HomeOfficeVoice

Hey all,

Just a quick roundup post of what’s going on here at HomeOfficeVoice and some little insights and thoughts on what’s been capturing my attention.

Redesign

I’m having a full on redesign of HomeOfficeVoice. This is being done behind the scenes. In days past, I would do such a thing on another “dead” blog to get everything right and then migrate it over to the blog that was being redesigned - which usually meant lots of little bugs and bad links that needed to be cleaned up.

Well not anymore!

I recently came across a beauty of a plugin called Theme Test Drive which allows me to tweak a new blog design (on the same blog) while you guys still see the current design - ie: no messed up messes :-) and css butchering. Very Cool.

The Interview Series

Wendy Piersall - of sparkplugging, formerly eMoms at Home, has done an outstanding job (imo) of answering a bunch of questions that go straight to the heart of what she’s been up to these last few weeks and months - both professionally and emotionally. This is going to be a must read - but then again, I’m biased. ;-)

A Mini Rant

Of course, no week can go by without a little bit of a rant. Well it can, but not this week. ScribeFire. An excellent Firefox addon that is near perfect as a blog editor. I love it and have used it on and off since it came out when it was created by the original guys over at Performancing.

My rant, and it’s not just against ScribeFire, is this one: If It Ain’t Broke, Then Don’t Fix It. That post will come to you on Thursday.

9Rules

Someone alerted me to the new 9rules… not interested. They’ve been off my radar for so long that I even thought they had folded up or something. For me it’s about the blogs not the “me too” walled-in community and ego-driven individuals behind it. But for the uninitiated, I have had my run-ins with them folks over at 9Rules over the years - but those days are long gone. Next…

LinkedIn

I’ve had a love/hate/puzzlement affair with LinkedIn for so long now that I get a headache just thinking about it. The foundations are solid. It’s clear-cut what it’s all about. But, and there’s always been a but… It never seems to live up to its expectations - well, for me anyhow.

Even so, it came as somewhat of a surprise and shock reading Scott Allen’s post about the future of LinkedIn Intelligence (especially point #3). Scott has been THE evangelist for LinkedIn for so long now that everytime I think of LinkedIn I automatically think of Scott Allen as a leading (independent) authority figure.

I’m really looking into whether LinkedIn is an ideal place for us lifestyle entrepreneurs to network. My research continues and yes, Scott’s announcement does have an impact. Obviously, I’ll be trying to get Scott over here for an interview. Scott! Hello! :-)

That Twitter Post

It’s been three weeks in the making, but I have completed a thorough post on Twitter. It’s obviously geared to an audience of lifestyle entrepreneurs and basically asks, and sometimes answers, the question of whether it’s a “must have” tool, a waste of time or just one more thing in the web 2.0 bag of cool apps.

Have a good week, enjoy your business but more importantly enjoy life.

Cheers,
Martin

PS. Happy Birthday to my little girl - already 7! Your Daddy’s proud of you.