Photo manipulation has grown from correction to more of an art form, allowing anyone with an iPhone and the Instagram app to create edited photos with filters applied, easily and in a matter of seconds. This has created a demand for more photo apps that have greater features that are easy to use but can make a photo look how a user wants it.

If part of your social media strategy includes quotes or sharing images of projects or products, then the following free photo editors can certainly help. Each has its own benefits and set of unique tools that can make any image posted on your social media accounts, websites, or blogs stand out better than ever.

Pixlr

Pixlr is a popular and easy to use app because it mimics the major tools of Adobe Photoshop, but it is free and online. This means that you can access Pixlr from any internet browser without having to download (or pay for) any software. Pixlr is great for basic image correction and editing, including resizing, color correction, and cropping. It is easy to save images and the process is fast. Pixlr also has an app for iOS.

PicMonkey

PicMonkey is what most Insatgrammers probably envisioned a great photo editor should be. The controls and options have fun references (e.g. you save file sizes as Roger (Federer? Ebert?), Pierce (Brosnan), or Sean (Penn)) and there are so many creative and fun features: cool fonts, seasonal clip art add-ons you can lay on top of your photos, custom filters that can be applied to only certain parts of the image, beauty filters like wrinkle remover and blemish fix, and so much more.

There are certain fonts and features that are only accessible with a paid membership, which is $4.99/month or $33 per year.

QuotesCover

QuotesCover is an image editor that was created to put words on patterns or images, with a typographic, artistic emphasis. There are hundreds of quotes you can already choose from on the site, as well as color combinations to create the perfect background. You can also upload your own words or images for the background. When you have chosen your words, you chose from 5 different image types: Facebook Cover, New Google Plus Cover, Viral Images (these are square), computer wallpaper maker, and for art prints.

Once you have chosen your image size, it then takes you to a creation tool where you can choose from pre-designed font and color combinations. You can also add your image background.

Once you are ready to download your image, click Download Picture. When saving, do not change the file name until the image is downloaded. Otherwise it won’t download (for reasons unclear).

Using the viral image size is also a great option for creating unique Pinterest pins that can help get your Pinterest account more traffic.

FotoFlexer

This free image editor is online as well. It has a robust set of features and lets you upload a photo from your computer as well as get your photos from a variety of online sources, including Facebook, Flickr, and SmugMug. Once you have chosen your photo, you can begin to make edits, which include the ability to fix red eye, smooth wrinkles, add glitter text and stickers, or even a border. There are also a wide selection of effects (or filters, to the Instagrammers) to add to the photo.

There is even a Geek section, which allows you to use Smart Resize, Smart Recolor, and the Morph feature. Because of its fun stickers and actual photo editing features, FotoFlexer is a great choice for creating viral images with text or just retouching a few images that need help with coloration or red-eye.

GIMP

GIMP is the only downloadable program on this list, and it is most similar to Photoshop. For that reason, it is useful to have some Photoshop experience before using it. GIMP is completely free and has a variety of features, including a customizable interface, photo enhancement, and the ability to open several different kinds of photo formats, including .PSD, the default Photoshop format. GIMP is a great alternative to Photoshop and while it cannot do everything that Photoshop can, it is a great alternative, especially because it is free!

While these are just some of the copious amounts of free image editors online today, these 5 will give you a great start toward creating viral images that could help you get more traffic and views online.

In Florida, the state legislature wanted to crack down on what it felt was a growing problem of Internet cafe gambling. To do so, it felt that the best way was to place steep restrictions on the types of machines that would be considered legal in the state for gambling-like activities.

As a result, they passed a new law that such said machines had to comply with three different rules:

1. All machines had to be coin operated, no dollar bills, credit cards, etc.
2. All games had to involve an element of skill, not just be pure chance
3. No machine could offer a cash prise, only merchandise, and only of a value up to 75 cents.

With the law passed, the police began to move in on Internet cafes that offered gambling services and it seemed that the law was effective, shutting down the intended target.

But then some of those cafe owners began to cry foul saying that the law was being unfairly applied to only them. According to them, the law also makes Chuck E Cheese equally illegal.

Though many recoiled at the idea of a children’s arcade being an illegal den of gambling, upon closer inspection, the argument makes sense. The chain not only offers prizes with over 75 cent value, some going up to $20 or more, but it also has several games that are pure chance.

In short, a law that was intended to shutter Internet cafes widely considered to be shady, may have accidentally banned a popular destination for kids.

But it wasn’t the first or last law to go bad. The law of unintended consequences can be brutal and many times legislators are the first to feel its sting.

Good Intentions, Bad Legislation

Though people like to describe legislators as being evil and self-serving, most laws, in truth, start out with good intentions.

Take, for example, the controversial anti-circumvention components of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). These provisions make it illegal to break digital locks placed on things such as ebook, music, etc.

The goal, rightly or wrongly, was to reduce piracy by enabling content creators to have legal protection of their locks. To protect against misuse of the law, it asked the Library of Congress to enact exemptions every three years at its discretion.

However, as digital locks get applied to more and more things, the breadth of what was protected by digital locks grew.

A law passed in 1998 didn’t foresee that people would use digital locks to keep you from working on your car, from refilling your printer cartridges or unlocking your cell phone. But that’s exactly what the law began to do and that’s why Congress is now mulling the Unlocking Technology Act of 2013, which aims to address many of these concerns.

But these are just two examples of laws passed with good intentions going very bad. But if it’s such a big problem, often with comical or disastrous consequences, why can’t legislators do more to stop it?

Here are five reasons why the problem is so pervasive and so difficult to stop.

1. Poorly Written Legislation

Some legislation, simply put, is written badly. Whether it’s not well thought out, omits certain parts or just isn’t properly targeted, sometimes a bill just starts out bad.

While it’s easy to blame legislators, it’s often not their fault. Legislators are burdened with the task of voting on an unholy amount of bills, many of which are in fields they are not experts in, while maintaining a full schedule of other, essential activities.

Couple that with the fact that most legislation is a process of compromise and group revision and you have a recipe for some pretty big mistakes. Our government is only human after all.

Still, the main point is that some legislation isn’t written well and just doesn’t adequately express the stated intent of the law. That can, and has in the past, lead to serious problems down the road.

2. Unprepared for Changes

A lot of legislation is written fairly effectively for the time, but things shift pretty quickly.

Imagine, for example, trying to write legislation regarding the Internet in 1998 that would hold up in 2013, as the U.S. tried to do with the DMCA. The Web was a completely different place then and it’s obvious many of the rules and ideas wouldn’t hold up.

Though courts are supposed to help interpret and apply laws as the world around them changes, that doesn’t always work out. Intent can be a very difficult thing to measure and even the best courts will struggle to apply old laws to new issues.

In short, even if a law is written well and adequate at the time it’s passed, it can quickly become obsolete, especially with the quick march of technology.

3. Sneaky People

The nature of laws is that, if you pass one, some people will try to break it. Of course, it’s even better if they can break the spirit of the law without violating the letter of it.

While people like to talk about loopholes written in laws and contracts, the truth is that its much more common for people to try and creep up to the line without crossing it or find ways to gain the benefit of breaking the law without actually doing so on paper.

This can result in laws being modified to try and prevent the exceptions, which in turn leads to a game of cat and mouse between legislators and those who want to defy them. That game, in turn, can ensnare a lot of innocent people.

Bottom Line

When good legislation goes bad, it affects everyone. As a blogger, it actually affects you more than most because you are not just a private citizen, but also a public figure, at least legally.

This means that not only do you have to think about the standard set of laws that everyone does, you also have to consider issues such as copyright, trademark, privacy, etc.

Bad legislation has more opportunities than ever to affect you and that makes it important that you pay attention to what’s going on and have a voice when you think something is jumping the tracks.

Remember, even if you disagree with what a legislator is doing, that doesn’t necessarily make them evil or immoral. Most legislators are trying to do what they think is best for their constituents but their actions might have unintended consequences.

This is why it’s important for people like you to be watching, to help point those cases out.

Social media and guest blogging were meant to be together– they both can increase your exposure, allow you to meet new people, and make it easy to share your ideas with the world. Whether you are the blog needing guest posts or the blogger who has posts that you would like to publish, guest blogging can be more successful if social media is involved during the entire journey.

Setting Up Expectations

Before even getting actual guest posts, be sure to set up the expectations from either the writer or the website. Besides setting up the guidelines for the content of the post itself, it is also important to iron out how social media is going to be used. Will the writer or website promote your guest post? If so, on what accounts? How many shares are they going to post? Is there a special hashtag that is going to be used? It’s also important that both sides know each other’s Twitter and Facebook profile names so they can tag one another.

It benefits both the writer and website to promote any and all guest posts– the website gets more traffic and the writer gets more exposure for both him or herself and their business or website.

Building Up Your Social Audience

Building up your social audience should always be at the forefront of your mind when it comes to social media. If you have a big following across multiple social media platforms, this can be an added incentive and benefit to your perspective guest author or publisher of your content.

For instance, if you propose a guest post, you can mention that you also have 10,000 Twitter followers. This not only lets the website know that you can increase the exposure of their website by tweeting your guest post link, but it also shows that you are an established and knowledgeable person in your industry. Including other metrics, such as your Facebook likes, Pinterest followers, and website metrics (such as pageviews per month) can also be useful to websites that are considering you as a guest writer.

On the flip side, for websites that are looking for high quality guest writer, a large platform will bring better writers (and therefore, higher quality posts). The more traffic you get, the more credible you will look to potential writers who are looking for places to submit unique content.

Building a great social audience can make a difference, no matter which side you are on.

Find Your Opportunities

In addition to increasing your credibility, social media can also be used to find guest blogging opportunities. Putting a call out on Twitter for guest bloggers or asking fans on Facebook for places to submit content can be a great way to connect with others who need content or who are writing it.

It also helps to search by keyword or hashtag via social media– #guestblogging or #writeforus might be good places to start. Set up an alert for specific hashtags or phrases and have it send you an alert as soon it appears online.

Besides searching for hashtags and phrases, you should also regularly follow businesses and individuals that are in your industry. Some may follow you back, allowing you to connect. This type of digital networking can lead to genuine connections that can create all different kinds of content opportunities.

Working With the Writer

From a website perspective, you should treat writers with respect and admiration. These writers are wanting to give you content for free, and you should be appreciative. It is easy to do this if you expectations have been declared up front. Have a unique guest blogging page or section on your website that outlines:

• The types of post you are looking for
• The length of the post
• Whether or not the writer needs to include photos, attribution, links, etc.
• The type of bio allowed, including what type and the amount of links

It is also helpful to include topic suggestions, “ideal” post examples, and places to find royalty free stock photo content (photopin.com is amazing).

Working With the Website Owner

If you are a writer needing places to distribute your content, it is important to choose websites that fall into your industry or interests. For instance, don’t ask to guest blog on a website that sells jewelry if you work for a travel app start-up. While there are some creative ways that blogs and websites of all industries can work together, it’s usually best to stick to what you know (this also makes your posts easier to promote via social media).

When you are contacting the website owner about a guest post, be sure to:

• Pitch a topic for a post
• Ask any follow-up questions, such as photo sources or bio length
• Frequency opportunities

Website owners and writers can both greatly benefit from guest blogging. Even though it can be a time-costing endeavor, it is worth it to all parties involved, especially when social media is thrown into the mix.

To learn more about the guest blogging services that Performancing provides, please contact us. 

Though the law may never fully catch up to the pace of innovation on the Internet, it certainly is trying and there are a lot of ways you can find yourself in legal trouble on the Web.

Many of the ways are obscure, complex and difficult to avoid. Is using that passage from a site a copyright infringement? Is that comment about another person defamation? Is the action you want to take a violation of a terms of service? These are often tough questions that can be difficult even for legal experts to answer.

But then there are the ways in which idiots find themselves getting in trouble online. Things that pretty much any sane, reasonable and intelligent human being would know to be a bad idea before even finishing the thought.

Yet, time and time again people fall victim to the most stupid and idiotic ways that they can get in trouble online.

So, for a bit of fun and education today, we’re going to look at three of the dumbest ways people seem to routinely get in trouble online. You might learn something, but if you do, you probably want to re-examine whether you want to be online or not.

After all, if you’re falling into these hazards, the Internet is likely just a great big disaster waiting to happen.

1. Using the Internet to Plan/Commit an Obvious Crime

The Internet has made it easier to conduct business, both legitimate and illegal. The problem, if you happen to be of the criminal persuasion, is that the Internet also makes it much easier to get caught.

The reasons for this are two-fold.

First, it makes it easier to trace back crimes to the person who committed or is committing them. Though smart criminal can hide these tracks, few have the expertise to do so completely and even fewer are careful enough to do it 100% of the time. In short, if you aren’t smart and 100% perfect with your track-covering, it’s inevitable that your activities can be lead back to you.

Second, if you are caught, those Internet footprints and other activity, become a mountain of evidence against you, making it easier than ever for a prosecutor to score a conviction. In short, plotting a crime on the Internet is like writing down every detail of what you’re doing and storing it somewhere that you can’t destroy.

If you’re trying to stay out of trouble, committing a crime is pretty dumb by itself. However, compounding the issue by planning or executing that crime online just makes things worse. It virtually guarantees that the crime can easily be traced to you and that your email service, your computer, your social network and even your search engine can become powerful witnesses against you.

In short, if you want to stay out of legal trouble, don’t commit any crimes and especially don’t do them online.

2. Confessing (Truthfully or Falsely) to Other Crimes

If we’re completely honest, pretty much no one has gone through their lives without breaking the law in some (hopefully relatively small way). Poor decisions, accidents and indiscretions are human and, fortunately, most of the mistakes people make are small and are for crimes that either go unnoticed or don’t become anything more than a lesson learned.

However, this doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to hop on your blog, YouTube channel or Facebook account and brag about how you’re driving with a suspended license, siphoning gas or scamming restaurants for free food.

What’s amazing about this isn’t that it’s happened once or twice, but that would-be criminal masterminds have been confessing to their crimes so regularly that police are now actively monitoring social networks since much of the information is posted publicly, meaning no warrant is needed. This information has led to arrests in crimes big and small.

If you believe that you can talk about your misdeeds in private, always remember that it only takes one person to forward a message to break that circle.

Likewise, don’t think that hiding behind a shield of anonymity can help, remember that your anonymity is only as solid as the interest is in discovering your identity. Consider the case of the Redditor that “confessed” to a murder via a meme and was later discovered (he now claims it was a joke).

In short, it’s best to keep the details of your misdeeds off the Internet. The police may not care enough about your crimes to pursue you and build a case against you, but if you hand them a free confession they might change their mind.

3. Using the Internet to Settle Real-World Scores

Got a beef with a teacher that gave you a bad grade? Maybe feeling jilted by a ex-lover? What about your boss that passed you up for a promotion? The Internet gives you a bevy of ways to get your revenge.

From the truly malevolent to the seemingly harmless, the Internet makes it easy to lash out at people you know online. Whether for revenge, fun or something in between, you can impact or wreck other’s lives very easily and with little skill.

The problem with doing so is that, as with the above examples, it’s very easy to trace back the source of the activity. ISPs and email accounts can be subpoenaed. But even worse, since the activity was targeted (and likely reported) by someone locally, enforcement is easy.

When someone is cyberstalked, hacked or otherwise attacked online, suspicion doesn’t usually go right to foreign hackers or anonymous trolls elsewhere online. Instead, it usually starts with the people who have a grudge with that person in the physical world and, more often than not, it’s right, especially when dealing with someone who doesn’t have a large online presence.

To make matters worse, one of the things that prevents more cybercrime from being prosecuted or litigated is jurisdictional issues. It’s difficult, for example, to bring a German man to justice for an attack on an Australian site even if one can be reasonably certain who did it.

However, bring the weight of the Internet to bear on someone closer to home and those issues go away, making you vulnerable to being arrested, sued or more.

Commiting any crime online is stupid, but committing it against someone you know personally is practically begging for legal trouble.

Bottom Line

The Internet brings out the best and the worst in humanity. It gives a world wide voice to our best, brightest and most ethical as well as our worst, dumbest and most vile.

It always amazes me how many people post stupid things on the Internet and expect not to get caught. Time and time again idiots who commit crimes or other unethical acts on the Web are surprised when they are discovered and brought to justice, be it by criminal court, civil court or the court of public opinion.

When online, don’t do anything that you wouldn’t do in your town’s square or in front of a police station. Remember that everything you post on the Web is public, or can quickly become as such, and that you are never truly anonymous.

Crime doesn’t pay and that’s true both off and on the Web. Unfortunately, the Web just makes it easier to get caught and also makes you look much more foolish when you do.

The recent updates to Google Analytics has made it possible for SEO professionals and webmasters to evaluate their social media presence and how it translates into actual user traffic and activity. Google Analytic’s new upgraded platform offers an exclusive social media section that wasn’t available in previous versions.

The social media section is a customized report that is located under Traffic Sources on the sidebar once a user logs into a specific website in Google Analytics. Under this report, users can track social media referrals, landing pages, trackbacks, conversions, visitors flow, plugins, and more.

Goals

To get the most out of the social media report, specific goals should already be set up for the entire website profile. Goals can be segmented by URL destination, visit duration, pages/visit, and event (such as completing a contact form or purchasing a product on the website). These metrics can all be utilized when looking at social media traffic. The Event goal type is especially useful, as it can show actual proof of how many sales come directly from social media traffic.

Once goals are set up, the social media report can display data better in a way that translates to goal completions (also sometimes known as conversions. In this case, they are called social conversions).

Social Value

Back in the social media report, after setting up goals, the report will display the chosen goal metrics, as well as a quick overview of overall visits and how many of those visits were from a social referral.

The Social Value section also shows traffic as broken down by each specific social media website, including lesser known networks, such as Tumblr and StumbleUpon. These reports can also be segmented by URLs visited and scheduled to be sent as a report every set interval (e.g. weekly, monthly, etc.)

Social Plug-In Analytics

The plug-in analytics are a great new feature of Google Analytics. According to Google, “If you have Google “+1″ and Facebook “Like” buttons on your site, it’s important to know which buttons are being clicked and for which content. For example, if you publish articles on your site, you’ll want to know which articles are most commonly “liked” or shared, and from which social networks they’re being shared (for example, Google+ or Facebook). You can use this information to create more of the type of content that’s popular with your visitors. Also, if you find that some buttons are rarely used, you may wish to remove them to reduce clutter.

The Social Engagement reports allow you to see how people shared content on your site via social actions. Examples of social actions on your site that can be tracked include Google +1 button clicks, Facebook “Like” and “Send” interactions, and Del.icio.us bookmarks.”

By setting up plug-in analytics, it’s possible to get a good overview on how often social sharing buttons are used on your website. While different plugins may not always report the same social button interactions, utilizing this reporting feature in Google Analytics can give better overall information to average the reporting metrics for these social sharing reports.

Data Hub Activity

This section of the social media report deals with online discussion groups, commenting systems, blogging platforms, and other networks that allow users to discuss your website content on external websites. Basically, this section of the report is showing where users are discussing your website (provided they give a link to your website).

This is a great way to see where users are sharing your content and to get involved on those platforms, if possible. For instance, if the conversation is taking place in a commenting plug-in like Disqus, a representative of the company could log in an answer any questions from users directly on the platform where they originally asked the question.

This data can also help with advertising strategy– if a large number of users are discussing your website on another site, then it might be beneficial to advertise there if possible. It stands to reason that that advertisement will get more clicks (and possibly higher ROI) than an ad on a website that doesn’t have any current discussion about your website’s content.

Visitors Flow

The visitors flow chart is a great way to visually grasp the path that users use when getting to your website via social media. The chart provides a visual representation of the where users go after coming to a specific landing page on your website.

This chart can help you see what type of content is most interesting to your website visitors who are coming from social media, as well as what pages they are exiting your website from. This can go a long way when it comes to crafting content strategy and blog post ideas for your website, as well as published social media content.

All of these metrics can help you get the most out of utilizing Google Analytics for your social media campaigns.

The default templates and settings of WordPress are normally more than good enough. If you have an eye for detail and pay attention to design more than the average person does, you might want to do some tweaking using WordPress plugins, of which there is no lack.

Here are some WordPress plugins that will help you prettify your blog, one way or another.

Vimeography

Arguable one of the best WordPress plugins for video, Vimeography allows bloggers to display video content that will fit the rest of the design without having to deal with workarounds. The result are beautiful posts with elements that blend excellently. The downside is that this obviously works with Vimeo only.

Galleriffic

Via http://zoerooney.com/blog/

If you work more with photos as opposed to videos, then the chances are that you want a plugin that will make displaying photos – lots of them – without giving you a headache. For this purpose, Galleriffic is an excellent choice. It’s a jQuery plugin that gives you the power to deal with lots of photos without having to worry too much about bandwidth, and it does look good!

SlideDeck 2

Truth be told, slideshows have received their fair share of flak – and for good reason. Then again, there are sites which continue to use slideshows without suffering for it. If you absolutely must use slideshows on your WordPress site, then you might as well go for a plugin that will not only make it easy on you, but also add to the visual experience of the reader: SlideDeck 2. The plugin has a free version and a premium version. The advantage of the latter is that you get more “lenses” or templates which you can choose from. The free version does give you the option of developing your own to suit your site’s design to a T. The plugin supports a wide variety of content: text, images, video, social media feeds, and even syndicated content.

WPtouch

Mobile is a niche that no blogger can ignore. With more and more users relying on their mobile devices to access information, blogs have to offer a comparable – maybe even better – viewing experience on mobile. You don’t have to be super techie to make this a reality with WPtouch, which basically does the job for you. All you need to do is install it and the plugin will make sure that your site displays properly on mobile browsers.

Slick Social Share Buttons

Social sharing is a must. We all know that, but how many sites have you seen that have horrible social sharing buttons that you just get turned off? It’s a pity if the buttons are what make readers NOT share your awesome content, so it’s best to pay attention to this not-so-little detail. Slick Social Share Buttons is one plugin that looks really clean and simple. I understand that the concept of beauty will differ from one person to another, but it’s difficult to find fault in these buttons.

About the Author
Timothy is a web writer by profession, and he has a strong interest in design. He highly recommends designer mag for those who want to improve their knowledge base on the topic.

Lead image via Softstribe

One of the great things about the Internet is how it makes us feel. It can easily seem like the Web is a secure, anonymous and inviting place that enables you to either get in touch with your closest friends or reach out to an audience of millions.

The Internet is home to YouTube, the site where anyone can be a TV/movie star, Facebook, the world’s largest social structure ever created and Twitter, where instant feedback and updates is the norm.

The Internet can be an inviting place and, if you’re running a blog or other website, you’ve obviously felt that call and decided to to carve out your own corner of it.

But the warm and fuzzy feelings need to be mixed with a healthy dose of caution and concern. While the Internet can be a very inviting place and definitely has many great things going for it, it also is home to some pretty grim legal realities that you need to be aware.

To be clear, these aren’t meant to stop you from enjoying the Internet, but rather, to keep you from getting so caught up in what the Internet can seem like that you do something daft that lands you in trouble.

After all, the last thing anyone wants is to end up in real-world trouble because of something they did in the virtual one…

1. You Are Never Truly Anonymous

Though it’s easy to believe that you can be anyone you want on the Internet, it’s really not so simple. While using a fake name and a separate email address might give you enjoy anonymity to slip past your spouse or your boss, you still leave digital footprints almost everywhere you go online and, with the proper motivation, they can be traced back to you.

The truth is that perfect anonymity online requires that you be perfect with your precautions and that is almost impossible. The secret of your identity is only as secure as the interest in finding it.

So if you want to complain about your job or make jokes about your family without them knowing, you can likely do that with relative safety. But the moment you break laws, whether civil or criminal, and your data can be subpoenaed, the amount of effort and skill it takes to remain anonymous skyrockets and nearly anyone will leave at least some trail.

2. Everything You Say is Public (Or Can Be)

Email is often likened to snail mail. It’s something you most commonly send person to person (or to a small group) and is a direct form of communication. This makes it easy to feel as if email is private, a confidential source of communication when, in truth, nothing could be farther from the truth.

For one, if you destroy a piece of physical mail, it is gone. However, your email can hang for extended periods of time after you delete it, making it available via subpoena by third parties. For another, there’s no easy way to forward a piece of snail mail to a large audience. Finally, most of your email is not encrypted and sent “in the clear” meaning that it’s more like a postcard, where anyone can read it in transit.

The truth is, there is no such thing as truly private communication on the Interent. Though some ways are more secure than others, they all depend upon the other party keeping your trust.

However, even if there were a way to contact just one other person with complete security, the law doesn’t distinguish between one person and a million on issues of disclosure to a third party (such as with defamation cases).

In short, doing something sketchy in private on the Web may reduce your risk of getting caught, but it doesn’t necessarily make an otherwise unlawful act legal.

3. You Can’t Control Your Image Online

There’s an old saying that you can’t delete anything from the Internet and it’s true. Once something is on the Web, you might be able to reduce it or keep most people from seeing it, but you can’t delete it. Simply put, the Web is not your hard drive and you can’t delete what’s on it.

It doesn’t matter if it’s an unflattering photo, a libelous statement or a pirated copy of your content. All you can do is focus on mitigation and recovering damages, not removing it completely.

In fact, excessive attempts to control what others say about you online can result in the Streisand Effect, where people actively fight against your efforts, drawing still more attention to what you wanted hidden.

This goes back to rules one and two above. If you can’t be completely anonymous and you can’t trust that anything is 100% private, you must be very careful of what you say and do as your actions or words could be spread all over the Internet tomorrow.

Bottom Line

So what does all of this mean for you and your site? It’s simple: Always assume that everything you do online, and many of the things you do offline, could be seen by everyone tomorrow.

To be clear, the risk of this is extremely low. The odds of one stupid tweet or post causing you serious trouble is extremely slim unless you are already a celebrity. But the Internet is something of a reverse lottery, sometimes small things become big ones and no one really knows why.

While you probably will be fine even if you aren’t careful, the risk is still very real and stupid actions on the Web can have dire consequences both in and out of the courtroom.

If you want to avoid being the next example of a person whose life is ruined because of something they did online, it’s important to be mindful of the danger and work to ensure that you keep your limit your actions not just to what’s legal, but to what you don’t mind others knowing you did.

After all, decisions on the Internet are tried both in the court of law and the court of public opinion and the latter is often much less forgiving than the former.

To be successful at guest blogging, there are few guidelines to ensure that posts are shared often and are driving links back to your website.

Write an Amazing Bio

The majority of blogs or websites that accept guest posts will allow writers to include a short bio at the end of their content. This bio must be carefully optimized to include the best possible information about the company and its services in the shortest amount of space. Be sure to always include a link to the company’s website, and also a few keywords surrounding the company’s products or what they offer.

In many cases, the bios can only be about 25 words, so be sure to eliminate any necessary information, while also personalizing the writer and the company.

Here’s an example:

Kelsey Jones is a writer for Performancing (hyperlink), a new media company focused on blogging, marketing, branding, and more. Follow Kelsey on Twitter (hyperlink) or read her posts on the Performancing blog (hyperlink).

Of course, not all sites will allow 3 links in the bio, but always use as many as are allowed. Great bios include call to actions that give readers options to learn more about the company or its writer.

Choose an Engaging Topic and Title

To make a splash on someone else’s site, guest post topics must be engaging and interesting. The best posts answer questions, drive controversy, share news, or teach the reader something they didn’t know before. The title of the post is what first introduces the content to readers– so it must be catchy while also giving them an immediate idea of what the post is going to be about.

Titles that do well include numbered items (such as “Five Marketing Tactics You Don’t Know About”), make people mad or curious (“Why Your SEO Strategy Sucks”), or answer a question by teaching the reader something (“The Complete Guide to Adobe Photoshop”).

Once a catchy title has been generated, the content must be just as well-written. Don’t include  anything that isn’t absolutely necessary and be sure to include photos, links to support statements, and call to actions or the inspiration for change.

Tie-In What The Company Does

It is also important to tie in industry keywords or services that the company sponsoring the guest post provides. This increases the company’s credibility because they are writing in areas that they are actually working in. For instance, it doesn’t make any sense for an app developer to write a guest post about knitting. However, if they just made an app that showcases knitting patterns, then the post could be “The Best 5 Knitting Apps”, including their app (if guest posting guidelines would allow).

Just because a blog is willing to take posts doesn’t mean it is right for your company if they aren’t in your industry. It will also mean that less readers will actually click on the links in the writer bio to go to your website. While having a dofollow link on an reputable website has some benefit, the benefit for your gaming customers just isn’t going to be there on a canoeing blog.

Online and Social Sharing

When the post is published, be sure to promote it via the company’s social media accounts. This only serves to generate visibility for the post, which can lead to more site traffic and more trust from the website the guest post is published on. If a guest blogger’s content is heavily read and shared, then a website is more likely to ask them to guest blog again.

Besides social media, there are other places online to share content– email blasts with link roundups, newsletters, the company’s website, or a blog post summarizing the content with a link to the article. By promoting the content in every available outlet, you are not only benefitting by getting your posts more exposure, you are also showing your existing audience that you are reputable enough to be published on other websites.

Follow-Up

Once a post has been published, it is important to check it regularly for the first couple weeks to respond to any comments. Users appreciate having their questions answered by the actual writer of the article. The bigger the site, the most comments articles it will generate, so it is important to make sure these are answered in a timely fashion.

For posts that are extremely popular, many readers appreciate follow-up articles by the same author. So if “The Complete Guide to Adobe Photoshop” went viral, then the author could benefit from writing “The Complete Guide to Adobe InDesign.” Because the author has already set himself up as an expert in Adobe products, it only makes sense to continue writing content surrounding that software.

It has been said before that “content is king”, but when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO), this is really the case. Regular high-quality content can help websites and blogs get better rankings online and also drive more traffic to a website. In addition, it also helps companies be seen as a resource and important resource in their field or industry.

Blog Posts

Blog posts are an easy way to continuously provide a website with fresh content. Blog posts should be published on websites 2-3 per week, on a variety of topics that are related to the industry or the company’s products and services. These are easy to find if marketers read online content daily. Companies that create publishing calendars for their blog content may find that they be more productive and organized, leading to better overall content.

To get the benefit from regular blog posts, the blog must be hosted on the same domain as the content. The blog can be on a subdomain, but most users and search engines are used to finding blogs at domain.com/blog.

External Content

Providing content to other sources is another great way to get the benefits of SEO, even though it’s not on the company’s website directly. Guest blogging, press releases, testimonials, videos, and other types of content are examples that can give links to the company’s website. Besides getting links, users see companies that have a wide reach (meaning that they are published/seen in a variety a different platforms) as being more reputable than those that aren’t seen anywhere else online besides their own website.

To find places that will accept your content or mention your company, do Google searches for “guest blogging + “industry keyword”" or look at guest blogging websites like MyBlogGuest and Hullabaloo. Use these platforms to create connections with other companies and website owners to help get your content and website out there.

Social Media

Google and Bing now include personalized search results based on a user’s social network, so being active on social media, for both employees as individuals and companies, is definitely key. Websites should also have social sharing buttons on all blog posts so they can be shared online easily.

Social media shouldn’t just be a place to share your own company’s information and content, but to also be a fun resource and industry news source. Occasionally post updates about current events, holidays, fun facts, and other information that your audience will find interesting.

photo credit: See-ming Lee 李思明 SML via photopin cc

The mammoth 91-page decision, a summary judgment in favor of the AP, was a crushing defeat for the news aggregation service Meltwater, which is left considering “options” after the decision was handed down.

But ever since the ruling was handed down there have been questions raised about what the broader implications of this ruling could be. After all, it’s not every day we get a fair use ruling on the issue of online news and aggregation, the impact, theoretically at least, could reach not only other aggregation services, but news search engines and even bloggers that write about news stories first reported by others.

So, what are the potential impacts for bloggers? To find out we first have to take a look at the background of the case, what the judge ruled and why.

On that note, let’s delve into the case itself and find out the issues that’s at the core of the dispute.

Associated Press v. Meltwater Background

The Associated Press is a wire news service that produces and sends out news stories for inclusion in publications all over the world. Meltwater, on the other hand, is a Norwegian news aggregation service that is paid by companies to monitor mentions of their name or relevant news in the field and provide digital “clippings” of them.

The AP is extremely well known for being aggressive and protective of its copyright, having previously successfully received favorable settlements from artist Shepard Fairey over the iconic Obama “Hope” poster and All Headline News, for allegedly creating a competing service by rewriting AP content.

In February of last year, the Associated Press filed suit against Meltwater claiming that Meltwater, similar to All Headline News, was creating a competitor to the AP’s services using AP content. Meltwater defended itself, saying that all it does is produce a headline and a snippet of the article, which it believed was protected under fair use, and Meltwater routinely likened itself to a news search engine, such as Google.

The case quickly created sharp divides with publishers, including The New York Times and others, filing briefs in support of the AP but tech organizations, including both the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Public Knowledge, filing briefs in support of Meltwater.

However, when the judge handed down his ruling late last month, it was not pretty for Meltwater. The judge granted summary judgment in favor of the Associated Press on all issues save one, namely a request for an injunction requiring Meltwater to delete all AP content in its database.

Still, the judge ruled that Meltwater’s use of the content is infringing and set up likely damages against Meltwater. For understandable reasons, this case has been celebrated by the publishing industry and decried by the tech industry.

But why did the judge reach the decision he did? The information is in the decision itself.

The Reasons Behind the Decision

The ruling, according to the judge, hinges primarily on the idea of transformative use.

Fair use, which is what Meltwater was attempting to claim, is a limited set of exceptions to copyright law that allows others to copy content without permission. However, the test as to whether or not a use is a fair one or not is a complex argument that involves weighing four factors of varying importance.

In performing that analysis, the judge came down heavily on Meltwater because, according to him, the use was not transformative enough and, in fact, Meltwater’s service competed directly with the Associated Press.

The judge pointed to several variables in Meltwater to make his case, including that Meltwater is a private service, that it includes the lede of the story with its snippets (the lede being considered the “heart” of the story) and that Meltwater did not change the work in any way (for example, to add commentary, criticism or opinion).

Though Meltwater attempted to position itself like other search engines, the judge went out of his his way to differentiate Meltwater from a “legitimate” search engine, noting that Meltwater did little to drive traffic to the AP (Meltwater’s click-through rate was much lower than Google’s) and that Meltwater is a paid, private service. The judge also chided Meltwater for using more content than he felt was necessary to provide the function of the service.

So what does this mean for bloggers? The answer is probably not much right now, but it is definitely a case worth following closely.

What Meltwater Might Mean for Bloggers

There are two critical factors to consider before weighing what impact that this case might have on bloggers.

First, the case is just a district court ruling. As we discussed in the Supreme Court discussion two weeks ago, this is the very bottom of the legal pyramid in the U.S. This case almost certainly will be appealed and the Appellate Court could have something very different to say.

Second, like most fair use-oriented case, the decision is very fact-specific, looking exclusively at Meltwater’s actions. It’s possible even a small change in the facts could drastically alter the results.

Still, the case is an interesting one for bloggers, who often comment on and quote news sources.

While it’s tempting to nitpick elements of the case, such as whether the lede deserves such a high level of protection, the truth is most of the case seems to have hinged on whether Meltwater was competing directly with the AP without adding anything new to the conversation.

This goes back to the idea of symbiosis. The case closely analyzes the relationship between Meltwater and the AP and found it to be purely one-directional. Meltwater used AP content, charged for its service, provided little in the way of traffic and, according to the judge, competed directly with the AP. This seemingly one-sided relationship appears to be critical in the judge’s decision.

What this means for bloggers is that it’s important to focus not just on regurgitating news, but in adding your own commentary, background and opinion. It also means to focus on ethical linking practices that encourage people to visit the original stories and using as little of the original content as necessary.

All in all, this is fairly standard advice when it comes to fair use and the Meltwater ruling really doesn’t change that. What did change was that an activity that many considered to be universally a fair use, namely the use of headlines and snippets of articles, was found not to be by one judge in this particular case.

It doesn’t really change what is good fair use advice and what bloggers should be doing when incorporating the works of others into their posts.

Bottom Line

In the end, it’s understandable why the tech community is so upset and worried about this ruling. It adds a great deal of uncertainty to an area of copyright law that many felt was more or less settled.

The truth is that fair use is always very fact-specific and even if a series of rulings come down that seem to indicate something is universally true, it may not be, as the Meltwater ruling shows.

The best thing anyone can do is never assume that fair use is a “settled” issue and, instead, focus on following the best practices they can. It won’t guarantee that a use will be fair, but nothing else will either.

If you want legal certainty, fair use is probably not the place to seek it out.

Contenders such as Dropbox and Google Drive probably think they have nothing to worry about with MEGA, but Dotcom thinks differently. Backed with 25 times more free storage than Dropbox, MEGA just might eat up its competition.

Unlike its predecessor MegaUpload.com, MEGA  operates completely on the cloud and outside of the USA to discourage any illegal attempts to take it down. To prove that the site isn’t a piracy platform, MEGA also automatically encrypts every file uploaded onto their servers, causing the uploaders to be the only people to know what it is they uploaded.

MEGA has also been actively keeping pirates away, vigilantly stopping sites like mega-search.me from sharing links to their content for other people to download (apparently MEGA uploaders have been disclosing information and links on their uploads themselves). The good folks over at Who Is Hosting This.com had recently released this infographic on the matter, you might want to check it out below:

With the uproar over the closing of Google Reader earlier this month, it has been shown just how many people have depended on this popular RSS reader as their chosen way to read and consume content from their favorite blogs. Regularly reading blogs that appeal to your industry and personal interests is one of the best ways to stay current.

Choosing (and reading) the best blogs shouldn’t be something to hate or not look forward to. When you have chosen the right blogs, you will know because reading each day becomes enjoyable and a way to relax. This is why having a mixture of personal and professional blogs to follow mixes it up and makes it fun.

After deciding which blog to follow, sign up for a reader, like BlogLovin’ or Feedly. These two platforms are available on mobile devices as well, so you can access your content at any time, whether at home or on the metro during a long commute. Many reader services allow you to search for blogs by name to add, so you don’t have to worry about finding their RSS feed URLs.

Once this has been all set up, setting up a daily schedule to check the reader is crucial. Checking it daily will help keep you up to date and prevent too many posts from getting backed up. However, don’t let it stress you out if too many have piled up. BlogLovin’ for instance, allows users to mark all current unread posts as ‘read’, thus clearing their queue and getting it read for the next day.

Many people like reading their blog RSS reader at the beginning of each day as a way to start their day. However, there are many other places this can be done:

• During lunch
• On the work commute (if you aren’t the driver)
• During a workout, on a machine like the treadmill or elliptical
• Sitting at home watching TV
• Converting to audio versions and listening during a walk or run

There are many places to consume content, it just depends on how much it is made into a priority and taking the time to get into the routine of reading each day.

The benefits of this are far-reaching. Not only will you be more educated and involved in what is happening in your industry, you will also never run out of material to share via social media and email to your audience and network. RSS readers are a great source of useful information that has many uses, both personal and for your business.

photo credit: Pensiero via photopin cc

The case centered around Supap Kirtsaeng, a Thailand native and a now-former student in the U.S. He carved out a business for himself importing cheaper textbooks from his native country and reselling them online. Though the textbooks were legally purchased, published John Wiley & Sons felt that it was an infringement as copyright law grants copyright holders the right to control when works are imported into the U.S.

However, copyright law also grants the purchaser of a legally-bought work the right to resell that work, also known as the right of first sale. This created a clash of two rights that eventually made its way to the Supreme Court and, in the end, it reversed a lower court ruling and backed the right of first sale, going against interests in the entertainment and publishing industries.

But why should you care? If you aren’t reselling textbooks or eBaying your personal library, it might not seem like this applies.

However, U.S. Supreme Court rulings are incredibly important, especially when it comes to copyright and related issues on the Internet. This is true even if you don’t live in the United States or host your site here.

The truth is, when it comes to laws that apply to the Internet, the U.S. Supreme Court is easily one of the most important institutions on the planet and one that can greatly affect you, your site and all of your online activities.

How the U.S. Court System Works

For the purpose of this article, we’ll be talking solely about the Federal Court system in the U.S. However, most state courts have a similar system within its borders. Still, since Federal Courts are the only ones that see copyright and patent cases (as well as the lion’s share of trademark disputes), it’s a good place to start.

The U.S. Court System, if we ignore outside courts such as bankruptcy, international trade and veterans appeals courts, is structured very much like a pyramid.

At the bottom of the pyramid are the district courts, which are scattered all across the country. If you live in the U.S., you can use this map to find out where the nearest district court is. These are the courts that actually try cases. These are where suits are filed, heard by judges and tried, either by judge or jury.

Many cases end at the district court level. However, rulings at this level only apply to that particular district. This means that if a similar case is heard in another district, even one nearby, there can be a very different result if there is confusion over how the law appliesthe issue.

However, with some cases, one or both parties wish to appeal and that matter is taken to the United States Court of Appeals. That, in turn, is broken up into eleven Circuits, which you can also see on the above map. The circuits are simply numbers one through eleven and are handled solely by geography.

The decisions at this level are handled by a panel of judges and their rulings apply to the entirety of the circuit. This means that the districts within the circuit are settled on an issue and should rule the same way on it but the same issue before another circuit could result in a different finding.

On that note, if one or both parties still wish to appeal, they can petition the Supreme Court. However, unlike the Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court is very selective about which cases it takes and declines to hear the majority of appeals it gets. Typically, it reserves its time for cases where there is a split among the circuits, meaning two or more of the circuits have ruled differently on a matter, or there is a constitutional question at issue.

When the Supreme Court rules on an issue, that ruling, in effect, trumps all other district and appellate court rulings that may contradict it. As a result, all future rulings from all courts should align with the Supreme Court.

The Importance of the Supreme Court

The reason that Supreme Court rulings are so important can be summarized in one word: Precedent.

Precedent, in the legal context of the word, is simply looking at how other courts have ruled on similar cases to support one’s position. Since precedent from the Supreme Court applies to all circuits and all district courts, it is considered the most valuable.

This has a very interesting impact on future legal challenges. Most obviously, it help guides who wins and loses at all levels of the courts. It also shapes the arguments that are made with both sides either working to put their case in the light of a Supreme Court decision or distance it from one. In short, after a Supreme Court ruling, cases that come after are often placed in the light of that decision, either by showing it’s parallels or highlighting its differences from the Supreme Court Ruling.

However, a Supreme Court ruling can also help decide what types of cases are brought. For example, if the Kirtsaeng case had gone the other way, we likely would soon be seeing publishers suing many different types of book importers, knowing that the Supreme Court ruling makes victory much more likely.

Why You Should Care

For those who live in the U.S., the reason to care is obvious. Supreme Court decisions, especially those that might be relevant to your daily life, are so rare and play such a major part in determining how laws are applied, a decision one way or another can have a drastic impact.

But even if you don’t live in the U.S., the rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court can still have a drastic impact on you, especially if you work online.

The reason is that so much of the Internet is either hosted on U.S. servers (YouTube, Facebook, etc.), passes through U.S. companies (Google, Microsoft, etc.) or involves selling to the U.S. (Amazon, eBay, etc.) that decisions by the Supreme Court affects many companies with international reach.

For example, the Kirtsaeng ruling could have made it difficult to import copyrighted works into the U.S. or resell legally-bought works here. That, in turn, would have created challenges for both eBay and Amazon, two companies that specialize in marketplaces for such reselling.

That result, in turn, could have had an impact on resellers all over the world, especially those who sell to the U.S.

In short, as long as so much of the Internet and the largest companies on the Web are based in the U.S., it’s important for everyone to at least be aware of the potential changes in the legal climate of the country, including Supreme Court decisions.

Bottom Line

Those in the legal field treat Supreme Court decisions with a near-religious reverence. They are relatively rare decisions passed down from on high that change the rules for everyone all across the country. They can bring clarity, major changes and new opportunities to those in the field.

But to most of the media, unless the decision is in a controversial or divisive issue, the decisions are usually little more than footnotes, barely worthy of a mention. That’s unfortunate because those decisions can drastically impact the lives of everyday citizens as much, if not more, than lawyers and other judges.

Simply put, the Supreme Court is a central part of the legal process and it plays a crucial role in interpreting the laws that were written by Congress. While that might not seem important, given all of the overlap and the ambiguity often written into the laws, it gives the Supreme Court (as well as the lower courts) a lot of room for interpretation.

So while every U.S. citizen who attended a civics class knows the Supreme Court can’t write the laws it judges on, it clearly plays a big role in determining how they are applied to everyday situations.

Hashtags

Utilizing trending hashtags, as well as custom hashtags that are unique to your current promotions or products, can be a great way to increase engagement and exposure.  However, there’s a word of caution when it comes to utilizing trending hashtags. Be sure to not make tweets cheesy and only relevant to the conversation. Tweeting something like “Our #NBA jerseys are on sale for $19.99!” is not going to get the same respect that “#NBA Trivia: The Miami Heat averages ## points per game this season.” In the latter example, you’re not only sharing something that users monitoring that hashtag will find interesting, you’re also setting yourself up as a resource for that conversation without seeming intrusive or pushing your products in users’ faces.

Sponsored Tweets

Twitter is getting ready to officially launch its advertising campaign to any Twitter accounts, which will bring a variety of features. This includes Sponsored Tweets, which are messages that are promoted on user’s Twitter newsfeeds to get the company more exposure. It also comes with analytics so you can see your campaign metrics and results. Purchasing a sponsored tweet campaign for new products can help get that immediate exposures companies are looking for.

User Campaigns

In addition, many companies also pay users to tweet messages about their company on the users’ personal accounts. There are some FTC regulations that come with this, so be sure that your company and your paid users are following all laws when implementing these types of programs. In addition, users should write their own tweets so it seems more natural.

photo credit: eclecticlibrarian via photopin cc

Sharing and promoting content that your target users are going to be interested in is key when it comes to having a successful social media strategy. It is not a good use of time and resources to post any content that users won’t find interesting or may make you or your business look unprofessional. For example, including an unrelated or uninteresting link with commentary that is full of typos isn’t going to give your audience a good impression of your company online (and sometimes, as a whole).

To find the right type of content to share, check out competitors’ pages (but do not copy them) as well as pages that you yourself find interesting as a member of the industry you are in. Sometimes being aware of what you find interesting and sharing it is all it takes to get started.

In addition, asking coworkers and online users themselves what type of content they’d like to see can be a very enlightening experience. They may have ideas or suggestions that you haven’t thought of before, or they may say they like something that you thought wasn’t popular.

To find out the best type of content that is best for your social media marketing campaigns and publishing campaign, test different types of content to see what gets the most clicks or engagement. It’s also important not to over think it. Not surprisingly, content about improving your LinkedIn profile goes over great on LinkedIn, and comics or funny news pieces can usually be popular on Facebook. Additionally, on Twitter, content that has really interesting titles, such as “5 Mistakes You’re Making While Networking” will get more interest than something like, “Common Networking Mistakes”.  These are all over-arching factors to take into consideration, as well as finding more specific niche topics for your business.

When sharing content, use link shorteners that have analytics attached to them when possible (such as cli.gs or bit.ly links). This will help you track shares, clicks and referral sources from your shared social media links. This just provides even more information that makes it possible to have the most targeted social media publishing calendar that is possible.

Along with the type of content, timeliness is also important. Because social media is very focused on the now, be sure to only share content that is relevant and timely to that day. For instance, when Michael Jackson passed away, it just wouldn’t be in good taste to post a news story announcing his death two days later. Everyone already knew. It will make your business seem out of the loop and just struggling to keep up– not an image you want to promote.

photo credit: Rosaura Ochoa via photopin cc

With the search engines – of which Google is the unquestioned leader – regularly changing their policies, it is up to you to make sure that you adapt. It is not always easy, of course, especially since the exact details are almost always never divulged, but we have to admit that what they are doing is for the good of the user.

That being said, here is a timely reminder for you – some key SEO habits that will help you get on Google’s good side. Consider these tips a refresher, if you will.

Be original

Originality is such an important thing – online and offline – especially in this world where it is very easy to provide and acquire information. How can you make sure that you have something unique for your users? Something they will not find in another hundred other sites? While you may write about the same topic as others do – that is something that cannot be avoided – make sure that you provide something of additional value.

Be relevant

More than providing original content, you also have to ensure the relevance of your content. What good is original content when it does not mean anything to your target audience? That’s like giving a guy 10,000 spoons when all he needs is a knife to cut his steak. (That’s channeling Alanis Morissette right there.)

Clean up your web site

You don’t have to be an expert coder to work on this aspect, but a basic coding knowledge is imperative to those who want to achieve any measure of success in SEO. And when it comes to the point, there are many resources which can help you learn. It is important that you not only pay attention to the quality of your content, but also to how your site is structured. While we place more emphasis on your content being written for users (humans!), we cannot overlook the role that crawlers (bots!) play. They need to be able to access your pages efficiently. Hence, tried and tested practices such as internal linking and a clean internal URL structure should be innate to you. Take the time to check your site for these things. It will be worth your while.

About the Author
Lance Stadler has been blogging for 10 years. He has gone through so many search engine updates, and he believes in staying on the right side of the law. He also makes sure his workflow continues to be smooth by choosing the right internet service providers.

Image via StayAlien

In reality, however, travel blogging may not actually be such a glamorous endeavor. The grass is not greener on the other side, and all that jazz. Still, there have been quite a handful of travel blog success stories. Enough to convince more people to give travel blogging a try.

From the outset, I believe that you should make your goals clear to yourself. Why do you want to engage in travel blogging? Is it mainly because of your love for travel, or does your intention of making money weigh heavily? There is no right or wrong answer to that question, but your answer will have an impact on your experience.

Now, if you are at the point where you already have a travel blog going, and you want to make some bucks while you’re at it, just look to the expert travel bloggers. Those who have been there, done that. They might even have a collection of t-shirts to show for it!

Here are some ideas on how to make money from your travel blog, courtesy of some of the most prolific travel bloggers out there.

Google Adsense

From the outset, let me say that I do not consider a blog a business. While there are enough bloggers – travel-focused or not – out there who make good money from Adsense, I don’t think that counts as a business model. That being said, if you don’t mind receiving pennies (which is what you will get unless traffic to your blog is amazing), then Google Adsense is always an option. And if you do hit high traffic stats, then you’ll be seeing this option in a whole new light, just like travel blogger Anil Polat of foXnoMad. Browse his site, and learn from his use of ads – placement, size, and so on.

Write and sell your own ebooks

Nomadic Matt was “pushed” to traveling the the world when he visited Thailand in 2005. Before that, he says that he never saw traveling the world as an option, but that life-changing trip was the start and now, he is one of the most popular travel bloggers out there.

One of the ways he makes money? You got it – ebooks!

How to travel the world on $50 a day

How to Travel the World on $50 a Day. You might have heard of that. Matt wrote it, obviously based on his experiences. He has a product to offer, and he makes money out of it. Got enough travel experiences and tips that will actually benefit others? Then maybe you can write your own ebook, too.

Affiliate Links

Don’t think you have the chops to write an ebook just yet? Want more than what Google Adsense brings? You can go the affiliate link route. It’s still selling a product, albeit not your own.

One, you can sign up for the Amazon affiliate program and tastefully include links and image blocks to related products that your readers may want to purchase from the online store. The advantage of this is that many people are already existing customers of Amazon, making a purchase an easy deal.

Two, you can hook up with the popular travel bloggers mentioned above, who have affiliate programs for other travel bloggers who promote their products. And do check out Unconventional Guides, which also has an affiliate program.

These three methods can get you started. And once you get bigger, you’ll have even more opportunities to make money from your travel blog, ranging from creating your own services to selling your own apps.

About the Author
Gemma is an ardent fan of traveling and writing. She has her list of non-negotiable travel requirements, with fun, adventure, and safety at the top. For Gemma, peace of mind is of paramount importance, too, so she recommends travel safety/insurance at all times. See here for Gemma’s go-to travel insurance resource.

Lead image via Start to Run

While not all of the answers have been great, there are signs that the law is thinking about these issues and that the wheels of justice are grinding forward.

So while that may be small comfort, it’s important to remember that there are areas of the law that we either barely have addressed or have not addressed at all.

It’s in these spaces that the next frontier of Internet law may be hiding. These may well be the areas of law to become hot topics in the coming years and they could easily be the areas that will have huge impacts on you and your sites as they rise up.

On that note, here’s a look at the areas of law that we haven’t really begun to address, but most likely will have to soon.

1. Internationalization of Law

Typically, a site is seen as being bound by the rules of the country it is hosted in (the same as a person is bound by the laws of the country he or she is in). So, if you’re a U.S. citizen and you host your site in China, your site has to comply with Chinese law or move.

On the positive side, this can be useful if you live in a nation like China or Iran that is known for Internet censorship and tightly controlling the types of sites that citizens can create. On the other hand, it can be bad if you use it to “forum shop” for a site most countries would consider illegal.

Attempts to standardize laws across borders have, for the most part, failed. The first problem is that traditional methods have involved using treaties, which is a slow, tedious process with few guaranteed results. The other is because such attempts to standardize, such as with the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) are wildly unpopular.

The Internet is the first truly global thing. Cars can cross borders, boats can cross oceans and planes can cross countries, but the Web crosses the world and that creates a need for a truly global law, something that has never existed before.

This has created the desire for some truly global standards when it comes to law. Standards that can’t really be reached through treaties and will likely require something very different in the near future.

2. Jurisdiction

A related issue with international law is the issue of jurisdiction, meaning which court or courts have the right to hear the legal issue before them.

Think about it this way: If an Australian man uses a U.S. server to violate laws in France, where is the case handled? Many would jump and say he should be prosecuted in Australia but he didn’t break any laws there, in fact, what he did might not even be illegal in Australia.

The next solution many have is to ship him to France to face the court. However, he didn’t break any laws while physically in France and, theoretically, under French law.

But what about the United States? What he did might be illegal there and owning servers and equipment there could grant jurisdiction as he has (or had) a business presence? Should he go to the U.S. instead?

These are the type of jurisdiction issues that the Web raises. Though jurisdiction law has existed for centuries, it’s typically dealt with physical actions and with returning people to the physical place they committed a crime or needed to be sued. Now, it’s possible to violate a country’s laws without ever setting foot inside it.

The recent case of Kim Dotcom highlights just how bizarre this area of law has the potential to be. A New Zealand citizen facing extradition to the United States over copyright infringement, money laundering and other acts that he’s accused of having done from within New Zealand.

These days, you can commit a crime anywhere from behind your computer. We just haven’t necessarily figured out how to make sure that such crimes are punished.

3. Property on the Web

Think about this, the Internet is a world where nothing physically exists, at least not in the same concept it’s used. If you get a special weapon in an online role playing game, a digital copy of a book or access to an online site, you’re paying or acquiring something that doesn’t really exist, not in the physical sense of the word.

So what happens when someone steals your virtual property or you’re denied access to a work that you legitimately bought? It’s often times unclear.

In some cases, this comes down to a matter for contract law. When you buy a game on Steam or a book through Kindle, you’re agreeing to a set of terms that often gives the company the right to serve you your content at their discretion, even if you paid for it. This is how cheaters are banned from video games and, sometimes, legitimate customers are denied access to works they bought.

Also, with a physical object you own, you have certain rights. For example, you can destroy something you own, you can resell it or you can give it away. Though there are some restrictions, such as with firearms, for the most part, any physical object you own, you can do with as you please.

However, if you try to resell your games on Steam or your books on Kindle, you’re likely to find that you don’t have those rights online. Though the European Union recently ruled that citizens should be able to resell digitally purchased goods and there is a push to force Steam to comply, there’s no indication as to how this would work or what structure this would take.

While intellectual property law does cover a lot of the property online a lot of the questions digital property raises can’t be answered easily, creating the possible need for a whole new definition of what it means to own something.

Bottom Line

The simple truth is that the world and its courts have never seen anything like the Internet and the laws have no hope of keeping up.

In the long run, the real change the Internet may bring to the law is not any of these areas, but a rethinking of how we view the idea of law itself. After all, when it takes longer to pass a law that it does to invent a new technology, it’s clear that the system we have for creating and enforcing laws can’t catch up or keep up.

How we fix that is a tough question and I doubt there are any answers that will be liked. Every possible solution has serious drawbacks.

However, one thing all of this does make clear is that the Internet will change the world. To be sure, it’s a gradual change, one that moves over years, but the effect is still faster and greater than anything that’s come before it.

Think about it this way, the first “modern” automobile was invented in 1771 and the first speeding ticket was handed out in 1904.

Clearly, the car took a lot longer to change the world and its laws than the Internet has and that change is only accelerating.

Staying connected online can often be overwhelming, especially if you are managing several social media accounts on a daily basis. Fortunately, there are several apps and websites which can help you stay on top of your social media marketing game and help you stay productive.

Buffer

As mentioned previously, Buffer is a great tool for users that allows you to build up a queue of social media messages on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. You set the days and times that the posts should go out, and Buffer releases the next one in the queue at each set time. It is $10/month and has a great mobile app that makes it possible to add content on the go, while you are on the metro or waiting in line.

TweetDeck

TweetDeck continues to be a valuable player when it comes to staying productive online. It now offers a chrome app and also has a mobile and downloadable program version. Twitter recently announced that it was ending the support of the Adobe AIR and the mobile apps. However, the web-based versions (such as the Chrome app) still makes it easy to monitor your Twitter mentions and posts for multiple accounts.

SocialMention

SocialMention is a great listening/monitoring tool to see what users and websites are saying about your product, name, or brand online. Searching by specific keywords can bring up the most recent mentions and links surrounding it, making it easy to monitor conversations. Regularly participating in these conversations about you or your business can help increase credibility and awareness.

SocialOomph

SocialOomph is an easy social media scheduling service. They offer paid and free memberships. You can shorten links, schedule posts, enable auto following, post in Facebook groups, and much more. What it lacks in design, this website makes up for in unique and useful features for its members.

SocialMediaToday & Business2Community

It can be hard to keep up with all the current social media trends and news that are developing every day. News aggregators SocialMediaToday and Business2Community make it easy to get a good overall grasp of the current news and trends in the online marketing industry. Both websites syndicate content from some of the top blogs and websites online, making it easy for bloggers to get more visibility while readers get a heavy dose of great content, all in one place. AllFacebook and AllTwitter are also good places to find news on social networking.

image courtesy of Tweepi.com.

Think of it as an eclectic mixture of Twitter, Vine, YouTube, Instagram, and your voice memo service all in one.  This new social networking website and mobile app is gaining traction, especially among the teenage and hipster generation. States website Inquistir.com, “Is Pheed just another new social media network to add to the seemingly ever growing list, or is the new social sharing platform really about to give Facebook and Twitter a run for their money? That’s the question social media commentators have been asking all week a Pheed takes over the number one spot as the most downloaded free social media app in iTunes, and holds the position for over a week.”

Pheed, an obvious pun on the word feed that Twitter and Facebook both use, is fairly easy to use, especially because its main features– upload a video/photo/audio recording, share someone’s content, follow someone, and more– has already been made intuitive by regular, daily use of other social networking websites and apps.

So what makes Pheed stand out among all other social networks? Claims the Huffington Post, “The catchphrase for Pheed, which launched in October 2012, is, ‘A new way to express yourself.’ Whether you want to do so in text, photos, videos, audio, voice or live broadcast, Pheed offers all of that functionality. Other social networks offer some of that, but not all of it.”

A quick sign up of a new profile (which allows you to use your existing Facebook or Twitter login information) shows no glaring glitches or confusion navigation paths. In fact, the only problem that a user may find with Pheed is that not enough of their friends and favorite celebrities are on it yet. Some celebrities– such as Kim Zolciak-Biermann from The Real Housewives of Atlanta and Jamie Foxx– are on and active on the site, but many of us who are in our twenties, thirties, and beyond may have a hard time finding other friends who are using the site.

Even though teenagers are seeming to be driving the growth of Pheed and other new social apps, it shouldn’t be ignored. The #1 downloaded app in the iTunes app store should never be ignored. However, Pheed is still less than six months old, so there is no telling how big (or small) it may be a year from now. While Twitter-owned 6 second video sharing app Vine continues to get attention, Pheed may be the next social networking site that you should be paying attention to.

But should you care? Is it really worth the time to search for such infringements, find them and stop them? After all, many bloggers have their content infringed upon and never even realize it, seemingly not hurt by it at all. Others, however, appear to obsess over it, tracking every infringement and working doggedly to stop it.

So which approach is right? Well, that’s a personal decision and it’s one that stems from your specific situation including your search engine position, your personal feelings toward your work and the other sites in your niche.

Whether you want to care or don’t want to care, it’s pretty easy to justify your position. However, it’s important to be honest and make the decision that’s right for you and for your content.

With that in mind, here are a few factors to consider.

1. Search Engine Optimization

Google and other search engines pride themselves on returning the best results that they can for their visitors. Part of that means finding the best and most accurate content for a search result, but it also means not repeating the same result over and over again. After all, a top ten search results list is useless if half of them are just different sites with the same content.

So, when Google sees two sites with the same or similar content, it has to make a decision and choose one of the sites to list and demote the others, either to lower pages or to a completely different index.

Google tries, and mostly succeeds, in trying to reward the sites that post the content originally, giving the best spots to the sites that create the work. However, it’s not a perfect process.

Search engines inevitably mess up and give the top spots to sites that came later, including spammers, plagiarists and other infringers. This means that, for relevant queries, people who infringed your work can easily beat you in the search results.

Not all sites are vulnerable to this. Well-established and trusted sites are less likely to be bit than sites that are new or haven’t built up a great deal of inbound links. For new sites in competitive niches, this can be a major headache but it’s less of a problem for those who are at the top of their field already and generally do well in search results already.

Still, if you’re climbing the Google ladder, you likely want to pay more attention to infringements than if you’re already on top.

2. Personal Views

As a writer, everything you create you put a piece of yourself into. The time, work, expertise and expression of the work is your own and that can be a very emotional thing, especially if the content is deeply personal.

If that’s the case, then having someone infringe your work, especially if they also plagiarize it, can be a difficult experience. It can feel as if someone is laying claim to a part of you, like a huge violation of trust and even like a literal theft.

Sometimes, these feelings of being violated can get in the way of your writing and your honesty, it can make you feel retrained in an environment where being honest is your most valuable asset.

If infringements are impacting you emotionally and you think dealing with them can help, then it’s best to do so. The time it takes to deal with infringements is small and, if peace of mind comes with it, it’s a small price to pay.

The hardest part though is being honest with yourself about your feelings. Many people tell themselves they’re fine with infringement even though, on some level, are bothered by it. This can create a problem that can impact the rest of their work and their connection with their audience.

3. Competitive Advantage

Creating content, especially good content, takes time, energy and, possibly, money. If another site can gain the benefit of your content without putting in that effort, they have an upper hand over you. Not only can they accumulate a lot more content from other sources, but they can dedicate that energy to other tasks, such as promotion.

That’s a major advantage to that site, not just in terms of SEO, but also usefulness to readers. After all, a site that aggregates content from a variety of sources is better for the reader than visiting them separately. However, while some aggregators do a good job creating a symbiotic relationship with the sites they pull from (look at Google for example), others only extract value without returning any to the creators.

If you are wanting to grow your site and reach the top of your field, you may need to, from time to time, work to strike down sites that are gaining an unfair advantage over you using your content in unhealthy ways.

After all, you still want to be the primary destination for your own content.

Bottom Line

So should you worry about infringement? It comes down to a simple question: Is it hurting you?

Infringements can and often do harm bloggers, especially as they work to grow their site and build up something great. But this doesn’t mean you should chase down every since copy of your posts. Not only is such an effort a waste of energy, at some point copyright enforcement is a distraction that pulls you away from creating a great site.

Instead, it’s best to look at the problem objectively and focus your energy on the cases that matter the most. Which cases are causing you the most problems, professionally and/or emotionally, and how can you get the greatest benefit from the least amount of work.

If you take a pragmatic look toward your enforcement, you’ll likely find that you can handle the issues you truly need to with minimal issue, freeing you up to create content and grow your site without the dead weight of infringements or the excess burden of over-the-top enforcement.

Wanelo, short for Want, Need, Love,  is a visual image collecting site that is similar to Pinterest. Their website states: “Wanelo (“wah-nee-lo,” from Want, Need, Love) is a catalog of products organized by people. You can buy almost everything you see on Wanelo, and everything is posted by members.”

The main difference is that all images link to the pages where the item depicted in the image can be purchased. This is of great benefit to e-commerce sites that have their products on Wanelo, as it makes it easy for customers to purchase items quickly.

Wanelo is still a fairly new site, but has gained the greatest amount traction among  teenage to twentysomething women. For e-commerce businesses that offer products that may target this demographic, it is crucial that they get on Wanelo as soon as possible. While it isn’t experiencing the record numbers of growth that Pinterest has, it’s audience continues to grow.

For e-commerce sites that offer home, fashion, design, or even technology products and accessories, Wanelo can still be another great outlet to promote online products. The type of items shared on Wanelo shouldn’t be strictly feminine items– there are also several occurrences of gadgets, video games, and other products that are gender neutral and even masculine. Just like with Pinterest, Wanelo is skewed to the feminine audience. However, sharing items that are visually appealing and creative can still be of great benefit to online marketers.

Once a company’s products are shared on Wanelo, they can be reported for incorrect or missing links to product pages by users. This is great for companies who have had their products shared by a user instead of via their company profile.

To get your company started on Wanelo:

1. Sign up for a profile on Wanelo.com.
2. Add the Wanelo Save buttons to all product pages on your e-commerce site.
3. Add a link to your company’s wanelo profile on your website with other social media profile links.
4. Maintain the company Wanelo profile by regularly sharing new items to your collections, as well as uploading photos and links to new products as they appear on your e-commerce site.

Wanelo marketing is still a relatively new e-commerce strategy, but companies that stay ahead of the growth of Wanelo are sure to find success, especially if they are in the design, fashion, and technology industries.

However, the first step toward being successful with occasionally discussing internet memes or viral videos with your audience via social media is to do it the right way. Don’t be cheesy or make it look like you are trying too hard. Make the video or content part of the natural conversation on your social media pages.

For instance, an animal shelter could pull in a photo of grumpy cat with the line, “Find your own grumpy cat at the ASPCA!” Brands that are lighthearted with their responses and tie-ins to viral content will find more success with it than companies that are just posting it to ride the wave of sudden attention the meme or content is experiencing.

Video Responses
For viral videos, many companies and individuals go beyond just posting the video on their blog or social media profiles. They create versions of their own. For instance, after there was a rash of sing-along parodies of Carly Rae Jepsen’s hit single, “Call Me Maybe”, even the 2012 USA Olympic Swimming Team got into the action.

Having fun with videos can be a great way to get involved in internet memes while also introducing your customers to your staff in a fun medium.

Asking for Feedback
If a meme is controversial and relates to your company or blog, simply asking discussion questions about the topic on your social media profiles can garner great conversation . For instance, if a questionable parenting topic, such as shaming your children through Facebook, went viral, a parenting blog or toy company could post a link to a story about and ask, “Would you embarrass your kids like this parent? Is it an effective discipline strategy?”
It may be worthwhile to emphasize that stating the company or blog’s policy on the topic, just to make sure everyone knows where they stand on the issue. This can clear the company of choosing sides. Remaining impartial may be the best bet for controversial memes.

No matter how a company chooses to partake in sharing and discussing memes and other viral content, keeping it lighthearted and impartial is usually a best bet.

PicMonkey

PicMonkey is a light, fun, and easy to use photo editor. They have great seasonal clip art and fonts that can be laid over your photos and loads quickly. Some of the slang used may take a while to get used to, but it is a fun program that has a lot of extra features. There are some paid options, but the free options make it possible to make the majority of basic photo edits without the additional cost.

Pixlr

Pixlr is one of the most popular online photo editors. Its layout is a lot like Photoshop, so designers who are familiar with that infamous Adobe program will enjoy this and get used to using it a lot faster. It has a basic navigation and features, but there aren’t any features that free users are barred from using, so that makes it a plus.

FotoFlexer

FotoFlexer states that it the “most advanced online photo editor”. You can import photos directly from sites like Flickr, Facebook, and myspace and the site allows you to use sample photos to get the hang of the layout and program before going in to edit your own photos.

BeFunky

BeFunky is a younger, hip free photo editor, like PicMonkey. It features effects that are common on apps like Instagram and offers many interesting photo enhancement features. Besides the online website editor, BeFunky also offers apps for the iPhone and Android via Google Play.

Having an arsenal of free photo editors and other online marketing tools at your disposal is important for marketers because online campaigns usually move and change quickly. Easy online photo editors that allow the addition of text can be great for contests, banner advertisements, blog headers, and even profile photos. The variety of different fonts and photo effects that these free online editors can provide can provide some visual interest and break up online content, whether it is on a blog, social media profile, email newsletter, or other online marketing medium.

The question of whether or not bloggers are journalists is an old one and it can be an important one legally. As the EFF puts it, journalists can often times keep confidential sources private, gain extra protection in libel cases in the form of retraction statutes and receive fee waivers when Freedom of Information Act requests.

But while all of this is true, The Atlantic, in 2011, argued that we shouldn’t care whether or not bloggers are journalists, that the issue isn’t very important and that reporters at large publications and organization have much stronger protections than the title “journalist”.

Still, the subject is a sensitive one for bloggers, who are often eager for the weight and credibility that comes with being a journalist. When blogger Crystal Cox was ruled to not be a journalist in 2011 and ordered to pay millions in a defamation lawsuit filed by the founder of an investment group, after denying her protection under the state’s shield law that protects journalist sources, many bloggers took up arms. However, once the details of the case came to light and it was clear just how wrong much of Cox’s information was, attitudes slowly changed.

But it leaves the bigger question unresolved: Are bloggers journalists? To get the answer, we have to first look at what the question is really asking and try to drill down to the important answers.

Are Bloggers Journalists?

The question “Are bloggers journalists?” is misleading. Bloggers and journalists are two overlapping groups. Many bloggers are journalists (and vice versa) but many journalists don’t blog and many bloggers aren’t journalists.

The question of what does or does not make one a journalist, from an ethical perspective at least, hinges less upon the medium used and more on the methodology. A journalist, meaning one who practices journalism, is simply one who collects and edits news for presentation through the media.

Is a TV reporter less a journalist than a newspaper one? Is an investigator writing for a magazine a superior reporter to one working in radio? Journalism already involves many different type of media. A blogger working for the New York Times, is no less a journalist than one writing for the print edition, the question is not a matter of the medium one chooses.

If you engage in journalism, you’re a journalist, regardless of the media.

But What About the Law?

The law, however, is where things get a bit trickier. Unfortunately, most of the laws written to protect journalists, including the aforementioned shield laws (which are handled on a state-by-state basis) were written well before there was an Internet and make no mention of online journalism at all.

This makes the issue complex and dicey, but the long and short of it is that you have to look at the specific laws that impact what you are trying to do. For example, if you’re wanting to protect a source, you’ll want to look up your state’s shield law, if one exists at all.

For most laws though, the issue has more to do with how you conduct your site and your investigation than it does where it’s posted. If you get your facts straight and don’t libel anyone, you don’t to worry about retractions or shield laws.

What About Press Access?

A similar problem arises when trying to get press access to an event or a person. Though government institutions can’t set arbitrary rules for who will and will not receive a press pass, private institutions can. However, typically, what’s more important when trying to apply for a press pass is your reputation and your audience (namely how large and how relevant it is).

A small blog no one has ever heard of is going to struggle to get press passes anywhere but a large one, especially in a relevant field targeting a desired audience, will have a much better chance.

In short, for press access, you need to focus on growing your site and your reputation before trying to get a badge.

Should I Care?

Probably not. If you’re doing the types of things where you might obtain some benefit from being legally identified as a journalist, you’re probably a journalist. If you can have a legitimate claim to shield laws, FOIA, press access, etc. then you probably are a journalist in your field, regardless of how you are distributing your work.

However, the Atlantic was right. The advantage a reporter at CNN or The New York Times has over you isn’t they qualify as a journalist and you don’t, it’s that they are backed by large corporations with a history and reputation and you can’t match. They have the legal resources to end problems and names that can open doors.

In short, what separates a blogger from “mainstream media” journalist isn’t the medium they use, but the size of the organization and the history behind their outlet.

Bottom Line

As a blogger, regardless of whether you consider yourself a journalist, you have a duty, legally and ethically, to be accurate with what you publish, avoid infringing copyright and obey all of the relevant laws related to privacy. You also have an obligation to be a decent human being and not cause undue harm on others.

If you do those things, your legal status as a journalist probably doesn’t matter a great deal. You can still get press passes when relevant, you can report from any public event or public meeting and you can use the same laws to gather information, even if it at times may be slower and more expensive.

Rather than hand-wringing about whether or not you are a journalist, it’s more important to focus on doing the best journalism you can, contributing as much as possible to the larger debate and following the laws the best you can.

If you do that, you’ll be doing better journalism than many people who wear the “journalist” badge proudly and you’ll be going a long way to ensure that the laws that are lagging behind catch up quickly.