tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-242237432024-03-13T16:05:26.130-04:00Cranial SoupPeas, carrots, green beans, and gray matter.Apphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04973805741360160102noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24223743.post-69122729908046752802009-12-04T15:41:00.001-05:002009-12-04T15:41:01.689-05:00Free FTC Disclosure Graphics from Louis Gray and Jeannine Schafer<p>Ever since the FTC announced <a href="http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/10/endortest.shtm" target="_blank">new disclosure rules for bloggers</a>, which went into effect on December 1st of this year, many have been wondering how do it in an easy to handle manner. </p> <p>If you are still fretting over exactly how to go about disclosing your relationships to the companies and products you write about and review, and do it with style, you can stop now. </p> <p><a href="http://blog.louisgray.com/" target="_blank">Louis Gray</a> and <a href="http://jeannineschafer.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Jeannine Schafer</a> have come up with a great tongue-in-cheek set of FTC Disclosure graphics that you can use for your blog posts. </p> <p>A couple of examples: </p> <p align="center"><a href="http://blog.louisgray.com/2009/12/ftc-disclosures-made-simple-for.html" target="_blank"><img style="display: inline; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px" title="ftc_gadgets_250" alt="ftc_gadgets_250" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_qlCAUZtia6Q/Sxlz2pMs6dI/AAAAAAAAA5k/rIHsjqV2604/ftc_gadgets_250%5B6%5D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="216" height="240" /></a> <a href="http://blog.louisgray.com/2009/12/ftc-disclosures-made-simple-for.html" target="_blank"><img style="display: inline" title="ftc_book_250" alt="ftc_book_250" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_qlCAUZtia6Q/Sxlz3BS_AWI/AAAAAAAAA5o/M7O94-bge4I/ftc_book_250%5B4%5D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="216" height="240" /></a></p> <p>To see the rest, the best, and download the entire collection (in various sizes), <a href="http://blog.louisgray.com/2009/12/ftc-disclosures-made-simple-for.html" target="_blank">visit Louis Gray's blog</a>.</p> <p> </p> <p>And while you are at it, follow <a href="http://friendfeed.com/louisgray" target="_blank">Louis Gray</a> on Friendfeed and <a href="http://twitter.com/neenerbot" target="_blank">Jeannine Schafer</a> on Twitter for lots of interesting news, discussions, and other cool stuff.</p> Apphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04973805741360160102noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24223743.post-87571890880146222072009-03-16T23:10:00.001-04:002009-03-16T23:10:21.572-04:007 Reasons Not to Direct Link to a Developer's Download Files<p><img style="margin: 0px 10px 30px 0px" height="169" alt="downloads" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_qlCAUZtia6Q/Sb8UnKwWemI/AAAAAAAAAsk/36AprmLCk78/downloads%5B27%5D.png?imgmax=800" width="240" align="left" /> As a developer, I can't help but be more than a little bit bothered by the fact that some bloggers chose to direct link to application download files (.zip, .exe, etc) in some of the articles they write, rather than the page on the developer's site, in which the download links can be found.</p> <p>If this is how you do things when you write articles & reviews, then I'd like to inform you that this isn't a very nice thing to do, for the following reasons: </p> <ol> <li>You are depriving the developers of the full credit they deserve for the work they have done. If the application is worth writing about, it's also worth giving the developer full proper credit. </li> <li>Some freeware authors have Paypal donate buttons on their sites, and your readers will never see them, therefore never click them. This deprives some developers of their only income and maybe their only incentive to keep making freeware/donationware. </li> <li>Some freeware authors have advertising on their sites, and additional page impressions or clicks generated from the traffic you send them means an income for them, and your direct linking to the files prevents that from happening. This is how some software can remain free, rather than the author resorting to making it payware (or even worse, adware). If you would like things to stay free and clean, you have to do your part to help the developers keep it that way. </li> <li>A blog linking to a page on a small developer's site can mean a big boost in Page Rank, making their software easier to find through search engines. This helps the people searching for the perfect tool to do the job they need, as well as the software developer that created it. </li> <li>You are depriving and cheating your readers of the chance to browse around the developer's site, and perhaps the opportunity to discover more useful software they might be interested in. And in the case of the applications that come from sites like <a href="http://donationcoder.com/" target="_blank">donationcoder.com</a>, you are preventing them from discovering a wonderful software enthusiasts community that they really would enjoy, and can even request custom made freeware, made to their specifications. </li> <li>In some cases, you may also be making it more difficult for your readers to find the info necessary to submit bug reports and get support, not to mention application updates and upgrades. </li> <li>You may also be depriving your readers of important information related to installing or using the application, that they may need to know. </li> </ol> <p>So, could you please be a really nice person to us poor freeware/donationware developers, and your readers, and fix your links to point to the pages and not the file downloads? And in the future, always link to the pages, instead. </p> <p>Your readers and the software developers would really appreciate this.</p> <p>Thank You.</p> Apphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04973805741360160102noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24223743.post-37599158472633653982008-07-15T01:57:00.006-04:002008-12-11T02:24:11.803-05:00Bloggers With Comment Forms That Suck a Chunk of Your Life Into a Black Hole<img style="margin: 20px 10px 0px 0pt; float: left;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_qlCAUZtia6Q/SHxASAbNBBI/AAAAAAAAAXA/aq_1ucvUNr8/s400/black+hole.jpg" alt="Black Hole" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5223120345938854930" border="0" /><br />Listen up, <a href="http://johnchow.com/">John Chow</a>, <a href="http://www.jackhumphrey.com/fridaytrafficreport/">Jack Humphrey</a>, <a href="http://blogaboutyourblog.com/">Matthew Henrickson</a>, <a href="http://andybeard.eu/">Andy Beard</a>, and the rest of you lazy and/or inept bloggers out there:<br /><br />I am tired of wasting my time on broken comment forms, screwball captchas, lazy moderation, and bad site design.<br /><br />Too many times in the past 2 weeks, I have tried to make comments on blogs that ended up sucked into cyberspace and never making it to its destination, which is the post in which I was commenting on.<br /><br />On three blogs, after taking the time to formulate an informative, relevant, quality comment (one of them was at least an hour of work), it was just sucked away after clicking the submit button, with no indication that it made it to where it was supposed to go, or it being held for moderation, or anything else. Will I ever grace those blogs with another comment again? No!<br /><br />On another blog, after almost the same amount of work and hitting the submit button, I was informed that commenting on that post was closed. Why was there a comment form then? And why was there no visible indication that commenting was closed that I could see,<span style="font-weight: bold;"> before</span> I wasted my time putting together a comment? Will I ever grace that blog with another comment? No!<br /><br />On another blog, after I took the time to make a comment thanking the blogger for his post and tell him how useful it was to me and why, and how I was going to send him some traffic because it was that damn good, his captcha informs me that I must have flunked math in school because 4+3 does <span style="font-weight: bold;">not</span> equal 7. Don't insult me like that. I try to compliment you and thank you, and this is the thanks I get? A screwball captcha that calls me an idiot? Will I ever comment on your blog again? No!<br /><br />On another two blogs, my comment was being held for moderation. Now I can understand the need to do that in order to keep spammers at bay, but don't you think you should check your queue to see if any comments were made, at least once a week, if not more often? Maybe even check it when you are making a new post, at least. Will I be commenting on those blogs again? No!<br /><br />I am tired of wasting chunks of my life trying to comment unsucessfully on your blogs.<br /><br />So to all you bloggers out there, please check to make sure your comment forms and captchas <span style="font-weight: bold;">work</span>, when commenting is closed that it is visibly closed to your visitors <span style="font-weight: bold;">before</span> they waste their time (remove the form if possible), if comments are being held for moderation that <span style="font-weight: bold;">commentors are told this</span>, and process your comment moderation queues <span style="font-weight: bold;">on a regular basis</span>!<br /><br />And if you have no clue what you are doing or how to fix things, <span style="font-weight: bold;">ask someone to help you</span>!Apphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04973805741360160102noreply@blogger.com16