Google Buys Jaiku

…and inches a little further towards critical mass. This is definitely going to change things–what will all you Twitter-ites do?

Google has bought Finnish start-up Jaiku, which offers a mobile phone application that locates users and allows them to post short messages to a social network.

The news comes as rumours reach fever pitch that Google could launch a mobile phone, or mobile phone operating system as early as February 2008.

Of course, this doesn’t mean the absolute death of Twitter. There are instances where Google’s product is being outdone–Picasa/Flickr, Blogger/Wordpress. But in general they are heavy hitter in any market they enter. I think the mobile phone arena could actually use a good Googling.

As for me, I have to draw the line at text messaging and Twitter. Those are two things that seem absolutely pointless to me.

New Feed Subscriptions in September

Here are all of the new sites I added to my reader in September. When I say “new” I mean new to me in most cases.

Total Diatribe
If you were impressed with Billymacs ability to consume adult beverages, you’ll be even more impressed with his ability to find nutty stuff and add cleverly biting commentary. A new blog, and I’m expecting great things from it.

Donklephant
Here’s one I can’t believe I just found. A common sense moderate political blog. I don’t mean to imply that common sense can’t be found there, but usually only as it exists on the line between Democrat and Republican. Very pragmatic, as opposed to the, uh, idealism(?) you find here.

KTownLowDown
Another new blog authored by Little Bigfoot SVD. So far a lot of the lowdown that exists there is on a personal level, but he’s running a poll right now asking what you want him to blog about. One man, one vote. If you don’t like it, you had your chance to change it!

Ideas From Free Minds
I found out about Michelle’s blog after seeing her on Tucker Carlson’s show and wrote a post about her. My only complaint is that she doesn’t post enough–there was a huge opportunity to make this blog big when she appeared on TV. I hope she takes advantage of it!

Taylor the Teacher
As Taylor states on her site, she’s a philosophical anarchist who loves to help children learn. Sometimes the public education system even helps her in this endeavor.

TED
Technology, entertainment, and design videos. You’ll agree with some, you’ll disagree with others, but they are all pretty interesting.

Creating a Custom Feed For BlogRush

Taylor wasn’t sure about how to create a separate feed for using BlogRush. The reason you may want to make a feed just for BlogRush is if you want to control the exact article and headline from your blog that you’d like to have featured on the BlogRush network.

It’s pretty simple to make a new feed. Just copy the code below (change it to reflect your blog and your target post) and upload it to your site. Then go to your BlogRush account and add a new blog and point to this new feed. Mine is now located at http://54.224.128.86/blogrush.rss

<rss version=”2.0″>
<channel>
<title>Hear It From Us</title>
<link>http://54.224.128.86</link>
<description>Libertarian leaning commentary on everything you could possibly not care about</description>
<language>en-us</language>
<item>
<category>BlogRush</category>
<title>Hear It From Us</title>
<link>http://54.224.128.86</link>
<description>
Doesn’t really matter…BlogRush doesn’t use descriptions.
</description>
</item>
</channel>
</rss>

Unfortunately, you aren’t able to change the feed address of any of you existing blogs, so you’ll have to add the same blog again using the new feed. The headlines for this blog will be split between your existing feed and this new one. If you are adding a brand new blog or just signing up for BlogRush, you are set. You’ll have complete control over the exact headline that will be featured on the network.

In my case, I waited to create the new feed, so the headlines will be split. I’m actually ok with that since I like having both an anchor article being displayed along with posts that involve current events.

There is another solution I found that is a little more involved, but comes out very clean and more manageable for changing your feature article in WordPress later. The solution I presented here is the same one recommended by John Chow. If you ever want to change your feature article, you’ll have to edit the RSS file we created here and upload it again, but that’s not a big deal to me.

Hope this helps!

Ron Paul Gets a Freebie From a Former Stripper

Strippers for Ron Paul. Michelle does a great job of explaining why anyone who cares about freedom (not only theirs, but other people’s as well) should have their interest peaked by the Paul campaign.

All seriousness aside, it would have been interesting to hear her opinion on the idea of eliminating the Federal Reserve and changing back to the gold standard. Dolla bill yo!

He Plays, err, Blogs the Right Way

All the recent talk locally about proper link attribution prompted me to finish a post I started a while back about blogging and baseball. “Everything I need to know about blogging I learned from watching baseball”? Eh, don’t really like that title too much. Plus it sounds like link bait, and I’d never do that. 😉

But I do like the notion of “playing the game the right way”. To me, that’s just about the highest honor you can give a baseball player. In a lot of ways, the same things relate to blogging:

Persistence pays off–show up every day

Cal RipkenIf you go by the numbers, Cal Ripken Jr may not look like a Hall of Famer. His batting average isn’t spectacular(.276), he didn’t hit an incredible amount of home runs (431) given the number of games he played (3001). Ripken instead sealed his legacy by being a great shortstop and showing up to play every day for a very long time (2131 consecutive games). Some days it was miserably cold, and he played. Some days it was miserably hot, and he played. Some days he was injured, and he played. A lot of days he was just plain old, and he played. While Cal’s numbers may not be all that impressive, the fact that he was so reliable is.

Be consistent and reliable for your readers. Show up every day (or week, or whatever your posting frequency is), and bring the best game you’ve got. You may only be able to outsmart, outwrite, and out search engine optimize half of the bloggers out there. The other half you will have to outwork!

Try to be the best at what you do, and the rest will take care of itself

The Wizard of OzzieFor position players, Hall of Fame credentials are usually decided by offensive numbers. Ozzie Smith is a rare exception. Why? Because his defense (13 Gold Gloves) was exceptional. With his unreal abilities at the shortstop position, there’s no telling how many runs Ozzie was able to save for his team on defense. The fact that he wasn’t always an exceptional producer on offense is overshadowed by the fact that he is the all time best on defense.

Very few bloggers are good at all aspects of the game. Concentrate on what you do best. If you are a great writer, write. If you are a great layout designer, design. If you are a great programmer, program. If you are even average at your deficiencies you can be successful. If you are excellent at your strengths, you’ll have no problem finding experts in other fields who recognize your greatness and want to be associated with you.

Cheating may get you there, but there’s a price to pay in the long run

Bonds CheaterHe-who’s-name-will-not-be-mentioned-here hit an awful lot of home runs. Very few people I know think his record is legitimate. Even fewer think very highly of him as a person. He’s basically ruined his own legacy by cheating to create it.

Don’t cheat. Learn the ropes. Hell, even learn a few tricks. But don’t cheat. Any short term gains you get won’t be worth the price you’ll have to pay in the long run. As a blogger, you need to be trusted, even if “trusted” means that people know for certain they will find nothing at your blog but a hilarious curse word laced story. Don’t spam for links. Don’t promise something that you can’t deliver. And by all means don’t steal content.

When it’s not working out, you have options

Rick AnkielI can’t tell Rick Ankiel’s story better than John Hutcheson. Short story–Rick Ankiel was a big league pitcher. He lost his stuff. He tried to get it back. He failed. Repeatedly. He went back to the minors and learned to play the outfield. He returned to the big leagues in 2007 as a Cardinals outfielder.

When something isn’t working out for you as a blogger, don’t be afraid to try something new. You’ll have to work at it, and you’ll have to learn something new. But since when are those bad things? And you’ll still be in the game.

By the way, Ankiel hit a three run homer in his first game as an outfielder.

When the someone comes after you, be ready!

In 1980, Dave Winfield charged the mound on Nolan Ryan and gave him a beat down. No one tested Ryan’s skills at the sweet science again until 1993. There was no reason to–the guy throws 100 mph. If he wanted to hurt you, you’d already be hurt. But in Nolan Ryan’s final season, he hit Robin Ventura in the arm, and Ventura came after him. This time, Ryan was ready, and the insuing butt-kicking Ventura received let everyone know that Nolan Ryan is not a guy you want to mess with.

[youtube VUfJ1C8pGI4]

If you establish any kind of success as a blogger, someone is bound to come after you. While you can’t get them in a headlock and pummel them six times until Pudge Rodriguez comes out to rescue them, if you pay for hosting for you own domain, you need to make sure that your site is secure and your data is backed up from day one. Also, monitor your incoming links to make sure they are on the up and up. Don’t let someone else make you look spammy.

By the way, Ventura was ejected and Nolan Ryan completed the game without giving up another hit.

Conditions will change, and fame can come from anywhere

In 1922, the St. Louis Cardinals traded Cliff Heathcote to the Chicago Cubs in between games of a double header with the Cubs! If not for this fact, who would ever remember Heathcote?

Things change very quickly online. Who knew anything about social networking three years ago and the way it would change things? If you’ve produced quality content before the change, the same content will be just as valuable after the change. Keep doing what you do and continue to learn about how that fits in with the current environment. You’ll be surprised to find that some of what you consider to be your most unremarkable stuff is what people end up knowing you for.

By the way, Heathcote went 2-4 in the second game.

Last but not least…

Give credit to your teammates

In post game interviews with pitchers who have just thrown a perfect games or no-hitters, they generally thank two people–“God and my teammates”. This isn’t just lip service. These guys know they would not have been able to reach this achievement without a lot of support from other people (and elsewhere). The best even call out their teammates by name. Even that guy-who’s-name-I-won’t-type was big enough to thank the teammates he’d had throughout the years, and this was the closest he’s come to speaking to some of them.

Make sure you site your resources. Most of the time they will be people just like you scraping to get their blog seen and read. Know that you can help them most by giving them relevant anchor text in the link.

Can you tell I am was a Cardinals fan?

New Theme…Sorry for Any Issues

Please be patient over the next couple of days if things get really screwed up when you’re trying to view this site. I’m going through my first attempt at developing a WordPress theme, and I’m sure there are plenty of things I’ve missed and will change.

I’ve done a few things that I hope will make this site more convenient for the regular readers and a little more organized and easy to navigate for new readers. Most of these changes are due to some really good information I’ve gotten from sites like Copy Blogger and things that I like/dislike when browsing around myself:

* Larger text for posts
* Moved to a “double wide” single column in the left margin so you don’t have to look between two columns to get to the meaty content
* Separated colors for content columns from navigation/ad columns to make the content stand out a little more.
* Integrated Google Ads into the site a little better. Hopefully this will not only make the site flow more easily for regular readers, but result in a better CTR for new visitors.
* New graphics for comments, header, etc.

Please let me know if you guys see anything I’ve overlooked (I’m sure there’s plenty) or anything you’d like to see done differently!

JL Kirk Situation Hopefully Rectified

Surprise, surprise.

All they really wanted was to not have their company misrepresented by their mentally challenged employee who left a message on Katherine Coble’s blog.

JL Kirk’s main concern at the outset was that we communicate their position – which is different from the information originally told to me by a JL Kirk employee – that JL Kirk is not a continuation of the defunct Bernard Haldane company, either in terms of corporate identity or stock ownership, and that JL Kirk’s principal, Kirk Leipzig, is only a former Bernard Haldane employee but did not buy any assets or stock of Bernard Haldane.

Which is a round about way of saying, “We’re not denying we’re butthooks, we’re just not the butthooks that our butthook employee claimed we are in her post.”

Nice.

Free Market at Work in the Blogosphere

There is quite a soap opera going on at Just Another Pretty Farce regarding Mrs. Coble’s issues with JL Kirk & Associates.

Here’s a quick synopsis:

  • Mr. and Mrs. Coble felt ripped off by an employment agency, and she blogged about it.
  • JL Kirk & Associates got mad about that, and one of their employees posted some comments on to her post on Mrs. Coble’s site (that was stupid). These comments were rather nasty, especially coming from a company trying to defend itself publicly.
  • Mrs. C. has now received a letter threatening a lawsuit if she does not remove her post(s) about JL Kirk & Associates as well as all associated comments. I suspect this has little to do with their desire to eliminate her original post, and more to do with the venemous comment one of their own employees left there.
  • Countless people will now read the account of what happened, most of whom probably would not have read the account had she not been sent a threatening letter and had it picked up by the blogosphere.
  • Many more people will view JL Kirk & Associates as scam artist jerks than ever would have before. Whether they are scam artists and/or jerks is beside the point. They’ve gone a long way through their comments on Mrs. C.’s blog and by sending a letter to give that impression.

Their own actions will hurt them significantly more than Mrs. Coble’s ever could have. You have to love the free market.

Here are some highlights of the comments left by a JL Kirk & Associates employee in her original post:

And by the way, in Mrs. Cobles’ [sic] case, we would recommend (free of charge) to further her writing “career” she learn to spell “wizardry” and polish her grammar and punctuation skills.

Well, couldn’t we all use a little help there now and then? But free of charge? That’s going above and beyond helpful!

…Mr. Coble has had difficulty with sustained upward mobility.

Is the writer trying to stoke some sort of class warfare fire?

That comment is simply stupid.

This could be broadly applied to most comments on most blogs, but usually isn’t what one says when trying to win over an audience. I seriously doubt you’ll hear that in a presidential debate, although it wouldn’t be untrue.

Mrs. Coble’s spiteful meanness precluded her from asking me about it.

Mean and spiteful? I like Mrs. Coble!

Do a Google search on Katherine Coble! She is an angry, opinionated basher of many things

I don’t need to do a Google search. This statement sold me. From this day forward, I vow to be a reader of Katherine Coble’s blog and to never do business with JL Kirk & Associates out of fear that they will send certified junk mail to my house and an unprecedented amount of traffic to my blog.

On second thought…