buttonmashing

Mashing buttons since 1984

Blogging

Bloglines purge

by 1 Comment

I’ve been going through my Bloglines subscriptions and have purged it of 100+ feeds. I removed a lot of gaming blogs that were either not being regularly updated or simply didn’t have the content I was looking for. I noticed that a lot of the stuff these blogs were posting was simply regurgitated news bits that I could find elsewhere (Kotaku and Joystiq). I was looking for more from gaming blogs. These guys didn’t make the cut. It’s not that they were bad, it just wasn’t what I was looking for.

That being said, I’ve already been replenishing my feeds with new bloggers that, if you’re not reading already, I suggest you check them out. They include:

Matt Brett, who has done a little bit of everything including playing video games, of course. Really like his

Amber Night is a blogger who falls into the category of both gamer and game designer. Always a thoughtful read.

A group of guys from uber game-news site Evil Avatar have started Toy Bane, which is a great read as well.

I’ve been reading it for a while, but in case you aren’t, Michael Zenke’s MMOG Nation is a great place for MMO commentary. (That’s Zonk from Slashdot Games, but you already knew that)

I also had a hiccup with Damned Machines feed, it wasn’t getting updated and I thought they had gone AWOL. Glad to see there still blogging with their razor sharp (jaded?) wit.

There has also been a return of a couple bloggers whose return has made me happy. Both Adam LaMosca and Jeff Freeman are back in the game. Glad to have you back.

Lots of good stuff out there for your consumption.

Related Posts:
I Heart Bloglines
New Kids on the Block (#1)
New Kids on my Block (#2)
New Kids on my Block, Part #3 (BlogExplosion-style)
I still Heart Bloglines

Playing with WordPress

by Leave a Comment

I’ve been meaning to play with some new WordPress Toys, I just haven’t gotten around to it until now. They’re pretty slick.

For starters, I’ve just installed the most excellent WordPress Widgets. The k2 theme will support them shortly, but here’s the quick and dirty changes you can make yourself. I haven’t completely moved all my sidebar content over, but that’s on my to-do list.

Next are two excellent Flickr plug-ins I’m dying to try out. The first is a WordPress Flickr Album which uses your Flickr Sets and presents them in a gallery on your site. I’m more interested in this plug-in for my family blog, but I’m using BM as a guinea pig. It also implements the writer’s Flickr Post Bar which makes inserting Flickr images into blog posts a cinch.

While I have Google Ads on the site, I don’t really push them too much and wonder how much good they do anyway. I saw this little snippet of code from Michael that will hide the ads from regular readers (read: commenters). I guess that makes me feel better about having them. I’ll be adding it shortly.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, I can’t say it enough — WordPress is awesome.

Update: Whoops. I broke something and a bunch of my posts were updated and picked up by the RSS feed. Sorry about that.

He’s back…

by 6 Comments

Adam (render) is back with a new blog! Render was definitely one of my favorite blogs and I’m glad to see he’s back at it. He’s been doing stuff for Gamers With Jobs, which has been top notch, but I’m looking forward to reading what else he has to say.

Welcome back, Adam!

A milestone

by 2 Comments

Over the weekend, buttonmashing.com received its 100,000th hit! May not be much, but I was pretty happy about it.

Onward to the next 100k!

Carnival of Gamers #11

by 1 Comment

Is up at Slashdot Games and was also posted to the main Slashdot page. Very cool! Zonk told me that he didn’t use a few of the submissions, opting to go with quality over quantity. If your post was selected, don’t take it to personally. With 25 entries chosen there wasn’t enough room for everything.

Thanks to Zonk and Slashdot for hosting this, the Carnival looks great!

(Click here to digg this story)

To play or to blog…

by 11 Comments

One of the comments about gaming blogs from Zonk’s last call for submissions gave me pause:

Gaming blogs are for people that don’t actually play the games, and would rather write about them than fire them up and play them.

When I stopped to think about it, lately I’ve been spending more time with the blog then actually playing video games. I’ve been busy with real life stuff and the Carnival that I just haven’t played much. Just in the past couple of days have I had a chance to sit down a do a little gaming. I get my daily Animal Crossing in but I hadn’t played much else. I’ve finally been able to get back to Fire Emblem on the Gamecube and I’ve started blasting baddies again in Resident Evil 4. The mercenaries mini game, to be exact. I can’t get enough of it.

So I don’t want anyone to think I’m not actually playing any games. Sometimes it just seems like I’m not.

Carnival is around the corner

by Leave a Comment

There’s still a little more time to get your submissions in for the Carnival of Gamers #11. Zonk has told me that he’ll accept submissions up until 11:59pm tomorrow night. I have it on good authority that this is going to be a great Carnival, perhaps with a little surprise thrown in on Thursday. The submissions are pouring in. It’s great to see a lot of people participating. Should be a good time!

I’ve also received word from the April host, Unbeliever from MMODIG, that he will be co-hosting the Carnival with Cosmik of n3rfed fame. He says they’ve got the format worked out, so it will be interesting to see how they pull it off. If you’re planning on participating in April, prepare to be mocked. Unbeliever’s a Pro!

I am thinking about hosting the May edition, since it will be the one-year anniversary of the Carnival. I had no idea it would be this successful. I figured interest would die off quickly and we’d have to pull the plug on it a couple months after it started, but it’s actually done better than just survive, it seems to have been well received, at least by most readers. I’m grateful to everyone who’s read, participated, or hosted the Carnival.

In addition to all the good news, Gamers Radio has stepped forward to take the Carnival in June. We welcome them and hope you drop them a visit.

It’s a boy!

by 4 Comments

I’m so proud! This week has seen the birth of another blog-son of mine, the Conservative Buckeye. Run by long-time buttonmashing.com reader Jeremiah, the Conservative Buckeye is a mish-mash of TV culture, food and restaurant reviews, Ohio State football, and a little politics on the side. Stop on over and say hi!

Jeremiah is my second blog-child. My first, who I think I’ve mentioned before, is run by my buddy James, aka Rightank, at Rightank.com, another conservative blog with a judicial/political slant (he is a lawyer, afterall).

I know my readership is from all colors and stripes of the political spectrum so I don’t expect everyone to agree with my friends. While I keep my political leanings close to the vest here, I am firm in my beliefs. All I say is have an open mind.