Why WordPress.com is Virtually Spam Free

A great article on Plagiarism Today.

As those of you who read this site regularly should know, I’ve been pretty POed about the blog spam and splogging situation. I subscribed to the Plagiarism Today feed because of its excellent articles about copyright and the fight against feed scraping by sploggers.

Today’s article about WordPress.com was an especially good read. From Why WordPress.com is Virtually Spam Free on PlagiarismToday:

It seems as if nearly every major free blog hosting service has been either overrun or nearly overrun with spam. However, one services stands alone, a relative oasis of spam cleanliness, Automattic’s WordPress.com . Despite being just as free as its competitors and placing few restrictions on registration, WordPress.com has not endured the spam avalanche that other services have.

The article author, Johnathan Bailey, interviewed WordPress founder Matthew Mullenweg to learn why WordPress.com is so spam-free. The article is enlightening and highly recommended.

Podcasting Instructions Update

Apple revises its Podcaster Tech Specs document to provide information on Apple TV compatibility.

Although I haven’t published an episode for a while, I am a podcaster. My Maria Speaks podcast has about 30 episodes published over the past two years or so.

Because of that, I’m on Apple’s mailing list for information about podcasting. And today I got an e-mail message from Apple that provides some useful information about formatting video or enhanced podcasts for better compatibility with Apple TV.

Here’s part of it:

Recommendations for Formatting Video Podcasts

1. If you’re encoding your video podcast at 320×240, please increase the resolution to either 640×480 or 640×360 (depending on the aspect ratio of your source files). Why? Because video podcasts at this resolution look great on Apple TV and still port to video iPods. Lower resolution podcasts might also work on both platforms, but they don’t look nearly as good on a widescreen TV. As always, make sure to test any encoding changes you make to ensure device compatibility. QuickTime 7.1′s “Export to iPod” function will ensure that a video file is encoded at a width of 640 and is iPod-compatible.

2. It’s best not to create two different podcast feeds for different resolutions. By doing so, you dilute the popularity of your podcast and reduce exposure in our charts. It’s better to have one feed high in the charts than two that are lower.

3. If your source files are 16:9, stick with that aspect ratio. Don’t add letterboxing to make them 4:3. By doing so, you prevent the video from expanding to fill a 16:9 widescreen TV and instead end up with black space on all four sides. Also, your original source files should be at least 640 pixels wide.

Of course these are just recommendations. We understand that there are good reasons for 320×240 (bandwidth bills) and 720p (looks fantastic). Do whatever makes the most sense for your show. For more information on formatting video, see the recently updated spec:

http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/podcaststechspecs.html

To see a sample of excellent podcasts that also look great with Apple TV, check out the Apple TV Podcast Showcase.

This is interesting because one of the few complaints I’ve heard about Apple TV is the video quality of podcasts. It appears that Apple is trying to prevent this from being a problem by providing podcasters with detailed instructions for making their podcasts look good on Apple TV.

Come Fly with Us!

I do a “video” podcast for Flying M Air called Come Fly with Us! It’s basically an iMovie slide show of images taken on various flights and day trips throughout Arizona. Although I don’t want to go back and fix existing episodes so they meet these requirements, I’ll probably release new episodes with these specs on a go-forward basis.

As mentioned by Apple in the quoted e-mail above, a higher resolution will lead to bigger files. Not only will this affect bandwidth, but it can discourage potential subscribers from subscribing. For example, since moving from my downtown office back into my house, my download speed has been cut from high-speed DSL (5-7 M) to medium speed cable (512 K if I’m lucky). A 70 MB podcast has to be pretty darn good for me to further slow down my Internet access speed with a lengthy download. Right now, each episode of Come Fly with Us! is about 15 MB; I’m curious to see what the higher resolution files will be.

Just something to keep in mind.

How to Configure a Mighty Mouse

A look at the Mouse preferences pane.

Apple Bluetooth Wireless Mighty MouseWell, I finally broke down and bought one. A wireless Mighty Mouse.

Because all new desktop Macs come with a Mighty Mouse, I need to be able to write about it for my upcoming Leopard book. So I bought one from Amazon.com last week and it arrived on my doorstep today. I wasted no time opening the box and setting it up.

That Mousy Feeling

Before I go into some detail about Mighty Mouse settings, I want to comment about the feel of this mouse. Anyone who spends a lot of time at a computer gets used to the feel of the mouse he uses. I’m almost embarrassed to say that I’ve been using the standard Apple USB mouse that came with my Dual G5 since I bought the machine in 2003. I’m familiar with the way it feels under my hand and I have grown to like it — even though it only has one button. I have two other mice that I use with my laptops; I reviewed and commented on them in one of this site’s most popular articles, “Mouse Wars: Microsoft vs. Logitech.” Although I have hooked up one of these mice to my Dual G5 in the past, I went back to the original mouse after a very short time.

Now I’m getting ready for my next desktop Mac purchase, which is likely to be a 24″ iMac. I plan to buy that with a wireless Mighty Mouse and wireless keyboard. So figured I may as well start getting used to the feel of the mouse by using it on my G5 now.

In general, the Mighty Mouse feels good under my hand. It has much the same shape as the old USB mouse, so it’s familiar. Apple didn’t try to go ergonomic (like Microsoft and Logitech did), so it didn’t fail miserably (like Logitech did). Instead, Apple stuck to the same basic design, which should make longtime Mac users like me happy.

Once configured (as instructed below), you can set up a Mighty Mouse as a two-button mouse. That’s what I did. Although the mouse has just one physical button for your fingertips, the mouse can somehow sense which finger you’re using to click. So far, this seems to work pretty well, although I have managed to display a contextual menu more than a few times with what I thought was a left click. Looks like I can’t be sloppy with my clicking when using this mouse. I’ll need some motor skill retraining.

I like the silly little roller ball. It makes it possible to scroll on two axes — horizontally and vertically. It feel tiny and insignificant under my finger — so tiny, in fact, that it tickles. But it works a lot better than I expected it to.

Configuring the Mouse

Mouse SettingsYou configure the Mighty Mouse by setting options in the Mouse panel of the Keyboard & Mouse preferences pane. Choose Apple > System Preferences and click the Keyboard & Mouse icon in the System Preferences window that appears. Then click the Mouse button at the top of the preferences pane. It should look like what you see here.

If the options don’t look like what you see here, here are some things to check:

  • Is the Mighty Mouse attached to (if USB) or paired with (if Bluetooth) your computer?
  • Is the Mighty Mouse the only mouse attached to or paired with your computer?
  • If a Bluetooth Mighty Mouse, is it turned on? Are the batteries properly installed? Do the batteries have power?
  • Have you installed the software that came with the Mighty Mouse and followed the installation instructions?

The settings are pretty straightforward.

First of all, you can use pop-up menus to indicate what each button on the mouse should do. While I keep referring to a Mighty Mouse as a “two-button” mouse, it really has four buttons: left, right, scroll, and sides (two buttons counting as one). You can program each of them for specific tasks:

  • Primary button is normally the left mouse button on a two-button mouse.
  • Secondary button is normally the right mouse button on a two-button mouse. This is usually used to display contextual menus.
  • Exposé – All Windows activates the Exposé feature, displaying all windows. This is the same as pressing F9.
  • Exposé – App Windows activates the Exposé feature, displaying all application windows. This is the same as pressing F10.
  • Exposé – Desktop activates the Exposé feature, displaying the Desktop. This is the same as pressing F11.
  • Dashboard activates Dashboard. This is the same as pressing F12.
  • Application Switcher activates the application switcher. This is the same as pressing Command-Tab.
  • Spotlight activates the Spotlight menu. This is the same as pressing Command-Spacebar.
  • Other displays an Open dialog that you can use to choose an item that should be opened when you press the button. This makes it possible to launch applications or open documents by pressing a button on the mouse.

The Scrolling Options menu enables you to specify how the scroll bar should work when you move it (not when you press it). The options include Off, Vertical Only, Vertical and Horizontal, and 360 Degree.

Three sliders at the bottom of the window enable you to set speeds for:

  • Tracking is the mouse’s speed across the screen.
  • Scrolling is the scroll ball’s scrolling speed.
  • Double-Click is the amount of time between clicks to be recognized as a double-click.

At the very bottom of the screen is a check box that, when enabled, activates a program’s zoom feature when a key you specify is held down. You can further fine-tune the zooming feature by clicking the Options button and setting a few extra options.

Make the Most of It

Although you can configure a Mighty Mouse to work just like a regular one-button mouse, doing so would prevent you from getting the most of your mouse. Play around with the settings. I have mine set with primary and secondary buttons, Dashboard on the scroll button, and Exposé on the sides. (I don’t use Exposé much, but I also don’t like squeezing the buttons together.)

If you’ve been using Mighty Mouse for a while and have some tips to share about using it, please use the Comments link to share them. I’m sure I’m not the only one who would be interested in learning more about getting the most of this device.