Blogging is not just for teenagers nowadays. Everyone from stay at home parents to corporate moguls have blogs, and being able to blog from a mobile device is a must for those on the go. Having an iPhone is great for accessing the web and making notes, but managing and posting to a blog can sometimes be difficult. Here are some great iPhone apps to make blogging simpler:

1. WordPress and TypePad
Millions of users work with WordPress of TypePad blogs, and both platforms have introduced official iPhone apps. Whichever one you choose will depend on which site you support, but both have received good reviews. From them, you can create and publish new posts, upload pictures, manage comments, and check out other blogs in your network, making it easy to leave the computer without leaving behind your social network.

2. Facebook
The social media giant has an official app now. Although Facebook may not be the first thing that pops into mind when you think “blogging,” but it is an essential resource for advertising your blog and keeping up with friends, organizations, and current events. The app allows you to view and upload photos, as well as post to your own wall and your friends’. With all that writing and updating, who’s to say you aren’t blogging?

3. iBlogger
If you are connected to multiple blogs on various platforms, iBlogger is the perfect iPhone app for you. It supports all the basic platforms, as well as Xanga, Moveable Type, and Expression Engine. It includes a link button that automatically inserts your link with HTML code and anchor text, and uses the iPhone GPS to link your blog post to wherever you’re writing it.

4. Squarespace
What makes this platform great is the ability to import content from a WordPress, Moveable Type, Blogger, or TypePad blog. It’s free, too, and let’s you manage content, comments, and more.

5. Photobucket Mobile
Great photos make any blog stronger. So why not have your photos at hand to add to your blogs? The mobile app for Photobucket makes it possible to add photos to your posts that may not be on your iPhone, extending your mobile network and abilities.

6. Simplenote
For jotting down ideas on the run, try out this free, simple app. It even syncs with your computer for easy reference later. Great for the spontaneous inspiration.

==== About the Author ====

Namit Gupta, a hardcore technology lover who is always interested in learning something new and interesting and sharing it with others. His main focus lies in the web technology and is striving to make a fortune on Internet. He blogs about technology tips and tricks at Theitechblog.

Last week, an online buddy of mine told me that he’d use Linux more often if he could run Windows Live Writer in it. I had to agree, there are many different blog editors in Linux, but once you’ve gotten used to using Live Writer, you’ve been spoiled and won’t want to use anything less satisfying.

After a bit of searching around online, I finally figured out that the best solution might be to run a full copy of Windows inside a virtual machine. Then I’d have the best of both worlds within easy reach. After trying it, I discovered that it works quite well. In fact, this article was posted from Xubuntu Linux, using Windows Live Writer.

I decided to use VirtualBox as the virtual machine server, because it’s open source, but mainly because it’s already in the Ubuntu Software Center. Installing it was as easy as searching for VirtualBoxand marking it for installation.

An old, unused copy of Windows XP was my choice for a guest operating system. I was familiar with the steps needed to set that up, but if you need help, you can find a great tutorial on installing XP in VirtualBox at Linux Journal.

After I had XP running the first time, I did have a few problems. I kept receiving warnings that I didn’t have the Automatic Updates enabled. Since this was virtual machine, I really didn’t want it to update. If I had any problems, I could always use VirtualBox’s snapshots to return to an older state when needed. I finally opened XP’s Services manager and turned off the Automatic Updatesand the Security Center.

You can launch the Services manager by clicking Start, Runand then typing services.mscinto the run box (without quotes).

I also noticed that I couldn’t copy and paste between Linux and Windows. I found out that I needed to install the Guest Additionsin XP. You can find these in the VirtualBox Devicesmenu while the virtual machine is running.

There are two versions of Windows Live Writer. One version is for XP, while the most current version is for Vista and Windows 7.

Once you have Live Writer installed this way, you are ready to blog with ease, no matter what flavor of Linux you’re using. If you have your own favorite blog editor, let us know in the comments below.

The importance of viral marketing and the rapid dissemination of information through the internet has become more apparent than ever. It is clear that if you want to become famous or increase the popularity of your product or idea, the fastest way to do so is by generating buzz online so people become interested in whatever you are doing or thinking. This is known as the social media effect.

The first step involves the creation of content. Content can come from anywhere; it just depends on how creative it is and how it is captured. For the sake of argument, let’s say your content is a really great website or product. If you’re lucky, connected, or at the helm of a brilliant product, the story of your product will hit the front page of Digg, which nets over 7.6 million unique hits each day. This is known as the Digg effect, and it can be bestowed upon your site if you are fortunate. However, where the content goes from there doesn’t depend on Digg, but a plethora of other sites.

If you want engaging conversation, exposure, and a good amount of traffic, you will need to head to social networking sites such as Reddit, Yahoo Buzz, Twitter, and Facebook. These are, in effect, the front lines of social networking as we know it today. Yahoo Buzz isn’t that big, but if you get something on its front page, that can still stir up a bit of interest. Before exploring where things go from Yahoo Buzz to the rest of the internet, it’s worth taking a look at Reddit, Twitter, and Facebook, as they have the capacity for hosting unlimited audiences.

First one, up to 2 million unique visitors browse over to Reddit each day. In comparison, up to 29 million hop over to Twitter, and up to 128 million visit the likable Facebook. With all these people at your disposal, the more of them you can reach, the better. Take Reddit, for example: let’s say a major blog picks up an article on the front page of Reddit, and links to it in the post of the blog. Smaller blogs that follow the larger one will read the story and some of them will post about it. From there, content that you originally started can end up posted front and center on sites like Bing, AOL, and Yahoo. They eventually make their way to Google search engine results for your story or topic, and the rest is history.

Alternatively, information can be shared through tweets with Twitter or through feeds and shared stories in Facebook. Either way, different friends will pass the information to more friends in a chain reaction until the information is submitted to some of the big web hubs such as Yahoo and AOL, and from there, as before, information can then be transferred to Google search engine strings. And once your information shows up on Google, you get hits for your site, from one blog after another, from tweets and Facebook posts and Reddit threads and fark threads and more. The possibilities are endless, and it all starts with a single bit of good content posted on the internet.

In conclusion, Content is Kingso if you want lots of people to follow what you are doing, thinking, or selling, the quickest way to achieve your goals is to generate interesting content. Whether your content is hosted through cheap webhosting, or some other kind of hosting, regularly having fresh content available means people will most likely be able to get it, which will reward you handsomely sooner or later in the long run.

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About the author:

Gwen Davis is the webmaster of Hosting Observer Your guide to finding the best cheap webhosting online. A firm supporter of open source, she also blogs for Tek-Tips.NetHawk and GirlsinTech.net. You can contact the author at gwen@hostingobserver.com.

If Shahrukh Khan and sex influence movie sales, then the feeling of helplessness and the desire to change it influences nonprofit donations.   The idea of making the world a better place is a huge driving force. The most important question for a charity organization is, how can they best portray their cause and the plight of the situation to their public?

This brings us to Nanhi Kali, the brains behind The Girl Store. They also work with different NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations) to implement education for girls at the grass root level. It’s a noble cause, indeed! Having said that, the obvious problem is out there: The life of a girl child in India is not easy. If they are not facing the sex trade, they face discrimination and/or violence.

Getting back to the question, how does an organization portray the plight of these young Indian girls? Answer: The Girl Store. I urge you to take a look at the website. Make sure you record your very first impression and then come back to read the rest: The Girl Store

When I saw the site, my first impression was discomfort. It was almost scary looking at those girls, who clearly have dampened spirits in their eyes and are all fidgeting with the helm of their shirts or kurtas. It gives you the feeling of despair – you want to just go hug them and say … Please smile … please! Once that emotion overrides you, you will see what I saw.

First you see   9 girls and their plights, so openly, almost nakedly, being portrayed to the world. Now I ask you to look closer. It is not 9 girls – there are just 4 girls dressed differently. Look at the images below. (click for larger)

Feel deceived, don’t you? That feeling of despair almost gets overwritten with a feeling of What the F*ck!.   Take for example, this donor’s good intention in giving Binny a chance to go to school. But is it Binny, Nairit or Chandini?

This, by all means, crosses ethical boundaries. Not only is the company deceiving its viewers, they are essentially playing with our emotions. This is not to say that the company doesn’t do good work. They probably have done some great work for education of girls in India, but this blatant deception undermines all the work they do.

The first class that they should take is:

Nonprofit   101: Do Not Deceive

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About the author:

Priya is a social media enthusiast who works in the Bay area. You can connect with her on twitter @shahpriya.

I have been using FeedBurner to handle the RSS subscriptions for my blogs for a long time, and I thought it was time to look for other available options. If you are a blogger, you most probably use FeedBurner as well, but do you know about the alternatives on the market?

Of course, I have many reasons to use FeedBurner. It gives me a nice overview of how many people subscribe to my blog and how many are reading my blog posts. It’s very easy for my readers to subscribe, and   it’s easy for bloggers to use since the installation wizard is nearly idiot proof. It only takes a couple of minutes and a few clicks to get started. Best of all, it’s free, and you can monetize your feed traffic with AdSense for feeds.

If you’re not a fan of Google products or FeedBurner, I have found some alternatives that you might consider using.

1- Feedcat

Feedcat is mainly dedicated to boosting feeds and also serves as a public catalogue of feeds (RSS and ATOM).

You can submit your feeds and use services for free!

2-Feedity

Feedity will take virtually any web page, and convert it into a fully formed RSS document. Feedity allows news subscribers & publishers, businesses, non-profit organizations and programmers to seamlessly interact with Web content. Feedity isn’t however fully free, it offers different plans for different needs, with a very basic free plan.

3-RapidFeeds

RapidFeeds is a web based service, which aims to provide complete RSS Feed management solutions to publishers and webmasters.RapidFeeds gives publishers the ability to create and publish their own RSS feeds from any computer with an Internet connection. It however also costs money.

4-FeedBlitz

FeedBlitz is a computer online service that provides services to users who publish content (“Content”) using XML syndication and HTML web pages. Feedblitz however also has a pricing model.

5- PostRank

PostRank is one of the largest aggregators of social engagement data in the industry. Their platform tracks where and how users engage, and what they pay attention to — in real-time.

I’m interested to know if you’re still using FeedBurner, or if you’re using something else. Please add a comment to let me know what other alternatives you can suggest.

Blogging requires lot of time and hard work. Almost every blogger would like to earn a decent amount from their blogs to compensate the efforts they put in. When it comes to earning some money from the blog, selling advertising slots is definitely one of the most effective ways to monetize a blog. Bloggers sometimes complain about how difficult it is to find a relevant and good paying advertiser for a blog. We’ve created a list of 12 things that can help bloggers find good advertisers for their blog and close deals with them.

Readership first We often see bloggers who start looking for advertisers from the first day of their blogging. Such bloggers spend most of their time searching for advertisers rather than focusing on building readership for their blog. You must realize that advertisers will come to your blog only if you have a decent readership. So focus on building a loyal readership first and then search for the potential advertisers.

Understanding your audience Advertisers will never like to promote their products amongst irrelevant target audience. Before advertising on your blog, they would ask you about your audience. They’ll want to know things such as, what kind of traffic you get (search engine/direct/referring sites), from which part of the world you get most of your visitors, how much of your traffic is from loyal readers, how much they earn, their age groups and so on. It’s always a good idea to understand your audience and collect as much information as possible before contacting any advertisers.

Creating the Advertise herepage Once you’ve built a decent readership for your blog and have information about your target audience, the next thing you should do is to create a advertise herepage on your blog. It should contain information about the traffic you get, advertising options available, pricing details, and contact information. Now, if an advertiser is interested, they can contact you easily.

Create a Media Kit Most bloggers never create a media kit for their blogs. If you are working with small businesses, there is usually no need for a media kit. However, if you want to partner with big and reputable companies for advertising, you must have a stylish and well written media kit containing all the important information about your blog and traffic. A well written media kit makes you look more credible in the eyes of big advertisers and increases the chance of closing the deal.

Contact your frequent readers- Go through your list of frequent commenters and see if any of them has a business site or a product that may be of interest to your target audience. This method works really well if you already have a relationship with the person.

Contact advertisers of competitors The next thing you should to find advertisers is to create a list of advertisers of other blogs in your niche and contact them with your traffic stats and blog details inviting them to advertise on your blog. Since, you already have the audience relevant to their products the chances of successes are really high.

Join popular ad networks It may take some time to develop relations and find some good advertisers. Till that time you can join ad networks like BuySellAds , TextLinkAds etc. These sites have lot of advertisers as their users who always keep on looking for new blogs to advertise their products.

Webmaster Forums Besides Ad networks you can also join popular webmaster forums like DigitalPoint, V7n, Warrior Forum etc. All forums have a buy/sell/trade section where you can sell your ads easily to other webmasters.

Look at Google ads for relevant advertisers – Search Google for keywords relevant to your niche and check the websites that are using Google Adwords to promote their products. Contact those businesses inviting them to advertise on your blog.

Endorse the products you use If you are using some products which you think could be of some use to your readers too then contact the product owners and see if you can strike a deal. Since you are already using these products and are satisfied with them, there will be no risk to you credibility if you endorse them on your blog.

Keep Prices Reasonable Initially, you should keep the advertising prices reasonable. Your top priority, at the beginning, should be developing relationships with as many advertisers as possible. You can increase the prices once you’ve developed your own network.

Work as a team An advertiser will stick to your blog only if he earns something from it. Do not think that your work is finished after placing the ad. Try to help your advertisers get sales from your readers. Some things you can do are sponsoring spotlight posts, sending email to your subscribers introducing your sponsor, and reviewing products from them.

Conclusion:

These are 12 things that can help you find advertisers for your blog. Do you have any tips? Share them with us in comments below.

Guest post by David Smith, who works for conversion rate optimization company Invesp and enjoys writing about SEO, landing pages , conversion rate optimization and affiliate marketing.

We’re actually in a growing world of Google Gadgets, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re building a Gadget while reading this. But, if you’re looking to make your Google Gadget and don’t know where and how to start? Just read through this tutorial, I’m sure it comes in handy!

Google Gadgets? What are they really? I hear of them a lot now a days. In simple terms, Google Gadgets are mini-web applications or widgets you can easily embed into Google products, like iGoogle, Google Desktop and Blogger.

A Google gadget can range from simple HTML to a complex app. It can be a Calendar, a Clock gadget, a Weather Globe, a Media Player, a Diagram Viewer or just about anything you’d like to have on your web page. There are so many Google Gadgets out there, but I’ve picked the best 10 which I thought are fun, interesting and useful to be working with. So here you go!

1) TwitterGadget

This is a functional gadget that can be added on your iGoogle page. TwitterGaget lets you update your status and also fetches the New Tweet Alerts, Trending Topics and Twitter Lists. It’s quite handy, since you can now manage your Twitter account from the iGoogle page.

2) Official YouTube Gadget

Embedding this gadget helps you browse, search and watch You Tube videos from your iGoogle, your blog or your website. With this gadget, you can link to You Tube videos and let your website visitors check them out.

3) Creately Diagram Viewer

Creately is an Easy Online Diagram and Collaboration application, which helps you draw flowcharts, UML, Mindmaps, Sitemaps, UI Mockups and more. Now, you can add an always-updated Creately diagram with zooming and panning to your page. Whenever anyone updates the diagram, the latest version will be shown inside the gadget. No more manual image uploads!

4) Digg

Add this gadget to your iGoogle or your website and discover the best news, images and videos as voted on by the Digg community. You can also now customize your Digg gadget by topic, Select the topic you are interested in and get the latest diggs relevant to that topic!

Are you looking for free and affordable applications that will make your web life easier? Look no further! Here are a handful of add-ons that streamline the graphic design process.

1. Skitch.com

Skitch.com enables users to more quickly capture screen shots and drag them into email for sharing. The software automatically saves and names files to speed up the process. You can even annotate images with text and sketches and share them with colleagues. Use Skitch to show an image to a colleague or client and get their quick feedback on it.

Requirements: Max OSX 10.4.6 and higher
Cost: Free

2. Adobe Kuler
Kuler is an online application that’s also accessible through CS5 software. Use Kuler to generate color schemes for print and digital projects.

It’s got a community feature for sharing ideas and is a great source for color inspiration. Since it’s built into CS5 software, folks with the Adobe Creative Suite don’t even have to open a browser window.

Requirements: n/a
Cost: Free

3. Firefox Colorzilla & Google Chrome Eyedropper
Depending on your preference of browsers, these two add-ons will help you pick up any color you see on the web, analyze it and recreate it. It’s great for when you’re browsing sites such as logopond.com and want to repurpose an interesting color combination for your own work.

Requirements: Current versions of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox web browsers
Cost: Free

4. Lorem Ipsum Generator

It’s an industry-wide practice to flow dummy Latin text into a mock-up layout. The Latin helps designer’s see what the piece would look like with content. Instead of digging through old files to copy and paste dummy-text, use the Google Chrome Lorem Ipsum Generator add-on to create fresh text for each project.

Requirements: Current version of Google Chrome web browser
Cost: Free

5. Adobe Air Shrink O’Matic

An add-on application for Adobe AIR that lets you resize images in large batches. Perfect for getting files ready for the web. The app handles JPGs, GIFs and PNGs, and lets users set the output sizes, file names and end-formats.

Requirements: Adobe AIR 1.5
Cost: Free

6. Adobe Ideas Application for iPad & iPhone

A great tool for iPad and iPhone users who want the ability to sketch ideas on the go. The application integrates with Adobe Creative Suite software, so it’s easy to import ideas when you get back to work.

Requirements: Compatible with iPad and iPhone OS 3.2 or later
Cost: Free

7. Mac Rabbit CSS Editor

A CSS editor perfect for graphic designers who want to create beautiful websites using style sheets. This editor is easy to use whether you are a web expert or a beginner. The visual editing tools, don’t   dumb down the code, but instead help novices to learn to use CSS as they go along.

Requirements: Mac OS X 10.5 or higher
Cost: Free trial or $39.95 to purchase

Microsoft recently announced that they would be shutting down Windows Live Spaces and moving all users to WordPress.com. If you are a Windows Live Spaces user, Microsoft has made it very easy to move your data elsewhere, so how do you move it to WordPress.com? Take a look at the steps listed below.

Step 1: Login to your Windows Live Spaces account.

Step 2: When you view your Spaces account, you might see a notice which will prompt you to Upgrade your blog, click on the "here" link to start the migration process.

Step 3: Read the information on the page. Once you are done click on the "Get started. Upgrade my blog to WordPress.com!" link. Read the agreement on the next page and click on the "Confirm" button to continue.

Have you ever hit a bloggers or writers block, or don’t have a clue about what you should write next? Well, many people have been through that, and it is definitely not easy to get out of of too.

Fear not, the next time you hit a bloggers or writers block or want to get ideas to write about something, visit Linkbait Generator, a random blog post title generator.

The catch line of Linkbait Generator is "Need catchy blog post ideas?" and hitting the Generate button does generate some nice and catchy blog post ideas too. For example, here are some catchy headlines, that Linkbait generated for me.

• 8 reasons to love future technologies
• The 8 most baffling things about meth
• 5 amazing things you probably didn’t know about billionaires

Users can also find title ideas for only certain subjects or keywords as many would call it. For example when I enter Microsoft as the subject it will only display titles which have that word in it.

Techie Buzz Verdict

Linkbait generator can be used both as a fun pass-time and also as a serious way to generate blog post ideas for your blog. So head over to Linkbait Generator and have your share of fun.

Techie Buzz Rating: 4.5/5 (Excellent)

[via Download Squad]