By Senior Editor Kris Smith (@croncast)

Today, as I am sure you have noticed, I'm short on my five blog posts a day by about . . . um, five. That is until now.

I've been down with a bug all day and feeling a little better thanks to a great post from Bruno Giussani on his blog Lunch Over IP. The post is titled, Tips for Conference Bloggers, and includes an incredibly insightful and well designed PDF cheat sheet.

His post from a little over two years ago holds strong today and is resonating with me enough to crank this post out. Timing is important in this case since we are beginning a new conference season with mega events like SXSW on the horizon.

I spent nearly the entire last week at CES and had my pride handed to me by this monster trade show/conference/press extravaganza. I was ill prepared for everything that the event would throw at me and approached it like an average conference. This is a mistake I won't repeat.

What I learned at CES was that there are two types of attendees: those doing business and those covering the event. Those in the first category are more concerned with parties, sales and future business relationships. Those in the latter are analyzing, comparing and framing the event for publication.

Publishing from CES is a formidable process. Most press covering the event have teams of people dedicated to gathering information and creating media needed for a final publications. This is a smart move for an event with over 100k attendees.

In addition to the excellent PDF from Giussani's post that addresses the 95% of the concerns of a blogger in 2010 there is 5% that could be added for the here and now. There are new event realities and technologies that can enhance his original thoughts.

1. MiFi is a must have for connectivity. This is especially important for Giussani's rule of blogging an even no later that 10 minutes after it has ended. Conferences don't as often have wifi available as they did back then except in a few locations like press or blogger lounges.

2. Photo/Video lighting gear. Get used to shooting in dark to minimal light and learning your cameras settings well. Check your first few shots or reel to view the quality and make corrections as needed. Much of this can be enhanced with lighting rigs that will allow you to get the shots you need when they happen . . . not when you are ready for them with white balance or aperture settings.

3. Backup workflow. You have a machine that you love and take every where with you, right? What happens when it goes down? Before the event or during you should have a backup plan for gear failure so that it doesn't destroy your workflow. Blogging an event can be difficult in the first place, but when the workflow you went into the even is disrupted it can be detrimental to timely coverage.

4. Speak to previous attendees of the events you are going to be covering. This falls under the guidelines on page 6 of the PDF of collaboration. However, this is a proactive measure before the conference begins so that you can understand what obstacles you might be up against.

5. When the authors recommend having fun, it shouldn't just be at the end of the day for parties or networking. It should be throughout the day. It is counterproductive to be worried during the day about connectivity, media fails or missed opportunities. If something happens that you're not happy with, put it in the back of your mind or write a note down for it and move on. Dwelling on something that you can't do over is to your detriment and that of your readers ro viewers.

Please head over to Bruno Giussani's blog and download the PDF that he has made available. Even if you're not blogging a conference or trade show, there is great value in these tips for any writer publishing to the web.

Image: Screen shot of the PDF cover (Bruno Giussani).

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How To: Conference Blogging is a post from: TechStartups.com

By Staff Writer John Federico (@gadgetboy)

There was a time when gadgets did one thing and one thing well maybe two and people were happy with that. Over the past few years, expectations on what an electronic device can do have skyrocketed and I believe the iPhone is to blame.

When the Amazon Kindle was released, it was a groundbreaking device. It delivered a reading experience that was extremely book-like with the bonus of a built-in wireless book store. Amazon made the mistake of adding an experimental web browser to the device along with access to wikipedia and group of other online services.

I say mistake because that browser incited geeks and technophiles everywhere to start complaining about the page rendering, the speed and the fact that the iPhone browser was so much better. Many bloggers and even digital media industry insiders decried that the connectivity was poor and really meant it was only good for reading your ebooks.

My response to this was twofold. First, it's an eBook Reader, people! That's what it was designed to do not make phone calls, browse the web or make julienne fries. Second, who wants to read eBooks or other long form content on an iPhone? The screen just isn't optimized for that type of experience. (Nerd Disclosure: I've since read some significant portions of some books on my iPhone so that my wife could use my Kindle. It wasn't terrible, but I still prefer my eReader.)

And the chatter continues: The Apple iTablet (if it's ever released) will kill the Kindle and all other eBook readers! Netbooks will kill the Kindle! The [insert gadget with a screen here] will do everything!

Today, I saw this post on Gizmodo about the possibility of eBook Readers having gaming capabilities.

Why? Is there a significant subset of the gaming community that loves books or avid readers who love games?

Just because a device can do something, doesn't necessarily mean it should.

I'm happpy with a certain amount of convergence when convergence make sense, but to integrate features and functions just because you can doesn't always make market sense.

Damn you, iPhone.

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How the iPhone Changed the Expectations of Gadget Consumers is a post from: TechStartups.com

By Senior Editor Kris Smith (@croncast)

Blogs.mu has been around for a while but I'd bet you haven't heard of it. I'd also bet that if you have heard of it that you forgot all about it. If you fall into this latter category then consider this a refresher about the easiest way to run a WordPress blog network without installing WPMU yourself.

For the uninitiated, WPMU stands for WordPress Multi-User. It is the same WordPress that you can download from their .org site except that it allows you to create unlimited blogs from one upload to a web server. It is powerful and built from the same code that runs WordPress.com. Though I highly doubt the out of the box ability to run millions of blogs form a single installation without countless hours of coding.

The folks at blogs.mu have come close to doing exactly that for the end user of their service. They have taken an off the shelf version of WPMU and spent the hours coding, hacking, theming and delivered it as a product that anyone can use with all the bells and whistles build in.

I've run a couple instances of WPMU over the years on my own servers and if I needed to run it again I would go about doing it on my own. However, I am a tech masochist that stubbornly decides that sub domains are the the best way to run these installs and then spends days hacking around Apache and other config files. Blogs.mu has taken care of all of this.

They have even taken care of themes, plugins and advanced user management for you. Believe me, this is a big deal when you want to run a network of blogs. Being able to manage bloggers, themes and plugins effectively can leave you more time to create editorial or your own blog posts.

Blogs.mu is a free' service but one that I would recommend that you pay for. Partially, because their business model and your ability to unlock some of the best tools depend on it. You can use their free version to get your feet wet and create a couple blogs to use as demos for the decision makers at your job or within your group of friends. Then upgrade to the paid version once you are comfortable and ready yourself to blog like a pro.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/0

Multiple Partner Blogs is a post from: TechStartups.com

By Senior Editor Kris Smith (@croncast)

One of the great speakers, or swimmers, from the Audience Conference was Melanie Notkin. She is the founder of Savvy Auntie. A website dedicated to the cool aunts, great aunts, great mothers and all women who love kids, with a special focus on those that don't have children themselves.

Before this event I hadn't ever come across the site and it was missing from the conversations that I have those that needed a good shave. The niche that Notkin built her site for was the driven career woman that loves her neices and nephews but, like her core demo, she had no idea who Dora, Diego or Yo Gaba Gaba were. She was missing a connection with the little ones that she loved dearly. She decided to fix this, not only for herself but for all women.

The site that Melanie Notkin launched, Savvy Auntie, is more of a portal than a traditional informational website. It allows users to enter channels for general information, activities, shopping and social. Each channel delivering a similar experience to the next while allowing the users to find there way back to a central point to try another channel.

General Information

This channel has information regarding nutrition, books. learning, health and more. Two interesting components of this channel are the Auntipedia and the Q&A section called Dear Savvy Auntie. The Auntipedia is, well, pretty much what the name implies. It is a knowledge base that can actually get an aunt up and running in the areas most pertinent to being a prime caregiver to the little ones.

Activities

This channel provides a ton of useful and engaging activities that can keep you on the go with the kids. From crafts all the way to family reunion activities there is something here for every type of auntie. It is such a robust list, I'll be coming back to it on my own as a bearded one with two kids of my own. I'll also be recommending it to my friends with children and without.

Shopping

That is pretty straight forward. However, the Savvy Auntie has a hook that you can't deny. It is brilliant and creative marketing that most bloggers couldn't pull off Savvy Auntie 2009 Coolest Toy Awards. With great graphic design and a clean user interface it is easy to see toys that will make you cool with the tiny set. My only gripe with this area of the site is that many functions are tab related and triggered with JavaScript interactions that don't allow for direct linking within the site or to these specific sections.

Social

I've seen this quite a bit more lately on the sites that I review. Social is becoming a larger part of sites as they try to become a destination for their faithful. In the past it was forum or comment based. Today, sites like Savvy Auntie are working to create a community of like-minded individuals that want to share their experiences as Aunties by Relation or Aunties by Choice.

These social components can be a huge success for creating loyalty and brand evangelists. They often need constant grooming but can pay huge dividends. From what I can see on Savvy Auntie, not only is it an active community but there are new sections of it under work that grooming component.

What I would love to see on Savvy Auntie is Facebook integration like StyleCaster. Holy smokes. I was effusive in my praise of StyleCaster for doing this and thing that with the power of the biggest social network behind the Savvy community it would be major growth area. One key to this growth being Facebook integration and the other being the ability to still host it on SavvyAuntie.com.

If you are looking for some inspiration on how to get a startup off the ground you need to look no further than Notkin's Savvy Auntie. This is how execution of a great idea gets done.

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Savvy Auntie For The Holidays is a post from: TechStartups.com

By Senior Editor Kris Smith (@croncast)

A piece ran this afternoon in the NY Times site about their hometown rival, The Wall Street Journal. The focus of this piece being that the WSJ is hiring roughly a dozen journalists to fill a local NYC bureau in a print media local build up.

The first engagements in what is becoming a fight for survival are happening in local markets. And in this battle of media titans, the WSJ and the NYT are set to square off over the streets of New York City.

The most intriguing element of this move by the WSJ isn't that they are broadening the scope of the news that they deliver to take on The Times but they are moving in a direction that local, independent bloggers have had their eyes on for some time.

It will be interesting to see what impact this has on the WSJ's circulation or web traffic. A mobile app for this new local channel could make this offering stronger.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/0

The Print Media Local Build Up is a post from: TechStartups.com

By Senior Editor Kris Smith (@croncast)

The future of local journalism was the topic for the most recent meeting of the Future of Local Media NYC group. The conversation though fell short of anything resembling a dialogue about the future of local journalism. It was another example of the turf war that is plaguing publishers today Bloggers vs. Journalists.

In usual fashion only one side was present to represent their viewpoint. In this case, bloggers. If there was a journalist in the room of about 50 attendees they went unnoticed due to silence. Which was warranted given the conflicted and at time antagonistic nature of the answers panelists were giving to questions.

The panel could have been titled the Future of Local Snark. If a journalist had challenged the prevailing wisdom in the room they would have left bloodied from the snark bites. Gems like, I won't hire a journalist. They can't write what we need. and my fav The papers rip off our stuff, were guarantees that guests on the panel would have delivered swift verbal jabs to any journo speaking out of turn.

When the moderator would try to loop them back to elaborate on their answer he was typically met with the same avoidance and flippant, We rock. They suck., response.

Maybe it was brewskis that some panelists were drinking before hand that elevated their disdain for the topic at hand? Maybe is was that they really didn't have anything to offer to such a topic? Maybe they just didn't care?

It doesn't matter what the real answer is. I will never get those two hours of my life back. Much of my own emotion about this stems from the fact that these bloggers are held up as the thought leaders by the community and groups because they have traffic. Big deal when it comes from photos of a rat stuck in a sidewalk.

The fact of the matter is that the chasm is widening between bloggers and journalists even as we are being pushed closer together by digital delivery and crumbling business models. Bloggers and journalists are now face to face competing for the same eyeballs. The equation goes like this: Eyeballs equal traffic and traffic equals the ad dollars that fund both sides. Also known as the page view model.

For now it is adequate for bloggers to create life-style companies and brands around themselves. At the same time, it is the same model and the reason that print publications are being shed by the media companies that own them. Something that the panel seemed to be woefully neglectful of.

I am picking on my own people here, the bloggers. So let me address journalists for a second.

I admire the fact that journalists have chosen a profession that is supposed to reward them for their talent and skills with the written word. I do. For many decades journalists have made a go of it from the hands of global fat cats and local gentry that have two agendas making money and spreading their views.

Journalists have been eager to distance themselves from bloggers by calling them unprofessional, hacks and much worse. I was stopped by a journalist that I spoke with in preparation for this piece when I mentioned that bloggers and journalists are now competing. Oh, no we aren't. A we rock, they suck response from the other side.

It was then my turn to remind her that Rome was burning and if their isn't some innovation in how content and the production of it is paid for, not only would they be out of their current gig but they would be unable to find another that doesn't rely on test of their manual dexterity skills.

I don't know with any certainty what the future holds for journalists or bloggers. I do know, however, that right now the lack of dialogue, dismissal and inaction while great media empires fall are making the future of media less predictable. It's kind of exciting.

This is the time when the participants on both sides have the rare opportunity to shape the models. There will be winners and losers in the race to shape the future of media. But if this snark continues from both sides we're all going to be losers and our daily news will consist of Willard Scott in a tutu making fart sounds and photos of rats stuck in sidewalks while bloggers and journalists, dressed as a marching band, are led by Bill Moyers and Lady Gaga.

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The Progeny of Neglect and Great Technology is a post from: TechStartups.com

By Senior Editor Kris Smith (@croncast)

This is my last feed post for a while. I swear.

That said, it might be the most important one that can help startups, bloggers and established media makers begin to deliver new and better experiences to users.

Check out the Kris is reading section of Croncast. Go and check it out, be quick. I'll be here when you get back.

Glad to have you back.

So what the was that, right?

Croncast is my playground for all things nerdy that I can then apply to in my trade without doing it with a client's dime. So when things break I am not on the hook .

What you just saw was an interesting concept that enhances sharing information online and makes it more personable. You just met the full content feed reader, Kris the Filter'.

I'm going to describe that link destination the best way I can.

1. My server reads my Google Reader shared feed and stores it in a database. This is done with a script that runs on a cron (timed job) every two minutes to get new items post title, description and timestamp
2. The script stamps the item with the current time that I most likely read the item
3. This is cool the server runs a script to generate keywords (subjects) from the shared item. The script needs to mature a bit but it is effective enough for now.
4. Then cached posts are pulled up in to the Kris is reading section of the site and ordered by the time that I read them. Really the only way to organize them coherently since the post original times vary based on the author's time zone.
5. Keywords are displayed below each post. Each keyword is a link that will search all of my other shared items for related posts, has a link to Technorati and is an entry into a RSS feed for that keyword.
6. I have added a Search my read items' function so that you can search my shared items for whatever you like. If you want to find items that I have read about about ceratin topic like, Facebook, you can.

What's happening here is that I am giving you, the reader of my shared feed, the ability to use me as a content filter. And the best part is that you didn't have to ask me to read up on a given topic that you are interested in. I didn't have to add it to a to-do list, I was already doing it. And now I'm able to give you access to it in a few ways:

1. Here's everything that I have read and shared from Google Reader
2. Here's everything that I have read now search it by subject
3. Here's everything that I have read now subscribe via RSS to a subject (keyword) and get updates every time I read an item about your subject without needing to come back to this post or the site

In this scenario I have become a 'social filter'. I am able to share an item from a publisher that my current readers might have never found. In a strange way it gives an individual like myself the chance to create a low threshold directory with the ability to be distributed simply by marking items that I like.

It takes Google Reader to a new place beyond a feed reader and makes it a platform for syndication. Google Reader becomes a powerful tool to create new channels of distribution for content that usually meets its end on a subscribers computer. Now it has legs.

How can I see other people using this? Tons of ways.

1. The same way that I am using it to create a history of my own reading with the ability to share right down to the topic level.
2. By individuals respected as gate keepers like librarians. Example whether the source feeds were running on their library content or the internet they could mark items from those feeds and then give the feed based on a topic to a patron, i.e. happy computer savvy student who doesn't need to come back and ask for help again.
3. Could be used to share information behind a firewall from corporate blogs. Great way to fatten up a corporate knowledge base by picking and choosing from your qualified authors.
4. You could create micro-repositories based on topics
5. A million other ways that I haven't thought of yet. Not even quite sure I could come up with a million.

I know that I am not the first to work over a shared feed this way but it was fun to build and I am sure it will be useful in making something else. Maybe it will inspire someone else to do something cool.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/4

Make Use Of Google Reader Shared Feeds is a post from: TechStartups.com

By Senior Editor Kris Smith

With the new FTC guidelines for bloggers and other new media types taking effect December 1, 2009 it is a perfect time to point out why this is a good thing for bloggers. Bloggers have had the opportunity to grow unrestricted for years. These guidelines should allow bloggers, hobbyists and professionals alike, not to be pushed up against a wall.

Copyright attorney and intellectual property rights expert Evan Brown said in a recent interview, The new guidelines play the important role of showing participants in the marketplace how the FTC will enforce the laws that help consumers have a better understand what they're seeing or hearing when they view an advertisement or promotion.

Here are five more reasons that it is important

1. Bloggers were the first in this new media push to be paid for their work, community and influence.

2. Without a clear disclosure guideline within the professional blogger community between agencies, brands and individual bloggers much if not all disclosure fell through the cracks

3. With a clearer disclosure guideline structure in place from the FTC it is now understood that this space will be regulated . . . meaning it is a business.

4. To continue being a professional, one must be paid for their skills. If guidelines and or enforcement of those guidelines weren't a reality many businesses that have been looking at this space would withdraw and turn back to traditional media for their buys. Lippe Taylor's SVP of Digital Marketing, Matthew Snodgrass agrees, The blogosphere seems to be forgetting that advertisers are also on the hook with these new guidelines. It will be in the advertiser's best interest to only deal with blogs that will also be adhering to these guidelines.

5. It puts a new emphasis on transparency in new media communications that can only help improve the culture of paid endorsements and the material connections that the FTC monitors to protect the public interest.

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Post from: TechStartups.com

By Senior Editor Kris Smith

A few weeks ago the FTC updated their advertising guidelines for endorsements and testimonials to include blogs and other new media publishing methods. In the time between this update and today, DigComm (short for the Digital Communications Group), a company that builds digital communications tools for PR and social media agencies, has released CMP.ly.

CMP.ly is a simple solution for what could become a confusing and complicated landscape of sorting out what types of disclosures are needed different circumstances. CMP.ly makes this easy by allowing bloggers, SMS, tweets and podcasts simply link to a standard human readable disclosure.

The six standardized disclosures include:

CMP.ly/0 No connection, unpaid, my own opinions
CMP.ly/1 Based upon a review copy
CMP.ly/2 Given a sample by vendor/agency/brand
CMP.ly/3 Paid post cash payment or other compensation
CMP.ly/4 Employee/shareholder/business relationship
CMP.ly/5 Custom Disclosure

And for my disclosure I am a co-founder of CMP.ly. I have worked very hard on this project with a great friend, Tom Chernaik. I believe that this is an important tool for any publisher to remain transparent as the old guard is now prepared to regulate this medium starting December 1, 2009.

What is most important for us is that a site like CMP.ly is coming from people within the independent publisher community. It is our belief it can be used as a platform to prove that we're not new media, but the media.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/4

Post from: TechStartups.com