RocketGenius recently released their 1.2 Version of Gravity Forms

We are happy to release Gravity Forms v1.2! This is an exciting release that adds some new, exciting and very powerful features to the mix. Developers will love the data integration capabilities and novice users will love the new features that makes managing forms even more powerful.

I’m a big WordPress nut and this is truly one of the most exciting developments to hit WordPress imo since the creation of the Thesis Theme for WordPress. On the outside and inside this looks like a solid product that you could build some solid sites on.

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If you’re looking for an effective solution to help get your blog noticed then the Contextual Partnership Plugin for WordPress bloggers could be well worth consideration. Perhaps the most attractive aspect is that there is no cost involved.

According to the developers the plugin is designed to;

Drive more targeted visitors to your blog (or blogs) by strategically linking your blog to and from other bloggers participating in the network. The exact method used to achieve this remains confidential but apparently it’s not a basic reciprocal link exchange – nor the more common 3 way linking arrangement often seen between bloggers.

Enhance the user experience for your blog visitors by providing them with links to other high quality blogs for further information on subjects of interest (and it can do this without you actually loosing the visitor which is a great feature).

Indirectly increase your search engine rankings by building highly relevant incoming links to your blog for keyword terms you define, related to your own niche market.

Not a bad indirect benefit at all.

To better understand how the network works, first you need to know what a “contextual link” actually is. A contextual link is simply a link “within content” of a blog post and “within context” of specific keyword terms in that post. For example the term “dog training” found within a blog post becomes a link out to another blog (related to “dog training”) within the network. Contextual Links are found all over the internet – bloggers interlink their own pages contextually, there are paid advertising programs that allow you to place contextual advertising links and earn per click, and bloggers naturally link out to other websites they find useful “contextually” as well.

This is the key to the “Contextual Partnership”. When you install and setup the WordPress Plugin, you’re asked to provide the URL’s you wish to advertise on other partners blogs, and the keyword terms you want those blogs to use to link back to your own. When a match is found within the network for the keyword terms you provide (and assuming it meets with the Contextual Partnership’s strategic linking methodology), a link back to your blog is assigned, and your account has a credit removed.
The amount of credits your account holds appears to be directly related to the number of links you’re providing to other partners in the network for the keyword terms they themselves are looking to use to advertise. Apparently for every link you provide for another partner, you earn 1 credit. That 1 credit is then “cashed in” to assign a link back to your own blog from other partners whenever a match is found for your own keyword terms. So if you already have 100 posts in your blog, and each of those pages finds a match to provide a link to another partner, then technically you could receive 100 incoming links to your blog as soon as you’ve been approved to participate in the partnership. You also continually earn more points and incoming links as you continue to blog and add more posts just like you usually do.

That’s the basic overview and you’ll find more specific information on the plugin website including details of many features not mentioned here (like the ability to select specifically which blog posts you want to include – or nor include in the network)…

http://www.contextualpartnership.com

Uptake by the blogger community seems to have been extremely good and this new service looks to become very popular. In the first two weeks of launch the partnership already had over 54,000 individual places to place links throughout the network, and within the first 4 weeks over 10,000 advertising links had been allocated between network partners. This is most likely a result to how easy it is to actually setup the plugin and participate – it literally takes 5 minutes to install and setup – although approval can take anywhere from 24-72 hours depending on the moderation queue as only high quality blogs are accepted to participate to keep out the splogs and spammers.
This seems to be one of those services worth giving a shot for a few months, and by the looks of things the developers have some exciting new features in the pipeline to make things even more effective for partners in the future.

You can find out full details and download the plugin below…

http://www.contextualpartnership.com

Or alternatively you can download the plugin directly from WordPress…
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/contextual-partnership-link-exchange-plugin/

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For the technically inclined, Automattic’s Sam Bauers tells us more about their latest baby in the following three-part video interview. Download, install, and let the flamewars spread seamlessly from your comments to your forum.

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With OpenID for Flock, the process of discovering, configuring and using OpenIDs that allow the user to log onto website accounts and manage their identity is streamlined. Once a relationship is established between OpenIDs and the sites that can rely on them for authentication, an easy, seamless experience is created for users that frequently travel to multiple destinations across the Internet.

MySpace, Flock and Vidoop jointly developed OpenID for Flock because the browser is the common application used by everyone to make the connection between both OpenID providers and sites that support login using the OpenID standard. Vidoop was the catalyst behind the original Identity In Browser (IDIB) project. The collaboration started in October 2008 when Vidoop Labs produced a fledgling prototype of IDIB, shared the code with the community, and blogged about the need for online identity to be solved at the browser level. MySpace became involved because of their commitment to OpenID via the company’s Data Availability Platform and Flock contributed their browser expertise based on their commitment to OpenID and furthering usability.

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Placecast adds a new dimension to audience targeting by using location information as the key to relevance. In Trulia’s case, the starting points are the real estate locations in which users express interest. Placecast’s proprietary targeting algorithms correlate these with dozens of other demographic, psychographic and geographic data points.

For publishers in categories such as travel, events, tickets, real estate, weather, classifieds and career search, Placecast uses the location information already present on these sites to target audiences and customize messaging. Improved performance results in a dramatic increase in the value of ad inventory for advertisers, transforming remnant ad space into premium CPM real estate for publishers.

One of the first advertisers to take advantage of this approach with Placecast and Trulia is Avis-Budget. Approximately halfway through a three-month campaign, Avis has seen its ads on Trulia perform strongly relative to other publishers. The Avis-Budget campaign is just the first of many in the expanded partnership between Trulia and Placecast.

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Using social media, the Hornets capitalize on an opportunity to increase their connection with fans by extending the Hornets experience beyond the basketball court. The new website features its own social network with video and photo sharing functionality, forums, and the ability for members to take video and photos from the site to other social networks, blogs and websites using Hornets branded video and photo widgets.

To tip-off participation and activity on the site, the Hornets are holding a competition for fans to name the social network. Fans simply join the network and leave a comment with their proposed name and why they chose it. Additionally, the team has uploaded behind the scenes videos of the Honeybee cheerleaders and press conferences, with additional unique programming planned.

The New Orleans Hornets joins the Phoenix Suns’ Emmy Award winning PlanetOrange.net, New York Knicks, Phoenix Mercury, San Francisco 49ers, Seattle Seahawks, New York Rangers and Arena Football League, as teams that have embraced the KickApps Platform.

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Plug-ins for Userplane Webmessenger, Webchat and Webrecorder applications are now available for VBulletin, WordPress, Drupal, Mambo, Joomla and phpFoX. Developers can easily and quickly integrate Userplane plug-in applications into the social networking communities and websites they create with these platforms.

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BuddyPress is a suite of plugins that will completely transform Wordpress MU into a fully functional social network platform. Thanks to its $29.5 million funding raised in January 2008, it has gained some flexibility to explore different areas to sustain its continued growth. WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg explains the rationale for this acquisition:

It’s clear that the future is social. Connections are key. WordPress MU is a platform which has shown itself to be able to operate at Internet-scale and with BuddyPress we can make it friendlier. Someday, perhaps, the world will have a truly Free and Open Source alternative to the walled gardens and open-only-in-API platforms that currently dominate our social landscape.

This is an opportune time to partake in the social networking market for niche sites are expected to boom in the years to come.

via ReadWriteWeb

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Bloggers using WordPress.com as their blogging platform will be offered an integrated tool to easily link words in their posts to definitions and explanations from Answers.com. The service will also be available as a plug-in for users of the more customizable Wordpress.org service.

“The goal of the integration is to help the blogger maintain the flow of his or her writing, without needing to pause to provide explanations inside the text. It’s also a quick and simple way to keep readers from the distractions that cause them to leave, in search of an explanation for an unfamiliar reference,” explained Answers Chairman and CEO Bob Rosenschein.

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Created by Thord Daniel Hedengren and produced by TFS Travel Journal, Estranged is a two-column theme that features large, standout headers, and easy-to read body and link text. The color scheme involves subtle shades of grey and red, with a bit of orange, and these add to that simple yet eye-catching look. The proportions of the columns and the headers are just right, making ample use of the rule of thirds popular among those in the visual arts. Contrast is just right–having adequate readability, but not at the cost of being too much of a glare. The theme also makes adequate use of white space, so the blog doesn’t look cramped.

Here’s a preview of Estranged.

Editor’s Note: Performancing is owned by Splashpress Media, the company behind 901am.com

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