordCamp. There are also articles with tips and techniques for WordPress Meetups and WordCamps on The WordCamp Report, as well as on blogs by those who have run these events.

In general, you need to have a team of at least 5 active volunteers, a location and date, speakers, sponsors, and food or easy access to food. The rest of it is up to you.

Get a free blog on WordPress.com or host your own for the WordCamp, until WordCamp Central finishes setting up their WordPressMU blog network. Get a Twitter account and add a listing to the Yahoo Upcoming events for WordPress and WordPress Meetups Upcoming Events and tag them “WordPress Events” and “WordCamp. These are tracked by many WordPress fans around the world, many whom are willing to fly in to the various WordPress and WordCamp events.

How Do I Get WordPress Rock Stars to My WordPress Event?

While Matt Mullenweg, myself, and other representatives of WordPress and Automattic try to get to as many WordCamp and WordPress events as we can, look to your own neighborhood and community for your own WordPress experts and rock stars.

Many think it helps to have a “big name” to help attract attendees. In some large cities it does, but promote the event as a chance to learn about how to use WordPress in your business or personal life, and you’d be stunned at the number of people who will show up, just because they love WordPress.

To ask one of the press-o-rati, contact them through their blogs, email or Twitter accounts. To request someone officially from Automattic or WordPress, use the WordCamp Central contact form and ask. You can be vague and invite whoever is willing to come, or be specific and request someone who is an expert in WordPress Themes, Plugins, BuddyPress, bbPress, PollDaddy, Intense Debate, or any of the other WordPress and Automattic specific features and services.

I highly recommend you make your WordCamp and WordPress event about your community. WordCamp/Podcamp Hawaii brought in local social media experts, musicians, and tourist industry representatives familiar with WordPress to speak to attendees, giving them the local perspective that their community needs. WordCamp Toronto brought in members of the local art community to display interactive art work and held community competitions for the event logo, blog designs, and Plugins, involving as many people and groups as possible to make the event a social one. WordCamp San Francisco 2008 had a fund-raising event “Scavenger Hunt” for a local educational charity on the day after the WordCamp sessions.

There are a lot of ways you can involve your community and help others blog and share their voice with the world and benefit your community in general. Make your WordPress event inclusive not exclusive

To publicize your WordPress event or WordCamp, contact WordCamp Central, The WordCamp Report, Yahoo Upcoming events for WordPress, WordPress Meetups Upcoming Events, and Upcoming events tagged with “WordCamp” or “WordPress,” and contact me by email for inclusion on the Blog Herald and my site and other WordPress fan sites.

Upcoming WordPress and WordCamp Events

Upcoming WordCamp and WordPress Events include:

May 2009

• Akron, Ohio – Ohio WordPress Meetup – May 28, 2009
• WordCamp San Francisco 2009 – May 30, 2009
• San Francisco Area – The East Bay WordPress May Meetup – May 31, 2009

June 2009

• WordCamp Chicago – June 6-7, 2009
• North Carolina – WordCampRDU 2009 – June 13, 2009
• Los Angeles WordPress Users Group – June 14, 2009
• WordCamp Brazil – June 21, 2009
• WordCamp Dallas 2009 – Dallas, Texas – June 27-28, 2009

July 2009

• Canada – WordCamp Montreal – July 11-12, 2009
• United Kingdom – WordCamp UK, Cardiff, Wales, July 18-19, 2009

August 2009

• Alabama – WordCamp Huntsville – August 15-16, 2009

September 2009

• Los Angeles, California – WordCamp LA – September 12, 2009
• Portland, Oregon – WordCamp Portland – September 19-20, 2009
• WordCamp Seattle – September 26, 2009 (WordCamp Seattle Twitter)

October 2009

• WordCamp New York City 2009 – October 24, 2009
• Netherlands – WordCamp NL – October 31, 2009

Upcoming WordCamps not scheduled or confirmed:

• WordCamp Indy (Indianapolis)
• WordCamp Augusta
• WordCamp Argentina
• WordCamp San Diego
• WordCamp Perú
• WordCamp New Zealand
• WordCamp Israel

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

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Weblog Tools Collection Annual WordPress Plugin Competition

The best Plugin competition, The Weblog Tools Collection WordPress Plugin Competition 2009 (3.0), is underway. WordPress fans rejoice.

The annual WTC WordPress Plugin Competition has rocked the WordPress Community since 2005. Each event brings out the best and most creative WordPress Plugin authors competing for prizes, and many of the award winners and entrants are now among the most popular WordPress Plugins in the world.

Some popular past winners and submissions include WP Easy Uploader, OneClick, Who Sees Ads, WP Comment Remix, WordPress Automatic Upgrade, and Popularity Contest.

As most of you know, I’m a huge WordPress Plugin fangirl. Jonathan Bailey of Plagiarism Today recently covered “5 WordPress Plugins I Never Blog Without” on the Blog Herald, with some great recommendations, and in 2007, I spent an entire month writing daily about WordPress Plugins, including showcasing your favorite WordPress Plugins and a huge list of your lists of WordPress Plugin recommendations, since users often say more about WordPress Plugins then those who write them.

Please lend Weblog Tools Collection your support by helping to spread the word and the love, and help test the Plugin submissions and have your say on the ones you enjoy the most. If you would like to help sponsor the event, you are also welcome as this is a fantastic way to give back to the WordPress Community, especially to the Plugin authors who make our blogs run better and faster with little or no compensation.

I expect to see some WordPressMU and BuddyPress Plugins in addition to single hosted WordPress Plugins in the list this year. It should be one of the most exciting WordPress Plugin Competitions ever!

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

WordCamp Toronto Raising the Bar This Weekend

Of all the WordCamp events to track, WordCamp Toronto this weekend, May 8-10, 2009, has been one of the most product and prolific. The Schedule is three very packed days of events, speakers, and…everything.

Starting at 8AM on Friday and closing Sunday afternoon with an awards ceremony, it’s going to be a packed weekend event – and I’ll be there to share in all the fun and adventure!

One of the exciting parts of the conference is the FlashPress event. FlashPress is a WordPress Plugin which integrates a WordPress PHP based CMS and Flash site. One Method and BackSpaceStudios teamed up for this open source project which will feature the rebuilding of the One Method site from the ground up with the FlashPress bundle. They will be documenting the process, code, and challenges along the way as participants lend a hand in the process.

There is plenty of social during this three day event, including the Opening Night Party at Lou Dogs on Friday, a popular southern barbecue and blues locale.

The Speakers list is amazing, featuring some of the best of the best in WordPress and blogging from around Canada and the world. Speakers include:

• Christopher Wulff
• Dan Zen
• David Peralty
• Duncan
• Erin Blaskie
• Glenn McKnight
• Ilya Grigorick
• James Walker
• Jeremy Clarke
• Joe Taiabjee
• Joey DeVilla
• Nick La
• Paul Laberge
• Paul Morrison
• Peter Flaschner
• Rannie Turingan
• Terry Smith

Oh, and me, Lorelle on WordPress.

Members of the local b5media team will also be speaking and in attendance, one of the popular blog networks built on WordPress.

The event will feature three tracks each day, with the third “track” being mostly social interaction and barcamp style unconference meetups. Everything from the technical aspects to the creative design elements, to writing styles and social media will be covered – with a lot of partying and coding in between.

I believe there are a few tickets left so hurry for this exciting WordPress adventure in Toronto, Canada.

Throughout the past few months, there have been t-shirt giveways and ticket contests and all kind of events and activity around the WordCamp event. I believe this is the second WordCamp in Toronto and they are truly setting a standard for WordCamps around the world. Raising the bar, they are!

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Inspired by Glenda Watson Hyatt at SOBCon09

I just published “Glenda Watson Hyatt: Is Your Blog Disabled?” on the Blog Herald. I summarized the outstanding presentation the famous Left Thumb Blogger, Glenda Watson Hyatt of the Do It Myself Blog, gave at Successful and Outstanding Bloggers Conference (SOBCon) this past weekend.

Glenda is a major fan and proponent of WordPress, and I was delighted and honored to be a part of her powerful presentation on web accessibility, for which WordPress wins high praises (and a few whines).

Her How POUR is Your Blog presentation is available on ebook for free and I highly recommend you download it, and sign up for her newsletter while you are at it. You want your blog to be as open, accessible, and usable as possible, and she has the tips and information you need to know, simple and easy, whether you are using WordPress or not.

Oh, and get her book, I’ll Do It Myself. It’s a highly personal look at the struggles of a brilliant young woman fighting through her physical limitations to connect and interact with the world around her – and often against her.

Here is a short excerpt of her presentation at the conference, and it’s worth the wait for the laugh at the end. She had us falling out of our chairs at times on what would normally be a dry subject.

I highlighted Glenda not long ago in the video and presentation, How WordPress Changes Lives, where she shows how she blogs with only her left thumb with WordPress. The excellent level of accessibility features of the WordPress blogging platform and easy integration with Windows Live Writer helps her connect with the world around her, crossing borders seamlessly.

Work is underway to have Glenda speak at some upcoming WordCamps around the world, as well as other conferences and workshops. If you are looking for a lively, entertaining, and motivational speaker who will change you and your business’ outlook on the abled and disabled, Glenda Watson Hyatt, the Left Thumb Blogger, will accept the challenge. We have so much to learn from Glenda, a top social media and blogging expert and consultant, and a proud living example of why accessibility on our blogs is important. For everyone.

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Blogging and Social Media Tips for Real Estate Market at REBarCamp PDX

Tomorrow, April 23, 2009, I’m the keynote at Real Estate BarCamp, in Portland, Oregon, at Cubespace. The event is free but sold out. If you are interested in attending, check first.

I’ll be speaking to Real Estate agents, brokers, and related industry members about blogging, social, media, WordPress, and Woopra – though not all at the same time.

My keynote presentation will be on blogging and finding your voice on the web. I’ll talk about blogging your passion and creating your online identity that carries into your professional, and even personal, life. In the afternoon, I’ll be talking about web analytics and statistics and using tools like Woopra to learn more about your demographics and the connections you make on the web.

I’ll also be a part of a WordPress lab where we will sit down and answer any WordPress issues, offer tips, set up WordPress blogs on WordPress.com, and help attendees with their blogging needs hands-on.

How the Web is Changing the Real Estate Market

I grew up in the Real Estate industry with both parents, however, my mother was the ground breaker in the Real Estate industry, becoming a company owner, teacher and industry leader. Her work on a state and national level, the world for the buyer and seller are safer today than they were many years ago. I even studied for my real estate license, though life took me in other directions.

So I’m eager to be back in the world I grew up with, surrounded by people who sincerely care about helping people find the home of their dreams as well as make the right investments for their future.

The Real Estate world has changed dramatically since I was directly involved. Then, social media meant being an active member in your community, going to social events, meeting people how and when you could, signing deals on the hoods of cars, chasing down every lead you could with phone calls, brochures, newsletters, signs, social meetings…I guess little has changed.

What is different is that while some of the old marketing techniques work, the web changes things. Instead of working your community for leads, a client can come from Britain, Dubai, or Hong Kong. You might never meet them in person, but you can build a relationship enough to call them friends as you shake virtual hands and make those direct connections across the web.

Blogs are today’s brochures and newsletters, bringing the news and information to clients, old and new. Where it once was a fad to put your face on your business cards and signs, it’s now a requirement to put your face on your blog and videos, and your voice on podcasts.

It’s not just about being a good sales person and marketer. You have to write great content, knowing how to communicate and interact with the written word.

Social media tools like Twitter changes things even more, as do tools like iPhones and Blackberries. We’re connecting through 140 characters instantly – and people demand an instant response in kind.

It’s confusing and there are so many technological changes happening, but I believe that at the very core, all businesses are successful when they serve the needs of their customers on an individual basis – or at least put their focus on the individual not just the collective. The members of the Real Estate industry are experts at connecting with the individual.

And I hope to help them connect better with individuals online.

Is your world being totally changed by the web? If you are in the Real Estate or personal service industry, what would you want to know about connecting online and finding customers and building communities? What would you like to hear me talk about at such a workshop?

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Example of a Perfect Personal Blog

I’m working on a series of articles about personal blogging, but I wanted to share with you a perfect example of a personal blog. It’s by my cousin, Duke DesRochers.

You may remember Duke from the story I did on him called, “Future Social Media Renaissance Man,” on Lorelle on WordPress or the one on the Blog Herald called “Exploring Social Media: Social Means Personal” as part of my Exploring Social Media article series.

When Duke first emailed me to vote for his audition tape to be the next The Next Food Network Star, I was dumbfounded by his well done audition video showing how to carve vegetables with a lathe and drill in his garage, then cooking them up to make the most incredible side dish presentation. While he didn’t make it into the finals, an oversight on their part I’m sure, he did follow through on my encouragement to create a blog.

Truthfully, I signed him up and set up his WordPress.com blog in about 20 minutes and told him, “Go blog.”

He had no idea what I was talking about.

WordCast Turns 50

WordCast celebrates 50 episodes this week with a fun podcast featuring WordPress and WordCast fans Liz Strauss, Jonathan Bailey of Plagiarism Today, and myself, along with hosts Dave Moyer and Kym Huynh in WordCast 50: Our Semi-centennial!

It was amazing to have Liz in Chicago, Dave in Denver, Kym in Australia, Jonathan in Louisiana, and me in Portland, Oregon, all chatting away and debating about once again calling Brian Gardner and talking to his answering machine. We had some questions about his new WordPress Theme lines. We got so carried away talking about Liz’s butt, among other WordPressy things.

While there was much discussion about our favorite WordPress features over the last few years of releases, WordPress history, and WordPress 2.8, we also talked about Liz’s butt at SxSW in a lovely photograph by Brian Solis, SOBCon 2009, a great WordCast intro by Matt Mullenweg, a lesson in how Liz Strauss taught Matt Mullenweg to order me around, a fabulous rap by Kym called the “WordCamp Rap,” a quick look back at some of the WordCast jingles, and a lot of other nonsense.

Congrats to Dave and Kym for a great 50 episodes full of WordPress information, tips, and giggles. And here’s to 50+ more!

WordCast, the WordPress Podcast, is released weekly, usually on Tuesday, and is part of the Bitwire Media Networks.

Isn’t 50 old in podcasting years…or is that dog years?

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Round WordPress: Summer of Code, Kubrick Retired, How Tos, WebWare 100, and WordPress Fan Blogs

In my Blog Herald WordPress News, I used to feature a round-up of WordPress-related podcasts and fan blogs offering great tips and useful information on using WordPress from the beginner level to advanced techniques. I’ve decided to continue this tradition here on Lorelle on WordPress.

Every week or so, I’ll publish a Round WordPress post featuring highlights and most recent articles by some of the top WordPress blogging experts. I encourage you to visit these blogs and add them to your feed reader as they continue to provide invaluable WordPress tips, techniques, news, resources, and information.

This week, the talk around the WordPress Community is fired up over the discussion started by Weblog Tools Collection on retiring the Kubrick/Default WordPress Theme, Google/WordPress Summer of Code, WordPress 2.8, voting for new WordPress IRC ops and moderators, and the new WordPress Widget API.

WordPress Podcasts

WordCast: The WordCast features news, interviews, and great laughter on WordPress-related topics. This week’s episode is WordCast 49: Barbaric Blog Herald Barrage with Lorelle VanFossen as guest co-host, covering the delay of WordPress 2.8, WordPress/Google Summer of Code 2009, WordCamp Toronto’s efforts to involve their community in their WordPress Event, Celebrity Pressers help needed for Blog Herald WordPress News, WordPress for iPhone, contributing to WordPress, the Making of WordPress.tv, and more tips and news on WordPress.

WP Tavern WordPress Weekly Podcast: Jeffro interviews Andrew Ozz, the person responsible for the JavaScript load optimization articles and features, TinyMCE integration and updates, and other key and core WordPress features.

The most recent episode of the The WordPress Plugins Podcast featuring the MailPress Plugin and Search And Replace Plugin.

WordPress Plugins News: Coffee2Code Plugin Marathon, Plugin Podcast, Plugin Developer Center, Plugin Checklist

As most of you know, I’m extremely passionate about supporting and encouraging WordPress Plugin authors. I’ve written a love letter to WordPress Plugin authors, spent a month writing over 36 posts on nothing but WordPress Plugins, published extensive tips on how to install, configure, and use WordPress Plugins and another guide for finding Plugins, “Where to Find WordPress Plugins.” I’ve researched lists of your favorite WordPress Plugins pointing out the most popular WordPress Plugins WordPress fans recommend, and even feature a WordPress Plugin a day on my @lorelleonwp Twitter.

Okay, I’m a WordPress Plugin obsessed fan.

Some are saying this will be the year of the WordPress Theme with the addition of the auto-load and update feature for Themes in WordPress 2.8, but I think it will be the year of the WordPress Plugin as so many are now exploring more Plugin options with the WordPress 2.7 search, auto-install, and update for WordPress Plugins. With the release of the new WordPress Widgets API and Validimir Prelovac’s new book, “WordPress Plugin Development Beginner’s Guide,” it’s time for WordPress Plugins and their authors to get the support and respect they deserve. Without them, how would our WordPress blogs survive?

As I prepare my weekly Blog Herald WordPress News, I collect a lot of tips and articles for and about WordPress Plugins. I will be moving those here to Lorelle on WordPress, publishing summaries of news and articles WordPress Plugin authors need to know on a fairly regular basis.

If you are a WordPress Plugin fan, there will be a ton of great information here, too.

New WordPresa Widgets API Feedback Wanted

The WordPress developers are seeking testers and feedback on the new Widgets API which will be released with WordPress 2.8.

WordPress Plugin Checkoff List

All WordPress Plugin authors need to check the article Weblog Tools Collection recently published called the “Top 10 Characteristics of a Great WordPress Plugin.”

It is a checklist to follow when reviewing or coding a new WordPress Plugin. Print this checklist out when preparing their Plugin for public release, as well as the recommendations I made in my own list for WordPress Plugin authors and you will make WordPress fans around the world love and adore you.

WordPress Plugin Developer Center

Have you seen the new Developer Center within the WordPress Plugin Directory?

It is a general guide on how WordPress hosts WordPress Plugins and how to get your Plugin into the directory.

Not all WordPress Plugins are found in the directory, but all WordPress Plugins found through the new built-in WordPress Plugin search and install feature in WordPress 2.7+ are found only within the Directory.

To get into the WordPress Plugin Directory, there are a few requirements.

1. The plugin must be GPL Compatible.
2. It can’t do anything illegal, or be morally offensive.
3. Use of the subversion repository is required to host the Plugin.

Automatically Generate WordPress Plugin Readme Files

Check out the news WPEngineer wrote about with the new WordPress Plugin Readme File Generator by Sudar Muthu. This Plugin automatically creates and validates readme files for WordPress Plugins. Many WordPress Plugins need to have instructions to help users install and use them, so this is a very useful tool for the WordPress Plugin author.

Scott Reilly On WordPress Plugin Development Overload

A year ago, the incredibly prolific WordPress Plugin author, Scott Reilly of Coffee2Code, and creator of the powerful Customizable Post Listings WordPress Plugin, spent 14 days releasing a Plugin a day. By the end of the two weeks, he’d created 14 new WordPress Plugins and updated 20 more. Now he’s at it again.

So far, he’s created or updated Admin Per Page Limits WordPress Plugin to control the number of posts per page, pages per page, and comments per page that appear in the Administration Panel listings of posts, pages, and comments; Restrict Usernames WordPress Plugin to restrict the usernames that new users may use when registering with your WordPress blog; Linkify Categories to turn a string, list, or array of category IDs and/or slugs into a list of links to those categories; Linkify Tags to convert a list of tag IDs and/or slugs into a list of links to those tags; Disable Search to turn off the search capabilities of the native WordPress search; and Configure SMTP updated for configuring SMTP mailing in WordPress with support to send email via SSL/TLS (like Gmail), with more on the way.

I’ll be covering more of his new odyssey in WordPress Plugin production as he moves his way to the top of the list as one of the most prolific WordPress Plugin authors in the WordPress Plugin Directory, giving the likes of Michael Torbert, Matt Mullenweg, Lester ‘GaMerZ’ Chan, Arne Brachhold, and Andy Skelton a run for Plugin fame.

Top Niche WordPress Plugins

The Top WordPress Plugin Niches by W-Shadow is a list based upon the top 100 most downloaded WordPress Plugins to determine their “niche” categories. It’s an interesting look at the types of Plugins most WordPress users desire and use.

There are now various ways to check out which WordPress Plugins are the most popular on the WordPress Plugin Directory.

• Most Popular WordPress Plugins
• Highest Rated WordPress Plugins
• Newest WordPress Plugins
• Recently Updated WordPress Plugins
• By Tags

WordPress Plugin Podcast

I’m not the only fan of WordPress Plugins. Check out the most recent episodes of the The WordPress Plugins Podcast featuring the MailPress Plugin and Search And Replace Plugin.

Past episodes included:

• Plugins 001 – Blubrry Powerpress Podcasting Plugin
• Plugins 002 – 7 Minutes on Blubrry Powerpress Podcasting Plugin
• Plugins 003 – Peters Custom Anti Spam
• Plugins 004 – CFormsII Custom Forms
• Plugins 005 – Google XML Sitemaps
• Plugins 006 – All In One SEO Pack Plugin
• Plugins 007 – Special Guest Peter Keung author of Peter’s Custom Anti-SPAM Plugin
• Plugins 008 – WP-DB-Backup Plugin
• Plugins 009 – Share This Plugin
• Plugins 010 – Contact Form 7 Plugin
• Plugins 011 – Search And Replace Plugin

Highlights of WordPress Plugin Tips and Techniques

Here are some past goodies to warm you up. Some of these related to older versions of WordPress, but don’t discount them. There are invaluable lessons to be learned from such articles. The topics cover a wide range of WordPress-specific tips and techniques for Plugin and Theme developers, as well as PHP, MySQL, JavaScript, AJAX, and jQuery.

• WordPress Functions Implementation History Tool
• ThemeLab – WordPress Template Tag Lookup Tool
• Validimir Prelovac – WordPress Fundamentals for Newbies
• Pearsonified – How You Can Use WordPress Functions to Run a Smarter Blog
• DBSWebsite – WordPress Template Tags Reference Guide
• 5 Helpful Tips for Creating Secure PHP Applications
• 25 Resources to Get You Started with PHP from Scratch
• WordPress Development – Converting Default Widgets to the New WordPress API
• WordPress Development – Optimizing script loading, implementation
• WordPress Development – Optimizing script loading part 2
• WordPress Development – Optimizing Script Loading
• WordPress.tv – PHP Cross Reference of the WordPress Source (Video)
• Installing WordPress locally with WampServer
• Will Norris – Authentication in WordPress 2.8
• Secrets of the Conditional Tag Revealed: How to Gain More Control Over Your WordPress Templates
• Nettus – What You Must Know About jQuery UI 1.7
• Nettus – 10 Reasons Why Your Code Won’t Validate (and How to Fix it)
• Webdesigner Depot – 7 Interface Design Techniques to Simplify and De-clutter Your Interfaces
• Lester Chan – New WP_Widget Class In WordPress 2.8
• Preparing for WordPress 2.8: Using JavaScript in WordPress Plugins
• Justin Tadlock – What’s in store for WordPress Themes in 2009?
• Nerdaphernalia – On Attribution and Plugin Priorities in WordPress
• Justin Tadlock – My Plugins are Now Hosted on the WordPress Plugins Repository
• Custom Theme Design – Building a Control Panel for Your WordPress Theme
• WordPress Codex – Formatting Date and Time in WordPress
• WordPress Codex – WordPress Conditional Tags

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Social Web: The Art of Voyeurism

As I’ve been developing my ongoing series on the Blog Herald called “Exploring Social Media,” I’m constantly intrigued and nauseated at the new voyeurism that is sweeping our world and our online social life. It’s freedom of speech and expression meets voyeurism, changing the word-of-mouth gossip world forever.

With the recent announcement of a new feature in Woopra, I think the walls that divide us socially are going to crumble to the ground.

A Blog is Your Soap Box; Twitter and YouTube Your Show-off

In the earliest days of blogging, a blog was a personal space for people to have their say. That is what started WordPress, the need to make the process of having your say publicly on the web to be easier. People would set up a WordPress blog as themselves or anonymously, believing them had something to say worth reading, and worth publishing. Some took it seriously, while others blogged anything and everything that popped into their mind. How I envy that freedom of expression sometimes.

Matt Mullenweg has worked tirelessly to ensure that WordPress.com as a hosted blogging service stays free and open to anyone around the world with an opinion. He and his team fight constantly to not help those living in places that ban access to WordPress.com in violation of the true spirit of freedom of speech, as do bloggers around the world threatened by others, lawsuits, and governments to shut up. It challenges the courts to keep up with online defamation and libel issues as we all want our say on the web.

There is freedom of speech and then there is responsibility for that freedom, which many ignore as they spill their guts publicly. With the growing level of information we put out on the web and the risk to our security and privacy, we keep having our say, showing off our dirty laundry, reveling in the peeping tom thrill of it all.

There are those who want to say whatever they want and publish it, and there are those who just thrive in the virtual voyeurism that comes with the online social web. Being a peeping tom is easier than ever today as people open up their lives to the web world.

When people follow you on Twitter, they are inviting you into their space. In some cases, it’s their office. In others, it’s their home. In other cases, it’s literally their virtual bedroom. Not the bedroom for romantic affairs, but the bedroom we used to race to with our childhood friends to play cars and trucks, dolls and games, and in later years, to gossip and share secrets.

We watch their tweets scroll down our Twitter client, whether we want them there or not, and get a peek into their lives. We read their tweets as they get up in the morning, go to bed, take meal and snack breaks, debate over food options and dining choices. We see them struggle with relationships, family, children, and parents. Friends send cryptic messages back and forth in their own lingo while we try to figure out what they mean. In between all this, advice and help is exchanged, business deals started and ended, and a thread of the social work life winds its way in and out of personal revelations and gossip.

We even thread those tweets into our WordPress blogs and our blogs into our tweets. The seamless transparency between these mediums is almost gone.

As the web becomes more visual, we bring the pictures along with the words or replace the words with images on our blogs.

With the success of YouTube, anyone can now literally open the visual door to their life, telling their story, or capturing an embarrassing moment in the lives of others. One of the most popular videos on YouTube and other video services are the ones I call “stupid human tricks.” We love watching others make fools of themselves. I credit the television show “America’s Funniest Home Videos” for starting that trend in voyeurism, which has lead to “Survivor” and other shows where the camera moves into people’s day-to-day lives.

Pushing Online Voyeurism to the Next Level

So it’s appropriate that Woopra announce they’ve added a new feature for the next version of the popular live and real-time statistics and analytics program that takes social media voyeurism to the next level.

In Announcing Woopra’s New Webcam Enablement Feature, John Pozadzides, CEO of Woopra, shares a sneak preview video of the latest addition.

Using Woopra is a kind of voyeurism. You can track what visitors do live on your site as they click around and move through it. If they login or leave a comment, and Gravatars are enabled, you can see their avatars and their Visitor ID numbers become names. Visitor #24589 becomes Fred Smith. It changes how you think about your visitors.

One of the most popular features of Woopra is the Live Chat [currently under reconstruction] which allows the webmaster or blogger to chat live with any visitor on their site, without the need to install anything. People are breaking the website wall to interact with visitors.

The newest feature goes one step beyond both of these:

Woopra, the world’s fastest growing Web Analytics provider, today announced that the next version of its wildly popular real-time Website monitoring application will allow users to remotely activate and view Website visitor’s built-in Webcams.

The company’s chief scientist, Dr. Lirpa Sloof, said, “Woopra already provides the most robust, feature rich and easy to use Web analytics available. Today we extend our market lead by integrating our latest patent-pending technology to give Webmasters more information about their visitors than ever before.”

Combined with Woopra’s unique abilities to display individual Web site visitors in real time and track them by name, this new technology levels the playing field by enabling companies and individuals alike to gain unprecedented visibility into user demographics and preferences.

Check it out. It will change the face of social interaction on the web.

Note: Woopra is currently approving 5,000 random new beta testers for the closed private beta testing. Sign up and you might get approved. Installation is easy with the Woopra WordPress Plugin. The new feature will be available in the next stable release.

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

WordCamp News: Tokyo, China, Montreal, Egypt, New Orleans, Toronto

I’ve moved most of the WordCamp and WordPress Event information off the Blog Herald WordPress News and will be posting updates and news here and on the WordCamp Report.

Upcoming WordCamp and WordPress Events include:

March 2009

• The Dallas/Ft. Worth Area WordPress March Meetup – March 28, 2009
• The Chicago WordPress March Meetup – WordPress Plugins – March 28, 2009
• Atlanta, Georgia – Atlanta WordPress Users Group Meetup – March 28, 2009
• North Carolina – Greater Charlotte Area WordPress Group March Meetup – March 28, 2009
• WordCamp Egypt (English) – March 28, 2009
• Alameda, California – The East Bay WordPress March Mash-up – March 29, 2009

April 2009

• The New Jersey WordPress April Meetup – April 1, 2009
• Las Vegas WordPress Meetup – April 1, 2009
• New Jersey WordPress Meetup – April 1, 2009
• Gulf Coast WordPress/Blogger April Meetup – April 2, 2009
• WordCamp China – April 4, 2009
• WordCamp Hong Kong – April 5, 2009
• Austin, Texas – The Austin WordPress Meetup Group – April 7, 2009
• WordCamp Tokyo (English) – April 7, 2009
• Ft. Lauderdale, Florida – South Florida WordPress April Meetup – April 8, 2009
• New Orleans, Louisiana – WordCamp NOLA – April 10-11, 2008 (Twitter)
• Chennai, Tamil Nadu – WordPress Garage (Tech Camp for WordPress) – April 18, 2009
• Long Beach, California – Southern California WordPress Group – April 18, 2009

Exploring the Power and Variety of Image Gallery WordPress Plugins

With work underway with the Google/WordPress Summer of Code which includes work on the native gallery system within WordPress, let’s not overlook some of the WordPress Plugins which have taken the bare bones of the WordPress gallery feature and turned it into magic.

Some of these gallery Plugins were hard at work presenting images on photoblogs and art blogs long before WordPress came up with the gallery feature and Media Library, so they have a long history of helping WordPress users display their images in unique and fun ways with lightbox effects, easy image management from multiple sources, and more.

Blog Oh Blog has reviewed what they think are the 10 best WordPress Gallery Plugins.

They include:

• PhotoXhibit
• Lazyest Gallery Plugin
• Cleaner WordPress Gallery Plugin
• Inline Gallery Plugin
• WP Photo Album Plugin
• FlippingBook Gallery Plugin
• NextGen Gallery Plugin
• Lightbox Gallery Plugin
• AWSOM PixGallery Plugin
• Falbum Gallery Plugin

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, member of the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Time to Break WordPress This Summer

In Want to Break and Remake WordPress? on the Blog Herald, I summarized this year’s WordPress/Google Summer of Code, an exciting annual project that brings together the top WordPress Community experts with college students from around the world dedicated to making and breaking WordPress so we all benefit.

When I read the cute announcement by Jane Wells of Automattic on the WordPress Development blog, I thought of all the amazing things that have come out of the past WordPress Summer of Code events, then took a look at what they have on the menu for this year’s code hacker’s dream come true.

WordPress has been a part of the Google Summer of Code I believe since it began five years ago. Each year, from among over a hundred student applications, about 10 are chosen to work with WordPress staff and experts, with some of them going on to become valuable members of the WordPress development team. The incredible inline documentation and code work by Jacob Santos is just one example of the fine work the students have done.

Each year, free and open source software companies vie to be one of the recipients of the mentoring program sponsored by Google. The students submit applications for the project of their choice from among only 150 free and open source software projects chosen. The project team leaders narrow their choices down based upon the proposals, skills, and expertise of the students. The students are paid a stipend of USD $4,500 to cover expenses and time to dig into the code from May through August.

This year’s deadline for student applications is April 3, 2009 at 19:00 UTC, so you don’t have much time to get your application in.

Among the items proposed are three that really excite me.

WordPress News Report: iPhone, Widgets API, WordCamps in Hong Kong and China, International WordPress.tv

This week’s Blog Herald WordPress News is WordPress News: iPhones Up, WordPress Widgets API, 2.8 Delayed, International WordPress.tv, and More, and I’ve covered a lot of WordPress news you can use:

iPhone for WordPress is in the iTunes store. WordPress Widgets will use new Widgets API as of WordPress 2.8. Security authentication will improve with OAuth in future versions. WordPress 2.8 delayed. WordCamps in Hong Kong and China coming up. International languages embraced on WordPress.tv. And more WordPress news, tips, resources, and help.

If you missed last week’s edition on the Blog Herald, it was WordPress News: Plugins Reach Milestone, New WordPress Community Project, Help to Search for WordPress Help.

I am working with the editor of the Blog Herald to change the look and style of the Blog Herald WordPress News. I’d love your input here or on the announcement regarding potential changes and input. The Blog Herald WordPress News is designed to meet the needs of the WordPress Community, so help us help you blog better with WordPress.

Here are some highlights for this week you do not want to miss, followed by WordPress Events, WordCamps, and Meetups coming soon.