Performancing Releases the Herald Theme for WordPress

Considered one of the premier sources of blogging news, commentary and information, The Blog Herald has gone through different iterations since its inception in 2003. Among the most successful designs was Brian Gardner’s grey-themed three-column layout released in 2007. Performancing is releasing this theme as our latest free WordPress theme as the Herald Theme.

Sporting a grey-dominant color scheme, with red and blue highlights, the Herald Theme looks clean and crisp, with a wide main content area, and two sidebars to the right. The middle sidebar us wide enough to contain an ad block of 125×125 pixel buttons or a 250×250 banner, and supports featured posts which will display only posts from a defined category or tag. Each sidebar block and footer column can be customized using widgets for easy drag-and-drop rearranging.

The Herald Theme is optimized for use with WordPress 2.8 and newer. Dropdown menus use jQuery.

Preview the Herald Theme

For a live preview of the theme, click here.

Download the Herald Theme

To download Herald Theme, click here.

Paul Scrivens to Take Over as Splashpress Media Publisher

Splashpress Media, the parent company of Performancing, has recently announced that Paul Scrivens will take the helm of the network as publisher.

Scrivs will be our captain and conductor, managing our assets, coordinating our efforts and hopefully expanding our reach. Along with this new leadership comes a bit of reorganization. Andy Merrett (a regular contributor here), who has been a community manager and channel editor to sites like Forever Geek, 9rules and Performancing, will take the creative lead as Editor of the network. Andy plans to continue outgoing editor Jayvee Fernandez’s thrusts to enhance the networks’ reach and status, and we are confident that Andy will use his creative vision well in ensuring that momentum is maintained.

This announcement also comes with news that the core Splashpress team is being revamped, with Andy Merrett–who is also a Performancing contributor and community manager–taking the top creative role as Editor. The core team aims to continue Splashpress Media’s thrusts in enhancing the reach and authority of its online properties.

British Press Complaints Commission slammed for its desire to regulate blogs

The last few days has seen an interesting standoff developing between the British press regulatory body, the Press Complaints Commission (PCC), and the bloggers it may be seeking to regulate.

The PCC is a self-regulatory body set up and funded by a number of major newspapers and magazines published in the UK. Simply put, its purpose is to investigate complaints made against member publications on a number of grounds including accuracy, privacy, intrusion, portrayal of children, discrimination, financial journalism and the confidentiality of sources. (Read Wikipedia’s PCC entry)

On Monday, a report in the Independent newspaper suggested that the PCC’s chairman, Baroness Buscombe, would like to regulate blogs in the same way as traditional media.

In an interview with Ian Burrell, she said that “Some of the bloggers are now creating their own ecosystems which are quite sophisticated”, suggesting that the public may assume that blogs are official news sources, with the blogosphere being “the new newspapers”.

It’s wrth noting that these are very early days, but nevertheless she does seem interested in having some kind of public consultation, which would involve members of mainstream press, bloggers and the general public.

As you might imagine, the mere sniff of bloggers being regulated by a body that is widely seen as biased, toothless and extremely slow to act, has not gone down well with many.

The Guardian has reported on blogger Sunny Hundal’s letter, which he is inviting other bloggers to undersign, that sets out why any official regulation is incompatible with standard blogging practice.

The full letter can be read here, but the gist is that the PCC needs to get its own house in order — with particular reference to the practices of a number of tabloid newspapers — before attempting to regulate bloggers.

To give but one recent example of bad practice, of the many that bloggers have documented in over the last few years, an article published by the Tabloid Watch blog in October, documented, in some considerable detail, the tortuous process that one of its readers had to go through in order to get the News of the World to retract a manifestly untrue and inflammatory statement by one of its regular columnists, Carole Malone.

What we find most striking about the process documented by Tabloid Watch is the extent to which the PCC actively sought to facilitate the News of the World’s efforts to avoid undertaking practices that we, as bloggers, take for granted as being standard practice in our corner of the internet: i.e. the prominent publication of an honest and open correction of a factual error on the original article in which the error, itself, was made.

Instead, as we invariably find to be standard practice amongst, particularly, tabloid newspapers; the correction and cursory apology when it was grudgingly issued after what Tabloid Watch described as ‘two months of wrangling’ – appeared in a location other than that of Malone’s column in the newspaper’s print edition and on its website on a page utterly divorced from the article to which it relates, which was removed its entirety, and in such a way that only someone searching specifically for the retraction would ever be likely to find it.

To all intents and purposes, the retraction might as well not have been issued, for all that it would be apparent to visitors to the News of World’s website that it had ever been made.

This is but one clear example of a practice that would be unacceptable amongst established bloggers and one of many that bloggers who specialise in monitoring the national press for accuracy have documented in recent years.

For a blogger to engage in such practices, which include ’stealth editing’ of articles, after publication, to avoid owning up to factual errors and removing and/or refusing to publish critical comments from readers, especially those that highlight and correct factual errors.

For an established blogger to adopt such practices would do incalculable damage to their public reputation; this being, after all, all that we have to trade on.

It’s not the first time an organisation has called for a blogging code of conduct, and it surely won’t be the last. What I find interesting, though, is the localised nature of these attempts and the apparent refusal to believe that self-regulation is possible.

We know that the blogosphere can be quite a volatile place, but the fact is that most well-known, high-profile bloggers (and a lot of out-of-the-limelight bloggers, too) do adhere to their own ethical standards, and indeed they often seem higher than those adopted by established media.

Any attempt at regulation of blogs on a country-by-country basis is going to be very difficult to enforce. Blogs, far more so than printed publications, are international, and as such are difficult to govern under any one national law.

Until such a time as governments collaborate and pass international laws that restrict what bloggers can write, any oversight from the likes of the PCC will be totally voluntary. Even then, what organisation in its right mind is going to monitor millions of blogs to ensure they meet some kind of self-imposed journalistic standards?

Bloggers generally know how to take care of their own affairs without the need for external pressures (except from their readers, of course, which is how it should be).

I’m all for open, honest, ethical blogging, but I do tend to believe the best of most bloggers and think they can sort their own standards out.

What do you think?

Australian Court Gives Permission to Live-Tweet Proceedings

In what could be an important development in how social media affects just about any industry and field, an Australian court was recently reported to have allowed live tweeting of proceedings. Judge Dennis Cowdroy states that tweeting was fine as long as it did not disrupt court proceedings. He believes that the public “has a legitimate right to be fully informed of proceedings, particularly proceedings such as (the iiNet case), which have attracted considerable public interest. Twittering can serve to inform the public in a more speedy and comprehensive manner than may be possible through traditional media coverage.”

This has precedence in previous cases in the US. While live reportage of legal proceedings are usually at the discretion of the presiding judge, not all jurisdictions might allow direct discussion of ongoing court cases.

As with any discussions held on Twitter or any social medium, readers are advised to check and verify the information and the veracity of the sources before retweeting, blogging or otherwise helping spread information online.

9rules opens its doors to nominations once more

Back in 2003, 9rules established itself as a premiere collection of blogs highlighted by great content and a passionate community. The codex of the 200 and so blogs were summarized by the “9 Rules:”

1. Love what you do.
2. Never stop learning.
3. Form works with function.
4. Simple is beautiful.
5. Work hard, play hard.
6. You get what you pay for.
7. When you talk, we listen.
8. Must constantly improve.
9. Respect your inspiration.

Today 9rules has just opened up a new round of submissions and the door will be open for 24 hours. The submission form can be found here. If you think your blogging philosophy fits the nine rules, then by all means, submit.

9rules is part of Splashpress Media, of which Performancing is a member.

Splashpress Media Launches Donation Drive for Philippine Typhoon Victims

As posted on the Splashpress Media blog, we’re running a fund campaign in aid of typhoon victims in the Philippines, particularly in Metro Manila and neighboring areas. Anything you can do to help would mean so much. [Read more]

5 Things Your News Posts Should Cover

A couple of weeks ago, I came across a post detailing what every news article should cover. I unfortunately can’t seem to remember where I encountered it (if you know what I’m talking about feel free to leave a link in the comments), but the tips shared there make a useful foundation for writing news posts that are very useful for your readers—regardless of topic or niche.

In order of importance, here’s what I think every news post should include:

What Happened

Reporting on what happened is a given in any kind of news reporting, whether formal or not. In fact, the point of the source article was how all news articles cover this, but not the following.

Who Was Involved

Another given: no event is free from the influence of personalities or entities, nor are people or companies totally free from its influence. Yet with tight deadlines and lack of pertinent details, it’s easy to overlook this crucial requirement. Many events are significant enough to overshadow those who are involved, or those with the potential to be affected, but forgetting to include the who may leave readers wondering why the news you report is relevant to them.

How it Happened

Amazingly, most news reporting is content with fleshing out only the what and who, failing to mention how things happened in detail. The easiest way to cover this base is to zero in on a significant cause, and discuss how that led to a significant effect. Again, this is another way of making the news relevant to your readers, ultimately making it more relevant. People have an easier time relating to events when they understand how things happened.

How You Found Out About It

The source article said that journalists usually leave this out, based on the possibility that revealing their methods and research will diminish their “institutional authority”. Yet detailing how you found out about the news not only adds flavor to your post, it also helps convince readers of its accuracy. What would you believe more, a post based solely on the opinions and perceptions of the writer, or a compilation of perspectives and insights from various sources?

Background

It’s easy for a blogger to assume that readers automatically know everything about a given event or topic, especially if a blog enjoys a large regular readership. Yet detailing the background—the history and long-term implications—makes it easier for the reader to understand the news and put it into context. This also provides opportunities to link back to previous posts covering a particular topic or event. That’s always a good way to attract the traffic that authoritative sources enjoy, as the links lead visitors back to older posts.

It’s necessary to include all of the above when sharing news with your readers, if you want to establish your blog as an authority that people can rely on for detailed and updated news. The best part? Only your creativity limits how you can present these. Got any tips on how to represent current events to your readers? Hit the comments below.

The 9rules Nostalgia and Building Community

There’s been a blanket of nostalgia lately on the Internet. For those of you who may remember the good ‘ol days of blogging circa 2004 to about early 2006, this was a time when community was much smaller, and it was easy to spot the “A-listers” and blog networks. Amidst the typical blog networks that would hire and pay writers a fixed rate or revenue share, 9rules was different. It went against the grain of the “production house” blogging (not that this was bad in itself) and focused on quality content. 9rules had, well, 9 rules:

9rules is a place where members and readers can connect, build relationships, and learn new things. 9rules started in 2003 with a set of 9 rules:

1. Love what you do.
2. Never stop learning.
3. Form works with function.
4. Simple is beautiful.
5. Work hard, play hard.
6. You get what you pay for.
7. When you talk, we listen.
8. Must constantly improve.
9. Respect your inspiration.

Lots of other networks have adopted similar principles, but basically 9rules was a pioneer when it came to building a passionate community.

Today, Splashpress Media has acquired 9rules, (of which Performancing is part of the SPM network). From their blog, written by Paul Scrivens:

Why Splashpress? Because not only do they have the people that have a passion for publishing online content, but they also have the resources to make things happen without being too large as to forget the core of what makes 9rules special, the community. Much of the Splashpress team have been fans of 9rules for years so this will only make the transition easier as they understand the purpose of 9rules and why it is important to continue to push quality content to the forefront of the web.

The thing with the Internet is that the tides ebb to and fro too fast, and yesterday’s web is so much more different. In the past 2 years, big corporations have planted their blogging seeds through acquisition, while some argue that blogs were not what they once were with the rise of Twitter and Facebook. Tomorrow will be different.

The take away from all of this is that communities are bound to change. But change can be a good thing, and rebuilding a new community doesn’t mean the end of the world.

Misleading Headlines: Do they work or do they hurt?

As I was flicking through my RSS feeds yesterday, I came across the following headline:

“Steve Jobs Leaves Apple”

Huh? Wow… well I know I haven’t read that anywhere else, but could this be a scoop?

Naively, I clicked on the link to be greeted with this opening paragraph:

“Steve Jobs is leaving Apple — eventually. Whether because of health, age, or any other reason, key employees leave companies. It happens everyday. What distinguishes a great company from a just a good company is how they plan for this eventuality.”

Well, duh!

Unsurprisingly, I wasn’t impressed, particularly as for some reason the web site in question had decided not to publish an excerpt — let alone a full feed — for the article.

I can cope with less-than-scintillating prose so long as it’s related to the title and excerpt, but in my opinion this misleading headline was simply used to try and entice more visitors to the web site.

The thing is, I’m not convinced that a misled visitor is a happy one.

The article in question was about succession planning — something that I might have had a vague interest in but probably wouldn’t have clicked through to if I’d found it sitting in my feed reader.

Because it used a famous business leader who generates a lot of online buzz, particularly of late where his health is concerned, it potentially lured other readers in.

Are the articles at that web site well-written? In general it looks like a fairly professional outfit, so I’m guessing so.

However, does this little stunt make me want to subscribe to the RSS feed of that publication? No, not really.

No doubt the site will pop up again from time to time as I search for information, but it’s not on my list of favourite sites.

Perhaps I’m making too much of this, but I really don’t think creating deliberately misleading headlines is a good policy.

Controversial headlines: fine, so long as the article is on-topic and actually contentious.

Now, hand on heart, I can’t say that I’ve never published an article with a headline designed to lure visitors, but I hope that I haven’t deliberately tried to mislead people in order to get a few more click-throughs.

At the end of the day, the overall reputation of my site is more important than any short term gains gleaned from such tactics.

What do you think?

Someone Else Claiming CAPTCHAS Are Dead

Craig Butler of SitPoint.com has published an article which outlines his reasoning as to why CAPTHCAS have finally reached their end of life. Captchas are usually the first lines of defense for web forms to combat against automated bots/scripts who’s sole purpose is to spam. Here is the list Craig has for why Captchas need to be replaced with something that works.

1. Accessibility
2. Not A Turing Test
3. All CAPTCHAS Can Be Cracked
4. CAPTCHAS Are Getting More Difficult
5. CAPTCHAS Measure Ability

I agree with practically every point mentioned in the article. I for one have a difficult time filling out CAPTCHAS let alone someone without sight, or hearing. At least on my blog, Akismet has been doing a great job allowing me to the keep the comment form Captcha free. I don’t know what the answer is to replace the Captcha system which is why I’ll be keeping an eye out for the follow up post which will include a set of alternatives to help spot hackers and bots without disrupting real users.