10 blogging mistakes to avoid

Time to avoid the blogging mistake #1 as listed for top 10 (or wost 10?) by John Chow. Of the ones listed, I had never heard of John Chow. How about instead of that # 10, not reading Guy Kawasaki or .. well, keeping fresh and updating your ideas?

And as again, for some own input on the subject, and as continuation of 10 reasons why I've quit reading a blog - here what I could consider some of the worst things for blogging :

1. Being abandoned or giving the feel of being it. If it's about an interesting topic, and has some good content, maybe a look every now and then to check for updates, or maybe it gets to even bloglines or google reader but no new contents in months .. could make a nice graphic here for time per readers abandonment.
2. The God-attitude of writing. "I know everything about cars/digital photography/social networking/social media optimization/photoshop//macs/something else". Good - if you actually do know that much, how about making money out of it and working in that field? Blogging gives good options for a starter for getting good feedback, but if the years of bragging on how good one is is nothing more but confabulation made by just the author, then it may become suddenly boring.
3. Summarized the reasons for quitting reading : no original content, being supposed to like the blog and the topic, buzzwords, blogging about your kids in your work related blog when you are not a nurse, no sense of humor, too much posting or no new content...
4. Poor writing skills. When your language and expressions give the reader a headache, even if it's because of your f4sh10nabl3 sp3ll1ng, still. Let the writing take its time. Formulate the phrases when you know what you want to say.
5. Negativity. People that are negative attract negative things around their life - the life, the work, everything becomes dark and stale. If you don't like negativity, then maybe time to read something more positive than a blog where the constant topics are about how one's life sucks.
6. Not growing. When all your blogging for the past four years have been about one thing only, maybe it's time to add some more interests and write about them. Bruce Schneier doesn't think only about security issues, but also blogs about squids (on Fridays) and writes restaurant reviews. So why would anyone else have only one obsession or interest? Then at least add to your interests getting more interests. Ask your readers for ideas in what to become interested in.
7. Me, me, me. My camera, my opinions, my blog, my links. Me me me. Solution? Get a life, and get some online and offline friends and other interests than you yourself and you.
8. Liking and linking what everyone else does. Google and digg whoring. And just because the boingboing editors like Yasmina Tesanovic or ioerror then you like them just because ..
9. Being afraid of writing or other reasons for no content. It's ok to have as a part your del.icio.us links and quick links to the funny things that you find but add some original input too, at least once every few weeks.

That's 9 until there. What would be the 10th?
Sticking to default template?
Annoying amount of ads?
Using a certain hosting site?
Word is yours.

The gayest, straightest, sexiest - or just the most boring cars

There was somewhere a few days ago something about the most sexiest, straightest and gayest cars in the net. I had to rush so I forgot where I saw it so I tried to search it again...
So I found different versions.
You'd think they have something in common.

About-site's gay section lists these as the gayest cars of the year:
1) 2006 BMW 5 Series Sedan
2) 2006 Saab 9-5 Wagon
3) 2006 Kia Sorento
and lists after these in the top ten also 2006 Chevrolet Impala, 2006 Mini Cooper, 2006 Honda Element, 2006 Chrysler 300C, 2006 Pontiac G6, 2006 Subaru Outback (for the lesbian moving van), and the budget queeriest car, 2006 Ford Focus.

Straight sites name the gay cars a lot different. Finally I found the site I had seen the article too, gizmodo.
Personalbee and gizmodo both take the results of wheels24. So, the straight rich car magazine reading people in New Zealand think that these cars are gay:
1. Peugeot 207 (pictured above): 7155
2. BMW 3 Series Coupe: 3378
3. Jaguar XK: 2571
4. Honda Civic Hatch: 1776
5. Alfa Romeo 159: 1293
which, if we compare the list to what the gay review site had concluded shows NONE of the "gay" matches be the same. Maybe in this second list the gay was used as a synonym for not very nice design instead.

This wheels24 voted these as the most straight cars:
1. Audi RS4 (pictured above): 9824
2. Toyota Fortuner: 2629
3. Dodge Caliber: 1808
4. VW Jetta: 979
5. Lexus IS250: 936

And the sexiest rear-end votes:
1. Alfa Brera (pictured above): 6608
2. BMW Z4 Coupe: 5722
3. Opel Astra GTC: 2270
4. Renault Clio: 1071
5. Nissan Tiida: 505

There is something just plain wrong with these results.
First - there are no sexy cars in the sexy cars list. If they want to go voting for not so budget cars, why limit the results with any budget? Top sexiest cars rear-end list that doesn't contain Lamborghini Diablo, any Ferrari, old Fiat Cinquecento, Cadillacs from 1970s among others is just plain wrong.

Second - all these cars in the gayest and sexiest list of wheels24 are average looking. The straightest cars list is way boring - hopefully no one will boost their family valueness or straightness facade by choosing a car voted straight from the list. Volkswagen, Dodge, Toyota, Lexus.. meh. I would choose gladly any non-straight car over those.

Third - I could not vote for the gay cars since my gaydar isn't on the wave length of cars. Gay car would have to not look like a family car, and sure be with style and elegance. And it's not what you have but how you use it.. On my version of the straight cars list there would have to be SUVs, just because I can't imagine any gay driving a SUV ... so I leave my votes open.

What would your version of the gayest, straightest, and sexiest cars be? Please tell.

Ten reasons why I've quit reading a blog

Why is it so hard for people that consider themselves so professional and godlike?
To keep the topics separate that is. If a blog is about technology or gadgets or something specific, the last thing I want to read about regularly in that blog is about the author's kids, attempts to conceive, or any gross personal health issues for that matter.
There are a few blogs that I quit reading for that matter.

That made me analyze why I have quit reading blogs that I like, and the conclusions would be more or less as below.

1. The topic or topics blogged don't interest me any more. Maybe I was reading searching about something specific of for work or other reason my interest has expired. I found out what I needed to find out about a particular subject, so it is done now. I no longer care about a certain brand mobile phone details, Apple rumors, body hacks, transgender issues, or cooking. The topics have been replaced by something that interests me now.

2. The bloggercentric, godlike view of everything. I know everything, look, here are my professional views about everything. And after that know it all entry about how to improve ssh the god know it all blogger posts about his kids or what he ate. Did I already mention blogs about anything professional and kids don't mix?

3. Professional blogs that mix content of private life, such as their kids or reproductional status.

4. Blogs that don't have content. In this category there are a bunch of the digg whorers. Look what I found in the Internet, here is this cool link about this and that, here digg it, and here youtube. Umh, no. I tend to prefer the sources, so if I find the source, I may follow the source for a while, if there are no other interesting stories there I'll ignore that source, but most likely, the copy paste of 'look what I found in the internet' isn't going to keep me for a while if it's only purpose is getting dugg.

5. Blogs that I am supposed to like. Just because boingboing or tuaw authors, Bruce Schneier, or Guy Kawasaki or someone else regularly brings contents of a blog that they like does not me make any more interested in every topic they blog about. Just because it's about macs, it does not make it any more special than the 20,000 other blogs about macs out there.

6. Blogs of which the authors are not teens but blog teenager style. Includes examples of people who complain openly in the internet that they are in US illegally and try to get theur bride over .. needless to say, unless those blogs are very bad, they don't normally even get a second visit. If they are very bad, then it's a different story again, it may even become more entertaining than these too serious blogs. This would in some cases include those that have a really ugly layout or colors, but normally that deficit is bypassable using an RSS reader.

7. Blogs that repeat all the same buzzwords of the day and week they read. The US blogger that refused to give his video materials to police and got in trouble about that, the Jesus appearing in the cheese sandwich on ebay, all the special children doing their star wars kid dances in youtube and so on.

8. No sense of humor. I may take my job seriously, but there is no reason why I would take my private life without humor. Unfunny things don't generally interest me.

9. Over repeating the political, religious, or any ideological points of view about everything and all the time.

10. Blogs that update too often or too rarely. Updating the personal blog 20 times a day can be worse than when you update your personal blog once a month.


What does that leave?

Blogs that have fun content and no heavy material.
Blogs that are of the people who write on a way that I like.
Blogs of my friends - how was your day, what pissed you off today, what got you excited recently and how is your love life. It's way more likely to matter than your 'professional' views about everything and all the time.
Blogs that are of a specific matter, including kids. The blogs about kids and family life should be kept separate about the rest of the blogging topics - so I don't mind seeing every now and then how is little Lucy doing out there, as long as the Lucy posts are not in the middle of your technogodrambling.
Blogs that have information that matters to me. How to get something done that I don't bother to waste more time than every now and then read a post or two.
Blogs that contain good quality rants often enough.

This is a rare entry where I don't feel it to be appropriate to give examples of URLs of the offenders.