I’ve been quiet here lately, thanks to a large workload. But I had to pop in to tout an invaluable WordPress plugin, the Yoast Plugin for Google Analytics.
Yoast’s Analytics plugin solves one of the most vexing issues I’ve had with Analytics: how do I screen out visits from my own account? In today’s age of mobile computing and dynamic IP addresses, filtering by IP isn’t an option. You can solve this problem using browser cookies, but it’s a bloody hack.
Yoast GA solves this problem cleanly. After installing the plugin, click Settings -> Google Analytics on your WordPress Admin Panel, and scroll down to the Advanced Settings section. Here, you can choose to tell the plugin not to generate Google Analytics tracking code whenever you’re logged into WordPress. You can screen out only visits by Administrators, or you can screen out visits by a lesser role. As the useful UI help text explains, the GA plugin screens out all visits from users of that role or greater. Screening out Editor, for example, will tell the plugin to ignore visits by both Editors and Administrators.
That’s only one feature among many that this free plugin supports. Install it, and if you find it useful, send the author, Joost de Valk, a few dollars via PayPal to show your appreciation. He’s earned it.
Need help installing plugins for WordPress? Check out my article on how to install plugins on your Hostgator account.
When I established my new domain, I used Google Apps to create new e-mail accounts for my business. My dream was to export all of my old e-mail and chat transcripts out of my username@gmail.com account and into my username@jayallenwrites.com account.
Consider my dreams dashed. There’s no good way to export your chat history from a Gmail account. (Notice I said no good way. I’ll discuss the bad way in a moment.) The best I was able to do was import all of my old e-mail from my old account into my new account, and keep the old account around for reference.
I’m glad I haven’t bought a Kindle or a Nook. I noticed today on Amazon that Archos has several tablet computers running Google’s Android OS, with the least expensive unit priced competitively against the e-readers. The Archos 7 8GB Home Tablet only costs $192, compared to $189 for the Kindle. A company called Augen is selling its own Android-powered faux iPad for $150.
This isn’t an endorsement of these devices. Judging from the reviews, the Archos tablets need to ripen for another release or two. But these are the first Android tablets to hit the market. Word is that Motorola is releasing its own Android-powered tablet in November.
Even before the iPad imitators hit the market, Kindle and Nook were in trouble: Apple’s iPad outsold Kindle in just three months, despite the iPad’s heftier price tag.
Why is all this significant? Because you can read Kindle books on Android, just like on a Kindle (or a PC, or an iPad.) Why spend between $150 and $200 on a device that can only read books and play music, when you can spend the same cash for a multimedia device with a full operating system? True, the eInk technology on the Kindle and Nook eliminates the screen glare that can strain your eyes on an LCD screen. Personally, I’d trade a little readability for a fully functional computer than can stream video, play multimedia, and run games in addition to displaying text.
This doesn’t mean e-readers will disappear. I’d gladly buy a Kindle – if it cost less than three figures. With cheap tablets on the horizon, I’m betting you’ll see sub-$100 Kindles before the summer of 2011.
I cringed recently when I saw a post on the political blog DailyKos that contained this sentence:
As this article and an earlier one in the New York Times elucidates, there were at least three other career NSA employees, and a Republican staffer on the House Intelligence Committee, who shared Drake’s apoplecticy. [Emphasis mine]
No, “apoplecticy” isn’t a word. It wants to be, but it isn’t. It’s an abortive attempt to noun a verb – a tragedy compounded by the existence of “apoplexy.” Come to think of it…can you even “share” apoplexy? (“Hey, Don, can I borrow some apoplexy?” “Sorry, Drake, I used all mine up on the Gulf oil spill last week.”)
I don’t mean to pillory this author. Let he who has never mangled English cast the first stone. I’m citing this because it’s a good example of how the desire to be inventive or seek economy of expression can get the better of us, leading to constructions that aren’t useful, but plain wretched.
Of course, plenty of folks would argue that my verbing of “noun” above itself presages a literary Apocalypse. Verbing is the subject of Wordnik founder Erin McKean’s recent article in the Boston Globe. McKean comes out firmly on the side of verbing, even in a business context:
Some of the outrage might be connected to verbing’s popularity as a feature of business jargon: Liase, incentivize, leverage, and status are often cited as horrible bizspeak to be shunned at all costs. (Why are businesses supposed to be superefficient in everything but their use of language? “He didn’t have a chance to status us before he left” is four words shorter than “He didn’t have a chance to give us a status update before he left.”)
I agree, in theory. Language is dynamic, and authors shouldn’t be shy about extending it, so long as their intended meaning is clear. But there’s no reason to noun verbs that already have noun forms. That’s just lazy. In McKean’s example above, “status” doesn’t convey additional meaning; it’s a linguistic secret decoder ring that establishes the speaker as part of an in-group or clique. “Update his status” may be three words as opposed to one, but it also conveys its intended meaning while avoiding the alienating feel of jargon. And if you’re aiming for word economy, there’s always “apprise.”
I’m fine with creating new words – but not before using the ones we have.
The WordPress for Writers Series discusses how to install and maintain your own copy of WordPress. It is written for writers and subject matter experts, and does not assume any prior technical knowledge.
I’ve argued that online authors should use their own installations of WordPress. Administrating WordPress is easy if you use HostGator. Like many providers, HostGator drives its site hosting using an application called cPanel. After signing up for HostGator and registering your domain name, go to http://www.yourdomainname.com/cpanel, and you’ll have everything you need to install and maintain WordPress.
Installing WordPress is simple using the Fantastico De Luxe installation tool listed under the Software/Services tab. This will give you everything you need to set up your blog, give it a theme, and begin posting to the world.
Eventually, though, you’ll want to expand what your installation of WordPress can do by installing plugins. A WordPress plugin is a piece of software that extends WordPress with new features. The plugin architecture of WordPress permits thousands of developers around the world to add features to your blog without waiting for the WordPress developers to do it for them. By installing plugins, you can make your blog easier to use, and set it apart from the crowd.
In the following article, I’ll show you how to install the Google XML Sitemaps plug-in. This nifty extension improves your search engine results by generating a file used by Google and other engines to prioritize your site’s content. You can use the sitemap to instruct Google to give priority to your feature articles over your regular blog posts, or to highlight certain categories of blog posts over others. The steps provided below remain the same for any plugin. Once you install one, you’re free to upload new plugins to your heart’s content.
Note: While this article is specific to HostGator, it may work just as well on other service providers that use the cPanel interface. Emphasis on the “may.”
I don’t hate print. I’m currently making my way through very physical copies of Richard Evans’ The Third Reich in Power, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Love in The Time of Cholera. But the writing’s on the wall: the majority of reading matter will be digital by the end of this decade. Digital books are easier to access, more environmentally friendly, easier to store, and easier to use. As my friend Mark once said, “You can’t Google dead trees.” *
Perhaps that’s why Jeffrey Toney’s reminiscence of the physical books he loves struck a chord. As Toney notes, art books are ill suited to the Matrix. One of my prized possessions is a copy of Alphonse Mucha: The Spirit of Art Nouveau, a beautiful coffee table compilation of this groundbreaking artist’s work. I remember coveting this book online for weeks, and being shocked upon finding a copy in the Art shelves at Half Price Books for $37. I’ve spent hours pouring over it, both alone and with friends. Someone may, one day, convert this tome into a rockin’ iPad application. But you can’t Kindle or Nook this book. The content is the pictures, not the type.
Digital books are fine for easy storage and search, but they carry no history. I can go on Amazon.com and download Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz for free. (And I have!) That doesn’t compare to when my high school girlfriend Mandy, aware of my fondness for the author, bought me a rare turn-of-the-20th-century print out of an antiques store window in Rochester, New York. Digital media is Teflon-coated against memories. None of us will look back 40 years from now and say to our grandchildren, “Yes, I remember the day I downloaded The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo.”
Maybe digital will make these “real book” moments even more precious. Maybe we’ll find that we treasure the physical books we own more – not merely because they’re rare or beautiful, but because they’re doorways to our histories.
What physical books do you cherish?
(* Actually, Mark said, “You can’t grep dead trees.” I decided to take mercy on the 99.7% of you who wouldn’t get that. You owe me.)
Let’s assume that WordPress is the best content management system available. I’ll prove it later; just trust me for now. The next question for would-be bloggers and Web site owners is whether you host a blog on WordPress.com, or self-host your own copy of WordPress.
WordPress comes in two versions: one you can use freely over the Web (WordPress.com), and one you can download and install yourself (available through WordPress.org). In the first case, you have no responsibility for the blog software. WordPress.com upgrades WordPress periodically, applies security fixes, and keeps your blog up and running. It’s the (seemingly) low-cost, low-maintenance way to host your content. In the second case, you open an account with a hosting service such as HostGator, and install your own copy of the WordPress software. When WordPress is updated, you’re responsible for installing the upgrade. If something breaks, you’re responsible for fixing it.
Does self-hosting sound like a pain? It can be. Most authors and subject matter experts avoid it, because they’re not “techno-geeks.” They want a Web site so they can educate people on stocks, gardening, or the forthcoming Robot Revolution – not so they can tinker with software. But if your business requires building a fully functioning Web site that grows along with your operation, there are many reasons why you’re better off opening a hosting account and installing WP yourself.
1. It’s not as hard as you think. WordPress is so popular that all of the major hosting services have made it easy to install. Services like DreamHost and HostGator provide one-click installation of the latest version. After the initial installation, WordPress can upgrade itself. WP will tell you on your Administration panel when an upgrade is available. In most cases you can click a couple buttons and, bam – new WordPress!
What if you’re just starting out, and can’t afford a custom design for your site’s appearance? No worries. There are over 1,200 free themes that will give your blog a professional look and feel in a matter of minutes.
2. WordPress.com isn’t as cheap as it looks. Hey, they have to keep the lights running somehow. The site makes its money by charging for “advanced services.” Want to change your blog’s background color? That’ll be an extra $10 a year to edit your site’s style sheet. You’ll also pay extra to host your own domain, upload video, remove ads, and obtain more storage space. Depending on what you need, hosting your blog on WordPress.com can be just as expensive as hosting it yourself.
3. Self-hosting is cheap. When you consider what you receive in return, self-hosting is a steal. For $10 a month, HostGator will provide you a hosting account with unlimited disk space, unlimited domain name hosting, 24-hour support, data backups, Web site traffic analysis, mail hosting, FTP access, and secure e-commerce services. And HostGator calls that their “Baby” hosting service!
$10 a month is a drop in the bucket even for the most piddling blog whose sole revenue stream is Google AdSense. If you self-host and your blog does even moderate traffic (1,000 visitors a day) by the end of its first year, self-hosting will pay for itself.
4. Self-hosting means more features and happier users. With WordPress.com, you’re restricted to using the features that the site offers all of its users. That’s a rip-off! WordPress has a plug-in architecture that allows third party software developers to add new features. As of this writing, there are over 10,000 plug-ins available for free download. WordPress users who self-host can distinguish their sites and keep their customers engaged by installing a few well-chosen plug-ins.
As an example, this blog uses Redirection to automatically redirect users when a URL changes; Contact Form 7 to provide an easy means to contact the author (moi); Facebook Connect to enable complete Facebook integration; All in One SEO Pack to optimize my posts for search engines; and Google XML Sitemaps to make my content easier to find. That’s only a small sampling of the plug-ins available to turbo-power your WordPress installation.
5. No restrictions on site advertising. WordPress.com makes additional dosh off of ads it places on your content. That’s right: they’re profiting off of your hard work. You can pay to have ads removed, but most bloggers can’t host ads themselves. Some high-traffic blogs (i.e., blogs pulling in more than 25,000 visitors daily) can apply to host their own ads, and split the revenue evenly with WordPress.com. No offense to the good folks behind the scenes, but I find that obscene. Your content is yours. You should own it lock, stock, and barrel. If anyone’s making money off of your output, it ought to be you.
If you’re using your Web site for business, your business deserves better than being hosted on WordPress.com. Open up a HostGator account, and you can start developing a uniquely branded site immediately. And remember: if you get stuck, I’m only an e-mail away.
I recently installed WordPress 3.0, and am blown away. The latest version of the popular content management system introduces several killer new features. WP and WP-MU (Multi-User) are now integrated, which means you can administrate a blog network under a single WordPress administration panel. WP 3.0 also supports a custom menu system, custom post headers and backgrounds, and a streamlined administration UI.
But my favorite feature is Custom Post Types. Let’s say you run a movie blog, and want to have a separate listing for DVD capsule reviews, with the reviews containing affiliate links to Amazon.com. You don’t want these posts to show up in the main feed, as you may be adding several every day. Before 3.0, this required coding and template hacks. With WP 3.0, you can create a new custom post type specifically for your DVD reviews. This collection of posts will have its own tab on the Administration menu, just like Posts and Pages. By default, these custom posts are distinct from your main publishing stream, and can even have their own post templates.
Want an example? Visit my Humor page, which I generated by defining the custom post type “Humor.” Here’s a screenshot of how these posts appear in the Administration UI:
You can read a full tutorial on Custom Post Types at Justin Tadlock’s blog. But don’t start fiddling with your blog just yet! Hop on over first to Matt Wiebe’s Smart Custom Post Types page. Matt provides additional template code (it goes in your template’s functions.php file) that improves WP’s native support by enabling custom landing pages, custom index templates, and more. I used Matt’s code to generate the Humor page without defining any additional templates or functions.
A great article in the LA Times last week makes it clear that literacy isn’t dead – it’s simply evolving. Textbooks are coming alive on iPads; fans are interacting with authors, and extending fictional universes on sites like FanFiction.net; and authors are gaining notoriety through online publishing, proving themselves in the Wild West of the Internet prior to scoring a traditional print run. Now that anyone can be their own publisher, content is proliferating exponentially. (Yes, exponentially. I measured it last night with an astrolabe and a tape measure. As my daughter would say, “Trufax.”)
Between blogs, fan sites, and document libraries like Scribd, the Internet is a vast repository of textual content. Publishers refer to their collection of unsolicited submissions as the slush pile. The Internet is the world’s largest slush pile: there’s a wealth of information waiting to be tapped…if you know how to find it. This is where having friends comes in handy.
Before I read the Times article, I hadn’t used Scribd. “Great,” I thought, “another wasteland of content to navigate.” Fortunately, I have plenty of friends on Facebook, and Scribd supports Facebook integration. Everything my Facebook friends have uploaded to or read on Scribd is visible to me. That gives me a foothold into a service I would otherwise find unnavigable.
I hadn’t realized until I read this article how social media has changed the way I content-surf. Once upon a time, I would monitor hundreds of feeds in Google Reader – and i had the pinched shoulders to prove it. Now, I track less than 30. Most of these are high quality sites producing original content, such as NPR Music. Some are aggregators of quality articles, such as ArtsJournal. Everything else I read online comes from the recommendations of my online acquaintances. Instead of suffering under the delusion that I can monitor everything, I keep my eye on my infinitesimal slice of the Internet. And my friends keep their eyes on their slices. Whenever one of us finds something worthwhile, we shout “Eureka!” and fly it up the digital flagpole.
Combing through piles of crappy content to unearth a few gems is exhausting. But it’s manageable with a little help from my friends.
If I wrote as well as I spoke, I’d be in a world of trouble. My speech is rife with “very”s and “kinda”s, riddled with “um”s and “ah”s. If it were possible, I’d wire my brain to the network and communicate with everyone through neuro-email. The more time I have to consider my words, the less I sound like a gibbering idiot.
Writing is re-writing. One goal of re-writing is condensation. Your second draft ought to be shorter than your first. A second draft is a first draft on Weight Watchers. You condense by removing irrelevant material, avoiding repetition, and omitting needless words. As William Strunk put it in The Elements of Style:
Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.
Which words are needless? Strunk covers common verbosities in his book, such as “the fact that,” “who is,” and “which was.” Children’s writer Casey McCormick rails against adverbs and adjectives. Don’t use a verb phrase like “ran speedily” when “dashed” will work. Strike most instances of “really” and “very” from your writing – and demand that the survivors defend themselves. Your writing will flow and float without all that garbage weighing it down.
