The Reader Appreciation Project

Reader DJ Slim asks:

I absolutely love the layout of your comments section, with the pictures off to the side. I have never seen anything quite like it.
Would you be willing to share your code along with the css stuff so i could implement it on my blog?

Well Slim, I will absolutely share the code as nothing on this site is propriety. The code may be messy, but it’ll get you what you want.

Let’s start with the end result first:

The Final Solution

The reader wants the desired look of the person being shown to the left with the comment on the right. Furthermore, I have also separated trackbacks from comments.

The Necessary Files

You will need to modify two files to get this effect and also install one plugin.

You Need the Gravatars2 Plugin

The plugin that we use here at RA Project is called Gravatars2. You can use your own Gravatar plugin if you like, but you’ll have to modify some code.

You Need a Modified Comments.php

What I have attached at the end of this post is a modified comments.php. Within this file is a change to the comments loop and numerous helper functions. You could separate out these helper functions, but for the sake of simplicity I included them all in one place.

You Need the Styles

Also attached at the end of this post is the styles necessary to have the desired look. It should all work out of the box if you copy the contents of the “comments.css” file into your theme stylesheet.

Download the Files

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As I always say, “Stereotypes are everywhere.” There are stereotypes in both reader appreciation and blogger appreciation. Today I would like to tell you about 5 stereotypes many bloggers have when it comes to blogger appreciation that stems from readers towards the bloggers. These 5 points can either make or break relationships that one may have with each and every individual reader. That means the stereotypes you are about to read do exist, though they may exist in a nature other than the stereotypical description that I will also describe for each point.

For each stereotype, I will first list the actual non-threatening reasons for which a reader may appear to be not appreciating you, and then I will list some reasons due to which a reader may actually not like you, thus giving the rise to such stereotypes. I call these 5 points stereotypes instead of myths: a myth cannot be verified easily or else it will not be a myth, though a stereotype is a broader generalization based on observing only a few people or situations where what the stereotype generalizes may be true.

5 Stereotypes of Blogger Appreciation

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It has been noticed that when it comes to employees, salary is not a motivator. No matter how big it is, it’s a matter of months until the employee gets used to it, and treats it like a given, regardless the passion and commitment for the job. This is why employers who want to keep their team’s moral up, have to offer other kind of incentives, such as performance-related bonuses, trainings, or bonus trips.

What about blogging? I suppose most of you will tell me that readers are a motivator. That the comments you receive, the social bookmarks and votes, and all that stuff is keeping you on the track, is unleashing your best ideas, is giving you the strength to keep on blogging, in this ever busier age, when time seems like shrinking day after day.

What if there were no readers at all? What if I (or somebody else) would pay you to write posts after posts, the only condition to get paid being that nobody ever would read your articles. For how much would you do this?

Would $1000/month be enough to keep you motivated in the long run? I very much doubt.

What about $10,000 a month? If all you had to do for this kind of money would be to write great content which nobody else will ever read?

It is not about money? Then what other motivator would drive you to blog every day and hit delete before any foreign eyes would read your wisdom words?

If you will tell me that there’s nothing is this world to motivate you in this apparently non-sense enterprise, think twice: did you know that in the Tibetan Buddhist religion, when somebody dies, monks gather together and during several weeks, they make a sand mandala, so beautiful and so perfect that you cannot imagine? During all this time, they pray for the dead person, they quote from the Book Of Death, so the soul gets guidance in the beyond worlds. Then guess what? After they finish, they break the mandala, without any shroud of regret, without having the feeling they’ve worked in vain for such a long time. They don’t get any material reward for ther work.
Would you call this madness, or superiority?

Back to blogging: what would motivate you to destroy your blog before getting read by somebody else?

Among many other sources, online disagreements can stem from commentors, readers, e-mailers, instant messenger buddies, and also from other bloggers in the form of direct disagreeing posts. Many disagreements come from the passion that a person may feel towards a certain topic. Usually, many people stand their ground in disagreements or avoid them altogether. Different steps to dealing with disagreements and arguments can either result in appreciation for all parties involved or can result in the involved parties ending all and any connecting relationship and communication.

Today I would like to tell you of another option: giving up in an argument that you may be winning, for the sole purpose of maintaining the relationship and a good level of respect with the person disagreeing with you. This option can help you maintain a lot of online and offline relationships that would otherwise simply dissolve away. For the rest of this article, I am assuming you never knew the meaning of the word “ego“, and that you do not exhibit it either.

Why should you give up winning arguments, specially if you are right?

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This week I had the privilege of staying in my first 4-Star hotel. Four-Stars are supposed to be somewhat luxurious in appearance and have great service. But man was I in culture shock.

When I walked into the lobby, someone was playing on a grand piano with numerous suits-and-ties watching with interest. I showed up after driving for six hours with jeans, and two duffle-bags over my shoulders.

As nice as the hotel was, I noticed a few things. One, things I normally didn’t have to pay for at cheaper hotels had a charge. And two, I didn’t feel at all welcome.

The Hidden Costs

If I would have stayed at a regular Holiday Inn, I would have had free parking, free Wi-Fi, and a complimentary breakfast.

Since I was staying at this particular hotel, however, I had to pay parking. And I had to pay about $10 a day for Internet. For breakfast (they deliver it to your room), you have to pay the cost of the meal, delivery charge, gratuity, and tax.

The charges seemed so excessive that I was really afraid to do anything in my hotel except sleep. I didn’t want to wake up with a “calling the front desk” bill or something.

As a result of these hidden costs, I was constantly aware of where I was and what I was doing in this hotel. In other words, I couldn’t enjoy myself without worrying completely.

The “Unwelcome” Feeling

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As a member of RA Project, I’d like to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving.

I’d like to take this time to express various thanks to readers/users of this site.

Thank You Plugin Users

Thank you to the 10,000+ people who have downloaded Ajax Edit Comments. The amount of support people have shown me behind this plugin has been tremendous and am deeply honored to have one of the most downloaded WordPress plugins.

Thank You Translators

Thank you to all of the various translators who have provided translations for various posts and/or plugins.

For those who have provided translations to Ajax Edit Comments, thank you very much:

• Chinese, Nicky
• German, David May and iKArus
• Romanian, Tache Ionut Madalin
• French, Lise
• Spanish, Adrian
• Polish, Maclej

Thank You Commenters

Thank you to each and every commenter who has taken their valuable time to leave feedback on this site. I personally value every single comment and “try” to respond to every one.

Thank You Subscribers

As of today we have 130+ subscribers. It’s been a long journey to break the 100 mark, but we finally did it thanks to all of you. Thank you for taking the time to subscribe and continuing to subscribe.

And Thank You Bes and Simonne

Bes and Simonne, you are very valuable RA Project contributors and this project would not be the same without you. Thank you for supporting me on design and plugin issues, and thank you for just putting up with me in general.

And in case I missed anyone…

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! You all have helped make RA Project a success.

Have you ever heard of the “butterfly effect“? Theory says that the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil can set off a tornado in Texas. Believe it or not, very small changes in the initial conditions (e.g. in your past) can lead to huge differences in the present.

These being said, I’ve always been thinking, if I were able to go back in time, what would I do differently, and the answer has always been “nothing”. If all so-considered failures are in fact life lessons, and past lessons shape us to our present personality, changing them into successes would prevent us from acquiring the learnings, thus making us be different today. I don’t want to be somebody else. But what about my blog?

How many times do we question ourselves about our blogs:

• What if I wrote one article per day, every day, over the past year? Where would my blog be now?
• What if I didn’t put those ads on the pages from the very beginning? Would I have 10 times more readers today?
• What if I didn’t sell text links, or if I didn’t write paid articles? Would my blog have a better Google PR today?
• What if I commented more on other blogs? Would my blog be more appreciated in my community?

This is only a small sample of questions you may ask yourself every now and then. At least I’m doing it. If you do it too, what is your answer? What would you change if you had the chance to start over?

One of the things I routinely write about here at the project is how reader appreciation is basically customer service on the Internet. For example, when you lose a reader, you lose a customer.

I’ve also compared a blog to a store and mentioned some items every blog out there has to sell.

Adding onto my analogy of readers as customers, I thought I’d expand on a post written by Daniel Sitter over at Idea Sellers (a blog I highly recommend subscribing to) entitled 6.5 Ways to Irritate Your Customers. In the spirit of the original post (with readers as customers), here are 6.5 ways to irritate your readers.

1. Lie

Bes Zain is often the one on the project who writes about bloggers who blog without revealing monetary interests. Bes’s argument is simple: if one blogs about something without revealing a financial conflict of interest, is it lying?

In a rather disturbing poll, Darren published that only 35% of bloggers disclose affiliate links. Another 32% are on the fence.

I’d personally be irritated if someone was writing about a product without disclosing a financial interest. It’s deceitful, and I might even go as far as to call it fraud if the reader purchases something.

2. Cheat

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Today I would like to ask you a simple question: what happens to reader appreciation when you a sell a site that has readers? Does the old site owner have any obligation to those readers? Does the new site owner have any obligation to those readers? Should the readers themselves expect anything from such a sale? Should the readers expect anything to change or remain the same during and after the sale?

To help you come up with some answers, let me tell you a story that happened not long ago: this is the a partial story of Gravatar.

Example: The 6 Gravatar volunteers, and the Gravatar Sale

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From: Bes Z

To: R, aka Ex “C”

Dear R,

How are you doing? I hope you are doing better, and I hope you are feeling better too. The last few times I have seen you around, things have been hectic. I have been busy with a lot of things, and I am sorry I have not kept in touch with you. I know you have noticed I am responding to all of my public comments but not interacting with you outside of my blog.

You may be wondering why I am writing this letter, and whether or not I am writing this letter in order to apologize to you. No, I am not apologizing in this letter. Well, I am writing this letter so that you can know why I have stopped talking to you, and so that you can stop wondering why I am not giving you attention anymore. We had a wonderful time while we were together. Ever since your first comment supporting me while I was starting my site, to the last days of your commenting when I had several other commentors flirting with me also, I sometimes knew that without your support I would have never gotten to the exact place that I am at right now.

Why did I stop kissing you while I kept asking you to kiss me?

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