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Bloggers many times put text inside images with different things in mind. At times it works to their advantage while many times it makes the blog look childish. Take the example of small sayings superimposed tastefully on images. In such cases, the entire piece looks like a piece of art and gives the text an iconic identity. You can see some examples of this in these two posts: 1 , 2 . But this, like a special effect, should not be overdone in blog posts. Text works fine as an image or inside an image, when put as the title of the blog. It helps in recall of the blog’s identity. Poet bloggers often use a background image to enhance intensity of their poems. Some blogs excel in beautifully composing their small posts of quotations etc with appropriate images. This all is fine but only if the basics of readability, design etc are kept in mind. We have earlier dealt with this and other related aspects at this link on placing images on blogs . We have seen a good number of blog...

Most of us bloggers open our blogs 'on the spur of the moment' and keep posting on it whatever comes to our mind. In the Directory of Best Indian Blogs , you will find more than a hundred such blogs under 'personal' category. We are not saying that there is something intrinsically wrong with posting personal matter on the blog. In fact, blogs (originally called web logs or web diaries) were/are primarily meant to do that. In fact, the blogs selected by us in the 'personal' category of the Directory are indeed very good blogs. So, what's the issue? The issue is lazy blogging; maintaining the blog like a Facebook timeline (or worse, like a Twitter account) just because  we have not thought of making the blog something better. This also explains why a large number of bloggers have left blogging or reduced it in favour of Facebook or other networking sites: they have found new platforms better than the blog for their personal chatter or comment on what...

Most bloggers the world over just blog. Their love for writing and/or clicking photos and sharing them on the blog keeps them going. They write about any topic that stokes their imagination - from spiritual and emotional matters to mundane daily life. They post photos, audio clips and videos of whatever they feel is worth sharing. They engage with other like-minded bloggers. Blogging is their love.  Such bloggers make the bulk of the blogosphere. The common bloggers often open a blog to satisfy the itch to share something more serious and permanent than posts on their Facebook or other social networking accounts. They feel they can write better than many others. They feel they have some special viewpoint on life-matters. They want to have a place where they can put their poems written over years or to share their views with the world whenever they are agitated with their government's  actions or something bad happening in the society. They keep the blo...

Some people take wrong actions deliberately; they are crooks and criminals. But some do wrong things inadvertently; they are innocent but are not so in the eyes of the society and the law. This post is to caution such innocent bloggers who inadvertently  break a law, offend people, hurt the blog’s reputation.  Do not copy. Do not copy others’ content be it text or graphic or a/v content. In case you must copy, attribute the source but in many cases this will not be enough, e.g. copying a song or photograph or a research document available only to members. Do not use untested widgets and codes. Putting such matter on the blog could harm the blog in many ways: spurious activity such as stealing private information, key-logging, annoying visitors by forcing them to commercial sites, linking to bad sites, etc. In any case, put only such widgets that will add value to the blog. Do not give personal information about others. Unless it serves a special purpose ...

It is often seen that businesses are guided by their IT advisers to go for large portals and have their presence on social networking sites [right now, very fashionable]. Anything that is more sensible but not ‘in vogue’ soon loses importance in the eyes of such star-grazers. Blogs fall in this category. Yet research by international social-media sites as well as marketers themselves have shown that blogs give lots of value to the blog, which websites and social networking presence do not give.   Blog content is more permanent than that on social networking messages. Social networking sites, especially Facebook and Twitter, create content so fast that unless you are always creating content or are repeating your content again and again (and this could be irritating), your content will be swamped by content that is constantly posted by others.  Blogs have more authority and higher credibility than other platforms. Research shows that a significant num...

This post tells you how to put maps on your blog and also how to share maps elsewhere to help people [e.g. visitors] relate to a location. Thanks to Google Maps, you can easily put your own markings to Google maps and share these with your blog viewers by following the steps given below. But before going to the steps, let’s set your imagination on a roll about the ways in which maps can be used on blogs and elsewhere. The possibilities are many. Some could be like these: This map was made in Google 'mapsengine' and its screenshot pasted here. Did not remove edit/delete guides just to show how it looks on mapsengine. You may want your invitees to know the driving route to your wedding or your daughter’s birthday function or a seminar in which you are to speak. You may want to guide a visitor to a city, giving him routes and glimpses of what to see. You might want to tell your visitor how to plan his trip to your area, depending upon the likely traffic. You ...

Long ago, we published a post on using widgets / gadgets on blogs , and it is one of the most popular posts on ITB. To supplement that, we give here some ideas about which widgets go with which types of blogs. The following widgets look fine on most types of blogs, if used imaginatively and without cluttering the blog with too many and too gaudy ones: blogroll of blogs / websites that have related content; social media sharing buttons / stats; archives; label list; best content on the blog [e.g. most popular posts]; pages [to be displayed in a menu bar or as a sidebar widget]; profile; search box; contact / subscription form [if in simple design] In addition, different types of blogs can benefit from relevant widgets as suggested below: Blogs on political and social happenings [current affairs]: news feed; latest comments; poll Travel blogs: currency converter; distance measurement; map; weather; slideshow; world time; translation  Blogs on photography, history, culture, ...