In light of Google’s Penguin update, it seems like a good time to suggest that you don’t spam blog comments. Even if you’re not technically spamming, and are leaving semi-thoughtful comments (but your ultimate goal is to get a link), it’s very likely that the blog you’re commenting on implements the nofollow attribute on comment links, which keeps the links from passing PageRank. Don’t forget that nofollow was introduced with blog comments in mind. Google put out a post in early 2005 called “Preventing Comment Spam,” in which it said: If you’re a blogger (or a blog reader), you’re painfully familiar with people who try to raise their own websites’ search engine rankings by submitting linked blog comments like “Visit my discount pharmaceuticals site.” This is called comment spam, we don’t like it either, and we’ve been testing a new tag that blocks it. From now on, when Google sees the attribute (rel=”nofollow”) on hyperlinks, those links won’t get any credit when we rank websites in our search results. This isn’t a negative vote for the site where the comment was posted; it’s just a way to make sure that spammers get no benefit from abusing public areas like blog comments, trackbacks, and referrer lists. SEO consultant Carson Ward recently wrote a great article at SEOmoz about types of link spam to avoid. One of those was comment spam. “If I were an engineer on a team designed to combat web spam, the very first thing I would do would be to add a classifier to blog comments,” he wrote. “I would then devalue every last one. Only then would I create exceptions where blog comments would count for anything.” “Let’s pretend that Google counts every link equally, regardless of where it is on the page. How much do you think 1/1809th of the link juice on a low-authority page is worth to you?” he wrote, referring to a screen cap of a spam comment on a page with 1808 other comments. “Maybe I’m missing something here, because I can’t imagine spam commenting being worth anything at any price. Let’s just hope you didn’t build anchor text into those comments.” It may seem like common sense to many, but it’s amazing how frequently comment spam occurs, even today, even on blogs that implement nofollow on comment links. For the Bloggers Matt Cutts put out a pretty popular blog post in 2009 about PageRank sculpting. Here’s what he had to say about blog comments in that: Q: If I run a blog and add the nofollow attribute to links left by my commenters, doesn’t that mean less PageRank flows within my site? A: If you think about it, that’s the way that PageRank worked even before the nofollow attribute. Q: Okay, but doesn’t this encourage me to link out less? Should I turn off comments on my blog? A: I wouldn’t recommend closing comments in an attempt to “hoard” your PageRank. In the same way that Google trusts sites less when they link to spammy sites or bad neighborhoods, parts of our system encourage links to good sites. Some bloggers aren’t opposed to turning off comments though. We had a couple of interesting conversations with bloggers Jeremy Schoemaker and Michael Gray last year, following the Panda update. Panda was all about the quality of content on a page, and obviously blog comments can carry varying degrees of quality. Schoemaker told us that he called a Google engineer friend and asked about this. Schoemaker said he was told that if anything, it’s “diluting the quality score of my page” by possibly diluting overall keyword density. Another factor could be comments that go through, but are clearly spam. These send signals that the page is not being well maintained. Gray, who turned off his blog comments years ago, told us last year, “While I’m not living in the SEO world of 1999, things like keyword focus and density do play a role,” he adds. “If you’re doing your job as an SEO in 95% of the cases the keyword you are trying to rank for should be the most used word/phrase on your page. If you’ve gone to all the trouble to do that why would you now let and knucklehead with a keyboard and internet connection come by and screw that up with comments?” Google says in its help center, “If you can’t or don’t want to vouch for the content of pages you link to from your site — for example, untrusted user comments or guestbook entries — you should nofollow those links. This can discourage spammers from targeting your site, and will help keep your site from inadvertently passing PageRank to bad neighborhoods on the web.” “In particular, comment spammers may decide not to target a specific content management system or blog service if they can see that untrusted links in that service are nofollowed,” it says. “If you want to recognize and reward trustworthy contributors, you could decide to automatically or manually remove the nofollow attribute on links posted by members or users who have consistently made high-quality contributions over time.” As far as I can tell, nofllow hasn’t done much to detract spammers, but at least it does keep you from passing PageRank to bad neighborhoods.

There are tons of WordPress blogs out there, many of which you may comment on. While such interaction is always welcome, keeping track of the various discussions you’re engaged in can be difficult. Thanks to a recent WordPress update, this process has been refined, making it easier on those who visit, and comment on, multiple WordPress blogs. The first aspect of the update is to automatically subscribe those who comment on a particular post. The official WordPress blog has the details: By default, posting a comment will now subscribe you to receive follow-up comments via email for that specific post, keeping you updated on the conversation. This is indicated by the checked box in the comment form. If you have a WordPress.com account, you now have a global setting to change this so that by default you will not be subscribed… If you don’t want email notifications for a thread, just uncheck the box when you post your comment. If you’ve disabled the feature, you can also subscribe to a specific thread by checking the box in the comment form. There is also a link at the bottom of every notification email that will allow you to change your subscription options. Essentially, if you comment, you’re subscribed. This includes email notifications when other readers respond to a post containing one of your comments. As the screenshot indicates, you can change what posts you follow every time you post a comment: Are default subscriptions the way to go as a WordPress user or should this be something users should have to opt into? Granted, WordPress members can adjust their accounts globally, but if you neglect to do so, every time someone comments in a post you’ve commented on, you’ll receive an email notification.

Earlier this week, we talked about the reasons you should be using Tumblr for business. We didn’t really go into Tumblr advertising, but it’s not really been an option. They recently launched highlighted posts, where you can pay a dollar to promote certain posts, but that’s not really much of an ad model. Now, it appears things are changing at Tumblr, which could help drive some significant revenue from the company, while giving brands a real way of generating interest on the increasingly popular social blogging network. On May 2nd, advertisers will be able to pay to be featured in a “Featured” section on the Tumblr dashboard, reports Mashable’s Sonia Paul, citing an announcement made by Tumblr Founder and CEO David Karp at the Ad Age Digital Conference. This space reportedly gets 120,000 impressions a day. According to a recent AdAge interview with Karp, Tumblr itself gets 4.5 million impressions a week. In January, he said it had hit the 15 billion pageviews per month mark. That’s likely grown in the meantime. This month, Tumblr launched some new integration with the Facebook Timeline. Judging on how that has worked for some other social sites, it’s likely to have a significant impression on Tumblr growth as well. Facebook announced last month that timeline integration had lifted Pinterest’s daily active Facebook user base by as much as 60%. Earlier this week, we reported that Gnip and Tumblr have teamed up to make Gnip the exclusive data firehose provider for Tumblr, which could benefit marketers greatly too.

It may not be up there with widgets.net/wordpress-for-beginners/” title=”wordpress”>WordPress yet, as far as user adoption, but Tumblr is growing like a weed, and it has more of a social network feel than WordPress. Your business doesn’t have to be on every social network there is, but you may find Tumblr to be an untapped audience that you shouldn’t be ignoring. Luckily, Tumblr wants businesses to take part. The company tells WebProNews it’s “very encouraging of businesses that want to use Tumblr.” “We don’t have a standard list of best practices but we love businesses to use Tumblr as an opportunity to engage with their community by actively engaging in other blogs, posting regularly, and following members of Tumblr who might be interested in your brand,” a Tumblr staff member said. “As we grow, I’m sure that we’ll be open to business partnership opportunities, but it’s not something that I have specifics on at this time,” she said, adding that Tumblr is “always actively looking for creative ways to help out brands on Tumblr.” This was actually the subject of a recent interview Founder and CEO David Karp did with AdAge. He said Tumblr has 4.5 billion impressions a week. In January, Karp said Tumblr had hit 15 billion pageviews per month. That’s most likely higher by now. Earlier this month, they launched new integration with the Facebook Timeline. Based on the success other apps have had with this, you can certainly imagine how much this will increase viewership for Tumblr posts. Last month, Facebook claimed the Timeline had boosted Pinterest’s daily active Facebook user base by 60%. Still want to ignore Tumblr? GalleyCat has an interesting article, featuring some advice for writers straight from Tumblr’s literary outreach, Rachel Fershleiser. If your business has a blog, some of what she has to say may apply to you. Likewise if your business is looking to Tumblr to be its main blog platform. A lot of what she has to say, would really apply to anyone using Tumblr. It’s about being active in the community, as with most social networks. She suggests finding people to follow, actively liking and reblogging posts from others, and using a bookmarklet for your browser, from the “Goodies” page, to help you “incorporate blogging into your daily life.” Tumblr “Goodies” She also stresses the importance of tagging posts with relevant topics, and not “getting fancy” with your URL. She suggests a firsnamelastname.tumblr.com approach, noting that you can still be creative with your blog’s actual title. Also, she says, “Make sure you upload an image to be your avatar so you don’t have a creepy blue default profile and choose a theme from our theme garden to customize your look.” Hopefully you’re already active on Facebook. If so, I’d suggest taking advantage of that Tumblr timeline integration. You can do this by simply selecting “send to Facebook” when you post to Tumblr. More generally, I’d also suggest paying attention to the Tumblr community. Look at the kinds of things that you see on Tumblr. It’s often a very visual experience. A lot of animated gifs. Look at what’s being reblogged. Can you create quick, easy Tumblr content that takes what this content does well, but make it your own? I’m not saying you have to use animated gifs, but they certainly are popular on Tumblr. Tumblr even increased the size limit for them a few months ago. Tumblr has a paid “highlighted posts” feature, which you can use to help promote certain posts. It costs a dollar. “Every now and then, a post comes along that’s meant for big things. It could be pulling the wraps off your new project, promoting your next show, raising awareness for a cause, or just sharing a truly incredible photo,” Tumblr said, when announcing the feature in February. As I said at the time, I’m not really sure just how effective this is for making posts standout. It adds a sticker like this (albeit, a customizable one): They do give you a lot of options on the customization, as far as what it says: Karp did note in the AdAge interview that the feature wasn’t really designed with brands in mind. “We’re not expecting Vogue to spend a buck on every one of their posts to make it stand out,” he’s quoted as saying. “In fact, that would make the experience kind of crappy.” He did mention, however, that he likes how Reuters uses it to highlight breaking news. Businesses might have more Tumblr features to work with soon. “We want to offer a set of nuanced creative tools for users on Tumblr,” he’s quoted as saying. “And [highlight posts] was the right starting point. And this is not the first user-oriented promotional paid feature. There are two in production — the highlight posts and the ability to purchase and sell themes, but before that we had the ability to put your blog’s avatar up on the dashboard. We tested the ability to promote yourself in our directories. That was one of the most successful revenue-generating features, not only in driving traffic to our blogs but in acting as a filter on our network, and it’s something we want to get back to very soon.” He also implies that directory improvements for brands are on the horizon. One big takeaway I get from that interview is that Tumblr, in general, wasn’t designed for brands, but brands flocked to it anyway to find it useful. Now, Tumblr is acknowledging this, and seems to be thinking about how it can become better for brands moving forward. My guess is that over the next year or two, we will start seeing a much bigger brand presence on the service, and a lot more tools provided by Tumblr, which will prove beneficial. There may not be as much to work with right now, but there is still plenty of opportunity. Tumblr’s been around for a while. It was founded in 2007, but it’s still the early days, given the growth it’s seeing, it’s going to get a lot bigger. It might be wise to start building your Tumblr community sooner rather than later, so when more useful tools come out, you can use them more effectively and not have to start completely from scratch.

There’s a lot of stuff on the internet. This might sound obvious, and it is – but just think about how many different ideas are expressed throughout all the little nooks and crannies of the interwebs. It’s inevitable that some stuff out there is going to piss some people off. Some of the most recent types of content causing a stir are “pro-ana,” “pro-mia,” and “thinspo” blogs that promote people (admittedly, mostly girls) to stay thin – dangerously thin in the eyes of some. “Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” is the type of advice you might find tagged “thinspo” (short for thinspiration) somewhere online. Plus, you’ll also find images of thin (mostly) women, as they serve as a visual motivator for girls who want to become or stay skinny. There are mixed feelings about this sort of thing, as would be expected. Should sites police this type of content? Is it just free speech, like minded people discussing a life choice? Or is is promotion and glorification of harmful activities? Earlier this month, super-popular blog platform Tumblr sided with the latter argument. They instituted a policy that disallows users to “post content that actively promotes or glorifies self-harm. This includes content that urges or encourages readers to cut or injure themselves; embrace anorexia, bulimia, or other eating disorders; or commit suicide…” Tumblr later clarified that the new policy would only prohibit blogs that were “dedicated to triggering self-harm,” and it wouldn’t affect those that are about discussion of issues like anorexia and bulimia. Over the weekend, Pinterest followed suit. On a blog post last Friday, they announced that they had updated their Acceptable Use Policy in order to not allow “pins that explicitly encourage self-harm of self-abuse.” The actual new provision to the policy reads that users cannot post content that “creates a risk of harm, loss, physical or mental injury, emotional distress, death, disability, disfigurement, or physical or mental illness to yourself, to any other person, or to any animal.” Many have said that Pinterest bowed to the pressure of those that are against “thinspo” content. One of the main critiques that caught fire was a March 19th article on Jezebel called “The Scary, Weird World of Pinterest Thinspo Boards.” That article quoted someone from the National Eating Disorders Association that broke down why Pinterest was such a good place for Thinspo to reside: Pinterest is a format that’s attractive to the pro-ana community because it’s both visual and highly interactive; young women (and some men) suffering from an eating disorder or teetering on the brink of disorder crave the unique combination of visibility and anonymity offered by the site. Pinterest users can swap photos of their most enviable shoulder blades in a supportive “community” of like-minded people, but because it’s on the internet they can do it from behind the protection of an anonymous handle. So, advocates of sites banning this type of content can rejoice at Pinterest‘s decision, right? Wrong, at least so far. Mashable points out that thinspo pins and board are still alive and well all over Pinterest. And it’s true. A quick search for thinspo within Pinterest yields tons of images of thin girls, motivational images with text like “You will regret eating that cookie, you will not regret running that mile” and “unless you puke, faint, or die, keep going.” These aren’t just ramdom pins, as there are also still plenty of boards left devoted to nothing but thinspo – many of them have hundreds of followers. I’m truly of mixed mind about this. I completely see the problem with blogs or pinboards dedicated to making sure girls stay thin. Not that thin girls are a problem, mind you, but because in the context of “thinspo” or “pro ana,” the practices that are encouraged to help them get/stay thin are unhealthy. There is a lot of variety on pins tagged thinspo on Pinterest, however. Many of the images, motivational posters, etc. aren’t promoting anorexia or bulimia specifically. Many promote exercise, and although some may be a little extreme, who should tell people that they are exercising too hard (besides maybe a doctor)? Not all of the images of girls taged thinspo are too thin either. Of course, this is not a scientific statement and I don’t know the girls’ weight or BMI, but the eye test tells me that many of the girls in the images aren’t unhealthy. Some of the images are scary though. And even the images that seems rather innocuous, when put into the context of a thinspo board, become helpers to an unhealthy (read anorexic) lifestyle. And i think that context has as much to do with it than anything. What do you think about thinspo content, and sities like Tumblr and Pinterest‘s decision to ban it? Are you concerned that this content still exists on Pinterest, even after they updated their policies? Let us know in the comments. UPDATE: We’ve received the following statement from a Pinterest spokesperson: Pinterest relies on its community to help identify and flag offensive content. Once offensive content has been reported, Pinterest reviews it on a case-by-case basis and immediately removes any pin that violates the Terms of Service, Acceptable Use Policy or Pin Etiquette. Basically, they’ll come down when they’re reported. Last night, I spoke to an avid Pinterest user who said that over the weekend, they’ve personally noticed that the amount of thinspo pins (especially images of thin women) present on the site was far less than last week.

Earlier, I wrote about these new content curation/news aggregation guideline initiatives that were brought up at SXSW, and first reported on by The New York Times’ David Carr. I didn’t look much at what others were saying about them before I shared my own thoughts (which are that they won’t work, basically). Since then, I’ve looked at some other articles that are making the rounds, and I get the idea that most in the industry are of a similar mindset. Hamilton Nolan, an editor for the popular Gawker framed his take under the headline, “We Don’t Need No Stinking Approval From the Blog Police“. “The day that I ask the editor of Esquire for a seal of approval on my blogging is the day that I sign a fabulously lucrative contract to write for Esquire.com,” he says. The editor of Esquire, by the way, is part of the Council on Ethical Blogging and Aggregation, described in Carr’s report, though little is known at this point about the guidelines this council wants to bring to the Internet. The Curator’s Code, has a bit more clarity around it, in that it appears to simply be a more visual way to use “via” and “hat tip” without adding much incentive (to anyone, including the original content creator) that isn’t present with a simple link saying “via” or “hat tip” (unless I’m missing something). “The motives are honorable, the objectives reasonable, and the timing … timely,” says Rob Beschizza at BoingBoing of the Council. “But no-one is going to care about these folks or whatever theses they nail to pastebin’s door, except for their entertainment value. The problem isn’t that we lack a necessary formal system of crediting and linking to sources. The problem is that people break and exploit social norms and standards, which can’t be regulated by committees.” ReadWriteEnterprise’s Scott Fulton has an interesting angle on the “Curator’s Code”. He uses the code on his article about it, and goes so far as to propose a third entry: I agree with Popova [the person behind the Code] that there is a fundamental disconnect in the way we pass on information through this medium, and I also agree that it is ethically prudent to attribute what we’ve learned to where we’ve learned it. I may even use her symbols because it’s a good idea to do so. But I fear that, in the interest of substantiating this horribly inefficient system we’ve concocted for disseminating information by attaching it to 1) noise and 2) reverb, we are confusing reproduction with creativity, and confusing source with origin. So in addition to the two characters Popova has appropriated, may I suggest a third: one which enables someone not to just cite where information was discovered, but where the person citing it believes it originated. This way, someone linking to this article I’ve just written will accept it for what it is: a comment as opposed to a genuine flash of original inspiration or an original exercise in journalism. Not everything I produce is worthy of exaltation. I still fail to see how these symbols and code do anything to improve the situation over linking. Furthermore, it will be interesting to see if Fulton continues to use the symbols on future articles. I like Danny Sullivan’s take: .ditto179082202359922688{background: #FFFFFF url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/151549713/500px-Flag_of_California.svg.png) no-repeat;padding: 20px;} .ditto179082202359922688 a { color: #038543;} p.dittoTweet{background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 18px !important;line-height: 22px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding-top: 12px;height: 65px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author {line-height: 22px;color: #666;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} .mainlink {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 26px;color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: none;} .mainlink: hover {color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: underline;} .tweet {font-size: 24px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author img {float: left; margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;} p.dittoTweet a:hover {text-decoration: underline;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp {font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image:url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;} @dannysullivanDanny SullivanCode Of Conduct For Aggregators? Can we also have one where newspapers link to sources they site or pick tips from? http://t.co/3jMLYLNn 14 hours ago via Seesmic twhirl ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto Chris O’Shea at FishbowlNY says, “As aggregators ourselves, we completely agree that there should be some sort of standard. But there’s a couple problems with the CEBA. Maybe the most troubling thing is that for a group developing rules for bloggers, there aren’t many bloggers taking part.” Do you write for the web? What do you think of the Council and the Curator’s Code?

WordPress announced that there’s a new “Views by Country” option available from the My Stats tab on the WordPress.com homepage. The feature is designed to let bloggers quickly see where there audience is around the globe. “When you click on or hover over a country name, the map zooms in so you can really get a feel for all the parts of the planet your content has reached,” explains Jeff Bowen on the WordPress.com blog. “The Summaries page shows you country stats for the previous week, month, quarter and all time, but keep in mind this feature is new and views by country are not available prior to March 2012,” he adds. He also hints that more features are on the way for the My Stats tab. WordPress.com blogs have been getting a lot of features lately. Other recent additions include: comment notifications, a Chrome extension, and increased storage limits.

Last week, Tumblr announced a new policy that drew some mixed responses, and now they’ve made some clarifications in the hopes of making things clearer to their millions of users. The new policy will ban so called “self-harm” blogs, defined as those that advocate or glorify things like anorexia, bulimia, self-mutilation, and suicide. Blogs that would fall into this category, for example, are thinspo blog that provide images to help people achieve certain weight goals. Many of the “self-harm” blogs on Tumblr offer advice on these controversial topics. That announcement turned out to be rather controversial, as many Tumblr users cried censorship and some debated whether Tumblr had any business regulating things that some people think is a life choice. Another point of contention concerned where the line’s going to be drawn. What about blogs that talk about issues like anorexia or suicide? Would those be banned too? Tumblr has clarified their policy to say that you can talk about it, just don’t promote it: While we won’t allow blogs dedicated to triggering self-harm, we will not act against blogs engaged in discussion, support, encouragement, and documenting the experiences of those dealing with difficult conditions like anorexia, bulimia, and other forms of self-injury. Of course, the next logical question centers on how the Tumblr staff is going to be able to keep up with this and make the right judgement calls on particular blogs. They say that they are going to enforce the new policy on a “blog-by-blog basis,” but also warn that they’re “not under the illusion that it will be easy to draw the line between blogs that are intended to trigger self-harm and those that support sufferers and build community.” Here’s the complete amended policy: Promotion and Glorification of Self-Harm. Don’t post content that actively promotes or glorifies self-harm. This includes content that urges or encourages readers to cut or injure themselves; embrace anorexia, bulimia, or other eating disorders; or commit suicide rather than, e.g., seeking counseling or treatment, or joining together in supportive conversation with those suffering or recovering from depression or other conditions. Dialogue about these behaviors is incredibly important and online communities can be extraordinarily helpful to people struggling with these difficult conditions. We aim to sustain Tumblr as a place that facilitates awareness, support and recovery, and to remove only those blogs that cross the line into active promotion or glorification of self-harm. Along with regulating these self-harm blogs, Tumblr is also going to start displaying messages alongside searches for tags promoting self-harm like “pro-ana” and “thinspiration.” Here’s an example of what those messages will look like (in part): Eating disorders are not lifestyle choices, they are mental disorders that when left untreated, can cause serious health problems, and at their most severe can even be life-threatening. For treatment referrals, information and support, please contact the National Eating Disorders Association’s Helpline at 1-800-931-2237 or www.nationaleatingdisorders.org. Smart, responsible decision by Tumblr or first step down a slippery slope to censorship? Let us know what you think in the comments.

After AOL acquired TechCrunch, the popular tech blog started going through a lot of changes. They weren’t all immediately noticeable, but it didn’t take too long for things to be very publicly coming apart at the seams. That’s no slight on TechCrunch as it stands today. It still has writers that deserve the respect of being taken seriously. Some of the old school TechCrunch writers are still there, for that matter. It’s just that they keep leaving, one by one. Nobody’s saying TechCrunch can’t continue to thrive as a quality tech publication, but there’s no denying that things are rapidly changing. It began mainly when founder Michael Arrington had that whole Crunchfund thing blow up in the media. If you care enough to be reading this story, you’re probably already familiar with that story. Other writers followed Arrington out the door. Paul Carr was early to do so. Others that have since left include: MG Siegler, Sarah Lacy, CEO Heather Harde, Robin Wauters, and now it’s Jason Kincaid. Forgive me if I left any out. For those who have been reading TechCrunch for a substantial amount of time, it’s easy to see that this is the bulk of the writers that made the blog what it would become. Arrington would go on to start his Uncrunched blog. Some of us wondered if this would become the next TechCrunch eventually. That changed when PandoDaily was launched earlier this year, led by Lacy, and also including writing from Arrington, Siegler and Carr. It will not be surprising to anyone if Kincaid and some of the others end up writing for PandoDaily as well (I should point out that Siegler still does contribute to TechCrunch some). Here are a few tweets from TechCrunch editor Erick Schonfeld and Kincaide himself. Kincaid’s links to his explanation. .ditto173091794010128385{background: #C6E2EE url(http://a1.twimg.com/images/themes/theme2/bg.gif) no-repeat;padding: 20px;} .ditto173091794010128385 a { color: #1F98C7;} p.dittoTweet{background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 18px !important;line-height: 22px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding-top: 12px;height: 65px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author {line-height: 22px;color: #666;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} .mainlink {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 26px;color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: none;} .mainlink: hover {color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: underline;} .tweet {font-size: 24px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author img {float: left; margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;} p.dittoTweet a:hover {text-decoration: underline;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp {font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image:url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;} @erickschonfeldErick SchonfeldYes, @jasonkincaid is leaving TechCrunch. A terrific writer who is ready to do something else. I’ll let him explain why. 50 minutes ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto .ditto173094375084138496{background: #C6E2EE url(http://a1.twimg.com/images/themes/theme2/bg.gif) no-repeat;padding: 20px;} .ditto173094375084138496 a { color: #1F98C7;} p.dittoTweet{background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 18px !important;line-height: 22px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding-top: 12px;height: 65px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author {line-height: 22px;color: #666;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} .mainlink {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 26px;color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: none;} .mainlink: hover {color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: underline;} .tweet {font-size: 24px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author img {float: left; margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;} p.dittoTweet a:hover {text-decoration: underline;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp {font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image:url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;} @erickschonfeldErick Schonfeld@sarahcuda @eldon Maybe he wants to say goodbye in his own way instead of grandstanding like some other former TC writers. 41 minutes ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto .ditto173102612374237185{background: #000000 url(http://a3.twimg.com/profile_background_images/3044372/cool_background_1_1152x864-1.jpg) no-repeat;padding: 20px;} .ditto173102612374237185 a { color: #0000ff;} p.dittoTweet{background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 18px !important;line-height: 22px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding-top: 12px;height: 65px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author {line-height: 22px;color: #666;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} .mainlink {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 26px;color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: none;} .mainlink: hover {color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: underline;} .tweet {font-size: 24px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author img {float: left; margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;} p.dittoTweet a:hover {text-decoration: underline;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp {font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image:url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;} @jasonkincaidJason KincaidA Farewell Ahoy. Thank you to TechCrunch — and all of its readers — for an amazing four years. http://t.co/BRuJEQvh 10 minutes ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto .ditto173102894466338817{background: #000000 url(http://a3.twimg.com/profile_background_images/3044372/cool_background_1_1152x864-1.jpg) no-repeat;padding: 20px;} .ditto173102894466338817 a { color: #0000ff;} p.dittoTweet{background: #fff;padding: 10px 12px 10px 50px;margin: 0;min-height: 48px;color: #000;font-size: 18px !important;line-height: 22px;-moz-border-radius: 5px;-webkit-border-radius: 5px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata {display: block;width: 100%;clear: both;margin-top: 8px;padding-top: 12px;height: 65px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author {line-height: 22px;color: #666;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;} .mainlink {font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size: 26px;color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: none;} .mainlink: hover {color: #1F98C7;text-decoration: underline;} .tweet {font-size: 24px;} p.dittoTweet span.metadata span.author img {float: left; margin: 0px 7px 0px 0px;} p.dittoTweet a:hover {text-decoration: underline;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp {font-size: 12px;display: block;color: #999;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a {color: #999;text-decoration: none;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a > span {display: inline-block;width: 16px;background-image:url(http://images.ientrymail.com/socialditto/everything-spritev2.png);background-repeat: no-repeat;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply > span {background-position: 0px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.reply:hover > span {background-position: -16px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet > span {background-position: -80px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.retweet:hover > span {background-position: -96px 3px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite > span {background-position: -32px 2px;} p.dittoTweet span.timestamp a.favorite:hover > span {background-position: -48px 2px;} @jasonkincaidJason KincaidI should add that @erickschonfeld graciously offered to let me publish this on TC, but I thought it would be better suited for my own blog. 10 minutes ago via web ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto In other AOL Tech publication staff loss news, Engadget Editorial Director Joshua Fruhlinger is reportedly leaving for TMZ.

Content+ put together the following infographic breaking down “the anatomy of content marketing,” which it calls the “heart of online success”. It draws on data from a variety of sources as cited at the bottom. Some interesting stats it lays out: - Word of mouth is the primary factor behind up to 50% of buying decisions - Blogs on company sites result in 55% more visitors - Companies with blogs get 97% more inbound links than others - 37% of marketers say blogs are the most valuable content type for marketing That’s just a few.