So I’ve installed Performancing for Firefox – a plug-in for Firefox that allows creating blog entries right from the browser. I happend to stumble across this while setting up Performancing Metrics. So far I’m very impressed.
Technorati Tags: Performancing for Firefox, Performancing Metrics
While the concept is encouraging, I think that some companies (including the one I work for) don’t really ‘get’ blogging. There has been some talk, and the only place I’ve heard it from is the corporate officer level. This worries me because I don’t believe that the right people are thinking about blogging, or that they are thinking about it for the right reason.
What may be a powerful means of communicating with customers, or even simply within the company, is getting lost in a typical discussion of what tool to use. The fact that SharePoint was looked at along with wiki software tells me that the people looking for the blogging solution at our company, don’t even know why they should blog. SharePoint is a powerful tool and one can add a blogging component to it, but at its heart SharePoint is a collaboration tool.
It’s similar to what we did several years ago with SourceSafe. We had (actually still have) a need for a document management system. Somehow, someone got the ‘great’ idea to use SourceSafe. SourceSafe itself is a good product… for source code management. How the fact that it was a source code management system and not a document management tool got lost on everyone with decision-making power. What did we use SourceSafe for? Managing Word, Excel, PowerPoint documents, CD ISO images (please stop laughing, yes really), and many other items that should never be stored in a flat-file database (and these were ‘IT’ people who decided this!) Now I’ll be the first to rave about the wonders of SharePoint, and for a number of reasons, but blogging will not be among them – at all. Luckily it didn’t make it too far in the evaluation, and I’m not sure what software has made it any farther as the criteria for a corporate blogging solution is being tightly held.
What use is even considering a corporate blogging solution when the people evaluating the concepts don’t even understand what a blog is for? This is what concerns me about corporate blogging – that it gets tied up with the wrong people. And that the whole idea of blogging is for the wrong reason. I’ve got a suspicion that most companies that either have or are considering corporate blogging have the wrong idea about it, and have the wrong people investigating it.
Technorati tags: Corporate Blogging
Recently I’ve been wondering what to do with the posts on my old blog(s). Before setting up shop here at RickMahn.com, I had tried out MSN Spaces, Blogger, and then WordPress.com. Each of which allowed me to learn more about what blogging is, introduced me to the blogosphere, and let me experiment with different platforms. As I learned more about the tools, I started to settle on the platform that seemed to work best for me. That was WordPress. The experience over at WordPress.com convinced me that it was the best blogging platform for me – though I wanted to have full control of the system, server, etc… so I ended up setting up my own hosted WordPress installation.
A recent post by Kent Newsome got me thinking about it, though I’ve not the same problem that he describes. I was kind of testing the waters and since I was not a pioneer in blogging, or even a real early adopter, I’ve the luxury of being able to find out what everyone else’s opinions of the free sites, the pay sites, and the “go it your own way” crowd thinks about all the blogging choices. And taking that all in, I’m glad that I can sort of start from scratch with my system of choice and work toward the future.
Now Kent is right, it will probably be up to WordPress to create a good migration tool to support migrating from a different platform to WordPress as large companies like Blogger (Google) stand to loose ad revenue from people leaving their system and want to discourage anyone from doing so. Of course WordPress has an Import utility which should word for my needs, but would not work for Kent’s as he has a lot of history on his site and would need to keep the permalinks to all existing content. And that is the real challenge, not just to Import existing posts & comments, but to migrate them in such a way as to keep all the links alive and functioning for reference, search bots, etc…
This is an opportunity for some enterprising programmer to come up with a migration tool to support the major blogging platforms. As time goes on, each platform will win or loose user favor and one thing should be simple – the migration of a blog from one platform to another. Anyone going to take up the challenge?
I’ve been using GMail for domains for about two weeks now. I’ve not moved fully to it, but have set up what will probably turn into my main email account going into the future. The service is still in “beta” – one of those long beta’s that Google is famous for – and seems quite solid to me. Of course I’d be surprised if I ran into issues – this is the same GMail system that everyone can sign up for, with the simply addition of being able to point your domain’s MX records to it.
The service comes with room for up to 10 accounts, each getting the now-expected 2GB storage and Google search capabilities built in. You also get the ability to use the chat functionality built into GMail. While I’m not a big “chat” or IM user, this functionality built into the GMail interface is fantastic. We use it at the office since we don’t have an IM system in-house and would rather not use any of the IM clients even though they can now handle the proxy/firewall setup we have. Having this simple chat tool in the browser allows us to send really short, really simple questions and get answers, though I could not see using it for long chat sessions.
The rest of the system is identical to your regular GMail account save for the ability to send invitations. Also, the first account created is the admin account which you will use to manage all other accounts for the domain. Overall the admin interface is simple and straightforward. Very easy to use.
So I recommend anyone who has a domain that needs a powerful, flexible, and affordable set of email accounts sign up for the “beta”. It may take awhile to get a response (mine took two weeks – your mileage may vary), the system itself is fantastic. As a strict Microsoft guy, I’m very fond of my new email setup for the domain your visiting right now. Check it out!
So there is an update to WordPress out now (v2.0.2) that fixes some security issues:
Please check out the update at WordPress.org
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“We are not enemies but friends.”
Live your life.
Completely.
Without fear.
Live it with Love, compassion, empathy, tolerance and joy.
Treat every person with the kindness, respect and dignity they deserve by the very virtue of being a human being.
Out riding this rainy, wet spring. Got 1,000 miles on the clock with more to come this season. #IMRG #IndianMotorcycle
Watching early seasons of #GoldRush. Fun seeing @GoldrushRick in season 3! Hope his new season is off to a good start!
Oh yes I did! https://www.instagram.com/p/BsRDO9ogSO0/?utm_source=ig_twitter_share&igshid=1kha5yzhjq3ot
