Well-run blogs do more than offer an outlet for your thoughts. They've actually influenced everything from a company's image to the outcome of a local election. Because the blogosphere is pretty crowded, it's a good idea to find out a bit about the anatomy of a blog, what makes a good one, and what it takes to keep one going before you dive right in and start sharing with the world. Blogging For Dummies, 2nd Edition gives you all the basics so you can get a good start. And if you've been around the blog a few times and want to advance to the next level, Blogging For Dummies, 2nd Edition even takes a look at podcasting and videoblogging.You'll find out how to:Make your blog stand out in a crowd, build an audience, and even make it pay Choose the best software options, boost readership, and handle comments Generate revenue from your blog with ads and sponsorships Protect your privacy and your job Deal with spam and the inappropriate comments from that guy who posts several times a day Find your niche Attract and keep readers Use your blog to promote your business, cause, or organization Add audio, video, cool widgets, and more Ready? Get Blogging for Dummies and let's get started!

    In Web Form Design, Luke Wroblewski draws on original research, his considerable experience at Yahoo! and eBay, and the perspectives of many of the field's leading designers to show you everything you need to know about designing effective and engaging Web forms.

    If you're looking for a book like that, put this one back on the shelf.Rework shows you a better, faster, easier way to succeed in business. Read it and you'll know why plans are actually harmful, why you don't need outside investors, and why you're better off ignoring the competition. The truth is, you need less than you think. You don't need to be a workaholic. You don't need to staff up. You don't need to waste time on paperwork or meetings. You don't even need an office. Those are all just excuses.  What you really need to do is stop talking and start working. This book shows you the way. You'll learn how to be more productive, how to get exposure without breaking the bank, and tons more counterintuitive ideas that will inspire and provoke you.With its straightforward language and easy-is-better approach, Rework is the perfect playbook for anyone who’s ever dreamed of doing it on their own. Hardcore entrepreneurs, small-business owners, people stuck in day jobs they hate, victims of "downsizing," and artists who don’t want to starve anymore will all find valuable guidance in these pages.

    Visit the SEO Made Simple (fourth edition) page for more information. http: //www.amazon.com/SEO-Made-Simple-4th-Ed... More Than 30,000 Copies Sold! The original SEO Made Simple: Strategies for Dominating the World's Leading Search Engine, is a tell-all guide for anyone trying to reach the highly coveted #1 ranking on Google for their Web site or Blog. Learn from a leading Webmaster the specific SEO techniques that deliver top rankings in less than 30 days. Whether you're a search engine optimization expert or new to Web site rankings, the techniques revealed in SEO Made Simple will give you everything you need to dominate the leading search engines. Generate tons of traffic to your website absolutely FREE with top search engine placement on Google, Yahoo! and MSN. SEO Made Simple is the only resource on search engine optimization that you'll ever need.

    And in a perfect world, those who produce the best code are the most successful. But in our perfectly messy world, success also depends on how you work with people to get your job done.In this highly entertaining book, Brian Fitzpatrick and Ben Collins-Sussman cover basic patterns and anti-patterns for working with other people, teams, and users while trying to develop software. It's valuable information from two respected software engineers whose popular video series, "Working with Poisonous People," has attracted hundreds of thousands of viewers.You'll learn how to deal with imperfect people--those irrational and unpredictable beings--in the course of your work. And you'll discover why playing well with others is at least as important as having great technical skills. By internalizing the techniques in this book, you'll get more software written, be more influential, be happier in your career.

    Fire departments, political candidates, and C0EOs have used Twitter to share up-to-the-minute information. Laura Fitton, maybe better known by her Twitter handle - @Pistachio, has more than 10,000 followers on Twitter, and gives presentations on how to use Twitter to build business and personal opportunity. She's joined by Michael Gruen and Leslie Poston to share Twitter expertise in this easy-to-follow guide.You'll discover how to get set up on Twitter, build a follower list, and find a voice for your tweets. Then you'll learn to use third party tools to link Twitter to other sites and incorporate it into business communication models. This book coversThe basics of signing up and creating tweets Following other users and adding followers to your own tweets Mastering the "Twecosystem"-the tools that tie Twitter to many other Web applications, including mobile devices Strategies for enhancing business communication, marketing, and networking opportunities with Twitter Twitter For Dummies gets you up and running on this hot communications tool the fun and easy way.

    For millions of years, humans have been seeking out tribes, be they religious, ethnic, economic, political, or even musical (think of the Deadheads). It's our nature.Now the Internet has eliminated the barriers of geography, cost, and time. All those blogs and social networking sites are helping existing tribes get bigger. But more important, they're enabling countless new tribes to be born—groups of ten or ten thousand or ten million who care about their iPhones, or a political campaign, or a new way to fight global warming. And so the key question: Who is going to lead us?The Web can do amazing things, but it can't provide leadership. That still has to come from individuals—people just like you who have passion about something. The explosion in tribes means that anyone who wants to make a difference now has the tools at her fingertips.If you think leadership is for other people, think again—leaders come in surprising packages. Consider Joel Spolsky and his international tribe of scary-smart software engineers. Or Gary Vaynerhuck, a wine expert with a devoted following of enthusiasts. Chris Sharma leads a tribe of rock climbers up impossible cliff faces, while Mich Mathews, a VP at Microsoft, runs her internal tribe of marketers from her cube in Seattle. All they have in common is the desire to change things, the ability to connect a tribe, and the willingness to lead.If you ignore this opportunity, you risk turning into a "sheepwalker"—someone who fights to protect the status quo at all costs, never asking if obedience is doing you (or your organization) any good. Sheepwalkers don't do very well these days.Tribes will make you think (really think) about the opportunities in leading your fellow employees, customers, investors, believers, hobbyists, or readers. . . . It's not easy, but it's easier than you think.

    

    In a new chapter for this edition that brings the story up-to-date, Nicholas Carr revisits the dramatic new world being conjured from the circuits of the "World Wide Computer."

    But as scientists break open the mind’s black box with the latest tools of neuroscience, they’re discovering that this is not how the mind works. Our best decisions are a finely tuned blend of both feeling and reason—and the precise mix depends on the situation. When buying a house, for example, it’s best to let our unconscious mull over the many variables. But when we’re picking a stock, intuition often leads us astray. The trick is to determine when to use the different parts of the brain, and to do this, we need to think harder (and smarter) about how we think.Jonah Lehrer arms us with the tools we need, drawing on cutting-edge research as well as the real-world experiences of a wide range of “deciders”—from airplane pilots and hedge fund investors to serial killers and poker players.Lehrer shows how people are taking advantage of the new science to make better television shows, win more football games, and improve military intelligence. His goal is to answer two questions that are of interest to just about anyone, from CEOs to firefighters: How does the human mind make decisions? And how can we make those decisions better?

    A malicious online rumor costs a company millions. A political sideshow derails the national news cycle and destroys a candidate. Some product or celebrity zooms from total obscurity to viral sensation. What you don't know is that someone is responsible for all this. Usually, someone like me.I'm a media manipulator. In a world where blogs control and distort the news, my job is to control blogs--as much as any one person can. In today's culture... 1) Blogs like "Gawker," "Buzzfeed" and the "Huffington Post" drive the media agenda. 2) Bloggers are slaves to money, technology, and deadlines. 3) Manipulators wield these levers to shape everything you read, see and watch--online and off.Why am I giving away these secrets? Because I'm tired of a world where blogs take indirect bribes, marketers help write the news, reckless journalists spread lies, and no one is accountable for any of it. I'm pulling back the curtain because I don't want anyone else to get blindsided. I'm going to explain exactly how the media "really" works. What you choose to do with this information is up to you.

    It's Tuesday morning and on his drive into the office, Bill gets a call from the CEO. The company's new IT initiative, code named Phoenix Project, is critical to the future of Parts Unlimited, but the project is massively over budget and very late. The CEO wants Bill to report directly to him and fix the mess in ninety days or else Bill's entire department will be outsourced. With the help of a prospective board member and his mysterious philosophy of The Three Ways, Bill starts to see that IT work has more in common with manufacturing plant work than he ever imagined. With the clock ticking, Bill must organize work flow streamline interdepartmental communications, and effectively serve the other business functions at Parts Unlimited. In a fast-paced and entertaining style, three luminaries of the DevOps movement deliver a story that anyone who works in IT will recognize. Readers will not only learn how to improve their own IT organizations, they'll never view IT the same way again.

    Your colleague's husband's sister can make you fat, even if you don't know her. A happy neighbor has more impact on your happiness than a happy spouse. These startling revelations of how much we truly influence one another are revealed in the studies of Dr. Christakis and Fowler, which have repeatedly made front-page news nationwide. In Connected, the authors explain why emotions are contagious, how health behaviors spread, why the rich get richer, even how we find and choose our partners. Intriguing and entertaining, Connected overturns the notion of the individual and provides a revolutionary paradigm-that social networks influence our ideas, emotions, health, relationships, behavior, politics, and much more. It will change the way we think about every aspect of our lives.

    Windows 10 (a free update to users of Windows 8 or Windows 7) fixes a number of the problems introduced by the revolution in Windows 8 and offers plenty of new features, such as the new Spartan web browser, Cortana voice-activated "personal assistant," new universal apps (that run on tablet, phone, and computer), and more. But to really get the most out of the new operating system, you're going to need a guide.Thankfully, Windows 10: The Missing Manual will be there to help. Like its predecessors, this book from the founder of Yahoo Tech, previous New York Times columnist, bestselling author, and Missing Manuals creator David Pogue illuminates its subject with technical insight, plenty of wit, and hardnosed objectivity for beginners, veteran standalone PC users, new tablet owners, and those who know their way around a network.

    Not to worry: This book is the one place you can turn to find quick, non-intimidating, excellent design help. In The Non-Designer's Design Book, 2nd Edition, best-selling author Robin Williams turns her attention to the basic principles of good design and typography. All you have to do is follow her clearly explained concepts, and you'll begin producing more sophisticated, professional, and interesting pages immediately. Humor-infused, jargon-free prose interspersed with design exercises, quizzes, illustrations, and dozens of examples make learning a snap—which is just what audiences have come to expect from this best-selling author.