Helping You Rock Out Your Site Like A Rockstar!

WP-FollowFriday for Twitter is a plugin that allows you to select the people you would like to recommend for #FollowFriday. However, when setting this up, I ran into some issues.

It does not ask for a password like in Twitter tools or any authorization. So, how will this connect to the user? I believe more thought and possibly allowing users connect with their Twitter account, and select users would be better. Also, I am the administrator of my blog. Somehow the plugin was telling me I did not have sufficient access to use the plugin.

Also, here is another issue, Follow Friday is not just about listing names. It is about also saying why you recommend a person to be followed. This plugin would allow people who already do not get the concept of #FollowFriday and there would literally be lists of icons, rather than why people should be followed, especially if the list has many.

This also could run into some load time issues with the blog (if the plugin were to work and the people using it list – say 50 people to follow), this would put a little strain on the Twitter API, and frankly as Twitter is known to fail whale or go down lately, or even freeze up, this plugin is not necessarily something I recommend using.

I believe this is a first time I am not recommending a plugin for use, but that is what a review is all about. Unless it is brought back to the drawing board to deal with the user unfriendliness, and altering it to be practical for those who would use the plugin as it should, then I would recommend it. I can give credit to Fabien Bouchard for at least trying to accomplish something like this to make #FollowFriday recommendations unique and easier.

Have you tried this plugin? How has it worked for you?

Andy Peatling, announced BuddyPress 1.1 Released on September 30, 2009. There were a few updated to the core and now the social network platform offers:

• One click internal bbPress forum integration
• global forum directory
• Easier theme integration
• More freedom for administrators to control their site
• Allow plug developers to hook their BuddyPress installation into outside web services
• Group API to extend features.

as well as a few more attributes. The one-click install for the bbPress integration is something that I have particularly looking forward too as it is just less hassle than installing the files and then the plugin to fit it into the site. I have been working on my own installation for my class reunion site so we have a central place to talk, rather than use Facebook to sort through all the messages. Although I can say the class reunion was a success in September 2009, many people were informed last minute even though they were online to find out about the event.

Also, loading new themes had been quite the struggle for me in the past. In fact, even based on the FAQs and reading the forums on BuddyPress, I still had to wing a few things to get my theme working correctly, so this is a true relief.

I still wonder when BuddyPress might become available for a one-click install for webhosts to offer their clients (example: cPanel’s Fantastico Deluxe.)

Have you tried out BuddyPress? What do you think?

HookPress is a plugin that allows create POST webbooks to publish material or send push notifications to other sites, like making your own Twitter Tools without the plugin itself. So, in a way, you are just about making your own plugin. You can use PHP, Python, Perl or any code language.

You can use it to can take the content through WordPress filters and publish it in a unique way. Michael Yoshitaka Erlewine aka Mitcho, created the post and explains more about it in his video, which I embedded below.

The plugin is easy to install and you can one-click install it through your own WordPress admin panel. If you do install it, or have already, feel free to drop by and share your creations. It is very exciting to see how people are using this to make their WordPress-core site more versatile. As for using, based on the video, and using my own hook to try something other then my Twitter Tools plugin (which means I when I went to publish, I had to click the ‘no’ to publish to Twitter with Twitter Tools), it was also quite easy to get working. Once I published my first tweet with this, I actually got a bit giddy at the prospect that I could do things I normally do with plugins the countless plugins I have installed in the past.

By the way, I think Twitter Tools is great. I just like trying new things. You cannot always rely on plugins, but not all of use are super code ninjas, so they help a ton. However, this alternative way uses what you already have without loading more files to your webspace for plugins and calling any unnecessary functions.

Have you installed HookPress? If so, have you used it?

So, I guess I should make it at least official. Blogrity is a social bookmark site built with the WordPress core. Of course, the site is pretty raw on design, but it is functional, and I am hoping that some of you might try signing up and submit your links to the site. I am just at the point that I need people to try it out, feel free to give some imput, and hopefully through that, I can add more features.

One thing on mind once I get to a comfortable point, I develop and will offer up to my own ‘digg’ type button that you can bring back to your website, or perhaps offer it to the other places like Sociable or that like so bookmarking your links will be easier.

For categories, I am not going to get too detailed on the categories. I would like them to not exactly resemble Digg’s categories where sometimes the article might not fit. I will be open to adding more general categories. I want to thank Webmasterish for some of the help provided along the way to get to this point. In fact, I probably should have mentioned the site before.

Do you think you might try out Blogrity?

Tumblr seems to be a nice little system that you can sign up and blog, share your twitter tweets, and import posts from other services. I recently signed up and perhaps it is because of their recent infastructure work on September 14th, the site loaded slowly, and frankly when it did load, I would have turned people to WordPress.com’s free blog accounts.

I have always expressed spreading out and signing up for different social handles online, but I believe it best that if you have a full blog, to just import your posts to your Tumblr account rather than use it religiously. I found it not as user friendly as I would have liked to see, and that is something I look forward too, not the fact that I was running in circles trying to find out why the places I am importing there did not start posting after the hour that Tumblr tells its users to wait. I got faster cross-posting with my Dreamwidth.org account.

I am sure I will blog more about Tumblr in the near future, but right now, especially for bloggers who are active, it is just better to use as an extra place to spread your blog posts and social network streams.

Have you used Tumblr? What do you think of it? What do you use it for?

A couple of months ago, P2 was mentioned at WordCamp Chicago (and I am sure it was mentioned at a few other WordCamps before that by Matt Mullenweg.

It is a way to integrate microblogging and regular blogging. Or you can use it by itself. For those who are regular bloggers, this is an extra way you can harness your blog’s power. How? Well, for example, you might come across something interesting, but only have a brief thought to share with your readers. You can not only engage your readers in checking out what you were reading, but encourage them to join in and share their own thoughts.

It gives more of the dynamic of group blogging in a way that not many would really think about doing. Below is the video describing P2′s features. I recommend taking a look.

P2 was announced in March 2009 as P2: The New Prologue as Prologue was introduced a little over a year before. Although it is not like Twitter, it has real time capabilities, but with comment threading, RSS feeds, and many other great features.

Do you use P2 already? What do you think about it if you do? If not, do you think P2 might be something that you might want to use?

I am as much a Facebook addict as I am a Twitter addict, and it did not take TechCrunch in their article Facebook Tweaks Design, Drops Rounded Corners to tell me the notices about Facebooks design tweaks.

Already with every application and module a person adds to their profile, along with all the followers (I currently have over 1600 followers/ friends at Facebook), load time can get a bit bulky. Sometimes I even get the Facebook timeout connection too. Kind of reminds me of the Twitter Fail Whale. Yay, and I say congrats to the person who though rounded corners in Facebook would really be an asset, but really – keep it simple.

With the ridiculous and non-relevant advertisements, plus the applications, it is insane. Just in case those of you were not aware, there was an application to be able to change your Facebook background, but you had to download a toolbar. There are others than ask you to add a person, invite your friends to the group, and go to some chatroom to get the link to add your background. That is insane. It should be simple and not involve anything but adding the application itself. I decided to avoid that application like the plague because I really do not want another toolbar on my computer and I am really afraid of what the load time would be even though I have cable internet.

Although I would love to pretty up my Facebook, I am content with what it looks like. Getting fancy with a product like Facebook will degrade it and make it look like MySpace, the immature reject of Facebook.

What kind of design tweaks do you think Facebook should consider trying? What should be added? What should be removed?

I have to agree with TechCrunch’s article Right Before Facebook Bought It, FriendFeed’s Real-Time Stream Saw A Flood Of Usage, that I had no clue why it was bought. Kind of reminds me how no one knows why Yahoo! is shutting down Geocities. In fact, I recall Robert Scoble asking who would leave Friendfeed after Facebook had just bought the site. According to the Friendfeed blog – FriendFeed accepts Facebook friend request, things will go on as usual until future plans are decided… or at least that was the gist of it that I got from reading.

So, will yet another social network service go mainstream? Who knows, but I guess until Facebook actually does something with Friendfeed, then until any plans are revealed, we can only hope that Friendfeed does not become integrated into Facebook like so many services that have been bought up by Yahoo and Google.

I wonder if the Sherman Anti-trust Act might have to be enforced with these Internet companies? Or perhaps I am thinking too much into it. I already use both services, but I wonder if Friendfeed will eventually be phased out, forcing using to just use Facebook?

What do you think? Do you use Friendfeed? What do you use it for? Do you see the site either becoming more mainstream or being phased out?