Do you (or would you) like to blog?

[SVOboy]

Ecomodder will soon be opening up it's own blog. It certainly won't be ABG from the go, but I have high hopes for it and if you'd like to be part of the team from the get go, let me know!

We're looking for people who want to write regularly about their own vehicles, automotive news, or some people who would just like to do special features of their own work! Send me a PM or reply here with questions, comments, or to express interest.

Thanks all,
Benjamin Jones

[TomO]

personally, blogging kind of confuses me. At first I thought it was like writing in a diary that everyone else could read, then I thought of it more like a forum with a different structure. Now, I'm just all confused and don't really understand "blogging" Why can't we just post on forums, lol? Maybe I'm too old to understand

On topic though: I would love to blog on a regular basis, but life gets in the way for me. Plus I'm spread thin right now.

[SVOboy]

I think blogging grew out of the journal thing...but I'm not sure on the history, I'm a recent convert myself.

Anyway, the point is to present some good information here and there in a condensed, "newsy" form. It'll be a bit like a newspaper or such that publishes content with much less emphasis on discussion. It's mainly to reach out to a different group of people that don't really read forums and to present our best content in a more condensed and readable form for others.

[Coyote X]

Wouldn't it be easier if there were a small group of writers for the blog that create articles from the discussions in the forum? They could condense the information down into an article and link back to the forums where they cite their sources. There are a lot of informational posts that run out of steam before reaching a conclusion and maybe with the forum users knowing a front page article might be made out of their discussion would keep it going till the experiments are concluded.

It would be better than a wiki since they usually end up kind of messy if anyone can edit. Not saying a wiki would not be a good thing to add once the volume of information gets large enough that it needs a neatly organized index. But to start with a simple article based site would be better.

If you use wordpress for it let me know, I have lots of sites running it and can help with setting it up.

[SVOboy]

That is indeed that idea. Condense some of the spread out forum bits and present it in another form.

I've already hacked together a theme for WP, you can see it here: http://ecomodder.com/blog

[Coyote X]

looks good, are you planning on integrating it into vbulletin so the articles get a thread in the forums to discuss instead of the standard wordpress comments module? That would also get rid of the multiple account thing

I think there is a lot of potential for a blog attached to this site, plus easier SEO

[SVOboy]

I had the plug-in installed originally, but I used my roommate as a tester (he's a programmer) and he cursed mightily the fact that the log in was redirected through the forum. I understand it would be nice for forum users to log in automatically, but then I don't expect forum goers to post in the comments and I don't want to put off the section I'm targeting who are used to WP and prolly don't want to have to register through the forum...if you get my drift?

Hush hush on the SEO bitz,

[Coyote X]

Sounds good to me

btw to write posts on wordpress check out windows live writer, you will like it once you play with it for a while. Way easier to write locally and arrange the page then just hit a button to publish it.

[SVOboy]

Thanks for the tipsy whipsy! If you have any other critiques, do address them too me.

[TomO]

ok, so after chatting with Ben, still in the middle of that even at this moment, he's twisted my arm into making me install the wordpress software for my own webpage.

I guess this means I'll make time for blogging now, lol. Damn technology!