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Im posting this from the latest version of Performancing Firefox, the #1 blog editor (which just happens to be free! aswell…), and though it’s a more subtle update than some others, it’s about to introduce a whole new level of power to users, designers and programmers…

http://performancing.com/files/performancing-1.3rc1.xpi

Grab the BETA version of 1.3, and let us know what you think, or if you find any last minute bugs — we’d really appreciate your help in spotting anything that needs fixing ahead of a general release!

Main New Features

• Support for Addons — PFF can now be extended
• Support for Themes — If some enterprising blog designer doesn’t spot the obvious opportunity here…
• Localization – We have just the one language in so far, Arabic, complete with Right to Left support, but there’s much more to follow as we start contacting all the kind folks who’ve offerend to help — much more on the tremendous effort of our Arabic partners on general release.

Of course there are a number of bug fixes and stability enhancements, but i’ll let Jed talk you through the details when we release in full — there will also be a number of cool tutorials on how to extend and theme PFF 1.3

For now, enjoy, and please let us know what you think, or if you find any last minute bugs!

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This post could just as easily been titled “Great example of why not owning your own domain is dangerous”, as I’m refering to a great discussion in the forums about MySpace and how 52 of the uber popular social networks top bloggers are trying to break free of the site, and promote their new blog PointlessBanter.Net.

In the forum discussion you’ll find some great tips on how to wean readers away from a blog service you have no control over to a new domain, enjoy!

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I’ve just watch the first of Matt Cutt’s series of videos (and more here…) on site optimization and general webmaster skills — If you’re new to this stuff, or even an old hand, you’re going to enjoy it — i’d highly recommend taking a little time out today to watch the vids..

The first one echos much of what i said recently in 3 ways to immediately increase search engine traffic

The videos are not aimed at bloggers specifically, so some of the information is a little redundant for most of the Performancing regulars, but in general it’s pretty neat, enjoy…

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Since it was asked in our forums I have been pondering on this question and thinking about the blogs I have read since the thought was raised; is it necessary to be an expert in your subject in order to have a successful blog? I have to say I am more sure now of my initial assessment than I was when I made it. Blogging is not necessarily about expertise, in fact you might be at a disadvantage if you think that is the case.

Let me explain my thinking with some examples

• The Dilbert blog
• BoingBoing

What, other than their entertainment value and popularity, do these blogs have in common? Both of those blogs have authors that are experts but the blogs are not popular because of the bloggers expertise!

Scott Adams is an expert in creating and drawing a massively popular syndicated comic but in his blog he writes funny stories about daily life or trouble in the middle east. It is actually quite rare for him to write about his work in any sort of detail.

For every serious post about freedom, copyright and campaigns on BoingBoing there is around ten that are just plain fun. Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author (a good one actually), but you never see a “how to write science fiction” tutorial on there.

OK, I know you are thinking of a bunch of blogs where the author does share his or her expertise. You might include Performancing in this category, I don’t know. Fact is for any given “expert blog” there are many non-expert blogs. I love bloggers that share their expertise, it is a good thing. Just, you know, not entirely necessary.

What I think sets apart a good blog from a bad one in most cases is not the knowledge or experience of the blogger but how interesting they make the content. If Scott Adams wrote the very same ideas in a serious political blog I would never subscribe to it, as well as his off the wall way of looking at life it is his writing style that grabs me. If you are not an expert but can be interesting or write particularly well I believe you can more than make up for a lack of expertise. Have all that and expertise you will probably do even better but don’t hold back because you don’t consider yourself an expert.

So what if your subject requires a tutorial or knowledge approach? Take a quick look at Darrens Digital Photography School blog and tell me what you see. A bunch of tutorials and tips right? His blog has quickly become probably the most popular photography tips blog on the web right now, mentioned everywhere including newspapers etc. Well he is a decent photographer but I don’t think Darren has turned into Ansel Adams any time recently! He is sharing a well-researched passion, not necessarily expertise. Much of what is in his blog is already available, what sets his blog apart is the accessible way he presents the information in daily, clear, uncluttered, simple, bite sized chunks.

For a while I attracted quite a lot of attention from tutorials, articles and books on certain programming technologies. People considered me an expert on the subject but I thought of myself as anything but. Whatever I wrote about was usually something I had only just figured out for myself. With my own photography blog part of the aim was to learn by teaching, it has certainly helped.

It is like the old joke about the two hunters being chased by a bear, one stops to put on his running shoes, “you really think those will help you out run a bear??” “No, but I might just outrun you …”. You just need to be interesting and one step ahead of your audience. There are so many resources you can turn to for the information you might not actually need to know much about your subject at all (although you might feel a fraud it is only what authors have done for years). It’s better to have both but if you do have to choose between “expert” and “interesting”, choose “interesting” every time!

Those of you browsing the html version of this site will probably have already noticed that the new Performancing Partners ad format has moved out of testing to the right hand side of our regular pages. They actually make quite nice navigational tools for the various products and services this site offers…

The next step, as i mentioned to our beta group in email, is to get the generic house ad out onto participating sites — that’s not happening today, but it shouldn’t be long, so if you’re interested in helping us build the Partners network, and getting in at the beginning of a great project, drop your email into the slot on the link above.

Feedback welcome…

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Have you noticed how blogs can give a person more authority just by virtue of the fact that their thoughts are “published”. In some circumstances this can be pretty bad, at least for the gullible. How many times will people make decisions based on advice or reviews that basically comes down to acting on the opinion of “some guy on the internet”?

For some reason the same person could post the same thoughts in a forum and not get noticed, but publish a popular blog and all of a sudden they seem to be an expert. No additional qualifications, no visible change in talent, experience, wisdom or clarity of thought. No, just the same thoughts published in a blog.

It seems in a certain segment of the online population a blog is like having a book published. The act of publishing bestows some veneer of authority. Having been published and technical edited/reviewed others I know what a fallacy even that is but at least with print publishing there is some fact checking, at least with the good publishers a modicum of quality control. Nothing stops a blogger spouting absolute complete offal and having it taken as gospel.

OK so most of the time the blogger has to build up some sort of following before this takes place but I actually believe it is that very following that causes many bloggers to think they know better. “10,000 rss readers can’t be wrong”. After this happens comments they make that would be taken as trollish in other media becomes dogma for their followers. Just look how disproportionately influential some blogs have become, say, in the web2.0, tech or marketing crowds. Yes some of them deserve to be popular, but do they deserve to be followed blindly? I would say no-one deserves that. A healthy level of cynicism is worthwhile while reading anything on the interweb.

The good news is this affect can be used to your own evil advantage if you want to generate consultancy work, attract writing and speaking gigs or just become internet famous.  Just remember wise words from Spiderman; “with great power comes great responsibility”.

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Just to let you know, that the bug reported by several users that was causing a blank page to appear instead of content after a Metrics account was activated should now be fixed.

I have tried the following,and all appears well:

• Sign up as new user
• Go to the /metrics page and hit “Activate Performancing Metrics”
• Get the “add a blog” page directly after.

If anyone has any further trouble, please report it here, and please include as much detail as possible — really, go to town on the details, “it doesnt work” just isnt that helpful 🙂

Apologies for the inconvenience folks, and thanks to those members that reported and described the issue.

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After a year of signing up to Flickr I finally managed to get one of my photographs into their “interestingness” category. While not particularly very important to anyone outside the Flickr community I feel really pleased with myself that I produced something others quite like. People who regularly get into those lists turn out to be semi-celebrities, I have a long way to go before I get there. The warm fuzzy feeling I got from this experience made me realise something; part of why I blog is for “virtual pat on the head”.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am not an attention seeker as such. Well, not to that extreme. I do think though one of the reasons I like to blog is for the comments. In the past I have thought I just like to share my thoughts on things but the buzz I got from this Flickr validation makes me think there is more to it. I am an intellectual narcissist!

Is there anything wrong with this? Initially I thought, oh my God next thing I will be signing up for “big brother” but I think I have enough of a grip on sanity for that to not happen. For a blogger it could actually be a good thing right? I mean, what it basically amounts to is wanting to be liked because of your thoughts and ideas? It’s kind of like being a performer but through a different medium.

The problem of course is providing I get enough validation I will not put as much effort into monetisation or promotion. I have actually seen this happen where things have been going well (in my mind) so I haven’t felt like I need to work quite as hard. Thank goodness for the Performancing BlogRank, Metrics, Alexa and other such measures. There is always another mountain to climb.

Am I alone in this or are you looking for a pat on the head too? Come on, give me some comments, I need the attention! Heh

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