Category Archives: Technology

May 10 8 comments
Technology

Back to Akismet; Word Press anti-spam Plug-in

When I first started blogging in 2004, I was using Akismet, it did a great job of rounding up the obvious spammers, and tossing them into a the marvelous anti-spam pit; never to resurface again.

A few years ago, I changed to Defensio. I liked it a lot… On average, Celebrate Life receives about 400 or more spam comments daily. Of course,  none of them ever make it live, since the anti-spam plug-ins do a great job of trapping them.

I didn’t have a problem with Defensio, until the last WordPress update, which went live a few weeks ago. After that, Defensio would occasionally mark legitimate comments as spam. I could have lived with that, but when I’d approve the comment, it would disappear. The comment was gone, poof, deleted….

I’ll give you an example, although, Nicole of D’Nali, had already commented a few times, after the WordPress update it saw any of her comments as spam. To make it worse, when I approved her comment, stating it wasn’t spam, Defensio thought it’d knew better and would just toss her back into the spam pile, but with a new title; very spammy. If I tried to approve it again, poof comment was gone for good.

For the most part, Defensio still did its job, and only acted temperamental with some commentators. The instant it started behaving badly, I’d simply disable Defensio, approve the comment, and then go back and enable Defensio. Yeah, that wasn’t annoying… <sarcasm>

The next reader to receive this treatment was Teeni from Aunty’s Tea Room. I guess Defensio needed someone new to torment, since Nicole’s has been silent because of computer issues.

Between you and me… I think Defensio was trying to punish Teeni for shutting down her old website. ;)

Yesterday, I pulled the plug on Defensio, and this is why…

Every single comment by Teeni would end up in the spam folder. I went through the extra steps of approving her comment, and then went on a search for a new anti-spam plugin. About an hour later, I decided to check my comments…

Guess what?

Defensio decided it wasn’t happy with my decision…

Teeni spam

Germ 1

And I found Teeni’s approved comment, tossed back into the spam corner,  but this time it has been upgraded to “very spammy”, and she brought friends!  Hooray for Teeni! ;) Approved comments, you know the ones that had already gone live on my site without landing in the spam box, were now hanging out with her in her “very spammy” corner. Guess what? Some of my comments were there too!

Defensio was disabled after that. I really loved their anti-spam WordPress Plugin, and only started having issues after the last WordPress update. I will be following up with Defensio to see what the issue could be.  In the meantime, I’m using Akismet.

There are other anti-spam plugins available, like  the CAPTCHA plug-ins, which I absolutely loathe. Some of those words are hard to read, why torment your readers with them! Also there’s GrowMap Anti-Spambot Plugin, but that requires Javascript to be enabled. The majority of people will have this enabled; but there are some who don’t. Addons such as NoScript ( a plugin that I use) turns off all scripts. You can manually enable scripts.

Also, a few of my blog visitors are blind. I want their experience to be enjoyable, and I don’t want them jumping through a lot of extra hoops. The American Federation for the Blind, is an amazing organization, over the years they’ve opened my eyes to many things that seeing people take for granted. They’ve written a few articles about making sites easily accessible for those who are visually impaired. I’ve included them below.

Blogging for the visually impaired

  1. How you can make your site accessible to the visually impaired
  2. Is Blogging Accessible to People With Vision Loss?
Apr 17 0 comments
Technology

Combating spam; some websites welcome it…

Cat spam police

You’ve been to those sites, where spam overruns the comment section. It’s a major turnoff, right? The site owner is given the impression, that they aren’t paying attention to what’s going on in their virtual home.

I promptly left. It was obvious the owner, wasn’t paying attention to their websites, so why should I?

The thing is…

I just assumed that site owners (who allow this sort of behavior) aren’t reading their comments.

Some of them do…

Yesterday, I stumbled upon a website where the owner dedicated a post to the amount of spam received on their site. I read the post and nodded, yep I can relate…

Bad Behavior has blocked 5493 access attempts in the last 7 days.

That’s the amount of spam, my Bad Behavior blocked on Celebrate Life. Naturally I receive a fair amount of spam since this site is allows Dofollow, CommentLuv, and Keywordluv. Additionally, I recently started promoting this site, so I’ve seen a surge in traffic. But if you’re post is spam, or links to a porn site. Sorry it won’t be published. This is a family friend site. My larger sites receive more…

You know what surprised me? As I continued to read the author’s post, I realized he was mocking  those who left comments on his site, say what? Sure enough… looking through the amount of comments he received, I noticed most of it was spam. In fact, this could be true with the majority of the posts I saw.  His site were overrun with junk comments.

I have no idea why he chose to accept all those spam comments, since it’s obvious he reads them. Perhaps he wanted a high comment count? That means nothing, if the comments left are junk. The quality of the comments left, would far outweigh the volume, right? In his case, I guess not… He really should check out Google’s post; hard facts about comment spam. A few years old, but it’s still relevant today.

I guess some of them actually do read their comments, they just don’t care.

With the numerous anti-spam plug ins available, regardless of what platform you’re using, why keep let publish those comments? It would appear that would send the wrong message of I don’t care about the types of comments that are left on my website.

I’ve been blogging since late 2004, and have had websites since oh about 1998? When it comes to blogging, I’d thought I saw it all; I guess I haven’t…

If you’re not monitoring your site(s) for spam, or personal attacks, why should I bother to comment?

Apr 09 0 comments
Technology

Apple: Help, my Mac is stuck at the Apple log on screen, what do I do?

Apple logo

Being greeted by a spinning circle (or the spinning circle of death as it’s often called) is not something you want to see when you’re attempting to log onto your Apple Mac.

A few days ago, that’s what welcomed me, when I attempted to log onto my 17″ MacBook Pro. Uh, yippee?

Fortunately, all I had to do was reset my MacBook Pro’s PRAM and NVRAM, and I was able to log onto my MacBook Pro computer

How do I  reset PRAM and NVRAM on a Mac

  1. Shut down your computer
  2. Find the keys Command — which is the  symbol, Option, P, and R
  3. Turn on your computer
  4. Immediately hold down the keys; Command, Option, P, and R
  5. Keep holding the keys down until the computer restarts, and you hear the startup chime
  6. That’s it, release the keys

Although my geek cred is Microsoft related. Over the years, I’ve received several Microsoft certifications.

However thanks to numerous Mac related books, and online research, my technical understanding of Macs has increased dramatically.

Apr 07 9 comments
Technology

Celebrate Life: Site updates; Dofollow, CommentLuv, & KeywordLuv installed

Do follow badge redheart

Celebrate Life, like many of my sites have been do follow since they were created. A simple way to know which sites are dofollow is by installing and addon. To make the process a bit easier, for those hunting for dofollow blogs, I’ve added a badge to my right-hand sidebar. Clicking the icon links to the post I wrote about dofollow…

Comment Luv

CommentLuv

CommentLuv is another wordpress plugin that’s been on all my sites since they were created. To increase the awareness, I also added a CommentLuv badge; CommentLuv enabled blogs allow users to link back to one of their posts when they leave a comment.

Here at Celebrate Life, you have the option of linking to one of your last ten posts. It’s an excellent plugin; my only wish is that more bloggers would use it on their sites. It doesn’t stop me from commenting on those who don’t use it, I feel CommentLuv is another way to reward your readers, and if they linked posts has an interesting title — perhaps encourage others that visit your site to stop by theirs site also — pure win!

Keyword comic

Keyword Luv

Earlier today, I installed keyword luv on Celebrate Life. I’ve been using this plugin since it was released in 2008, Stephen Cronin is the creator of the keywordluv WordPress Plugin. When it was released, I used it on several of my old sites. I’m not thrilled with people simply using keywords on my sites. Personal identity goes a long way in social networking, because of that, I normally won’t approve a comment that’s just keywords.

What’s great about Keyword Luv? It allows a person to leave their name and keyword; the only thing that will be linked is the keyword. Keyword Luv makes this possible by linking anything you add after the @ sign.

If I left a comment and signed my name as…

Opal @ Healthy Eating

The only words that would be linked are Healthy Eating.

Using appropriate keywords, is something I practiced even before I knew what ‘keywords’ were. In my mind, It looked more attractive when I used an accurate description when linking to a post or page.

Fast forward a few years later, and I learned the way I had been linking was the ‘correct way’… well if you want to try to bring more traffic to your site via search engines.

Will Keyword Luv increase website spam?

One of the arguments I’ve seen against Keyword Luv, and other WordPress addons that rewards its readers, is that you’ll receive in increase in spam. While this is true…  a knowledgeable website owner will have anti-spam plugins installed so this is a non issue. How much spam have you seen on this site? None, my anti-spam plug ins does a great job of blocking spam. Although Celebrate Life is small, I do receive a lot of spam because of what’s available here; Dofollow, CommentLuv, and now KeywordLuv.

Moving forward…

I don’t write too much about technology, but I’ll try to inject some of it here on Celebrate Life (now and again). There will be a few more changes to Celebrate Life, in the upcoming weeks, one of those changes will be a new WordPress theme.

I’d love to write more about keywords, but I’ll have to wrap up this post.

My daughter’s will awaken soon, and I really need to prepare breakfast; strawberry pancakes, hyperborean, and pineapple, blueberry, peach smoothie (we love delicious and healthy smoothies) is on the menu, and yes it’s all made from scratch.

For those itching to use keywords, by all means do so… just remember to include a name, and the keywords desired after the @ symbol.

Of course… the comment can’t be spam.  ;) There are sites that don’t monitor their comments. And it’s apparent, by the amount of spam that some of those sites receive. Well guess what, Celebrate Life isn’t one of them, I read all comments. As I posted before, spam never gets published — and on the off chance that it bypasses those filters, I will delete spam comments.

Apr 05 11 comments
Technology

Celebrate Life: Do follow; site statistics

Spam

If your site is dofollow, one of side effects you might encounter, is the increase in spam.

Here at Celebrate Life several comments, never get published.  I use a few anti-spam Word Press plugins on my sites.

The chance of a spammers comments actually slipping through my anti-spam trap is very slim, and since I actually read each comment, I’d delete those that were published.

What is dofollow?

<a href="http://www.imcelebratinglife.com/" target="_blank" rel="dofollow">Celebrate Life</a>

Above, I’ve included the code that makes a link ‘dofollow‘ .

Making links dofollow enables search engines to follow whatever link your site has linked to, which can be helpful since the special markup language used tells search engines they can follow a link.

Not as important for those who aren’t looking for traffic, or ways to increase their page rank, but dofollow links are (normally) welcome by those who are trying to achieve that, as long it’s the right type of links…

That’s the main reason you’ll see dofollow on my sites, I like to reward my readers and do it in a few ways; Dofollow, Top commentators plug in, and CommentLuv.

If you’re a WordPress user, there are numerous plugins available to make this automated. I use NoFollow free on this site.

Normal link – No follow

<a href="http://www.imcelebratinglife.com/" target="_blank">Celebrate Life</a>

Since Nofollow is the default code, it’ll be found on the majority of sites a person visits. With nofollow sites, search engines won’t follow places you’ve linked to on your site, and why would they? You haven’t given them the ‘ok’ to follow the links you’ve linked too. Remember a special code is needed if you want search engines bots to follow them.

Do follow badge redheart

Do follow or nofollow, which one should I use?

Both types of links are good. However, dofollow links give the most benefits since it brings human traffic and SEO (search engine optimization) traffic to your site, SEO improves your sites online presence in search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.,). Nofollow links only bring human traffic.

People linking to your site within their posts are one way to bring traffic to your site, another way is to leave thoughtful comments with a link back to your site, so people know where to visit.

On commenting…

It takes time to comment, and so you don’t see me doing too much of that. However when I do, I stay on topic, and add to the conversation.  If you’re the copy/paste commentator, sorry that doesn’t fly here at Celebrate Life, and I’ll delete your comment. What I’m interested in is real conversation. It doesn’t bother me if people are commenting just to get a link back to their site; leave a real message, be part of the conversation.

Celebrate Life Bounce Rate 04 05 12

Site Performance

Although I haven’t been active on Celebrate Life, the basic principles that I use elsewhere were applied here. Why? I didn’t want too much of a headache to deal with, once I came out of hibernation.

Web stats at Celebrate Life are continuing to improve, my bounce rate is still low, 12.75%, and the amount of new visitors is increasing. I’ve had Google Analytics installed on this site since its creation, but it’s something I haven’t actively tracked until now.

Online success isn’t foreign to me, and it’s something I’ve been successful with on my business sites. Granted, the type of ‘success’ I’m striving for here, will be different, but they way I’ll achieve it, will be similar.

Photo Source: Vince Lamb

Mar 03 4 comments
Technology

How do I disable right-click on images?

Earlier today, I posted ways you could get around people stealing your images. That post was focused on code that could be added to prevent users pinning your images to Pinterest.

Users that don’t want to mess around with their themes, can always install the NoPin WordPress Plugin created by Shawn Hooper. It can also be found on the WordPress Addon site; NoPin WordPress Plugin.

Interestingly enough, the script that Pinterest provided doesn’t seem to work with all WordPress themes. With some of the themes, I was still able to copy to Pinterest without an issues. A bit of research, and it seems that it might not work in some themes.

So… how are you going to keep people from copying your images? One workaround is disabling right click on your images. For a free dhtml script, I used the disable right click on images code, that’s located at Dynamic Drive.

How do I disable right click on my WordPress site?

  1. Click on Appearance tab
  2. Click on Editor
  3. Click on Footer (footer.php)
  4. Insert the code, listed below, on the line right above the </body> tag
<script language="JavaScript1.2">

/*
Disable right click script II (on images)- By
Dynamicdrive.com
For full source, Terms of service, and
100s DTHML scripts
Visit http://www.dynamicdrive.com
*/

var clickmessage="Right click disabled on images!"

function disableclick(e) {
if (document.all) {
if (event.button==2||event.button==3) {
if (event.srcElement.tagName=="IMG"){
alert(clickmessage);
return false;
}
}
}
else if (document.layers) {
if (e.which == 3) {
alert(clickmessage);
return false;
}
}
else if (document.getElementById){
if (e.which==3&&e.target.tagName=="IMG"){
alert(clickmessage)
return false
}
}
}

function associateimages(){
for(i=0;i<document.images.length;i++)
document.images[i].onmousedown=disableclick;
}

if (document.all)
document.onmousedown=disableclick
else if (document.getElementById)
document.onmouseup=disableclick
else if (document.layers)
associateimages()
</script>

For those that don’t want to install the above code, you can always pick up a wordpress addon that disables right clicking images; no right click plugin.

I’ve checked out both the code, and the plin in. Thus far, both have worked with various themes (10 thus far) that I’ve tried.

Because right click has been disabled, most users who use sites such as Pinterest, won’t be able to right click your image and pin on their board. It won’t stop all the copying, but it will decrease the amount that’s copied without permission. As mentioned in the post, how to disable our images from being pinned to Pinterest, a technically advanced user will still be able to copy your images.

 

 

 

Mar 03 11 comments
Technology

Pinterest: Can WordPress users prevent their images from being pinned to Pinterest?

 

Pinterest has become increasingly popular for many internet users, it gives the user a way to pin items of interest, and can generate additional traffic to the site where the images were found.

However, there are some that aren’t thrilled about this new service. The obvious reason, is the complete disregard (knowingly or unknowingly) that some users go about pinning copyrighted material. Not every site wants their images copied. It’s always a good idea, to read the websites copyright policy before you pin. In doing so, you avoid being sued if a website owner decided to come after you for stealing their original work.

I used Pinterest, briefly, but grew weary of tracking down to make sure what I was repinning wasn’t in violation of the original owners copyright. From my own observation, I’ve seen many users pinning images that weren’t supposed to be copied.

One way to avoid items being pinned, is by implementing a simple code into your header tag.

<meta name=”pinterest” content=”nopin” />

According to Pinterest, if you install the above code to your site a Pinterest user will receive the following message.

This site doesn’t allow pinning to Pinterest. Please contact the owner with any questions. Thanks for visiting!”

Oh by the way, the meta tag information, can be found in the Pinterest Help section under Linking to your Blog or Website.

Pinterest LogoRed

Pinterest: How can WordPress users block their images being pinned to Pinterest?

  1. Click on Appearance tab
  2. Click on Editor
  3. Click on Header (header.php)
  4. Insert the code listed below on the line immediately after the <head> tag.
  5. <meta name=”pinterest” content=”nopin” />

WordPress Plugin that blocks Pinterest users from copying my images

Users that don’t want to mess around with their themes, can always install the NoPin WordPress Plugin created by Shawn Hooper. It can also be found on the WordPress Addon site; NoPin WordPress Plugin.

Will it stop all pins? I’m sure someone might find a way around it, but it will decrease some of it. Additionally, it’s a good idea to watermark all your copyrighted photos.

Edited to add WordPress Plugin information.

Photo Source: Pinterest

 

Jan 19 13 comments
Technology

MegaUpload shut down; Day after websites went dark to protest SOPA/PiPA

Behind bars

I find it interesting that the day after many websites went dark to protest SOPA/PIPA that MegaUpload was shut down. MegaUpload, for those of you who don’t know, is one of the largest file sharing sites available. It’s based in Hong Kong, and has been around since 2005.

According to TorrentFreak, it was shut down by the US federal prosecutors in Virginia. I have to admit this has me a bit confused, since MegaTorrent is a legitimate file sharing site.

The Justice Department’s website states this about MegaUpload...

WASHINGTON – Seven individuals and two corporations have been charged in the United States with running an international organized criminal enterprise allegedly responsible for massive worldwide online piracy of numerous types of copyrighted works, through Megaupload.com and other related sites, generating more than $175 million in criminal proceeds and causing more than half a billion dollars in harm to copyright owners, the U.S. Justice Department and FBI announced today.

This action is among the largest criminal copyright cases ever brought by the United States and directly targets the misuse of a public content storage and distribution site to commit and facilitate intellectual property crime.

The full indictment regarding the MegaUpload shut down, can be read at Scribd.com. To be honest, I’m a bit puzzled by the entire ordeal. I know they used the DMCA notice for people wanting to download files… If the allegations are true, I’m guessing some people were sharing copyrighted material and this is why it’s being shut down? I’ve seen similar things happen on Youtube, where copyrighted material has slipped through, but once it’s found YouTube removes it.

I’ve known about MegaUpload for a few years, and so I’ll be following this story closely.

Photo Source: My Side of the Story

Jan 19 3 comments
Technology

What is SOPA and PIPA? How it could this bill change your internet experience (if passed).

As mentioned, I participated in the internet blackout on all my sites on Wednesday, 01/18/12.

The good news is that 25 senators are now against the bill. Naturally this is great news, but is something to keep a close eye on to make sure that these bills aren’t tacked on to other bills.

If you’re not sure what the SOPA and PIPA are abut, please check out the video, which is 11 minutes and 15 seconds, below. Thus far, this is the best video I’ve seen about these two bills, and I’d encourage you to watch it — if you haven’t already.

Jan 17 3 comments
Technology

SOPA/PIPA: Going Dark on Wednesday, 01/18/12

Zappy censored 300x300

As you travel the net, tomorrow, you might notice that some of your favorite websites are inaccessible.

The reason is simple, some websites are Going Dark, to protest Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and Protect IP Act (PIPA). I’ve read about these two bills last year, and over the past few months the outrage amongst those not wishing to be silenced has picked up momentum.

Although written about a month ago, 1st Webdesigner Foundation has written a great article about SOPA/PIPA and how it can affect you.

Several of the big name tech companies like Wikipedia, Boing Boing, Reddit, and Google are joining in the protest…

“Like many businesses, entrepreneurs, and Web users, we oppose these bills because there are smart, targeted ways to shut down foreign rogue Web sites without asking American companies to censor the Internet,” a Google representative said. “So tomorrow we will be joining many other tech companies to highlight this issue on our U.S. home page.”

In response to questions about how the protest link would be displayed on the page, all Google would say is that the link would not replace the company logo.

The White House has spoke out against SOPA

Right now, Congress is debating a few pieces of legislation concerning the very real issue of online piracy, including the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), the PROTECT IP Act and the Online Protection and Digital ENforcement Act (OPEN). We want to take this opportunity to tell you what the Administration will support—and what we will not support. Any effective legislation should reflect a wide range of stakeholders, including everyone from content creators to the engineers that build and maintain the infrastructure of the Internet.

While we believe that online piracy by foreign websites is a serious problem that requires a serious legislative response, we will not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet.

Any effort to combat online piracy must guard against the risk of online censorship of lawful activity and must not inhibit innovation by our dynamic businesses large and small.

Last week, I read about a protest that’s been scheduled for Wednesday, 01/18/12. Perhaps some of the politicians who’re trying to pass this bill don’t  care too much about some websites going dark. I do believe some of them will care if their constituents start calling them complaining about the bill that they read about online, and so I’ll be participating. Go Dark, is the Word Press Plugin I’ll be using to join the protest against SOPA/PIPA.

References

  1. CNET: Google will protest SOPA using popular homepage
  2. The White House: We the People
  3. ABC news: ‘Wikipedia Blackout’, SOPA and PIPA explained

Photo Source: XBMC