Glenda Watson Hyatt: How WordPress Changes Her Life Daily

Glenda Watson Hyatt: How WordPress Changes Her Life Daily
I was so thrilled when Glenda Watson Hyatt of the Do It Myself Blog volunteered her story of how WordPress changed her life for my WordCamp Portland keynote presentation. I’ll be sharing the videos and pictures of the program in the next few days, but I wanted to share with you Glenda’s personal story. As you [...]

I was so thrilled when Glenda Watson Hyatt of the Do It Myself Blog volunteered her story of how WordPress changed her life for my WordCamp Portland keynote presentation. I’ll be sharing the videos and pictures of the program in the next few days, but I wanted to share with you Glenda’s personal story.

As you design and develop WordPress Themes and Plugins, and even WordPress itself, remember that you are serving thousands, maybe even millions of people just like Glenda. Creative, energetic members of society determined to give back to their community, yet unable to communicate in person or easily interact with a computer. They are reliant upon those of us who make the web possible, and social, to communicate with others by maintaining web accessibility standards.

Glenda tells her story in her book, “I’ll Do It Myself.” Imagine being unable to communicate but having a lot to say. With the help of determined friends, family, and an off-and-on-again support community, made her way through high school and then into college, and eventually into her own consulting business without much ability to talk “normally.”

Glenda Watson Hyatt, Darrell Hyatt, and Lorelle VanFossen at Blog World Expo

When she started blogging, she discovered that she could leave behind all the years of “I don’t understand you” and “What are you trying to say?” and people thinking she was retarded or a vegetable. She could express herself. She could communicate with others with no barriers. A whole world opened up to her.

I was extremely lucky to spend time with Glenda and her wonderful husband, Darrell, at Blog World Expo in Las Vegas. We had a great time visiting and both were extremely excited about being included in the WordCamp Portland event through video. I’m lucky to have found two wonderful new friends and I look forward to visiting them soon in the Vancouver, British Columbia, area.

If you have a social media or web technology conference in the Pacific Northwest - or anywhere for that matter - and you want an incredible inspirational blogger to speak to you, get Glenda. She will change your life with her smile and attitude.

Thanks, Glenda!

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Site Search Tags: glenda, glenda watson hyatt, i can do it myself, i’ll do it myself, accessibility, accessible, web accessibility, web standards, disabled, disabled blogger, inspirational, how wordpress changes lives

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, the author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Posted in Web Design, WordPress News, WordPress Plugins, WordPress Themes, WordPress Tips������

"Plugin Manager Enabled" Badges

Are you a Movable Type plugin developer? Have you built in support for Plugin Manager yet? If so, consider adding one of the following badges to your plugin's web page to signify the your plugin is "Plugin Manager Enabled." This... Read More

SATellite Images

SATellite Images
Allows the user to view many different SATellite Weather Images of USA including 10 Day Forecast. Also does World Weather, Sea Surface Temperatures, Earthquakes, Oceans, Solar Activity, and almost the entire world of Geology, including all 50 states and 76 cities.

Month Calendar

Month Calendar
Month Calendar is a resizable calendar showing a month at a time. The month is displayed in weeks, each starting on a Monday or on a Sunday. A week-number is displayed at the start of each week. A memo can be attached to any date. The first three lines of the memo are displayed in the date's tooltip. Memos are saved as files. Calendar files (iCal files) can be imported and managed. When enabled and selected, calendar events appear in the dates' tooltips. Files, texts and URLs may be dragged onto a memo window or onto a calendar date. The dragged text is appended to the text already in the memo window. The Widget can speak the selected date when a memo is opened and can speak the contents of memos. Various types of single or repeating alarm events can be associated with calendar dates.

London Underground Tube Status

Provides real time information about the London Tube Lines. There are two views for this Widget: 1) The detailed view shows the status of all the London Underground Lines. 2) The compact view only shows the Underground Lines that are having problems. You can get detailed information about each of the tube lines (including station closures and details about the report problems) through tool tips (by giving the Widget focus and moving your mouse over the individual tube lines). The Widget also contains a complete map of the tube system and four convenient links to the TFL Journey Planner tool for common trips. Read More

Retro iPod Shuffle Case Proclaims Old School Fandom [IPod]

What better way to celebrate your new iPod shuffle than sticking it to Apple's marketing/branding department and sliding the sleek device into the original Apple logo? Available from an Etsy seller,... Read More

Comcast Now Restricts Bandwidth Data Transfer Levels

If you haven’t reviewed the GigaOM White Paper: The Facts & Fiction of Bandwidth Caps, do it now. As of Wednesday this week, Comcast, the largest provider of broadband and DSL for Internet access in the United States is going to be restricting your data transfer levels to 250 gigabytes a month. According to Om [...]

If you haven’t reviewed the GigaOM White Paper: The Facts & Fiction of Bandwidth Caps, do it now.

As of Wednesday this week, Comcast, the largest provider of broadband and DSL for Internet access in the United States is going to be restricting your data transfer levels to 250 gigabytes a month. According to Om Malik:

With this move, the cable company will become the symbol of a new Internet era, one that is both monitored and metered. It is an era that threatens to limit innovation and to a large extent, the possibilities for new startups.

Many bloggers are part of online businesses and startups as well as suppliers of video, podcasts, and downloadable and uploaded files across the web. As web designs and WordPress Themes become more graphic and code dependent, increasing our bandwidth access levels, these limits impinge upon that grown and that access.

While WordPress Themes, Plugins, and Widgets account for very small levels of data transfer, what about a new WordPress user who wants to download and experiment with a lot of Themes and Plugins? Downloading more than a gig or two of WordPress stuff is rare, but if you add that to their other file downloads, like software, instant messaging, IRC, email, flickr, YouTube, podcasts, music, news, television, VoIP, and all the information and data that enters our world through our computers - those numbers add up fast.

I just moved from a satellite connection with a 17 gig limit. We hit the limit all the time and we weren’t downloading music or shows. I didn’t even download podcasts until I went on a trip. There were three of us using the web for our work. Download a few software programs, update your computer’s operating system, test out some Plugins, and it all adds up fast.

According to the White Paper, “today’s power users are tomorrow’s average users” with a predication that by 2012 we will be paying about $215 a month for Internet data access. Malik and others are fighting back with words in hopes of changing this “walled garden” limitation. I hope you join us in spreading the word.

The Web Must Be Free

The timing of this announcement comes the same time as the announcement of the new World Wide Web Foundation was announced. In the welcome statement, the founders, including Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, stated:

The World Wide Web Foundation seeks to advance One Web that is free and open, to expand the Web’s capability and robustness, and to extend the Web’s benefits to all people on the planet. The Web Foundation brings together business leaders, technology innovators, academia, government, NGOs, and experts in many fields to tackle challenges that, like the Web, are global in scale.

One of the focuses of the World Wide Web foundation is to investigate, in its Web for Society program, how to lower the barriers of accessing the Web for people who are not able, today, to find accessible and usable information.

While I’m totally in favor and support breaking down communication and language barriers, as well as all social, cultural, and technological barriers, the biggest barrier we have to fight is greed.

It’s getting harder and harder to find free access to the web. Someone has to pay. With belts tightening around the world, will Internet access be only for the rich?

The Internet was originally started and built on lines abandoned by the phone companies, the same companies who struggled to find ways of charging for that access after they realized they were missing out on the financial possibilities of connecting via the Internet and web. They have been looking under every rock to find ways of making money off this “web thing” ever since.

Yes, we must pay for the continued growth and access to the web, but restricting bandwidth and data transfer hurts an economy already showing the flashing red danger signal.

Be warned, be aware, and let Comcast and others know that you do not want this. Fight back with your voice. Spread the word.

I remember when Arthur C. Clarke predicted that long distance telephone calls would be free by the end of the century. I thought it odd since he was a very intelligent man and he lived in the same world that I did, one where corporate greed controls everything. I couldn’t see such a thing as being possible, but with the web, it became possible. Will that freedom continue or will corporate greed continue to slip into our pockets?

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Site Search Tags: comcast, bandwidth, data transfer, internet access, internet provider, high cost, bandwidth restriction, bandwidth limits, internet connections, wordpress themes, wordpress plugins, wordpress news, download, upload, files, connection, internet

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, the author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Posted in Web Wise, WordPress News������

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Lifehack?s Writing Tips

Lifehack?s Writing Tips
Every once in a while, Lifehack tackles writing tips and tricks. Recently, two great articles caught my eye. Just Keep Writing! motivates you to just keep writing, inspired with quotes from famous writers on what they believed kept them writing. If you feel the writing spirit waning with your blog, these are some great motivational tips. If [...]

Every once in a while, Lifehack tackles writing tips and tricks. Recently, two great articles caught my eye.

Just Keep Writing! motivates you to just keep writing, inspired with quotes from famous writers on what they believed kept them writing. If you feel the writing spirit waning with your blog, these are some great motivational tips.

If you are already feeling blogger’s block, then it might be time for some of the tips in Break Through Writer’s Block. While I rarely suffer blogger’s block or writer’s block - I always find something to write about - I do get bored with my writing. If I’m bored, I’m sure you are. Boredom leads to procrastination, which eventually slows down my production as I can’t find the motivation to keep coming up with witty and intelligent things to say every day.

This article is a great resource with tips to keep you on the blogging path and kick your ass if you start blog-foot dragging.

Related Articles

• Copy Copy Copy: You Can’t Write My Post. I Can’t Write Yours.
• Your Blog is Your Unedited Version of Yourself
• Tips for Writing WordPress Tips
• I Love Your List! I’m Going To Copy It!
• Why Writing a Link Post May Be Less Like Partying and More Like Work
• Blog Struggles: Ideas and Drafts
• Blog Struggles: The Blog Focus
• The Dos and Don’ts of Blogging
• Blog Challenge: Write a Memoir of a Moment
• Blog Resources for English Language and Blog Writing
• Blog Resources: Researching the Research, Finding the Facts, and Seeking Supporting Evidence
• Blogging Resources: Business and Professional Resources and References for Bloggers and Writers
• Writing Better Blog Post Titles
• When a Comment Requires the Honest Truth
• Why Not Activities For Blog Writing
• The Writer’s Pulse: How to Survive Writing and Publishing on the Web
• Liz Strauss: The Secret to Writing a Successful and Outstanding Blog Ebook

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Site Search Tags: writing, blogging tips, blog writing, writer’s block, blogger’s block, block, writing tips, how to blog

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, the author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Posted in Blogging Tips, Writing������

Awesome Photo Gallery/Google Maps Mashup

I recently was contacted by James Sanders who created a really cool Photo Gallery and Google Maps Mashup. They installed and customized the Photo Gallery Plugin such that a little thumb tack is displayed on a map of the world... Read More

GAMES, GAMES, GAMES!!!!!

GAMES, GAMES, GAMES!!!!!
We love the cool games we played when we were kids, so we found them and put those games in our widget platform (Thank You, Neave!!!!).

http://springwidget.com/widgets/byCategory/12

Check them out - they are in the "Fun and Games" category of the Widget Gallery.

We have the following:
Asteroids
Tic-Tac-Toe
Simon
Hexxagon
Snake
Space Invaders

They are pretty addictive - I spend more time than I'd like to admit tie-ing the computer in Tic-Tac-Toe - but I figured out the one move that always wins - hehe.

Have fun and let us know what you think!

Get this widget!

Homer Simpson Explains the Problem with Electronic Voting [Clips]

Conspiracy theorist or not, any time I'm typing information into a computer at any time of the day, I know that it can be lost at a moment's notice, by the simple glitch of a program or power supply.... Read More

Redefining the Widget

Last year at Widgets Live, the announcement of the SpringWidgets platform redefined what a widget could be. At the time of our launch there were three categories of widgets: desktop widgets, web widgets and a special subsection of web widgets that would work on social networking profiles.

We changed all that by inventing a widget platform that allowed for the first time, the ability to use a single, updatable and configurable widget file to reach all of these destinations. We took it further by incorporating in the ability to “pop” any SpringWidget you find on the web onto your desktop with just one click.

Since our release, there have been a few companies that have announced a similar product offering - YourMinis and Netvibes are examples we feel are well done.

I'm going to give you a little sneak peak behind the curtain where we are quietly working on redefining the widget once again, and perhaps in the process spur another round of inspiration.

For the most part, online widgets have been exactly what the limited definition has made them out to be …

A web widget is a portable chunk of code that can be installed and executed within any separate HTML-based web page by an end user without requiring additional compilation.

Thanks Wikipedia

Reading this, I’m thinking about the widget landscape and in my head I’m starting to challenge the entire box that we have collectively put widgets into, trying to look past the simple definition and look at the transformative nature of what a portable chunk of code can do.

Is the widget just a visitor on the web page or can it be much more and control and interact with the web page it’s on? If widgets are like parasites, can a parasite define the host?

Can a widget be a portable “experience?”

Envision if you will a Widget that no longer sends the user off to another site to personalize itself. Imagine a widget that is not content to stay within the confines of it’s own little box, but rather can interact with the page it lives on. The “Transformative Widget” would take over the page it’s on; integrating it's content within that page and transforming it based on a click.

If the Widget is not just a chunk of code, but rather a portable experience, imagine the infinite ways we can expand the brand experience within the social network itself. Moving code and embedding Widgets can create a better way to immerse the user in an extreme brand experience. The widget then becomes an ad that is user embedded, user selected and more powerfully engaging and interactive than any traditional advertisement that is available - and just as performance oriented.

If a user allows the widget to brand the entire page, is that a "Widgetview", an "Ad Impression", or a "Pageview"?

So if SpringWidgets is ready to challenge the Widget Landscape it’s safe to say that the launch of THE FANTASTIC FOUR Widget is the next step in redefining the Widget. The transformative nature of TFF Widget is completely apparent once you start using it on your MySpace profile and the brand experience is more immersive than anything possible with a widget prior to the Fantastic Four widget launch.

This is only one of the many transformative widgets that we are engaged in and only represents a small amount of our R&D efforts. Over the weeks and months to come, we'll be rolling out some truly fantastic products that will not only transform the widget, but transform SpringWidgets as well.

We would love to have you on board as we make these transformations, so please feel free to download our API and put your own thoughts to work in redefining what a widget can be. Read More

Multi-Media Screensaver 1.1.551

Multi-Media Screensaver 1.1.551
Can transfer media player to screensaver Can transfer media player to screensaver (read more)

TextCatch 2.6.4.1

TextCatch 2.6.4.1
A powerful windows TEXT capture program with many features and options A powerful windows TEXT capture program with many features and options (read more)

AProverbGenius 1.0

AProverbGenius 1.0
Collection of Proverbs on your Dashboard.

About AProverbGenius Dynamic loading of Proverbs when you start Dashboard, more than 1000 of Proverbs in your Dashboard. Internet connection required.