Blog: February 2009

Northern Voice 2009 Wrap-Up: All the NV09 Posts We Could Find

February 24, 2009

2009 marked the fifth year of the Northern Voice conference, Vancouver’s very popular personal blogging and social media conference, This year, the Hop Studios staff was involved in many ways to help make it the fun times, connection-filled, and interesting talk extravaganza that it was…. and we do it because we like all those things, too.

I worked hard in my third term as a volunteer on the organizing committee—I’m secretary of the non-profit society now, too—and moderated two of the talks, both about journalism in this era of social media. I also ran the Northern Voice Twitter feed but, shhhh, don’t tell anyone that, and was responsible for printing the badges—which was WAY more work than I thought it would be.

Susie submitted (and was chosen to lead) a panel, “Help! I’m Sick and Tired of My Blog”, which was a lively and packed discussion on blogging burn out and how to rediscover a passion for blogging. Susie is now the only person who has spoken at every single Northern Voice since 2005 on topics as diverse as blog design, blog widgets and using blog software for non-blogs and we’re honored they keep picking her.

Rachael was in attendance for both days, and had a small role in wrangling the Moosecamp schedule on Friday morning—she wasn’t a volunteer, but at Northern Voice, everyone pitches in. Matt volunteered his time on Saturday morning, helping conference attendees find their way to talks and checking folks in at the registration desk. We all had a great time attending talks and catching up with friends both old and new, and after the conference, we held an impromptu post-conference party which ended, as usual, with a little Wii Tennis.

There’s a lot of Northern Voice now spread across the Internet, but much of it has moved to Twitter and other sharing sites. Here’s what I could find as far as blog posts go, and I’d love to add to this list if you can suggest anything.

Blog Posts:

Note: I’m picking posts about the conference, not about any one particular session.

The conference’s own wrap-up

Lauren Wood laurenwood.org

Stewtopia stewtopia.com

Blue Lime Media bluelimemedia.com

D’Arcy Norman darcynorman.net

Tim Bray tbray.org

Invoke Media invokemedia.com

Dave Olson feasthouse.wordpress.com

Geeky Mom geekymom.blogspot.com

Social Signal socialsignal.com

Gus Digital gusdigital.com

Darren Barefoot darrenbarefoot.com

Out Smarts out-smarts.com

No Spin PR nospinpr.com

John Biehler johnbiehler.com

Tzaddi Gordon zodomatica.com

Jeff Traynor raincitystudios.com

All Wordpress blogs tagged northernvoice09

Google blog search

Blog Posts from people who didn’t like the conference, because those are always more interesting:

Kim Werker kimwerker.com

Shit Hawks on Parade shithawksonparade.com

No Spin PR (again!) nospinpr.com

northernvoice09

Posted by Travis Smith at 11:54 AM | Comments (4)

Announcing: Reeveal Comments Extension for ExpressionEngine

February 13, 2009

Here’s the idea behind Reeveal Comments: All the comments associated with an entry are accessible—and can be managed—from the same page you edit the entry on. No more hunting for the right dropdown; no more digging to find the comment you’re after. Just open up the entry and click the “Comments” tab.

Reeveal Comments Image

Reeveal Comments uses AJAX to minimize overhead and sweeten the interface. If you don’t click the “Comments” tab, you won’t run any extra comments queries or download any extra comments HTML. If you do click the tab and want to open, close, or edit a comment, you won’t lose the entry page you’re on.

Sound like something you might like? Go a head, grab a copy of the extension and give it a try. If you think it’s cool (and we sure hope you do), thank Matt for coming up with it. And, if you don’t mind, leave a tip in the tip jar so we can keep developing add-ons for you.

As always, if you run into any issues or have any suggestions, just drop us a line or leave us a comment.

Posted by Justin Crawford at 4:38 PM | Comments (7)

Publish Improve: Small EE Tweaks Make a Big Difference

February 13, 2009

A long time ago, I released an extension called “Publish Improve” for ExpressionEngine. But I never blogged about it. Here’s the belated blog post.

The extension is available here.

That’s really all I have to say

Posted by Travis Smith at 3:33 PM | Comments (4)

So, You Want to Know More About Trackbacks

February 5, 2009

Every blog is different, but there is a family of functions that are generally deployed on most blogs. Features like comments, categories and blogrolls are commonly used and generally well understood by bloggers and their audience as well. There are, however, features that are thinner on the ground and less well known.

Trackbacks are a prime example, The trackback is a linkback specification created by Six Apart and launched in august 2002. (A linkback system is a way for blogging software to track other places that add a link to a particular entry or page.)

It works like this: You write a great blog post. I come along, read it, and write a post that responds or relates to your post in some way on my own blog. I can trackback to the entry on your blog by inputing a Trackback URL. Then my blogging software will ping (send a message) yours. Your post will updated with link to mine, and my blog post will show that you originated this conversation and link to you. We both get a small positive SEO (search engine) boost and you build your reputation as a trendsetter. Or provocateur! There are several linkback systems, but Six Apart’s trackbacks are generally accepted as the industry standard. Blogger is the only major online publication software that doesn’t support it, opting instead to use the “backlinks” specification.

This sounds like a great idea, and for the most part, it is. Trackbacks can build community between blogs, increase traffic and brings an acknowledgment system to the rough and tumble of the blogosphere. So why isn’t this widespread, in use by every blog?

Unfortunately the primary reason is that trackbacks have been overwhelmed by spammers. Trackbacks offer an means for malicious links or content to be easily inserted into your blog. Why did this happen? Well, at first, trackbacks offered very little spam protection, though spam filtration tools have since been developed for them. Many bloggers find that the chore of managing the large spam load is not matched by a significant increase in traffic.

Trackbacks are aimed at the classic blogger, an individual who is trying to send a message on their own. So business bloggers who use trackbacks may be put in the awkward position of linking to the competition, or sending traffic away from their site. Linking to someone in this way is a courtesy, and often benefits the originator more then the linker. This doesn’t make sense in every blog application.

Trackbacks are also confusing and poorly explained in most blogging tools’ documentation. Many bloggers don’t use them or bother to understand them. Unlike comments they require a little extra expertise to use. Many otherwise net savvy people simply ignore them. There is debate in the blogging community about the validity of trackbacks. Some claim that trackbacks are outdated and not worth the effort, others claim that maintaining them is helping to build a healthy blog ecosystem.

Hop Studios often does not implement trackbacks on sites we build, unless they are requested by the client. We take the view that the spam risk and workload is greater then the potential gain.

Posted by Matt Gardner at 10:07 AM | Comments (1)

Explore the Ball Possibilities with AdHack

February 4, 2009

AdHack (people-powered advertising) wants you to Show Us Your Balls! They’ve created part 1 of an awesome video campaign for .... well, you get to decide!

Here’s the idea: You watch the video then write the script for the sequel. AdHack will actually film the top script and then promote your contribution. Wow, creative control and free publicity. You can’t lose.

Here’s your starting point:

Want to learn more? Visit http://adhack.com/balls.

AdHack founder James Sherrett says, “The brands that succeed in the world of open advertising harness the power of hearing what passionate, powerful consumers have to say. These are the folks who benefit most from commissioning AdHack commercials and advertisements. They have the balls to let go.”

Posted by Susannah Gardner at 4:52 PM | Comments (0)