Changes Afoot

Hello to all my loyal subscribers (all 6 of you ;) )!

And anyone who happens to pop by to see what I'm saying of course. :)

This is a scoop just for you!!!!

Lightening's Blogworld is in the process of moving to a self hosted wordpress site.

Yes, the wordpress self-hosting bug has bitten me so hard that I now have 2 blogs on self-hosted.

lighteningsblogworld.com is not due to "officially" launch until Feb 1st.... BUT, I wanted you guys to know about it first. So pop over and check it out.

I am attempting to switch my feedburner address over so that if you're subscribed to THIS blog, you should automatically switch and start receiving posts via your feedreader for the new blog (and therefore not NEED to resubscribe).

However, I cannot do that until I send this post so you have a clue what is happening. Otherwise you won't get this message. :)

And of course, it is all dependent on whether I can actually manage to make that happen. But I will keep you posted. If I have trouble with it, I'll come back here and post another message asking you to manually resubscribe to the new blog. We have a week to get ourselves sorted out before the rest of the world comes rushing in (LOL).

So, please pop on over and I'll give you a grand tour. There are a few little jobs that still need doing but I *know* that you, my loyal friends and readers will excuse the few packing boxes lying around the place. ;)

Feel free to leave a comment and respond to my poll in the sidebar. It feels all a little lonely and echoey around there so I'd really LOVE so company!!!! :)

See you there and thanks for reading!!!! :)

Oh, and come February 1st, if you'd like to give me a hand to spread the word about the new blog, I'd be ever so grateful!!!! :)

Aussie Bloggers

The Aussie Bloggers Blog was launched yesterday.

Here is a copy of the "About" page for Aussie Bloggers

Aussies, and bloggers, can be really nice people . Put the two together and you have the potential for a wonderful community.

At Aussie Bloggers, we are passionate about blogging and helping other Aussies do the same.

Our goal is to:

empower, encourage, support and promote Aussie Bloggers and the Australian blogosphere in general

Specifically we hope to:

• provide a resource for new bloggers
• provide assistance in a welcoming (non-threatening) environment
• promote networking of Aussie bloggers
• promote the visibility/credibility of Australian bloggers and the Australian blogosphere

We envisage that this blog and forum will best help us meet our objectives in a collaborative, friendly environment.

We hope to assemble a range of Australian bloggers to be regular contributors to the blog and forum. A group of Aussie bloggers who have demonstrated a willingness to help other bloggers and who are working towards raising the profile of blogging in Australia.

The official launch for our blog will be 21^st January, 2008. In the meantime our (beta) Aussie Bloggers forum is open for discussion.

We look forward to seeing you around the community

If you haven't been over to have a look yet, I'd encourage you to do so. Blogging posts will be written by a large range of different people so it promises to be an interesting and varied read.

National Hugging Day

Apparently today is National Hugging Day!!! I only found this out yesterday when I wrote the post I Need a Hug on my personal blog. Of course, it isn't today yet for some people in the world. But we'll call it today anyway. Got that?

It would seem that there is a day for EVERYTHING!!!!!

According to the National Hugging Day website, there is also a "National Whiners Day". Who'd have thought? Although, on further reading, I discovered that National Whiners Day is actually a day to be thankful for what you DO have rather than focusing on what you don't have.

On the website you can actually vote for the most huggable person and the most famous whiner!!! LOL. How interesting.

You can print off your own hug colouring sheets.

You can send a hug card.

Now in our family, we have different kinds of kisses. An eskimo kiss, a butterfly kiss, a lizard kiss and so on.

But I've never come across different hugs before. How about this list for a variety of different hugs:

Gorilla Hug - Squeeze the huggee tightly while saying "ooh ooh" like an ape. A great one for grown ups and kids!

Circle Hug - Hugger wraps his or her arms all the way around huggee so huggee can bury his or her face in hugger's chest. A good one for comfort or encouragement!

All Purpose Hug - The any-time-is-good friendly embrace that says, "good to see you" or "I like you!" Usually brief but meaningful.

Cyber Hug - Include the person's name in an e-mail, surrounded by multiple parenthesis, i.e., (((((Donna)))))

Party Hug - A minimum of three huggers grab each other's waists and form a circle of happy hugging people.

The Man Hug - Slap the huggee's upper back while hugging; upper body may touch, but nothing else!

This article describes how a Hug A Day Can Keep the Blues Away.

And I love this quote that I found:

"For human beings, you need two hugs a day to survive, four hugs for maintenance, six hugs to grow." Virginia Satir, a Wisconsin Marriage and Family Therapist.

I know this isn't technically about blogging but I figured a website was close enough and it was worth mentioning. ;-)

I hope you all found someone to hug on this "National Hugging Day". If not here's a {{{HUG}}} from me. :)

We Do Have a Voice

One of the things I LOVE about blogging is the chance to have a say. To have my opinion or thoughts actually heard. In fact, I think one of the reasons blogging has become so popular with "mommy" bloggers is that those of us home with our children still want to have a voice, to make a difference.

Over the past week or so, there have been a number of people expressing their voice over Jay Jay's range of Little Losers t-shirts (including yours truly).

Today I have just read a post at Imaginif stating that Jay Jay's have started to take notice of the voices of the general public and have agreed to at least remove these t-shirts from store windows and not restock those that are causing particular concern (ie those with sexual and alcohol references).

While it doesn't entirely resolve the concerns of many, it is at least a step in the right direction. I know that this isn't entirely the result of bloggers voicing their opinions. But I like to hope that in some way, they added to the overall community voice.

Here are some links to some of the blogposts on this topic:

Jay Jays is the Little Loser

National Retailer Selling Lewd T-Shirts to Kids

Mr Pimp Miss Wasted

Little Losers Not so Funny

Kids Have Enough Attitude

Harmless Fun


And some links to articles talking about the changes being made:

No More Little Losers in Shop Windows

Jay Jays Responds to Public Pressure


Obviously I'm glad that some changes have been made, regardless of who made them happen or who claims the credit for doing so. I very rarely blog about controversial or political type topics as it tends not to be in my personality to want to cause a ruckus. All the same, I feel quite pleased that blogging gives people like me the opportunity to have a voice. :-)

Full Feed vs Partial Feed

Every now and then out there in "blogworld" I read a rant from a blog writer about the issue of full feeds vs partial feeds. To be honest, I used to wonder what all the fuss was about really. So what if a blog writer wants you to have to visit their blog to read what they're reading? Fair enough that they want to count you in their stats (for their own enjoyment and/or for the sake of advertising).

Naturally it didn't matter to me at the time because I was visiting blogs anyway. It wasn't until I attempted to use a feedreader myself that I began to understand what they even meant by frustration with people who only allowed partial feeds.

For those who I have already lost (don't worry, I was there myself not that long ago), a feedreader is basically a page that collects all the recent blogposts you want to read. It shows you when a blog has a new post and you can read that post all there at the same website. When you read a lot of blogs or have a number of blogs that don't update regularly, they are a brilliant way of saving time.

If a blog allows a full feed version, you can read the entire post without needing to actually leave your bloglines page. If they only offer a partial feed you get the first few lines of their post and then have to click through to their page to read the rest. That takes time that I don't always have.

So, if I don't have time to visit the site, does that mean I'm a reader that person isn't really interested in?

I guess the question of whether to run a full feed or a partial feed comes down to this - do you blog to be heard or do you blog for some other reason? There's no real wrong or right answer as to the reason for blogging - but it is a good question to ask yourself when you're making the decision between full and partial feeds for your blog.

What about comments? Do people comment less if they don't have to visit your site? I wondered the same myself before I started reading in a feed reader. Admittedly of late I have been commenting less often per site than I used to due to reading more and more blogs. In general though, I have found that I am MORE likely to comment on a blog where I've been able to read the whole post (and therefore know I have something I'd like to say).

Blogs that only offer partial feeds get left until last in my feed reader. IF I have the time I will have a look at the partial feed and decide if it's worth clicking over to that blog. As it turns out, I visit most of my full feed blogs more often than I visit the partial feed ones.

Sadly this week I culled the first partial feed from my bloglines reader. I still have others but most of them will be the next to go as new blogs get added to my list. I can't help but feel like some of the partial feed blogs are more interested in my advertising value than my reader value. I'm sure this isn't always the case. But it is how I feel.

If you're reading this and only offer a partial feed, please reconsider. If you have some other reason why you only offer a partial feed rather than a full feed, please let me know. I'm always interested in other peoples opinions of what they are doing and why.

Is there anyone reading this that actually PREFERS to subscribe to blogs that only offer a partial feed? If so, I'd be really interested in hearing your viewpoint as well.

A Little Tip

I learnt a little trick the other day that has made my internet life soooooo much easier. If you have a mouse with the little scroll wheel in the centre. Clicking on a link using that scroll button will open it in a new window.

Once upon a time I made all my links so that they would open in a new window. Why? Because I really appreciated it when others did the same. That way I didn't lose the page I was on. Then I read somewhere that it's considered bad internet etiquette to do so. BAD MANNERS??????? Well, I couldn't have that on my blog could I????? So I stopped making my links that way.

So, anyway, if you're clicking on links in any of my blogs (yes, they appear to be breeding rapidly LOL), try the little scroll button click if you'd like to open the link in a new window/tab.

Where did I learn this little tip? Why at the Aussie Bloggers Forum that's where. :-) If you'd like to go straight to the discussion where the tip was placed, you can go here. It's actually a topic on using firefox as your browser - but that's a topic for another post! :-)

Like More Info on Blogging?

There really are some amazing bloggers out there and if you haven't yet joined Aussie Bloggers Forum yet then you really are missing out.

It's a great Forum full of wonderfully friendly and knowledgable people. If you have a question related to blogging, you are SURE to get an answer there.

It is also a great place to promote your own blog and find some interesting and new blogs to read.

There are no prerequisites for joining. You don't have to be an Aussie OR have a blog to join. So come on over and have a squiz! I'm sure you'll be glad you did.

Here is a sample of some of the discussions going on over there:

Resources for Stock Photos. A list of great sites you can use to find free photo's to accompany your blog posts.

Feedreaders - which one and why?

Aussie Bloggers Using Entrecard. Read how other bloggers are finding Entrecardas a method of promoting their blogs.

How to Use Stumbleupon.

This is just a little taste of what's available on the forums. They're growing daily and the wealth of information contained within is growing with them. I'd encourage you to take a look, join up and join in the fun!!!