There's a fine line between blogspam and self-submission

Nobody reading your crappy blog? Spam Digg and Reddit with it constantly!

Blogspam is bad. It must be; it has ‘spam’ in it. But what on earth is blogspam? [read more...]

How to lose half your subscribers in 28 days or less

A case study on the difficulties in selling a blog and maintaining readership

Followers of Wisdump may be familiar with the saga over the new ownership. The once-mighty Web 2.0 blog changed hands twice in a very short space of time, and has fallen from grace in some respect as a result. Indeed, the FeedBurner subscriber statistics tell a grim tale - once standing at around the 7,500 mark, the total number of RSS subscribers now languishes at around little more than 3,000. Where did it all go wrong? [read more...]

Guest Posting on Wisdump

Followers of fellow weblog Wisdump (née Whitespace) probably already know this, but with owner / 9ruler Scrivs selling the site to Manchester-based Maxafi there was an opportunity for a new batch of writers to write for Wisdump. [read more...]

How Long is the Ideal Blog Post?

On word counts and writing for entertainment

The internet is changing the way we read information. No longer are we constrained by a physical medium - we don't have a fixed number of pages to fill, nor a certain column inch quotient to meet. [read more...]

'What's Wrong With My Blog?'

A guide to common pitfalls, mistakes & faux pas in blogging

Creating a blog is easy - but alas, building a readership is somewhat more difficult. So where do nascent bloggers most commonly go wrong? [read more...]

Comment on this post?

I’ve been knee-deep in PHP this week, working on a multitude of projects – and I’ve finally found the time to implement bona-fide commenting in the backend Modern Life blog software. [read more...]

How To Get A Six Figure Blogging Income

In just a few simple & logical steps...

Blogging is easy; it’s the getting rich whilst doing it that’s difficult. Fear not, though, as here’s everything you need to know in one simple (and logical) diagram. [read more...]

UK Blogosphere: Top 10 British Blogs

Underepresented, undersubscribed and dominated by the US?

You may be able to guess by the .co.uk domain name and the Anglo-centrism of Modern Life, but to clarify, I hail from England in the United Kingdom. With all the buzz about blogs in the UK media (notably the BBC, Guardian and the Times Online, amongst other forward-thinking publications), one would have thought the UK blogosphere would be a shining example of how to embrace new media. Right? [read more...]

Ethical Blogging 101

On what can be deemed acceptable, and otherwise.

Blogging is an area that can be fraught with legal and ethic issues - in many ways these reflect the way journalism is affected by ethics and the law, but with blogging there's one significant difference - anybody may start a blog on just about any topic. The barriers to entry normally associated with the press are effectively gone - and passionate folk now have near absolute free reign to write whatever and however they please. [read more...]

BBC Manchester Blog Workshop

Thursday 22nd February 2007

I attended the first BBC Manchester Blog Workshop on Thursday eve, partly out of curiosity and partly to see what sort of folk might turn up. With nary a clue of what to expect, I walked the short distance from my place of work to the BBC Manchester offices, arriving a short while before the start of the workshop at 6pm. [read more...]