Weekly Digest: End of Two Months of Guest Bloggers, More WordPress Tips, and Heading to Reno, Israel, and Seattle

This weekend is the last of the two month celebration of the two year anniversary of WordPress.com and this blog. For the past two months, I’ve opened this blog up to guest bloggers from around the blogosphere, sharing their thoughts and expertise on blogging and WordPress tips and techniques. It has been amazing. I’ve learned so much and hopefully, you’ve learned a lot, too.

This is the Weekly Digest from Lorelle on WordPress. To subscribe to the Weekly Digest category of Lorelle on WordPress, you can subscribe by the Weekly Digest feed or by email with the Weekly Digest Email Subscription to stay up to date on what is happening in Lorelle’s world of WordPress and blogging.

Last week’s issue of my weekly digest was Weekly Digest: WordPress Tips Month, Grateful to Guest Bloggers, WordPress 2.3.

What’s Happening with Lorelle on WordPress

WordPress.com 2 year anniversary party Celebrating Blogging and WordPress: Our two month party is coming to an end this weekend, after a month of WordPress Tips by myself and some of the best of the best in WordPress. I’ve been so honored and humbled by my guest bloggers, and all of the supportive readers leaving comments, asking questions, and making my guests feel welcome and at home on my blog. Our blog. That’s what I’m feeling. It’s been a great party and I have so many new friends, I really feel blessed. Thank you to all.

Here are some of the great WordPress tips we’ve offered throughout September:

Creating a Clickable Header in Your WordPress Theme by me covers the challenge I had of creating the header for this blog, using a background image and expanding the blog title link to encompass the whole header area, not just the h1 tag of the blog title.
5 Advanced Techniques for Creating Plugins and Widgets for WordPress.com by Engtech of Internet Duct Tape lists five great tips and techniques for pushing WordPress.com beyond its limits with Firefox Greasemonkey scripts and so much more. If you think WordPress.com blogs are for the blog-illiterate, his article will turn your head around and please geeks and teckies alike.
When Akismet Goes Bad: What to do when Akismet starts spamming your own comments is another great post by Engtech of Internet Duct Tape covering some of the concerns people have about Akismet’s false/positives, and the issue of having your comments captured by Akismet, as well as features some the powerful Akismet Auntie-Spam Greasemonkey Script which is my life saver when dealing with vast amounts of comment spam in Akismet.
Converting a Newsletter Into a Blog is an article series I did for the Blog Herald on helping a small business women’s membership group make the switch from a newsletter mailed and emailed to members to producing the same content on a blog, saving printing and postage and moving into the digital age.
5 Most Useful Administrative Plugins For WordPress by John Pozadizes introduces many to five powerful WordPress Plugins that will help speed up your administrative tasks and movement around the Admin Panels.
WordPress Tips: Previewing Your Post in WordPress takes a look at some options, pros and cons, of how to preview your draft post in WordPress.
The 3 Easiest Ways to Speed Up WordPress by John Pozadizes gives some simple and easy-to-do tips to help speed up your WordPress blog.
Tags Arrive on WordPress.com Blogs offers tips and information for WordPress.com and full version WordPress blogs on the new tagging feature.
Heads Up News on WordPress 2.3 lists news and resources to help you prepare your WordPress blog, WordPress Theme, and WordPress Plugin for the upcoming release of WordPress 2.3.
Banning a WordPress Spammer With .htaccess: John Pozadzides takes another stab at stopping a nasty commenter and comment spammer with a nice tutorial on blocking users with the .htaccess file.
Are You Abusing Your WordPress Pages – and Your Blog? Pages are for “static” information about your blog like who you are, how to contact you, and other information. Posts are for content. This post looks at how people are confusing posts and Pages, turning their Pages into posts.
Fighting Comment Spam: WordPress Comments Mass Edit Mode: More tips for fighting comment spam, I explore the power of the Comments Mass Edit Mode, helping you tackle dozens of comment spam quick and painlessly – at least for you.
Checking WordPress for Comment Spam That Slips By You: Dealing with comment spam on your blog is tough, but some do manage to slip through. I offer some quick tips on how to search regularly for comment spam keywords to make sure no comment spam reaches your reading audience.
WordPress Tip: Writing Customized Post Headlines, Title Tags, And Permalinks: Mohsin at Blogging Bits covers a top of tips dealing with writing customized post titles and more on using the Post Slug.
Is Your Site Ready for the New Mobile Internet?: Douglas Bell tackles the issue that confronts all of us: Is your blog ready for the mobile web? He helps us understand how our blogs are viewed on cell phones and iPhones and how you can improve your blog’s mobile viewing quality.
Attack of the Mean Commenter: Blocking Commenters and Comments on Your WordPress Blog: Do you have a mean commenter, one who just enjoys saying vicious and nasty things? There are some easy tips for preventing your vicious reader from commenting, or even viewing your blog, or worse.
Protecting Your WordPress Blog: I take a look at the various ways you can boost your blog’s security and improve your chances of avoiding being hacked or invaded.
WordPress Tip: How to Display a Specific Post Anywhere You Want: Want to feature a post on your blog anywhere in your WordPress Theme? This tip by Mohsin at Blogging Bits will show you how to do it easily.
Kubrick and K2 WordPress Themes: Collection of Theme Tips: There are a lot of tips around the web for working with Kubrick (aka, Default Theme, K2, etc) WordPress Theme, but I dug up some of the best of the best to help you tweak and customize a Theme based upon the Default WordPress Theme.
Using WordPress Categories To Style Posts: Abhijit Nadgouda of ifacethoughts helps us customize any post by category, allowing you to change how a post is viewed on multi-post page views so it stands out visually by category “style”.
How to Turn Off Snap Preview on WordPress Blogs: Many find Snap Preview, now called “Snap Shots”, annoying, so I offer a basic guide to help WordPress and WordPress.com users turn it off.
Write Today, Post Tomorrow: Using Post Timestamp: Dawud Miracle of dmiracle.com reminds of us of the powerful “future posts” feature of WordPress, which gives you a ton of freedom with your blog to post blog posts ahead of time so they will automatically publish when you want them to, so you can work, play, and not babysit your blog constantly.
Displaying the Date in Your WordPress Theme: The time and date plays an important role in your WordPress Theme. In the byline or post meta section, it tells readers when the post was published. It can also be used elsewhere to provide chronological or date information about your blog and blog post with these tips.
Understanding The WordPress Post Title and Post Slug: I dig into the post title and post slug issues with tips on how and when to change the post title and post slug of your blog posts.
Microformats and WordPress Themes: Ever wonder about what microformats are? Otto of Nothing to See Here introduces us to them and how to use and incorporate them into our blogs so browsers and other online services can take advantage of these “address forms” and other embedded information. If you don’t know what these are now, you will have to get to know them soon. Start early.
WordPress.com Tip: Get Your Own WordPress.com Email: If you have a WordPress.com blog and you want an email address that connects with that blog, I’ve written some tips on creating a “WordPress.com-like” email address and account.

The guest bloggers have been putting on their best party outfits and bringing forward the best of their best for you and me, and we’re having a great time. I hate seeing this two month long party comes to an end.

Besides you, the party goers so far include:

Greg Balanko-Dickson, The Remote control CEO

Edrei Zahari of Footsteps in the Mirror

Engtech of Internet Duct Tape

Jan of Circular Communication

Daniel Brusilovsky of Apple Universe

John Pozadzides of One Man’s Blog

Michael Hampton of Homeland Stupidity and Bad Behavior

Battling Referrer Spam

Abhijit Nadgouda of ifacethoughts

J.T Dabbagian of JTDabbagian.com

Pelf Nyok of pelf-ism is contagious

Dawud Miracle of dmiracle.com

Douglas Bell of Webmacster87.info, PreviewCast, and phpBB Weekly

Mohsin at Blogging Bits

There have been a few little bits of news and information not related to the two month celebration:

Douglas Bell Interviews Lorelle – Excellent! Douglas Bell reports on a podcast interview he and I did a couple weeks ago, published this week. I had so much fun and was so impressed by the interviewing and conversational skill of this talented teenager, I was surprised when he shared how much he learned and enjoyed the conversation, too. I’m honored. We need to look out for this young man. He is a future leader of the Internet, without a doubt.
Weekly Digest: WordPress Tips Month, Grateful to Guest Bloggers, WordPress 2.3 is last week’s issue of my weekly digest.
Tags Arrive on WordPress.com Blogs covers the new arrival of tags on WordPress.com blogs in time for a little testing before the Monday release of WordPress 2.3.
Heads Up News on WordPress 2.3 covers a wide range of news and resources on WordPress 2.3.

Lorelle’s News

Lorelle at WordCamp Israel: It’s official. I’m heading to Israel after the Reno conference to participate in WordCamp Israel on October 25, 2007 in Tel Aviv (English). It’s so exciting. If you live in the Middle East, specifically in Israel, or nearby, get signed up fast. The conference will be in English and Hebrew and will be a powerful WordPress and blogging experience for all.

Lorelle in Reno in October: The Conservative Leadership Conference is hosting “RIGHTOBERFEST” in Reno, Nevada, October 11-13 and I’m one of the workshop leaders. I’m scheduled to present two programs, one on WordPress and another on blogging tips. There is limited seating, so get your registration in as soon as possible for this huge event which will bring together bloggers, political commentators, and politicians from around the United States.

WordPress Podcast: I was invited to participate in two episodes of the WordPress Podcast with Charles Stricklin and Aaron Brazell and both podcasts have been released. Episode 29: Lorelle and WordPress 2.3 covered the upcoming release of WordPress 2.3, news from WordPress.com, my book, and a lot of WordPress news and tips. Episode 30: Weblog Tools Collection Plugin Competition Winners covered the winners of the Weblog Tools Collection 2007 Plugin Competition, and more news about WordPress 2.3. It was great fun and if you are missing out on the WordPress Podcast, you are missing some great WordPress news, tips, and tricks!

Douglas Bell and Lorelle on PreviewCast: The interview I did two weeks ago on PreviewCast with Douglas Bell is out. PreviewCast #044: What Podcasters Won’t Tell You About Blogging. We discussed blogging tips, my start with Lorelle on WordPress, personal blogging, how advertising changes blogs, family history and genealogy, and my new book. Douglas and I had so much fun, we lost track of time. Thank goodness, he finally paid attention. We could have gone on forever, it was so much fun.

American Business Women’s Association Regional Conference in Seattle: November 3, 2007, will see me in Seattle as the keynote speaker for the regional meeting of the American Business Women’s Associations regional chapters. I’ll be talking about blogging, specifically about working on the web with a blog to support your business through social interaction, networking, search engines, and reputation-building. If you are interested in attending, let me know. There are a few tickets left for this dinner event, but the response has been so great, they are working on a fundraising event open to the public featuring me babbling about how to blog, possibly for the early Spring.

Blogger and Podcaster Magazine: The current issue of Blogger and Podcaster Magazine features an article I’ve written on the mistakes and overlooked tips that I’ve found some veteran and top notch bloggers overlook, helping you to learn how to do these invaluable things on your blog to help your SEO, accessibility and web standards, and increase your readership and traffic. Next month, I’m writing an article on creating a blogging editorial calendar to help you find, build, and plan your blog’s content, with another one coming in a future issue on blog writing tips and how to improve your blog writing skills.

Problems with Taking Your Camera on the Road: The web host from hell and I are in major dispute over the “quick-and-easy” termination of services and transfer of my main sites. Unfortunately, these people don’t know their heads from their…fill in the blank. So yes, I know there are problems with my main site and genealogy site. Hopefully, this will be resolved soon without legal action. Currently, Taking Your Camera on the Road and Lorelle’s Family History Blog are up and running, but the games my former host is playing weary me, and so expect anything until this two month ordeal is finally resolved.

Blogging Tips: What Bloggers Won’t Tell You About Blogging

I will be traveling extensively for the next couple months on behalf of my popular book, “Blogging Tips: What Bloggers Won’t Tell You About Blogging”, and the orders are coming in faster than ever. Amazing.

If you will be attending one of the events, workshops, and programs where I’m speaking, you can buy your own copy and save some postage and handling. If you want your own copy now, you can order it still at the introductory price, you can order it from SplashPress or the new Blog Herald Bookstore.

For more information on the book, see the original announcement and a recent update with reviews and other information, as well as the Blogging Tips Book official page.

Most Popular Articles on Lorelle on WordPress

The most popular posts on Lorelle on WordPress these past few weeks were:

Blasts From the Past

This issue, I thought I’d reach back into the nine months of blogging on the Blog Herald to see what blasts from the past I’ve written there to tickle your fancy:

Blog Herald Columns

I finished my article series for the Blog Herald on converting your newsletter into a blog, a great look at how to think through the process of turning a newsletter from a small business, individual, or organization into a blog, saving time and money, and involving more members.

Converting a Newsletter Into a Blog Series

Other articles on the Blog Herald included:

What Does It Really Take to Blog? asks the question about what it really takes to blog and how to answer the question.
Are You Blogging What You Should Be Blogging? tackles a very important issue in blogging: Are you blogging about what you should be blogging? Are you writing topics that encourage your passion for blogging, or blogging about what think you should or are told to blog about.
Are You Helping the Searchers Find Your Blog? tackles an issue that is near and dear to my heart: Writing with keywords. If you aren’t helping those who are searching find your blog by writing with keyword-rich content, then why bother?
List Links: Can’t I Google For These Myself? was written in response to a commenter who asked why I published a list of links to technical articles in a recent blog post. He said, “Why bother? Can’t I Google these for myself?” Good question, and I and my readers ask themselves the same question.

Some recent weekly WordPress Wednesday News reports included:

Lorelle’s Linkworthy Links

This is the Weekly Digest of Lorelle on WordPress.
Subscribe to Lorelle on WordPress Weekly Digest Weekly Digest Email Subscription
Subscribe to Lorelle on WordPress Via Feedburner Email Subscription
Copyright Protected and Reserved – If you are reading this post outside of your feed reader or Lorelle on WordPress, the usage of this content is a violation of copyright and the DMCA. Please report it immediately so action can be taken against them. If you are using this content illegally, and you know who you are, consider this a cease and desist order.
Lorelle VanFossen is a member of WordPress, WordPress.com, the 9Rules Network, and author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won’t Tell You About Blogging.

2 Comments

JOSEPH

Posted October 2, 2007 at 12:03 am | Permalink

Your blog is very nice. Could you tell me how you have done it?
Im looking for good way to work with wordpress.
thanks.

Lorelle VanFossen

Posted October 2, 2007 at 10:33 pm | Permalink

How it’s done? Um, read my blog? It’s a WordPress.com blog, which means I have no control over any aspect of the blog except for a few sidebar widgets, what I put into the post content area, and the “look”. I cannot add WordPress Plugins, customize the template files, or dig into the core programming. What you see is really what there is. The rest is just good writing.

But my blog is stuffed with tons of tips and techniques to help answer that question. Enjoy.