No tinkering ...

It's happened to everybody. You've filed, contacted us to let us know to publish, and then ... horrors ... you spot a typo that you just know we're not going to catch. (Or, in an alternate take, we miss a typo.)

Figuring nobody gets hurt, you go back in and make the change yourself.

Why's this wrong?

Well, for starters, the Internet world looks down on making changes without owning up to making the mistake. That's why we prefer you either provide an "update" on the bottom of your entry or use the surprisingly versatile "strikethru" code. (Info on both techniques can be found here.)

It also may have the unfortunate side-effect of "unpublishing" your entry ... Which can, in some cases, lead to angry phone calls to us insisting we never published said entry in the first place.

This provides general workplace stress (the cold/hot and mosquitoes do enough of THAT) and also means we have to re-edit your entry all over again. (This approach sometimes will "nuke" all the changes we've made, such as adding "target=new"s to your links and fixing all the bad apostrophes and quote marks.)

So, in short, if you need something fixed, talk to your editor or to us.

Trust us, it's better all the way around.

Check yourself ...

One really obvious tip that I'd like everybody to follow is to look at your blogs after they've been published.

This serves two purposes:

1.) An additional layer of quality control, in case a mistake made it onto the page and

2.) You can take note of changes made between what you filed and what was ultimately posted.

Best methods for quoting stuff ...

Now more than ever, it's vital that people understand what words are yours and what words belong to someone else.

It's imperative that we make it really clear who says what, and there are about a dozen ways to do it.

My suggestion? Use blockquote when you quote somebody. Always.

What's blockquote, you ask? Allow me to demonstrate.

This is regular words being used to set up a quote I borrowed from somewhere else:

These are the words that I borrowed from somebody else.

Note that they're indented and clearly set aside from the rest of the text.

My words again. And here I provide a link back to where I found these words.

Some people wrap quotes around passages they're referencing ... that can get clumsy. Some people put 'em in italics. Effective, but sometimes unclear.

With blockquote, you leave no doubts, and that's what we really need to strive for.

Another important rule: When in doubt about attribution, OVER-ATTRIBUTE. It might read clunky, but ... again ... we want to be clear above all else.

How to create a blockquote:

Open your blockquote with this: <blockquote>

Close your blockquote with this: </blockquote>

Hence, in your entry, it'll look like this:

<blockquote>This text will be blockquoted.</blockquote>

This text will not be blockquoted.

Last note, it's almost never appropriate to clip out more than a paragraph or two at any given time. You're not here to reprint stories in their entirety (or even small minority) ... you're here (within this context) to point to interesting stuff and provide some insight when possible.

A note on audience ...

Your homework for today ... and we'll be beating this topic to death over the coming whatevers ... but for starters, answer this question:

What audience are you blogging for?

And "everybody" and "my bosses" don't count.

Nailing down this most basic question is a first step toward getting better at this.

More later ...

Carnival Time ...

One way to get word out on your blog is a more traditional method amongst non-msm-aligned bloggers: Carnivals.

What's that mean? I could explain, but it would be easier to point you here.

That site also has a listing of some current carnivals, by topic.

Even if you don't get involved in the submission form of things, these places are great for culling ideas of your own. (Just be sure to give credit where you got the idea from.)

• BlogCarnival.com

How the Posties Do It ...

Nothing in here really shook my boots, but it's interesting reading, nonetheless:

Blogging at the Washington Post (pdf)

See how your blog fits into these guidelines. (Emphasis, by the way, on the "dumping ground for notes that will not make the paper" pwnership. Couldn't have said it better myself.)

Courtesy LostRemote.com, among other places.

Yet more on headlines

Steve Yelvington makes an interesting observation about writing headlines for the Web vs. writing headlines for print:

Print is a serendipity medium where puns, clever language and cultural references can work really well. Online is an information-seeker's medium (and that was true long before Google) where a clear and straightforward phrase wins the game.

• More online newspaperism

Must read ...

This is about a Houston sports blogger, but much of what he says can apply to any beat at the paper. (To some degree or another.)

WebTalk Primer ...

Might come in handy if you're still getting your feet wet.

(Via Yelvington.com)

Headline Writing Part II: Clever vs. Informative

Brian Clark's wonderful Copyblogger has a nice entry today titled Clever vs. Descriptive Headlines: Which Works Better?.

Since that's not a particulary "clever" headline, you can probably presume which side he falls on.

Anyway, it's worth a read:

Clever vs. Descriptive Headlines: Which Works Better?

Headline Writing tip (short)

Keeping myself from a long diatribe today ...

Via the always wonderful Boing-Boing, here's a note on how eye-tracking studies have indicated how writing headlines in the passive voice can help boost, well, everything.

Because, remember, as grandpa always said, "Passive Voice = $$$"

Boing-Boing

Passive Voice Is Redeemed For Web Headings

So, why exactly are we doing this again?

This one's primarily for the newspaper side bloggers, but it's probably a question everybody has to ask from time to time.

Why are we blogging?

It's not usually framed in that fashion. More often, it's a reaction instead of a question. It usually comes from someone upset with pageviews, or general public reaction (or lack of it), and said person reacts with the "This isn't worth my time" matra.

Let me be clear on this, as clear as I can be: Even if nobody reads your blog, even if the audience just feels like it's not there and there's no point to this, IT IS WORTH YOUR TIME.

Why? I could go into a long diatribe about "Long Tail" economics and the new media world ... and all that would be valid ... but this post is going to be long enough already.

Instead, I'll push THIS concept: Because we learn by doing.

And, to paraphrase a quote I heard last week, understanding blogging is to understand the direction journalism is going.

Let's break down a list of what people are expecting more and more of as they grow accustomed to getting their news online. All of these are items that a well-executed blog is already providing:

Speed: People aren't waiting until 5 p.m., let alone 6 a.m. anymore to get the details to the stories they care about. Well-executed blogs operate in that fashion, quite often providing information as it's coming in ... providing transparency about where the information is coming from ... and updating as needed.

Choice of Delivery: Mark this down: The ability to choose how news and information is delivered to oneself is going to be a key issue within the next few years ... if not sooner. RSS feeds and other forms of aggregation are only going to become more important as we progress.

Don't understand RSS? Figure it out. Now. I use reader.google.com. I recommend it.

Interaction: The era of "We talk, you listen" is over for journalists. People are going to be more and more inclined to leave their two cents. Respect it or not, reader commentary is only going to grow. (Certainly in some markets faster than others, but best to grow accustomed.)

Specialization: With mass media facing troubling times, people expect to know more about the things they care about. It might not yield massive pageviews, but a narrow focus — in popular parlayance, your niche — is a stronger way to connect with people. In my experience, the people who are blogging about things I never thought anyone would care about tend to get more personal feedback than people who are blogging about more general, popular items.

Thoroughness: Even while people want more specialized content, they want pretty much everything they can find about it. If you don't have it? Link to it. Where it's coming from is of less concern than finding it. If your source is a reliable, updated source for info, they'll revisit you (or subscribe to your feed), even if you're not the one doing all the heavy lifting each time out.

Intimacy: As a collective effect from the other items on this list — and as a definite by-product of the growing strength of social networking sites — people are expecting a more personal, one-to-one experience in media.

This is far from an exhaustive list, but ... again ... if you learn how to blog, and blog effectively, it's going to be easier for you to deal with these various trends, no matter the medium in which you're operating down the line.

Minor Rant: A note on "More"

I can't make you do things or not do them ... you really should defer to your bosses when they tell you to do certain things ... but, when the choice is yours, please ... PLEASE ... avoid the use of the "More" button.

AND, if you HAVE to, make sure you have more than a few paragraphs waiting on the other side.

For the uninitiated, the "More" button appears on a blog entry when you split your entry between the "Entry Body" and "Extended Entry" windows.

Some of our bloggers, and I can think of only one or two, are forced to use it due to technical situations involving other pages (feed issues, etc.), but the "More" button provides little to no value whatsoever, and — particularly if there's only a few sentences or paragraphs waiting on the other side — runs the very real risk of honking readers off, and making us appear to be (please pardon the language) "click whores."

When I first got here, all the blogs used "more" buttons, and I can't think of a single one of those blogs that even LOOKED like a blog to seasoned readers.

Now, they're creeping back in. There's little to almost no benefit to them (I think, over time, they do as much to repress pageview growth as to prop them up), and I also don't buy the "You get more headlines above the scroll" argument, either, since 1.) the headlines are always in the left-rail, above the scroll and 2.) The content should be good enough to draw a reader all the way through, where they'll see the next headline, anyway.

So, to sum up:

1.) Do what your boss tells you, but try not to ever use the "More" button.
2.) If you must, make SURE that what you put behind there is worth the click, because — particularly with our load times — it really will put off some readers if they have to click TWICE to read your five-paragraph entry.

Minor rant over.

Thanks for your indulgence.

Blogs Defined

This is a fairly basic posting for people in the community who may have little or no experience in the blogosphere.

Put simply, a blog is no more than a Web page that it easily updated. Each update is called an "entry" and each entry can consist of as little as a few sentences (although writing longer is not prohibited, by any means). The newest entries appear on top.

A blog can be as simple as an online column, or as intricate as a photo album. You can embed videos, link to other sites, and/or talk back with people who comment on what you've written.

You can use this site to get started, but it's always good practice to find a few blogs that appeal to you and start making it a habit of visiting them.

We think you'll like what you find.

The Backbone Theory

I've discussed this with a variety of you out there over time, but I'd never tried to put a name to this concept before. I've decided to call it the "Backbone Theory" ... just cuz.

Basically, it's a method for constructing your blog so that it puts the needs of your readers first and foremost, yet gives you the freedom to improvise as much as you like.

Will it fit all bloggers? No. It's not designed for what I tend to call "online columns," which have their places, too ... but those are more for entertainment and opinion than a good news blog. (Although the BEST blogs cover those areas, too, as we shall see.)

If your thinking of starting a blog, go over this list very carefully. If you already have one, think hard about incorporating the suggested structures into your routine.

It can only help.

The five basic principles:

1.) Identify your audience (The answer "everybody!" isn't gonna cut it anymore)
2.) Figure out what those people need
3.) Tailor the blog to those needs
4.) Establish a routine
5.) Structure your improvisations

Taken one by one:

1.) Identify your audience:

Let's say you want to launch a blog about video games. Big subject. Narrow down who you imagine your reader will be: Casual gamers? Weekend console warriors? Hard-core nutjobs? Developers?

What matters most in this equation? You.

If you don't know a dev-kit from a joystick, don't pretend to appeal to developers. If you're familiar with the industry from a business/technical standpoint, targeting developers might be a good idea.

You have to be honest with yourself, and try to reach people who are like you. Make sense?

In our example, let's say we're setting up a blog to appeal to casual gamers. Does that mean you don't cover anything BUT casual games? Not at all, but you have to keep in mind who you're shooting for. Casual gamers don't need to know heavy-duty technical specs on a new graphics card ... but they do probably want to know how that card might affect their favorite games.

2.) Figure out what those people need:

Are you taking a massive subject that would be served best by a daily digest of news stories from all around the Web?

Do your readers need suggestions for new products, new sites to visit or insights into a specific item from the day's news?

Think long and hard about what will make your blog USEFUL. Think long and hard about how your blog will IMPROVE PEOPLE'S LIVES ... even in a trivial way, if that's what it comes down to.

Charming and funny are nice, too, but that's window-dressing. We have to provide utility first and foremost.

And never be afraid to teach. Newspaper folk, in particular, tend to assume massive amounts of institutional knowledge in their readership, and that may be a much more difficult assumption in the days of multi-tasking and media saturation. Explaining the WHY may be the most valuable utility of all.

3.) Tailor the blog to those needs:

This might seem redundant, but it's more an execution of the mindset from No. 2.

Build a routine that covers the basics of your target group. Is a daily news roundup useful? Is it feasible? Is weekly enough?

Again, be honest with yourself.

Figure out a way to economically (in terms of your time and energy) serve those needs as often as feasible.

4.) Establish a routine:

I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times. If you're gonna blog three times a week, make sure you have the new entries up by the same time every one of those days.

If you're gonna blog daily (or more), make sure your CORE PURPOSE, the idea from Nos. 2 and 3, is posted by the same time every day.

In other words, if you're gonna blog Monday, Wednesday and Friday ... make sure you have your stuff up by, say, 9 a.m. each one of those days. Or noon. It doesn't matter when, necessarily, but make that your new deadline and STICK TO IT.

Only going to blog once a week? Make it by noon Monday. Or 9 p.m. Sunday. Again, it only matters that you adhere to a routine, not what that routine is.

This is the Backbone of your blog. The bare minimum. The structure around which everything else will be built.

5.) Structure your improvisations:

Once you've established your routines, it's time to get looser. Best way to do that (and prepare for the irony), is yet more structure.

In my experience, it's been very helpful to organize your approach around "themes" or "categories."

For the sake of an imaginary start-up blog, you could have a daily, 9 a.m. news digest, followed as needed by either "breaking news" sorts of items or — in lieu of those — something from a mental menu of possible topics. I'm just making these up, so they're REALLLLY general, but:

"New on the Web" (providing a new site relevant to folks following your topic)
"Product critique" (pretty much what it sounds like)
"Update" (follow up on a topic introduced in a previous entry)
"Reader comment/reply" (elevate a reader e-mail and/or comment into a full-post status ...)
"Something Completely Off-Topic" (Feel free to be whimsical ... once your blog's purpose is clear and established)

Need a more specific example? Fine.

When I used to blog about video games, my list looked something like this:

> News Items (a headline digest)
> Greatest Games (when stuck, I'd blabber on about a favorite game)
> Off-Topic Musings (self-explanatory ... often "Lost" and such)
> MMORPG (online role-playing lunacy)
> Demo Watch (I'd play a free demo and react to it)

I also evolved developing stories/controversies and long-form games I was playing into their own categories:

> Grand Theft Auto Controversy
> Star Wars: Galaxies
> Ultimate Baseball Online

So, whenever I was stuck, I'd go over that list and nine times out of 10, something would ring a bell.

If the utility is the backbone, this is the meat of your blog, and it's where you can really have more fun, too. Add and subtract categories at your will, too.

It's supposed to be dynamic, and, remember, your blog is more of a long-term project than it is a daily posting.

A break, courtesy The Onion ...

(America's finest news source, after all ...)

'Most E-Mailed' List Tearing New York Times' Newsroom Apart

NEW YORK—A feature on the New York Times' website that lists the stories most e-mailed by readers is destroying morale and escalating tensions among the once-dignified and professional Times staff, sources within the newspaper of record said Tuesday.

...

Columnist Nicholas Kristof, a Pulitzer Prize–winning former editor who has covered Asia and Africa for the Times, claimed not to be aware that his work frequently appears on the Most E-Mailed list, saying he "never so much as glances" at it.

"Who cares—lists are stupid and arbitrary," Kristof said. "Only shallow morons pay attention to them. As if an article is inherently better just because more people happen to read it. This isn't a popularity contest."

Kristof returned Thursday from the Sudan after a six-week-long investigation of the plight of displaced house cats in the genocide-ridden Darfur region. His findings will be published in next Sunday's New York Times Magazine.

(Link found at CyberJournalist.com)

Common Errors: Table foibles ...

Every now and again, someone will get adventurous and tinker with a table or two.

I'm not telling you not to, but just make sure you "close" your table out when you're done. Nothing will screw up a page ... the entire page ... faster than forgetting a little </table> ...

That doesn't make sense? Good, acceptance is the first step toward doing something about it. For a decent overview on the table phenomenon, try this page.

Living and dying by your pageview total is a bad idea ... a hypothetical

One of the biggest challenges as newsbusiness people (predominantly) is overcoming the "one and done" mindset. When you work in an industry where your product is usually either in the trash or lining hamster cages by the time it's eight hours old, you become accustomed to a very short lifecycle.

Happily, the Internet doesn't function that way.

Good stuff that you write might not net boffo pageviews the day you post it, but good work will often pay off in the long run.

This is relevant because all too often I see people dispirited that they aren't getting huge numbers when that accursed "daily report" gets circulated every day.

But you have to attack it from the mindset that you're creating a collection of things, not publishing individual items. And even those individual items might be more valuable than the daily spreadsheet might indicate.

Let's create an example:

Person A has created a blog called, well, "Blog A." (Sorry, not big on the whole creativity thing today.)

Blog A posts an Item of General Interest, and it gets homepage play, because we're pageview whores, too.

Blog A ends up with 1,000 pageviews for the day. Great, huh? But a big chunk of that is a collection of about a dozen or so readers, arguing endlessly back-and-forth in the comments and refreshing often to see if anyone else says anything bad about them. In the end, about 500 actual PEOPLE read the posting, which is good, but not the slamdunk it originally was thought to be.

Blogger B's blog, "Blog B," is a touch more specific ... even "niche-y," to sort of coin the phrase.

This blogger posts a very specific, but very well-crafted and insightful entry, and that doesn't get big homepage play, because we're very close-minded.

At the end of the day, Blog B's new entry has only 100 pageviews.

Colossal failure compared to Blog A, right?

Not so fast.

Blog B's readership likes the entry so much, they begin e-mailing friends and family who share their Blog B passions. Over the course of the next two weeks, the humble little blog entry averages about 70 views a day. Not enough to chart on our daily reports, mind you, but enough that ... over the course of 14 days, our nicely-written little blog entry brings in 1,100 pageviews, largely from unique readers.

Compared NOW to the flash-in-the-pan (and now quite stale) Blog A's 700 or so unique readers ... let's be generous and throw another 200 or so in there .... Blog B doesn't look like the qualified failure anymore, does it?

And the best case scenario: if Blogger B continues the solid work, those people will become regulars, and begin to have inane comment-battles of their own, driving daily readership up as it goes.

Will that always happen? Is it likely to happen? The incredible competition of the Internet makes it tough ... but a Best Practice is always a Best Practice.

And, to spell it out, the Best Practice is to blog frequently, and blog well. Do things that please you and your peers.

Most importantly, do not get discouraged if your numbers aren't what you think they should be. Because, frankly, they're probably better than you think.

Common Errors: The Dreaded Dash

Curly quotes and apostrophes, which I've whined about in great detail over the months, only account for most of our garbled text.

The rest?

Usually dashes.

It happens when MS Word (or its equivalent) "helpfully" converts double-hyphens into hard dashes, and Movable Type chokes on those.

Best thing to do? Replace the dashes with this code:

&mdash;

That gives you the nice, smooth dash you need and none of the gobbledygook nightmares.

And it saves your editors time. And that's a good thing. Right?

A message from the proprietor ...

Please ... let us know when you post.

A lot of you have editors or other colleagues editing and publishing your entries — which is awesome, we totally dig the initiative — but if you don't either send a notification or simply drop us an email at our normal address (the one that starts with "news" and ends with "mysanantonio-dot-com") than we won't know to publicize your fine, well-crafted entry.

(If you don't know how to send a notification, check the bottom areas of this entry.)

It's frustrating when I happen across a particularly juicy blog entry that's a few days old.

We now resume our regular programming.

Common Errors: Image won't upload

So you're adding a picture to your blog, which is a good thing, and you're rocketing along until you try uploading it to MT.

Then you get this little beauty:



So what's gone wrong?

Nine times out of 10, you're looking at an image so large that the server couldn't handle the upload.

Check the size of your photo. (Easiest way? If you're using a PC, right-click on the image and select "properties." "Size" is usually right in the middle of the box. If you're using a Mac, you're kind of on your own, though if memory serves "Apple-i" gets you some information.)

If it's a bit on the hefty side (anywhere from 50 KB up to a meg or so), make it smaller. Remember, your photo should be no more than 450 pixels wide and the "DPI" should be set no higher than 71. Anything larger than that, you run the risk of choking the system.

I have a few details on how to size a photo further down in this entry, though I should probably do a larger entry on it later. (Look for it, I guess.)

How big, exactly, is "too big"? I can't put my finger on it, exactly, but as a rule of thumb, try to keep your photos from not getting much larger than 20 or 30-odd Kilobytes.

And, as always, if none of this makes any sense, contact me.

Common Errors: A series ...

I'm hoping to set this up as an almost "FAQ" for our most common errors. If you feel I'm missing an issue you'd like to see addressed, drop me a line.

Bloggers: Kings of Ethics

Well, maybe not "kings," per se, but dang if they ain't doing it right.

At least suggests NY blogger (and professor) Jeff Jarvis in his "Buzz Machine" blog in an entry circulated today by one of our OWN bloggers, Bob Richter.

Perhaps I oversimply. Jarvis certainly does insist, though, that in all circumstances, linking back to the source material is key.

What's that mean?

It means whenever you draw any content from any blog or any news source (including wires), link back to where you found it and give clear credit.

The reasons he gives are, by and large, more economics-based than ethically grounded, but there's no reason the two can't go hand-in-hand. Well, maybe one or two ... sometimes ... but I digress.

In demonstrating the standard journalistic practice of the Associated Press' repackaging of unique stories and sending them out to everyone -- including Google, which recently signed a fairly problematic deal with AP to host their content directly instead of linking to source publications -- he makes a great point:

The AP picked up a unique story from the Nashua, NH, Telegraph and that’s what Google displayed — along with other AP clients’ versions — above the original story from the paper.

...

Note that the Nashua editor chuckles because Fark.com picked up the story and linked to the original — we pride ourselves in that in this world — and sent it good traffic. So Fark served journalism better than the wires and Google. That is telling. (emphasis added)

Don't know what Fark is? Go find out.

And realize they're doing a better job of supporting the news business than the Associated Press.

See? Blogs aren't as bad as you think!

By the way, wouldn't it be great if we had one of these about everyone associated with our little Web venture? (Note the "disclosures" section, which particularly impresses me.)

Blogs I Love: Anthony Bourdain's "Top Chef" blog

It's no surprise that Anthony Bourdain is a top-notch writer whose talent for snarky juxtapositions seems tailor-made for the Web, but his weekly write-ups for Bravo TV's "Top Chef" (of which he's a participant as a guest judge from time to time) is a wonderful reminder that sharp, smart writing continues to be the driving force behind great blogs.

Take this passage from his most recent entry, in which he bemoans his status as resident ogre on his appearances so far on the program:

So far this year, I've had the dubious honor of helping to boot off the show an extremely likeable, open-hearted orphan with a lilting Southern accent, and now, last night, I got to be part of the hunting party who smashed the hopes and dreams of a cancer survivor. Short of biting the heads off kittens while dressed up as a storm trooper, I don't think I could look any less sympathetic.

Later, he blends insights gleaned from his own experiences in professional kitchens ("When not cooking or staging on familiar ground, you don't know what the ovens and refrigeration and food holding facilities or the space is going to be like -- and you have to assume the worst.") with flat-out funny lines describing the ugliness of one contestant's broccoli dish ("I believe I said something like, 'This looks like something you'd find in Bob Marley's closet.' I meant NOW -- like years and years after the great man's death").

In short, no only does he entertain, he adds insight and depth to what's a good, if not particularly great, television show.

He also proves you can, indeed, write long in your blog entries ... provided you're good at it.

(Although I must complain about Bravo's decision to "slice up" the blog into multiple pages. Annoying. Very annoying.)

A few, vital notes on linking ...

We all know that linking is an important, even handy, aspect of blogging.

We discussed the mechanics of linking here.

But a refresher might be in order, along with a point or two beyond.

1.) You don't need to reproduce the link in the link.

In other words, you don't have to do it like this: http://mysablogs.blogspot.com/2007/01/how-to-hot-link-to-something.html

It's unnecessary because it's highly unlikely someone will copy-and-paste the address off the page rather than just click on it. Even if they just want the address, they can "right-click" on it and that'll do the job.

This becomes a problem, sometimes, when you have incredibly long, involved links, and these have a tendency to "blow out" the page, making it impossibly wide for most browsers.

And that will stay with your page until the offending entry drops off the page.

It's better to just link up a few words, a phrase, or a sentence that'll send people to where you want them to go.

2.) Try to throw the "target=_new" thing in there.

There are valid schools of thought that discourage the use of this code, which causes the item to open in a new browser window. I don't discount their views, but ... as for now ... our style is to use "target=_new" (or a variant) when we're sending someone "off-site."

Cleaning up link code is a big part of what slows us down when we're trying to plow through a chunk of blog entries. (Fixing "curly" quotes is probably No. 1, though.)

Help us help you.

Good to read ...

From the always-reliable Mindy McAdams: Staff journalists who blog: Two cases.

Enjoy.

A word on comments ...

I'll be adjusting the way we do comments on most blogs over the next few weeks. It's gonna take me a while, but I think it's gonna pay off, eventually.

I'm going to be taking different approaches on different blogs ... mainly because of differing needs, but the general rule is the blog box will be at the bottom of the entry and any previous comments. PLUS, the "post" button on the main blog pages will actually DO SOMETHING now and will call up the "post a comment" box.

Thanks to Geek Speak for being my unwilling test subjects. Look there if you want to see what I mean.

So, to sum up graphically:

On sending notifications

Folks at the Express-News are shouldering a much bigger share of the load in terms of publishing blog entries, which is awesome ... we thank you for making our lives easier.

One thing to remember, though, is to send out notifications once you've published.

Even if few (or no) people have signed up for your notifications ... WE HAVE.

We need to know there's fresh content there to promote. And trust us, we want to, because we're under directives to feature as much fresh content as possible.

So, either send notifications (instructions can be found in the now-classic "How to Edit a Blog Entry" entry ... scroll nearly to the bottom) or hit us up with a generic e-mail.

Trust us ... brazen self-promotion works.

I'd tell you who's best at that sort of activity, but I don't want to embarrass her. Er, or him, it could just as easily be a "him."

Small Dead Animals 1,000; Us 1

Alan D. Mutter, a former newspaper guy and now Silicon Valley CEO type, writes in his blog, "Reflections of a Newsosaur," about an odd phenomenon he experienced over the last couple weeks.

Seems "Reflections" had a few posts that were linked to by various sites ... a number of "traditional" news sites (Business Week, San Francisco Chronicle, etc.), which he deems "Large Ones," and a blog built and maintained by a Canadian schnauzer breeder called "Small Dead Animals."

Traffic surged into the thousands thanks to the Dead Animals blog. From the "Large Ones"? Not so much. He counted one reader showing up via the Business Week link.

He has a theory why:

Small Dead Animals is a creature of the web, by the web and for the web. Unlike the blogs grafted as an afterthought onto the sites of Forbes, Business Week, the WSJ and the rest, Small Dead Animals is a primary destination for readers hooked on what, in this case, is the bracing point of view of Catherine McMillan, an airbrush artist and schnauzer breeder who resides in a small town in Saskatchewan.

Although the Large Ones deserve a C+ for making an effort to add blogs and a few other modern touches to the print content they recycle at their staid and static sites, the banal results please neither their traditional readers nor the connoisseurs of such sites as YouTube, Gawker or the Huffington Post.

He continues ...

Readers of the traditional media have been conditioned over the years not to look to the Large Ones for the quirky news, dorky videos and (knee) jerky opinions that, for the most part, saturate the blogosphere. And Kos-inistas largely view the mainstream media, when they view them at all, as fodder for future potshots.

With the formidable creative talent, market reach, commercial relationships and financial capability they possess, the Large Ones ought to have an enormous edge over Canadian schnauzer breeders in creating editorially compelling and commercially successful online content. But they are failing, because they try to confine their new media ventures to the tightly edited and carefully modulated conventions of their existing brands.

If they want to be serious about the new media businesses, the Large Ones are going to have to establish skunkworks where people who really get the new media are given the resources and support necessary to develop original, independently branded fare. And the Large Ones will have to restrain themselves from over-managing these necessarily alien efforts.

I posted this as food for thought, but it does suggest that, for our purposes, we continue to push the envelope wherever possible. We've a lot of people to convince we're more than just car crash and crime news ... and that we're as plugged into the world at large as much as your garden-variety schnauzer breeder.

Think ... ART!

As we attempt to feature the blogs more prominently, here's something you can do to help ...

When putting together your entries, do everything you can to come up with usable, solid art that we can utilize for the photo position.

Many of you already do this, and it's appreciated, but it's going to become more important as we move forward.

A really great idea ...

I love what Ramiro Burr did here in Latin Notes Now.

Beyond simply saying "Sign up for our e-mail updates," Ramiro tells people exactly why they should ... and with a little panache, too.

Well done.

Bear in mind, this works particularly well because Ramiro blogs really, really frequently. If the last entry you posted was sometime in May, you're probably facing a tough sell, no matter how much panache you bring to the table.

Nicely done.

Gone Tinkerin' ...

Hey all,

If you notice something weird about your blog in the coming days, weeks, months ... it's probably just me.

I've been figuring out some of the background code for Movable Type, and that's letting me do things like expand the number of entries per page (examples Geek Speak and Move It!) and also do some interesting things with comments (At Large).

If any of my tinkering creates a problem, please let me know as soon as possible.

Thanks,
Matt

Wanna be a better blogger? Try this ...

Forgive me if this is a trifle obvious, but I guess it bears mentioning:

Read blogs. It doesn't have to be a ton of them, just one or two good ones that involve an area you're interested in (not even necessarily within your beat).

Find a good cooking blog. A good hunting blog. A good golfing blog.

Whatever.

But read them.

You're not going to have a chance at becoming solid bloggers if you're unfamiliar with the form.

Piling on pageviews ...

So what constitutes a "meaningful metric" and what doesn't? In other words, are "pageviews" better than "time spent" or vice versa.

It's starting to look like "time" will win out.

First, there was news that Nielsen was junking pageviews as its main metric in determining the most successful sites.

Nielsen is part of a growing number of institutions realizing that with the advent of new technologies, the pageview's value isn't necessarily as important as it once was.

As the New York Times puts it:

Yahoo and others, however, are increasingly using a software trick called Ajax that allows sites to update data automatically and continually, without users needing to pull up new pages. Page views decline as a result.

And then the reaction began to flow in ... most of it excited at the prospect of being freed from the tryanny of the pageview.

Richard MacManus of Read/Write/Web:

Blogs are a good case where 'time spent' is more meaningful than page views. Especially since the blogosphere is particularly prone to the 'quantity over quality' problem. It's easy to pump out 20+ posts a day - and that tactic garners a lot of page views. But are those blogs actually writing for their readers, or writing to get page views? In other words, check the 'time spent on site' figures for those blogs and I think you'd find it is very low - because users click through, find nothing of value, and quickly leave. Is that good for advertisers on those sites? No it isn't. So in the case of blogs, I'd argue that 'time spent on site' is a better measure than the easily gamed (or at least cynically exploited) page view model.

His point was echoed by Mindy McAdams at Teaching Online Journalism:

Say I go to site “A” and view eight pages, but I never stay on one page longer than 2 seconds (because I don’t see anything that interests me). I go to site “B” and view only two pages, but I spend 8 minutes on each page.

Current page view metrics say that site “A” is better, more trafficked.

I say that’s just stupid, because on site “A,” I consumed no content or advertising.

Other reactions are similar.

While I agree the pageview is a particularly benign creature that is consistently overvalued, I'm not sure if "time spent" is going to work, either. I tend to leave numerous browsers open constantly, so I'm not sure if that's skewing undue "time" for all these various sites. Maybe there's a way to determine this and I'm showing my ignorance, but my larger point is that any metric we work with will have strengths and weaknesses.

And, while the view will, eventually, become obsolete, let's not forget that advertisers love 'em ... so until THEY are convinced, expect to still be taking pageviews way too seriously for a while longer.

Mindy had one other point I'd like to underscore and emphasize:

For me, that’s been the horrible thing about the page view metric — padding the numbers by adding unnecessary and highly annoying extra clicks to Web sites. Newspaper Web sites have been some of the worst offenders in this respect. (Emphasis added.)

Agreed. So let's not do that.

We get letters ...

Well, sort of.

I got this question this weekend, and it's a question ... frankly ... that I've heard before. Pruned down a bit, here's the gist:

Q.: A couple of us bloggers were talking and we all noticed that if we don't get promo'd on the MySA home page the day our blogs go up, no one knows we have a new one, so no one reads them. ... But if no one is reading them, the reporters aren't eager to spend time on them. Is there any way to push the idea with everyone who's posting blogs at MySA that new E-N blogs should, if at all possible, get a good ride on the home page the day they are posted? Or is that not likely for various reasons?

And my lengthy answer:

A.: The correlation between home page promotion and pageviews is not something that's escaped our notice. The obvious problem is that of labor supply and the steady flow of blog entries. An example, on Friday — a day when we're relatively short-staffed (meaning, I'm off) — we had at least 24 blog entries posted. I'm not sure what qualifies as a good ride, but trying to squeeze that much new content into the limited space we have to work with is a challenge on our best days, and it really is more time-consuming than it might appear to the outside viewer.

We have made efforts to improve homepage visibility of the blogs in general, and we do have some fixes in mind to try to increase overall blog visibility.

(Note: Here, I turn on the bloggers a bit ... I might sound harsh, but please bear with me ...)

Indeed, one of the biggest challenges here has been the obsession with traffic from the bloggers, and the concept of "it's not worth my time" is a familiar one to me. Problem is, NOTHING on the Internet is a success out of the box. The standard growth pattern of any online venture — whether a blog, a new overall site, or anything — is a long, steady, period of limited to no growth, and then — if it's to be a "success" — a tipping point at one point where traffic begins to grow exponentially. They call it the "hockey stick" graph. (Cuz the chart of growth looks like a hockey stick.)

Problem here is, reporters are so used to believing that everything they've written in the paper is read by each and every person who picks up the paper, they become — frankly — a trifle snobbish when it comes to only a few hundred readers (or, in some cases, 50-100). I know this, because I lived it from the other side ... making the jump from newspaper to the Web, where I could actually see the readership numbers ... well, the ego does take a bruising.

What this adds up to is a nasty mix of flagging morale and resignation that sort of cripples things before they have even a chance to hit that critical mass.

I suspect that many of those who feel like blogging isn't worth their time haven't been following best practices in regard to posting frequency. As long as you blog regularly (and well) and people know when to expect new work out of you (in other words, blogging Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays by 9 a.m. is MUCH better than blogging 15 times in one day, then twice another, then not at all for a week), you will build a following, modest though it may be ... especially at the beginning.

Which, upon reflection, is a little puzzling. A roomful of 100 people would make me nervous to speak in front of ... yet we dismiss them as "not worth the effort" when the blog numbers roll in. Even 75 people extremely interested in what you have to say are, in my opinion, worth at least as much as ten thousand who might — or more likely, might not — catch a whiff of what you're saying on the way to the the sports pages (or, in my case, the funnies).

The homepage promotion is a great way to expose a blog ... but it's not going to single-handedly elevate it into the "worth it" strata. Only time (and extremely hard work) is going to do that. The beauty of it is, once a blog is rolling, it's really hard to derail it, and it becomes an entity almost unto itself.

Well worth it, in my opinion.

I should note the blogger did respond with some good points, though they were a bit beyond the scope of what I wanted to discuss here. I wanted to post this because, again, I hear this quite a lot, and it is a major problem for our various ventures together. If you'd like to comment on this, either drop me a line at mthompson@mysanantonio.com or post it here.

Blogs I Love: Comics Curmudgeon

It's the essence of simplicity: Posting comic strips and then making fun of them.

Potential copyright issues aside, the Comics Curmudgeon is a daily, if mildly profane, hoot, and has actually managed to help make some obscure, dated strips, such as Mary Worth (a frequent target of his barbs), a small sensation on the Web.



But what can we learn about blogging from Mr. Curmudgeon?

It's a fantastic example of community. Check out the number of comments that fly up shortly after he posts. His most recent one, posted around midday yesterday, has over 350 comments already.

These are dutiful fans who have already, largely, made friends with one another, and they attempt to one-up each other (and the blog's author) on a daily basis.

Josh (the blogger himself) breaks character a couple times a week, identifying the "comment of the week," listing a dozen or so other ones he finds humorous, and hosting various "Meta" events. (This one, inviting his readers to recreate a particularly ridiculous event from Gil Thorp, is my personal favorite.) He, and his readers, have also created merchandise based on the blog at Cafepress.

It's the community aspect of blogs I'll be dealing with over the next few posts. Keep an eye on the Curmudgeon as a great example of what you can do with what following you have ... and how you have to be in position to boost and solidify that following when the opportunities present themselves. (And they will.)

Point/Counterpoint ...

I'm not sure whether to file this as some sort of debate, or just an ultimate slam (or "burn," as we used to call 'em when we'd have insult-offs back when I was a kid) ... but it comes to us via the always fantastic Teaching Online Journalism blog (if you haven't bookmarked it already ... go ahead, I'll wait).

TOJ details a radio exchange between old school journos Pete Hamill and Fred Dicker, recounted at Gangrey.com:

Dicker: “... You can take a look at these newspapers blogs. The bloggers seem to me, Pete, to be basically opinionated stenographers, writing basically for shut-ins. I can’t imagine who would spend their time reading these things except a very rarefied, small group of people.”

Hamill: “I don’t read them, because life is too short. But I advise the young journalist, don’t waste your talent on blogs. Get to a newspaper, no matter how small, where there’s an editor who will look at your copy and say this will be better if you do this. Go somewhere where you learn the craft. Most blogs are therapy. But they’re not journalism. People who write them, except for the professional propaganda blogs, are there for therapy.

At that point, TOJ's Mindy McAdams opens the can of proverbial whoopass:

"Writing for shut-ins"? Wow, where does that come from? So the 80-year-olds reading the printed newspaper -- they are the vibrant lifeblood of society? And all you blog readers out there -- you're a bunch of lumps on a log, do-nothings, hardly worth consideration.

But wait, there's more:

It would be great to have the tutelage of a good editor, no doubt about it. But I have to wonder what your chances are, nowadays, of getting a good editor at a newspaper. Maybe there is a good editor, but will he or she have any time to work with you?

As the kids today say: Oh SNAP! Oh, no she did-n't.

Okay, at this point, I'm embarassing myself.

But the exchange does reflect the fact that for a certain segment of journalists, the Internet is still lacking in value ... still a Wild West for computer nerds and geeks.

Gotta get over that folks. Fast. Like ... yesterday.

YouTube adds online mixer ...

Got a short video you want to upload and post on your blog ... only you find the editing process intimidating (or can't get access to editing software/equipment)?

Well, rejoice.

YouTube is beta-testing an online video remixer. There are others out there, but the convenience of editing your video and then immediately posting the finished product makes this an alluring new feature.

You can add titles, subtitles, transitions, background music (presuming it's stuff we have the rights to use) and various other bells and whistles. Then you publish it, grab the embed code (as seen below) and drop it into your entry body.



Presto: Instant multimedia. No muss. No fuss.

You'll have to sign up with YouTube, but it's not an extensive process. And while I have no idea if this is adequate for longer-form, higher-quality video projects, if you just want to dump something up online, this is the smartest way to do it.

(ADDENDUM: I should remind you that this is a "beta" project, so there might be glitches to be encountered. So, fair warning. I plan on playing around with this more later, when I get some time, so I'll post more later if I encounter rough going.)

How To ... Correct A Blog Entry

This is a big one, because there are a lot of misperceptions about correcting errors on the Web.

The most important thing to remember is as follows ... and I'm bold-facing it — not because I'm yelling, but because it's so important:

• Whatever you've published on the Web, stays on the Web.

In other words, there is no such thing as "unpublishing" a blog entry.

Think of the Internet as a giant piece of paper and your blog entry as a well-inked stamp. Once you publish, you've stamped that entry to the giant piece of paper. "Unpublishing" might make the stamp go away, but it won't erase what's on the giant piece of paper.

To resort to the more technical speak, "unpublishing" an entry might remove that entry from the index of your blog, but that entry is still accessible at the specific Web address assigned to it by Movable Type the second you published.

In other words, while an erroneous, unpublished entry won't show up here:

http://blogs.mysanantonio.com/weblogs/streets/

It will remain visible here:

http://blogs.mysanantonio.com/weblogs/streets/2007/06/this_is_a_mistake.html

As such, it can be searchable under any of the Internet search engines (and that address goes out on your "notification" e-mails, too).

ALSO, if someone's using an RSS reader to read your stuff, "unpublishing" has no effect on that whatsoever.

SO, what to do after a mistake's been made?

There are many ethical and even legal ramifications to this topic, which is my way of saying there's no clear consensus on the best steps to take.

Much like a TV doctor dispensing advice, let me be clear ... I'm speaking generally here about a variety of hypotheticals. If your situation is life-threatening (or, in our case, career-threatening), consult your editor and they'll get the lawyers involved. Do what they tell you to do.

This entry is more related to preserving the credibility of your blog in the greater blogosphere, where ... believe it or not ... the best thing you can do to ensure your credibility is to quickly and honestly own up to mistakes.

Again ... speaking generally ... the best practices depend on the gravity of the mistake:

For small errors, spelling at the like, I don't see a problem with making the correction, as long as you provide a small line at the bottom, such as:

(This entry has been updated to correct spelling and grammatical errors.)

For moderate errors, more factual stuff, let's look at two methods:

1.) Add an additional graph below the original content, clarifying the mistake:



2.) A slightly flashier — and more fun — method is using "strikethrough." This provides a line through the erroneous information, to be followed by corrected info.

It looks like this:



This can require a little more art in the re-write, and while it's an accepted (if not encouraged) practice in the blogosphere at large, it makes more than a few print-based folks way too nervous.

If you want to try it, though, use the following code around the words you want to remove:

<span class=strikethrough></span>

In the following format:

Correct text here. <span class=strikethrough>Stuff to be striked through </span>. Back to regular text.

Note: This has been used successfully by some bloggers to be a little playful, such as:



It's an effective technique in the right hands, but use it this way extremely sparingly.

The choice is yours, but I'd recommend the first, simpler, approach. Especially while you're still learning the medium.

For MAJOR errors (non-litigational division): You will have the urge to just yank it down. Do your best to fight that urge. (And don't get cute with the strikethrough.)

Instead, think about the best way to use an "UPDATE" block ... It's absolutely the best way to clarify/correct the information without looking like you're trying to weasel out of something.

However, there are times when something just has to come down.

In those times — we're talking Defcon 1 here — take everything out of the entry body and replace it with an explanation of what was done and why. Be contrite and specific, like so:



Please be aware, though, that the incorrect information is probably still floating out there in Cyberspace somewhere. That's just a fact of 21st century life.

LASTLY, again, if you think you've made an error involving libel, contact your editor and the lawyers and do exactly what they tell you to.

The beauty of <br clear=all>

So, let's suppose you have a piece of art that's deeper than the text block you're embedding it in. At worst, it drives into the post below it and looks awful. At best, an angry browser will punish you with grey space!



NOOOOOOO! It BURNS! It BURNS!

Sorry, not sure why I did that. Anyway, if you want to make sure this sort of thing doesn't happen, drop a little piece of magical code at the bottom of your entry that looks like this:

<br clear=all>

This code effectively draws a line at the bottom of the photo and creates white space to the left to even things out. So, no runover, no gray space, no fuss.

et voilà!:



Not an overwhemlingly vital piece of info, but it might come in handy.

The NCAA/blogger saga continues ...

A couple interesting points/opinions in the case of the NCAA expelling a newspaper reporter who was live-blogging a college baseball game:

• From Deadspin:If we are understanding the NCAA correctly, someone who is sitting in a press box providing "live" updates from a game is breaking some sort of ridiculous "rights" policy, but someone who is watching the game on ESPN and doing the same thing is not. We do not know if this applies to anyone who might update their site from their blackberry from the stands. We hope they eject their ass too. Oh, and if a friend of yours texts you asking the score, you better not tell write them back. The moral of the story: If someone from the NCAA is giving you grief about live blogging a game, just step 50 feet away. The NCAA has now, by definition, given the proverbial guy in the basement better access to his/her readers than someone in their own press box. SMART.

According to the Washington Post, the source of the problem was a memo circulated by the NCAA:

The newspaper said the university circulated a memo on the issue from Jeramy Michaels, the NCAA's manager of broadcasting, before the first super regional game Friday. It said blogs are considered a "live representation of the game" and blogs containing action photos or game reports are prohibited until the game is over.

And the newspaper's response via their lawyer:

"It's a real question that we're being deprived of our right to report within the First Amendment from a public facility," Fleischaker said. "Once a player hits a home run, that's a fact. It's on TV. Everybody sees it. [The NCAA] can't copyright that fact."

Blogs I Love: Lifehacker.com

This is the first of a series of posts that will stress what I think are great blogs. Some will be corporate. Some will be major media. Some will be independent.

The idea here is to get a feel for what is best practices, what works, what doesn't and why, with an eye toward improving our own work here.

As always, chime in with your own observations about these sites, as you see fit.

Up first:



Lifehacker.com

I like the entire Gawker family of blogs. They're smart, often funny, fearless and probably annoying to all the right people.

Even though, contrary to popular opinion, I'm not that much of a tech guy, I love Lifehacker because it so effortlessly mixes nuts-and-bolts productivity advice ("Choose a memorable password with Diceware") with much softer fare ("Recharge with a meditation nap).

It's all on one general theme (making yourself more productive and happier using technology and science), but it also goes all over the place, in a categorized, tightly organized way.

Which is a Gawker trademark.

Take time and explore the Gawker Universe (except Fleshbot! Many, many warnings about Fleshbot! It's about online porn, so beware!)

In the meantime, think about your own blog in terms of organization. What sub-categories, if you will, fit into the broader context? Can you establish regular features to cover that turf? (Such as — Hey! — "Blogs I Love"?)

Feel free to nominate new blogs you love, as well.

Sound the alarms!

Bloggers are under attack! A reporter was chased for blogging from the press box.

From Romenesko:

(Louisville) Courier-Journal sports reporter Brian Bennett had his media pass revoked and was ordered to leave the press box during a college baseball game Sunday because of what the NCAA said was a violation of its policies prohibiting live Internet updates from its championship events. "It's clearly a First Amendment issue," says C-J executive editor Bennie Ivory. "This is part of the evolution of how we present the news to our readers."

This is going to be more of a problem for everybody as the distinction between print and broadcast media becomes more fluid.

Some of the comments on the original Courier-Journal story are pretty interesting:

"The producer of the event owns the intellectual property rights. What the CJ illegally attempted to do was the same as bootlegging CDs and DVDs. It's the same thing as sneaking microphones into a concert and broadcasting it over the airwaves."

An opposing view:

"His blogging is no different than ESPN giving an update on a CBS NCAA tournament game. Does CBS deny ESPN to give coverage of March Madness simply because the game is not over yet? I'm sure ESPN pays for the rights to use video replays and such but a person sitting at a desk has the constitutional RIGHT to discuss the portion of the game that has already occurred."

Lawyers, start your engines ...

UPDATE: This just in from Tacoma, where word is that the NFL is taking steps to limit the amount of NFL player/coach audio and video any site not owned by NFL.com can broadcast, and for how long.

Tacoma News-Tribune blogger (and Seahawks beat writer) Mike Sando takes on this short-sighted policy, and offers an interesting suggestion:

For years the Seahawks have uploaded video from press conferences with coach Mike Holmgren and others. Most of the good questions (and some of the lame ones, of course) were asked by people who covered the team every day. Reporters should be less inclined to ask questions in that setting if the league monopolizes the audio and video. (Emphasis added.)

Oh, yeah, it is so on ...

Clip and save ...

Well, go to this post, THEN clip, THEN save.

It's "gear for the multimedia reporter." It's pretty great.

Enjoy.

• Basic kit: Gear for the multimedia reporter (Via the always awesome Lost Remote)

ADDITIONAL MUST-READING: The No-Fear Guide to Multimedia Skills

Tough love ...

This is only tangentially related to blogging, but this list of "10 obvious things about the future of newspapers you need to get through your head" is interesting for anyone interested in the state of Web news.

One blogging-related item makes the parade, and it's more about the reporter-blogger dynamic than anything else:

Bloggers aren’t an uneducated lynch mob unconcerned by facts. They’re your readers and your neighbors and if you play your cards right, your sources and your community moderators. If you really play it right, bloggers are the leaders of your networked reporting projects. Get over the whole bloggers vs. journalists thing, which has been pretty much settled since long before you stopped calling it a “Web blog” in your stories.

There's a fair amount of "ouch" throughout this list, but it's worth the time to read it.

• The list

Ghost of Christmas future ...

A friend of mine who's a computer programming wiz went to a convention a year or so back when they discussed what the future will look like.

The answer: Screens. Screens everywhere, with slots where we can plug personal memory cards (or cubes) in to access our data, which would come with us everywhere, attached to our car keys.

We're not quite there, yet, but we're getting close.

Microsoft is rolling out its new "Surface" deal, which is a fancy way of saying "tabletop computer screen."

What is "Surface"? It's a big-screen keyboardless, mouseless computer that enables select devices to sync up just by laying them on the tabletop. Infinitely cool.

This is an earlier video demonstrating how it works:



Notice the social aspect of this sort of technology. Two or three, or even more people can be involved simultaneously.

It's pricy now ... so they won't be in your living room anytime in the next few months. And, who knows? "Surface" may, indeed, fail for whatever reason.

But if it ain't "Surface," it'll be something just like it. This is what it's going to look like in the very near future.

I bring this up to remind ourselves: This is what we're going to be up against. This sort of integrated media experience is going to make it harder and harder for us to attract and maintain the attention of the consumer.

Are we really doing everything we can, as individuals and as an industry, to prepare for this sort of thing?

Game-changing impact aside, check out the videos, they're pretty cool:

• Microsoft Surface

How they view us ...

Recently ... as in, within the week ... ESPN.com launched a new football blog named Hashmarks featuring former DMN writer Matt Mosely.

Why this means anything to us is with ESPN being the Worldwide Leader, "Hashmarks" has drawn some serious fire from within the sports blogging community.

In one of the less vitriolic (or at least mocking) efforts, the sports blog The Big Lead takes some time to offer up some constructive observations about the new, corporate kid on the block.

I thought some of his points can be happily applied to us, here, too.

Among the highlights:

• Maintaining a blog is a marathon, not a sprint, but this dude’s out of the gate heavy on the production. He’s posting in volume, that’s for sure, but let’s see how long it lasts …

• It definitely looks like ESPN has taken the cuffs off the guy, which is a good thing. He actually referenced the Brady Quinn photos, and we haven’t seen them referenced anywhere else on the .com (it would have been nice to get credit for posting them first, but hey, such is life) …

• Though we’re still relatively new to this genre, it appears as if the best way to become part of the blogging community is to link to other bloggers. It’s kind of like we’re all on this immensely gay basketball team, going around giving each other high-fives and pats on the back. We’ll be curious to see if this Mosley fellow is standing off in the corner of the gym, too cool (or wealthy) to join in with the rest of kids …

Remember, you're viewed as the establishment by a ton of the local bloggers out there. Show 'em some love, show 'em you're just like they are, and they'll respond.

• Hashmarks (ESPN)
• Deadspin: Hashmarks' Comedic Value Is Superb! (a slightly less diplomatic critique)

Best/Worst Practices ...

I was throwing together a list of best and worst practices for some community bloggers we'll be inviting aboard (it's gonna get crowded in these parts), and I thought it was actually something everybody should probably see.

They're not cast in stone (well, MOST of 'em aren't, anyway), but I think they're a good start, regardless.

Best practices when writing blogs:

• Create lively, informative entries covering your area of expertise.

• Brevity truly is the soul of wit. While there's no hard and fast rule against epic-length posts, studies show they aren't read well, and you're probably doing yourself and your reader a favor by making your points cleanly and efficiently.

• Frequency will trump length everytime.

• Keep the tone conversational. Consider these e-mails to friends and family.

• Lists and sub-heads are a good way to break up huge blocks of text.

• Provide links to articles within the area of interest.

Poor practices when writing blogs:

• Brazen self-promotion, especially in terms of business interests: Not only is it against the spirit of what we're trying to do here, you'll lose major credibility ... and we would lose credibility, as well ... and we can't have that.

• Plagiarism: Make sure the words are your own. If you reference another site or blogger, that's fine, but quote no more than a paragraph or so, then provide a link back to the original source. Remember, in this age, it's harder to get away with it than it ever has been before.

• Making changes once a post has been published: When a mistake occurs, contact an editor. We'll add paragraphs updating the information and, where necessary, excise the incorrect information. But any changes you make should be, and must be, clearly noted somewhere in the entry. We'll work with you on these situations, but don't take matters into your own hands.


Some of these are pretty obvious ... some maybe not so much. Just stuff to bear in mind as we forage ahead.

Online photo editor I like

In an effort to help those who don't have Photoshop or a similar editing program on your computer, I spent some time field-testing some of the online photo editors that are available.

There are plenty to choose from, but the one I liked best was Picnik.

It combines an easy cropping and sizing interface with an option for sliding JPG quality ... a very good thing if our hope is to keep image sizes down. (And it is.)

Additional tips on sizing photos are available here, and I'll be adding more as we go.

(One caveat: Register with picnik if you like ... I've generally just used "Try It Now!" and then hit "sign out" when I want to work another photo.)

How To ... Create a Blog Entry

This entry covers the very, very basics of blogging. If you're looking for more intermediate to advanced techniques, check the list of "How-Tos" to the left here.

For those just blogging for the first time: Welcome.

You'll need a few things, which you probably already got from me:

• A URL to go to

• A username and login

• Something to blog about

You'll have to acquire the third item on your own, but I probably e-mailed the first two to you already. If not, contact me. (And never, EVER share your URL and login info with anybody. Only bad things can happen if that occurs.)

Step by step:

1.) Input the URL into your Web browser. You will eventually see something like this:



2.) Input the requested information. It might take a little while, but you should eventually see this (click to enlarge):


(Click to enlarge)

The important parts are these (click to enlarge):



First thing to do is check the name of the blog. Make sure you're on the right page. If you're not, use the pull-down menu (top circle) to navigate to the correct blog.

Then, click "New Entry" (left circle) and we'll move on ...

3.) The screen should look like this (my own markings added in red and, as always, click to enlarge):


(Click to enlarge)

The three areas you'll have to worry about are the Title (headline), Entry Body and Save Button. For our purposes, ignore "Extended Entry" and "Excerpt."

Type a headline in the Title box ... place your entry in the "Entry Body" box and then click "Save."

(Best Practice Tip: It's a good idea to compose your entry in another application. MS Word's a good choice — but first follow these steps to eliminate the automatic "curly" quote and apostrophe function.)

IMPORTANT NOTE: Be sure NOT to change the "Post Status" box from "Unpublished" to "Published." We'll do that.

4.) Send us an e-mail and let us know the entry is ready. You can also IM us. Ask me for a list of our logins. (UPDATE: Since this was posted, we've changed the workflow chart. You should contact the editor tasked with editing your blog after you're done. Check with your editor to see if that's them or someone else.)

And that's it! You're a blogger. If you're feeling adventurous now, try some of the more fancy stuff (photos, hotlinks, etc.) via the tutorials on the upper-left.

If you feel like I left anything out, let me know that, too. I can always update this thing.

Tips to fellow bloggers are welcome in the comments section, as well.

Thanks!

How To ... Edit a Blog Entry

If you're in a position to have to edit a blog entry and — outside of making the words better — you have no idea how to start, follow this handy guide.

Everybody does it their own way, but for me, this way works pretty well.

(First, a quick — and some might think self-evident — definition of terms. A "blog" is a group of postings by one individual or group. "Wine Matters" is a blog. "Courtside" is a blog. The individual components of a blog are "entries.")

• Log into Movable Type. This is best accomplished by bookmarking one specific blog page within MT — typically the blog you usually work in. You can then navigate to whichever blog you want by using the drop-down menu at the top of the page and clicking "go":



• Once there, click on entries and find the entry you have to edit.

• Copy the text from the entry and paste it into MS Word (or a similar word-processing program). Be sure to set the program to NOT INCLUDE "curly quotes," "curly apostrophes" and other characters that cause Movable Type to "choke" when the entry's published. (Example below.)



(Note: I've just now learned that the Firefox browser — which is awesome — converts these garbles automatically. Unfortunately, I think IE still dominates the market, so best practice is to eliminate these characters.)

(EVEN LATER NOTE: The above isn't true. For whatever reason, the garbles show up in Firefox, too.)

Here's the entry where I show how to banish "curly quotes."

Once you've done that, it's simply a matter of "searching and replacing" the curly quotes with regular quotes. You can do that by replacing " with "

The computer will automatically find the curly quotes and replace them with normal quotes.

Or, in graphical terms:



Do the same thing with apostrophes ... search for ' and replace with '

Hopefully that makes sense.

• Hunt down long dashes (or double-dashes) and replace them with this code:

&mdash;

You can do a search and replace if there are a ton of 'em, but it's usually faster for me (at this point) to do it manually.

• Make sure the spacing is correct.

Movable Type will convert any return into a page break. What's that mean?

It means this:



When published will look like this:



However adding a second return between the lines like THIS:



You get THIS:



Which I guess is a long way around to tell you to make sure to put breaks in between the paragraphs, y'know, to make it pretty.

Seriously, it's a relatively simple concept, but one you should definitely master.

• Run spell-check. Lazy, maybe, but why not use the technology.

• Make sure credit lines — consistent with the standard way the blog does them — are there.

• Copy and paste the edited copy back into Movable Type.

• Check the headline for special characters and spelling. (Frequently overlooked.)

• Publish.

• Most important step: Go to the blog and see what it looks like. Go back and fix any errors and then check again.

• Send notification. This is done by going back to the entry and clicking on the "notification" tab:



You'll get this screen, where you then check off the "include excerpt" box and then hit "send."



Note: Some of you might lack privileges to do this, in which case you won't see the "notification" tab. If that's the case, see your editor or contact me.

And that's it. It's a lot, but it's not unmanageable, and eventually it will become second nature.

Be sure to use to other "How To" guides on this blog for tips on dealing with photos, pdfs, etc. Or just drop me a line.