‎2012 is here. Like Kendrick says, “I was a black sheep, but now I’m just a goat”. This year, I won’t be following anyone, or trying to be coolcat like others I admired, this year I’ll be a goat. the greatest of all times. Wishing all of you the same, and lots of luck, health, and self-growth. Happy new year and welcome to the future.

By now you all know that Bloginity is growing and expanding as fast as possible. I am a true believer of the web’s development, and there is no time to rest, in order to keep up with the internet you must always push for the maximum innovation.

Here are the latest updates in Bloginity.com.

We have upped our Beauty site, http://www.blogintiy.com/fashion/beauty

Bloginity Beauty

It now offers sidebar:
- “Meet the Editors”
- They now include Follow Buttons
- New archives page design, all based on HTML/CSS

We have upped our Photography section too. Similar changes, this one features an Index widget (A-Z) with a weekly featured photographer. To the right is an A-Z (that we buzz about) magazine index.

Bloginity, Photography Section

Our fashion section has been divided to many categories.

Each one of the following is it’s own landing page, pulling Twitter hash keys and displaying the widgets all with the shows hash keys (e.g. #MFW, #PFW, #LFW, #NYFW).

By City
- New York Fashion Week
- London Fashion Week
- Milan Fashion Week
- Paris Fashion Week

By Season
- Pre Fall 2012 (ranking front page on Bing.com for that keyword too)
- Spring / Summer 2012
- Spring / Summer 2012
- Fall / Winter 2011

Two widgets are found there:

All models (that we write about from A-Z)
All designers, that we write about from A-Z).

It looks like this:

Bloginity - Fashion

Bloginity, New York Fashion Week Page

We have added a new tool in the site, that is basically arrows, positioned on each corner of the (larger) screens, you can easily navigate between articles within the category you are browsing.

Bloginity, Inner Page

What the future holds.. You’ll see :-)

Found these historic screenshots of Bloginity from 2009 or so. Design by Benjamin Tse & I.

FILE - In this 1987 file film publicity image originally released by 20th Century Fox, Charlie Sheen, left, and Michael Douglas are shown in a scene from "Wall Street." (AP Photo/20th Century Fox, File) NO SALES

These past few weeks I’ve been heavily consumed by watching motivational movies for entrepreneurs. I’m interested in consuming information, data, new thoughts, thinking outside of the box and have done some research for “must see movies for entrepreneurs.” One of them, was Wall Street.

Here are some of my favorite quotes from that movie.

“If your enemy is superior, evade him. If angry, irritate him. If equally matched, fight, and if not split and reevaluate.”

“Life all comes down to a few moments. This is one of them.”

“The point is ladies and gentlemen that greed, for lack of a better word, is good.”

“What’s worth doing is worth doing for money.”

“The most valuable commodity I know of is information.”

“I look at a hundred deals a day. I pick one.”

“Money’s only something you need in case you don’t die tomorrow…”

“If you’re not inside, you’re outside”

“Jesus, if this guy owned a funeral parlor nobody would die!”

Life is all about relevancy, especially with the web. If you notice, your News Feed on your Facebook profile is either getting shittier or much better. It’s all about relevancy, even the chat box, who you’re engaging, how they rank in order – everything is relevancy. It doesn’t’ matter if you’re running an e-commerce site, or a news site. Relevancy is all that matters to the user. Displaying the right information, is the key of driving engagement.

Over the past few years I’ve gained lots of experience with WordPress, testing plugins, trying out new things, creating my own plugins to create a better site and here goes my statement.

There are many widgets out there that generate related content to articles, such as YARPP. Here’s what’s bad about YARPP – what the end user doesn’t realize is that YARPP plays with your MySQL creating huge databases especially if you have over 3000 articles like we do – it nearly multiplies your database size by a simple installation. That’s not good, not good at all. It slows down the server completely.

Here’s another joke, OutBrain, an Israeli “innovative” company that specializes in relevant content. They have a business model, it’s simple: presenting two boxes, one relevant to your site, one relevant from partners. Many websites are using it such as The Daily Beast, TMZ, iVillage, etc. Here’s the the truth about Outbrain – it doesn’t display relevant content. Many nights I’ve spent staying up and trying to figure out how in gods name an article such as “J WOWW NAKED PICS FROM PLAYBOY”  is relevant to a Van Gogh article on Bloginity.com. I even emailed their team and told them about that – but never heard a reply. Outbrain does not innovate, they do not spend any time re-coding their algorithms, providing additional tools to the publisher such as re-indexing content, excluding certain content from site – there are so many issues with their code that it’s laughable. in 2011 alone we presented Outbrain to over 2,000,000 impressions and made as little as a $100 the funny part is that Outbrain has just raised additional $35M which most likely will go towards marketing, once again, while they actually need to spend that cash on re-thinking their entire code however if that’s what their team was able in producing with so much cash already I wonder if they are even capable of creating anything better. Perhaps that’s the best that they could do.

After publishing this article, I received a tweet from Yaron Galai – founder of Outbrain – here’s the perfect example of a company who “listens” to their users, but doesn’t care about them (read from bottom to top). Just because I’m cut throat, don’t be mad. I was cut throat to the founder of Nrelate, Neil Mody and he spent an entire Saturday with me on the phone, helping me code my own PHP site to make sure that Nrelate displays properly. I haven’t even received an email back from Outbrain’s support about the initial issue, stated above. What do you make of that?

Here’s what I recommend: It’s called Nrelate. it’s a related content plugin that works on WordPress flawlessly. No issues, ever.

Nrelate let’s you do everything everyone else doesn’t and not only that: they actually care about the user. I cannot tell you how many times they’ve helped us out over the weekends, battling code, gosh I mean that’s passion to what you do, they’re helping people get relevant content on the site and they are so passionate about it. Some serious features on Nrelate include:

• Nrelate lets you exclude certain categories from their indexation
• Nrelate lets you re-index your sites content whenever you feel like it by a click of a button
• Nrelate lets you design your own CSS / or choose from a selection of over 5 different layouts (beautifully done!)
• Nrelate also features a fantastic revenue models for sites who are looking to generate additional revenue from displaying partner content.
• Optional to choose between PHP and JavaScript code (Nrelate can actually get indexed in search engines, helping boost your SEO in a dramatic way)

Nrelate, in one word is awesome. I cannot expand my appreciation and how much the team has helped shape Bloginity to what it is today. I just wish that people out there would realize that Nrelate has something so special and even if it’s “competitors”  ever tried coming up with a code similar to theirs they would fail. Outbrain, with all their resources have nothing against them – for years. It’s the only plugin out there that actually displays relevancy and provides you total control. The team is re-writing the code on monthly basis ensuring that they are displaying the best and most relevant content for your user, the team is determined and if they’ll keep on doing this, when the right time strikes – they’re gonna make it big and I’m gonna tell you I told you so. I encourage all of you WordPress users to at least try Nrelate, you will not regret it.

Find more information about Nrelate right here.

I’ve been guiding several web owners this past few years. With continuos support and help I’m asking nothing back in return besides me learning on how to work with people better, you see – guiding them, helps me guide myself and bring new innovative ideas to the table.

I find myself in late-night Skype conversations that can last for hours sometimes, full of motivations, ideas, and brainstorming and when we are usually done with the conversation there’s a new goal – the question is, will they stick to it?

Here comes the part where you need to take action. It’s all about taking action in this industry. If you’re not taking action your idea sucks (referring to Neil Patel’s #37 on the list)

In Bloginity’s 2010 Business Plan, the first page of the presentation reads a quote, “For tomorrow belongs for the people who prepare for it today.” most of you out there come up with fantastic ideas that end up nowhere. If the idea is so great – deliver it, overnight. Nothing should stop you. My team and I came up with a concept and overnight we brought results to the table, so what if we stayed up for nearly 18 hours and got around 4 hours of sleep for a whole week. We delivered results and that’s what it’s all about, taking actions. You must memorize that, it’s not about what you know, it’s what you do with what you know.

Most of you all don’t realize that one thing – two years ago, Bloginity didn’t exist. Today, it’s a brand.

Taking Action Quotes

“You don’t have to be great to get started, but you have to get started to be great.” – Les Brown

“He who has begun is half done.” – Horace

“Well done is better than well said.” – Benjamin Franklin

“Many great ideas go unexecuted, and many great executioners are without ideas. One without the other is worthless.”  – Tim Biixseth

“The world is more malleable than you think and it’s waiting for you to hammer it into shape.” – Bono

“The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” – Walt Disney

“What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

“You’ve got to love what you do to really make things happen.” – Philip Green

About a week ago I had the pleasure of meeting with Avi Domoshevitski of Yatir VC and he told me something that affected my life very much. He has been working with an ex-IBM guy, and his quote was something along the lines of “If he learned something at IBM, it’s not to make a prototype but a finished product.” and that quote needs to affect all of you. Stop making betas, focus and make something useful.

I think I solved it. It’s all theoretically but it actually works, and works quite good so I encourage you guys to try it as well and let me know if it worked or didn’t.

It’s something all high quality entities on the web should try at least once. Basically, a string of code that pulls thumbnails at the bottom of my site has been added about 10 months ago. I’ve been playing with, changing it’s code for about 6 months now whether it’s featuring titles, or removing them, presenting title on a “a:hover” command and whatnot and I believe I just found the perfect way to present it.

It’s called “The Inspiration Box” and if you’re a follower of Bloginity then you’re well aware of that section on the site. It’s presented with every article on the site and pulls random categories according to the browsing section.

Everything nowadays is about relevancy, that’s why when you visit our fashion blog you’ll notice that the header changes as well. It will now present related content to fashion. For instance, Beauty, Collections, Runways, Galleries all relevant to the fashion side of the biz. If you visit our Arts & Culture section you’ll now notice that it’s presenting Photography, Exhibitions, Visual Arts, Design, and so on. Introducing this feature, or should I say, re-coding a new header for each section is a simple task. You have to build you hierarchy properly and find what’s relevant and what’s not while the homepage is pretty much featuring the focus itself.

The code looks something like this:

  $attachments = get_children(array(‘post_parent’ => get_the_ID(), ‘post_type’ => ‘attachment’, ‘post_mime_type’ => ‘image’, ‘orderby’ => ‘rand’));

While most of you can't understand PHP, you'll notice a simple line that reads "rand", a short for "random" that code displays random images that are attached to the post. This way, with every new pageview the user will see a new selection of images on the bottom of the post, engaging them to click if they didn't find the last image relevant to them. Genius? Sure, it's how we're pulling a 11 page/visit for each user.

Pull #1 -

Pull #2 -

This will work only if your content is timeless. I have spoken about timeless content many times in my blog, and encourage most of you to do so as well. It's referred to as "Green content" content that will never go out of style, and is always readable. Usually works great for photography, arts and culture, type of sites.

Anyway, this is just a thought because I truly believe that sharing is caring and want each and every one of you to succeed and ride the wave along with us.

Good luck!

I was already planning schemes when I was a teenager – how I was going to take over any arena where I participated. For instance whether it was a video game I was playing I was always pushing to be #1 in it.. And I did, in the old days of Diablo II (Classic for those who wonder) I reached a level 96 in Hardcore mode (meaning that if you die, you start over) and was #4 in Europe for 6 months, the funny part was that #5 would have needed about 3 months in catching up to do prior to winning and I was only able to play over the weekends since I didn’t have a computer where I studied (North Israel). The point is that everything you do you nowadays has to be done to the max. Utilizing everything that is involved within it. That’s every tool that’s given to you, even people you meet that are involved in it.

The way I reached level 96, was because I made friends who were also serious players and we created a team that whenever I go to sleep, they’re playing the character and when we’re playing we had a team of over 100 members, creating games for the character to join making sure I’m only killing the biggest mob in the game to gain the highest amount of experience, meaning, I spend an average of 30 seconds in each game just giving the last hit with my sword and moving to the next game to do what we call “Rinse & Repeat”. The goal was for the entire team to participate in a lifetime event of becoming #1 in Europe, which ones again, we did and that took us 9 months in total.

How to utilize everything in your life

Let’s take Twitter for example. How many tools are built for the usage of Twitter? Way too many. Socialite, TweetAdder, Twitter Dock etc. But which ones are good? Since there are plenty, master each of them one by one and focus your efforts. That means, pick up a tool and make sure to go into each of it’s preferences to ensure that you have seen everything that tool can do for you.

A recent tool that was introduced to the market it Crowd Booster (http://crowdbooster.com/) it enables you to see statistics of how many impressions your tweet delivered. Although I’m quite skeptical about the algorithm that’s used (I believe it’s measuring the amount of followers via who RT it and totals the impressions now although that’s quite weak I’m certain that they’ll update their algorithms within the next few months) What’s beautiful is that Crowd Booster is also utilizing Klout and lets you know which influential individual has been engaging with your twitter account. This enables you the opportunity of connecting with those who are influential, that are following you.

The point I’m trying to bring above is that Crowd Booster is utilizing Klout in order to make their platform better. We need more things like that in our lives.

You see, in today’s world you cannot become a sole leader anymore. For example Apple has utilized AT&T to deliver the first iPhone but if it was back in the 80′s perhaps Steve would have said let’s launch a carrier and rival against Verizon, AT&T and so on.

We must all work together as a team in order to make our world a beter place. Don’t lead, let the leaders lead, join them, utilize them, and collaborate with whatever tools they are giving you, enhance your platform and with their tools make your platform unique. If you’re working on a start-up and have a rival, merge and become a sole, together. If not merge, work together, do business, don’t just look what they’re doing and think how you can do it better. If it already exists bring them the idea of making that tool better so you can utilize best.

Here’s a minor example, recently we launched landing pages for several fashion week events (Milan, Paris, New York, London etc). each of these pages are pulling custom RSS feeds of “competitors” (once again, there are no competitors) Bloginity’s only goal is to deliver information to the user, therefore we are also utilizing a Twitter widget that pulls the latest hashkey.

Let’s say you landed on New York Fashion Week page, you’ll now see a #NYFW (“New York Fashion Week” hashkey on Twitter) stream on the right hand side of the page. I couldn’t care less what the buzz is around Twitter – whether it’s users submitting blogs that are irrelevant, low quality, that’s the buzz and we need to respect it. You cannot filter the web anymore.

Utilize every person in your life. What are they good for, are they good for anything at all? You only live once in this life so “using” people is not a bad thing, it’s the only thing you can do to lift up, together, as a platform.