Web 2.0 doesn’t have a strict and standard definition – the truth is, there are many elements and moving parts. So let’s start out historically for a second. Tim O’Reilly, the founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media, Inc., thought by many to be the best computer book publisher in the world, and an activist for open standards, wrote in a October 2005 article, “The bursting of the dot-com bubble in the fall of 2001 marked a turning point for the web. Many people concluded that the web was over hyped, when in fact bubbles and consequent shakeouts (a major change in an organization or system resulting in streamlining) appear to be a common feature of all technological revolutions. Shakeouts typically mark the point at which an ascendant technology is ready to take its place at center stage. The pretenders are given the bum’s rush, the real success stories show their strength, and there begins to be an understanding of what separates one from the other.” Read the rest of this entry »

As fast-growing Facebook closes in on MySpace in the U.S. in terms of unique visitors later this year, it's burning through millions of dollars a month (some claim it's as high as $20 million), with no magic levers to reverse the trend in the short term. In November 2007, when Facebook took a $240 million stake from Microsoft, the investment was at a $15 billion valuation. Now it's down to $4 billion and probably less. As Caroline McCarthy reported a few days ago, rumor has it "one potential investor submitted a term sheet for a valuation in the neighborhood of $2 billion." As Facebook works its way toward a probable IPO, the big question is how can it show it can make money? Well, one way--and I'm not the first to suggest it--would be to charge a nominal monthly fee. With that in mind, I ask a simple question: how much would you be willing to pay to use Facebook per month? A lot of people I ask say they'd pay $1 a month--or preferable a yearly fee of $10 if paid in one shot. But some say they have Facebook fatigue and would rather quit than pay a dime. Comments?

The Difference Between a Blog and CMS? Software that provides a method of managing your website is commonly called a CMS or "Content Management System". Many blogging software programs are considered a specific type of CMS. They provide the features required to create and maintain a blog, and can make publishing on the internet as simple as writing an article, giving it a title, and organizing it under (one or more) categories. While some CMS programs offer vast and sophisticated features, a basic blogging tool provides an interface where you can work in an easy and, to some degree, intuitive manner while it handles the logistics involved in making your composition presentable and publicly available. In other words, you get to focus on what you want to write, and the blogging tool takes care of the rest of the site management. WordPress is one such advanced blogging tool and it provides a rich set of features. Through its Administration Panels, you can set options for the behavior and presentation of your weblog. Via these Administration Panels, you can easily compose a blog post, push a button, and be published on the internet, instantly! WordPress goes to great pains to see that your blog posts look good, the text looks beautiful, and the html code it generates conforms to web standards. If you're just starting out, read Getting Started with WordPress, which contains information on how to get WordPress set up quickly and effectively, as well as information on performing basic tasks within WordPress, like creating new posts or editing existing ones. - Story

We’ve put together this CSS support in email clients guide to save you the time and trouble of figuring it out for yourself. With 21 different sets of results, all the major email systems are covered, both desktop applications and webMail.

Designing an HTML email that renders consistently across the major email clients can be very time consuming. Support for even simple CSS varies considerably between clients, and even different versions of the same client. Read the rest of this entry »

1.)  Google Doesn’t Need The Help: Lets assume you have a company website (you do have a company website, don’t you?).  This website is probably on its own domain (example:  yourcompany.com)  By hosting your blog as a sub-domain on BlogSpot.com you’re basically depriving your primary website of any real search engine optimization.  Instead, if you’re using blogspot.com, you’re kind of benefiting Google instead... Read the rest of this entry »