Alphablogs

The blogging world is an anglocentric world. If it’s not written in English, who cares? I have to admit that most of the time, I fall into this trap, too. Of course, this hardly makes us global.

Since I am also fluent in Spanish and German, I thought I should look at non-English blogs once in a while.

So today I made a foray into German blogs.According to Blog Frog Days, Else Buschheuer is the longest-writing German blogger. Her entries are very personal. And she knows how to write, viz:

the day drips through my fingers like mustard.
on my home floor: chaos spreads.
intellectual nature calls and i refuse.
we know about four questions by kant:
what can i know?
what should i do?
what may i hope?
what is man?
what we do not know is whether kant liked broiled chicken.

on a … what do you call it? “fun” web site … i just found a picture that makes me very, very hungry and which gives me a feeling for why i like broiled chicken so much.

She knows how to write because she’s a writer – and also puts words together about movies, after a friendly, light, interesting fashion, here at Westropolis.

BlogFrogDays itself is not bad, written by “a chronically underfinanced problem citizen with yet more shortcomings: presentable but unadapted and unconventional”. The category with the most entries is “citizen stupefaction.”

Another site I liked is Viralmythen (viral myths) by Benedikt Köhler. He’s a “hard blogging scientist” and this is his manifesto:

1. I believe that science is about freedom of speech.
2. I can identify myself with the science I do.
3. I am able to communicate my thoughts and ideas to the public.
4. I use a blog as a research tool. That means in particular, that I
- express my thoughts,
- get in contact with others,
- have a sketch of my process online,
- get feedback and new ideas from others.
5. I trust myself.
6. I surf a lot and I read a lot.
7. I blog once in a day/week/month.
8. I give comments once in a day/week/month on other blogs.
9. I am self-aware and critical.
10. I refer to the people who done the work first.
11. I give love and respect to the people.

I like that. And I like his posts, for example this sad article on the horrible image problem suffered by the academic discipline of sociology (apparently only 8% of the population thinks sociology is a science).

The rest? Well … there’s Robert Basic, one of the biggest German bloggers, a sort of Yugoslavian-born, German speaking Chris Pirillo. I think I’m going to stick with Chris for now.

My home town’s major newspaper, Munich’s Sueddeutsche Zeitung, did a “best German blog” survey a little while ago. The winner? Riesenmaschine (“gigantic machine”). Didn’t do very much for me – just one story after another about brands.

Spending a bit of time rooting around in Technorati, most blogs I found had a rating below 100. Only one had a high ranking, a difficult-to-navigate blog about street art. (I couldn’t even figure out the name of the blog) Too bad – I would have liked to see some interesting graffiti but what I saw at first glance didn’t impress me. After trying to find something interesting for a while, I just found it too frustrating to spend time there.

There were a whole bunch more, none of them worth a mention.

Now what? Is Germany still in its blogging infancy? Except for the first three, did I land on the wrong pages, simply by accident? Why is there only one that I’m looking forward to reading more about? Is my interest totally conditioned to English-speaking blogs and I can’t see the merit of blogs written in other languages?

Perhaps the same thing would have happened had I randomly dug into the English-speaking blogosphere.

Any thoughts? What do you think, Maktaaq, Jan, Geert and Raul? What non-English speaking blogs do you read?

Usually, we don’t write about crime here at Alphablogs. However, I just found this intriguing story in the Austrian news, (thanks to my Twitter friend Lotree) and noticed that no-one in the English speaking blogosphere had talked about it yet so I thought I’d translate it.

A Haiku renewed hopes to find the killer of 19-year-old Austrian Ulrike Reistenhofer, who was murdered on August 9, 1998. However, the poet could not be found.

According to psychologist Alfred Endl, the person who wrote the Haiku is directly or indirectly connected to the killing. In 2006, Austrian media reported the poem. Soon after, internet users contacted them to inform them that they had seen that poem at a memorial, signed by “serial killer”, as far back as 2003.

The police’s hoped were fanned. They attempted to determine via the ISP (internet service provider) address who had posted the Haiku – it was possible that the killer her or himself had put down the Haiku at the memorial and posted it to the internet.

Unfortunately, this is where the investigation ended – with the internet provider. In 2006, there was no law that the activities of internet users had to be recorded and stored with internet service providers for a specified amount of time.

The case remains cold.

(Image by John Drinkwater)

It’s April 8 and it’s time for Canada 9-5, the showcase for Canadian Business Blogs and generally, Canadian blogs that talk about work. We’re happy to report, by the way, that when googling for “Canadian Business Blogs”, Canada 9-5 shows up on first place!

Blogging is still new for most business owners. The ones you see here are pioneers. And here they are:

Life and Business Coaching For Women
Self-Care Enchantments
Zoey Ryan is a “Coach . Catalyst. Shakti Sage” right here in Vancouver. She helps women become POW – Positively Outrageous Women. Her series of “Inrageous/Outrageous Self-Care Enchantments” include

1. “Let go; let yourself be absorbed by life itself”. Practice living in the moment and for this week, suspend planning, goal setting and striving and simply float on your inner tube down the “river of life”
And/or
2. “Un-do, break down, mix it up”. Do something totally uncharacteristic this week!
3. “Expect breakthroughs to look like breakdowns”!

Library Blog
A Librarian Talks About Twitter
On Twitter, Connie Crosby uses what she calls “guerilla librarianship” – she nudges people towards library services who might not otherwise think of them. She sometimes answers questions as if they were reference questions, and also promotes critical thinking about web sources–all the while pointing out in the public forum of Twitter how librarians can help.

Real Estate in BC
Healthy Cities
Vancouver realtor Matthew Collinge talks about an award that says Vancouver is Canada’s healthiest city:

To come up with their findings they looked at 16 different areas of health and “went beyond the typical mortality stats to measure the comprehensiveness of smoking bans, the availability of OB/GYNs and mammography, and other issues uniquely important to Canadian women.” We even did well for number of available doctors.

Vancouver News
Car Insurance Fraud
EZ Vancouver is the blog by Vancouver web developer Frederic Desjardines. He frolicks all over the place, with themes that include Vancouver news, technology, futurism, oddities, gadgets, privacy, Disney and politics. Talk about eclectic! Among Vancouver / BC news, he dishes up the story of our car insurance company scandal: Fraud: ICBC Managers keep good cars while selling you the crappy ones.

Canadian Beauty
MTV and Body Shop Pair Up For Aids
Canadian Beauty talks about beauty trends as they move from the runway to the street and vice versa.

MTV and The Body Shop have paired up yet again to create a product that’s original and the proceeds of which will benefit AIDS prevention. Remember last year? They made that perfume in a pink bottle; this year it’s a lip butter.

Marketing
Apple’s Design Principles
Canuckflack is a blog about marketing and public relations, but really doesn’t follow a lot of “inside baseball” themes. Instead, you’ll find thoughts, snippets and blurbs on PR, marketing, corporate communications, retail, promotion, crisis communications and media relations. Colin McKay works in communications for the Government of Canada in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Here, Colin praises Apple’s design principles:

Take a look Apple provides for developers working on the iPhone, like Principles and Guidelines for Creating Great iPhone Content:
As you design the flow of your content and its user interface, follow these guidelines to build in simplicity and ease of use:
· Make it obvious how to use your content.
· Avoid clutter, unused blank space, and busy backgrounds.
· Minimize required user input.
· Express essential information succinctly.
· Provide a fingertip-sized target area for all links and controls.
· Avoid unnecessary interactivity.

Sports
Using a blog to raise money
An interesting experiment: In Speedendurance.com Mission Statement, we find that a Vancouver, BC, based track team uses a blog to raise money for travel expenses towards Beijing 2008 and Vancouver-Whistler 2010.

The mission statement of Speedendurance.com is to provide athletes of all levels the information required to better themselves, legally and drug free. Ordinary folks trying to get in shape or lose a few pounds can also benefit from this site. Like a true Buddhist, we never turn anyone away from a lack of funds … All the information on this site is free of charge. In return, ads are in place to raise money.

Snow Angel Maker
Network Marketing
Yup, Rob Moshe bills himself, among others, as a snow angel maker. If you want to know what else he does, you’ll have to go here. In 8 Steps To Success In Network Marketing, he shares his thoughts on how to be successful in MLM despite all the many pitfalls – for example:

Ask a successful Direct Marketer how much of their down-line are family and closest friends, and you will find that none of the successful marketers have more than a handful if any. You will have to find prospects (read ‘people you don’t know’) or you wont build your business. I strongly recommend against annoying friends and family to get into any business, I am also against becoming a walking infomercial whenever someone comes within your two square feet. Think of the last five social gatherings you were at, other than network marketers, how many people tried to get you into their business? Unless you are a multimillionaire, I am going to guess none. Yes, you should have an Elevator Pitch, you should have the tools at hand to get a prospect interested in your business, but you should use it ONLY when you have a qualified prospect.

Self Improvement and Motivation
Frederic Premji offers Tips For Home Based Business Owners, for example this one that I know works really well:

No pajamas at this office! Even if you are working from home, dress the part of a business owner. Staying in your pajamas or dressing too casual will affect your behavior, trust me. It’s much more motivating to be dressed up well and feeling good. This is your business, your creation, so treat it with as much respect as possible. If you are dressed like success, your mind will follow soon enough.

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Okay folks, that’s it for this edition! Please submit your Canadian business blog here for the next edition on May 18. If you have or know of any interesting Canadian blogs that talk about work or business, send them in – you can use this form.

I’ve been meaning to set out more on Bridging Media but have been too busy until today. Thinking about it, I’ve been trying to analyze just what made this event on March 29th such a success? Not only the hard work of the organizing team and the vision of the two founders, Erica Hargreave and Megan Cole, but also the willingness of the panelists to open up to the group and the easy interaction between the panelists and the audience. The setup in the round helped a lot, so it was more like sharing a conversation between panelists rather than having a linear group each taking a turn to show and tell.

Also, from start to finish this was a rapid and effective free community event. The concept came into reality very quickly - and this includes panelists, equipment, sponsors, barbeque from the folks at Vera’s Burgers, remarkable real-time liveblogging documentation by Miss604 and Robert Ouimet’s full podcast of the proceedings that was made available the next morning.  With around 150 people registered from both the video production and interactive media communities, this was a terrific example of the kinds of open events that are making a difference now in all fields.

I’m proud to announce that I was one of the winners in the social media mega project we’ve been talking about here in the last few months.

And because it’s Friday today, I’m going to donate the $25 straight to the Frozen Pea Fund to help the world get rid of cancer.

Here are all the contributors to the project:

Facebook

HOST: Ina from InspiringWear

• Gobala Krishnan from Easy World Press wrote about Getting Blog Traffic From Your Facebook Profile
• Simon from Yeepage.com shares his view of Top 9 Facebook Applications
• Jacob Share from JobMob offers us his article-review I’m on Facebook - Now what?
• Jeremy Lim from Marketing Ruined My Live brings us a very interesting, youthful, point of view in Facebook Ruined My(Social) Life
• We even got a contribution in Spanish - Cómo hago para estar en contacto con mis amigos? Facebook!
• in the latest issue of “Oprah Magazine” there was an article on Facebook as well You’veBeenPoked! by By Liesl Schillinger

Social Photography
HOST: Brian from Epic Edits Weblog

• In Social Media as I See It an amateur photographer pays her gratitude to one of the most popular photography sites, strobist.com, that managed to take the blog to the next level and turn it into a community of passionate photographers.
• In his contribution Blog Writing Project Iain confessed that Flickr gives him angst at first, but then realized that in reality it gives him “an opportunity, and maybe in time, inspiration”.
• Read Utilizing Flickr as a Photoblogging Tool to find out how to use Flickr as a blogging tool.
• Help me Flickr! I want to be a better photographer! is a must read post on how to get the most out of Flickr and improve your photography skills.
• Brian wrote an excellent guide on using photophlow: A Social Experience for Flickr Photographers.
• Twist & shout! is about another social photography site called Shutterchance.
• Virtual community becoming real is just one example of many how virtual friends and social networks are transcended to the real world.
• In the article Flickr is the key to my social photography experience Lilahpops recounts how Flickr helped to become the active member of this photosharing community.
• Audee warns us about Things to Consider Before You Join a Flickr Pool

StumbleUpon, MySpace and YouTube
Karen Zara from a1-fan-fun

• Steven Snell suggests Promoting Older Posts With Social Media
• Tibi Puiu gives us A Guide to StumbleUpon: Understanding and Beating The System
• Simon shares his personal experience in StumbleUpon: My Story So Far
• Tejvan Pettinger reveals Why StumbleUpon is Better Than Digg
• Isabella Mori shares her StumbleUpon finds on Frozen Pea Friday: Breast Cancer Info on StumbleUpon
• Karen Zara has also written her views on StumbleUpon, Networking At MySpace and Silent Interaction With YouTube Users.

Twitter
HOST: Yours Truly at ChangeTherapy

• Carol from Alphablogs has posted a valuable find - Lee Lefevre’s great video on Twitter.
• Rhett ponders about our lives on Twitter with 140 characters or less.
• Karen talks about why Twitter may not be for everyone.
• Glenda thinks Twitter is much more than instant messaging. it’s about building community.
• Simon on yeepage has a mini-series on Twitter with a step by step approach on all you need to learn about this social network.
• Gregg has written his post about Twitter on yet another microblog, Tumblr.
• Sameer has written about Twitter stats and many other twitter-related posts.

Digg and Reddit
HOST: Vivien from InspirationBit

• How To benefit from Digg by Tejvan Pettinger. Broken up in 13 easy-to-follow steps, Tejvan shares his observations on how to prepare your site for Digg. Afterwards he followed up this post with another article, which is questioning and reflecting on
  Is it worth Trying to Get On Digg?
• How To Get Onto Digg’s Front Page in 8 steps by Jacob Cass. Ever wondered what are the sure-fire techniques on reaching that coveted #1 spot on Digg? Jacob will not only share the secrets but also will make you laugh.
• Experience with Digg by Dexter. This is one of those no-luck-with-Digg-whatsoever articles which actually tell the truth about this social networking site.
• I’m Really Not a Digg Fan by Karen Zara.
  Now you too can join Digg’s NoFan Club, just head over to Karen’s post and share your reasons for not being Digg’s fan in the comments.
• Redditers – What They Tend to Do? by A u d e e. If you’re like me and still didn’t quite figure out how Reddit works and how to tackle that site, be sure to check Audee’s article.
• Can You Dig Digg?, where I contemplate about 8 things that I especially don’t understand about Digg and the obsession with it.

Technorati
HOST: Monica Hamburg

• Simon addressed the purpose of Technorati and how it works.
• In another post Simon shares tips on How to improve your Technorati ranking
• Kriz Cpec contributed his Secrets of Using Blogorati
• Monica has also posted responses to her Facebook query, so be sure to read the results on how bloggers use Technorati.

Sphinn
HOST: Simonne from AllTipsAndTricks

• If you’ve never succeeded with Sphinn, be sure to read Simon’s advise on How to reach the front Page in Sphinn
• Karen Zara briefs us with some Quick Notes On Sphinn
• Simonne gives us an honest and eye-opening review of what goes behind the scenes of Sphinn’s community.

LinkedIn
HOST: Yours Truly

• Simonne contemplates about Why LinkedIn And Pen Names Don’t Go Well Together
• Jacob has put together Gigantic Tips Guide for Finding Jobs With LinkedIn
• And Isabella has collected interesting LinkedIn Stories from her fellow bloggers.

Del.icio.us
HOST: Aaron Stroud from On Financial Success

• Simon from yeepage.com shares his Tips on how to use del.icio.us
• Simonne explains why she likes del.icio.us so much in her article They Used To Call It Social Bookmarking
• Karen goes as far as claiming that Del.icio.us Is The Best, so read to find out why.
• Jacob provides us with the Success Checklist To Hit #1 on del.icio.us
• Ronald teaches us how to Share Your del.icio.us Links With WordPress.

Squidoo, Mixx
HOST: Pearl from Interesting Observations.

• Lauren teaches us all there is to know on how to Use Squidoo to Drive Traffic and Make Money.
• Karen shares her Mixed Views on Mixx

Comparative Analysis of several Social Media sites
I’ve decided to list the following four articles separately since they cover various social networking sites:

• In Social Media In My Way Tibor Radványi shares tips on several social photography sites, such as Flickr, photographyVoter.com, Jumpcut and Animoto, Propeller and Squidoo.
• Socializing is about social media sites like Flickr, photographyvoter.com, stumbleupon, technorati.
• What is the best social media website? Digg, SU, Delicious, Reddit?, by Jacob Cass
• In my interview with a local enterpreneur, Social Media as a New Way of Doing Business, Rastin shares his experience with Flickr, Facebook and LinkedIn.