Now, the fifth edition has made the change offline, and it’s a ‘real world’ edition – on Amazon.com!

About four times the size of the last edition, I’ve gone into detail on using WordPress, as well a many, many beginner topics: getting a domain name, choosing good hosting for your site, and more. Plus, I’ve updated it throughout for WordPress 3.

There’s much more inside the book – but enough talk – so head over to Amazon to check out “Top 10 Tricks to Conquer Your Niche With WordPress”.

RSS feed readers, for the uninitiated, make it easy to read RSS feeds, those text summaries of blogs, and simplify the task of reaching out and grabbing those text-only (mostly) blog summaries. Using one, it’s short work to review a goodly number of articles quickly.

In my case, the topic is timely: I’ve just updated FireFox to 3.6, and of course that means there’s all sort of plugin conflicts between my current ones and the newest Firefox.

I generally avoid upgrading and/or using a lot of plugins for just that reason (it’s also why I’m reluctant to use a lot of WordPress plugins, except my own, of course). However, one is mandatory – Sage, my trusty RSS reader.

However, in reading up about it, I also noticed a lot of other RSS readers – ones with different styles (in fact, I did a quick search on ‘best firefox rss reader’ and there seems to be a huge amount – although which one is best is inconclusive).

For example, Sage is very simple – click to open a side pane, and then click on feeds to load them in the main one. Very convenient to open/add files.

However, another popular one is News Fox, which open in a tri-pane window – feeds on left, site’s listings on the top right, and articles in the bottom right (much like an email client). It looks interesting…

However, I realize my ideal RSS feeder should:

• Work via FireFox, since I use it so much.
• Allow me to easily add feeds, ideally with a click (like Sage).
• Make it simple to segregate feeds, for when I want to browse feeds on a particular topic.

Not sure if anything like that is out there, or if Sage will do for now. Of course, I’d be willing to try another solution – if the benefits are well worth it. So I’m asking – what RSS feed reader do you use? Why do you like it? And what makes it ‘best of class’ for RSS feed readers (for FireFox or otherwise)?

It actually uses the content available from ALL the image sites out there, and gathers the details into one easy to use interface.

Traditionally, when you need an image, one source has been various photo sites with Creative Commons licenses. For example, browsing Flickr, you might see a photo that you can use if you attribute to the author.

However, while good in theory, there are problems: the vast amount of images out there, and no guarantee that everything you look at is available to use. Plus, the effort of wading through them all is oftentimes too much to go ahead an do it.

Enter EveryStiockPhoto, which bills itself as a search engine for photos. It searches the other sites for you, and gathers the images you can use on your sites (with appropriate licensing, such as attribution). Also, you can join and then help index the images by captioning each one.

The benefit is access to photos in one place, and a source of images suitable for your blog – like the purrfect image used here!

The February ActiveBlogging Report explains how this using site can help with your productivity, and also includes a collection of similar links to timesaving productivity tools and software.

The move, using an in-house compiler program, HopHop, takes the original PHP code and translates it to C++ code, with then can be compiled and run on the Web server as a program.

As another benefit, FaceBook has released the HipHop compiler as Open Source, meaning anyone can convert/compile their PHP code.

C++, a language that allows very fast low-level access to computer hardware, is traditionally preferred for fast programs. In contrast to PHP, C++ is however more difficult to learn and program. Using a compiler like HipHop marries the strengths of the two; PHP code for fast development, and then C++ for speed and performance.

One disadvantage of the resulting code is that it is less portable. Unlike PHP, which can be run on just about any web server, different processors need different C++ program formats, so the code will need to recompiled for every processor/Operating system it is run on.

Despite the disadvantages, a 50% speed improvement is no small thing for FaceBook – and with close to 1/2 billion members, it translates into a lot less servers needed to run all those pages..

So now that we can turn PHP into faster C++ code the next question comes up: will anyone compile WordPress for speed?

Actually, the full rule is no contextual competition – that is, no other ads on the page besides Adsense that changed based on the context of the page. So, you can place banners and static ads alongside Adsense all you want, but put an ad that that ‘adapts’ to the blog post – and you’re breaking Adsense rules.

However, that has changed. Adsense now allowed approved partners in the contextual advertising. The difference? They go through the Adsense network.

Details of the new contextual partner networking are on this Google page; however, looking over the list of partners, only one stood out for marketers – eBay.

What does this mean?

• Since Google will manage the ads, this potentially means a greater selection of ads in the same spot, with no extra input from you. Ideally, this means more income for you.
• If however, you already deal with these groups, then you’ll be served up ads with Google as the middleman, which potentially means LESS money for you on those networks.

As Google points out, you’re automatically entered in the ‘multiple ads network’. However, you should take a moment to check it over (in your Adsense account: Adsense Setup, Ad Review Center Tab). And pay attention to the networks showing on your site. While the list of potential advertisers shouldn’t conflict (unless you use Doubleclick or Neilsen, for example), the one to watch out for is eBay. If you have eBay ads on you site, and you see Google versions, this Adsense page is the place you go to not only monitor, but deactivate (filter) them.

Obviously, this change is good for Google; it increases the advertising content available to offer. And it can be good for us, since more ads likely means more targeted (and therefore more valuable) ads. However, it remains to be seen if it makes a huge difference. In the meantime, take a moment to familiarize yourself with the new Ad Network changes, and keep an eye on your revenues.

Yesterday however, I actually found Twitter useful in business. Here’s how: I received an email from Michael Hopkins of eBookTimes.com; in visiting the site, I saw his Twitter banner, clicked on it, and found out some of his posts. One of them, a discussion of eBooks, tied in well with one of my products on publishing info-reports (“Top 10 Tricks to WIN BIG With Your First Info-Product!“). Long story short, we got in contact, and there’s the chance of mutually-profitable business ahead (affiliate offer, JV, or what have you).

Now, let’s recap this heartwarming tale and break down how Twitter helped:

• I already had a PREEXISTING relationship with Michael. I had been receiving his emails for years, as a customer of his popup tool Dynamic Popup Generator.
• He got me to visit his site with his EMAIL. He mentioned a post and a product, I was interested, so I dropped by.
• While there, I saw his TWITTER BANNER. His icon for Twitter got my curiosity (as well as wondering what his account would be like), and so I clicked.
• He had INTERESTING TWEETS. From his tweets, I found a post on his blog, and went to his site.
• He LINKED TO HIS SITE. After all, the tweets were interesting to me because they linked to offers.
• We found COMMON GROUND on a product. There’s no guarantee anything will happen, but we ended up dialoging.

So, what does this mean for Twitter?

Go through the list above again – Michael worked hard for years to get my interest in his emails – and THAT was what took me the step farther into Twitter.

The Twitter account helped in connecting me to a post I would never have seen otherwise – but as this example shows, Twitter will never be a replacement for quality support and attention.

However, it IS an additional method of reaching visitors. I’d say the icon on his site was a huge factor to getting me over there, so if you are ‘a-twittering’, make sure the world knows about it.

Finally, make the tweets count – tell the world about your business topic (only). Start on target and people will know what to expect. For another theme (or site), start another Twitter stream.

So I’m almost convinced – Twitter has finally done something positive for me. Now if only I had something useful to Tweet about…