Blogging Blog

PostMapper.com

Today's guest blogger is Wade Sonenberg. You can learn more about Wade at the end of this post.

Just released, is a new blogging API and mashup that allows bloggers from across the web to plot their posts on a Google map.  It's called PostMapper.com, and it works by geocoding a blog post's location, and displaying the post's title, link, and excerpt on a searchable map.  PostMapper visitors can then find a participating blog's post about that location, and follow the link to the full post on the member's blog. 

It sounds complicated, but there is a downloadable Wordpress plugin that does all the work, and they hope to have a simple solution for both TypePad and Blogspot users early next year.  You can see the map in action on the PostMapper.com website, or download the plugin here.

As for me, my name is Wade Sonenberg, I live in Atlanta.  I sell and lease office space as my day job, but aspire to write & fish full time if I can ever figure out how to make it work.  My personal blog is The Great Outsmores.

Gifts for Bloggers

What, oh what, to give your beloved blogger for the holidays?

These are just a few of the designs you can get on mugs, T-shirts, buttons, mouse pads, magnets and yes, even -- underwear! -- from cafepress. Hmm. Maybe we should offer our bears?

Of course, books are always a good choice: Books on Blogging

Then there's my personal favorite:

She-Blogger coffee mug from tild~

I actually own this, and use it often. I love She-Blogger.

Of course, there are more practical gifts for bloggers. There are tech gifts of all sorts for all budgets, from spendy laptops to sweet USB gadgets. If you'd like to give to the blog, as well as the blogger, here are a few ideas:

• Contribute to hosting fees. Some blogs are hosted on free sites, but many pay a monthly or annual fee for hosting, support, and features that are rarely available on free sites.
• A flickr pro account is a good choice for a blogger who uses lots of photos (and I see that until the end of January, if you buy one as a gift, you get three months free for yourself.) There are other options as well; be sure to choose the one your blogger prefers.
• A picnik pro account offers lots of easy online image editing and creation tools, and excellent integration with the most popular photo hosting sites. As with flickr, the pro account offers features not available in the free version.
• Other blog expenses that the reader doesn't see, but the blogger likely pays, include an annual fee for the domain name (such as bloggingblog.org) and possibly a fee for podcast development and hosting (like Hipcast.)

Blogging can be a costly habit, with even more expenditures for designers and clipart and professional statistics packages, but most of us don't have to worry about that. And some, of course, display ads to take the edge off even basic expenses -- but you need heavy traffic to make that pay -- and few have enough traffic to make the annoyance worthwhile.

For more ideas from other folks, check out these posts - and have a lovely holiday!

• Eight Gifts for Bloggers 
• Gifts for Bloggers [Warning: PopUp!] 
• 10 Best Gift Ideas for Bloggers 
• Ideal Christmas Gifts for Bloggers 
• Top 10 Christmas Gifts for Bloggers
• Gifts for Bloggers: Gossip Bubbles!

Blog Memes for December

It's that time of year again, when the those of us in the North think of snow and darkness and holiday lights; shopping and giving and receiving; family and friends and food.

It's also a time that bloggers decorate their sites with red and green and sparkles of various sorts. Seasonal music infuses not only our city centers, but the places we visit online.

Granted, all this can become sectarian and obnoxious, but it can also be fun. I recommend indulging yourself in whatever brightens your own season. Here are two possibilities for bloggers:

BlogCatalog.com . . . will launch its fourth social awareness campaign on Dec. 17. This time, the “Bloggers Unite” campaign challenges its more than 80,000 members and other bloggers to do something good offline — an act of kindness — and then post about it, using words, pictures, and/or videos to tell the story.

Another option is the annual Holidailies project:  Holidailies is a free community writing project. All Holidailies 2007 participants promise to update their personal web sites every day from December 1 to January 1. Portal participants post summaries of their entries, which are aggregated on the front page of Holidailies 2007.

Both of these are good ways to connect with other bloggers, as well as inspiration and impetus for your own blogging.

But perhaps you prefer to take it easy in this darkening season? There is something for you, too: After coming across what seemed to be the 4000th or so post on someone's blog starting with "I'm sorry I haven't posted in awhile." I decided it is time to rethink what makes a good blog and the expectations that have come to be part of it. I am thinking that no one should utter those words again . . .and with that thought I give you Blogging Without Obligation.

So, go post; or don't -- and may you have a good and deepening season!