I also got a netbook for Christmas. The next thing for me to do is to try and tether it with the Blackberry. Then, I should have everything I need to blog from just about anywhere. I’m sure my wife will just love that! LOL

One option is to implement a comment policy that clearly states that comments where keywords are used in names, or links provided to certain sites will not be approved. While this is a sure-fire way to curb the spam that gets through, I have no doubt that it will also adversely affect the level of activity that I have come to appreciate.

The other option is to do nothing, allow all decent comments through, because people may be willing to provide a quality response, but want something in return. Since I already use the dofollow, CommentLuv and Top Commentators plugins, I am not opposed to providing incentive for visitors to contribute.

While I believe the most effective tool against spam is moderation, some sites like BlogHerald.com do not use it and have a comment policy similar to my own existing spam prevention philosophy where comments are censored or deleted if they are abusive, off-topic, contain ad-hominem attacks, promote hate of any kind, use excessive foul language, or is blatantly spam.

As expected, ProBlogger.com has a comment policy, but seems to be much less formal. It’s more of a narrative response than an outline of what’s acceptable, or not.

The AriWriter.com policy is similar (some parts are identical) to that of BlogHerald.com, but takes it a couple steps further by disallowing the use of handles and adding a legal disclaimer.

So, those are the obvious options, but what else can possibly be done? What does a fair yet effective comment policy allow? Or, am I overthinking this?

Important!

Google has recently taken over FeedBurner which means
your feed URL has changed. CommentLuv stores your
feed URL from the first time it sees your site so if
you are using Feedburner be sure to log in to
CommentLuv, go to the "claim your site" link in the
menu and enter your new feedburner URL in the field
marked "Feed URL"

This will fix any problems you may be experiencing
where the posts returned when you comment on
CommentLuv blogs aren't up to date. Once you update
your feed url to the new one then everything will go
back to normal.

Please be aware that the new site and back end script
are being developed this and next month so there may
be some intermittent access and responses while the
new server takes over from the old one.

Visit the link below to log in to CommentLuv and
update your feed url.
http://www.commentluv.com/settings

you can contact me any time by replying to this messge

Kind regards

Andy Bailey
http://www.commentluv.com

I guess I need to contact some blog aggregators like IpsoSacto.com and have them update the feed URL. I think the original one still works, but I wouldn’t be surprised if, at some point, it gets turned off.

Thanks to the Akismet plugin for WordPress, only one spam comment made it through to the queue. Akismet has successfully blocked over 1,300 pieces of spam in the past month. Take a look at these stats!

Looking into this further, I found that much of this spam was comming from 83.233.30.32, which is located in Sweden based on the WHOIS search I did on that IP address. I also contacted the two abuse email addresses on file. I’ll post an update if I get a response.

So, consider this a heads up – make sure you have Akismet installed. It’s easy to set up and to get a key, you only need to register on WordPress.com. Once you register, check your profile and copy/paste the key into the Akismet Configuration page.

Also, you may want to add 83.233.30.32 to your IP Deny Manager if you use cPanel, or whatever ban list your host provides. While I was at it, I banned the 194.8.75.* range as some of the spam was coming from there as well, but not nearly as much…

1. Affiliate Marketing – Some of the big networks in affiliate marketing include Commission Junction, Linkshare, ShareASale, among many others. Don’t fall into the trap of believing that you can throw up a page full of banners and generate an income. Having too many ads is a sure way to drive away your visitors. Tailor your ads to your posts and you can not only provide a service, but make more money than having random, un-related ads on your blog. For more information on affiliate marketing, I strongly suggest you join ABestWeb.
2. Paid Posting – There are several options available for bloggers who wish to get paid to post. One of which is the recently redesigned PayingPost.com which will, if approved, present opportunities to you that you can choose to accept and blog about. If your post meets the requirements, you can earn a few bucks per post. Keep in mind that your blog will need to be somewhat established first. What’s great about this option is that you can earn while doing something that you’d be doing anyway, blogging. If you wish to post an opportunity for bloggers, click here.
3. In-house Ad Sales – Many people overlook this option, opting only for affiliate ads or adsense for banner and link advertising. By offering site sponsorship directly (see 125×125 ads to the right and the advertising page), you can control the price, the ads and it can be a much more guaranteed form of income. Some advertisers can also help you by sponsoring, or providing prizes for contests. If you think it’s too hard, look into OpenX, formerly phpAdsNew, to serve the ads and PayPal to handle subscriptions. It can be fairly automated. If that’s still too hands-on, check out Bidvertiser and PerformancingAds.
4. Contextual CPC Ads – Contextual ads are those that display depending on the content of they page of your site on which they reside. There are many pros and cons of using Google Adsense (see sponsors ads to the left) or Yahoo! Publisher Network to serve contextual CPC (cost per click) ads. If done correctly, they can generate substantial revenue. But there are many marketers out there looking to swindle new bloggers out of their money by offering them the road to quick cash. Your success with contextual CPC advertising generally depends on the traffic to your blog, whether or not they have a high level of ad blindness, and the content of your blog.
5. Contextual Links – Rather than having CPC banners and ad blocks on your blog, you can have CPC links directly in your posts. These ads are usually set to appear differently (i.e. two underlines) so as to not confuse the visitor. Once the link is moused over, an ad bubble pops up. One such network is Kontera – you can run this in addition to Adsense and not be in breach of terms.

So, here is the list, in no particular order, though I did place the newer ones at the top.

1. Akismet – This comment spam prevention plugin, as you probably know, comes pre-installed with WordPress. The hangup for me in activating it is that you need a WordPress API key to use it. To get that, all you need to do is create an account on WordPress.com. If you have an account, you can find it in your Profile. I activated it yesterday and it’s already started blocking spam comments
2. Top Commentators Widget – This is becoming one of my favorite plugins. Top Commentators adds a widget to your sidebar that lists the visitors who have commented the most in whatever duration you select. You can also check here for a list of sites, sorted by PR, who use this plugin. By commenting on these sites, you can wind up on their front page with a link back to your site.
3. CommentLuv – This plugin is showing up more frequently as it’s a good way to provide value to people commenting on your blog. When a visitor comments, CommentLuv can pick up the last post(s) on their blog and provide a secondary link directly to that post. I am grateful for visitors who take the time to comment and this is a way to show my appreciation.
4. DoFollow – WordPress has NoFollow set by default and this plugin remedies that by removing it and allowing search engines to follow links in comments left by visitors. You’ll also notice that I’ve added a “U Comment I Follow” image to the left sidebar to show visitors that there is added benefit to posting comments on drivelocity.
5. Google XML Sitemaps – This plugin creates that sitemap and will help the top search engines index your blog better. While it is called Google XML Sitemaps, the XML-sitemap format was adopted by Yahoo, MSN and Ask.com.
6. Slashdigglicious – See the cute little icons below each blog entry? Those, if you’re not aware, are social bookmarking links to help promote the site. If you find something interesting, please click the icons and vote/add for that entry.
7. Viper’s Video Quicktags – This plugin easily lets me embed videos from YouTube, Google, etc. into my blog posts. Without this, I could only post links and that’s just not very fancy… To use it, you just click a button in the WYSIWYG editor and paste in the URL.
8. WP-ContactForm – I don’t like putting my email address out there for all the email address harvesting bots to come by and pick up, and it has built in security. Plus a contact form built into the site makes it easier for people to email you.
9. Yet Another Related Posts Plugin – This is a pretty impressive plugin that can crawl your post titles, content and tags and provide a list of related topics (if any) below each post. It can help people find other posts that are not otherwise easily found.
10. wp-cache – I’ve just installed this plugin, but I don’t need it just yet. If a post ever ends up on slashdot or digg, it will help to keep the site up. I hope. If you’re using shared hosting, there may be issues with symbolic links.

So, if you’d like to be listed and linked to in the right sidebar, start posting some comments! Keep in mind that comments are moderated and blatant spam will not make it through this human filter.

Here is the proposal to and acceptance by Max Kiesler and Emily Chang, two well known web designer/developers:

Maybe I’m old fashioned, but I think a proposal should be more personal and better thought out. I can only think that this will be something thelse people may regret later on in life. I understand that some women don’t want a big deal made, or may think of it as a mere formality, but what is the reasoning behind not doing this face to face? Even over the phone would be better than Twitter.

What do you think? Romantic? Regretable?

What is CommentLuv?

CommentLuv is a WordPress plugin that helps give incentive to visitors to post comments on your blog. Rather than simply giving them only one URL to their site, CommentLuv adds another option when someone posts a comment. You will now see that below the comment form a new checkbox that is pre-checked. Once you fill out the form, it will give you the option of selecting a post from your blog to display with that post’s title. It’s a way to give something back to the people who visit and comment on your blog, especially since NOFOLLOW is turned off.

Why register on CommentLuv.com?

Once you register yourself and verify that you are the owner of your blog on CommentLuv.com, you will have some added benefits. Specifically, you will have a wider selection of your blog posts to link to from a blog using the CommentLuv plugin.

I visit both of those sites almost daily, and I’ve noticed a major difference. The content (feeds) on IpsoSacto are updated more frequently and there are a lot more of them. I recall when RiverWrap started, it was doing well, looks better and seemed more promising, though pretty much identical in function. As I check the various categories on both sites, I see that RiverWrap is getting stagnant. There aren’t enough feeds to keep it moving and it takes me only a minute to find that there isn’t anything new worth reading. To be quite honest, I don’t find anything there that I don’t find on IpsoSacto.

So, kudos to IpsoSacto and to John Hughes who runs it! Thank you for including drivelocity. Keep up the good work.

RiverWrap, what happened? Why have my emails gone unanswered? Is Prosper Creative Media planning on continuing RiverWrap? Anyone?