Wordpress 2.5x having troubling publishing posts?
Five times in the past 3-4 weeks I’ve written and published a post on this blog only to come back a day later and see it not actually published and live. What’s going on?
The question in my mind is: am I actually publishing the post or just hitting Save? As you can see … the two buttons are side-by-side in the Wordpress screen where you write posts.
Although I can’t be sure, I don’t think so. I never click Save, because WP auto-saves posts every few minutes. And I’m pretty sure I can’t have made that mistake so many times.
So I’m wondering if there’s a bug in Wordpress … and if anyone else has noticed it. I think there is, and I think I might even know where/when it is. I say where/when, because my guess is that the problem might be occuring when two things happen at the same time: Wordpress auto-saves a post, and simultaneously, I click Publish.
I wonder if anyone else has seen this issue. To help me find out, I’m now going to very deliberately click PUBLISH.
As I “write a blog”
Seth Godin has a short post about how to sound smart (or not) when talking about techy stuff. A reader named Jackson chimed in with this:
A blog is the whole, and a post is just one article (like the one you’re reading). So you don’t say, “I wrote a blog about that,” you say, “I just blogged about that,” or “did you read my post on how to talk about the Internet?”
Thank you! I’m seeing that in well-respected publications lately, and it’s annoying.
LOL: price of a sparkplug
Just got this email:
HELLO,
COULD YU KINDLY LET ME KNOW THE UNIT PRICE OF THIS SPARK PLUG …..
Model: 5466
SKU: 578096…SPARK PLUG..
AWAITING FR YOUR RESPONSE ASAP,BEST REGARD,
SUSAN LOPEZ
Hrm … I better get back to her on that right away.
Social media mindset
My good blogging friend Leo Bottary asked this question on LinkedIn Answers:
Describe the mindset one needs to be successful at using social media tools?
Here’s the answer I gave:
There’s a few qualities that come to mind:
- some familiarity and comfort with technology
- some commitment of time to engaging with social media
- a relaxed attitude about controlling every aspect of a message
- an ability to communicate effectively
- above all, a desire and willingness to learn
People who are new to social media should get their feet wet by finding some blogs and podcasts in their niches and just reading and enjoying them for a month or so. Get familiar with the conventions and styles that are out there. Read a few books, like Robert Scoble’s Naked Conversations.
Then start simple, with a blog. Add a Flickr account if you’re into pictures, and link the two. Ensure that you’re on Facebook, LinkedIn, and any other social networks that might be verticals in your area.
Say interesting, informative things about your industry. Link generously, and be generous with data.
Most importantly, don’t lose it when people disagree. That’s natural, and it’s going to happen. Use these situations as learning experiences. Respond calmly and politely, apologize when you were wrong, and move on. You’ll be respected for how you deal with disagreement.
There are a lot of good answers to that question - follow the link above to see them all.
Hello again, Leo
Leo Bottary is back blogging again, at CSI season two.
(That’s Customer Service Insights, of which he has more than a few.)
As Leo mentions, he’s finished his masters degree (lucky dog, I’m still in the middle of a long tough slog) moved to New England, and switched his corporate allegiance from Hill & Knowlton to Mullen. That’s a lot of change!
Welcome back, Leo.
Wordpress automatic upgrade
Wordpress automatic upgrade absolutely rocks.
Upgrading Wordpress every time there’s a minor security update is a major pain the you-know-what … but Wordpress automatic upgrade takes all the pain out.
Here’s where to get it; here’s the site of the people that made it.
Pop-unders: thanks but no thanks
If I ever want to kill any readership of Sparkplug 9, I know exactly how to do it. I’ve received written instructions in the mail.
Email, actually. I recently received one from Kim Tompkins, a “junior media buyer” at Red McCombs Media. It’s a proposal any self-respecting blogger would swiftly upchuck at:
Hi there,
I am a Media Buyer with Red McCombs Media. I am contacting you today because we are looking to place some 800×600 small business related pop-unders. I can give these pop-unders to you at a $2.50cpm, targeted to US visitors.
These pop-unders only contain content relating to small business and will not rotate in anything inappropriate, pornographic, etc. Please let me know if you are interested at your earliest convenience! We would love to get you set up as a publisher immediately! If you could just get back to me with how many impressions per day we can expect from your site we can move forward from there. Please let me know if you have any questions!
If you would like to learn more about our company please feel free to visit our website http://www.redmccombsmedia.com. Look forward to hearing back from you and hope we are able to get something started!
Thanks!
Nothing good starts with “hi there.” And no, I have no intention of putting pop-unders on my site. $2.50 per thousand is a very small amount for my integrity.
I’ll stick with Text Links Ads.
Blogroll, not blogdrool
Maybe I’m just old-fashioned. Or else maybe I don’t suck up well.
Either way, I hate the kind of blogroll that is stuffed with A-lister links. Yeah, I love Seth, and Scoble, and a bunch of other blogs. And when I really like something, I’ll probably save it to my delicious or even write a post on it.
But my blogroll is for people I know. People I like. People that I’m friends or acquaintances with. That’s probably different than for most bloggers, and that’s OK.
Seth and Scoble and Guy and Engadget and Gizmodo etc. etc. have enough links already. I’ll give mine to people I actually know.
Connections
Last night my wife Teresa stumbled on a photography blog by the daughter-in-law of one of my co-workers, Rachel Ludwig.
That lead her to I Lay Me Down To Sleep, an amazing organization that works with photographers to donate their time and expertise to give families who lose children a few precious memories of their babies.
And that lead her to a personal blog of a family in a church we used attend who just lost an 8-week old baby.
Sometimes, the world wide web is exactly that.
New day, new skin
Well, I went minimalist for a while but, since I am perennially unable to keep a Wordpress theme for longer than a month or so, I’ve up and switched.
This is Silhouette by Brian Gardner, and it’s actually still fairly minimalist … but a lot easier on the eyes.
The only problem I see so far is that this theme does not seem to display my tags … I’ll have to monkey around with the code a little to see what I need to do to make that happen.
I have to say, I really like this theme. Might even stick to it for a couple of months this time!
[ update ]
Categories deleted; tags inserted.
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About
Sparkplug 9 is John Koetsier's blog on life, the universe, and everything,
but mostly the stuff you see big in the tags to the left.
Welcome, enjoy, buy the T-shirt, take a picture, tell your friends. -
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