Helping You Rock Out Your Site Like A Rockstar!

I had been looking for a decent player for a client’s website and tried quite a few until I came across WordPress Audio Player. The plugin was developed by Martin Laine It is currently on version 2.0 beta 6. The plugin WILL work in WordPress 2.8.6.

To install, you can simply look up ‘WordPress Audio Player’ in your WordPress admin under Plugins> Add New or go to the WordPress Plugin directory and download so you can manual install.

One of the issues I came across and this was actually something that came up in the WordPress forum is the fact that the player might not show up or the following message was seen in place of where the player was suppose to be:

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

To remedy this, I simply added the following snippet of code in my header.php file of my theme before the body tag.


<?php wp_head(); ?>


and the following in footer before the ending body tag.


<?php wp_footer(); ?>


After that, the player worked great.

One other issue noted was that you could not properly insert the image from your WordPress admin panel. Although you could upload your audio file to your Media gallery, inserting the file was not working. I resorted to manually inserting the file, which was really easy to do.

Example:
[audio:your-audio-file-name.mp3]

You can insert single files or multiple files and it works great. Other than a few kinks to work out, I find this plugin very useful and recommend it.

Have you tried WordPress Audio Player out? What do you think?

I had been noticing some of the things streaming around twitter involving suing for tweeting something and such. In fact Chris Voss (on Twitter) has a video blog called Rude Tweets or Blogging Can Get You Sued – Video. The New York Times covered the fact that Courtney Love had been sued for saying defamatory things a designer in their article Short Outbursts on Twitter? #Big Problem.

I am not entirely into agreeance with Chris on those, but even the ‘golden rule’ is not used of day by day. Some instances are where the social network user or blogger may say something that is true. In the case that what is said is not libelous or defamatory toward a company, individual or brand, you are within your rights to say what you like.

Forgive me on this, but I will give an example. Calling someone a petty bitch is not libelous. It is a matter of opinion. However, if you say that someone is a liar, like the Courtney Love Twitter debacle, you could face serious backlash: being sued, fired, blacklisted from a career, and overall – damage your reputation.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is a civil liberties group that covers the internet users rights. This includes bloggers. Their section on Bloggers Rights is indepth and insightful. In fact the EFF covers Bloggers Rights well in their article How to Blog Safely (About Work or Anything Else) which talk about scenarios for certain bloggers whether they should or should not blog.

So, although you should really not say anything negative about anyone, you really should think about how it is said. If it is not true – do not write it or you could risk your credibility as a respected blogger.

Have you ever gotten in trouble for blogging?

Recently Weblog Tools Collection published an article called Pinging Your Own Blog Posts? Good or Bad? Basically, it is arguing the side that pinging your own blog is bad.

According to Wikipedia:

A pingback is one of three types of linkbacks, methods for Web authors to request notification when somebody links to one of their documents. This enables authors to keep track of who is linking to, or referring to their articles.

That means, you write a post and possibly use a link in reference to another post whether within your blog or to another blog – also known as an internal link or external link. Pinging your own links is not necessarily a bad thing unless your posts are already filled with spam, and linked to other posts with spam within in it. As already mentioned in my article Crossposting: Pros, Cons, and Etiquette, Google penalizes for spam, not penalizing internal linking or duplicate content, so Weblog Tools was not entirely according to Google’s policy changes. Though duplicate content and internal linking is not the same, the principle is. It also makes sense that this is okay as bloggers use some type of related post plugin for their blog, which links to 3 similar topics, not necessarily the one you may have internally linked within your blog.

Though pingbacks really do not deliver any content other than to notify that your post has been referenced either internally or externally as according to the WordPress Codex’s description of a pingback, it can be a great tool to help your readers learn more, especially when your site may contain valuable information that is of interest to anyone (ex – related posts plugin or internal link.)

Matt cuts talks about PageRank sculpting talks more about letting links flow, whether internally or externally. It is up to the webmaster to make some type of balance, meaning that you as the blogger will have to make sure to reference outside sources more (which is great for you and the person you are linking), while also linking internally to posts that are of similar interest and carrying on the topic so readers looking for more information will either stay or go to the sources that you are referencing. So, in using the Nofollow method within your own blog, you are basically saying that you do not vouch for your own posts, right? That does not sound like a confident blogger at all.

Do you use pingbacks? What are your views on using pingbacks?

As a few know (and for those who do not, now you do know), I intern for the wiki named FanHistory.com. Unfortunately in the past they were banned from Digg because of apparent spamming, and partially past wankage (wank), this is a case based on a past grudge. This was done originally as one of those ‘I am excited to have a site, but not exactly aware of how to properly promote my content.’

However, after some time, I thought that I would contact Digg and ask them to reconsider their stance, since I could not even bookmark some of FanHistory’s blog entries. Although it seemed I received a human response about reconsidering, I am willing to bet that no matter even if FanHistory becomes a very informational resource (which it has become to an extent. Example: There was an article called Trending Topics: 5 Ways Companies Used News Trends for Business Success on Mashable not long ago), that Digg may have been just have looked, replied, and then deleted.

In fact, this is the reply I got (and Digg was great at replying promptly, just so you know):

Does Digg differentiate between spam and spamming?

Spam is very subjective. Many times, the spammer honestly doesn’t think they are spammers, so we generally leave that up to the Digg community to decide with the report/bury feature. We may delete users who blatantly and consistently submit obvious spam. Additionally, comment spam is against our TOS and will result in an account ban or deletion, depending on the severity. Submission spamming is different because it may be quality content but the submitter is “spamming” every story from their blog/site. While we welcome users to submit their own content, overdoing it often incites the users to mark the user as a spammer, the site as a spam site, and otherwise decent content as blogspam. We recommend considering this before you engage in this activity. Remember, if domains are consistently buried and reported as spam, the site may be
banned.

Because unblocking your domain would not be in line with the best interests of the larger Digg community, we cannot reverse this decision. But we’ll take your feedback into consideration.

So basically Digg even says that submitting your own blog content to Digg on your own account can be considered blog spam by them. Now, I can see spamming off topic material that constantly asks people to purchase something is definitely spam. However, good articles… what is the point if you cannot get your own content out there in the community. Also, you cannot like your own posts and submit them?

So I guess I should come to a point about this by now. Be careful about what and how you bookmark your articles on any social bookmark site. When you sign up, read the site’s terms of service. Even if you think it is dumb, it could save you a headache later on. Ignorance may not save you from an being unbanned later down the road because the site rules are available and easily accessible. In fact, these services do not try to hide them because if they did, it could look bad.

Should social bookmarking places like Digg look further into what classifies as blog spam? What do you think?

(Note: This is not an attack on Digg. I like their services, but I think more should be done in the area of classifying spam.)

People preach password protection by citing online resources to either signup or download. Personally, I would stay away from them. A lot of these programs and places require that you put in answers to personal security questions, your birthday, and more. However, as we have seen from time to time, there has been hackings of the best internet companies out there, including the Twitter hacking a couple months ago that TechCrunch revealed to the world.

You should not rely on these services to do this for you, even if it is a matter of convenience. Yes, it is great, but are you willing to still risk your information being blown to bit. Even people are being hacked by their own family and friends. Now, this post is not to make you leery of your own family and friends, but to share with you that it is a possibility as it has happened. Some people literally live online and they have signed up to dozens of different sites: social networking, gaming, shopping, banking, etc. I hear a lot of people every day talking about losing passwords or getting hacked and I guess today I finally decided that it was time to address the matter. Here are some ways to help:

1. Keep a ‘black’ book, some kind of offline written documentations of the sites you have joined. Record username, password, and security questions.

2. Passwords – It may be frustrating, but if you have to make up a strong password. Use a combination of lowercase letters, uppercase letters, and numbers. For those with access to the root of their servers whether it is theirs or purchased through a webhost, you can also include symbols. (cPanel users have this ability.) Make those passwords no less than 8 characters.

3. Security Questions – Even if it says ‘Who is your favorite uncle?’, do not put your uncle’s name. Try a separate type of password other than your chosen password for your account. Make it difficult for even those who may know some things about you.

4. Try to avoid clicking the box that says ‘remember my password.’ Log in each time and remember to clear your cache if you have not set your computer to automatically clear cache (computer cookies – remembers information you send.)

5. Always make sure the service you enter is not collecting passwords. If you are not sure – avoid.

6. Try not to document your passwords to an Excel file unless you password protect that file.

7. Try not to always use the same password for everything.

These are just a few suggestions. What other suggestions do you have?

Although some might say it is debatable and say there is no such thing as having a blog post so long it deters your visitors away, the fact is – it CAN be harmful to your site do produce extensive articles. The reason for this that a lot of times your first time visitors may find it daunting to see the majority of your articles go on and on. Some only have so much time, while others are wanting you to go straight to the point. Then, there are those who are your regular followers – some will just skim your article, comment and might even miss the whole point.

You do not want that to happen. You want to be able to influence your visitors enough that they might learn something, or add their own knowledge to the kettle.

On the other hand, if you produce short articles, you could be failing to deliver vital information or even touching your topic so it delivers your message as you want. I have mentioned this from time to time, but articles should be targeted to reach a word count between 200 and 700 words. Any more, and you may need to decide if the topic truly needs all that information you are jamming in it, or consider writing an essay and placing it as a section within your site for those interested. Of course, if you are passionate about it, you could always make an ebook out of it, since that has been the craze these days (that I noticed.)

However, if there is a topic that you could break into several sections to convey each point – you should consider that option. With something like the Yet Another Related Posts Plugin for WordPress users, it will keep your visitors on your site or they could bookmark the posts and read them when they have time.

How long do you think posts should be? How short?

It is inevitable. There will be people who eventually visit your website and try to cause havoc. Whether it is a ‘hit-and-run’ where they visit once and never return, or have been regularely lurking, you can take several actions. Some of what I suggest are quite progressive, while others are not. Flaming is a form of harassment. Often it is stemmed from jealousy, or boredom – at least from my experience in handling them.

Just in case, for those who do not know, according to Wikipedia:

Flaming is a hostile and insulting interaction between Internet users. Flaming usually occurs in the social context of a discussion board, Internet Relay Chat (IRC), by e-mail or on Video-sharing websites.

Here are ways to handle this type of behavior when you are faced with it:

1. Ignore and delete flamers who comment. Even if a commenter is persistent, you can ignore or delete their comment. If you are a blogger who allows any type of comments to be posted, that is fine. Regardless, whether you ignore or delete, without response back, the flamer will eventually get bored.
2. Even if a commenter is persistent, you can find out who their Internet Provider (ISP) is according to their Internet Protocol (IP). If your blog records IP addresses for commenters, you can apply the xx.xx.xxx.xxx (example) to an application like SamSpade.org. Once you have found their internet provider, you can email the ISP with the user, evidence of their harassment (screenshot or if you have left their response up on you live website), and your complaint.

I know, only two, but really, you can either ignore or do something about it. If the harassment involves threats to you or your family, you will have a definite case. Remember, some of these people might have nothing better to do with their time then mess with other people, so it is better to not give them the fuel to continue their charades.

Have you ever had a flamer visit and comment on your site? What steps did you take to deter them or did you do anything?

I had the most interesting encounter in Reddit recently with a user who accused me of blog spam. Of course, having a slight understanding of what the term was, but not that it was a real term, I decided to do a little research. I know this might sound a bit know-it-all, but I am almost certain other bloggers have run into these type of users who really have no idea what spamming entails, especially in regards to blogging and using social media in the social networking and social bookmarking communities. In fact, not one, but 2 of my articles that were top roundups about WordPress layouts I found that were handy for certain webmasters looking for those type of themes were accused the the same user.

So, here is what I found and how not to blog spam.

According to Wikipedia,

Spam in blogs (also called simply blog spam or comment spam) is a form of spamdexing. It is done by automatically posting random comments or promoting commercial services to blogs, wikis, guestbooks, or other publicly accessible online discussion boards.

In my case, I manually bookmark and share my links, or my visitors graciously do this, so in my case, and since my posts really have not been commercial in nature do not constitute as such. You are within your rights to share your blog or other links in any social network or social bookmarking system. In fact, most of their services highly encourage it, but they also warn about spamming. So it is a use at your risk type of situation. If the article is not yours, you are required to give credit, but you are still able to share those links anywhere.

It is when you post unrelated material to those networks and keep doing so in a manner that may be assumed that you are trying to force people to go to that link. No matter if your articles or the ones you plug are commercial or not, you have to be certain that others will not take offense to such material. For example, in Twitter, there are users that will send you reply messages and try to get you to try their product. After further look into the matter, you will find that the person has contacted many other users with the same or similar message. That is spam. Even if the message is to go to a blog, that is blog spam.

You could also create this when publishing paid to blog articles as well. How? Well, if your sponsored posts have no relevancy to your site’s focus, some of your visitors may feel that you are spamming them. Make sure to choose paid post opportunities that fit as closely to your blog’s niche.

What constitutes as blog spam to you? What other suggestions can you make to avoid the possibility of blog spamming? Have you ever been accused of spamming with your blog?