As expected I thoroughly enjoyed my personal trip down memory lane, not all of which I shared, but the process was memorable. At the end of the post, time to tag seven people, you want to know more about.

Let me say, reading the various posts on “7 Random Things” has been enjoyable.  I have learned many things about people, their childhood memories, professional challenges, aspirations, as well as personal challenges. Most everyone was fairly transparent and some just plain bared their soul.

Here are a few of my friends and respected bloggers. They are in no specific order, as is clear in seeing the people at the end. I summarized, briefly, a few interesting facts.

Simon Salt, Incslinger

Twitter: @incslinger

Simon once lived in Scotland and traveled to England on weekends to play in Ultimate Frisbee. Today he volunteers as a firefighter. He enjoys reading and enjoys history, yet enjoys magazines like Men’s Vogue and Fast Company among other quick reads.  read more

Russ Somers, Egghead Marketing

Twitter: @rsomers

Russ loves internet memes! Good to know for next time, I say smiling. Russ enjoyed the 1980’s style music and 80’s day on Twitter just isn’t the same without him. Did you know in 1979, Russ dropped out of college to be in a rock band? Or that the Smashing Pumpkins opened for one of his bands?   read more

Cheryl Smith, Culture Smith Consulting

Twitter: @cherylsmith999

Cheryl did a meme a few months ago, so she highlighted seven things about Christmas. She loves drives down Cranehill Drive, in Lynchburg, to see the streets filled with beautiful luminaries. Did you know she loves the movie “Olive the Other reindeer”? read more

Rosina, Baby Friendly LA

Twitter: @babyfriendlyla

Rosina is a first time mom, published her own retro lifestyle magazine, which went national and was in every major bookstore. She honeymooned in Paris and has never drunk a single sip of Coke or Pepsi. read more

Mel Aclaro, Business Casual Blog

Twitter: @melaclaro

Mel is a dog lover that belongs to not one, but two very jealous cats. He is a morning person who has his best formed opinions in the morning, yet is forbidden to share them before 9 am. He is not a fan of chain letters but enjoys a good meme. Big hairy eight legged spiders, not a fan, yet will make an exception for daddy long legs. read more

Mack Collier, The Viral Garden

Twitter: @mackcollier

Mack is a painter and artist who strives for perfection.  He is big-time introvert. He loves animals and believes you can learn about people, through their treatment of animals.  He came close to drowning once, his cousin reached him and saved his life. read more

Shannon Paul, Shannon Paul’s Very Official Blog

Twitter: @shannonpaul

Shannon played piano and electronic keyboards competitively. She had two imaginary friends as a child, but they stopped hanging out with her around kindergarten. (cute). She can recite the quadratic formula on command.  read more

Dana Coffey, Crazee Geek Chick

Twitter: @crazeegeekchick

Dana believes there is no greater food than chocolate. She can write code to bluegrass and jazz music, when many of us need peace and concentration.  She loves a good treasure trove through thrift stores, yard sales and flea markets. read more

Amber Naslund , Altitude

Twitter: @ambercadabra

Amber majored in music performance and her primary instrument was the flute. Today her flute, given to her by her grandmother, is one of my prized possessions. She is an animal lover with a house full of lovable rescues.  read more

Sonny Gill

Twitter: @sonnygill

Sonny’s real name is Sandeep.  He grew up in a large family and describes his families gatherings and both awesome and hilarious. A dog lover! He once had to get more than 40 stitches in his forehead. He has a passion for basketball. A man who admits he likes shopping! read more

Tim Walker, Hoovers Business Insight Z

Twitter: @twalk

Tim doesn’t believe in writers block. He has dreams of being an expert cook. He moved to Austin Texas in 1990 and has lived there since. Another of Tim’s many ambitions is to earn his law degree. But by far, his greatest career ambition — so far unrealized — is to write compelling books and he is working on that now. read more

Aaron Strout, Citizen Marketer 2.1

Twitter: @astrout

Aaron has a tattoo, of a thunderbird, on his right hip. His third child sparked from a chance meeting in Jackson Hole. His wife wasn’t there. Hmm.

read more

Scott Monty, The Social Media Marketing Blog

Twitter: @scottmonty

Scott’s favorite candy is Peanut M & M’s. He impersonates singers, like Willie Nelson and Julio Iglesias, when participating in karaoke. He only drives American made! He holds a Masters in Medical Science. He was once a writer for the Department of Veterans Affairs, during the Clinton healthcare reform proposal. read more

Brent Schlenker, Corporate eLearning Strategies & Develpment

Twitter: @brentschlenker

I’m an Arizona native, married with three children, and lives a few homes down from his high school.  He loves 80’s guitar rock and prefers Van Halen’s Sammy Hagar to Diamond Dave.  His daughter was youngest girl to swim Alcatraz. read more

Laura P. Thomas, LTP

Twitter: @LPT

Laura starts her meme off with an “ice breaker”. She tells of drowning as a young child, discovered by her brother, he pulled her out of the pool and emergency personal revived her. She shares a few summer jobs, one working at a TV news station, while working on her journalism degree.  read more

Cammy Bean, Learning Visions

Twitter: @cammybean

As a kid, Cammy wanted to grow up to be a writer. Her backyard looks upon a forest and little stream running through yard.  She is an extremely efficient, mother of three, and occasional mouse hunter.read more

Ken Burbary, Web Business by Ken Burbary

Twitter: @kenburbary

Ken is a closet geek and likes to tinker with technology.  He is a digital pack rat and a early user of Compuserv and Prodigy. He has three children who love playing wrestlemania. He is a World War II history and has a book collection on the topic.read more

Chris Brogan

Twitter: @chrisbrogan

Chris as written three posts in responses, over several years. Interesting to read his view of “meme’s”, change over time, as mine did through this experience.  In 2006 Chris wrote “Not Normally a Meme Guy”. In 2007 he posted “8 random things”, and most recently “Memes and Why They Matter”.

Questions:

What do you think about the 7 random things meme? Were you tagged? Did you enjoy reading them? Did you ignore tags? If you did a post on your 7 Random Things, please post a link? Those of you who view it as a complete waste of time, let us know you thoughts?

To my delight, a few days later ProBlogger, wrote a post on his process.  He provided a link to Ideashower, a plugin developer with a method of adding fields into the comment section. Between ProBlogger ’s post and the overview of the developers site I was able to code my comments, fairly simple. If you use Thesis template, ProBloggers post would benefit you.

Here is the process I used.  Let me remind you, each Theme is different, so your code may look slightly different. It is also a great idea to make a backup before changing any code, here is a plugin referred by @panah, WP-DB-Backup. I used Dreamweaver to modify my php files and used my “undo” a few times testing this method.

Download Plugin Files

Download the plugin files from the developers site.

• Download - Version 0.4 (Requires Wordpress 2.5+)
• Download - Version 0.2 (For Wordpress 2.0 - 2.3)

Install the Plugin

Unzip the “Extra-comment-fields” zip file.  Upload the file PHP file “extra-comment-fields“ to the /wp-content/plugins/ directory, under your themes directory. This file does not have a folder as do many Plugins available.

Activation & Setup

• Activate - Log into Admin Panel. Access the Plugins, locate “Extra Comment Fields” and click Activate.
• Variable Setup - Access Settings > Extra Comment Fields.

Comment.php Modification

In this section, you will be modifying your html code. I am using Dreamweaver as my editor. Open your Comments.php file, usually located in wp-content/themes/yourthemename/comments.php

Part 1

Look for a piece of code similar to the image below. This code may be grouped together with several similar lines, grouped together, with “text” name(s) like comment_author, comment_author_email or comment_author_url or something similar.

When you locate the correct code, copy one entire section, and paste it at the bottom.

Part 2

a.Name =”twitter” (your reference name)
b.Id=”twitter” (Set in Activation & Variable setup A)
c.Value = $comment_extra_twitter; ?>” (refers to plugin & variable set)
d.Twitter ID’,'arthemia’) (“Twitter ID: is the label that will show on your comment form)
e.optional)’,'arthemia’) (“optional” is the label that will show on your comment form)

Once your code is modified, upload your new comment.php page. Go to your blog, view your comment section, it should now have a Twitter ID line for commenter’s to add their Twitter Id.

Part 3

This next step is a method of allowing people to enter their user names with and without the “@” symbol, and continue to link correctly. This piece of code, courtesy of ProBlogger referenced above.

Look for code that looks similar to this:

div class=”commentlist”

Under this section of code, courtesy of ProBloggers post, paste the below code as is:

<?php if ($comment->extra_twitter) {
// Strip out the @ if they put it there because we’re going to need to get rid of it for the url anyway
$extra_twitter = preg_replace(”/^@/”, “”, $comment->extra_twitter);
$extra_twitter = htmlentities($extra_twitter); ?>
<a href=”http://twitter.com/<?=$extra_twitter ?>”>@<?=$extra_twitter?></a>
<?php } // extra_twitter ?>

Twitter Added to your Comments:

This is such a quick and easy way to locate the commenters blog as well as their Twitter Id, which is as important to me.

Let me just say, I HOPE someone creates a great plugin to add your Twitter ID in the future. Every Theme is different, so please, if you follow this process and find any differences with your theme, please post the work around. I hope this was helpful and simple to understand. Please post a comment if you add it to your blog, so we can see your creativity.

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I have enjoyed reading the others random things, so I will happy to play along, who knows there might actually be something new I have not previously shared on Twitter.

1 – Wisconsin Summers

Wisconsin is my birth place. I spent the first five years of my life in a small town, in Rock County.  After moving to California, we continued to spend our summers in Southern Wisconsin. This was the place of running through corn fields and making forts out of hay stacks. A place you could ride a tractor without a license. My first corn roast and a country fair. The early mornings fishing trips and afternoon catfish fry.

2– Best Friends 30+ Years

I had six best friends from High School, as most friends get lost in the shuffle of life, I am lucky that these six people remain in my life today.  Recently, we spend an amazing weekend in Vegas.  It was the first time, in 30 years, that we were all in the same place at the same time.

3 – I love animals

I love animals. We currently have two gold retrievers, one of which was a rescue puppy we met at a visit to the Veterinary Cancer Group, he was there looking for a home.  It was like he was sent to us. The very next day, Kacee our five year old retriever, lost her two year fight against canine Lymphoma. Our puppy, now named Cody, helped us focus on life, after all puppies don’t give you time to rest. We also have a Macaw, a chick imported from South America, only to end up living in a pet store for five years.  I found him, gave him a home, he runs of household and too smart for my own good. (I doubt this was a little known fact, as my Facebook and Flickr pages are full of furry friends)

4 –My Genealogy Library

Life is full of discovery and learning about my history, has been a seven year fascination.  My library is filled with books and recorders, some dating back to the 1600’s. I have a database of over 8,000 family members, primarily in the United States, Canada, England, Germany, Denmark and Australia, so far.  It is fascinating to see people and lifestyles change over time.  I am a member of the HistoricalSociety of Wisconsin and a volunteer of Rock County, helping other researchers piecing to their family trees.

5 - The Joy of Baking

There is something that comes over me in December.  I have overwhelming need to get creative in the kitchen and bake.  A two week period, full of cookie baking, fudge making, chocolate melting and cake decorating.  My efforts are a continued tradition in my family, where mothers, daughters and grandmothers spend this special time together.  My husband finds it a bit scary, multi Suzie Homemaker’s on Steroids, but I love it and he is lucky it only happens once a year.

6- Love of Ceramics & Sculpture

During a summer visit to Wisconsin, we went to my great aunts farm in La Prairie, where we spent the day painting ceramics. It was a room filled with brushes, colorful paints, clay and a kiln. Fascinated by the possibilities, I have spent 35 years studying sculpture and casting techniques, first in High School, then in college. Today I continue through experimentation in my own studio. Writing this is a reminder it has been too long.

7 - A Few things my husband would like you to know…..

She chooses to live in shorts or sweats, even though she has a closet of designer clothes.  She believes filing is a passing fade (which it is if you scan your documents).  She is fluent in two languages, English… and DOG!  Despite Popular Opinion, she is ruled by a man, a guy named “Jose”, our blue and gold macaw.

I hope you enjoyed and maybe found something new or interesting about me.

Those of you below are now tagged.

Cheryl Smith, Brent Schlenker, Mel Aclaro, Brian Regan, Graham Smith, Calvin Lee, Lamarr Wilson

The Four Simple Rules:

• Link your original tagger(s) and list these rules in your post.
• Share seven facts about yourself in the post.
• Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
• Let them know they’ve been tagged

What the big brands have missed, the savvy business professionals have not. What do I mean? Take a look at these creative backgrounds, not only shows their brand, but also contains useful information in addition to the mini bio of 160 characters and your single URL link.

Sonny Gill

In this background Sonny Gill has managed to show his brand logo, email, AOL IM, Google Talk and shows the symbols of six of his other networks; Linkedin, Plurk, Facebook, Digg and StumbleUpon.

It is simple, clean and sleek, yet packed with valuable information.
__________________________________________________________________________________________

Armano

I am constantly inspired by David Armano’s graphic illustrations, so it was no surprise his Twitter background would be as inspiring. He has his brand logo, expanded bio and information of address for five other networks. As a personal touch, a photograph of his motorcycle, showing more of his personality and interests.
__________________________________________________________________________________________

Mayhem Studios

Calvin Lee updated his background just yesterday. Thank you Calvin! He gave me one more great example for my this post. He has managed to show his brand logo, website, blog and email addresses. In addition, four alternative network addresses, he is available to engage; on Linkedin, Bizmik, Facebook and Skype.
__________________________________________________________________________________________

Michael Bertoldi

In this simple, clean and sleek. Michael Bertoldi has his brand logo, email address and five symbols of other networks he engages his community; Linkedin, Deli.cio.us, Facebook, Digg and StumbleUpon.
__________________________________________________________________________________________

Amber Naslund (aka AmberCadabra)

Amber Naslund’s Twitter background is simple, clean and has focus on her branding. She has matched the images, log and colors between her Twitter background and her blog. Nice transition and no doubt it is the same brand.
__________________________________________________________________________________________

Cheryl Smith

Cheryl Smith’s Twitter background is a great example of  branding. Her Twitter background is clean, simple and has focus on her branding. What is most nice is when you go from Twitter page to blog. The transition is smooth and almost transparent.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Need help creating a custom or semi custom background?

Not everyone wants to spend precious time on branding, yet wants to set their Twitter page apart, so I have listed a few sources to help those who want to create something, quick and easy. Here are a few websites to help, some services are free, others have are fee based.

Twitbacks -This application allows you to be creative, without any design or illustration skills.  You can add your name, company, website, blog, bio, photo, logo, phone, email, twitter name and add social network icons. As of this post, the service is free.

Twitterbacks - They make it simple for those with Photoshop or any software capable of editing a PSD file. Go ahead and download a file and construct your own Twitter background.

There are many other great backgrounds out there and over time I will locate and enjoy more. If you have a good background, please drop a comment and give us your Twitter page link.  I also made a Flickr album with more backgrounds I have admired.

Conclusion

Have you looked at your Twitter background? Do any of these samples inspire you? Will you create your own creative background? If you create or always have a creative Twitter background, please post a comment with a link.  All creativity welcome.

I admire these professionals for thinking outside the box and taking advantage of what has been missed by many big brands. To learn more about them, click their Twitter Background. Enjoy.

Related articles:

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Very busy as of late and this morning I was catching up on my favorite bloggers. This particular post grabbed my attention, “Social Media is a Lotta damned work”. First, I laughed, thinking “isn’t that the truth”, but then continued to read and found Mack’s candor on the topic refreshing.

I was first drawn to The Viral Garden, though a meeting with Mack Collier, the author on Twitter. I enjoy his candor on Twitter and then began to explore his blog and have been a fan every since.

There are many great blogs writing about etiquette, what to do, what not to do, networking strategies, tips, applications and other services to engage in social media, but few so openly discuss the true time commitment involved. Mack sums it up.

Social media is a lotta damned work, and if you’re only interested in using the space to promote yourself, you’ll quit before you see the results you want.

Why don’t more openly discuss the time commitment? Would the truth detour people from participating in social media? Truth be told, if someone had pointed out the true time commitment, prior to my exploration into social media, I may have put if off until I had more available time. More time….. and we all know how that stories goes.

In the beginning, in addition to the time spent interacting, there is a learning curve for each service and application one might choose use, both online, desktop and even mobile.  Depending on each individual familiarity with these topics, learning curves will vary.

Having support system is a definite bonus.  There are many people to help, co-workers, friends, the online community through social networks, blogs, podcasts, videos, ebooks, manuals as well as service providers and application developers.

Through my LinkedIn network, I was able to find the education and support I needed to begin. Here are a few of my favorites:

• Real People Don’t Have Time for Social Media
• On Managing A Community

Social networking, social media or building community, whatever term you wish to use, is NOT easy, fast or a rainbow that leads to the pot of gold. If this is what you believe it to be, then please invest your time in further research, before you are disappointed.

The network you have created is an important one. The same time you invest in your personal face to face relationships, you will need to invest in growing and enhancing your online relationships. Being active and engaging in your community is vitally important.

Now that your eyes are open, I must state Social Media is one of the best professional and personal decisions one can make.  You will have the potential to strengthen your network, expand your resources, encourage collaboration and meet like-minded individuals.

Why don’t more openly discuss the time commitment? Would the truth detour people from participating in social media?  What other bloggers have written on the topic of the time investment?

If you found this post helpful, please consider subscribing to our feed.

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Your content might be the greatest out there, but if the blog itself unappealing and difficult to read to “browser incompatibility” it draws my attention from your content. It is like trying to figure out a puzzle of text and graphics, in some cases.  It might just be ME, but I really enjoy reading left to right, not up, down and sideways.

Inconsistencies in browsers can be difficult and time consuming to correct, but you cannot begin to deal with them, until you identify them.  There are several sources to test your site against the various browsers, but I have been using BrowserShots since it was recommended by a fellow eLearning professional, Lee Graham, who I met on Twitter.

BrowserShots.Org

What is BrowserShots? A service that creates screen shots of your, blog or website, in a wide variety of browsers, including a few less common. When you submit your web address, it will be added to the queue for processing. Then it will create screen shots, upload to the central server, and make available to you in your browser.

Here is a small sample of Browsers and versions:

Lets Get Start

It is simple, visit BrowserShots.org , enter your blog or web address in the address bar and submit.

Screenshot Request Group

This process will take time, when using the free service, so don’t be surprised if you wait 20-45 minutes for your information.  You will see a “Screenshot request group” message, giving you the estimated queue time, the number of browsers selected.

Tip: Best to bookmark this page and check back later.

Queue Completed

Once the queue has completed, you will see a screen containing a small screen shot for each browser you selected, similar to the screen shot below:

Use your mouse and as you put it over the snapshots, they will enlarge, as seen in above screenshot.

View Details by Browser

Click again and you view a larger format and get details on the browser, engine, hardware and operating system the test was ran.

There are dozens of other tools to check your browser compatibility, some are free, others are fee based.  I find BrowswerShots is a simple method for checking your blog or website browser compatibility. What tools do you use to check your browser compatibility? What are your favorite features?

If you found this post helpful, please consider subscribing to our feed.

Other Related Articles:

• Quirksmode.Org - Contains about 120 pages with CSS and JavaScript tips and tricks, and is one of the best sources on the WWW for studying and defeating browser incompatibilities.
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