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WordPress CMS Themes and Plugins search made easy
WordPress CMS
As most will already know, there is this little giant out in the land of CMS that has changed the horizon for productivity on many levels called Wordpress CMS. In short, so not to bore, Wordpress is a platform that will enable the would be newcomer to the net with his or her vision for a website or streamline the process for any professional company / person or group, wanting to deploy a large multiuser or publishing model.
We have been looking and looking for a long time, and have ended up, right or wrong using a theme with elements that we think are customizable enough to give the look and feel that we want for now. The most important thing for us was that the code be clean. Brian G’s name kept coming up throughout the search. We picked his Vertigo 3-Column Version theme - to be a starting point, which as you can see we adjusted to suit our liking. Some may laugh and say, if that’s all you wanted why not just……bla bla bla. We chose to get on with more important things to us, so why not create our content on a theme by a well known and respected designer?
You might be thinking at this point why we didn’t just make our own that would be better than others and more specific in the customizations. The simple answer is, it is not our expertise. I’m sure at some point we’ll add that kind of mind power to our group but for know we are just going to harness the good work of others that have freely made it available to the public. Our thinking is, why waste good time doing something we are not good at when we can use our minds in other productive ways(to be determined).
So, back to the topic of Wordpress CMS. If you are not going to create your own at first, you will need to find a theme that fits your needs (this is after you have WP installed on your server etc.). The list of themes seems to never end so we will tell you where to look. The following have been put together well and offer you good choices. Be sure to look through the files when you pick one you like so that no hidden links to other site are in that you haven’t put there, other then the standard powered by and theme by links. The same thing goes for plugins, you will need to choose what best fits your needs.
View our WP Themes and/or WP Plugins sections to see our picks and thoughts.
Well, that’s it for now. We hope this will be of some use to you. Thanks for reading and make a comment if you will, good or bad, we take all. If we goofed, maybe we can learn from your feedback and help other visitors at the same time.
On a side note, something you will see quite often is the lack of attention we might give to certain variables as to their importance or function.
Please read: About Tech Minds
The Blogrush Wait
Blogrush code removed - update:10/23/2007 they finally made their updates and determined we were not good enough for their widget /service or our review. One can only guess, as to why we would be removed. It is hard to review something when it doesn’t work(even before we were deemed good enough or not) Something smells. Good luck Blogrush and John Reese.
Blogrush Update 10/14/2007:
BlogRush - The Mighty Phase 2
BlogRush will soon unleash PHASE 2 of its network.
This is a MAJOR update. The service is not even 30 days old, yet we’re about to release more changes than most Internet startups do in their first 6 months.
Bloggers will wait, while others just hate.
If you are following any of the Blogrush story, you’ll see the amazing amount of support they have for John Reese and his efforts. You will also see or here the complaining ones that always expect something from nothing, meaning its free so why complain?
A discussion the other day brought up the topic of stats and the idea of privacy vs increased readership. What does that mean? It means, are different code snippets of java script applications, there to add more content and/or something good to your popular or not yet popular site? OR just good backend research stats for the would be collector to know competition and or whatever?
A better example might be “MyBlogLog”. (now owned by yahoo) or Google AS users. As soon as you put something like that on a site, it tells Yahoo and Google exactly what traffic you are getting. Which some will say, so what. Well, if you are new and are trying to get visitors in etc and are thinking the search engines will pick you up in turn adding to the snow ball effect of growth but then realize that that isn’t happening. One might think that the SE is not seeing traffic increases so they just keep you from the light of day, so to speak. This topic can go on and on and round and round so, why ask at all?
There are days that even the best have their doubts as to what they know. Maybe all we really know is there will always be something new to discover and always garbage to throw out.
A side note about Blogrush: Thanks For Your Patience by John Reese
If you missed the last discussion on Tech Minds, look here: BlogRush
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update:10/23/2007
Blogrush code removed - they finally made their updates and determined we were not good enough for their widget /service or our review. One can only guess, as to why we would be removed. It is hard to review something when it doesn’t work(even before we were deemed good enough or not) Something smells. Good luck Blogrush and John Reese.
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http://www.income.com/blog/2007/10/21/blogrush-quality-audit-complete/
http://www.income.com/blog/2007/10/19/10000-blogs-being-removed-from-blogrush/
Tech Minds are curious: Is BlogRush the next best thing?
Tech Minds are curious about BlogRush:
Will you get new readers?
Does it work for you?
Are they just collecting stats about your blog?
Let us know what you think.
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update:10/23/2007 Blogrush code removed - they finally made their updates and determined we were not good enough for their widget /service or our review. One can only guess, as to why we would be removed. It is hard to review something when it doesn’t work(even before we were deemed good enough or not) Something smells. Good luck Blogrush and John Reese.
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update: John Reese is pissed. Looks like a few blips are causing a stir.
It may have been the buzz I had while reading the email but I couldn’t help but think “i wonder if i viewed my own pages too many times or clicked a link to see what the story was about etc and if that was what we were supposed to do? Kinda reminded me of having an AS account to which i block the java so not to click on my own ads. Was I supposed to look at the titles referred? Should i block the blogrush java? I thought it was pretty straight forward but it made me think.
Its too bad that people have to cheat the system which in turn makes the system more difficult for everyone.
On a brighter side, without mistakes would we have this much drama / attention anyway? Keep up the good work John Reese.
(please forgive any mistakes i’m kinda of tired but felt like saying something)
Grazr Evaluation
Grazr creating widgets
Looks good w/ many options. Have you made your widget today?