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Month: February 2006

Faves Cleanup! Links from my bookmarks that you might enjoy!

Faves Cleanup! Links from my bookmarks that you might enjoy!

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When I add a fave while surfing to my browser, I always just dump it into the root of faves and forget about it until I need to look for it. Every once in awhile I like to go back to all these dumped links and either categorize them, or delete them. It’s a fun little ritual that usually lasts me me an hour… most of that time is spent scratching my head wondering why I had that site bookmarked in the first place! So, I thought why not share this particular clean up with the P2L gang and post it in my blog? Shall we dance?

Color Scheme Generator – www.wellstyled.com

This handy tool is a virtual color wheel that you can use to select appealing color combinations for websites, logos or whatever else you want to design that requires multiple colors that blend well together. You can even select the color methods… so pick a green color and it’ll show you green hues, or click contrast for clashing colors. Best of all, it’s totally free!

4Templates – www.4templates.com

Looking for kick ass website layouts in Flash or HTML? Check out 4templates, which has gorgeous templates at half the cost of templatemonster!

AvP Jewelry – www.jap-inc.com

Someone PLEASE buy me this! Nah… don’t worry about it. I had a guy visit the shop that makes these in person and they don’t offer the ring in my size. *sigh*

Break-dancing Transformers – students.washington.edu

Watch Soundwave and some other transformers get down with some classic break-dancing moves. Amazing 3D modeling by Charlie Bayliss and Dan Kohn. If you feel like getting into 3D artwork, here’s all the inspiration you’ll need!

Daniweb Forums – www.daniweb.com

The professional forum hosted over at the IT discussion community known as Daniweb! It’s not as huge as Sitepoint or Webhostingtalk, but you’ll definitely find some great tips for all things web design and webmaster management. I just started hanging out here and people seem really cool with some clever cookies hiding in the bushes!

Chitika Advertising – www.chitika.com

This new ad network has made quite a stir in the advertising world with their new minimalls ad format. We’re running them on P2L for our filler ads, but they don’t perform all that great. It seems some people have had tremendous results with their ad formats, whereas others have completely bombed. Personally I think this is gear towards sites with typical “online shopping” looks to them where it easier for the ads to blend in to the rest of the site. Give them a try and see how they perform vs Google or other ad vendors… you never know!

Doll Houses – www.dollproperties.com

I’m looking into designing and building a custom doll house for my daughter. This site had some beautiful models, so I stole some ideas from here although I may just end up buying a kit from these guys and build it myself to save some time. Anyhow, thought this would be funny to toss into this list… gotta keep you on your toes!

Design 2.0: Minimalism, Transparency, and You – www.emilychang.com

Part of my never ending quest to figure out what exactly they mean by Web 2.0. It turns out that even the people that invented the buzzword don’t even know what it means, but this was a great read on the subject!

Go Articles – www.goarticles.com

One of the best places to find free articles based on GNU licensing that I’ve ever found (Thanks Donna!) and you can even submit your own to their database! This is a great way to get your link around because other people that republish your article need to leave the “About the author” section intact, where you of course have posted a link to your site. TONS of information on here for a wide variety of subjects.

Google Ranking Factors – SEO Checklist – www.vaughns-1-pagers.com

This is just a MASSIVE checklist for those of you looking for the complete list of SEO factors and tweaks for your site. Bear in mind this list changes with every Google update, but most of this is still VERY accurate information and the checklist is huge! This should keep you busy for awhile!

Marketing in the post-Cluetrain era – www.horsepigcow.com

This is a great article on what it takes to be an effective marketer, and it not only applies to running a successful website, but it also covers your personal and professional life. A lot of this is common sense, but common sense is often missed, so make sure you read this 😉

Invisionize – www.invisionize.com

If you run an IPB (Invision Power Board) based forum, then this is a site your should DEFINITELY have bookmarked someplace! It has every mod created for IPB known to man! You can find anything from door game style mods, to ad systems like the one we run on the P2L forums. If you’re into forum customization, go put on a pot of coffee, because you’re about to waste some SERIOUS time snooping around on here!

Glossary of Digital Photography Terms – surgery.mc.duke.edu

New to digital photography or digital art and you’re not sure what some of the common buzz words and acronyms mean? Here’s a quick list of some of the most common terms in digital photography discussions.

Pastebin – www.pastebin.com

Pastebin is self described as a “collaborative debugging tool” and someone sent me this link in a recent hacking incident where believe you me, the good guys won. Anyhow, you ever want to paste a large amount of code to someone via MSN only to get it cut off a few lines into it? This handy site is exactly what you need, and it’s free!

Plogger – www.plogger.org

This AWESOME photo blog script is simply the easiest and most powerful photo gallery system I have ever used and I love it to bits! Auto thumb-nailing and a kick-butt admin system make this a must have for your photo cataloging. The best part is how easy it is to skin! It’s so easy, even I can do it, and most people know my coding skills are laughable at best.

Sam Spade – www.samspade.org

Some SERIOUSLY powerful tools when it comes to tracking down IPs, Website owner information, Whois queries and more! Handy tool for looking for folks that are doing things they shouldn’t 😉

WebHosting Talk – www.webhostingtalk.com

This is a huge online community forum for webmasters and hosting company folks for tips on anything from Dedicated hosting packaged to selling websites. This is a very professional website PACKED with extremely valuable information to anyone who owns a website!

Well, that’s about it for this clean up! The rest were dead links or completely pointless bookmarks. Next article will feature sites that are the ultimate in getting your creative juices flowing! When you’re looking for inspiration to get your next project under way, these links will be a sure hit to get you cooking!

Until next time!

Dan

Mag Mention: P2L Gets 2 Mentions in Practical Webdesign January 06!

Mag Mention: P2L Gets 2 Mentions in Practical Webdesign January 06!

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One of the most frustrating things I deal with, luckily not frequently, is when something really cool happens with one of my projects, and I don’t hear anything about it until months after it’s passed. A typical example of this is when P2L gets mentioned in a magazine, which seems to be every couple of months if I’m to believe the people that email me telling me about it after it’s impossible for me to find a copy of the publication in question. Call me a pack rat, but I like to keep a scrapbook of these little articles, no matter how small the blurb is. Anyhow, Jay just happened to pick up a copy of January’s issue of Practical Webdesign, which is a UK publishing distributed worldwide, and Pixel2life.com gets 2 mentions! How cool is that? So I ran out and bought a copy, so I FINALLY have so on-paper proof of one of my sites being in a magazine.

The first mention is on page 41, where Marc Peter from on-IDLE talks about one of his site designs and there’s a section talking about what’s he into, what’s he’s been up to etc… Under “What sites have I been visiting this month”, P2L is 1 of the 3 he mentions. Thanks Marc and I hope you enjoy the site and get some use from it!

Here’s a snip from the article:

Mag Mention

The second mention is on page 104, where they have this massive list of valuable links in a section called “140 of the BEST web building resources”! Thanks for listing us PWD and we hope our next projects impress you folks just as much!

If anyone ever finds P2L or anything else I do in some form of printed media, please let me know ASAP so I can try and get a copy locally or bother you to pick one up for me. *grin*

Take care!
Dan

PayPal: Not as safe as you think!

PayPal: Not as safe as you think!

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As an avid eBay and Paypal user, I had no idea that the basic coverage is only $175, even if an item costs much more. If you use Paypal, you should read this article:

Think PayPal will cover you if you get scammed on eBay? Think again! Most people, myself included, haven’t read the fine print. Basic coverage gets you $175 if PayPal settles in your favor.

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Dan

Digital Photography Tutorial: Aperture Tricks and Tips for Close-Up Object Photography

Digital Photography Tutorial: Aperture Tricks and Tips for Close-Up Object Photography

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As a product photographer enthusiast, I deal a lot with close up shots and macro style photography that can range from photographing 2 foot model kits, to the model numbers on the bottom of a Hot-wheels car! I shoot with relatively cheap equipment that I am slowly upgrading to a professional level, but whether you spend $200 or $20,000, the basic principals of photography still apply. In fact, it doesn’t even matter if you shoot film or digital, because the rules of aperture and other camera basics are universal. Before we begin, let’s put some of the fancy photography terms that you might have heard to plain English shall we?

Title

ISO and ISO Speed:

ISO stands for International Standards Organization, and the ISO rating of your film is the ISO speed rating established by this organization. According to Kodak, this is the official definition: The emulsion speed (sensitivity) of the film as determined by the standards of the International Standards Organization. In these standards, both arithmetic (ASA) and logarithmic (DIN) speed values are expressed in a single ISO term. For example, a film with a speed of ISO 100/21° would have a speed of ASA 100 or 21 DIN.

So what does that mean? The higher the number, more sensitive to light the film is and, the faster you can shoot at. Why is this important? The less sensitive your film is, the more exposure your film needs to take the shot. This means you have to slow down your shutter, and the more you slow down the shutter, the more likely your photos will be blurry if you’re shooting action. The other side of the scale is that the more sensitive your film is, the more noise it picks up… noise appears as tiny spots all over your photo that become quite evident if you blow up your shots significantly.

What are the guidelines? When you’re outside on a nice sunny day, shoot ISO 200. Cloudy days and bright indoor locations should use ISO 400, and darker locations should go with an ISO 800 film or faster, depending on what you’re dealing with.

Shutter:

The shutter is normally a set of blades, a curtain, plate, or some other movable cover in a camera that controls the time during which light reaches the film. The longer you set the shutter speed, the longer your film is exposed to light and the brighter your photo becomes.

Aperture:

Aperture is the opening in a camera lens through which light passes to expose the film. The size of aperture is either fixed or adjustable. Aperture size is usually calibrated in f-numbers. The larger the number, the smaller the lens opening.

Now here is where things become important when it comes to close-up photography… by combining various configurations of shutter speed and aperture size, you GREATLY affect your depth of field. This means you can alter what’s in focus, and what isn’t and that is the main focus of this tutorial.

F-Stop or F-Number:

A number that indicates the size of the lens opening on an adjustable camera. The common f-numbers are f/1.4, f/2, f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16, and f/22. The larger the f-number, the smaller the lens opening. In this series, f/1.4 is the largest lens opening and f/22 is the smallest. Also called f-stops, they work in conjunction with shutter speeds to indicate exposure settings.

So when you hear a photographer say to his assistant that he’s going to open the lens right up, this means he’s going to increase the aperture size by setting the F-Number to a lower number. He might turn around and say close up the shot, in which case he’s saying he wants to close up the aperture setting by increasing the F-Number. Why would he want to do that? That’s what we’re going to find out next!

For a complete glossary of photography terms, check out Kodak.com

…

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RSS Advertising in Feeds – Acceptable or Deplorable?

RSS Advertising in Feeds – Acceptable or Deplorable?

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This is a great article I received from Sitepro, and I thought I would share it with you guys to show you how constant the need for new advertising venues are being exploited and how nothing is really that safe. I personally think that ads within RSS feeds themselves is a bit much and I can honestly say you won’t be seeing those inside the feeds on P2L any time soon! Are people really so desperate? I guess it’s all a matter of one’s personal taste… I was recently asked why I wasn’t running ads in my journal blog. I guess this is my personal space and I’d rather not have ads playing around in my space… you need to draw the line somewhere after all.

Anyhow, enjoy this article written by Sharon Housley and don’t forget you can subscribe to great articles like this in your inbox daily by visiting Sitepronews.com.

As publishers have moved towards monetizing RSS feeds, there have been vibrant discussions as to whether advertisements in feeds are viable or whether they will drive subscribers away. At the end of the day while it appears that many are discussing the philosophical approaches to ads in RSS feeds few are taking the time to examine the options available for inserting advertisements in feeds. Ultimately the advertisements served are going to determine the success of RSS as an advertising medium. The ads served must be related to the content contained in the feed. If the RSS feed contains quality content, the ads are relevant, and the volume of ads is in balance with the volume of content served, advertising in RSS feeds will succeed. Take a closer look at some of the ad serving options currently available for RSS feeds.

Review of Current Options

Google AdSense for Feeds

Google’s AdSense for Feeds offers contextually targeted advertisements, with a wide selection of advertisers. Google chooses not to divulge the percentage of revenue that is shared with the publisher, so it is difficult if not impossible to predict monthly revenue. The current Google AdSense system for feeds is tied to blogs and does not appear to be overly flexible.

Pheedo

Pheedo displays categorized advertisements rather than contextual advertisements. The upside to this is that Pheedo’s advertisements can be used in conjunction with Google AdSense or AdSense for feeds without violating Google’s contract. Pheedo works with the publisher to serve advertisements from similar or related categories associated with the feeds contents.

Pheedo’s system allows for advanced ad filtering, giving publishers control over keyword ad filtering, specific ad filtering or url filtering. Pheedo’s system also allows publishers to sell ads to existing advertisers with whom they already have a relationship. The revenue split is 50% and feeds can be a sponsored flat rate advertisement or a pay-per-click advertisement, where the publisher is only paid if the advertisement is clicked.

Kanoodle for Feeds

Kanoodle’s systems for providing advertisements for feeds is similar to Google’s but they do not have the breadth of advertisers that Google boasts. Advertisements are served based on topics, not keywords. Kanoodle shares 50% of the revenue generated from the advertisements with the publisher serving the ad.

Evaluating Options

When evaluating feed ad serving solutions consider the following:

1. Ad Relevance
In order to generate revenue from RSS advertisements or for an advertising campaign to succeed using RSS as a channel it is absolutely critical that the advertisements served in the feed contain related content, the more related the content the higher the likelihood that the advertisements will be of interest to the reader and clicked. Also, the closer the content relates to the feeds theme the higher the likelihood the reader will have genuine interest in the product or service being advertised.

2. Ad Ratio
Publishers need to retain control over the frequency of advertisements. Advertisers may be happy because they are reaching a targeted audience and publishers because their advertisements are being clicked and generating revenue, but readers will become frustrated with feeds that are too heavily laden with advertisements.

3. Clearly Denoted as Ads
The debate over editorial control and advertisements rages on. It is generally considered proper net etiquette for publishers to clearly mark advertisements to distinguish them from editorial web content. When selecting a RSS advertising partner consider the context in which the advertisements are displayed. Does it blend with the feed or site, while still being clearly marked sponsored material? Or does the content blend so well that it appears as a product or service endorsement from the publisher? Credibility and reputation online matter, and the segregation of advertisements and ensuring they are properly denoted as such will go a long way to enhance credibility with readers.

Clearly as RSS increases in popularity, publishers will be looking for ways to monetize their content. RSS in advertising is a logical step, and striking a balance between quality, consistent content and occasional related advertisements will lead to the success of advertising in RSS feeds. If the balance is not found, publishers may be forced to move to a subscription RSS feed model.

The Wall Street Journal was one of the first content publishers that announced a subscription model. Rather than embedding advertisements in the RSS content feeds, the Wall Street Journal provides teaser copy and if the subscriber wishes to view the expanded content they are charged a subscription fee.

Time will determine the long term viability of advertisements in RSS feeds. If RSS advertisements perform like the contextual text based ads currently served on websites, RSS advertisements will likely become common place. While the content publishers who specialize in unique, consistent content might find the subscription model more effective.



About The Author
Sharon Housley manages marketing for FeedForAll software for creating, editing, publishing RSS feeds and podcasts. In addition Sharon manages marketing for FeedForDev an RSS component for developers.