Story Theme Released

Posted on May 26, 2008

Performancing has released its latest free WordPress theme for May.

As Ryan Caldwell announces on the Performancing blog:

Most of the time (when I’m not busy becoming a father, like in April) Performancing is committed to bringing you a free new WordPress theme each month.

This month’s theme is called The Story Theme. It’s a 3 column design where the content is situated to the far left, followed by two contrasting sidebars.

I’m especially fond of the look of the left-margin on this theme. It’s a nice touch that I’ve not seen in a theme before, but which adds a lot of class.

Check it out and let us know what you think!

And over at the Performancing Themes blog, another introduction:

Performancing is pleased to release another great, free WordPress design called the Story Theme.

It’s a three column design with the content on the far left, followed by two sidebars. The color scheme uses a subtle mix of tans, oranges and browns to provide great texture and depth for your blog.

Rounded corners and a unique left margin give the impression that you have just turned the page in a compelling story.

Whether you are writing your blog to tell a story, or engage readers with a product, the Story Theme just may be the perfect choice.

So far, the reaction from the community has been good!!

You can preview the theme here.

You can download the Story Theme here.

Matt Craven: Back at the Blog Herald

Posted on May 19, 2008

We were very pleased to recently welcome back Matt Craven at the Blog Herald. As the former owner and publisher of the Blog Herald, Matt has been sorely missed by the readership and it is great to have back back on board- posting with his usual insatiable appetite for news, tenacity for the scoop and incisive analysis.

Here is a first: an interview with himself!

Tell us a little about yourself

I’m 34 years old - originally from America’s Crossroads in Indiana. I grew up in an incredibly small town where my family still resides.

I ran away to college to escape the small town lifestyle and got to see some amazing places in Indiana and Massachusetts. For a long time, I lived in Woods Hole, Massachusetts on Cape Cod soaking up the coastal lifestyle before moving to Minnesota in 2005.

I’m an avid cyclist - I prefer to ride only Trek Bikes - and I really wish I lived in a warmer climate.

How did you get started into blogging?

I actually started blogging not too long after September 11th in a private blog using Dave Winer’s Radio Userland - one of the first desktop based blogging tools. I needed an outlet to talk about what was going through my head - and what I was experiencing at the time.

I later switched my private blog to Movable Type - and today, like all of my other blogs, I’m utilizing Wordpress.

In the winter of 2005, you launched the BlogMedia Network - one of many blog networks that launched around that timeframe - tell us about that experience

The internet was just really getting started when I was in college - my business partner and I started a small business focusing on website development and IT consulting in 1994 when we were both still in college. We’ve been able to maintain that business over the years - morphing into professional blogging in 2005 - and now into a larger business handling project/program management, social media/blogging, and continuing (as we always have) to own and operate niche websites.

Since we started out small and then built up our business from there - we’ve never had to take outside funding. We’re pretty proud of that fact. Then again, we have run up significant debt on our credit cards back in the early days that we later had to pay off..

We’ve always tried to ride the trend - when I was still living in Boston in 2004, we both attended BloggerCon 2004 at Harvard Law School - the unconference hosted & ran by Dave Winer. It was there that I heard Jason Calacanis talk about what he was doing at the time with a very-small Weblogs, Inc.. I just wished I had listened more closely to him at the time.

It was about 18 months later that this really sunk in - and we launched BlogMedia that fall with a small set of blogs.

I was approached by David Krug, who at the time was well known in his role as Cowboy from The Jack of all Blogs, to start a single blog. This became a strong partnership that lasted throughout most of the next six months.

It was a great experience overall - some blogs did incredibly well - others did not.

Our approach was similar to what b5media has been able to pull off successfully - take a wide and deep approach to the blog network business. Unfortunately, going wide didn’t work as well for us. It’s tough to oversee writers when you lack passion for certain subject areas - like sports for example - and thus we had some challenges as we look at this wide network approach.

In February 2006, you purchased The Blog Herald from Duncan Riley - what can you tell us about that purchase?

At that time, The Blog Herald was the leading blog covering the burgeoning professional blogging industry with a wide set of coverage. There were larger sites, such as Darren Rowse’s Problogger, but they were focused in different ways than The Blog Herald.

When the site first came up for sale, we were interested in buying the site - but the rumored $60-75k asking price was out of our range. When that sale fell through David was able to negotiate with Duncan and secure a deal that was acceptable to all of us. I believe this was the first of many large & successful deals that David has been able to negotiate.

I’ve written extensively about our time as owner of The Blog Herald over at our problogging site - we did alot of things right, and we did alot of things wrong. There are certainly things that I think I would do differently if I had to repeat that experience today.

In November 2006, you sold The Blog Herald to Splashpress Media. At the same time you were selling off large portions of the BlogMedia network - and even changed the name to Problogging, Inc. - what was going on that drove these changes?

More than anything else, it was the rise in workload on the consulting side of our business that drove this decision. But it was also acknowledgment that we really weren’t cut out to run a large blog network. Our interests are much more in the technology & social interaction side of blogging - and less so in running a large - wide focused - blog network.

We were also motivated financially because there were many buyers looking to grow in the blog business - and were paying a premium for sites in some of the genres where we had a presence - so it just made sense to part ways with several sites.

Interestingly though, we really never planned on selling The Blog Herald as a part of this. I half jokingly told David to go find us a buyer for The Blog Herald - and he found 3-4 within 24 hours. We were able to make a solid deal with Splashpress Media that just seemed to make sense. I was back in my hometown for Thanksgiving surrounded by friends and family in what I’ve described elsewhere as “one of the most relaxed environments you can imagine” - so we made the deal.

It has been really cool to see how the site has grown, changed, and expanded over the last eighteen months - and it’s neat in a personal way to see Thord onboard as the editor after we brought him on as a columnist nearly two years ago…

After selling those properties in November 2006, you’ve been largely absent from the blogosphere until this year - what have you been up to?

Several things have actually been happening since that fall.

First, I’ve been in graduate school most of that time at the University of Minnesota - which has kept me incredibly busy and sucked away almost all of the free time that I once thought I had. Fortunately that’s ending soon and I’ll regain some sense of balance in my life again.

Second, I’ve been consulting through our current venture, which I’ll talk more about in an answer here in a bit.

Finally, I’ve been completely and totally addicted to World of Warcraft.

Tell us a little about your new venture at Bryghtpath LLC and some of the websites that you’re involved in through your new venture.

After we wrapped up the sale of most of our web properties owned by Problogging, Inc. - we actually wound up dissolving that firm and launching a new LLC called Bryghtpath LLC. We just wanted a fresh start and liked the LLC format better than the S corporation that we were before.

Our focus to date has been around our constantly growing consulting business - which is primarily focused in Boston and the twin cities of Minneapolis & St. Paul, Minnesota where we’re based. We’ve been working internally with several companies here in the twin cities on their blogging & social media strategies. We’ve just recently wrapped up a project where we have more than 1100 employees of a Fortune 100 corporation in St. Paul blogging internally on top of Microsoft Sharepoint (their platform choice, we recommended Wordpress-MU). It’s been fun to help those corporations get their employees to connect with each other in this way. We’re working with them now on a Wiki pilot - fortunately this time they’re rolling with MediaWiki which powers Wikipedia rather than the Sharepoint based wiki platform from Microsoft.

In addition, we’ve been building and acquiring niche websites in areas that we’re passionate and interested in. For example, last year we acquired Shadowpriest.com - the largest forum dedicated to the Shadowpriest class in World of Warcraft. The site has grown enormously in traffic since that time - and we have a blast playing the game and participating in the forums there.

Talk with us a bit about some of the tools that you use for blogging - and as one of the principals in a small business.

My main blog platform is Wordpress. I was previously a Movable Type disciple, but I switched to Wordpress in late 2005 and haven’t looked back since then. I usually just blog directly in the administrative interface - I used to use some desktop blogging tools but the web interface is just alot easier and more distraction-free for me to use. Your mileage may vary, of course.

I use del.icio.us for bookmark management, NetNewsWire & NewsGator for feed reading, and Gmail for email.

For business management, we use Quickbooks Pro for financial management and most of the 37signals products for project management, communication, online intranet, and other functions.

I’m a hardcore Apple/Mac user - but I do use both a Dell Desktop & Laptop so that I can be compatible with the needs of our clients.

What are your plans for this year?

Several, first, to finish graduate school with a reasonable GPA. Second, to be the best writer/online journalist/podcaster that I can be.. and Third, to continue to just try and be me… Beyond that, I’m open to other writing/consulting gigs - contact me over at our Bryghtpath site.

Disclosures: I interviewed myself and therefore had complete control over the questions

Welcome back Matt- we at Splashpress Media are honored to have you on board again!!

Easy Photoblogging with Photoblogs.net

Posted on May 12, 2008

A picture paints a thousand words, or so the saying goes. With today’s digital lifestyle, it is not uncommon for people to be able to snap photos just about anywhere, at any time. We have our digital cameras. And we have our camera-equipped mobile phones.

The camera is ubiquitous, but sometimes sharing pictures with the world is not as easy as clicking that shutter button. And even with numerous photo-sharing services around, bloggers might find the gallery-type format of these different from the chronological order that they are used to.

The solution: photoblogging.

Photoblogging is a combination of blogging and photo sharing. The idea is to post photos at regular intervals (daily, twice a week, etc.), or as the need arises. Popular blogging software packages are able to run as photoblogs, with special themes that focus on photos rather than–or along with–the written word. However, for no-hitch photoblogging, Splashpress Media has a solution: Photoblogs.net.

Photo Blogs is a free photo blogging service that lets users easily upload and publish photos in a photo-blog format. The service lets users manipulate photos and add tags, keywords, descriptions and captions for easy reference.

Photoblogs.net is yet another collaboration by Splashpress Media with Bloggy Network LLC, which has done the design and programming according to our needs. We hope that shutterbugs would find the service useful in sharing their captured moments, along with interesting captions and commentary. As the Photoblogs.net tagline goes–Even shutterbugs write!

Relaunching More Blogs

Posted on May 5, 2008

We have been busy behind the scenes working on a whole host of our blogs- redesigning them and finding top, dedicated writers, to relaunch them with the aim of renewed impetus and momentum. This is in line with our previously outlined strategy of “graduating” blogs from Mr Bloggy’s Network and bringing them into Splashpress Media’s fold. This is by no means the sum of all the blogs that we have had redesigned or found new editors and writers for (just check out the new Wisdump, for example..)- it is more just to report on those blogs that were dead and buried and are now being brought back to life!!

Here are just a few examples of recently relaunched blogs:

Biziki

Yet another design makeover by Thord Hedengren (don’t you just love the logo from “The Office”?)- Biziki has been relaunched as a premier blog on business and professional blogging. With a new blogger on board- Frank, Biziki promises to get back to its former glory.

Parenting Blog

With a stunning new design by Ia Lucero and professional fulltime Mom Lara giving her insights, Parenting Blog promises to yet again become one of the top resources in its niche.

Definition of Philosophy

Randa Clay really goes out on a limb with this sublime design, while Avatar gives excellent insight for the layman in philosophical academia.

Downloading Legally

Another great design by Ia Lucero and a dedicated, expert writer- Nick - is hopefully going to bring Downloading Legally to its full potential.

Japan Blog

Randa Clay did us proud with this beautiful design, while Maki fills us in on the latest trends and eccentricities from Japan.

IT Security Blog

A wonderfully tailor-made new design by Ia Lucero, with Saran continuing his spot on content.

Brewed Coffee

Markku Seguerra did a fantastic job for us with this design, while the java queen continues to do her stuff.

Gaming Blog

Once again, Ia Lucero delivered a masterpiece with this redesign, while sharker carries on capturing the latest and best that the gaming world has to offer.

Have Laptop Will Travel

Thord Hedengren delivers a classic design for HLWT, while Mel, of Forever Geek renown, continues to keep his audience engaged with fresh, incisive content. Thord writes on Devlounge that he broke the mold for this one!

Study Driving

Ia Lucero has done an ultra chic new design for this- check out the Rolls Royce image! Marcel continues to educate the uninitiated on learning to drive.

Geeks Blog

Lorraine Nepomuceno did a charming and clever design for us here, while Nick continues to give us all the latest geeky news.

Biz Crunch

Randa Clay hits a home run once more with a stunning design, while Gordon continues his engaging articles on business practices.

The Health Blog

A wonderful design by Ia Lucero that truly encapsulates the positive aspect on gaining important information about your health, and a gem of writer in Charlie who delivers that crucial message.

Zero Value

An innovative design by Chris Jennings, while David has been joined by Hannah in the delivery of great content about how you can survive the current real estate crisis in the US- nay, even profit.

English Blog

Randa Clay did another beautiful design here capturing the quintessential English spirit, while Jodie carries on the blab about Old Blighty.

Charities Blog

Ia Lucero does her usual perfectionist job with this new design, while Merve continues his insatiable enthusiasm for charitable projects.

Man Utd Blog

Randa Clay does another extraordinary design for this blog dedicated to Manchester United, capturing the great tradition of the club and winning spirit of the team. Meanwhile, Varun continues to follow the team’s progress through the season with his unique, personal analysis and sense of humour.

Our huge thanks to Thord, Ia and Randa- who did the majority of these redesigns. You were great to work with and we hope that these fruitful relationships will carry on well into the future! Our thanks also to the other designers who have helped Splashpress Media become a better looking blog network, as well as all the individual bloggers- without you, we would have nothing to deliver to our readers.

Watch this space as we work on more new designs and recruit talented bloggers for our network of blogs…

Gadzooki! I Want One!

Posted on Apr 28, 2008

It’s not uncommon for gadget lovers to drool over every new device–electronic or otherwise– that’s out in the market. It’s called gadget lust. That means there are things that generate enough desire for people to go crazy over them, whether they are actually necessities or just something one wants.

It doesn’t matter if it’s a laptop, a mobile phone, a portable media player, a big-screen LCD television set, a car, or just about anything that moves or does something. If it’s a gadget, there’s bound to be a gadget lover lusting for the latest model, or the shiniest model, or the smallest, or the one that has the most features.

In 2006 a blog dedicated to gadgets was born. It was called tech.erati.com, part of the Erati network. Then the owners decided to rename it Gadzooki, which shows how they thought gadget lovers would exclaim when they learn of yet another gadget they want to get a hold of. Gadzooki! I want one!

And with the blog featuring reviews and news of the latest gadgets out there. Who wouldn’t want one.

You don’t have to be a techie to want the latest gadget - its practically a necessity today in our modern lives. But before you splurge out on that larger-than-life flatscreen tv or iPhone, let our tech-obsessed bloggers at Gadzooki point you in the right direction.

At Gadzooki you’ll find out about the latest technology-driven products around– from media players, mobile phones, laptops and cars, to consumer electronics like televisions, photographic equipment, audio-visual systems, and much more than you could imagine.

Splashpress Media acquired Gadzooki in early 2007 and gave it an overhaul in terms of the format and design. Gadzooki has been reborn as a community site, with several bloggers (who are gadget-freaks, of course!) regularly contributing news items, reviews and features. Splashpress Media has also since acquired the Erati brand, which has been converted into an entertainment blog.

So let us help satisfy your gadget lust with Gadzooki, at least in terms of information and learning more about the gizmos you love.