What can you do to breathe a little life back into your site?
- Set the bar LOW: Once a month is a crappy goal when you were cranking out 5 posts a week, but better than once a year!
- Set a specific day: Put it on your calender, think about your post during your commute, type some notes on your break at work, have lunch at somewhere with wi-fi and crank out that post.
- Get a buddy: Know someone else that is still posting away or even that isn’t and wants to get back to it? Have lunch with them and talk about posting or even write together
- Reward yourself: Pick something small as a reward for yourself when you finish a post
I’m sure that there are a number of other things that people have done to get the ball rolling again and if anyone is still out there that has succeeded I’d love to hear about it.
Today I am proud to announce the launch of the newest Knetwork site KnightWebsites.com. Now that I have a few sites of my own under my belt I’ve decided to branch out a little bit and build websites for others. I’m still pretty new to this but using freely available templates form sites like OSWD.org you can build a simple and very attractive website quickly and inexpensively. This idea came about when I took a look at the business card of the company that replaced my old heat pump and noticed that they didn’t have their own website or e-mail address. I offered to put something together and so Knight Websites was born. Wish me luck in my latest whim and I’d love to hear any or resources or advice people would care to offer!
Recap:
Resolution #1: Read a self-improvement book
As I mentioned yesterday, the Pragmatic Programming book inspired me for:
Resolution #2: Learn a new Skill
For me, this usually means I learn a new programming language. I’ve picked PHP for this year since WordPress is written in PHP, I’m pretty sure it’ll come in handy and I’ll be more likely to use it and not let the skill rust away. I always find learning a new language is easier if you have a project in mind and so I’ve decided to play around with Google‘s chart API and see what I can so with it. I also have been thinking about putting together a PHP/mySQL site to help with another resolution, the one I’ve gotten some much needed motivational help with which I’ll go over tomorrow.
We’re a week into the new year, how are your resolutions holding up? I’m actually pretty excited about them this year so I started a couple of them a little early and the one that I’m no so excited about I’ve put off starting so I can get a little help in the motivation department. As I get back into the blogging spirit this week I’m going to cover my resolutions, and if you’re a programmer I’ll highly suggest the first two. Here’s #1:
1. Read a self-improvement book: I’m not talking about anything from the self help section, I’m talking about learning something general that you can use to make your life better. Job related books are definitely a good place to start. I like to get something that’s about programming and computers in general or that can help me improve my interpersonal skills. This year I’m reading Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software
- Wesabe Security and Privacy Page – Includes information on encryption, removal of all personally identifying traits from your Wesabe account, and their Data Bill of Rights.
- Wesabe Expanded Privacy Page - Expands on the above and adds disclosure of how your data will be used.
- Jedi Build Their Own Lightsabers – Marc Hedlund of Wesabe explains why they developed their own account access tools.
- Super Ninja Privacy Techniques for Web App Developers – Marc Hedlund explains how a Super Ninja protects your Wesabe data… how much more could you want!
I was doing some reading about running a site and building readership and one of the things that was suggested time after time was to narrow down your topic and find your niche, but I really can’t do that. All the interest in the cell phone postings lately has made me rethink that some, but I’m just not interested enough in cell phones to write about them exclusively. It turns out that I’m not interested enough in ANYTHING to write about it exclusively, well not anything that would draw any readership. What does this mean for the readers? Well, more general tech stuff, anything I find interesting, I just have to hope you will too!
A second piece of advice I heard several places was to put a face and some biographical data up, people like to know who’s providing the information. I agree with this, it’s always good to be able to put a face with a “voice” and so to that end – that’s me in a suit (gotta look professional right? How else I’m I going to get people to believe I’m an authority for articles like 5 SUPER AMAZING Uses For Soap!) I’ve updated the About Page and I’m going to try and badger the other contributors into giving me good bio information as well, so check that page every once in a while and thanks for visiting!
It is with great sadness that I tell you that the Dragon is gone. RJ left us today at 2:45 PM. He fought a valiant fight against this most horrid disease. In the end, he left peacefully and in no pain. In the years he had fought this, he taught me much about living and about facing death. He never waivered in his faith, nor questioned our God’s timing. I could not possibly be more proud of anyone. I am eternally grateful for the time that I had with him on this earth and look forward to our reunion, though as I told him this afternoon, not yet. I love you bubba.
Our beloved Harriet was at his side through the entire fight and to the end. The last words from his mouth were to tell her that he loved her.
Thank each and everyone of you for your prayers and support through this ordeal. He knew you were there. Harriet reminded him today that she was very proud of the many lives he had touched through his work. We’ve all felt the love that you’ve been sending my brother/cousin. Please keep it coming as our Harriet could use the support.
Jason will be posting funeral arrangements.
My sincerest thanks.
Peace and Light be with each of you,
Wilson
Brother/Cousin
4th of 3