BuzzLogic has recently launched its advertising network in Beta, with a promise of $2 CPM (cost per thousand impressions) to bloggers. That rate seems very lucrative, but of course it’s just for a limited period. BuzzLogic’s guarantee is as follows:

• Guaranteed $2 CPM, up to $200 per month, during beta period(June 18 - July 18)
• Get in on the ground floor of a new kind of network based on influence
• Access to great brands and advertisers eager to work with you

According to BuzzLogic, their main purpose for this high payout is to get enough interest of bloggers. They expect the beta users to be able to help the BuzzLogicCommunity Team to get feedback the performance of the ads–what’s working, what’s not. BuzzLogic will eventually develop other blogger tools based on influence to help bloggers not only understand their own influence but to leverage that influence to get higher CPMs for ad inventory.

Some limitations of the program, though, are that only traffic from the US will be counted as eligible impressions, and that the beta program will end on July 18th. Still, $2 CPM is an interesting proposition, particularly for blogs that have high traffic.

As I have promised in a previous post here, I’d like to share with you that useful little plugin that allowed me to automatically update/upgrade my WordPress blog version.  Thanks for being patient.  I intentionally wanted to post this at the end of the month.

OK, I used: Wordpress Instant Upgarde by Zironoa .

Here’s a little blurb from their homepage:

How does it work?
The InstantUpgrade plugin downloads the latest WordPress version from the WordPress server and unpacks it at your server. In the next step, it deletes all of your old WordPress files (except wp-content/ and wp-config.php) and puts the new files into your WordPress directory. Finally, it runs the database upgrade script. That procedure is exactly what the official guide proposes, only 30 times faster and with you leaning back.

Is it safe to use?
Yes. The plugin interfaces are very intuitive, everything is well explained. Before the upgrade process, comprehensive checks are performed to ensure that nothing can be broken. As for security: The plugin cannot do anything that you or your webserver couldn’t do anyway. So, yes, it is safe to use. (However, bad things can *always* happen, so you should always have backups of your database and files.)

I encountered a few snags along the way, though. Snags like directory permissions (mostly writing privileges), but that was because I changed write privileges as my WordPress blog needed a little more security.  For standard WordPress installations though, the plugin install and activation was very smooth. 

Zirona noted that you should not use this plugin if you installed WordPress via Fantastico.  The only harm that may happen to you is that you cannot use Fantastico to update/upgrade your WordPress anymore.  You’d be using this plugin from thereon.  Well that’s all the harm it did me.

Suggestions:

• I would suggest that you install another WordPress blog to test the plugin first.  I have one that just sits there for this purpose.  So everytime a new plugin surfaces, and I believe is useful to me, I install it on that test WordPress site first.  Don’t worry about overcrowding your hosting account, hey most hosting accounts have the basic 5GB standard package anyway. 
• I would suggest that you BACK-UP your data first.  Everything …. texts, images, your database… hey you better backup your directory tree even through FTP.  I did.  Believe you me that backup is hard work… but definitely worth it!

NIC Mexico “Network Information Center Mexico” administrador del codigo territorial .MX alcanzó los 250,000 nombres de dominios registrados en Mexico el pasado mes de abril.

NIC Mexico reporta que hay una tasa de crecimiento del 24% anual. Prueba de ello es que se llevó 15 años registrar los primeros 100,000 dominios .MX, y dos años y medio mas en alcanzar los siguientes 100,000; por lo que llegar a los 250,000 dominios .MX en tan solo un año resulta satisfactorio para la organizacion Mexicana con base en Monterrey N.L. que cuenta con una cadena de distribuidores a lo largo de Mexico.

Esto es el resultado del incremento en el uso de Internet en nuestro pais, ademas de que las personas y organizaciones quieren tener una mayor presencia en la red para darse a conocer.

Estas son las cifras del registro de dominios en Mexico que muestra NIC Mexico a la fecha.

.com.mx — 235,427 — 91.60%
.gob.mx —— 4,332 — 1.69%
.net.mx ——— 441 — 0.17%
.edu.mx —–5,026 — 1.96%
.org.mx —- 11,619 — 4.52%
.mx ————– 172 — 0.07%
TOTAL 257,017

Como podemos ver, prácticamente un 92% del total es de uso empresarial, el resto se divide entre las demas areas como: organizaciones, educacion, gobierno y comunicaciones.

La terminacion .MX asocia en Internet al dominio con el nombre del pais, en este caso Mexico. Casi todos los paises tienen su terminacion asignada, como por ejemplo: Italia .IT, Francia .FR, pero tambien los hay por regiones, como es el caso de Europa .EU, Asia .ASIA, o LatinoAmerica .LA

El registro de dominios hecho de forma adecuada es una parte fundamental en las estrategias de marketing en Internet. Esto te puede dar una mayor visibilidad en los motores de busqueda si consigues un nombre adecuado en el area en la que desempeñas tu actividad.

Google y Yahoo! asocian tu dominio a la region geografica en el cual lo registraste, esto tiene 2 caras, restringe los resultados o bien los dirige a esa region. Esto es muy facil de verificar, si buscas “algo” en Google.com.mx los resultados de las busquedas no son los mismas en Google.com, Google.com.ve o cualquier otro pais.

Puedes leer mas al respecto en este articulo de Posicionamiento en Google

addthis_url = 'http%3A%2F%2Finternetmarketingmexico.com%2Fregistro-de-dominios-en-mexico-supera-los-250000-dominios-mx%2F'; addthis_title = 'Registro+de+dominios+en+Mexico+supera+los+250%2C000+dominios+.MX'; addthis_pub = '';

Fresh news is a fundamental element of social media and can be used in a variety of different ways to one’s advantage.

Across virtually every social network site, users scramble to be the first to break a news story. Inevitably, this leads to hundreds of duplicate story submissions and ends with one winner amongst hundreds of losers. But even if you weren’t the Woodward & Bernstein who successfully broke the story, there’s still hope. Remember, the story isn’t over once the news breaks; indeed, in many cases, it’s just beginning.

Taking a step back, a story that is ‘breaking news’ material is news for many different reasons. Every popular news event has multiple angles and subplots that make the story newsworthy for different individuals. For instance, the Boston Celtics recently beat the L.A. Lakers in the 2008 NBA Finals. Why is this news?

This event is newsworthy for the following reasons:

1. A professional title was awarded making the Celtics the best team in the NBA

2. The Celtics went from terrible to tremendous in one season

3. Kevin Garnett, a good guy, finally won a championship

4. Paul Pierce won his first championship on a team that he has played for his entire career

5. The Lakers vs. Celtics rivalry is one of the more storied rivalries in sports

6. Boston sports have been phenomenal over the past few years

7. Kobe Bryant was MVP but his team lost the series

8. The Lakers were favored to win the series

9. The final game was a total blowout

Each of these different aspects contributes to the newsworthiness of the event, but as evidenced in the above screenshots, most of these slants are not highlighted. Hence, the same ‘breaking news’ headline is repeated – an ineffective tactic in generating social media attention. A more successful approach is to look for (or create) articles that highlight different elements of a popular story; use the story’s momentum to your benefit.

Reworking the above elements to improve social media traction might look like (in order):

1. Breaking: Celtics Win Championship

2. Tremendous Turnaround: How the Celtics Went From Worst to First

3. 12 Good Guys That Won Championships Before They Retired

4. 24 Loyal Athletes that Stuck With Their Team To Win A Title

5. Where Does The 2008 Finals Rank Among The Lakers-Celtics Rivalry?

6. Boston Sports: The Hottest Sports Streak for a City Ever?

7. MVPs That Couldn’t Finish: 36 Players That Had Great Seasons But Lost At The End

8. Underdogs That Overwhelmed: A Look at Recent Championships The Favored Team Lost

9. ExciteLESS: The Least Competitive Championship Winning Games In History

Of all of the proposed stories, only one of them is hedged solely on being the first to report it, the rest simply use the momentum and popularity of the event to their advantage.

Every news article has an angle that can be exploited.

The Iphone was released - What apps need to be made in order for it to work for businesses? Why Should GPS makers be scared?

Tiger Woods won’t play this year - Who are the best of the rest? How long will he take to fully recover from the surgery and what is the general success rate of this type of surgery?

Someone famous died – Why were they famous and what were the highlights of their life? How did they die, could it have been prevented?

Regardless of your industry or focus, there is almost always an opportunity to find a way to spin relevant breaking news into a story that relates to your niche. And if you view every breaking news story through this perspective, you’re already ahead of the crowd.

It seems so simple, but these incredibly effective tactics may be the most underutilized in Social Media. It is a beautiful thing when you realize that you aren’t working hard to break the story, you are letting the ‘broken’ story work hard for you.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the 10e20 RSS Feed!

DashBlog 1.5 is a FireFox plug-in I’ve been waiting for!  You see, as a blogger, it takes a long loop of processes for me to get a photo in a blog post.  I’d shift-printscreen, open up microsoft’s photo editor, crop that picture, save it in a folder, fire up the wordpress blog… hit a couple more buttons and (puff puff) click the OK button to post the photo right there.  DashBlog 1.5 takes all those work from me.  Thanks a lot!  I’m downloading it now.

DashBlog has been out for quite some time already (almost a month).  Funny I haven’t heard the news resonate quickly though.

Do you like video? Do you like to blog, tumblr or twitter? Then dashblog is the plugin for you. It’s the fastest and easiest way for you post video, text, quotes, images and songs to your blog, tumblr and twitter (all at the same time).

Plus there’s more – with DashBlog you can do a screen capture and then draw, comment, crop and post all with one simple click.

Dashblog currently works with:

• WordPress
• Blogger/Blogspot
• Tumblr
• Twitter

Know more about DashBlog 1.5 right here. You can download DashBlog for FREE right here.

Last week, we explored the world of foodie blogs, focusing in particular on Orangette, a delicious mix of food-based personal essays and recipe development.

This week, I’d like to delve into the world of career blogs, a natural expansion of online networking, combined with the always-helpful how-to. In the spotlight this Tuesday is FreelanceSwitch.

FreelanceSwitch is a site for freelancers built around multi-contributor blog, chock full of general freelance advice, not to mention the always-hilarious Freelance Freedom comic.

The blog is not all readers are returning for, however. The people behind FreelanceSwitch have created a one-stop shop, providing their audience with a host of resources, including a forum for interactions beyond the comment field, which helps in encouraging a feeling of community.

The site as a whole is a great model for how bloggers can expand upon the simple blogging format, providing additional value to loyal readers, and effectively drawing in new ones.

Other FreelanceSwitch tricks:

• A variety of content formats. I’ve already mentioned the site’s regular comic, Freelance Freedom. In addition to this is Freelance Radio, a series of podcasts recorded by a regular group of panelists well-versed in the world of freelance. Bloggers who like to experiment with different forms of content also enjoy playing around with videos. Sites such as YouTube allow one to easily set up an account where videos can be hosted, and also embedded right into your posts.

• Expansion into other media. Bloggers can often parlay their blog-based expertise into additional writing, speaking, or teaching gigs. The founders of FreelanceSwitch have written an actual book — How To Be A Rockstar Freelancer — which can be purchased in paperback or ebook form.

• Reader Resources. In addition to your basic web content, if you’re interested in expanding your site, you should think of what else you have to give (this can also be an alternate source of income, when you’re ready to move beyond advertising income alone). FreelanceSwitch provides an actual job board, searchable by job category, in addition to other resources, such as their handy-dandy rates calculator and a large-scale freelancer survey. Is there something your readers need that you could perhaps provide them with?

• Merch. Because the creators of FreelanceSwitch have successfully created a name brand, they are able to expand into merchandise. There are downloadable desktop wallpapers and banners, apparel and accessories using FreelanceSwitch designs over at CafePress, and an Amazon shop.

Blogroll of Other Career Blogs: Brazen Careerist, Working Girl, Career Hub, Monster Blog, One Day One Job, Freelance Folder, Lindsey Pollak, life@work

Just dug up an informative article by the guys/gals of www.mashable.com.  They’ve compiled 300+ of their most useful WordPress plugins.  Some of them are in the same usage league, so it is up to us to check it out ourselves and see which tool among them works best for your need.  Check it out right here.  They also have related articles here and here. (and all the WordPress newbies, like me, say hooray!) I really appreciate people who takes time to list great stuff, kudos Mashable, you guys rock!  It’s interesting that they have categorized it in a helpful way too… check it out, they have grouped it as follows:

1. Plugins for the blogger
2. Plugins for your readers
3. Plugins to fight spam
4. Plugins to encourage commenting
5. Plugins to improve appearance
6. Plugins to enable rich comments
7. Plugins to enable avatars
8. Plugins to show off comments
9. Plugins to allow better conversation
10. Plugins to moderate comments effectively
11. and many more….

Got you interested, didn’t I?

For newbies, like me, it is an overwhealming list.  But I still do appreciate it nonetheless.

Oversharing–it’s as endemic to the blogosphere as flaming and deceiving. Who among us hasn’t stumbled upon a shudder-inducing post and wondered why anyone would want to make public such personal details with the faceless masses surfing the Web? What happened to discretion?!

However, oversharing doesn’t strike only lovestruck teens or lonely souls; a form of it can spread to the workplace as well. Only instead of private mortification, on-the-job oversharing can have deep repercussions for your professional life, exposing you and your company to legal action or even the possibility of getting fired.

This isn’t to say, though, that your work life should silence your blog or, conversely, that blogs are inherently anti-enterprise. Whichever side of the corporate ladder you inhabit, you need to understand your responsibilities to the other half. For the average employee, that could mean being mindful of not divulging corporate intellectual property; for the execs, that translates into setting clear guidelines for your employees/bloggers to work with.

If you’re in management, you’d do well to look to the blogging guidelines laid out by the likes of Yahoo, IBM, Sun, or the BBC–all companies with extensive experience navigating the intersection of media and technology. You’ll find that they cover several common points, such as transparency, confidentiality, and legal liabilities–the very same territory you’ll need to go over with your employees.

If you’re a blogger, you may also want to take notice of the parameters. Of course, it’s up to your employer to lay down the law, but even without their guidance, you should keep in mind a few very rudimentary tips if you want to keep your job and your blog.

Don’t assume your blog will stay secret. You may never refer to yourself or anyone else by name, you may obfuscate every detail, and you may avoid speaking of your blog at all–but none of this guarantees your privacy. All it takes is a slip of the tongue and a search engine, and presto–you’re exposed. Trust me, I know this from personal experience! Fortunately, the colleague who’d been secretly reading my blog for two years appreciated the content, but it could’ve been bad news if, say, my boss had been following my adventures outside of the office–far outside of the office, as a matter of fact.

Respect your colleagues’ privacy. Yes, your blog is your personal space, your soapbox, your mouthpiece, and your pedestal. It is where you get to express yourself on your own terms. But when these expressions involve other people, including your family, your friends, or your co-workers, your blog is no longer an island. Think twice before you snipe at someone; once it’s out in the blogosphere, it’s hard to take back, and your seemingly benign complaint could very well be twisted into a vicious allegation. It’s the Internet, after all, where gossip is fuel.

Be smart. When bloggers from both Microsoft and Yahoo agree, you know something is going right. Let me put it this way: You started a blog because you have things to say and ideas to share. Don’t undermine your own reputation with pranks, vendettas, or pettiness. You’ll thank yourself for it in the long run.

The number of bloggers who get arrested is rising. The World Information Access (WIA) Project at the University of Washington has released a report on bloggers arrested for activism. It identifies sixty four bloggers not connected with any media organization who were accused (between 2003 and 2008) of writing unacceptable content relating to politics and government. The report included Burma, China, and Iran in the list.

The WIA predicts more arrests in 2008 even as blogging continues to be a popular vehicle outside mainstream offline media. It notes the rising number of countries implementing Internet regulatory policies, and even blocking blog sites like Blogspot. It concludes from a pattern that began in Egypt, that attention to and monitoring of blogging activism will increase with elections in China, Pakistan, and even in the United States.

Other countries named in the report (in no particular order) are Syria, Greece, Singapore, France, Canada, Fiji, Malaysia, Thailand, Kuwait, Russia, USA, Tunisia, and the KSA.

The 2008 WIA Report.

The American Red Cross has published a wordpress blog about all efforts and news of the June 2008 flooding in Indiana, Illinois, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, and West Virginia.

Because of WordPress’ quick setup and use facility, the blog was able to set-up specific feeds from several Red Cross regions in the affected states.  People can subscribe to RSS feeds from Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Nebraska, Oklahoma, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

The blog currently has 23 active categories, most interesting is their photo blog (linking to their flickr feeds) containing Red Cross “in action” in those areas.

I’ve noticed that it updates quickly allowing people to get the “blow by blow” news where needed, when needed.  Another great WordPress way of initiating grass roots cooperation within, and between, Red Cross centers.

Very informative is the “how to use” section and the “maps” page.  Gives you a great feeling of what’s happening “on the ground” and where best you can fit in to help.

The developers, I see, have used a lot of the freebee services the internet has to offer, from flickr to slideshow.com to the feeds… you name it… they’ve used it.