You are never too young to start blogging

I’ve recently been musing over the viability of children blogging. The child would develop writing skills and, as long as they were allowed free reign over topic choice and content, they would enjoy the experience. And, let’s not forget the potential income that the child could generate. This could be used to fund future education and act as a non traditional college fund. With children spending more and more time writing, for example,... Read More

Dreamhost stoops to a new low

A couple of days ago I started to receive some odd comments. All of them were written in the same style, by apparently different people none of whom left a web address. They all had one thing in common. Every one was praising Dreamhost, saying what a wonderful host they were and how they, unlike me, had received nothing but fantastic service, 100% uptime and wonderful customer support. Yesterday six of these bizarre comments were left, similar... Read More

Three blog designs that have stood the test of time

When considering a blog design or redesign it is often useful to look at the classics. Those blog designs that have stood the test of time and have resisted the temptation to constantly redesign. Each of the following blogs have huge audiences, are instantly recognizable and their authors are revered in their respective industries and generally online. Zeldman. Described as the Godfather of the web and online at zeldman.com for as long as I can... Read More

Conformity is the enemy of creativity

Today’s post has been prompted by a couple of recent comments and emails regarding the current look and feel of Upstart Blogger. It seems that a lot of you don’t like the yellow links, you don’t like the big text and you hate the titles being underneath the excerpts. This is your chance to tell me what you think is wrong, why you think it is wrong and how you think it can be improved. Before you aim the comment gun and pull the... Read More

Free iPhone number two

In case you missed the free iPhone number one click here to read the full instructions of how to get involved with this giveaway. Today I’d like you to take a look at another work in progress blog project, one that I’ve been talking about for a while without finding the time to finish it’s design nor launch it officially. That said, Infinite Critique is already on its way to becoming a thriving multi author community. Like all new... Read More

Blogging as a respected career

Although I will always class myself as a musician first and a blogger second there is no doubt in my mind that my blogging career is partly, and a big part at that, responsible for the success of my music career. In order to be successful and sustainable in any artistic career you have to be able to draw attention to your work in order to turn that work into a successful business. If you don’t then you end up being a bedroom artist. Someone... Read More

Hello Italy

No, I haven’t decided to whisk the family away for weekend break to Italy. In fact, the reverse is more accurate. Italy, it would seem, has come to me. In the last few days my traffic logs have shown a huge increase in the amount of visitors from Italy. Upstart Blogger has always been an international blog, with translations available for a number of different languages, but recently I appeared on the radar of a couple of prominent Italian... Read More