Dougal Campbell's geek ramblings

WordPress, web development, and world domination.

9rules Network chooses WordPress

Apr202005

The 9rules Network is a website affiliate network. They have chosen WordPress to power their blog, and hint at more things to come.

Wordpress’ powerful theme architecture and plugin API gives us
the ability to not only build a powerful blog, but to empower an entire
Network – as you’ll soon see. WordPress is not just for blogs anymore.
We’re utilizing some of the very latest features available in WordPress
Strayhorn (1.5) to build the 9rules network – a platform which will
drive blogging and Weblog networks to the next level.

Cooper MINI Fun

Apr162005

Recently, while Susan was driving the kids around, our daughter saw a convertible and commented that she’d like a car “with the lid down”. Susan told her, “save your money!” That’s our stock response to the kids whenever they request anything expensive. Anyhow, Susan has always thought that Mary would be really cute in a MINI (when she’s old enough to drive, of course). So we were joking around about that, and began to wonder just what the prices were like. So I hopped over to the MINIUSA web site and looked around a bit.

MINI Open User Agreement

MINI Open User Agreement

The prices weren’t unreasonable for the base model. And I started poking around, looking at the various options. When I went to look at the prices for the convertible models, I was presented with a popup window with an “Open User Agreement”. I stared, stupified for a moment. “What the? They can’t be serious, can they?” An EULA which requires you to keep your convertible’s top down 90% of the time?

I read further, and began to laugh. Here are some choice quotes:

[…]

MINI Owner recognizes the following conditions below are acceptable reasons, under agreement, for having the top in closed position: (please initial)

  1. When motoring in rain under 25 miles per hour.
  2. When motoring through a car wash and/or having car washed manually.
  3. When parked outside for an unexpected extended time period.
    (MINI USA doesn’t recommend any MINI, including MINI Cooper,
    MINI Cooper S, and MINI Convertible be parked for an extended time.)
  4. When temperature drops below freezing point (32°F/ 0°C).
  5. After hair plug surgery.
  6. When within earshot of an outdoor banjo and/or kazoo concert.
  7. When driving through biblical-size swarm of locusts.
  8. To avoid riotous teenaged groupies.

[…]

This open contract extends to third parties that operate MINI Owner’s Convertible while in the legal possession of MINI Owner. This includes but is not limited to: husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, step-sons, step-daughters, best friends, next door neighbors, tennis instructors, sugar-mommas, sugar-daddies, girlfriends, vengeful ex-girlfriends, tow-truck operators, valets, and/or joy riders. MINI Owner accepts full responsibility and recognizes that any non-open motoring by anyone in his/her vehicle (vin # above) is a violation of this contract.

[…]

There’s more, but you really should read the whole thing for yourself.
For added fun, visit the site and attempt to decline the agreement. Oh, and if that wasn’t enough, try out the “Build your own / Robot” option.

eBay Storefronts?

Apr142005

Has anyone else noticed brick-and-mortar stores that offer auction services through eBay? There are two in my area that I’m aware of so far. One is TheTradingBay, in Marietta, which I pass each day on my way to work. The second is iSoldIt, which has a store in Woodstock. Basically, they operate sort of like a consignment shop which fronts your items through eBay.

“Clicks-to-Bricks” isn’t exactly a new idea. But for some reason, I find this particular venture facinating. I don’t know why, because I’ve only bought one item through eBay (I did have an OnSale.com habit many years ago, though). But it just caught my eye when I passed by TheTradingBay, and the sign said “eBay the easy way.” I had to wonder if this was just somebody leeching off of the eBay name, or if it was officially sanctioned (which it is).

eBay Trading Posts — Now Luddites can use eBay, too!

SpamLookup plugin for MovableType

Apr112005

There’s a new plugin for MovableType called SpamLookup. Let’s compare this add-on to the anti-spam features already in the WordPress core:

Feature Comparison for MT SpamLookup Plugin vs. WordPress Core
Feature SpamLookup Plugin WordPress Core
IP-based lookup Yes No
Domain-based lookup Yes No
TrackBack IP check * Yes No
Passphrase checks Yes No
Checking HTTP Headers Yes No
Hyperlink Count limits Yes Yes
Dynamic proxy checking Yes Yes
Wordlists (blacklist/graylist) Yes Yes
Whitelist URL checks No Yes
Whitelist Author checks No Yes

* I have concerns about using this method for spam detection. There are many legitimate circumstances that will fail this test.

And of course, there are plugins for WordPress which fill in the gaps. I’d say that for MT users, this should be an excellent tool to add to your arsenal of anti-spam measures. WP users wishing to add more anti-spam features have plenty of options available.

Personally, I find that between the blacklist/graylist and the open proxy checks, WordPress catches most of the spam on its own. I’m using a couple of homegrown plugins, but don’t have so much to do with detecting spam, as with how to handle it once it’s been detected.

Wil Wheaton considers WordPress

Apr082005

Oh yeah, and Wil Wheaton is also pondering a possible switch to WordPress.

Some plans:

  • […]
  • Rebuild the entire site, either in Movable Type, or in WordPress. Right now, I’m playing with a development version of WordPress, and I’m very excited about what it can do. It may not be for me, but I’m enjoying the test drive.
  • […]

I’m still kicking myself for not buying an autographed copy of Dancing Barefoot when I had the chance.

Scrivs considers new CMS for Whitespace

Apr082005

Scrivs is pondering a change for his design blog, Whitespace. The three main choices are Textpattern or WordPress or DIY.

I’ve already weighed in with my (admittedly biased) opinion of WordPress. It seems to me that it would be a great fit for his stated requirements.

Here is a list of features that I am looking for:

  • Easily import entries from MT
  • Multiple authors with different permissions
  • Multiple blogs. For example, I may setup a site with a news blog and an articles blog sitting side-by-side.
  • Decent spam prevention
  • Can use the same url structure as my current sites (very, very important)
  • Free
  • Easy plugin architecture in case I get creative and decide to program something of my own
  • Easy export in case I decide to build my own software

It’s a basic blogging list, but those are the essentials. Any advice beyond just telling me which one to go with is greatly appreciated.

About the only weak spot is the multi-blog handling. I pointed out WordPress-MU, though.

I’m guessing that one of the strongest features in this case is going to be WP’s ability to mimic his existing permalink structure (which he can do with the addition of an “underscore titles” plugin). I’d probably favor a solution that automagically generated permanent redirects to new, cleaner URLs. But the important thing in this case is that an easy solution to the problem is available.

This is not a call for everyone to go comment on his site advocating WordPress. I will always tell people to use the best tool for the job, even if that means using some other system than one I normally favor. But in this case, my personal opinion is that WP would be a good fit.

A modern day fairy tale, part 2

Apr082005

For some reason, our daughter doesn’t like it when I make up new versions of her favorite stories.

… Around that time, the three bears returned from their walk to eat their breakfast. When they went inside their house, Papa Bear immediately noticed something wrong.

“Somebody’s been DDoSing my server,” he said.

Mama Bear checked her server. “Somebody’s been defacing my corporate website!”

Baby Bear checked his server, too. “Somebody’s been spamming my blog!”

The three bears decided to set up a packet sniffer to see if the Somebody was still there…

Well, I thought it was a pretty gripping tale.

Tartan Day 2005

Apr062005

Today is Tartan Day, which originated in Canada, was later adopted by the United States, and is now beginning to spread to other corners of the world, just as the “Scottish diaspora” has. The celebrations in New York this year were especially auspicious, as they featured the sword of William “Braveheart” Wallace, which has never before left its native Scotland.

There was also some controversy this year with the conspicuous absence of Sean Connery, who had previously committed to attend, then withdrew at the last minute. Connery blamed his busy schedule, but other sources point to an argument between the actor and Scottish First Minister Jack McConnell.

Clan Campbell played a prominant role in the festivities this year, as they led the gathered clans in the Tartan Day Parade.

There. Isn’t it refreshing to read about something besides blogs and web development every once in a while?

WordPress Scandal: Photomatt Responds

Apr012005

Matt finally had a chance to make a response to the recent WordPress SEO scandal. Here’s a small snippet:

The articles hosted content thing was just a short-term experiment, an interesting idea (original and relevant Wikipedia-type content on the site) that was badly implemented. As an experiment it could have been conducted much better than it was. The content should have been more topical to WP issue, I should have kept up with the content that was going up, the links should have never had the overflow CSS, and I should have discussed it with more people. Each was a mistake and they combined badly — I’m very sorry. Originally I wanted to do a poll about it but I never got around to adding a polling add-on to bbPress and thus the poll never happened. In my mind there were more important things to spend time on (the 1.5 release, the plugin and theme directories, etc.) but I don’t offer that as an excuse. I didn’t give the ads much thought after the very beginning until about two weeks ago when I got a few emails about them. I did not know they had mesowhatever/asbestos content on them until Andy Baio messaged me.

Okay, as cooler heads have already noted, a mistake was made, there’s no conspiracies going on, and the whole thing was blown way out of proportion. Can we all just go back to tweaking our software and fighting the real spammers now? Yes? Thank you.

WordPress Scandal Update

Apr012005

Matt “scum of the earth” Mullenweg, vacationing in a not-very-wired portion of Italy, finally got wind of all the villagers with torches and pitchforks who have been searching for him.

I have close to a thousand emails and countless blog posts and comments to go through, but I’ll try to synthesize everything and respond ASAP, I think it’s important because some people seem to be spinning things quite maliciously. If you have a specific question please send me an email and I’ll do my best to respond personally or on the blog, even if you’ve already decided I’m the scum of the earth.

— Back Online

What a way to spend your vacation, eh?

In the meantime, the offending hidden links have been removed from the WordPress.org website, the HotNacho articles are gone, and Google has restored the site’s pagerank.

Update: Andy at waxy.or has another update which includes a statement from HotNacho.

Chad Jones, the creator of Hot Nacho, contacted me and asked me to post this statement. Several parts of his story were contradicted by Matt himself, and I don’t believe it myself, but I’m happy to reproduce it in full below.

I’m not sure what Andy meant about contradictions. I didn’t see anything that really contradicted anything that Matt had said. (But then again, I’m functioning on about 3 hours of sleep, so I could have missed something)