Here’s one I’ve been meaning to link up to for 24 hours now (I’m getting absent minded in my old age). Andy Hagans wrote a good post on his Blog Buying Checklist. It has a good list of things to consider and look for when looking to buy a blog and trying to determine it’s value. Andy knows what he’s talking about having just bought a blog on SitePoint.
Written on 12/22/2005 at 4:05 pm by
BlogKits Announces They’re Back…. Almost
Jim from BlogKits (a blog ad system that went on hiatus for the past few months) has just posted that BlogKits Is Back! and to expect an announcement on the system in the new year. It’ll be interesting to see what they’ve come up with – blog specific ad systems will always be difficult but hopefully they’ve come up with a winning formulae.
Written on 12/22/2005 at 2:54 pm by
Duncan goes Pro
My fellow Aussie and b5media director Duncan Riley from the Blog Herald has just announced that he’s become a Problogger. While I think this was always his goal it’s come a little sooner than he expected by the seems of things having being told this week that he’s being ‘restructured’ out of his full time job.
Duncan’s seeing this as an opportunity rather than a threat and is throwing himself into blogging with everything he’s got in 2006. All the best with it Duncan!
Written on 12/22/2005 at 2:46 pm by
Kinja Relaunches
Kinja has relaunched. It’s a Gawker service that incorporates elements of an RSS reader with some other interesting web tools. In a sense it’s also a blog directory. I’ve never been a big user of it because I have other tools which do everything it does and to be honest I’ve always been a bit confused about what it’s main purpose is.
Having said that – I’m sure it will be useful for some and the relaunch is a real improvement on the previous incarnation with lots of new tools and a nice redesign. Here’s the Kinja ProBlogger page.
found via lifehacker
Written on 12/22/2005 at 12:16 pm by
AdSense Begin Serving Themed Holiday Ads
Google AdSense have begun serving their special Holiday Ads to publishers who have elected to allow the themed ads to show on their sites.
The only problem is that the designs don’t take into any consideration the designs that the publisher already had on their site.
For example check out the following screen captures from my Digital Camera Blog which I just spotted the themed ads on.
First here is a screen cap of two of the themed ads. You’ll see they are a rather ‘blue’ design with the Christmas watermarks behind.
And now here is the design of the ads I designed and have put on my blog originally. You’ll notice they are much more blended and fit with the total design of the blog.
I wasn’t aware when i signed up for themed ads that the who ad would change like this – I’d though they would just serve my normal ads with watermarks. I’ll be interested to see how this impacts CTR in the next few days. Obviously not every AdSense ad is being served up with the themed ads which will make it hard to track their success from a publishers end.
Lastly I would have thought a red/green color combination might have been a little more Christmas like.
Written on 12/22/2005 at 9:29 am by
Clipmarks and Copyright
Has anyone ever heard of a site called Clipmarks? It’s a social bookmarking type site except they seem to give the full content of the pages being submitted. For instance here is a Clipmark of my 18 Lessons I have lernt about Blogging which has the full content of the article I wrote in a little scrollable box – including the comments! It even pulls in the images from my post. To give them credit they do give a link back etc – but I wonder if they’re going to get themselves in trouble reposting full posts from blogs etc.
They do have a copyright policy in place but it seems to heavily put the onus on the owner of the copyright to enforce it. It’s not just as simple as sending them a ‘please remove my content’ email. Here’s what you have to do:
If you believe that your work has been copied, framed or otherwise used in a Clipmark in a way that constitutes copyright infringement, or your intellectual property rights have been otherwise violated, please provide Amplify’s agent for notice of claims of copyright or other intellectual property infringement (“Copyright Agent”) the following information:
1. an electronic or physical signature of the person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of the copyright or other intellectual property interest;
2. a description of the copyrighted work or other intellectual property that you claim has been infringed;
3. a description of the material that you claim infringes on the intellectual property and the location of such material;
4. your address, telephone number, and email address;
5. a statement by you that you have a good faith belief that the disputed use is not authorized by the copyright or intellectual property owner, its agent, or the law;
6. a statement by you, made under penalty of perjury, that the information in your Notice is accurate and that you are the copyright or intellectual property owner or are authorized to act on the copyright or intellectual property owner’s behalf.
My reaction is not overly positive. I don’t mind excerpts of my content being reproduced but to have a full page reproduced goes too far. This is why I have partial RSS feeds. To set up a service that has at it’s heart the reproduction of others work seems to me to be an unwise move – I can just imagine the legal fights they will have on their hands.
What do you think?
Written on 12/22/2005 at 9:11 am by
More ProBlogger ‘Summer Series’ Guest Posts Needed
I’ve had some great submissions to the Write for ProBlogger ‘Summer Series’ post of a day or two back. There is still a few spots left though if you want to join in. I’ll extend the deadline for another 12 or so hours if you need the time.
Written on 12/22/2005 at 8:41 am by
WordPress on Yahoo
Looks like Yahoo are opening up even more options for bloggers and are now offering WordPress on their hosting packages in addition to MT. Read what Matt has to say about it at the WordPress Development Blog › WordPress on Yahoo
Written on 12/22/2005 at 4:14 am by
A Blog Award a Day….
It seems that at this time of year every second day brings another Blog Award. Today The Best of Blogs went live with yet another awards. Their categories are a bit more accessible to average bloggers than many awards and they are currently seeking nominations.
The other awards I came across today is the KBCafe Blog Award which opening voting today.
My name is Darren Rowse and I’m a full time Blogger making a living from blogs like 
