Just a small announcement for today. I’m in the process of re-branding the site and bring all the sides of my photography under the same umbrella. This, as expected, will also involve the renaming of the RSS feed.

So, while before you were getting the feed for this blog under the name “Words:irrational” (the name that originated this blog, at the time still not completely dedicated to photography), you will now get it under TZPlanet.com (or so I hope). All the links remain the same, including the RSS feed address.

The overall layout should not change much more and all the functionality remains the same (including the mobile version of the blog).

If by any chance things stop working for you, please let me know in the comments. Thanks for your patience.

Mobile-ready

Just a small update to the ever-connected people out there: This blog is now mobile compatible.

This means that if you have an iPhone, Blackberry, Windows Mobile phone/PDA, etc. and you use one of the regular mobile browsers, you’ll be able to access this blog without the normal layout problems that many sites have when displayed on mobile devices (hopefully).

So, give it a try and tell me if it’s working for you.

What about in portuguese?

This is something that I’ve been thinking about for some time, but since it involves more work I’ve been sort of putting it off. The site gets a few hits from portuguese-speaking countries and I was thinking it might be interesting to provide a translation to my articles (human one, not machine generated). So, if you live in a portuguese-speaking country and would like to see this site translated, please drop me a comment or an email. If I see some interest from you, I’ll do it.

Probably some of you might have already noticed, but if not here are a few changes that I’ve applied to the main site that hosts this blog and that works as a hub to my photography projects on the web:

On TZPlanet.com

A new splash image now links to several places: Fine Art Photography Gallery, Light:delirious (photoblog), PhotoNetCast (podcast) and Words:irrational (this blog).

On Words:irrational

Some functional changes happening mostly on the sidebar. It has been expanded and now includes links to my profiles around some of the "microblogging" and social networks. If you need to contact me, besides the already existent contact form, you can now check my online status both on Skype and MSN messenger and contact me directly through those platforms.

Fine Art Photography Gallery

For some time now I’ve been making some of my images available as fine art photo prints in limited signed-editions with some success, but mostly offline. It is now time to expand this side of the business online as a Fine Art Photography Gallery. In there you can see some of the images available for sale (with many more to be added in the next days) and order them directly.

If you like the work there and if you have some available ad space on your site that you’d like to try and monetize, associated with the gallery I’ve setup an affiliate program that gives members, to begin with, a 10% commission on any generated sale. The number of affiliates I’ll accept is limited so, if you’d like to participate, check the program and sign up now. If you need any information on this, I’ll be more than glad to answer any questions you may have.

As always, any feedback on these changes, what you like and don’t like, is very welcome.

At some time point during the next week I’ll be moving this site to a new server. Since this process will also involve a domain transfer to a new registrar, I don’t know if there will be any extended period of downtime. I hope not.

So, if you come to the site and the site isn’t here, you know the reason. I’ll try to minimize any disruption. Thanks for your patience.

It seems that the evolution of new media is leaning towards video.

With the availability of cheaper and cheaper bandwidth, internet video has become a major way to transmit information. And of course, it includes photography.

Introducing "On the Air"

With this in mind, I’ve created a channel where you can watch some of the videos I’ve found of interest for photographers. From beginners to more experienced artists, I believe you’ll find something there for you.

All you have to do is go to On the Air (link on the header). In there you’ll find an embedded display (powered by Mogulus) that is continuously showing these videos. If you want to have more selectivity, click on On Demand" and you’ll have access to the video list currently available.

So far, none of the videos on the list was created by me, but some are "in the making" and I’ll probably release them in the next weeks.

I’ll also be expanding this list as more and more interesting videos start to show up.

For now, sit back, grab a cup of coffee, relax, and enjoy photography.

I know that spammers see in blogs one of their main targets to achieve whatever it is they want to achieve, but is comment spamming the right way? Well, it seems that it is working or I would not see such waves of spam coming my way.

Fortunately Askimet catches most of it (with some still evading it and needing to be manually moderated).

What worries me the most is how many valid comments from my readers may have been caught also and forever banished to the internet waste dump. Yes, I could manually go through each and every one of them, but going through 100 to 200 daily comments trying to convince me that I need to see that latest porno or that a specific pill is exactly what I need to enlarge some parts of my body is not something that I look forward to.

If you have a blog, how bad is it for you? Are you getting this amount of daily garbage or was I singled out for comment torture?

How do you deal with comment spam on your blog?

In the beginning…

In the beginning, and my very first attempt at serious blogging, this blog was dedicated to more “personal discharges” than photography, although already inserted on my photography-related site (see the TLD for what I’m talking about) – and thus the name.

With time I saw myself writing more and more about photography than anything else and I decided to dedicate it exclusively to photography, with a focus on digital photography, and although the name might not make much sense, it stuck, and I think if for nothing else, it distinguishes it from the crowd.

On the visual side, the template this blog is using still came from those very early days, almost since I made it live (there was another but for a very shot period of time). It took me ages to adapt the original theme and customize it to what I needed.

The hunt restarts…

With growth, I’m starting to have the feeling that the current theme, although I still like it, is not enough to support the blog anymore. I need something that interacts more with the readers while, at the same time, un-clutters it and makes it more reader-friendly.

So, the hunt begins again…

I’m looking for a new theme. This time though, supported by a much more extensive knowledge of CSS and how a Content Management System like WordPress works, I hope to find one and customize it in a way that stays for a longer period of time.

So, this is where I need your help.

How would you like this site to look like? What are the main things that you think a blog dedicated to photography should have? A one sidebar layout or two? Bigger header? Bigger footer?

Tell me what you think. Help me in this process so that you can also enjoy it more. Or, is it good the way it is?

Share your thoughts on the comments bellow. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

For my feed readers, you probably need to pop around the site to take a look at how it is right now.

Thanks again for any help you may provide.

I was not happy with this setup since the meshing did not allow for full feeds for this blog. Also, some readers mentioned that they would rather have separate feeds since many have on the feed readers categories for photography blogs and photoblogs.

So, now they are separated.

If you were previously subscribed to the blog’s feed, and you wish to keep it that way, no need to change anything, the feed address is exactly the same. The only difference is that now you won’t get my photoblog updates through that feed.

If you wish to subscribe to the photoblog feed, just grab it using the photoblog feed icon on the sidebar.

Feed for the blog

Feed for the photoblog

I hope this improves the functionality of the site’s feeds.

It has been a long time since I had the opportunity to write something to my readers. Thank you for sticking with me.

The reason? It’s in that logo on the left…

I’ve been busy setting up a new online venture: the Digital-Folders Network, a new blogging network.

What can I tell you about the network? If you are really curious just go there and look around. The fast version is that it is a place to gather a number of blogs, dedicated to the most varied subjects, and like-minded people.

Belonging to a blogging network has a huge influence on traffic levels and of course makes it much easier to sell advertising spots on a blog. Also, due to the fact that all the blogs abide by certain standards and policies, the “neighbors” are sure to be good.

We intend to bring into the network new and established blogs alike with the aim to cover a wide range of subjects.

Again, this was the quick version of it all. For more details it’s worth it to visit the site.

The Digital-Folders Network is aggressively “recruiting” blogs and bloggers to its realm and advertising campaigns have started to intensify the exposure of the network and of the blogs involved.

If you are interested in creating a new blog or optionally integrating your existent blog into a dynamic network be sure to visit the Bloggers Needed page where you can find more details about the requirements and advantages as well as apply for a position.

Domain and hosting are provided for you. So, what are you waiting for? This blog is already there

Bare with me on this, ok?

I’ll edit this post as soon as all the major changes are finished.

EDIT: all the major changes should now be finished. From now on, just minor tweaking. Please report any bugs you may find. And I hope you enjoy the change.

To justify why these changes were made let’s just say that I hope the functionality of the site increases as well as the visual appealingness.

The first big change had to do with the front page (probably you have already noticed that). Visual links with content related images might prove more functional. And the looks got better…

Also, the previous “Reviews: blaspheme” site has migrated to “Words: blaspheme”. Since it was just a side site, and who’s main purpose can be fully achieved in “Words: blaspheme” there was no point in having more divisions.

These were the major changes… as for the small ones: If you get lost around or want to know just a little bit more about each individual pages just find the link to the “sitemap” and navigate from there to anywhere on the site; the “about” page was also updated to integrate these changes; the links page also saw an improve in layout and much more links are expected to join the crowd…
As always, I’d appreciate immensely if you could leave your comments on the changes of layout. It got better, worse, the same? More functional? As well as any other suggestions…

Now, I hope I can dedicate myself completely to content. After all, that’s all a site like this is about…

SPAM bots are getting smarter and smarter as lots of people are making money out of it… Of course they also have the ability to drive anyone crazy, and having to delete about 20 SPAM comments around the site every single day was making just that to me…

So, ASKIMET has the role of patrolling this entire site and taking care of those pesty comments offering replica rolexes or medical supplies…

Hopefully, those will be past.

On to another story, the site is changing more visibly day by day with some new features planned (yes, that is also one of the reasons you don’t see something new everyday, backstage work is still work)…

Please tell me if everything runs smoothly for you or not…

And as always, suggestions and comments (please don’t offer to enlarge my penis, I’m happy with it as is) are always welcome…

See you around…