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Friday, February 8, 2008Tips for new bloggers Things you didn't know about Tashanhttp://specials.rediff.com/movies/2008/apr/23sd1.htmTips for new bloggers
To create and retain a loyal readership, give your readers the value they deserve.
Anyone can start a blog. The problem is, with so many people across the globe blogging regularly, why would anyone want to read what you write? Some people write for the pure pleasure of it, or because for them, a blog is the equivalent of a personal diary. And they are content with a small but dedicated readership of fans or followers. But if you are not a celebrity and writing for a global audience, it can be hard to retain your readers’ interest considering the sheer volume of content that is available online. If you do a little research before beginning writing, you are likely to find that someone somewhere has already said what you want to. And at the same time, now that everyone can be published, a lot of poor quality writing is also doing the rounds online.
But there are things you can do to capture and retain the interest of your readers, improve the overall quality of your writing and ensure that your blog does not sink into the vast seas of repetitive, largely unread online content. Here are some basic guidelines to follow.
1. Define your topicDecide what you want to write about and stick to it. This will give your writing a sense of direction and purpose. Most people will not be interested in the infinitesimally tiny details of your personal life, however interesting your own thoughts may seem to you. If you have multiple interests, create separate blogs to cover each of these, so you can avoid the verbal equivalent of trying to sell a sledgehammer to a watchmaker. Define your bounds from the start and stay strictly within them; also make them unambiguous and easily identifiable to readers.
2. Make sure you have your story straight To do justice to your readers, you must be up-to-date with all the latest happenings in the field of your interest. When citing figures or quoting someone, don’t just make an empty statement - be sure to credit the source. Your credibility as a consistent blogger can only be built through knowledge and understanding of the subject matter, and not merely through giving the appearance of knowledge and understanding. This can only happen through dedicated study and sustained interest in the subject. When expressing a personal opinion, explain clearly that it is your personal opinion. Other people may go on to quote you, so be fair to them. Make sure your theories really hold water, and that you are not wasting your readers’ time by stating shaky opinions founded on inadequate research.
3. Get to the point Your readers’ time is precious. Don’t waste it by giving them lengthy, useless introductions. Before you start writing, make sure you have a point, and focus on introducing it as early as you can. Each sentence should be used to focus and drive your central point. Remember, you have a very short span of time before your reader decides that he/she is uninterested in what you are saying and moves on to the next blog. Use that time as well as you can. State your case clearly and quickly and avoid the use of redundant, repetitive words. Steer clear of adjectives and long-winded descriptions - provide facts as far as possible, and let people judge for themselves. Avoid jargon and long words/sentences where simpler ones will suffice. This will let people relate to your writing with greater ease. Make each word count. Also, remember that people across the globe are going to be reading what you write; in terms of content and style, aim for global rather than local.
To create and retain a loyal readership, give your readers the value they deserve.
4. Be original Give your readers the value they deserve. They don’t need you to reiterate opinions held by masses of people across the world, or rewrite news items faithfully without diverting from the original content of the story. Look for what people will care about and mould your content to build their interest, but don’t forget to add your own voice and personality to the content you publish.
5. Provide visual reliefAvoid large, intimidating, impossible-to-read blocks of text. Use subheads to break up your text, or insert pictures, graphs or quotes. Ensure that every element is informative, relevant and unambiguous in meaning.
6. Encourage dialogue The concept of blogging revolves around people exchanging ideas. If you don’t allow people to comment, you lose out on the ability to find out about the large variety of alternative opinions out there. Let people come back to you with what they think, and respond to them. Respect your readers’ opinions even if you don’t agree with them. This will help you to grow and learn as a writer and person.
7. Stick to a scheduleFigure out how much time you can invest in blogging each week/month. Try to post as frequently as you can, but stay realistic when setting expectations. Don’t overcommit and then disappear for weeks at a time. Apologise to your readers each time you come back after an absence.
8. Spellcheck!Everyone is prone to the occasional embarrassing typo, and unless you are in the habit of reading your text over several times before you publish, it’s nearly unavoidable. Running a spellcheck before you publish can save you a lot of trouble later.

Global Warming, Up Close and PersonalYou think you know climate change. You've seen An Inconvenient Truth. You've noticed the changing and warming weather patterns in your part of the world. You're beginning to suffer from acute ecoanxiety. But to really see global warming in action, you'd need to travel to the Arctic, where climate change is already kicking into high gear. Temperatures are increasing faster in the far north than they are in the more temperate zones in the world, and recent studies indicate that the North Pole could be underwater in the summer in less than 10 years. But seeing the Arctic firsthand isn't easy, unless you're handy with a dogsled — so Will Steger is going to take you there.
Steger is a legendary polar explorer, the first person to make a dogsled trip to the North Pole, and winner of the National Geographic Adventure Lifetime Achievement Award. He's at home in those frozen, hostile parts of the world that few of us will ever tread. But he's also a dedicated environmentalist who was early to ring the alarm bell on global warming, the effects of which he saw firsthand in his frequent polar expeditions, both in the Arctic and Antarctica. To help raise awareness of the damage climate change is wreaking on the polar regions, next month Steger will be leading a team of six young adventurers on a 1,400-mile, 60-day-long dogsled expedition across Ellesmere Island, in the far Canadian Arctic. The rest of us will be able to observe Steger's journey — intended to appeal to what he calls "emerging young leaders" below the age of 30 — on the website GlobalWarming101.com. "We want to take our audience to the front lines of global warming," says Steger, still trim as a Navy ship at 64. "We provide the spark with this expedition." (Listen to Steger talk about his mission and the impact of climate change on the Arctic on this week's Greencast.)
Steger's expedition will benefit from some celebrity association, with Sam Branson — the 22-year-old son of British airline tycoon Richard Branson — part of the team. Also on the expedition will be 27-year-old Norwegian Sigrid Ekran, who last year became only the second woman to win Rookie of the Year for the Iditarod — not a small deal in the world of dog sledding. The team will be uploading video, text and photos to the website as the journey progresses, allowing classrooms — Steger's foundation is working with the National Education Association on the project — to follow their progress first-hand. "We can actually bring the audience up there," Steger says.
What they'll see may be startling. Climate change has already refashioned the geography of the Arctic, melting glaciers that past adventurers — not to mention the Inuit who make their home in the far north — once journeyed on securely. On a 1995 Arctic expedition, Steger had his own close encounter with climate change, when the ice he was traveling across broke up unexpectedly early, thanks to warmer temperatures. He barely escaped. "I've seen a lot of these changes myself over the past 15 years," he says. "The ice caps are just gone."
Steger and his teammates hope to jolt the young people of the world into action on global warming. For their generation, says Sam Branson, "climate change is definitely going to be the biggest issue." There's still hope for the worst effects of global warming to be avoided, if we can come together globally, and projects like Steger's can only help. But the truth is that for the Arctic, at least, the sheer momentum of greenhouse gas accumulation in the atmosphere means that profound climatic change is virtually unavoidable, no matter what we do. "Within a decade or less, it's going to be impossible to reach the North Pole," says Steger. "If we're not taking action immediately, we're running out of time." Man your computers — GlobalWarming101.com might give you a last glimpse of a dying polar world. (TIME)
New York: Reflecting the outsourcing prowess of India Inc around 20 Indian companies, including the likes of Infosys, Wipro and Tata Consultancy Services, are among the best in the world.
‘The 2008 Global Outsourcing 100’ list compiled by the International Association of Outsourcing Professionals (IAOP) has named about 20 companies based in India.
Among them are: India’s top software exporters — Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, HCL Technologies and Wipro Technologies, while Genpact, WNS and EXLService are leading BPO firms listed in the US.
The others figuring in the list are MindTree Consulting, Aditya Birla Minacs, Patni, Quest, Tech Mahindra, Mastek, KPIT Cummins, Convergys, Zensar Technologies, First Source, ITC Infotech, Hexaware and 24/7 Customer.
The evaluation process for compiling the list mainly takes into consideration the size and growth in revenue of the company, its employees, centres and countries served, management capabilities, competencies and customer experience.
The list also features many foreign entities who have a substantial presence in India. Most of these companies are American such as Accenture, Cognizant Technologies, IBM, ADP, Xerox, CB Richard Ellis and Hewlett-Packard. According to IAOP, the list includes firms providing outsourcing services — “not just information technology and business process outsourcing, but areas such as facility services, real estate and capital asset management, manufacturing and logistics.”
In a statement, CB Richard Ellis Chairman Managing Director (South Asia) Anshuman Magazine said: “It is always good to be recognised but when it is from someone like the International Association of Outsourcing Professionals, it is even more valuable. Such recognition encourages our team and inspires us to give the best in class service to our clients.”
Heidi Klum has been named the sexiest model in the world, ahead of
beauties such as Kate Moss and Gisele Bundchen.
The 34-year-old German, who is married to singer Seal, was described by
judges as the total package.
They said her business acumen, with her Victoria's Secret contract and
her own line of shoes, jewellery and confectionery, added to her
appeal
9 Useful Websites You Should Know About, But Probably Don't

Featuring news, TV Shows, computer software and more. The second in the
series. The following is a continuance of my previous article, Nine Websites
You Should Know About, But Probably Don't. We decided that there were
still some extremely useful websites that were left out, so I'm writing
a continuation article to cover these sites.
MEEB
Genre: Instant messaging.
Why It's The Best: A one stop shop for all your instant messaging
clients - Meebo allows you to sign into all of your instant-messaging
services into the browser window, without having to download any of the
individual clients (MSN, AOL/ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber/Gtalk).
BUZZILLIONS
Genre: Product Reviews.
Why It's The Best:
With all the product reviews floating around the internet, it's hard to
know who's behind these reviews. Review sites like Epinions pay their
users to write reviews, so most of these reviews are written by people
who never even bought or used the product.
On Buzzillions.com the majority of reviews are written by people who
have been verified to have actually purchased the product, so the
reviews are quality oriented, unbiased, and trustworthy. (See how the
Verified Buyer system works) Also, they used a "tag based review
system" where you can find products and reviews that match your user
profile, needs, and interests.
PANDORA
Genre: Music.
Why It's The Best: An easy to use and extremely accurate music
recommendations system, all you have to do is type in the name of your
favorite band or artist, and immediately the site will start playing
songs which you can thumbs up, thumbs down, or skip over. The more you
tell the system what you like and don't like, the more accurate the
recommendations will be. There's no registration and no downloads
required.
PROSPER
Genre: Community based lending.
Why It's The Best: Prosper is a site where you can lend people money
for an interest rate you set the minimum to and bid in increments of
$50 to $25,000 on loan listings you select. If you're on the borrowing
side, you can list how much you want to borrow and set your maximum
interest rate, and lenders can compete for the loan by lowering their
offered interest rate. Lenders can easily check the borrowers' credit
grade to assess their risk. Read more under How it Works.
YELP
Genre: Local reviews.
Why It's The Best: Yelp is the best local guide in the San Francisco
Bay, Chicago, New York, Boston, Los Angeles and Seattle, and pretty
much every city that matters in the U.S. You can read reviews on
everything from restaurants to home services within your area, and find
which places to try out and which to avoid.
ETSY
Genre:Auction site.
Why It's The Best: Etsy is essentially an eBay for all things handmade.
Users can buy and sell homemade goods, promoting a vision for a better
economy.
CHEGG
Genre: Textbook renting.
Why It's The Best: Chegg.com is a site I randomly stumbled upon through
one of the founders I met through Facebook. Chegg provides a new way of
getting your college textbooks for cheap by renting them for a fraction
of their cost price. Additionally, Chegg promotes an "eco-friendly"
business model by planting a tree for each textbook rented. They have
an inventory of over 2 million book Titles.
GRANDCENTRAL
Genre: GrandCentral gives you “One number for life” which lets you
forward all your calls from any number, and answer calls at any phone
you want.
Why It's The Best: You can easily switch phones in the middle of a
phone call, screen your calls, check your voicemail by phone/email/or
online, organize/store/and record calls, customized voicemails, and a
lot more. For the full description and features, click here.
WOOT
Genre: Sells cool stuff for cheap.
Why It's The Best: Woot sells one consumer electronics product a day
until it is sold out (which is typically very fast since they offer it
at a major discount). Users can discuss the product up for sale on the
forum, and they show you all kinds of stats like percentage sales per
hour, quantity breakdown, revenue they incurred for that product, and
so on. A very fun way to get really cheap electronics!