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by Ernest Hemingway

In a calm sea every man is a pilot.But all sunshine without shade, all pleasure without pain, is not life at all.

Take the lot of the happiest–it is a tangled yarn. Bereavements and blessings,one following another, make us sad and blessed by turns. Even death itself makes life more loving. Men come closest to their true selves in the sober moments of life,under the shadows of sorrow and loss.

In the affairs of life or of business, it is not intellect that tells so much as character,not brains so much as heart, not genius so much as self-control, patience, and discipline, regulated by judgment.

I have always believed that the man who has begun to live more seriously within begins to live more simply without. In an age of extravagance and waste, I wish I could show to the world how few the real wants of humanity are.

To regret one’s errors to the point of not repeating them is true repentance. There is nothing noble in being superior to some other man. The true nobility is in being superior to your previous self.

So who came up with the idea of honoring mothers nation-wide on the second Sunday in May?

EARLY CELEBRATIONS
Some historians claim that the predecessor of the Mother’s Day holiday was the ancient spring festival dedicated to mother goddesses. In the ancient Greek empire the spring festival honored Rhea, wife of Cronus and mother of the gods and goddesses. In Rome the most significant Mother’s Day-like festival was dedicated to the worship of Cybele, another mother goddess. Ceremonies in her honor began some 250 years before Christ was born. This Roman religious celebration, known as Hilaria, lasted for three days - from March 15 to 18!

ENGLAND’S MOTHERING SUNDAY
More like the modern celebration of Mother’s Day is England’s “Mothering Sunday”, also called Mid-Lent Sunday, observed on the fourth Sunday in Lent. Some say the ceremonies in honor of Cybele were adopted by the early church to venerate the Mother of Christ, Mary. Others believe the Mother Church was substituted for mother goddess and custom began to dictate that a person visit the church of his/her baptism on this day. People attended the mother church of their parish, laden with offerings.

Also in England in the 1600’s, young men and women who were apprentices or servants returned home on Mothering Sunday, bringing to their mothers small gifts like trinkets or a “mothering cake”. Sometimes furmety was served - wheat grains boiled in sweet milk, sugared and spiced.

In northern England and in Scotland, the preferred refreshments were carlings - pancakes made of steeped pease fried in butter, with pepper and salt. In fact, in some locations this day was called Carling Sunday.

Another kind of mothering cake was the simnel cake, a very rich fruit cake. The Lenten fast dictated that the simnel cake had to keep until Easter. It was boiled in water, then baked, and was often finished with an almond icing. Sometimes the crust was of flour and water, colored with saffron.

INTEREST STARTS IN THE UNITED STATES
Anna M. Jarvis (1864-1948) is credited with originating our Mother’s Day holiday. She never married and was extremely attached to her mother, Mrs. Anna Reese Jarvis. Mrs. Jarvis was a minister’s daughter who for 20 years taught Sunday School in the Andrews Methodist Church of Grafton, West Virginia. Miss Jarvis graduated from the Female Seminary in Wheeling, West Virginia, and taught in Grafton before moving to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with the rest of her family.

Anna Reese Jarvis died in Philadelphia in May of 1905. Still unmarried and left alone with her blind sister Elsinore, Anna missed her mother greatly. Two years after her mother’s death (1907) Anna Jarvis and her friends began a letter-writing campaign to gain the support of influential ministers, businessmen and congressmen in declaring a national Mother’s Day holiday. She felt children often neglected to appreciate their mother enough while the mother was still alive. She hoped Mother’s Day would increase respect for parents and strengthen family bonds.

THE FIRST MOTHER’S DAY
The first Mother’s Day observance was a church service honoring Mrs. Anna Reese Jarvis, held at Anna Jarvis’s request in Grafton, West Virginia, and in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on May 10, 1908.

Carnations, her mother’s favorite flowers, were supplied at that first service by Miss Jarvis. White carnations were chosen because they represented the sweetness, purity and endurance of mother love. Red carnations, in time, became the symbol of a living mother. White ones now signify that one’s mother has died.

OTHER MOTHER’S DAY OBSERVANCES
The first Mother’s Day proclamation was issued by the governor of West Virginia in 1910. Oklahoma celebrated Mother’s Day that year as well. By 1911 every state had its own observances. By then other areas celebrating Mother’s Day included Mexico, Canada, China, Japan, South America and Africa. The Mother’s Day International Association was incorporated on December 12, 1912, with the purpose of furthering meaningful observations of Mother’s Day.

OFFICIAL PROCLAMATION
The House of Representatives in May, 1913, unanimously adopted a resolution requesting the President, his Cabinet, members of Congress, and all officials of the federal government to wear a white carnation on Mother’s Day. Congress passed another Joint Resolution May 8, 1914, designating the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day. The U.S. flag is to be displayed on government buildings and at people’s homes “as a public expression of our love and reverence for the mothers of our country.” President Woodrow Wilson issued the first proclamation making Mother’s Day an official national holiday.

SO NOW WHAT?
If your mother is still alive, take care to shower her with special attention this Mother’s Day. Visit her. Phone her. Send her a card. Give her flowers. Get her gourmet chocolates. Buy her something you know she’s been wanting. But don’t wait until after her funeral to let her know how much you’ve appreciated her! Wear your red (or otherwise-colored) carnation proudly.

My brother-in-law opened the bottom drawer of my sister’s bureau and lifted out a tissue-wrapped package. “This”, he said, “is not a slip. This is lingerie.” He discarded the tissue and handed me the slip.

It was exquisite, silk, handmade and trimmed with a cobweb of lace. The price tag with an astronomical figure on it was still attached.

“Jan bought this the first time we went to New York, at least 8 or 9 years ago. She never wore it. She was saving it for a special occasion.

Well, I guess this is the occasion.

He took the slip from me and put it on the bed, with the other clothes we were taking to the mortician. His hands lingered on the soft material for a moment, then he slammed the drawer shut and turned to me, “Don’t ever save anything for a special occasion. Every day you’ re alive is a special occasion.”

I remembered those words through the funeral and the days that followed when I helped him and my niece attend to all the sad chores that follow an unexpected death. I thought about them on the plane returning to California from the midwestern town where my sister’s family lives. I thought about all the things that she hadn’t seen or heard or done. I thought about the things that she had done without realizing that they were special.

I’m still thinking about his words, and they’ve changed the weeds in the garden. I’m spending more time with my family and friends and less time in committee meetings. Whenever possible, life should be a pattern of experience to savour, not endure. I’m trying to recognize these moment now and cherish them.

I’m not “saving” anything; we use our good china and crystal for every special. Event such as losing a pound, getting the sink unstopped, the first camellia blossom… I wear my good blazer to the market if I feel like it. My theory is if I look prosperous, I can shell out $28. 49 for one small bag of groceries without wincing. I’m not saving my good perfume for special parties; clerks in hardware stores and tellers in banks have noses that function as well as my party going friends.

“Someday” and “one of these days” are losing their grip on my vocabulary. If it’s worth seeing or hearing or doing, I want to see and hear and do it now. I’ m not sure what my sister would’ve done had she know that she wouldn’t be here for the tomorrow we all take for granted.

I think she would have called family members and a few close friends. She might have called a few former friends to apologize, and mend fences for past squabbles. I like to think she would have gone out for a Chinese dinner, her favorite food. I’m guessing. I’ll never know.

It’s those little things left undone that would make me angry if I knew that my hours were limited. Angry because I put off seeing good friends whom I was going to get in touch with someday. Angry because I hadn’t written certain letters that I intended to write one of these days. Angry and sorry that I didn’t tell my husband and daughter often enough how much I truly love them.

I’m trying very hard not to put off, hold back, or save anything that would add laughter and luster to our lives. And every morning when I open my eyes, I tell myself that every day, every minute, every breath truly, is… a gift from God.

I teach economics at UNLV three times per week. Last Monday, at the beginning of class, I cheerfully asked my students how their weekend had been. One young man said that his weekend had not been so good. He had his wisdom teeth removed. The young man then proceeded to ask me why I always seemed to be so cheerful.

His question reminded me of something I’d read somewhere before: “Every morning when you get up, you have a choice about how you want to approach life that day,” I said. “I choose to be cheerful.”

“Let me give you an example,” I continued, addressing all sixty students in the class. “In addition to teaching here at UNLV, I also teach out at the community college in Henderson, 17 miles down the freeway from where I live. One day a few weeks ago I drove those 17 miles to Henderson. I exited the freeway and turned onto College Drive. I only had to drive another quarter mile down the road to the college. But just then my car died. I tried to start it again, but the engine wouldn’t turn over. So I put my flashers on, grabbed my books, and marched down the road to the college.

“As soon as I got there I called AAA and arranged for a tow truck to meet me at my car after class. The secretary in the Provost’s office asked me what has happened. ‘This is my lucky day,’ I replied, smiling.

“‘Your car breaks down and today is your lucky day?’ She was puzzled. ‘What do you mean?’

“‘I live 17 miles from here.’ I replied. ‘My car could have broken down anywhere along the freeway. It didn’t. Instead, it broke down in the perfect place: off the freeway, within walking distance of here. I’m still able to teach my class, and I’ve been able to arrange for the tow truck to meet me after class. If my car was meant to break down today, it couldn’t have been arranged in a more convenient fashion.’

The secretary’s eyes opened wide, and then she smiled. I smiled back and headed for class.” So ended my story.

I scanned the sixty faces in my economics class at UNLV. Despite the early hour, no one seemed to be asleep. Somehow, my story had touched them. Or maybe it wasn’t the story at all. In fact, it had all started with a student’s observation that I was cheerful.

Deepak Chopra has quoted an Indian wise man as saying, “Who you are speaks louder to me than anything you can say.” I suppose it must be so.

by Lee Ryan Miller

by Jacob Gube of Six Revisions.

Flash is unparalleled when it comes to providing users a highly rich, memorable, and interactive experience. For developers, nothing matches Flash’s relative ease in allowing them to develop dynamic, complex web-based applications. For a vast majority of users, the required Flash Player plug-in is already installed, making it the most popular choice when it comes to animation and effects on the web.

When should you use Flash?

• When there’s a need for rich, dynamic user interactivity. JavaScript’s ability to provide fluid/smooth effects and interactivity is made easier with frameworks such as script.aculo.us and mootools, but it doesn’t come close to what Flash has to offer in terms of dynamic animations, effects, and interactivity.
• When accessibility is not a high-priority. Flash, unfortunately, is not as accessible when compared to an XHTML based design, not only for assistive technologies such as screen readers, but also for non-traditional browsers such as those found in mobile devices. For example, the Apple iPhone does not currently support Flash.
• When you need to show off your abilities. Flash developers naturally opt for Flash-based designs so that visitors can see their aptitude in designing Flash applications. In this way, Flash is also appropriate for those in similar fields such as web designers, developers, and front-end interaction designers.

When should you use something else?

• When you expect a wide variety of visitors. If your website caters to a niche such as individuals interested in graphics and animation, chances are, they’ll have Flash Player browser plug-in installed and enabled. But if you anticipate a large range of viewers, that last 2% of people who don’t have Flash installed can mean hundreds of visitors not being able to view your website. In addition, many users disable Flash because of Flash-based advertisements.
• When it doesn’t add value or interactivity to a website. Some websites use Flash simply for the sake of using Flash. When it doesn’t compliment the design or enhance the user’s experience, it’s best to use technologies and techniques such as JavaScript and CSS instead.

In this article, I’d like to present 30 outstanding websites that truly showcases the power of Flash and the ingenuity of their developers, as well as to inspire you should you choose to design using Flash.

American Airlines

Prospect Denim

Zikadias

Red Bull Flugtag Flight Lab

The Lure Lounge

Audi R8

Deadline Advertising

MaxHaus Virtual

Teh Cafcat

Canon EOS 400D

IKEA - Back to college

TurboChef

AIGA

Suitsupply UK

Starbucks Coffee At Home

Got Character?

IFAW

PiotrowskiMichal.com

Lake Nona

Carbon Studio

Climax Media

Erguvan Platin Evleri

Greenlight Marketing

Imagined Creative

Nokia: Nonstop Living

Hema

Converse

MINIUSA.COM

Bearfootfilms.com

Volkswagen 60 jaar

Some tips on designing with Flash:

• Avoid opening another browser window. Not only is it annoying to the user, but pop-up blockers may suppress your Flash application from opening.
• Don’t ask the user to click a button to enter. It’s unnecessary. Just load your movie without requiring an additional action from your viewers.
• Don’t resize the user’s window. Some designs force the browser to be resized, avoid doing this or you risk frustrating the user.
• Don’t remove the browser’s navigation. Similar to resizing windows, when you remove the controls of a browser (such as the back and forward button), it may frustrate your users.
• Make sure your Flash movie loads quickly. A good time to aim for is less than 5 seconds on a broadband connection — any more and you might find that many of your visitor’s will leave before your application loads.
• Consider having an XHTML version of your Flash site. You can use JavaScript to detect whether the user has Flash, and then serve the appropraite version of your site. Here’s Adobe’s Flash Player Detection Kit. This is not a completely bullet-proof method, so another option is to present the user with a choice upon entering your home page.

Jacob Gube is a web designer/developer and the creator of Six Revisions, a blog that shares useful information and resources for web professionals. To follow Jacob at Six Revisions, subscribe to his feed.

WordPress is a simple to use blogging tool. The beauty of WordPress is that it can become so much more with the simple installation of plugins. With a few clicks, WordPress can become a full fledged Content Management System (CMS). Here is a rundown on the top 10 best plugins every blogger should have installed.

Here is a great list that I whipped together of some of the most useful and most popular Wordpress plugins which every blogger should have installed. Enjoy the list.

Akismet - Simply the best Spam protection you can get for handling comments on your blog. Akismet checks your comments against the Akismet web service to see if they are spam or not, also checks the trackbacks for spam.

WP Super Cache - An extremely efficient WordPress page caching system to make your site much faster and responsive. It works by caching Worpress pages and storing them in a static file for serving future requests.

WP-PostViews - Enables you to display how many times a post/page had been viewed. It will not count registered member views, but that can be changed easily.

WP-PageNavi - A WordPress Plugin that adds more advanced page navigation to WordPress. It does this by adding page number links to your different pages. Using this plugin your readers will be able to jump from the first to the last page and other pages of your blog very easily.

Simple Tags - A plugin does everything related with tagging. With this plugin you can generates a list of related posts based on the text of blog entry. The tags can be used to search your blog and are picked up by blog search engines like Technorati and can bring in new users.

All in One SEO Pack - Automatic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) out of the box for your wordpress blog, everything you need to get your site optimized for search engines.

Google XML Sitemaps - Simple tool for auto generating sitemaps every time you make an update to your site. This plugin is the best tool to tell Google how it should crawl your blog and where to find everything you want found.

Wordpress Thread Comment - This Plugin is an enhancement for Wordpress’s comment function. It enables users to reply on a exist comment, and the discussion will be displayed threaded or nested.

FeedBurner Feedsmith - Forwards all feed traffic to Feedburner while creating a randomized feed for Feedburner to pull from.

Wordpress Database Backup - Automated or on-demand backup solution for your wordpress database. Don’t leave home without it!

[via Moonlight Blog]

The 2007 List is out!

Our Top Ten Toy list for 2007 includes some of the best and most innovative toys of the year. The best toys were judged based on several criteria like enjoyment level, uniqueness, ease of use and toy safety. It’s also interesting to note that, once again, electronic toys seem to dominate the the market! There are only a few hot toys like the Barbie Princess Rosella doll which are non-electronic. All things considered, 2007 seems to have brought out some great toys. Have a look!

1. SmartCycle Physical Learning Arcade System

The top 10 toys of 2007 list would be incomplete without Fisher-Price’s SmartCycle . The Smart Cycle is a stationary bike meant for preschoolers which plugs directly into your TV’s A/V jack. The little ones pedal their way through various adventures on the TV screen. The included software, Learning Adventure, has three options: Driving, Learning Arcade Games and The Big Race. In the “Driving” mode, your child can pedal away to glory while picking up interesting tidbits of information along the way. The learning arcade games are educational and your kids can use the joystick to learn about letters, numbers, shapes etc. The “Big Race” option is the most exciting of them all - a fast paced race on the TV screen.

2. Transformers Movie Ultimate Bumblebee

Hasbro’s Transformers Movie Ultimate Bumblebee has a place of honor in our Top 10 Toys of 2007 list. This Hasbro product from the Transformers Movie portrays the Ultimate Bumblebee who transforms from a yellow 2008 Camaro car to the 14 inch Ultimate Bumblebee robot. The ingenuity of this product is that it combines two things that appeal to young boys: cars and action figures. This product comes complete with light and sound effects. With a touch of a button, it emits the transforming sound when being transformed from car to robot. In robot form, the Ultimate Bumblebee also features the Whip It Battle song by Devo. Furthermore, Bumblebee has a sound detection mechanism where it responds to noises. A great toy for ages 5+.

3. Puppy Grows & Knows Your Name

The Puppy Grows & Knows Your Name from Fisher-Price is one of the best toys of 2007! It is undoubtedly one of the most innovative and cutest toys I’ve come across in a long time. This Puppy is also a technological marvel and will keep kids busy for a long time to come. The icing on the cake is the affordable price of $49.99. So, did I whet your curiosity? Do you want to know what the puppy does? Well, as the name implies, this puppy actually does grow to a full sized dog in 4 days. It knows its own name, your child’s name and can sing 2 songs using your child’s name. Isn’t that amazing! The puppy can be personalized using the CD provided. You also get a measuring tape with a growth chart, a bone, brush, and a birth certificate.

4. Furreal Friends Squawkers McCaw Parrot

Hasbro’s Furreal Friends Squawkers McCaw Parrot is a toy which makes it’s presence felt! This toy takes technology and interactive play to the next level with features such as voice recognition, animatronics, and dance and sing features. The only word of caution is that it can repeat what you say, so watch those words coming out of your mouth! It comes with a remote control which has pre-programmed voice commands which can prompt the parrot to say something or dance if there’s music playing. Although, since this parrot loves to dance, it will do so to his own tunes too. This product sells for about $70. The Squawkers McCaw Parrot is for those of you who are looking for something different this holiday season.

5. Power Tour Electric Guitar

Hasbro’s Power Tour Guitar meant for ages 10 + has certainly earned it’s place in our Top 10 Toys of 2007 list. The Power Tour Electric Guitar is a great way for youngsters to learn how to play the guitar. It’s also great for parents, since it is relatively inexpensive and not so loud! Hasbro and Tiger Electronics have put in a lot of thought into designing this product, which I highly recommend. The beauty of the Power Tour Electric Guitar is that there are no strings attached (literally) which makes it much simpler to learn. The whole concept is touch activated. The guitar fret is color coded, and the flashing lights prompt the player where to place their fingers.

6. Eye-Clops Handheld Bionic Eye

Jakks Pacific’s Eye-Clops, the handheld bionic eye that plugs into your TV, makes it to our Top 10 Toys list of 2007 due to it’s extremely innovative nature. Not only is it designed to keep kids of all ages (including fully grown kids) occupied and excited for hours, it also serves to educate your children. Eye-Clops works by providing close up images of minute objects. It’s amazing to see something magnified by a factor of 200 on your TV screen! It even includes an observation dish and tube to view liquids, salt, bugs or anything that catches your fancy. Three built-in lights help to illuminate the objects under observation. The approximate price of this product is $40.

7. Smart Sticks - Hooked on Phonics Electronic Learning

Zizzle’s Smart Sticks edutainment line makes it to the Top 10 Toys of 2007 list because of it’s simplicity and educational value. The Smart Sticks are based on the Hooked on Phonics concept and teach little ones the colors, shapes, numbers, and letters. There are three models - numbers, colors and shapes, and letters. Fun sounds, music and engaging displays on the LCD screen are sure to keep your toddler obsessed with playing with each of these colorful models. I loved the close resemblance to a remote control - it works as an excellent substitute for the actual TV remote control which my toddler craves after! Meant for ages 2+, each Smart Sticks has a street price of about $14.99 .

8. Disney Flix Video Cam

Disney’s Flix Video Cam just had to be a part of the Top 10 Toys of 2007 list. This inexpensive video camera from Disney is not just a video camera. It comes bundled with Disney’s Magic Director software too, which can be used to create all kinds of special effects. Simply plug the camera directly into your computer and use this software to edit away to glory! The included story boards and audio cues are all that are needed to pave your way towards becoming a professional movie director. The High School Musical and Hannah Montana storyboards are included. The camera has a storage capacity of 128MB and an included SD card slot can increase the length of a video that is captured with the camera. It is priced at $99.

9. Barbie as the Island Princess - Princess Rosella Doll

Mattel’s Barbie Island Princess doll has made it to our top 10 toys of 2007 list simply due to it’s unique outfit and theme. This stunning doll dressed in a blue gown comes with a train of feathers. What’s more, these feathers spread out to look just like a peacock’s feathers. As a bonus, the doll comes with Sagi, her animal friend who looks like a cross between a raccoon and squirrel. An average retail price of $24.95 keeps this doll in the same price range as the other Barbie dolls. Barbie as Princess Rosella doll is one of the must haves of the season for your little girls aged 4 and up.

10. Rubik’s Revolution

As far as toys go - the Rubik’s Revolution is catchy, fun and engaging. On the flip side, the Rubik’s Revolution is almost nothing like the original Rubik’s cube. But who cares, right? The Rubik’s Revolution has certainly earned it’s spot on this list of the Top Toys of 2007. There are 6 games that you can play on the Rubik’s Revolution. They are Light Speed, Rapid Recharge, Pattern Panic, Cube Catcher, Code Cracker, and Multiplayer Madness. Put simply, the basic principle of the Rubik’s Revolution seems to be how fast you can click the buttons, and in what order. It’s pretty challenging, as well as stimulating. Try it out.

An aspiring blogger can be overwhelmed with the vast amount of resources, tools, and advice for bloggers available on the net. While in no way definitive - there’s simply too much going on in this space to cover it all - we did our best to bring you a comprehensive list of blogging resources, which should be equally useful to beginners as well as veteran bloggers. Enjoy.

WordPress

WordPress Themes

ThemeViewer - The number one location to find WordPress themes to make your page cool, which you will most certainly want to do.
Templates Now - A smaller collection of WordPress themes, but still worth your while to check out.
TemplateMonster - If you want more professional quality themes then this site can be useful. They offer extremely high quality themes that you can purchase
for WordPress.
Wordpress Themes - a neatly categorized site with a huge selection of themes

Best WordPress Plugins

Akismet - The best blog comment spam prevention plug-in. Ships free with WordPress, but you still have to turn it on and keep it updated.
Wordpress Backup - an absolute must if you want to keep your archive in case of something going wrong
WP Cache - if your blog ever experiences a burst of traffic, you’ll be thankful you have WP Cache
Sitemap Generator - everyone who cares about SEO (and that should be everyone) should have this one
Preview Pane - If you upgrade/install WordPress 2.2.x, the Preview Frame has gone missing, as the developers decided to leave it out, and it is a vital tool on checking your posts, so this plug-in restores that functionality.
Facebook Photos - A nice WordPress plug-in that allows quick access to your Facebook photos and the ability to integrate them in to any post within WordPress with ease.
Flickr Photos - Same as Facebook Photos, but for use with a Flickr account.
Related Posts - This plugin lets you display all the posts you have written on the same subject near each post. It increases the chance that a visitor will spend more time browsing your blog posts.
Feedburner Feed Replacement - sooner or later, most people switch to Feedburner for their RSS needs. This plugin redirects all the RSS feeds on your blog to the Feedburner one. Might cause problems with Technorati.
Ultimate Tag Warrior - an advanced solution for all your tagging problems.
Adsense Deluxe - a great way to manage AdSense ads on your blog.
Super Archive - Creates a great dynamic archive for your Wordpress blog posts.
Stat Traq - Get detailed statistics in a very effective graphical format.
Sociable - adds all those cute tiny icons for easy social bookmarking
LightBox 2 - A fade effect that you see on a myriad of blogs you visit these days where you click the image, the background fades and then the image itself displays in full view. A very nice effect to have.

Wordpress Plugin repositories

Official Wordpress Plugins Site - The official Wordpress plugin repository is actually one of the best lists of its kind out there
Wp-Plugins - a comprehensive list of Wordpress plugins
Wp Plugins DB - another large database of plugins for Wordpress
Weblog Tools Collection - an often updated site bringing you the latest Wordpress plugins as they arrive

Movable Type

Movable Type Styles

Style Library -If you are looking for a way to make your Movable Type blog look fresh, then look no further.
The Style Contest - A collection of Movable Type Styles created from contests to create the best styles. Only the best is here.
Style Generator - Use this if you wish to take things in to your own hands and
create your own Styles for use with Movable Type.

Best Movable Type Plugins

MT Notifier - This plug-in gives you a great amount of control of notification options for your users and helps with keeping your users connected to your Movable Type blog.
InlineEditor - No more clicking through 3 or more pages to edit your posts on Movable Type, this plug-in allows you to edit through Ajax technology right on the same page as your post.
MT Blogroll - If you want to link to your favorite blogs and sites, then you need a “blogroll” (collection of links to sites and other blogs), and this plug-in solves this problem with providing you the ability to create and manage as many “blogrolls” as your heart desires.

Movable Type Plugin repositories

Official Movable Type Plugin site - a comprehensive alphabetical list of Movable Type plugins

Blog Hosting Solutions

Dedicated & Shared Hosting Services

Dreamhost - Offers a lot for a very small amount of money.
CirtexHosting - Hosting plans starting at as little as $2.
BlueHost - Another affordable hosting solution.
HostGator - Cheap shared personal hosting.
Media Temple - Grid based hosting; known to be able to sustain lots of traffic.

Paid Blog Hosting Services

TypePad - If you are a MovableType fan, then TypePad is the premiere service to be using to host your blog.
Blogsite - An enterprise level blogging and publishing platform. Multiple blogs can reside withing one blogsite. Amazing SEO visibility.

Free Blog Hosting Services

WordPress - WordPress allows you to create and host a blog on their own servers and you can display it to the world. You don’t get as much customization and functionality as if you have it hosted on your own server (for example, advertising is not allowed), but it is still a very good way to blog without paying money.
Blogger - A service owned by Google, Blogger is a way to have your blogs hosted for free and you can post as much as you want. It allows Google’s AdSense to be used.
Xanga - iXanga is a lively community of online diaries and journals. Users create their own profiles and there are many opportunities to interact with other users.
LiveJournal - LiveJournal is excellent if you wish to blog on a personal level and join a community and share your blogs among friends.
Vox - A new contender to the arena but Vox is a very nice and powerful blogging tool; not to mention free!; You receive many social experiences with this option as Vox is based heavily on community based blogging.
Tumblr - Tumblr is great if you don’t have time to blog, but still want to share something now and again. It lets you easily post videos, pictures, links, and of course you can write there too.

Mini-Blogging Services

Jaiku - Jaiku allows you the ability to post “mini-blogs” which are short blogs (usually under 140 - 160 characters in length) about whatever you decide. Jaiku also allows you to link together content from other services and social sites that provide RSS/ATOM feeds and they can be displayed as well.
Twitter - Twitter lets you say what you are doing in 140 characters or less. Recently new features have been added that have made it into a great communication tool.

Mobile Based Blogging

TextAmerica - A way to blog on the go. You blog with service by adding photos to your mobile blog and then later on you can add text descriptions and people
can see your world on the go.
Twitter - Twitter also has solid support for blogging from mobile devices.

Tips & Advice

Blogs about Blogging

About.com Weblogs - Professional blogger / freelance writer Deborah Ng covers a wide range of blogging topics for all levels of blogger, but is especially good for new bloggers.
Advanced Business Blogging - Two people who are really making money with blogs and new media and showing others how to.
Blogging for Business - Ted Demopoulos focuses “on practical business implications and uses of new media and technologies, including Blogging and Business, pod-casting, and other ‘Cool Internet Stuff’.”
Andy Wibbels - The author of Blog Wild! puts emphasises blogs for small business marketing, but his tips are useful for all bloggers.
Problogger - Darren Rowse is the definitive guide to making money with your blog.
MasterNewMedia - A site about independent publishing and social media which publishes articles showing how to create effective blogs and improve online marketing strategies.
Copyblogger - a great resource of no-nonsense information for bloggers (and everyone else who wants to learn how to write well)
DailyBlogTips - a place where you can find useful tips to improve the quality of your blog. Updated daily.
Blogging Pro - news, tips and technical support for bloggers.
Blogs in Education - a great list of useful resources aimed at those who want to use blogs for educational purposes.

Tips

10 Most Practical Blogs for Entrepreneurs - No philosophy, theory or personal rants/raves/ramblings here - just practical tips for business
owners.
Twenty Usability Tips for Your Blog - Tips for increasing the usability of your blog for your users which can lead to new and returning readers.
Big list of blog search engines - a very detailed resource for blog search engines.
Search Engine Submission Tips - an interesting list of techniques and strategies you can use to make your blog appear in relevant search results.
How to Make Money From Your Website - a practical guide that explains the differences between the different advertising systems that you can use on your blog.
25 Tips To Optimize Your Blog For Readers & Search Engines - useful tips that help your blog stand out from the crowd.
Research, Promote And Monetize Your Online Writing: A Blogger’s Guide To Twitter - a great guide by Michael Pick that shows you how to get the best out of
Twitter.
25 Tips for Marketing Your Blog - a detailed list of tips to help bloggers optimize their site for online marketing.
9 Lessons for Would-be Bloggers - Joshua Porter shares interesting lessons he learned in 7 years of blogging.
Weblog Usability: The Top Ten Design Mistakes - Jacob Nielsen writes down a list of the worst things you could do on your blog.
How to Become a Freelance Blog Writer - Leo Babauta shows how to become a freelance blog writer and get rewarded.
How To Prevent Running Out Of Blogging Steam - Did you run out of words? Here is what you can do when you have to face a situation like that.
13 Tips To Get Your Blog Noticed - a list of short tips to make your blog shine among the others.

Blogging Forums & Sites

Blogger Forum - This site has a nice forum with plenty of resources for helping you on your beginnings in blogging.
Bloggst - a fairly new community devoted to bloggers, and blogging, with howtos, interviews and other resources.
True Blogging - a forum completely dedicated to bloggers, blogging resources and blog monetization.
Blogger Talk - great resource for bloggers who want to share their experiences.
Bloggeries - a community for bloggers from all over the world to gather and discuss their blogs.
Webloggers - forum on marketing blogs, software for bloggers, blogging news and mobile blogging.
The Blog Herald - a source of blog and blogging related news for bloggers.

Blog Tools and Resources

Blog Search Engines

Technorati - One of the most popular search engines for blogs; its top list is one of the most often cited metrics on the Internet.
Sphere - a blog search engine that offers a contextual widget which shows related posts from other blogs.
Google Blog Search - A very simple blog search engine. It’s basically Google Search that only looks through blogs and comments on blogs.
Ice Rocket – A Google-like blog search engine.

Blog Top Lists

RSSTop55 - the most comprehensive list of blog top lists and blog submission sites on
the net.

Blog Statistics & Analysis

StatCounter - A completely free statistics and analysis tool for tracking your blog’s numbers.
Site Meter - Site Meter comes in two flavors, Site Meter Basic and Site Meter Premium and this service offers advanced analytics of your site statistics.
AWStats - A free and open-source alternative to track your site statistics.
Feedburner - A wide range of tools to spiff up your RSS feed, including HTML preview, geotagging, merging link and photo feeds, password protection, and one of our favorites - a customizable GIF-based headline animator. They can also insert ads into your feed and have both free and premium analytics.
Alexa - Alexa has the statistics for all of the internet and it lets you compare your blog to another.
Google Analytics - a free, full-featured (albeit a bit slow) analytics program from Google (ex. Urchin).
MeasureMap - another free tool for detailed analysis of your blog’s visitor habits

Blog Monetization

PayPal - PayPal allows you to set up a donations system on your site. Your readers can click a button that will bring them to a page where they can send you some cash.
Chitika - Contextual interactive CPC advertising. Requires more screen real estate than AdSense, but tends to have higher click-through rates and payout rates.
LinkAdage - Text links and text advertisements to generate revenue from your website by way of bidding, brokering, and exchanging text advertisements.
Txtswap - If you want to exchange text links to try and bring in more users, and in turn raise the potential to gain income, this is another service to try.
Google AdSense - Almost certainly the largest single source of income to bloggers worldwide. Pay per click and per view.
Yahoo Publisher network - pay per click ads, similar to Google AdSense.
AdBrite - Get paid for text link advertisements on your blog.
Text Link Ads - One of the leading suppliers of text link advertisements.
BidVertiser - an advertising system where you set the bids for pay per click ads.
ReviewMe - a marketplace for paid blog reviews.
PayPerPost - another marketplace for paid blog posts; often criticized, not only because of the idea of paid blog posting, but also due to the fact that they don’t require full disclosure on paid posts.
BlogBurst - get your blog syndicated by the bigtime media; best blogs get paid for their content.

Spreading The Word

Reddit - Social content site with focus on fun stuff, politics, science; sometimes, anything goes. Witty descriptions are obligatory.
ClipMarks - A service that allows you to save and share “clips” from web pages.
Digg - Social content site that likes technology-related content; especially Google and Apple related. Promoting your own blog - especially too aggressively - on Digg is not a good idea.
Blogmarks - another “clipping” service for saving and sharing links from the web.
Newsvine - Social news site with plenty of options and features
Netscape - Netscape’s social news portal, less oriented towards technology than both Digg and Reddit
Del.icio.us - If you need to share bookmarks or you want people to tell you about websites, Del.icio.us will allow you to do that.

Misc. Tools

MyBlogLog - Possibly the coolest blog community building tool around. Doubles as a simple analytics tool.
BlogRolling – Blogroll manager.
PollDaddy - cool polls for your blog.
BlogPolls - another provider of free polls for bloggers
Favicon Maker – simple service that enables you to easily create a favicon from an image.
Qumana - a desktop blog editor for Mac and Windows.
Blogjet - another desktop blog client, works only on Windows.
Blogarithm - enables you to track all your content at one place.
GeoLoc - a widget that shows your visitors’ locations on a world map.
JunkIWant - display your Amazon wishlist as a widget on your blog
BlogSticker - create stickers for your blog.
MyOpenId - enables you to identify yourself for various online service, using your blog address.
BlogFlux tools - several cool tools for bloggers.
ImageShack - free photo hosting service.

RSS & Aggregation Resources

Everything related to this topic is covered in our previous big feature, the RSS toolbox.

The following Mashable authors contributed to this article: Stan Schroeder, Livia Iacolare, Rodney Rumford, Scott Allen, James Mowery, Todd Carter, Ben Gold

see more:http://mashable.com/2007/06/19/blogging-toolbox/

To say that a company “eats its own dog food” means that it uses the products that it makes. For example, Microsoft emphasizes the use of its own software products inside the company. Dogfooding improves software quality, because the developers best able to fix bugs are likely to be personally confronted with them. It’s also a means of conveying the company’s confidence in their products: imagine the public relations nightmare if it were to emerge that Apple’s iPod team all owned Zunes, or if the Yahoo! Search team used Ask.com for their personal surfing.

The term is a variation of the marketing slang term “…but will the dog eat the dog food?” which is a shorthand way of saying that the product may look good and have many positive qualities, but the most fundamental point is whether the consumer actually likes it. The slogan refers to the early days of television, when programming and commercials were live, and things did not always go as planned, particularly if one of the actors was a dog. Dog food commercials frequently ended with a dog actually not eating the product. Thus, no matter how good the food looks on camera, or how good its story sounds, the commercial is not a success until the dog actually eats the dog food. This term became popular in the technology industry during the dot-com craze as many services seemed to be developed because they could be developed, rather than because consumers wanted them. The metaphor of a company “eating its own dog food” takes this idea one step further to say that the company has not merely considered the value of the product for consumers (that is, whether the dog will eat the dog food), but actually is a consumer of the product. When properly executed, this can add a new level of sincerity to advertising and customer relations, as well as helping to shape the product.

The phrase entered the industry in the following way. In the late 1980’s Brian Valentine was test manager for a product at Microsoft called Microsoft LAN Manager. His manager, Paul Maritz, challenged him in an email, titled “Eating our own Dogfood”, to increase internal usage of the product. Paul Maritz had in turn got this phrase from a past manager and colleague of his, James Harris, who had served in the military and often used colorful language, and who was fond of challenging technical types in review meetings by asking “But will the dogs eat the dogfood?” As a result of this exchange, Brian Valentine set up an internal test server at Microsoft called “Dogfood”. From this initial usage the term spread through Microsoft, to the point where reaching the “Dogfood” stage (i.e. good enough to use it yourself) became an important step. From there it spread to the wider industry.

Using one’s own products has four primary benefits:

1. The product’s developers are familiar with using the products they develop.
2. The company’s members have direct knowledge and experience with its products.
3. Users see that the company has confidence in its own products.
4. Technically savvy users in the company, with perhaps a very wide set of business requirements and deployments, are able to discover and report bugs in the products before they are released to the general public.

If taken to an extreme, a company’s desire to eat its own dog food can turn into Not Invented Here syndrome, in which the company refuses to use any product which was not developed in-house.

In January 2006, the manager of Ford Motor Company’s Dearborn, Michigan plant announced only Ford- or subsidiary-built vehicles are allowed to park in the plant lots in an effort to encourage auto workers to drive the vehicles they manufacture.

In the development process at Mozilla, fine details needing extra polish for an imminent Netscape release would be tagged catfood, to indicate a dish fit for a fussier creature.

In many development environments, to “eat [one’s] own dog food” refers to a point at which a product under development is delivered, even in its rough state, to all on the project for use. Particularly in software development, early versions of the product may contain many bugs, crash, lose data or otherwise be unusable, and the people on the project team do not fully rely on it for its intended purpose. As the product matures, members of the team are reluctant to try it, having been burned by a faulty “not ready for prime time” version. In extreme cases, management may issue a dictate that everyone in the organization is to “eat their own dog food” (meaning, for example, “use the latest version of our in-house email program”), as a way of verifying that the product works under real-world conditions. It is often the source of comic chagrin among workers when such a dictate comes earlier than is practical (if, for example, the in-house email program can not yet send email).

Thomas Siebel of Siebel Systems refined the term “eating your own dog food” to “sipping your own champagne” as a more pleasant way to describe the process of corporate self-testing.

[via wikipedia]

Do you ever want to start your own company, but you’re too afraid to lose that steady paycheck from your day job? What if I told you, that you could start your own company from the very cubicle you’re sitting in? Sound too good to be true? Not so. I’m a great believer in entrepreneurship and the following article from Business 2.0 (my favorite business magazine for those wondering) suggests different ways to build a new company from your current gig.

The 5 Ways to Start a Company (Without Quitting Your Day Job)

1. Use Your Salary as Funding
Finance your idea from your paycheck for as long as possible before selling a big stake to early investors.

2. Turn Common Complaints Into a Business Plan
Just because the company you are working for isn’t filling a customer need doesn’t mean you can’t go off on your own to fill it.

3. Make Your Boss a Beta Tester
Try your product out first on your employer, and then perfect it.

4. Cash In On Your Company’s Reputation
Use your connection to your former employer to open doors.

5. Convert Your Employer Into a Business Partner
Convince your company to spin off your unit.

Happy venturing to those considering, and let me know of any success stories!