12 Witnesses » Pastoral Blogging

So I’ve decided to be a blogger

art rogers — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 05:01:29 +0000

For those of you still checking in faithfully over the last, what? Three weeks? You deserve to know what’s been going on.

I’ve been busy.

I know. Life’s busy and if you’re going to be hosting your own site, then you owe it to the good folks who have come to depend on the sage advice, probing questions and stupid videos that you post to actually dispense these things.

Inquiring minds want to know.

Sorry.

I actually faced a bit of a dilemma with the whole situation. I’ve been so busy with pastoring and then my personal life (had you heard I’ve taken up cycling?) and then my family’s personal lives (I’m now the chauffeur for … never mind. If you know, you know and if you don’t, I don’t think I’m allowed to elaborate on the blog) that I have been too exhausted to write in the evenings when I typically craft my blog posts.

I considered shutting it down.

Some of you have heard that I have agreed to be an editor/contributor to a group blog called MissioScapes with some of the usual suspects. In fact, my initial article dropped there last week.

I thought that my occasional post there my tide over my writing jones. Scratch the itch. But then, no. I don’t think it will.

Then, I thought I might start an entirely new blog. An anonymous cycling blog from the eyes of a newbie cyclist. So much uncovered territory. So many obvious and yet unassaulted targets in the cycling community. You have no idea. I’m not even talking about the Lycra, either.

Still might do that, but then, maybe not.

If I’m too tired to write about the established aspects of my life, what makes me think an anonymous and yet unread cycling blog would drive me to shake off the web of slumber and expose the spandex clad, two wheeled, helmeted, free wheeling crowd to an audience that doesn’t even exist?

No.

The writing’s the thing. It’s not the subject of the blog. Do I want to write, and if so, will I set aside time to do it?

Yes.

I have decided that this is worth that and, frankly, it is you who have shown me that I should.

You’ve not said a word. No notes. No comments. No email.

But you’ve come back. Daily for over a month with barely a word from me beyond unfulfilled promises of posts to come, you still drop in and read what I have not written.

Thanks.

And since you’ve apparently cared what I have to not say, I think you’ll be immenantly more interested in the things that I hope to say, so…

I’ve decided to be a blogger.

By that I mean not just the random thought or question but something interesting – or at least something I think is interesting – more than once a week.

There you have it.

Sorry, for the impromptu time off. Thanks for sticking around. See you soon.

Comments

August 24, 2009, Gary Snowden writes: Art, Glad to hear that you've decided to stick with blogging. I'm not a very faithful writer at times either. There are long lapses of time that pass without a post, but then I'll get inspired and write 2 or 3 in quick succession. It's nice to have a venue for expressing one's thoughts, even if they are sporadic and periodic. By the way, I had a meeting with Rodney Hammer this past Thursday at the associational office and he described his initial meeting with you in Tulsa after having read your blog for some time. I suspect you have a lot of faithful readers. Blessings.
August 24, 2009, art rogers writes: Gary, Fascinatingly, this brings up another issue. My comment email system wasn't working and I would not be notified of comments when they were left. I wasn't participating well in discussion, which hurt discussion and also hurt my own interest. Miraculously, it has fixed itself and your comment just appeared in my inbox. Amazing.
August 24, 2009, Bob Cleveland writes: Art, It's axiomatic that the things we dream up to serve us, we eventually become enslaved to. I've felt the same thing about blogging, my ownself, but I finally decided I blog because of me. I enjoy the writing. And I don't write unless the bug, germ, spirit, whatever, bites me. I quit the choir for the same (admittedly twisted) reason. I'd been teaching 2 Sunday Schools for some months and when I finally made it to worship, they were doing a number they'd prepared for the Christmas Cantata, and I sat out that Sunday and loved being in the congregation out there in a pew. The little voice said "you can't quit .. you've been there longer than anybody but the pianist .. what will people think ..". God then convicted me that was precisely the wrong reason, and I've loved being "out there" ever since. If you want to write, write. When you don't feel like it, don't. It needn't be any more complicated than that. Besides, might a lot of those visits be from RSS readers, like mine? That's the only way I ever go to a blog any more since someone (you, as I recall...) mentioned them. (If it was you, a big thanks.) And oh, yes, I do enjoy your writing, or maybe I just enjoy hearing from a friend. Both, actually.
August 24, 2009, Bart writes: Bumbling blogging bicyclist is becoming better at battling bumper to bumper bottlenecks and bringing boy to bashes.
August 24, 2009, art rogers writes: Bob, I always enjoy your writing also, and good friends are like good medicine. Glad you're mine. Also, you are welcome for the rss feed reader, but no they don't show up in stats. Those are actual visits. Technology is fascinating, eh? Bart, Huh? ;)
August 25, 2009, Vicki writes: I got it. I actually have an RSS feed to my work email. I'm not sure if we can do an RSS feed to our personal email (that I don't like). I wish I was as clever as Bart!!!

Copyright © Art Rogers|12 Witnesses 2008
This feed is for personal, non-commercial use only.
The use of this feed on other websites breaches copyright. If this content is not in your news reader, it makes the page you are viewing an infringement of the copyright. If you suspect copyright infringement, please contact legal@twelvewitnesses.com. Thanks. (Digital Fingerprint:
4fb9806df94a8f093ce1b84a21d62535 (38.107.179.239) )

For those of you still checking in faithfully over the last, what? Three weeks? You deserve to know what’s been going on.

I’ve been busy.

Inquiring minds want to know.

Sorry.

I considered shutting it down.

Some of you have heard that I have agreed to be an editor/contributor to a group blog called MissioScapes with some of the usual suspects. In fact, my initial article dropped there last week.

I thought that my occasional post there my tide over my writing jones. Scratch the itch. But then, no. I don’t think it will.

Still might do that, but then, maybe not.

No.

The writing’s the thing. It’s not the subject of the blog. Do I want to write, and if so, will I set aside time to do it?

Yes.

I have decided that this is worth that and, frankly, it is you who have shown me that I should.

You’ve not said a word. No notes. No comments. No email.

But you’ve come back. Daily for over a month with barely a word from me beyond unfulfilled promises of posts to come, you still drop in and read what I have not written.

Thanks.

And since you’ve apparently cared what I have to not say, I think you’ll be immenantly more interested in the things that I hope to say, so…

I’ve decided to be a blogger.

By that I mean not just the random thought or question but something interesting – or at least something I think is interesting – more than once a week.

There you have it.

Sorry, for the impromptu time off. Thanks for sticking around. See you soon.

Comments

August 24, 2009, Gary Snowden writes: Art, Glad to hear that you've decided to stick with blogging. I'm not a very faithful writer at times either. There are long lapses of time that pass without a post, but then I'll get inspired and write 2 or 3 in quick succession. It's nice to have a venue for expressing one's thoughts, even if they are sporadic and periodic. By the way, I had a meeting with Rodney Hammer this past Thursday at the associational office and he described his initial meeting with you in Tulsa after having read your blog for some time. I suspect you have a lot of faithful readers. Blessings.
August 24, 2009, art rogers writes: Gary, Fascinatingly, this brings up another issue. My comment email system wasn't working and I would not be notified of comments when they were left. I wasn't participating well in discussion, which hurt discussion and also hurt my own interest. Miraculously, it has fixed itself and your comment just appeared in my inbox. Amazing.
August 24, 2009, Bob Cleveland writes: Art, It's axiomatic that the things we dream up to serve us, we eventually become enslaved to. I've felt the same thing about blogging, my ownself, but I finally decided I blog because of me. I enjoy the writing. And I don't write unless the bug, germ, spirit, whatever, bites me. I quit the choir for the same (admittedly twisted) reason. I'd been teaching 2 Sunday Schools for some months and when I finally made it to worship, they were doing a number they'd prepared for the Christmas Cantata, and I sat out that Sunday and loved being in the congregation out there in a pew. The little voice said "you can't quit .. you've been there longer than anybody but the pianist .. what will people think ..". God then convicted me that was precisely the wrong reason, and I've loved being "out there" ever since. If you want to write, write. When you don't feel like it, don't. It needn't be any more complicated than that. Besides, might a lot of those visits be from RSS readers, like mine? That's the only way I ever go to a blog any more since someone (you, as I recall...) mentioned them. (If it was you, a big thanks.) And oh, yes, I do enjoy your writing, or maybe I just enjoy hearing from a friend. Both, actually.
August 24, 2009, Bart writes: Bumbling blogging bicyclist is becoming better at battling bumper to bumper bottlenecks and bringing boy to bashes.
August 24, 2009, art rogers writes: Bob, I always enjoy your writing also, and good friends are like good medicine. Glad you're mine. Also, you are welcome for the rss feed reader, but no they don't show up in stats. Those are actual visits. Technology is fascinating, eh? Bart, Huh? ;)
August 25, 2009, Vicki writes: I got it. I actually have an RSS feed to my work email. I'm not sure if we can do an RSS feed to our personal email (that I don't like). I wish I was as clever as Bart!!!

No more comment security code

art rogers — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 15:07:41 +0000

I’ve had the comment security code in my comment field for a loooong time. At one point it served to keep spam generating programs from commenting on my posts. I think I can let other programs work behind the scenes to accomplish that now.

Why now?

Because I just had a brilliant piece of writing eaten by the exact same code on another blog. Something that have neither the time nor inclination to attempt to duplicate…

And it caused me to think that others who might like to comment on this blog might have had the same thing happen to them.

And since I want discussion on this blog, things that might inhibit discussion should go.

So it has, at least for now. We’ll see how it works.

I hope this will encourage more opinions in the future.

——————————————————————–

Update

Ok. Less that 24 hours and three spam messages.

Security code is back in. Sorry.

For those who have had comments swallowed by a message that says you have an invalid security code, only to hit the back button and have your comment gone forever…

The only way around this that I have found is to make sure you highlight and copy your comment before submitting it. I know it is a hoop through which to jump and one easily forgotten, but I fear I have no other suggestions.

Sorry.

Comments

June 10, 2009, art rogers writes: I've already been hit by one spam bot. I have a feeling the security code is going to go back up.
June 11, 2009, Quinn Hooks writes: I had to do the same, Art. For some reason, I am getting spam from Russia and I can't read Russian! Quinn Hookss last blog post..Camp McCall making a difference in South Carolina

Why now?

Because I just had a brilliant piece of writing eaten by the exact same code on another blog. Something that have neither the time nor inclination to attempt to duplicate…

And it caused me to think that others who might like to comment on this blog might have had the same thing happen to them.

And since I want discussion on this blog, things that might inhibit discussion should go.

So it has, at least for now. We’ll see how it works.

I hope this will encourage more opinions in the future.

——————————————————————–

Update

Ok. Less that 24 hours and three spam messages.

Security code is back in. Sorry.

For those who have had comments swallowed by a message that says you have an invalid security code, only to hit the back button and have your comment gone forever…

Sorry.

Comments

June 10, 2009, art rogers writes: I've already been hit by one spam bot. I have a feeling the security code is going to go back up.
June 11, 2009, Quinn Hooks writes: I had to do the same, Art. For some reason, I am getting spam from Russia and I can't read Russian! Quinn Hookss last blog post..Camp McCall making a difference in South Carolina

The fly by update

art rogers — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 21:39:06 +0000

Not avoiding you, dear reader. Just busy as can be.

We are growing closer in our staffing search and this has taken a lot of time.

Of course, we have just hosted the BGCO in our fair city. I went Tuesday for a while and had a couple of great conversations.

Since I usually blog at night and my nights have been full, I’ve not had time or energy to spend writing, but I have several things I still hope to get to this week.

See you soon.

Comments

November 13, 2008, Michael writes: Send me a top 5 - 10 books to read including those you mentioned Tuesday. A couple of the "newer" books I've started in the last 6 months or so are "Simple Church", "unchristian", "Surprising Insights from the Unchurched" and "Comeback Churches". Thanks for the time Tuesday. It was more of your time than I intended to take. You blessed me and made me really think. I'm just trying to get a handle on it and then work out the applications to minstry and church vision. I really appreciate you. God bless.

Not avoiding you, dear reader. Just busy as can be.

We are growing closer in our staffing search and this has taken a lot of time.

Of course, we have just hosted the BGCO in our fair city. I went Tuesday for a while and had a couple of great conversations.

Since I usually blog at night and my nights have been full, I’ve not had time or energy to spend writing, but I have several things I still hope to get to this week.

See you soon.

Comments

November 13, 2008, Michael writes: Send me a top 5 - 10 books to read including those you mentioned Tuesday. A couple of the "newer" books I've started in the last 6 months or so are "Simple Church", "unchristian", "Surprising Insights from the Unchurched" and "Comeback Churches". Thanks for the time Tuesday. It was more of your time than I intended to take. You blessed me and made me really think. I'm just trying to get a handle on it and then work out the applications to minstry and church vision. I really appreciate you. God bless.

WordPress 2.5 and plugins

art rogers — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 05:31:54 +0000

If you are new to blogging or don’t know much about hosting a blog on your own site vs. blogspot or even wordpress free services, you can check out my rundown from last year that will give you the basics. There are a few changes of specific info from then, but just a few.

I am really diggin’ WordPress 2.5. Kevin Bussey said he hated it over on Marty Duren’s blog, but I think he just hates change. He’s such a stick in the mud, he probably still likes his worship with all hymns and just the 1st, 2nd & last verse sung to a Hammond B3 Organ with the vibrato wailing.

Anyway, 2.5 is awesome in a lot of ways, but I’ll just tell you a few of my faves.

The Visual Editor is MUCH better and you don’t have to do the shift-alt-v thing to get the extra buttons.
In the Visual Editor, you can post media to your server by uploading pictures, audio or video. I’m still using flickr and podpress for most of this, but I am experimenting and have found hosting the pictures on my own server is a little easier and a lot more flexible than it used to be.
Big fave – You can embed video from Youtube or other similar hosting site via the Visual Editor. WordPress used to really not like you embedding streaming video. You used to have to write it in the html side of the code and publish it immediately. If you ever changed anything in the post, the video would quit. This makes obsolete the embedify plugin that I was previously using to do the same thing, but it only worked with Youtube (I think – I never tried it with another service).
The plugin page will check if you need to update your plugins and will do it for you with the click of a link, rather than forcing you to overwrite a file with ftp.

Well, those are just the top vote getters at the moment.

I also want to give you a new list of plugins that I am using. Joe Kennedy put up a list and it reminded me of a lot of changes that I have made in this area, so here they are:

Akismet – The anti-spam plugin that comes with WordPress.
All in One SEO Pack – This plugin is a Search Engine Optimization tool that will hlep your posts get found and, hopefully, read.
Angsuman’s Feed Copyrighter – Inserts a copyright tag at the bottom of your post when read in a feedreader.
Anti Spam Image – This plugin is no longer available on its host site, but might be found if you search for it. It puts the number/alphabet image input box by the comment section to keep spam programs from filling my comment section full of offers for porn and medications without a prescription. Very necessary, in my opinion (The plugin! Get your mind out of the gutter). Other plugins offer similar options.
Bad Behavior – This is anther anti-spam plugin that monitors ip addresses for frequent attempts to access and post to your site and shuts them down cold. When it is working, it rocks. Unfortunately, it sometimes messes up, like the time it shut me out of my own blog and I couldn’t even log in to the editor. It’s not doing that right now, but it is corrupting my category tables or something, so it is in time out (deactivated) for behaving badly. Hopefully, an update will patch it up and let it get back to shutting down spammers. I’ve just upgraded to the latest update (Monday night), but it is still living up to its name, so it is still in time out.
Countdown Timer – This is a fun little plugin that lets you count down to something that you might be writing about. Our big trip to Vietnam was the last thing I put up. The downside is that the time and date function don’t work right, so you have to figure how far it is off (I think about 2 hours behind) and set your event for the appropriate wrong time so it will show the right time. A little high maintenance.
Feed Statistics – Most of our blogs are read in feeds, but they aren’t counted by Statcounter codes that we embed in the page. This plugin lets you see some information about how many people are grabbing your feed, and which posts they pick up.
Google Sitemaps – This plugin creates a sitemap for the Google to pick up when it scans your site. That’s beneficial, because it helps Google decide if your post is relevant to searches that others are performing and this will cause relevant searches to rise in the search results.
inline RSS – One of two rss feed scrapers that David Phillips installed to scrape the feed of my photoblog and put the titles as links in the sidebar of my blog. If you need help, ask him. He’s pretty cheap tech support. I don’t know which of these scrapers is actually doing the work, but I’ll link to the other one when it comes up. (This is all alphabetical, you know.)
Maintenance Mode – This plugin allows you to stop others from accessing your site while you do upgrades or mess with the template.
Move Comments – Allows you to move comments from one post to another. This is handy if someone says something brilliant but it relates to another post.
PodPress – Plugin that turns your blog into an audio or video podcast. It’s awesome and easy.
Slashdiggalicious – This puts a bunch of icons for social networking sites that allow a reader to post a link to your article to those sites.
Subscribe to Comments – Allows readers to subscribe to emails updating them on comments posted to an article you’ve written. This is particularly helpful for people who are wanting to follow a discussion, but don’t want to check back all the time.
ToDo List Plugin – Let’s you create a ToDo list in the dashboard of your blog, so that you can keep up with stuff that you want to do, like modify some part of your template.
WordPress Stats – Keeps track of hits, etc. for your WordPress blog. Doesn’t track IP addresses, if you need that sort of thing, you still need Statcounter.
WordPress Automatic Upgrade – This plugin will walk you through an upgrade of WordPress software when it comes out. It works very well, and you don’t have to be a geek to upgrade your software. By the by, upgrade your software, because not upgrading it leaves security breaches that can expose your blog to hacking.
WordPress Database Backup – Creates a backup of all your data so if something goes wrong and your host accidentally wipes out your blog, then you can reload it and not lose everything. I have been close on several occasions and have lost a few things that weren’t backed up. Nice to have everything else still here.
WP-RSSImport – The other scraping plugin.

Comments

April 8, 2008, Kevin Bussey writes: Yeah, I finally got it installed or I should say Micah Fries did. It does look nice.
April 8, 2008, Kevin Bussey writes: Thanks for the new toys too! U da man!
April 8, 2008, art rogers writes: Hey, Kev. You've got some cool plugins. What are you using?
April 8, 2008, Kevin Bussey writes: I just screwed up my dashboard by installing some of them. I can't get back in my plugins or manage my posts. Uggh!
April 10, 2008, Marty Duren writes: Art- Thanks for the heads ups. Kevin- Please tell me which one(s) to avoid. If you guys haven't checked out David P's new template, give it a look. Cool stuff.
April 10, 2008, art rogers writes: Kevin was having problems with Podpress, but you are already podpressing, so it isn't a problem for you. When something like this happens, it is usually a template issue. Marty, you should use the automatic upgrade plugin to walk you through the upgrades, since you haven't upgraded since the stone age. It'll take you through backing up your files, downloading new ones, etc. That all happens step by step, or you can click one link and it will do everything for you. I've got a LOT more stuff about effective blogging that I've learned over the last week or so. More info coming.
April 10, 2008, Kevin Bussey writes: Micah discovered podpress messed mine up.
April 13, 2008, Global Fusion writes: Hi Art, Thanks for the nice list. I rather go with RSS Footer plugin from Joost http://www.joostdevalk.nl/wordpress/rss-footer/ instead of Angsuman’s Feed Copyrighter. The main reason? You can customize better your message and links. For tracking I am trying Wassup http://www.wpwp.org. Works great as a basic analytics tool for WP 2.5. Best of all, so far it is not messing up my other Analytics software. Keep on expanding that list please. Cheers!
April 13, 2008, art rogers writes: @ Global Fusion: GF, Thanks for the perspective. Actually, as of this week, I have dropped Angusman's for a whole new plugin (new to me, anyway) and I'll explain that this week. I appreciate the encouragement, because I am getting ready for a TON of tech posts on blogging called, "Better Blogging". I hope you will add your thoughts...
April 15, 2008, Global Fusion writes: @Art, I am anxious waiting for your post. I am sure you will be sharing interesting information about blogging.

Anyway, 2.5 is awesome in a lot of ways, but I’ll just tell you a few of my faves.

The Visual Editor is MUCH better and you don’t have to do the shift-alt-v thing to get the extra buttons.
In the Visual Editor, you can post media to your server by uploading pictures, audio or video. I’m still using flickr and podpress for most of this, but I am experimenting and have found hosting the pictures on my own server is a little easier and a lot more flexible than it used to be.
Big fave – You can embed video from Youtube or other similar hosting site via the Visual Editor. WordPress used to really not like you embedding streaming video. You used to have to write it in the html side of the code and publish it immediately. If you ever changed anything in the post, the video would quit. This makes obsolete the embedify plugin that I was previously using to do the same thing, but it only worked with Youtube (I think – I never tried it with another service).
The plugin page will check if you need to update your plugins and will do it for you with the click of a link, rather than forcing you to overwrite a file with ftp.

Well, those are just the top vote getters at the moment.

I also want to give you a new list of plugins that I am using. Joe Kennedy put up a list and it reminded me of a lot of changes that I have made in this area, so here they are:

Akismet – The anti-spam plugin that comes with WordPress.
All in One SEO Pack – This plugin is a Search Engine Optimization tool that will hlep your posts get found and, hopefully, read.
Angsuman’s Feed Copyrighter – Inserts a copyright tag at the bottom of your post when read in a feedreader.
Anti Spam Image – This plugin is no longer available on its host site, but might be found if you search for it. It puts the number/alphabet image input box by the comment section to keep spam programs from filling my comment section full of offers for porn and medications without a prescription. Very necessary, in my opinion (The plugin! Get your mind out of the gutter). Other plugins offer similar options.
Bad Behavior – This is anther anti-spam plugin that monitors ip addresses for frequent attempts to access and post to your site and shuts them down cold. When it is working, it rocks. Unfortunately, it sometimes messes up, like the time it shut me out of my own blog and I couldn’t even log in to the editor. It’s not doing that right now, but it is corrupting my category tables or something, so it is in time out (deactivated) for behaving badly. Hopefully, an update will patch it up and let it get back to shutting down spammers. I’ve just upgraded to the latest update (Monday night), but it is still living up to its name, so it is still in time out.
Countdown Timer – This is a fun little plugin that lets you count down to something that you might be writing about. Our big trip to Vietnam was the last thing I put up. The downside is that the time and date function don’t work right, so you have to figure how far it is off (I think about 2 hours behind) and set your event for the appropriate wrong time so it will show the right time. A little high maintenance.
Feed Statistics – Most of our blogs are read in feeds, but they aren’t counted by Statcounter codes that we embed in the page. This plugin lets you see some information about how many people are grabbing your feed, and which posts they pick up.
Google Sitemaps – This plugin creates a sitemap for the Google to pick up when it scans your site. That’s beneficial, because it helps Google decide if your post is relevant to searches that others are performing and this will cause relevant searches to rise in the search results.
inline RSS – One of two rss feed scrapers that David Phillips installed to scrape the feed of my photoblog and put the titles as links in the sidebar of my blog. If you need help, ask him. He’s pretty cheap tech support. I don’t know which of these scrapers is actually doing the work, but I’ll link to the other one when it comes up. (This is all alphabetical, you know.)
Maintenance Mode – This plugin allows you to stop others from accessing your site while you do upgrades or mess with the template.
Move Comments – Allows you to move comments from one post to another. This is handy if someone says something brilliant but it relates to another post.
PodPress – Plugin that turns your blog into an audio or video podcast. It’s awesome and easy.
Slashdiggalicious – This puts a bunch of icons for social networking sites that allow a reader to post a link to your article to those sites.
Subscribe to Comments – Allows readers to subscribe to emails updating them on comments posted to an article you’ve written. This is particularly helpful for people who are wanting to follow a discussion, but don’t want to check back all the time.
ToDo List Plugin – Let’s you create a ToDo list in the dashboard of your blog, so that you can keep up with stuff that you want to do, like modify some part of your template.
WordPress Stats – Keeps track of hits, etc. for your WordPress blog. Doesn’t track IP addresses, if you need that sort of thing, you still need Statcounter.
WordPress Automatic Upgrade – This plugin will walk you through an upgrade of WordPress software when it comes out. It works very well, and you don’t have to be a geek to upgrade your software. By the by, upgrade your software, because not upgrading it leaves security breaches that can expose your blog to hacking.
WordPress Database Backup – Creates a backup of all your data so if something goes wrong and your host accidentally wipes out your blog, then you can reload it and not lose everything. I have been close on several occasions and have lost a few things that weren’t backed up. Nice to have everything else still here.
WP-RSSImport – The other scraping plugin.

Comments

April 8, 2008, Kevin Bussey writes: Yeah, I finally got it installed or I should say Micah Fries did. It does look nice.
April 8, 2008, Kevin Bussey writes: Thanks for the new toys too! U da man!
April 8, 2008, art rogers writes: Hey, Kev. You've got some cool plugins. What are you using?
April 8, 2008, Kevin Bussey writes: I just screwed up my dashboard by installing some of them. I can't get back in my plugins or manage my posts. Uggh!
April 10, 2008, Marty Duren writes: Art- Thanks for the heads ups. Kevin- Please tell me which one(s) to avoid. If you guys haven't checked out David P's new template, give it a look. Cool stuff.
April 10, 2008, art rogers writes: Kevin was having problems with Podpress, but you are already podpressing, so it isn't a problem for you. When something like this happens, it is usually a template issue. Marty, you should use the automatic upgrade plugin to walk you through the upgrades, since you haven't upgraded since the stone age. It'll take you through backing up your files, downloading new ones, etc. That all happens step by step, or you can click one link and it will do everything for you. I've got a LOT more stuff about effective blogging that I've learned over the last week or so. More info coming.
April 10, 2008, Kevin Bussey writes: Micah discovered podpress messed mine up.
April 13, 2008, Global Fusion writes: Hi Art, Thanks for the nice list. I rather go with RSS Footer plugin from Joost http://www.joostdevalk.nl/wordpress/rss-footer/ instead of Angsuman’s Feed Copyrighter. The main reason? You can customize better your message and links. For tracking I am trying Wassup http://www.wpwp.org. Works great as a basic analytics tool for WP 2.5. Best of all, so far it is not messing up my other Analytics software. Keep on expanding that list please. Cheers!
April 13, 2008, art rogers writes: @ Global Fusion: GF, Thanks for the perspective. Actually, as of this week, I have dropped Angusman's for a whole new plugin (new to me, anyway) and I'll explain that this week. I appreciate the encouragement, because I am getting ready for a TON of tech posts on blogging called, "Better Blogging". I hope you will add your thoughts...
April 15, 2008, Global Fusion writes: @Art, I am anxious waiting for your post. I am sure you will be sharing interesting information about blogging.

Video Blogging

art rogers — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 00:31:31 +0000

How to create Video Blogs.

Simple Blog

art rogers — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 21:24:43 +0000

The plugin load on your WordPress blog.

Pastoral Blogging: Claiming feeds, switching readers and podcasting

art rogers — Sun, 21 Oct 2007 03:43:45 +0000

I am considering switching from Bloglines to Google Reader as my primary rss feed reader. If you don’t know what that’s all about, read this post: Pastoral Blogging, Pt. 7 (I hereby stop numbering them and will name them from now on…)

Anyway, this is not really brought on by Bloglines at all. It works well, adapts very well to the mobile internet on my Treo and is still the biggest feed reader. Google Reader is rapidly on the rise, however. The change is being brought about because My Yahoo homepage, which has been my homepage for a looooong time is trying to transition to keep up with iGoogle – another homepage, similar to My Yahoo. Well, Google also has online shareable docs, calendars, blogsearch, pictures (to compete with Yahoo owned, Flickr) and, of course, this reader. That’s just to get you started – there’s ALOT more.
Well, I am already using Google for those other things, excepting Flickr, so when Yahoo tries to force me to shift to its new beta My Yahoo page and I find that my email and fantasy sports teams are unsupported modules at the new version, so I switch back, but not without a hassle.

On a whim I check out iGoogle (available with free google account) and start adding modules. Guess what? I can check my email from the iGoogle homepage. Yeah my Gmail (google mail) but also MY YAHOO MAIL. I can check my Yahoo mail from the google homepage but I can’t from the new My Yahoo homepage. Errr…. Just a suggestion, Yahoo, be ready to roll before you start something like this.

Anyway, since it looks like I am going to be moving over to Google for a homepage, I might integrate my reader into iGoogle as well.

As I went through that process I found that I can import all of my feeds as they are from bloglines. In Bloglines, go to “edit” and at the bottom of the left hand column, click export feeds. Save the “export.opml” file to your hard drive and then upload it in the Google Reader. That simple.

Regardless of whether or not you switch, however, you might want to claim your feed at bloglines. It’s under My Account -> Publisher Tools. You need to find your feed, integrate some code and then authenticate.

In a mostly unrelated topic, I settled on an audio plugin to help with post Frank Page’s Q&A session with Tulsa Metro. It is PodPress, and it gives you tons of stats about downloads vs. plays vs. feed reads. Really good stuff, if you want to upload some audio. I tried another one, but it didn’t work. PodPress is low maintenance and clearly the way to go. it you want to get a little more high maintenance, you can list your audio at iTunes with Podpress, but even if you don’t, PodPress creates an rss feed that people can use to subscribe to audio that you upload. Bottom line: if they are on your blog, they can subscribe to your podcast, and if they aren’t, they are not likely to find you at iTunes because that is like a needle in a haystack. Of course, this plugin is for WordPress blogs.

Be good. I’m going to see Marty next week, so I haven’t decided whether or not I’ll blog, set some stuff to drop while I’m gone or just take some time off. Most likely the latter, but we’ll see.

Comments

October 20, 2007, Joe Kennedy writes: I like Google Reader a lot. Just so you know.
October 23, 2007, Lu writes: I started to switch over to Google Reader until I realized it only gives you a snippet of the post and you have to go to the blog if you want to read the whole thing. I'm really lazy and prefer to read straight from Bloglines and only go to the blog if I either have something to say, or if the post isn't showing up right/is hard to read. Messes up the blog's stats, I know. But oh well. Anyway, that's all I had to say. Except that I'm still reading regularly 'cause you always have good stuff -- just reading on Bloglines. :)

Anyway, since it looks like I am going to be moving over to Google for a homepage, I might integrate my reader into iGoogle as well.

Comments

October 20, 2007, Joe Kennedy writes: I like Google Reader a lot. Just so you know.
October 23, 2007, Lu writes: I started to switch over to Google Reader until I realized it only gives you a snippet of the post and you have to go to the blog if you want to read the whole thing. I'm really lazy and prefer to read straight from Bloglines and only go to the blog if I either have something to say, or if the post isn't showing up right/is hard to read. Messes up the blog's stats, I know. But oh well. Anyway, that's all I had to say. Except that I'm still reading regularly 'cause you always have good stuff -- just reading on Bloglines. :)

Art’s blogging (Pastoral Blogging 8 – this time it’s personal)

art rogers — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 18:59:53 +0000

Let’s just get one more thing straight about my blogging, shall we?

I am not quitting, nor am I slowing down. I am shrugging off the political weight that I have carried and the public demands that such carries with it.

I actually am looking forward to blogging more in the near future. I am, however, going to be changing my subject matter. As you will note from my last post, I am going to start highlighting stories that I find in the news and commenting on them. Previously, the stories were all about the SBC and our current situation. Now they will be about many other things, with the SBC in an appropriate balance as well.

In order to do that, I set up my bloglines (feed reader) to grab certain headlines that may be of interest to me as the subject of future blogs. You can do that doing a news.google.com search or a blog.google.com search and then subscribe to the feed for your search criteria that appears on the page with the results. This will feed new news stories or blog entries, respectively, into your feed reader.

If you don’t have a feed reader yet, it is way past time to get one and learn to work it, don’t ya think?

Well, sit back and enjoy the ride. Look forward to seeing you soon.

Let’s just get one more thing straight about my blogging, shall we?

I am not quitting, nor am I slowing down. I am shrugging off the political weight that I have carried and the public demands that such carries with it.

If you don’t have a feed reader yet, it is way past time to get one and learn to work it, don’t ya think?

Well, sit back and enjoy the ride. Look forward to seeing you soon.

Pastoral Blogging, Pt. 7

art rogers — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 12:02:52 +0000

I am cleaning out my feed reader. After a while, you just have to start pulling some of the things you don’t read all the time. Honestly, I track those blogs I really like in a folder of “live bookmarks” on the bookmark toolbar in Firefox. There are five there and I check them a couple of times a day.

If you don’t know what a live bookmark is, your browser has an option when you click the rss feed chicklet:

(umm… if you don’t know what an rss feed is, you should probably read my previous posts on this subject, but I’ll give you a reprieve and offer this cool link: video – rss explained in plain english [ht: Desiring God Blog]

Most of the time, I use bloglines, but for those select few blogs, I opt for a live bookmark which is a drop down menu that shows the latest posts. It updates mui pronto and I don’t have to log into bloglines and sort through all of the other feeds that I don’t want to read at the moment.

Which brings me back to my original purpose. Sometimes you have to weed out feeds you aren’t reading. A lot of times, when you decide to subscribe to a feed, you feel sort of obligated to hang in there. Listen, there are plenty of times I have read an incredibly thoughtful post from someone and thought, “Hey, there’s gonna be more of this good stuff.” Generally there is, but too often, it is a long time coming. Sorting through their other posts waiting for the really good stuff is why I got a feed reader, so I could skim.

When I got back from camp, though, and found 300+ feeds waiting on me, I had had enough. I spent a couple of hours on my couch just sifting. By the time I finished, it was midnight and I was supremely irritated from the process. I’m glad everyone was asleep, or I would have been likely to have snapped at my family just for being alive at the moment. When something puts you in that frame of mind, it is time for a change.

Also, I am dumping almost all of my SBC politics feeds. I used to keep track of what everyone was saying because I had to be current. Truth be known, I had pretty much quit reading most of them months ago unless someone linked to them. I was skimming, but my heart has been out of it for a while.

At this point, I have a hard time keeping up with just the stuff coming from SBC Outpost, and I’m a contributor.

There have been a few, more thoughtful blogs, to which I am subscribing, and I thought you might like to know who they are.

Tops of my new interest is Emily Hunter McGowin. That girl knows her stuff and is deep like big water.

Lu has caught my interest and secured a feed in bloglines. She is a former missionary and current Nashvillian. She likes her blogging so much, she is willing to pay to do it (she uses typepad). Who am I to talk? I own my own domain.

Joe Ball is the Student Ministry guy for the Kentucky Baptist Convention and a long time friend. He keeps me hooked up with thoughts on Youth Ministry at Despising None Blog and Podcast.

Finally, I recommend to you an old blogging ally and someone who has made a huge leap from SBC politics to serious cultural engagement and thoughtful cultural commentary/conversation, Kevin Bussey.

Along with these changes, and more, expect my blogroll to change. Almost every SBC politics is going to come off of it. Please don’t get your feelings hurt you are there and get dropped. All things must grow and change and 12 Witnesses is doing that, as well.

[edit]

What the heck!!! I forgot to commend to you the fine blog of Timmy Brister, Provocations and Pantings. Timmy rocks with some massive depth, but also will give you phenominal knowledge on photography, family and life. I guess I forgot him because I have been reading him for a while, but in editing my blogroll, I realized I had never added him. My bad, TB.

Comments

July 26, 2007, Lu writes: Aw, how cool! Work is slow today so I'm (supposed to be) working on my marketing paper. As is typical, I'm avoiding. ;) So I thought I'd drop in on you. You always have something new and profound for me to think about. But instead, I find my name, on your list. I's so excited! Now I have seven actual real live readers. :) Seriously, thanks. I am blessed. Yeah, I'm gonna have to clear out bloglines too. I added a bunch of new feeds recently, but I just can't keep up with all of them and still be a good student. Or have a life.
July 26, 2007, Kevin Bussey writes: I'm glad I made the cut!
July 26, 2007, Timmy Brister writes: Thanks Art for the nice recommendation. I really appreciate it. This series has been really helpful to pastors and lay people who are new to the blogosphere and all the technical features that accompany it. Thanks again, Timmy
July 26, 2007, Dorcas Hawker writes: Art - I know I'm on your Firefox 5 feeds you read more than once daily ... right? Ha! Seriously, with your busy life I doubt you have time to read my introductory paragraphs, much less an entire epic post. Keep it real, and follow the advice Alan and Bryan are always giving me -- when it comes to blogging, just do what you want ... it is supposed to be fun, interesting, positive, etc. etc. Dorcas
July 26, 2007, Joe Ball writes: Thanks for the kind words. It is good not to get voted off.
July 27, 2007, Ben writes: Art, the blogging world is not unlike the traditional world of message sending and receiving. There are millions of messages being sent every second from different sources. The hard part is to tune in only to those that are meaningful, substantive, and overall contribute to your passion. If you don't, you risk being crippled by the immense options available. A great book on this principle is The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz. His premise is that we think we want more choices and that more choices will make us happier. Yet the opposite it true. Thanks for the reminder to be careful where we spend our time--even in the blog world. Blessings, Ben.
July 27, 2007, Bob Cleveland writes: Thanks much, Art. I just went and set up Google Reader and added all the blogs I read. Took about 10 minutes and will be a big help to me. Particularly next year when I retire. You done good.
July 27, 2007, Dorcas Hawker writes: Art - I'm not one to complain you know. I suppose you have "done good" to make this decision to cull your time commitments. But I'll admit to being a little bummed I'm off your blogroll now. You were one of the major blogs to have me on the list and several people came to my blog from here. Of course I'll defend your right to make choices and put whomever you wish on your blogroll, but at the same time it is kind of like "hey, I don't want to be deleted." You know. Blog town can be a tough gig sometimes. Dorcas
July 27, 2007, Art Rogers writes: Dorcas, Don't get your feelings hurt. It's not against you. I'm trimming everything. Besides, you are in really good company. Did you note all the names that got removed from the overly bloated blogroll? Anyway, I have tried to switch themes, even in my blogroll. And to everyone I've removed- feel free to take me off of your blogroll if you want. It won't offend me I assure you.
July 27, 2007, Dorcas Hawker writes: Art - I don't suppose my feelings are overly hurt or anything. You just kicked off a crisis of blog identity I suppose. I am often motivated by my need to excel at whatever I do. So I find myself wondering what I can do to make my blog more "something" that keeps up with Emily and Lu and Kiki as writers who manage to stay on the "not SBC emphasis" blog roll. I suppose it is a female thing because I enjoy all their writing too and wouldn't suppose myself to be a better writer or more intelligent than any of them by any means. In fact, I just added Emily and Lu on my blogroll too because I thought ... hey these ladies really have something to say! Nevertheless, I find myself wondering if I to have something to say ... am I just writing into the wind. Oh, I know I have readers who enjoy my writing too. Blog town is big enough for all of us. It just hit me as weird to see my name no longer on the list (and yes I did note others were gone too). Sort of like "oh no, am I the ditz among all these brainy women? Do I need to reinvent my blog once again!?" And so forth. So I don't plan on deleting you from my blogroll as "payback" or anything so high school as that. I'm really not offended, just wondering what I want out of my blog. Do I want to strive to keep the pastor readership? Or am I okay with having been involved with the SBC discussion for a while, and am now glad to let people go on their way and continue writing about more personal stuff and let those who wish to read it to do so. So, I'll probably TP your house the next time I'm in Tulsa or something, but other than that ... we're cool. :) Dorcas
July 28, 2007, Emily Hunter McGowin writes: Hey Art, Thanks for the recommendation and the honor of being among your new interests. That's a great encouragement. I hope your trimmed down blogging lifestyle works out well for you. :) Have a blessed Lord's day, Emily

If you don’t know what a live bookmark is, your browser has an option when you click the rss feed chicklet:

At this point, I have a hard time keeping up with just the stuff coming from SBC Outpost, and I’m a contributor.

There have been a few, more thoughtful blogs, to which I am subscribing, and I thought you might like to know who they are.

Tops of my new interest is Emily Hunter McGowin. That girl knows her stuff and is deep like big water.

Joe Ball is the Student Ministry guy for the Kentucky Baptist Convention and a long time friend. He keeps me hooked up with thoughts on Youth Ministry at Despising None Blog and Podcast.

Finally, I recommend to you an old blogging ally and someone who has made a huge leap from SBC politics to serious cultural engagement and thoughtful cultural commentary/conversation, Kevin Bussey.

[edit]

Comments

July 26, 2007, Lu writes: Aw, how cool! Work is slow today so I'm (supposed to be) working on my marketing paper. As is typical, I'm avoiding. ;) So I thought I'd drop in on you. You always have something new and profound for me to think about. But instead, I find my name, on your list. I's so excited! Now I have seven actual real live readers. :) Seriously, thanks. I am blessed. Yeah, I'm gonna have to clear out bloglines too. I added a bunch of new feeds recently, but I just can't keep up with all of them and still be a good student. Or have a life.
July 26, 2007, Kevin Bussey writes: I'm glad I made the cut!
July 26, 2007, Timmy Brister writes: Thanks Art for the nice recommendation. I really appreciate it. This series has been really helpful to pastors and lay people who are new to the blogosphere and all the technical features that accompany it. Thanks again, Timmy
July 26, 2007, Dorcas Hawker writes: Art - I know I'm on your Firefox 5 feeds you read more than once daily ... right? Ha! Seriously, with your busy life I doubt you have time to read my introductory paragraphs, much less an entire epic post. Keep it real, and follow the advice Alan and Bryan are always giving me -- when it comes to blogging, just do what you want ... it is supposed to be fun, interesting, positive, etc. etc. Dorcas
July 26, 2007, Joe Ball writes: Thanks for the kind words. It is good not to get voted off.
July 27, 2007, Ben writes: Art, the blogging world is not unlike the traditional world of message sending and receiving. There are millions of messages being sent every second from different sources. The hard part is to tune in only to those that are meaningful, substantive, and overall contribute to your passion. If you don't, you risk being crippled by the immense options available. A great book on this principle is The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz. His premise is that we think we want more choices and that more choices will make us happier. Yet the opposite it true. Thanks for the reminder to be careful where we spend our time--even in the blog world. Blessings, Ben.
July 27, 2007, Bob Cleveland writes: Thanks much, Art. I just went and set up Google Reader and added all the blogs I read. Took about 10 minutes and will be a big help to me. Particularly next year when I retire. You done good.
July 27, 2007, Dorcas Hawker writes: Art - I'm not one to complain you know. I suppose you have "done good" to make this decision to cull your time commitments. But I'll admit to being a little bummed I'm off your blogroll now. You were one of the major blogs to have me on the list and several people came to my blog from here. Of course I'll defend your right to make choices and put whomever you wish on your blogroll, but at the same time it is kind of like "hey, I don't want to be deleted." You know. Blog town can be a tough gig sometimes. Dorcas
July 27, 2007, Art Rogers writes: Dorcas, Don't get your feelings hurt. It's not against you. I'm trimming everything. Besides, you are in really good company. Did you note all the names that got removed from the overly bloated blogroll? Anyway, I have tried to switch themes, even in my blogroll. And to everyone I've removed- feel free to take me off of your blogroll if you want. It won't offend me I assure you.
July 27, 2007, Dorcas Hawker writes: Art - I don't suppose my feelings are overly hurt or anything. You just kicked off a crisis of blog identity I suppose. I am often motivated by my need to excel at whatever I do. So I find myself wondering what I can do to make my blog more "something" that keeps up with Emily and Lu and Kiki as writers who manage to stay on the "not SBC emphasis" blog roll. I suppose it is a female thing because I enjoy all their writing too and wouldn't suppose myself to be a better writer or more intelligent than any of them by any means. In fact, I just added Emily and Lu on my blogroll too because I thought ... hey these ladies really have something to say! Nevertheless, I find myself wondering if I to have something to say ... am I just writing into the wind. Oh, I know I have readers who enjoy my writing too. Blog town is big enough for all of us. It just hit me as weird to see my name no longer on the list (and yes I did note others were gone too). Sort of like "oh no, am I the ditz among all these brainy women? Do I need to reinvent my blog once again!?" And so forth. So I don't plan on deleting you from my blogroll as "payback" or anything so high school as that. I'm really not offended, just wondering what I want out of my blog. Do I want to strive to keep the pastor readership? Or am I okay with having been involved with the SBC discussion for a while, and am now glad to let people go on their way and continue writing about more personal stuff and let those who wish to read it to do so. So, I'll probably TP your house the next time I'm in Tulsa or something, but other than that ... we're cool. :) Dorcas
July 28, 2007, Emily Hunter McGowin writes: Hey Art, Thanks for the recommendation and the honor of being among your new interests. That's a great encouragement. I hope your trimmed down blogging lifestyle works out well for you. :) Have a blessed Lord's day, Emily

Pastoral Blogging, pt 6

art rogers — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 10:00:01 +0000

Or guidelines for blogging in the pastor’s world.

Make it easy on yourself. Go back and read the other posts in the pastoral blogging series and figure out how to set up a feedreader and what rss feeds are. Also, figure out how to set your articles to drop at preset times so you can write when you want and go about your other business when you want. Hard blogging produces either lives out of whack or short lived blogging experiences. We have seen a fair share of both.
If you are able, tie your blog to your church’s website. It will boost your church’s site in the search engines by posting frequent content and it will keep you from saying things you don’t want your church members reading. Mostly.
Own your mistakes. If you can, own them before anyone else points them out. It is currency in the blogosphere to either be seen as one who will admit when they are wrong and thus be fair. The other side is that it is also currency in the blogosphere to spike someone’s words in their face. If you can point out where they are wrong – especially if they are reluctant to admit it, they lose credibility in spades. Don’t be that person.
Be gracious to those who admit their mistakes. It continues to boost your credibility.
Be a wordsmith. Capitalize, punctuate and follow the rules of grammar. Use a spell checker on your posts and comments (one comes embedded in Firefox, by the way). Know when to break those rules and why you are doing so. People naturally discount you if you can’t write clearly. Also, it’s not cute to act stupid or claim to be. If you say you’re just dumb about stuff, and that’s why you don’t worry about grammar, punctuation, etc., then people will think you don’t have anything to offer about anything else.
Say something original. Don’t repeat others’ thoughts like a Myna bird. People who frequent blogs read the same blogs you do, most likely, and they can see where you got things. Aside from making you look ignorant and losing your credibility, it’s plagiarism, which is stealing. It’s a major character flaw.
Follow the copyright rules laid out on other people’s blogs. If they copyright their work, you should follow whatever rules they have for citing it.
Take regular breaks from the blogosphere. It is a virtual culture and it is real, to be sure, but that is no substitute for the culture in which you currently live. If you don’t like the culture in which you currently live, change something about your life – don’t retreat into the computer. Allowing the blogosphere to dominate your life is unhealthy for your pastoral ministry (if you are a pastor) or other parts of your life.
Similar to the previous guideline, balance your life. Blogging can be a big and important thing that you do in this world. Again, it is a real, albeit virtual, culture. You can make a difference through it. Therefore, there are times when you need to devote to blogging. Then there are times when you need to devote to your family and no matter what juicy argument is happening on the blogs, you need to leave it alone. Give everything its proper place and make sure you know the difference.
Live blog a conference, if you are there. Whether you are able to blog at the moment or give reflective thoughts at the end of the day, your readers will appreciate the content. You will learn to appreciate those who live blog, more.
Allow comments, but tend to them. Blogging is conversation. Allow people to disagree with you and you will be better read. Tolerate disagreement, but don’t allow people to abuse others. Have some standards and publish them about what comments should be allowed. Don’t be afraid to delete comments if you have to. The secular blogosphere calls people who post unacceptable comments, “trolls.” They are everywhere, even the SBC blogosphere. Do what you must.
Only write on other writers’ personal thoughts occasionally. Stick mostly to your own thoughts. Wholesale reproduction of someone else’s articles shows you have no imagination. Avoid blog wars. They’re futile and only read by the participants and a few others.
When you read a blog that comments on an issue that you want to discuss, like a news article, give the blog where you first read about it a “hat tip.” At the end of your article, put something like, [HT: Kevin Bussey] This would let you know that I first read about the situation over at Kevin’s blog and let you jump there with the link. A permalink (link directly to Kevin’s article and not just to the blog) is the preferred option.

Comments

July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: Art: No. 6 -- "...If you say you're just dumb..." Thank you... BSC
July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: Oops. Make that No. 5
July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: Back to No. 6: It's plagiarism
July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: No. 12: "Wholesale reproduction of someone else’s articles shows you have no imagination."
July 9, 2007, Art Rogers writes: Thanks for making #5 so evident, Ben.
July 9, 2007, Art Rogers writes: Which leads me to #14: Proofread the heck out of what you are about to publish, especially if you take a shot at other people's grammar, etc. :)
July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: Art: In all honesty, you would be fine if you didn't write so well excluding these minor mistakes. The very fact that I took the time to read through your post is indicative of the substance thereof. May I copy this verbatim and publish it on my blog? Thanks, and God Bless!!! BSC
July 17, 2007, Wayne Hatcher writes: Brother Art, My apologies for the late-timed comment, but I have been busy testing various feed readers. After repeated brow beatings I finally broke down and invested some time this weekend trying out various feed readers. I have tried them in the past, but none suited my needs, which amounts to simplicity of use, and being able to read posts from my laptop while off line. What consternation, after finding a reader that meets these two criteria, that I should find that your syndication feed is one of only two I found that only submits a short summary rather than a full text of your posts. A syndication set up in this way requires extra clicks, as well as an on-line status in order to read a whole post. I'm confused; was I wrong to assume that the purpose your Pastoral Blogging series was to show your readers how to make blogging easier. There are reading options in your administration panel that, among other things, give you a choice whether to send a summary feed or a full-text feed. Brother Ben, (in honor of your linguistically supernumerary tendencies) it is with great diffidence that we of this comment thread with trepidation disseminate the intelligence concerning loquacity found at that ecclesiastical on-line journal which goes by the moniker Baptist Blogger, to wit, the said loquacity therein represents the second instance referred to above, which appears on our newly-acquired aggregator as manifesting itself as an encapsulation rather than a plenary representation of your (plural) cogitations. Could you possibly be of assistance in this matter? Honestly, guys, I can't understand why someone hasn't brought this up before now. I enjoy reading you both. Keep up the good work, and blessings. Wayne Hatcher

Or guidelines for blogging in the pastor’s world.

Make it easy on yourself. Go back and read the other posts in the pastoral blogging series and figure out how to set up a feedreader and what rss feeds are. Also, figure out how to set your articles to drop at preset times so you can write when you want and go about your other business when you want. Hard blogging produces either lives out of whack or short lived blogging experiences. We have seen a fair share of both.
If you are able, tie your blog to your church’s website. It will boost your church’s site in the search engines by posting frequent content and it will keep you from saying things you don’t want your church members reading. Mostly.
Own your mistakes. If you can, own them before anyone else points them out. It is currency in the blogosphere to either be seen as one who will admit when they are wrong and thus be fair. The other side is that it is also currency in the blogosphere to spike someone’s words in their face. If you can point out where they are wrong – especially if they are reluctant to admit it, they lose credibility in spades. Don’t be that person.
Be gracious to those who admit their mistakes. It continues to boost your credibility.
Be a wordsmith. Capitalize, punctuate and follow the rules of grammar. Use a spell checker on your posts and comments (one comes embedded in Firefox, by the way). Know when to break those rules and why you are doing so. People naturally discount you if you can’t write clearly. Also, it’s not cute to act stupid or claim to be. If you say you’re just dumb about stuff, and that’s why you don’t worry about grammar, punctuation, etc., then people will think you don’t have anything to offer about anything else.
Say something original. Don’t repeat others’ thoughts like a Myna bird. People who frequent blogs read the same blogs you do, most likely, and they can see where you got things. Aside from making you look ignorant and losing your credibility, it’s plagiarism, which is stealing. It’s a major character flaw.
Follow the copyright rules laid out on other people’s blogs. If they copyright their work, you should follow whatever rules they have for citing it.
Take regular breaks from the blogosphere. It is a virtual culture and it is real, to be sure, but that is no substitute for the culture in which you currently live. If you don’t like the culture in which you currently live, change something about your life – don’t retreat into the computer. Allowing the blogosphere to dominate your life is unhealthy for your pastoral ministry (if you are a pastor) or other parts of your life.
Similar to the previous guideline, balance your life. Blogging can be a big and important thing that you do in this world. Again, it is a real, albeit virtual, culture. You can make a difference through it. Therefore, there are times when you need to devote to blogging. Then there are times when you need to devote to your family and no matter what juicy argument is happening on the blogs, you need to leave it alone. Give everything its proper place and make sure you know the difference.
Live blog a conference, if you are there. Whether you are able to blog at the moment or give reflective thoughts at the end of the day, your readers will appreciate the content. You will learn to appreciate those who live blog, more.
Allow comments, but tend to them. Blogging is conversation. Allow people to disagree with you and you will be better read. Tolerate disagreement, but don’t allow people to abuse others. Have some standards and publish them about what comments should be allowed. Don’t be afraid to delete comments if you have to. The secular blogosphere calls people who post unacceptable comments, “trolls.” They are everywhere, even the SBC blogosphere. Do what you must.
Only write on other writers’ personal thoughts occasionally. Stick mostly to your own thoughts. Wholesale reproduction of someone else’s articles shows you have no imagination. Avoid blog wars. They’re futile and only read by the participants and a few others.
When you read a blog that comments on an issue that you want to discuss, like a news article, give the blog where you first read about it a “hat tip.” At the end of your article, put something like, [HT: Kevin Bussey] This would let you know that I first read about the situation over at Kevin’s blog and let you jump there with the link. A permalink (link directly to Kevin’s article and not just to the blog) is the preferred option.

Comments

July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: Art: No. 6 -- "...If you say you're just dumb..." Thank you... BSC
July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: Oops. Make that No. 5
July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: Back to No. 6: It's plagiarism
July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: No. 12: "Wholesale reproduction of someone else’s articles shows you have no imagination."
July 9, 2007, Art Rogers writes: Thanks for making #5 so evident, Ben.
July 9, 2007, Art Rogers writes: Which leads me to #14: Proofread the heck out of what you are about to publish, especially if you take a shot at other people's grammar, etc. :)
July 9, 2007, Benjamin S. Cole writes: Art: In all honesty, you would be fine if you didn't write so well excluding these minor mistakes. The very fact that I took the time to read through your post is indicative of the substance thereof. May I copy this verbatim and publish it on my blog? Thanks, and God Bless!!! BSC
July 17, 2007, Wayne Hatcher writes: Brother Art, My apologies for the late-timed comment, but I have been busy testing various feed readers. After repeated brow beatings I finally broke down and invested some time this weekend trying out various feed readers. I have tried them in the past, but none suited my needs, which amounts to simplicity of use, and being able to read posts from my laptop while off line. What consternation, after finding a reader that meets these two criteria, that I should find that your syndication feed is one of only two I found that only submits a short summary rather than a full text of your posts. A syndication set up in this way requires extra clicks, as well as an on-line status in order to read a whole post. I'm confused; was I wrong to assume that the purpose your Pastoral Blogging series was to show your readers how to make blogging easier. There are reading options in your administration panel that, among other things, give you a choice whether to send a summary feed or a full-text feed. Brother Ben, (in honor of your linguistically supernumerary tendencies) it is with great diffidence that we of this comment thread with trepidation disseminate the intelligence concerning loquacity found at that ecclesiastical on-line journal which goes by the moniker Baptist Blogger, to wit, the said loquacity therein represents the second instance referred to above, which appears on our newly-acquired aggregator as manifesting itself as an encapsulation rather than a plenary representation of your (plural) cogitations. Could you possibly be of assistance in this matter? Honestly, guys, I can't understand why someone hasn't brought this up before now. I enjoy reading you both. Keep up the good work, and blessings. Wayne Hatcher

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