Blogger was (not surprisingly) one of the first to adopt this technology, followed quickly by Typepad, Tumblr, MovableType, Posterous and last but not least WordPress.com (who finally joined the PuSH club a few days ago and was kind enough to create an official plugin for WP.org fans too).

With PuSH quickly becoming a standard feature for blog platforms and services, one has to wonder whether or not Twitter’s days of fame are numbered.

All Things (Now) Equal

One of the main reasons Twitter enjoyed early fame was it’s “real time” status updates that usually put the services tens of minuets (if not hours) ahead of the blogosphere (at least as far as breaking news went).

This led some bloggers to declare that RSS is dead, despite the fact that Twitter itself supports RSS feeds.

PuSH now removes this excuse, which means bloggers can now receive their instantaneous updates from their favorite blogs without having to deal with the 140 character limit.

Real Time Search Engines?

In the quest to index the “live web” first, all 3 major search engines (that would be Google, Bing and Yahoo) have licensed Twitter’s “fire hose” of tweets in order to display live conversations as they happen.

With PuSh finally gaining mainstream adoption across the blogosphere, search engines can simply index the tens of millions of blogs in order to present “the pulse of the web” at that exact moment.

This may lead to “the big 3″ as well as blog search engines like Technorati to display less interest in paying to access Twitter’s fire hose in the future (making it harder for them to raise revenue  outside of internal search ads).

Are Twitter’s day’s numbered?

Although Twitter recently celebrated its 10 billionth tweet, its user growth has been slowing down since January. While tweetaholics are more engaged with Twitter overall, there seem to be less and less people signing up for the service, unlike blogging which has continued to grow since last year.

While Twitter will probably still enjoy the spot light amongst the media, marketing firms and politicians, we may see micro blogging as a whole decline as users once again full featured blogs to deliver them the news as it happens.

Often on the forefront of mobile blogging, WordPress has been able to spread the “WP love” upon multiple devices (specifically for the Blackberry, iPhone and Android smartphones), with plans  to create a Nokia app as well.

While bloggers will probably swallow the iPill and buy the iPad, it may not be in WordPress’s best interest (or even its rivals like Typepad and Squarespace) to create an iPad app due it its present limitations.

(Image via Hack My Pad)

Dude, Where’s My Camera?!

No matter how you see it (pun intended), the lack of a camera will make the iPad app look “big and dumb” compared to its smartphone cousins.

With Automattic on the verge of integrating VideoPress within the WordPress iPhone app, the lack of a camera means that WP fans will be unable to upload original videos to their blogs (something professional bloggers do quite frequently).

(Image via Engadget)

What The Flash?

Even if the mighty iPad had a camera (as some rumors keep hinting that one will emerge), Steve Jobs “greatest creation” would be unable to view VideoPress videos due to his war against all things flash.

As high priest of the HTML5 faith, Steve Jobs refusal to embrace flash (something every netbook can view by the way) will make video blogging less fun for WordPress fans, forcing them to use alternatives like BlogPress (which heavily embraces YouTube).

A Virtual Keyboard For An Avatar?

After the magic wore off from Apple’s keynote address, a few bloggers were complaining about the iPad’s keyboard.

(Gizmodo) Typing in portrait is better than anticipated but still quite a stretch for our average-sized hands, which means that letters like F G and H will take a moderate conditioning for some. What about in landscape mode, sitting flat on the table? Well this is problematic too, as the iPad sort of wobbles. The back is not perfectly flat, meaning your typing surface is never perfectly flat, so the virtual keyboard becomes that much more difficult to use.

With the keyboard too big for comfortably typing on one hand and too small for two hands, the virtual keyboard seems to be designed for a 3 meter Na’vi from Avatar (perhaps as a super sized iPod Touch?) than for a human blogger.

Although WordPress fans could simply purchase the physical keyboard to accompany the large iDevice, this would make it less mobile (than say a “handy dandy”  netbook (since carrying around the keyboard will be kind of awkward).

So will WordPress create an iPad app?

I would not be surprised if they did, especially if Squarespace and Typepad created an app for their users.

While the iPad will probably be an awesome tool for researching information online, when it comes to blogging on the go, I think I will stick to my iPhone (and I predict that most WP fans will too).

While rumors are still speculating on whether those ads will be within the tweet stream, it looks like All Things D suspects that Twitter will instead place ads within search results, similar to how the mighty Google profits off of search (hat tip: Mashable).

If Twitter chooses to go the tweet search route, it may be wiser for bloggers to spend their marketing dollars within Tweet search than Google Adwords for three simple reasons.

Building A Loyal Audience–Fast!

One of the hardest things about blogging is getting exposure, especially in a popular niche (like Apple products).

Instead of competing against product resellers, code monkeys (aka super geeks) or multimedia giants in a Google search, bloggers could instead buy a spot to pop up within a hashtag stream (lets say #Apple) at every 10th result (or however Twitter decides).

Example: Putting your iPod Touch / iPhone On Kitchen Duty (via @AppleGazette) http://twet.ad/12345

Note: Twitter of course would have to create an official short URL for ads (and perhaps highlight the backgrounds) in order to differentiate the ad from the search stream.

This could help bloggers quickly gain exposure from an engaging, passionate audience, especially during a popular seasonal event (say an Apple Keynote launching the new iPad, an iMac or even the glorious iPhone).

Breaking News

Whether it’s a celebrity scandal, a sporting event or (God forbid) a natural disaster, the first thing many people turn to for reaction is Twitter (as you can tell from the numerous references in the media).

A celebrity/sports blogger covering the Tiger Woods scandal for example could buy a search term or hashtag (say #woods or #golf) linking a post with updates about the golfer’s fall from grace (or even rebound).

This could help direct new users to your site, and possibly help them subscribe to your RSS feed (or more likely follow your Twitter account).

Knowledge Is Power

Although one could easily determine what the hottest trends are in a Google search by simply glancing at the hot trends section, it may be hard to determine what the overall reaction to the topic is without scanning the blogosphere for reactions.

Example: As of this post, the word “whale” is trending right now in the US (on Google).

If I were an animal blogger, I might think “Gee, now would be a good time to promote my “10 reasons why I love whales” post via Adwords, not realizing that people are discussing the recent killer whale attack that has horrified America.

A quick Tweet search of whale could inform you of this, allowing a potential blogger to instead submit a Tweet ad link titled “Are Whales Safe To Train With?” instead, helping you to avoid a public backlash due to ignorance.

Conclusion

Although some bloggers may still choose to go the route of the Google Goliath or even organic SEO, both methods may not help one build a community quickly upon their blog, something Twitter can do thanks to the zillions of apps upon mobile phones and computers.

While other factors such as pricing, availability and the payment method will ultimately determine whether or not tweet search stream ads are a hit within the twittersphere, bloggers may want to seriously consider it as an option that could help them eventually become a problogger.

Image Credits: Brain by Gaetan Lee via Flickr, Trust image via US goverment.

Whether this is due towards Blogger’s powerful free features or “keep it simple” user interface is subject to debate, but regardless of the reason the fact remains that Blogger is King.

While WordPress’s odds of over taking Blogger on the PC may be as great as Frosty the snowman’s chances of conquering hades by himself, WordPress may be able to surpass Blogger globally thanks in part to the popularity of cell phones worldwide.

(Spacemart) The ranks of cell phone subscribers will swell to five billion people this year thanks to the growth of smartphones in developed nations and mobile services in poor nations, a UN agency said Monday. [...]

“Even during an economic crisis, we have seen no drop in the demand for communications services,” ITU Secretary-General Hamadoun Toure said in a statement at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, the industry’s biggest trade show.

This probably explain’s why WordPress has heavily embraced smartphones (at least for Android, Blackberry and the mighty iPhone), as well as feature phones like Nokia (the latter which should be easier to purchase in third world nations).

Even though Google has embraced the world of mobile via the Android OS, they have yet to build their own apps, choosing instead to delegate the responsibilities to third parties like BlogPress, Blogaway and Bloglive (for the iPhone, Android and Blackberry, respectively).

Although these third party blogger apps are powerful when it comes to multimedia blogging, they fail to give users a “total blog experience,” especially when it comes to comment moderation and page editing (features built within all of the WP apps, but sadly lacking within Blogger apps).

While only time will tell whether or not WordPress will over take Blogger in the next few years, the fact that users can update as well as edit their blog while on the go may help thrust WordPress ahead of Blogger in the next few years as the world moves slowly away from PC’s to smart phones due to the global recession.

Considered by some to be a distant cousin to WordPress (as they have  ”same blood“), b2evolution has continued to evolve at a seemingly faster pace than its younger cousin (as b2evolution is on version 3.3.3 while WordPress is on 2.9.2).

Although boasting numerous plugins, template skins and a small but passionate community, b2evolution has nearly faded from the public spot light as most people outside of the “realm known as geek” have never heard of b2evolution (as it brings up blanks stares, unlike WordPress or Blogger).

Despite its humble reputation, the b2evolution crew announced in January that they are planning on releasing version 4.0 in a few months. But the question remains: will it be enough to save this dying brand?

Even though there are some bloggers who prefer b2evolution over WordPress, a quick Google search reveals that the vast majority of users are leaving the platform in order to embrace the WP faith.

This could be due to its user interface which although powerful is not the most elegant thing to look at (especially if one compares it against WordPress, Blogger or Movable Type).

While I could name several blogs supporting the WP brand (like Mashable, Inside Blackberry, and many, many more), the only prominent blog supporting b2evolution (that I know of) is the Moon Society (disclaimer: I occasionally write for that blog, and have in the past asked the leaders to switch away from b2evolution–hence this post).

Unless b2evolution 4.0 releases something innovative and perhaps even embraces the world of mobile like WordPress (which is now upon Android, Blackberry and the mighty iPhone), I do not see a healthy future for this platform–although I am hoping that somewhere some b2 geek can hopefully prove me wrong in the not so distant future (hint, hint).

Despite the power and popularity of WordPress amongst the blogging elite (at least upon the Techmeme Leaderboard), Blogger still remains the dominant blogging platform in the world, with the glorious WP coming in at a distant second.

Some in the WordPress faith may wonder why anyone would consider using Blogger, especially since WordPress boasts thousands (or is it tens of thousands?) of plugins, themes and developers–not to mention awesome smartphone apps upon the iPhone, Blackberry and Google’s very own Android OS.

However upon closer examination, BlogSpot fans may not be as “delusional” as some geeks may think for choosing Google over Automattic, as there are at least 5 major advantages of using Blogger instead of WordPress–both WP.com and WP.org.

1) Problogging On Your Domain

No matter how you slice it or dice it, Blogger is just far cheaper when it comes to blogging underneath your custom domain.

Backed by the mighty Google, Blogger is free when it comes to hooking up your domain. WordPress charges you $10 per domain (and that is on top of what you pay for registering your domain elsewhere).

While this may seem like a small price to pay, the bill can add up quickly if you own 5 or 6 domains.

2) Image Hosting

When it comes to default image hosting, WordPress beats Blogger 3 times over (as the former offers 3 gigabytes of default space vs Google’s 1 gigabyte).

However when it comes to upgrading to the next level on both accounts, Blogger destroy’s WordPress by offering users 20 GB of space for $5/year while WP.com offers users 5GB of space for about $20/year (note: the options become worse for us WP fans the higher up we go).

3) Video Hosting

If image hosting wasn’t bad enough, the video options alone will make one weep when you consider that WordPress charges users $60/year to use VideoPress–a fee that does not include any extra space.

BlogSpot fans on the other hand are offered video uploading for free (thanks to Google Video), with no limits on space.

4) Themes: Free for thee, but not for me?!

Despite Blogger’s popularity, WordPress (to my knowledge) still has more custom themes than its Google rival. However a new trend that I am noticing is that many premium WordPress themes are available for FREE (or very cheap) on Blogger.

One example (out of many) would be a premium WordPress theme called Church is available for $60 for WP fans. BlogSpot lovers however can get the same exact theme for free.

In fact there are many sites out there (like WordPress To Blogger) that convert premium WordPress themes to Blogger for free or very inexpensive prices (note: I am not sure how legal these businesses are, but thus far they seem to have faced little action against the original creators).

5) Security

This last point is probably debatable, but lets just face the facts: Google has one of the most secure platforms in the world.

Although WordPress.com and many hosting companies (such as Media Temple, Host Monster and GoDaddy) provide excellent security for their customers, the fact that Google can take on foreign hackers from semi-hostile nations speaks volumes about how tough their defenses are.

So is Blogger better than WordPress?

Answer: That depends on who you ask. ;-)

I personally use WordPress for most of my blogging needs right now, although I do also use other platforms such as Tumblr, Joomla–and yes, even Blogger.

However now that I’m done playing Devil’s Advocate, I’m interested in hearing what your opinion is regarding these two rival platforms (and the reasons why you chose one over the other).

If you have been following the drama over in the Blackberry App World, you probably know by now that the company is planning on developing a corporate app for Twitter and releasing it for free (hat tip: Mashable)

(Inside Blackberry) The Twitter for BlackBerry smartphones application has been designed to take advantage of the BlackBerry platform to create a user experience that will be familiar to both Twitter and BlackBerry smartphone users. Some of the areas that we have focused on are:

• Push technology and Message List integration to notify you of your direct messages as soon as they arrive.
• Send/Share BlackBerry menu integration along with bit.ly URL shortening so that you can share your favorite BlackBerry App World™ applications, interesting websites or a random picture from your camera with your Twitter followers.

From the initial screenshots the Blackberry Twitter app (thus far) looks impressive, although its entrance within the BB App World could signal the death of excellent mobile apps in the not so distant future.

Although I’ll admit to you that many of the twitter apps on BB world were underwhelming, there were a few diamonds in the rough like TweetGenius, which was like “the Tweetie” for Blackberry devices.

Despite offering an array of features for BB fans, it’s doubtful that users will pay BeeJive $8 when Blackberry is offering a native one for free.

This will probably discourage other third party developers from creating decent premium apps for the blackberry, which could translate into blackberry becoming a smartphone that sucks when it comes to blogging (unless you are using WordPress that is).

Could I be wrong? I seriously hope so. Although if I were a developer I would think twice about creating a blogging app on the Blackberry as the last thing you need is direct competition from the mobile phone creator itself.

Finally the news has hit the scene, while being as overdue as this post probably is: there finally is a WordPress Foundation. But this entry is not about the WordPress Foundation but about the weakness of communities and their need for strong leaders, using the WordPress community as a perfect example.

More than two years ago, during the heated sponsored themes FUD debate, I wrote that it was time to return the WordPress trademark to the Community and was also called out, by Matt himself, for it being an attack post. I have been a critic of Matt for a long time already but there is one thing ‘the community’ must understand: Matt has the guts most people would not have. Every community needs their Matt Mullenweg.

Period.

Design By Communittee Leads to Mediocrity

An often misunderstood statement and one I will dare to challenge at times but when it comes to projects as large as WordPress, Movable Type and other open source projects, design by committee leads to mediocrity. Face it, accept it and get over it.

Why does this happen? You do not need me to understand this but the turning point is when communities start to grow and become important. When a project becomes popular. When a project passes beyond being new and exciting. Could you imagine how WordPress would look like if everyone could decide what would flow in to the code? No? Just have a look at the numerous plugins in the repository. Like ‘There’s an app for that’, there’s a plugin for almost anything. Just like most iPhone apps suck, most plugins for WordPress suck and so do a majority of the WordPress themes. So does a majority of all sites you find on the internet,so do a majority of all books you find in the library aso.

Strong and opinionated leadership is essential.
Design by committee ensures mediocrity — at best.

It’s what happens when you let the community decide. It’s what happens when you are allowed to decide. It’s what happens when I am allowed to decide. Instead of thinking for the community we tend to let our own ideas influence our decisions. It’s called being human. Leaders need to be different though: most projects need someone who is not afraid of calling shots, someone who dares to go against the flow and dares to say ‘This is my decision and that’s how things will be’. Over the last years Matt did so with the Themes repository, with the WordPress 2010 theme and Matt will lead the WordPress Foundation as well.

Personal Opinion Can Lead to Lack of Respect

After the sponsored theme controversy and Matt’s decision to nuke and clean the theme repository the cries to remove the default links to the sites of core (historical?) contributors to the code of WordPress got louder all the time and subsequently these were removed and replaced with links to WordPress documentation. Many people said that links were a currency, a way to pay the people listed, but have you ever tried to get a loan approved based on how many backlinks you have in Google?
The original links to these contributors were there because of what these people meant to the code of the platform we all use, the links honoured their participation. If at any point these links provided a valuable financial return, it was based on the merit of the great code these people contributed to.

Not Every Decision Needs to Please the Community

The strength of great leaders is that they think further, think months, often years, ahead already. Think about what will positively help their project grow. Often they do decide not to do what would seem the popular option but instead they will offend a part of the contributing community by opting for the other, less popular among smaller but very active groups, solution. Well known examples are the sponsored themes debate and the canonical plugins debate.

Leading a project as large as WordPress is not much different from being the President of the USA

As the WordPress community grows up there is one thing it has to accept: leading a project as large as WordPress is not much different than being the President of the USA.
Whoever is the leader will be hated by some people, will make decisions disliked by others and if the leader were to be replaced by another, democratically chosen, leader the new leader would be just as hated by some within the shortest time.

You do not have to agree with this statement but we do not have to look far back in history to realise that the last ‘lauded Messiah’ nothing more than another miserable failure is and perfectly serves as example here.

The Grass Is Not Greener at the Other Side

On Twitter Jeff Chandler expressed that maybe there had been a shift in thinking.

I’m guessing the pursuit of happiness which existed at one time has since disappeared.

The fact is that for hardcore users, long term contributors and evangelists, WordPress no longer a new, shiny and exciting project is. And hasn’t been since probably the days of the sponsored themes debate. This does not take anything away of how awesome and powerful the platform, software is.

If you look at the other side, at other popular open source projects, you will find the same discussions in almost every ‘democratically lead’ open source project. Projects have faltered because of this, have failed because of community pressure, others have been forked. Often to live the same fatal destiny within the next 5 years.
WordPress though is on a good and stable path and this is probably because of Matt and nobody else. He seems to think long term and is surrounded with great people. He hasn’t made any major errors.
If Matt makes too many errors, WordPress might become the next ‘Mambo Server/Joomla’. Or the project might die within the next 10 years, like happened to PostNuke.

Feel free to fork and go your own way (as I am sure will happen to WordPressMU lead by the WPMU.org crew).

If you like small teams and shiny new, exciting projects help the Habari community, which is also designed by Committee. And so far things work out great, but if Habari grows and becomes big at some point, the deficiencies of design by committee will become more and more apparent and also that community will see its fair share of upset contributors and people will leave annoyed, each for their own reasons.

Otherwise… accept that Matt the Boss is but do not forget that he’s the first one to admit that he isn’t perfect and to admit errors. He also has learned from previous errors.
Personally I am not excited by the evolution of WordPress anymore, I prefer being a watchdog of small, shiny and exciting new projects. WordPress has many great things going and the community is blessed to have a great leader in the name of Matt. People who, like me, love being ‘bleeding edge’ are already looking for the next big thing and have made place for the reporters, the real watchdogs. But to conclude, trust me that many communities would love to have a leader like Matt. Like it or don’t. Stay or leave.

The three triggers are danger, food, and sex. If you notice, these are the basic elements that fire-off red flags in our collective instincts. This is because the way our brains are configured due to millions of years of evolution. All three items relate or our self-preservation instincts.

The premise is that the brain is hard-wired to get immediately attracted to words, images, and videos that pertain to danger, food, and sex. And if people are aware of these content, there is a higher likelihood that interest will be developed and the desired action, which is clicking (if it’s a hyperlink), will follow.

Here’s a few suggestions in incorporating the triggers:

• Danger - Make the wordings of your links to be more active and, if appropriate, place “threatening” images or images that convey cautionary measures.
• Food – The author of the book says that people pay attention to food (and that’s why there are plenty of food bloggers out there). If possible, place food items or benefits people can derive from your blog and blog posts.
• Sex – I’ve mentioned this is in the past and that sex is always a powerful attention getter.

2010 is just around the corner and it may be a good new year’s resolution to make your content more interesting. Just rememebr the three key triggers: danger, food, and sex.

Happy New Year!

But as a blogger, how do you get into the whole “spreading the wealth” business?

But let’s get some things straight first: for a lot of professional bloggers, the content being written is focused on a particular niche.  So try putting yourself on your readers’ shoes and ask the question “What’s in it for me?”

This may sound too mercenary-like (and the last thing about the holidays), but think about it– why should your readers care about your blog? If your blog is one thing that leads to benefits, such as wealth, a better life, or  more informed way of doing things, then there are reasons people will come back.

So, as a blogger, be generous in pointing the benefits and making sure your readers know that there is a benefit to reading your posts. Here are three ways to highlight the benefits:

1. State the Obvious – If there’s a benefit your readers should find worth getting, say it! This may entail having an approach that’s more direct to the point and being clear with the benefits. Apple is very good in this because they are able to put the key benefits of their products very concisely.
2. Reinforce with Images – Blog posts will always look a little shinier and spiffier with images (provided the image will provide the proper context.) The images can also reinforce the tangible benefit your readers can derive.
3. Make the Benefit Scarce – Create a sense of scarcity with what you are offering because people respond to loss and scarcity in a more natural way than abundance. If you think the information contained in your blog post is only good for a season, then make it clear.

Remember, make the benefits clear, obvious, and worth getting. The benefit for you may be a better performing blog.

Happy Holidays!