What an exciting week it’s been. We just concluded the second round of interview topics with Lorelle (of Lorelle on WordPress) and learned:

1) Revisitng old posts can provide fresh content

2) How to Manage our feed readers

3) And then we Wooped it up.

4) On Tuesday we welcomed our first teenage blogger to the NBOTW series

On to the Free ‘n Easy Friday Finds (FEFF).

If you didn’t follow the comment thread on Wednesday’s post, Lorelle stopped by and shared a link for anyone who uses Firefox and the Greasemonkey Scripts Extension which will help speed up our reading/commenting time. I used it last night while visiting blogs and estimate I shaved 20 minutes off of my visiting and commenting time. It’s fabulous.

Lorelle has written a post detailing the use of this script.

I’ve also been cleaning house (no, not my home, although that needs it, too). I’ve been tidying up my blog by removing the monthly archives list (it was 17 months long), taking off all affiliate ads (In over a year they haven’t made me a dime), and for my recent commenters, I removed the snippets. My “Recent Commenters” now shows your avatar and name with hopes of giving you more name recognition and traffic to your blogs.

Although it’s my blog, it’s all about you!

I hope you like the changes.

Have a great weekend!

Having finished the first three interview questions with Lorelle (of Lorelle on WordPress), I reread the comments from Part Two. Her answers got us thinking, didn’t they?

Most bloggers are not using a copyright license, privacy policy, and/or disclaimer. List below are several free resources that I use.

Priority Digital.com offers a privacy policy and a disclaimer (see their free services)

Creative Commons (.org) offers a copyright license, along with a badge that can be included on your site. (see mine at the bottom of my left sidebar)

Copyscape.com is a great service to check with to see if your content has been plagiarized.

More information can be found by checking the links Lorelle provided in Part Two.of our interview series.

Remember: You work hard to produce quality content and share beautiful photographs. Protect what is rightfully yours.

Today’s Questions

Are you protecting your writings? Your photographs?

Has your content been plagiarized? If so, what did you do?

Is this an issue that concerns you?

Do you have other concerns you’d like to discuss? The comment section is open for all questions.

It’s Friday, and I’m adding another great freebie to my “Free and Easy Friday Finds”(FEFF)

Last week I found a new plugin called “Random Posts”. It’s quite slick.

Via the use of a plugin (link to follow), you can display posts from the past. What this plugin does is extract random posts which will change each time your page is loaded. So what you see now, will be replaced with new random posts on the next click.

To see it in action, I’ve installed it in my left sidebar below “What Others Are Reading”.

What I like about this plugin is that old posts are now revived without having to manually link to them. Granted, some may not be your best work, but it may get them some attention. (The plugin has options where you can block posts you don’t want displayed)

To use this plugin, it requires downloading TWO plugins.

The first one is called “Post-Plugin Library”

And the second one is obviously called “Random Posts”

Just follow the instructions and you’re set to go.

The plugin author is Rob Marsh. Let’s all give him a round of applause for these great plugins. ///clap, clap, clap\\\\ Also, please note, Rob offers several other plugins on his site, as well.

By the way, next Friday is the Fourth of July holiday here in the States, so I won’t be posting, BUT, on Thursday, I’m publishing my second Monthly Mini Meme (MMM), so start thinking about that one random thing about yourself you would like to share with the BWAB community. I have mine picked out, and it’s rather funny.

Mark you calenders, and have a great weekend.

Hi all,

Welcome to my new series.

It will be called “Free ‘n Easy Friday Finds”. As some of you already know, I like to use acronyms (abbreviate with letters), so it will often be referred to as “FEFF”.

Each Friday, I will share something that is free to bloggers. It may be a plugin, a site that offers free themes or photos, a potential (free) income stream, advice that will save you time and money, or something else. Plus, it will be easy to use.

For blogging, there is tons of free stuff online, so before you get out the “plastic”, ask a question in my comment section and either I, or one of the other bloggers in the BWAB community, may know of a free source.

As an added bonus, there will be no “assignment” on Fridays. Did I hear a “yeah”? ///clap, clap, clap\\\

The comment section will be open for questions, comments or anything you might want to share. Just remember, I don’t allow profanity on my blog, so keep it clean.

Let’s get started:

Last week Dr. Cason mentioned she wanted to organize the blogs in her reader. This was something I needed to do, too.

Organizing Your Google Reader

With the Google Reader, this is pretty easy.

Go to your reader (duh!)

1) Click on “manage friends”

2) Click on “subscriptions” – All of the blogs you’re following will be listed. Each line has “Rename”, a garbage can, and a white rectangular box.

3) If you click on “Add To A Folder” (the white box) It gives you the option to make a new folder

As you make new folders, the names of the folders are added to the “white box” option.

4) Add the first blog to a folder, and that part is done.

5) Move on to the next blog

As you go through the blogs in your reader, you can add it to an existing folder, move it to a different folder, or create a new folder.

You’ll also see a small garbage can on this page. This is used to delete blogs from your reader.

If you want, you can also rename a blog you’re following. e.g. Instead of being listed by the name of the blog, you could rename it by the author.

When you click “Back to Google Reader”, the blogs you are following are neatly placed in the respective folders. The folders can then by opened or collapsed by using the + or – signs (to the left of the folder icon).

As an example, I currently have four folders:

1) “NBOTW” (these are all bloggers who were named New Blog Of The Week)

2) “Visit Daily” (Updated blogs I read on a daily basis)

3) “Visit Twice A Week” (Blogs I read at least twice a week, but usually more often, if time permits)

4) “Blogs To Watch” (These are new blogs I’ve found that have the potential to be part of my NBOTW series)

What I like about setting up folders is that you have two choices

1) You can open all updated blogs on one screen, (by clicking on the name of the folder), or

2) You can open the folder and then open up each blog in the window.

Warning: With regard to the #1 choice, be careful not to click on “mark all as read” until you have finished reading all of the updated blogs.

Although my explanation of this may sound confusing, it’s actually an easy process.

Once you start playing with, and becoming comfortable with, the options in your reader, you’ll see the advantage of setting up folders. (It’s similar to setting up folders in your email account).

That’s my first FEFF….

Now the floor is yours.

Have your say, share an idea, ask a question or………