Just to sum up do I see the traditional relation between writer, text and reader as the first dimension. Thinking circularly about this relationship makes it two dimensional as it allows the flow in both directions and connects the reader and writer beyond the text. The third dimension is when you turn the circle into a sphere by considering all the relations between writers and writers, texts and texts and readers and readers. The fourth dimension is time, which unfortunately is a dominant a force when it comes to blogging as in life in general.

You are surely familiar with the question about what came first, the hen or the egg? Although I do know the answer (which is quite simple once you break of the circularity of the question) I am not going to flaunt it as this is not about knowing the answer, but about understanding the question. Sometimes it seems impossible to know what came first. Sometimes you shouldn’t be able to tell.

Splitting things up like I do thus makes little logical sense. Still does it provide a platform for examining the elements isolated. You can not have text without a writer, just as you cannot have a writer without a text. You cannot have readers without texts, while admittedly you can have texts without readers. The elements are nonetheless closely connected and not really logically separable. Still is it worth looking at each of them isolated as that brings new perspectives into the light and makes it possible to think differently about them.

You do perhaps ask yourself what all this talk about circularity is good for and where it comes from. I always loved circles more than straight lines, I believe that most things are circular in some way and I think that reflecting and communicating accordingly is often more rewarding. Think about how we communicate to get a response, how we receive when we give and how we often return to the same places or ideas when we find ourselves lost. Admittedly, does thinking this way seem to make everything more complicated, but sometimes it is really worth it.

As I get the articles written will I link them to this post and add links to them here so that this post ends up being the hub around which they are hovering. Your comments and input are as always not only welcome, but deeply appreciated.

One of the bloggers I admire the most is Lorelle from Lorelle on WordPress. Knowing her I guess I should have been prepared for an unusual response and still hers blew me away. What you are about to embark on is a journey into the mind of Lorelle and what a journey it is.

I left it unedited and uncommented just as I forgot all about my tips and suggestions for writing about your favorite articles because it would have been a crying shame to do anything else. That it is entirely different from the other tributes is typical for Lorelle. You do not only get more than expected, but often also something slightly different. I find that both refreshing and mind opening and hope you do as well.

From here on out is Lorelles response to my request for her to name five favorites from her own blog. The following is thus practically a guest post from Lorelle on WordPress!

When you’ve been blogging as long as I have (over a decade) with thousands of posts to choose from, finding five to represent your “favorite blog posts” is quite a challenge. As is my style, I couldn’t begin to choose until I defined “favorite”.

Is a post a favorite because of how it was written? How the words came together in a magical way that is a delight to write and read?

Is it a post that was fun to research, digging deep into the subject to find out all I could and then translate that knowledge into something fun for my readers to read?

Is it a post that my readers love, bringing tons of traffic to my blog and, thus, building my reading audience?

Is my favorite one that is timeless, that withstands the test of time, a treasure for my readers?

Or is a post my favorite because of how hard it was to write? Because it took so long, so much thought, so much work, it damn well better be my favorite because I earned that post.

As I began to evaluate my favorites, what actually happened surprised me. Instead of hundreds and hundreds of posts attacking me from within my mind, overwhelming my decision, only a few bubbled up to the surface as my true favorites.

Why? Because of how they were written, the research involved, the attention they received, the timeless quality of the content, and because they were such damn hard work to write.

What Does The Web Look Like?
My mother is a highly intelligent woman, though sometimes she jumps to conclusions without following a natural progression. Most people start with A, B, C, etc., but my mother is a member of Mensa and her progression is A, B, G, M, Q, S…you get the picture. She often misses some steps along the way. Not critical to the final conclusion, but does create some interesting lapses in her ability to really see the whole picture.

She wanted to know what the Internet looked like. I tried to explain that it was a virtual world, but physically it was represented by telephone lines, cables, big computers, all connected together. That didn’t satisfy her. She wanted to see the Internet.

So I wrote Can You Visualize the Web? after searching for others who wanted to “see” what the web looked like, and the researchers who complied with mathematical algorithms, charts, graphs, and visual presentations to show you what the web looked like if you were to actually see it.

There is no one picture, but many different ways to show what the web looks like and that was fascinating. These are works of art.

For me, this was a big lesson in how to make the virtual real, but also how to really listen to what someone was asking, then research and present the answer. Do you know what the web looks like?

Recovering With a Month Long Blogging Series
If there is anything that will take your mind off your life, it’s work. Hard work. After my father died, and the family exploded into pieces, as I’ve learned tends to happen for little or no justification in an already dysfunctional family (any excuse is a good one), I knew I needed a major distraction that would keep me busy and focused while my unconscious continued with the healing process. They say blogging is good therapy, and I needed some desperately.

I’d been longing to do a huge series of blog posts featuring WordPress Plugins, so I plunged into A Month of WordPress Plugins, a thirty-day series featuring different categories of WordPress Plugin types, and tips for using them, one a day for a month. While not a single favorite post, I think of the whole series as one, long, thirty-day post.

Why is this a favorite? It fulfilled a long-held desire to dig into a favorite subject. I worship the ground Plugin authors walk over. Since the early days of WordPress, I’ve been honored to work with some of the best of the best of WordPress developers and Plugin artists to help create Plugins I and others so dearly love, but also to solve users’ problems and needs. I knew the month long project would allow me to give back to the community I love so much, and to party with some of my dearest online friends.

What I didn’t realized is that it would be so damn hard to write. It was easy to feature the most popular WordPress Plugins and categories. They are known commodities with many reviews and well-written documentation and support. As the month wore on, it got harder and harder to find good Plugins to write about – wait, that’s not true. I found good Plugins to write about. What I didn’t find were good write-ups on those Plugins. The struggle to plow through horribly misspelled, poorly written, and pitiful explanations of WordPress Plugins led me to write A Love Letter to WordPress Plugin Authors and Tips For Writing Good WordPress Tips, hopefully helping WordPress Plugin and Theme authors, and anyone who writes WordPress tips, to get it right so they help everyone know more about what they offer – no mind reading required.

So the month-long series was fun to research, fun to write as well as hard to research and hard to write, but I made it through. My mind had time off to heal and get stronger, and I created an amazing body of work to help WordPress Plugin authors get the attention and respect they deserve.

The thing I’ve most proud of from this series is that on the last day, I wrote an article about the WordPress Plugins that I wanted that hadn’t yet been developed. Many believe that every Plugin idea has been done. Well, they haven’t. That list generated a huge response. Now, many of the Plugins I wanted have been or are in the process of being developed. That series and final post encouraged others to give back to the same community that I was giving to. What a great honor to be a part of such an altruistic process.

Peek Inside Lorelle’s Head
I write technical articles. I tell you how to do things. I break things, I tell you how I broke them, and how you can prevent such breaks. That’s what I’m good at.

Fiction and creative writing skills are not my forte, though the one published piece of fiction I’ve done has gotten great reviews. Therefore, when I published Too Much To Write About, I was exceptionally nervous. I was inviting the reader to use their imagination and look into my head through my words:

Imagine the inside of my head looking like an office. In this corner of the desk I have a meter high pile of articles and research I want to write about on my family’s history after an amazing last few months digging into the past and coming up with full hands and head. Sitting in front of me is a half meter high stack of notes and ideas on articles about WordPress and blogging that have been backlogged with all the traveling I’ve been doing for the past 3 months. On the floor next to my chair are the stacked half finished manuscripts of three books I have to finish writing very soon, and under my feet is another pile of paper representative of another book still in the negotiation phase.

On the other side of the chair on the floor are piles and piles of PHP, HTML, and CSS coded print outs, covered with red pen marks as I analyze, troubleshoot, and break my head on them. There’s good material there for technical articles, but more problems to solve than publish. I spot an apple turning brown among the papers and ignore the ripening smell in my head. Maybe it will turn into one of those neat dried apple heads in a few months, preserved for all time. What do you think?

On the shelf above my desk, right above my mental laptop screen, is a huge row of articles on photography and travel rustling at me to publish on my Taking Your Camera on the Road website. On the shelf also sits a photograph of my husband, smiling at me with love in his eyes and camera in his hands. A smile and eyes I haven’t seen in four months as I’ve been constantly on the road. My heart aches. It reminds me that tucked in a small alcove underneath are months of dusty papers making dry cracking sounds from their thin pages on the airline manufacturing and maintenance industry for my husband’s aircraft engineering blog, much ignored lately.

In between and around the stacks of paper, notebooks, scratch pads, and books are the dried up remains of half eaten lunches and dank tea cups with the loose tea leaves starting to grow plants. A roll of stamps twists around the yellowing pages of another manuscript on the business of networking for nature photographers, a reminder of days gone by when such topics were in demand and real letters were once written. I don’t even pay my bills with stamps and envelopes anymore. In fact, I think the stamps have 29 cents imprinted upon them. Yikes.

Airline tickets and car rental receipts fill in the left over spaces, as does huge lumps of gas receipts and mileage records, keeping track of the more than 15,000 miles I’ve traveled by vehicle in the past six months, across 24 states, repeating some of them more than once (which total to 30 states, I think, but whose counting?).

I hear a sniffing and scuffling sound, and from in between the white stacks pops my black cat, Kohav, evil in her golden eyes. I grab the piles and hang on because right behind her is Holiday, my tiger kitty, chasing her across my mental desktop. It takes all my energy to hold everything in place. This time, the stacks survive. Next time, even in my mental office, I might not be so lucky.

With all of this mental clutter, you think that my brain would contain a gold mine of material worth digging up and translating into text for you to read and editors to buy. With all this mental clutter, it’s hard for me to focus and concentrate. That’s the truth and the dilemma.

It’s a scary place, inside of Lorelle’s head.

It’s About the Links
As Jan has shown you here repeatedly, it is all about the links, the circular connection of the links, that makes the web what it is today.

Where else on this planet could you work at a job where your primary function is to send people away and expect them to come back happy? You tell your customers to go away, tell them where to go, and they so love where you sent them, they come back and usually bring their friends with them. Amazing!

In 2005, I wrote The Power of the Link and it got little attention. Many took links for granted. Yeah, yeah, a link is a link and it connects the web, which is why it’s called The Web. With the public release of the patent for Google’s PageRank algorithm, putting even more pressure on the link, everyone now is learning about the real power of the link.

In the article, I made some very important points I continue to emphasize in all the blogs and magazines I write, as well as in my workshops and presentations:

This value is a one way street. Do not expect that just because you link to a site or blog that they have any responsibility to link back to you. They don’t. You are only saying that they have said or shown you something of value you want to share with others. However, if the blog or site owner pays attention to their site statistics and referrals, especially if they are getting a lot of visitors from one particular link, they will often come visiting to see what you wrote about them to encourage your readers to leave your site to visit them. If they find value, the odds are likely that they may link back to you when they write something pertaining to your site’s topics. If they find a lot of great content, they might add you to their blogroll or permanent link list.

…How to you get people to link to your site or blog? There is only one way. Provide content worth linking to. Write sincerely about what you know, or write an eloquent opinion. Provide references and examples of what you are talking about. Help people learn more about whatever you are writing about, and give them something to chew on. Make it something not only worth reading, but worth pointing to. This will encourage them to link to your post.

Incoming links or referrers to your blog does not hold you responsible for linking back. While it is nice to do, only link to sites worthy of such links. Remember, your outgoing link holds as much power for others as their incoming link. Use your linking power wisely.

….you have a lot of power over the blogroll links on your blog. These are not one time links. They are a permanent resident on your site. They tell people that the blog you are linking is sincerely good, giving them page ranking benefits.

The Art of How NOT to Comment
How NOT to Comment on Comments continues to be one of the most popular posts on Lorelle on WordPress. It was dug by Digg and picked up and spread around the globe several times since it was published.

I’ve written other articles on comments, but this one clicked. I took a negative and satirical look at the whole aspect of how “not” to comment on blogs, and people got it. Amazing.

While it was fun to write, the reason that this article is one of my favorites is because of one line I said in the post that people keep picking out and quoting around the web. In the year since I published this, I can’t tell you how many variations I’ve seen on this same point published. It gives me great pleasure that my writing had such an impact on the blogosphere, and hopefully, changed a little about how we blog and comment on blogs, and maybe how we interact in general.

Your Comment is a Mini Resume
Your comments on this blog, and many others, are published with your name and blog URL on them, if you include them. When people click your name, they visit your blog. Your comments are little representatives of you and your blog.

Make every comment you make to be a mini resume or sales pitch to encourage people to click and visit. Make sure there is something on your blog that makes their visit worthwhile and makes them want to hang around and read more. And since your URL will take people away from my blog, make sure your comment and blog reflects well on me. By leaving your comment on my blog, in a very round-about way, I’m speaking well of you. Consider it a mini-letter of recommendation.

So What Is Your Favorite?
While Jan has asked me to name my favorite five posts, I wonder what you think your favorite posts are. I wonder how you define “favorite” and what criteria you would use to select your five favorite posts.

Would your criteria be the same as mine? What makes you value one post over another?

As I do one last review of my favorite five, I find a new value in these. In my mind and heart, each of these posts made a different in the lives of others. They weren’t about “me” so much as they were about “me helping others”. That’s the most important part of blogging that keeps me blogging: helping others.

Consider what criteria defines your favorite five posts, and see what discoveries you make about your own blog writing.

I set out to communicate about communication. Considered blogging itself to be part of that was it natural that I explored blogs blogging about it thoroughly. Playing with the circularity of it all I began blogging about blogging as well. Learning by doing was the way I chose to learn the ropes. Linking to others who had touched similar subjects seemed both natural and logic to do. After all if the communication should be circular it had to reach out. At first nothing happened. Then people who I linked to started commenting here and recognizing me when I commented on their blogs. I mailed a few asking questions or seeking advice. Practically all of them responded. Although I am sure they get much more mail than the average person did they actually take the time to read and respond. Probably not least because they at least had an idea who it was from and what I was about.

When looking back the greatest pleasure of the beginning of my blogging journey have been how many people I have connected with in so relatively short time. It has not propelled me to world fame nor has it made my blog the center of the universe. Not to anyone but me at least. I have however noticed that the real thrill is when something you wrote in solitude gets company. Not only that it is being read, but that someone takes the time to comment on it, to link to it or even to write about it. That people know who you are because they have read you. That you have actually connected with someone through your writing. Since I actually started out writing to myself as many bloggers do when they first start blogging did it take some time before the ball got rolling. Staying true to what I wanted to achieve paid of though. Connections were made and if cared for they will continue to exist.

When reflecting about it I imagined a grid consisting of the elements mentioned. Since I cannot draw very well will you have to imagine it as well. On one axis is the classic relation between writer, text and reader. On the other is all your fellow bloggers with their own triangular relations. Their writing, themselves and their readers that is. However important these triangles are do each of them not signify much in the grand scheme of things. If we however apply a little circular thinking and imagine that writer, text and reader each are points on a circle it becomes much more interesting. Then the relation is not just dynamics in a straight line, but feeds itself. The writer writes a text, which is read by a reader. That in itself is bound to influence the writer when he writes again, but the dynamic can also be turned around, which reverses the roles. When the reader comments he turns writer just as the writer turns reader when reading it.

Expanding how we think about it from the one dimensional straight line to the two dimensional circle still doesn’t accurately depict my experiences though. Perhaps is the word Blogosphere not such a bad term for it after all. Taking this concept to heart we put on our 3D glasses realizing that those circles in fact form a sphere. In lack of a better image can you think of them as the longitude and latitude lines on a terrestrial globe. Instead of one or two dimensional connections between writer, text and reader do we now also have three dimensional connections between writers, readers and texts. It is no longer merely writer – text – reader or vice versa, but also writer – writer – writer, text – text – text and reader – reader – reader. Remember this is not individual people, but roles and the writers and readers typically the same who however when interacting act in different capacities.

Everyone who have made the slightest effort can attest to the connections between bloggers. You may be unaware of them at first, but you soon discover bands of connections. They may know each other through their work, through common projects, guest blogging, blog networks and not least through reading each others writing. That is also typically where the connections between readers come into existence. Readers do also connect when reading though. That may not be a direct connection, but it is certainly one that becomes obvious when they turn writers and comment on what they have read. As far as connections between texts is concerned is practically every text online worth reading connected to at least one other text. Not least so when it comes to blogs where linking out is not only regarded a duty when citing someone, but also a natural part of writing and posting in general.

As for the fourth dimension can I only attest to that there just isn’t enough time to do everything you would like to do. Exactly for that reason you should actually reserve enough of it to enjoy and be aware of what you are doing. In fact is looking back and thinking about what was not a bad use of the present. As long as it prepares you better for the future that is. Time is a strange thing. In some ways the time past have gone incredibly fast and in other ways does it seem like some things took forever. This was obviously not the case. However, you do see what was significant when looking back and that is where it pays off to pay attention. Whether it is remembering the successes with fondness or the bitterness of what went wrong I will try to take it with me as I look forward. There is so much more to do. So much to write and so much to read and so many other connections to make.

Following the comments on your own blog is easy. Just as easy is it when people offer a way to subscribe to comments. Not everyone does or can though. All those who are on a hosting service like WordPress.com are limited to what features they can offer and this is one of the limitations.

Since I have a poor recollection and also comment here, there and everywhere the result was that I kept forgetting to check back to see if someone commented on my comment, answered my question or otherwise added something valuable to the conversation.

With coComment that happens no more. At least I am hopeful that it won’t as it serves up all the my comments and what I commented on in one location. As long as I remember checking that (and remember turning the coComment extension on again after occasionally turning it off) then everything will be fine.

You can even make rss feeds of your comments, which I use to integrate them into my orbinaut website. You can also choose to include others comments in which case it can serve as a reminder of when to check back to see the new comments.

The way you make sure that your comments are tracked is through the extension or the bookmarklet. coComment works with these browsers: Firefox 1.0 and 1.5, Safari 2.0 and Internet Explorer 6.0 and 7.0. I find the extension most useful as you don’t have to remember bookmarking the conversation before commenting if using that option.

The reason that I sometimes have had to turn it off recently was that the extension slowed everything down. Having recognized the problems and apologized for them does it seem that coComment now have the issues in grip and that it can be left on without limiting my browsing.

You can choose to integrate it directly on your blog (as Alister Cameron have), but I have chosen not to do that. Most, if not everyone, using it will already be using the extension or bookmarklet, which renders integration superfluous and for those who don’t use it does it confuse more than anything else I think.

Since coComment is already compatible with most blogging and social networking sites and tools is it a great way to keep track of practically everything you are commenting on when surfing. You can see a complete list of the compatible platforms here.

The service is not yet perfect, but it is obvious that the people involved want it to be. They strive for constant improvements, are listening very carefully to their community and are not afraid of admitting mistakes or correcting errors. Hence am I sure the already great service will become even better.

Still is it not to find negative or pessimistic remarks about conversation and conversations. The best are both witty and contain an element of truth, like “People say conversation is a lost art; how often I have wished it were” from Edward R Murrow or George Santayana’s “The primary use of conversation is to satisfy the impulse to talk”. Another remark that comes to mind is from Truman Capote, who in his usual dry way remarks that “A conversation is a dialogue, not a monologue. That’s why there are so few good conversations: due to scarcity, two intelligent talkers seldom meet”. Following practically every great invention within mass media and communication technology have also spurred a lot of comments about the art of conversation disappearing or dying out.

That there also are a lot of positive and more optimistic things to say about the subject is the following evidence of (although a couple of the quotes do make reservations). While I do realize that more of them circle around the same aspects do I think that you benefit from seeing the same point formulated differently. As is the idea with of the rest of the articles in this quotation series is this about adding to the understanding and use of a concept and that is, no matter how you turn it, almost always better done by trying to see what is right and important about it.

Conversation is a game of circles. In conversation we pluck up the termini, which bound the common silence on every side. The parties are not to be judged by the spirit they partake and even express under this Pentecost. Tomorrow they will have receded from this high-water mark. Tomorrow you shall find them stooping under the old packsaddles. Yet let us enjoy the cloven flame whilst it glows on these walls. When each new speaker strikes a new light, emancipates us from the oppression of the last speaker to oppress us with the greatness and exclusiveness of his own thought, then yields us to another redeemer, we seem to recover our rights, to become men.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The techniques of opening conversation are universal. I knew long ago and rediscovered that the best way to attract attention, help, and conversation is to be lost. A man, who seeing his mother starving to death on a path kicks her in the stomach to clear the way, will cheerfully devote several hours of his time giving wrong directions to a total stranger who claims to be lost.

John Steinbeck

Young children…are often uninterested in conversation It is not that they don’t have ideas and feelings, or need to express them to others It is simply that as one eight-year-old boy once told me, “Talking is okay, but I don’t like to do it all the time the way grown-ups do; I guess you have to develop the habit.”

Robert Coles

The great secret of succeeding in conversation is to admire little, to hear much; always to distrust our own reason, and sometimes that of our friends; never to pretend to wit, but to make that of others appear as much as possibly we can; to hearken to what is said and to answer to the purpose.

Benjamin Franklin

A sudden silence in the middle of a conversation suddenly brings us back to essentials: it reveals how dearly we must pay for the invention of speech.

E.M. Cioran

In my opinion, the most fruitful and natural play of the mind is in conversation. I find it sweeter than any other action in life; and if I were forced to choose, I think I would rather lose my sight than my hearing and voice.

Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

Conversation is the music of the mind, an intellectual orchestra, where all the instruments should bear a part, but where none should play together. Each of the performers should have a just appreciation of his own powers, otherwise an unskillful novice who might usurp the first fiddle, would infallibly get into a scrape. To prevent these mistakes, a good master of the band will be very particular in the assortment of the performers; if too dissimilar, there will be no harmony, if too few, there will be no variety; and if too numerous, there will be no order.

Charles Caleb Colton

Ideal conversation must be an exchange of thought, and not, as many of those who worry most about their shortcomings believe, an eloquent exhibition of wit or oratory.

Emily Post

One reason why we find so few men of reasonable and agreeable conversation is that there is scarcely anyone whose mind is not more intent upon what he himself has a mind to say than on making pertinent replies to what is being said to him.

François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld

It is a Secret known but to a few, yet of no small use in the Conduct of Life, that when you fall into a Man’s Conversation, the first thing you should consider is, whether he has a greater Inclination to hear you, or that you should hear him. The latter is the more general Desire, and I know very able Flatterers that never speak a word in Praise of the Persons from whom they obtain daily Favours, but still practise a skilful Attention to whatever is uttered by those with whom they converse.

Richard Steele

It is not what we learn in conversation that enriches us. It is the elation that comes of swift contact with tingling currents of thought.

Agnes Repplier

He that questioneth much shall learn much and content much; but especially if he apply his questions to the skill of the persons whom he asketh; for he shall give them occasion to please themselves in speaking, and himself shall continually gather knowledge; but let his questions not be troublesome, for that is fit for a poser; and let him be sure to leave other men their turn to speak; nay, if there be any that would reign and take up all the time, let them find means to take them off, and bring others on,–as musicians used to do with those that dance too long galliards. If you dissemble sometimes your knowledge of that you are thought to know, you shall be thought, another time, to know that you know not.

Francis Bacon

I have always loved quotations. While they cannot replace complete works I find it fascinating how much you can pack into just a few words or sentences. Unlike reading the whole book or hearing the entire conversation they leave room for interpretation and reflection. They mean something different to different people and can yet act as facilitators of great thoughts and meaningful acts. Hence have I also decided not offer my interpretation, but to leave them as they are.

The best quotations are the ones that reoccur to us when we need them the most. I have a few of those and hope that you do to. If not then this series of quotations on concepts related to circular communication may help you find some that can guide and support you.

Shelly Kneupper Tucker presents “Neighbors” United by the Internet posted at This Eclectic Life. Shelly has written a beautiful piece about how blogging works as a substitute for the old feeling of neighborhood. Describing how her neighborhood used to be and how it currently is she describes how her connecting with people through her blog have taken the place of having caring people next door. That it indeed is possible to feel at home in a global neighborhood and that you indeed can help others and change things through your blog. Shelly is such a good writer so do yourself the favor and check out the rest of her articles while visiting. And do leave a comment if just to say hello. You do live in the same neighborhood after all.

Engtech presents Community Starts with Communication: 5 Tips to Building Your Readership posted at Internet Duct Tape. Engtech makes a great case for adding some one on one communication to the one to many communication of blogging. Although your blog post can be commented on and that you can respond in the comment section he argues that it might be better to combine it with emailing your commenters. Giving you 5 tips on how to do it he suggests you add to the conversation to encourage discussion and build relationships. Although a blog is a great communication tool it is not the only one and you may as well look to incorporate other proven means of communication when appropriate.

Lillie Ammann presents Double Whammy: Blast from the Past Meme and Carnival of Circular Communication posted at A Writer’s Words, An Editor’s Eye. Combining her entry for this Carnival with answering a meme about her ten favorite posts from her own blog Lillie is doing what every blogger should do once in a while namely take stock. Having to pick just ten posts will be a challenge to most bloggers and will thus really get you thinking. Whether you try to pick out those that didn’t get the attention they deserved or those that most accurately signify what your blog is about you are bound to get to know your blog better. That will in turn get you thinking about what you wanted, what you hoped for and what actually happened with your blogging, which will teach you a lot if you let it.

Skellie presents Getting Great Interviews posted at Skelliewag.org. Although you do see interviews on blogs from time to time I do agree with Skellie that we should be seeing even more. This article focus on how to change that by giving tips on who to interview, how to get in contact and how to ask for an interview. Reading this will probably make you realize that you also know someone whose thoughts will interest your readers as well. The key is to shift focus from the person to the contribution. Instead of focusing on those that everyone know should you look to interview someone who knows something that anyone could benefit from hearing about. Don’t miss the follow up Executing Great Interviews, which suggests what questions to ask and how to ask them.

Vivien presents Secret Formula To Writing Headlines That Catch Your Eyes posted at Inspiration Bit. In light of how many articles that have already been written about writing headlines you would think that it would be practically impossible to write one, which brings something new to the subject. Vivien’s did. To me at least and following her advice that is what counts. Actually she reveals the secret right there in the headline, but you still have to read the article to realize it. Since she also shares links to other great articles and resources besides giving eight concrete pieces of advice are you well advised to go check it out. It certainly made me think about how I write headlines and being aware is the first step towards improvement.

GP presents Navigating the Seven C’s posted at Fish Creek House – INNside Innkeeping. “The world is full of problems, just ask any cynic. Perhaps, you’re reading this because you want to be a problem solver, or hopefully, you are looking for ideas to serve as a lighthouse to guide you in making a constructive transformation of some sort in the microcosm of your locale, business, place of employment, or even the greater global community. If you are motivated to make a positive difference somehow, someway, you are invited to continue.”

Jeanne Dininni presents Magnetize Your Blog: Always Reply to Comments! posted at Writer’s Notes. “In short, after content, one of the major secrets to building a viable, dynamic blog is demonstrating a responsiveness to your readers, who are, after all, the foundation of your success. The critical importance of, first, appreciating, and then showing that appreciation to your readers simply cannot be stressed enough! If you think that writing wonderfully informative and brilliantly eloquent blog posts is all that you owe your readers, think again!”

Leo Dimilo presents Confessions of an Information Junkie- How to avoid Information Overload posted at Idiot Affiliate. “Information overload is a real problem for most bloggers and affiliate marketers. It is such a problem that someone needs to develop a 12 step program to get people off the information juice and back to doing what they need to be doing. I believe that most failures now stem from too much information and not enough time to implement it.”

Jordan presents Quick Guide to Google Analytics for Bloggers posted at MamaBlogga, saying, “If you’re serious about blogging, it’s important to focus on your visitors. How much do you really know about your visitors? Do you know where they come from? Why they came to your site? How long they stayed? How many pages they looked at? How many came and immediately left? Before you say, “Oh, numbers; I can’t deal with numbers!” or “Oh, coding; I can’t deal with coding!”, let me tell you that these numbers are good to know—and very useful in growing your blog readership.”

The Free Geek presents The Enormous Gmail Productivity List posted at Free Geekery. “The versatility of Gmail doesn’t end at what comes with the program (though many of the features it provides often are underused). Gmail has attracted the talents of many independent programmers and there are numerous scripts and plug-ins made for Gmail that can further enhance your experience. To that end, the following list provides some of the best tips and hacks to help you make the most of your Gmail service.”

Blog Carnivals is a great way for bloggers to recognize each other’s efforts and improve the overall level of conversation in the Blogosphere. By participating you will make it easier to find the information people are looking for while receiving recognition for your work. The Carnival of Circular Communication is a particular Blog Carnival celebrating Communication, Circularity and not least the combination of the two. To participate please start by reading the Carnival page, which will give you a better understanding of what this carnival is about and how you submit to it. Additional insights and information about Blog Carnivals can be found in How Blog Carnivals Boost Communities and Make Dreams Come True.

Evaluating your own blog and revisiting your initial thoughts about it something I can recommend to anyone who have been blogging for a while. I was already in the process when reading Chris Garrett asking What is Your Blog About Really? and Lorelle’s challenge to Blog about the path your blog took to get to now, but both certainly helped fuel my desire to take a closer look at not only this blog, but also my entire approach to blogging.

Looking back am I not unhappy with the themes and subjects that I have covered so far. In fact will you see more on several of them. There is however so many pieces missing that would help understand how I think about the core concepts and why I write about what I do as well as why I write as I do. As I crafted the new design I even added a small section to the right top corner telling you what this site is about or rather what it is supposed to be about:

Circular Communication flows in two directions and is woven in a second layer thus communicating about communication. Rooted in systems theory what you witness when visiting is theory meeting practice in a community based on learning and teaching.

Writing it and constantly having it before me helped me realize that change is necessary and a stronger focus is needed. Having already stayed away from the most off topic subjects should this not be too hard to change. It will in fact be more about adding than about cutting away I believe.

Speaking of adding have I collected a vast number of ideas about blogging as well as links to great resources on blogging since I started blogging myself. Combining the desire not to let that go to waste with my way of thinking about blogging, communication and community I decided that I would try starting a new initiative. A blog where the main purpose is to help bloggers and (thinking circularly) helping bloggers helping bloggers. This is not supposed to be merely another blog about blogging or meta blogging as it is sometimes referred to. Hopefully will it with time develop into a resource as well as a collective that although based on information, but which is about much more than that. A dream would be to see it turn into a collective experience. Perhaps even a genuine blogging community.

It is thus both a separation in terms of content and an extension in terms of purpose. Topic Factory is just as much as Circular Communication about contributing to and contributions about connecting and collaborating. The main difference is the center around which it all turns. Consequently will the two blogs share some themes and subjects while they what the rest of the content and how they deal with it are concerned will be very different indeed. Hence is this what I imagine that the Topic Factory will be about:

In essence Topic Factory is circularity applied to the Blogosphere. It is blogging about blogging and helping bloggers helping bloggers. It is a tribute to connecting and collaborating in an effort to highlight the best and help improve the rest.

With that in mind I hope to welcome you there as well as here and would love to hear what you think about it. If you are interested in helping me can you either comment or send me a message through the contact form. You can read more about the Topic Factory on its about page to see which themes and subjects I would like it to cover etc. As you will see do they cover a broad spectrum and everyone who have a genuine and valuable contribution to make are welcome. Perhaps you have a blog that covers other subjects and seek an outlet for your thoughts on blogging or you actually always wanted to write about it, but don’t have a blog yourself. You could also be looking for somewhere to guest blog on occasion or simply find the concept so appealing that you would like to lend a writing hand. Either way should you get in touch if you are interested in making a contribution to my humble effort of trying to make the Blogosphere an even better and rewarding place to be than it already is.

Since everyone is here let us begin. Regardless whether you are the one pitching or the recipient are there certain things you need to keep in mind when writing or reacting to a pitch, which leads me to ask all of you:

“How should you ideally pitch a blogger if you want something from him?”

Leave the hard-hitting hyperbole at home when marketing yourself to authority bloggers. Remember what your mom said about old-fashioned courtesy and kindness. They work especially well in the post-modern blog universe.

Roberta Rosenberg

Lead with the link. I’m a blogger. I read links. It’s what we do. I might skip the rest of your poorly-written email if there’s a URL at the top with full info about your product or service, and then if it’s interesting, I might even link to that page.

Anil Dash

Be relevant. It seems so simple and obvious, yet it is the biggest mistake made when pitching bloggers. Look at the categories of the blog and look at previous blog posts. Is your pitch REALLY relevant for the blog? With a lot of the pitches we get, you can tell there’s been no attempt to look any further than the title of the blog.

Lee Odden

Bloggers aim to provide a personal view of the news. They write in conversational style as an antidote to the canned news of traditional media. Why would you send a canned PR-speak pitch?

B.L. Ochman

Just give ‘em the facts and let the pitch stand on its own. Be proud! If you feel you’re not offering high value information, go back to the drawing board and re slant your pitch until you come up with something truly compelling.

Steve Rubel

Make it short and sweet: Generally, the shorter and more concise, the better. I don’t need your full 500 word press release. Tell me why I should be interested in 50 words or less, and then link to it. If you can’t communicate why this is worth my time in 50 words, you’re unlikely to be able to do so in 500 words.

Jeremy Wright

The goal is to build a lasting relationship with people. So reach out to them and sympathize with their problems and find ways that you can help them. Helping people is the best way to build contacts.

Nick O’Neill

Thank you for your answers. You really gave some great answers and offered a lot of insight… Yes, Lee, did you want to add something?

Don’t be offended or give up if a blogger doesn’t take your story the first time. Be courteous and smart about repeat attempts though. Watch to see if they really do pick up on your story before sending another pitch. Of course, this is not a problem if you actually read their blog.

Lee Odden

Thanks Lee, it certainly does pay to be persistent doesn’t it. Regardless of whether you are a blogger reaching out to other bloggers or a company looking for exposure for your products or your clients is there a lot you should pay attention to and take the time learning provided you want to do well. None of us appreciates being spoken to by strangers raving on about things we have little or no relation to. Ideally we want to buy and get advice or suggestions from someone who we know and respect just as we want to pass on what we know and like to them. Hence would my advice be not to speak to people, but to speak with them. It will be a whole lot more rewarding for everyone.

You can learn a whole lot more by reading the rest of the posts quoted above as well as by reading Bloggers: An invaluable communications channel, which will give you more of a background while The PR Wiki: Tips on Pitching Bloggers and The Bad Pitch Blog all are full of good advice and examples of both poor and great pitches and pitching.

The inspiration for this post came from reading Liz Strauss’ Writing Challenge: Joanna’s Thematic Link Post! I was both taken in and carried away about the circularity of it all. Seeing how my first guest post on Lorelle on WordPress Why A Link Post Should Be Like Mingling at a Party was picked up by Joanna Young in her post How to write a links post and then turned into a writing challenge, which now circulates among the readers of Successful Blog.

In addition this post can be seen as trying yet another way of writing a link post combining my usual way of writing link posts with how I normally write quotation posts as well as my idea about the virtual interview.

Adding to it and expanding our understanding of it is how a concept is used. Beyond the formal usage of it is the use of the concept in the context of conversations, writings, speeches and other forms of communication. It is this practical employment that not only adds depth to the conception as such, but also adds to its worth and not least how and why it can and should be used. What follows are ten quotes about community from a variety of people. Each of them adding different elements or aspects and together hopefully enriching our understanding of community and communities.

… to a poet, the human community is like the community of birds to a bird, singing to each other. Love is one of the reasons we are singing to one another, love of language itself, love of sound, love of singing itself, and love of the other birds.

Sharon Olds

Every community is an association of some kind and every community is established with a view to some good; for everyone always acts in order to obtain that which they think good. But, if all communities aim at some good, the state or political community, which is the highest of all, and which embraces all the rest, aims at good in a greater degree than any other, and at the highest good.

Aristotle

The “sayings” of a community, its proverbs, are its characteristic comment upon life; they imply its history, suggest its attitude toward the world and its way of accepting life. Such an idiom makes the finest language any writer can have; and he can never get it with a notebook. He himself must be able to think and feel in that speech—it is a gift from heart to heart.

Willa Cather

We belong to the community. It is not the tailor alone who is the ninth part of a man; it is as much the preacher, and the merchant, and the farmer. Where is this division of labor to end? and what object does it finally serve? No doubt another may also think for me; but it is not therefore desirable that he should do so to the exclusion of my thinking for myself.

Henry David Thoreau

The open society, the unrestricted access to knowledge, the unplanned and uninhibited association of men for its furtherance—these are what may make a vast, complex, ever growing, ever changing, ever more specialized and expert technological world, nevertheless a world of human community.

J Robert Oppenheimer

Justice begins with the recognition of the necessity of sharing. The oldest law is that which regulates it, and this is still the most important law today and, as such, has remained the basic concern of all movements which have at heart the community of human activities and of human existence in general.

Elias Canetti

Commitment, by its nature, frees us from ourselves and, while it stands us in opposition to some, it joins us with others similarly committed. Commitment moves us from the mirror trap of the self absorbed with the self to the freedom of a community of shared values.

Michael Lewis

I believe each individual is naturally entitled to do as he pleases with himself and the fruit of his labor, so far as it in no wise interferes with any other man’s rights—that each community, as a State, has a right to do exactly as it pleases with all the concerns within that State that interfere with the right of no other State, and that the general government, upon principle, has no right to interfere with anything other than that general class of things that does concern the whole.

Abraham Lincoln

He thought that, because the community represents millions of people, therefore it must be millions of times more important than the individual, forgetting that the community is an abstraction from the many, and is not the many themselves.

D.H. (David Herbert) Lawrence

The American city should be a collection of communities where every member has a right to belong. It should be a place where every man feels safe on his streets and in the house of his friends. It should be a place where each individual’s dignity and self-respect is strengthened by the respect and affection of his neighbors. It should be a place where each of us can find the satisfaction and warmth which comes from being a member of the community of man. This is what man sought at the dawn of civilization. It is what we seek today.

Lyndon B. Johnson

I have always loved quotations. While they cannot replace complete works I find it fascinating how much you can pack into just a few words or sentences. Unlike reading the whole book or hearing the entire conversation they leave room for interpretation and reflection. They mean something different to different people and can yet act as facilitators of great thoughts and meaningful acts. Hence have I also decided not offer my interpretation, but to leave them as they are.

The best quotations are the ones that reoccur to us when we need them the most. I have a few of those and hope that you do to. If not then this series of quotations on concepts related to circular communication may help you find some that can guide and support you.

My old design was a tweaked version of an altered version of a rather old theme. It had lots of code in it that I didn’t quite understand even after looking at every file more times. I had figured out how to make the simplistic looking blog I wanted though. It contained everything I wanted so I was happy.

Then I realized that it wasn’t really making the most of the space. There was tons of space on the sides and somehow everything important was stuck at the bottom. Why would anyone scroll to the very bottom when they don’t have to? Answer is that they don’t. I don’t either.

So how do you get everything to the top? You can’t obviously, but by using the sides better and compromising a little on how prominent each blog post present itself you can get close. Close enough in fact for me to say I have accomplished pretty much what I set out to do. Not that I am finished tweaking mind you.

Apart from the left column that changes depending on where you are on the site between home page, single post, archive, page etc. is (almost) everything static. That means that regardless where you enter or where you go can you always access the links in the columns as well as the tag cloud below.

If you are an explorer like me that like clicking around to discover the yet unseen and unread this is a dream come true. If you are a minimalist afraid of being distracted is it probably more like having a nightmare. Speaking of nightmare am I not that happy with the logo. I wanted more circularity built in, but had to give it up and settle for what you see.

From any page should you now be able to get to anything in no more than two steps. The tags, the archives and the categories are the main examples. Searching for something also bring back excerpted results enabling you to reach the exact post in your second step.

There are plenty of one step travels too. Besides the most recent articles residing in the left column of the home page (and under “recent” in the other column when you are on any other page), can you check the most popular, the recommended etc. You can also check the latest comments and even get on the list in one step if you so desire.

The “asides” are basically announcements or other shorter posts (like this one). They reside only in the sidebar while the page links now reside in the menu bar where you probably would look for them to begin with. Subscribing can still be done using your browsers address bar, but now you can also use one of the subscribe links in the right column. You don’t even have to have a feed reader, as you also can get new postings delivered per email.

The design I ended up with is what I call a mashup between two themes. Basically is it Hello Wiki on the top and bottom and Silhouette in between. Only have I integrated a whole number of plugins, design elements and hacks from the old design (putting track backs below the comments for example) and more to make it unique and all mine.

A venture like this makes you realize what a wonderful and extraordinary community we bloggers (and especially us WordPress bloggers?) act in. There is practically nothing you will not find in terms of design, functionality, advice and help. A big thanks for that! I try doing my part as well.

Redesigning was hard work over a couple of days (with some planning going ahead of that), but since I have more sites now using variations of this design was it all in all worth it. I hope you think so too and would love to get your feedback on what works and what doesn’t. I am probably my own most frequent visitor and worst critic, but even I do not see or experience everything.