Review Horizon

Everybody makes mistakes, but this is the first time I experienced this notification from Google Webmaster Tools:

Dear site owner or webmaster of http://reviewhorizon.com/,

Your site appears to be running an older version of WordPress. Google recommends that you update to the latest release. Older or unpatched software may be vulnerable to hacking or malware that can hurt your users. To download the latest release, visit the WordPress download page.

If you have any additional questions about why you are receiving this message, Google has provided more background information in a blog post about this subject.

Best wishes,

Google Search Quality Team

Now, this would make sense if I would use an old version, but I am always careful to run the latest and greatest, in this case the newly Read More…

Starting today, Review Horizon gets a new commenting system – powered by Disqus. What is so good about this? Well, Disqus allows threaded comments, real-time updates, the capability to use your pre-existing social account with Facebook, Twitter, and OpenID compatibility to name just a few and of course, a comment ranking system as well. Many high profile websites are also using Disqus commenting system as well including CNN, Mashable, All Things Digital and Engadget. Check it out and let us know how you like it.

The moderation system is also improved in an effort to weed out the wannabe spammers. Let us know how the new system works for you and any advantages / disadvantages  in your opinion.

Just days ago after we announced the availability of Google+1 button for websites and our hope in an upcoming WordPress plugin implementing the functionality, here it is: The popular Digg Digg plugin in its v4.5.3 version is here and with its latest update brings Google +1 functionality to be added to your collection of social buttons.

Beside being Google’s official response to the popular Facebook Like button, Google +1 plays a major role in determining how relevant a certain post is, and thus determining its rank and position in Google SERP (Search Engine Result Page). So, of you like our articles, you are strongly encouraged to +1 anything you like. Good thing there is not a Google -1 button yet .

You are now familiar with the Facebook “Like” button present on various sites (including this one). It is a simple way to recommend a certain article to your friends. Well, Google wants in as well and just introduced their own version of “Like” button but with a different name for obvious reasons. Called +1 (plus one)  the new button will pop up soon in Google SERPs (Search Result Pages) and beside giving Google a good feedback about an article usefulness allowing them to improve their search results, it will also give potential visitors a quality idea for various websites prior visiting.

The is obvious the potential for gaming the system by hiring farmers of workers offshore hired to +1 articles from your website and it will be interesting to know how Google plan to alleviate potential cheaters.
The new +1 system is not yet completely deployed and will start like usual with Google.com and English. If you want to join the experiment, navigate here and enjoy. You’ll need a Google Account for this, of course. More important, don’t forget to give a +1 to our website as well, if you like our content .

via Google Blog

Check after the break for a video clip demo-ing the new Google plus one feature. Read More…

If you searched for something and on top of your SERP (Search Results Page) came eHow with crappy articles like how to tie your laces or how to be successful in life by smiling (no, I’m not joking) then you can understand that something had to change, at least if Google hopes to remain the leader of web search on long term.

Well, the search giant started to take action and in their case, that means some algorithm tweaking. While per their own admission Google tweaks their algorithms many times (around 500 times per year) most of the changes are minor. This one however is massive, affecting 11.8% from our queries which means billions of queries will be affected.

The change is designed to lower the ranking for low quality websites, the ones that do not provide original content or low usefulness websites. Obviously to keep everything nicely balanced, the sites at the opposite side, the ones that brings high quality content will see their rankings boosted.

To serve the same purpose, Google launched not too long ago a Chrome extension that tries to get the popular vibe about various sites, but today’s change does not seem to rely on that data. This makes sense since the extension is still fairly new and data gathered is limited. However, Google compared the new page rank as calculated by the new algorithm versus whatever data gathered from Chrome users and the match seems to be around 84%. Not bad, but we should expect thousands of small and medium websites to be caught in the process and benefit or be punished for no particular reason.

The change will happen first in US followed by the rest of the world.

via Google Blog

The highly popular WordPress blogging platform (which happens to power the website you are just surfing as well) got a new release, version 3.1 “Reinhardt” named in the honor of jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt. The database version is 17056 and the Trac revision is 17485. Per WordPress blog, there were over 2000 commits on the codebase and 820 closed issues.  I just performed the update and around 5 seconds later everything was good to go, the website still works as you can see and everything is fine. The admin interface feels updated and everything just feels faster than before.

The advanced taxonomy and custom fields queries, archive pages for custom content types and Post Formats support that enable themes to create portable tumblelogs with different styling for different types of posts enhance WordPress’s value as a CMS system as well.

Among the most important new features, you can find:

Highlights

Read More…

If you believe many search results from Google are overloaded with spam and crappy websites, you are not alone. Finally, Google gets to pay some attention and, through Matt Cutts, the big boss in Google Search Quality Team announces that it will tweak its ranking algorithms to eliminate some of the most annoying spam websites.

In his today blog post, Matt Cutts admits the spam issue (while also gloating that Google does a good job at detecting it) and discloses some high level actions Google will take. Among these actions we’ll see a new document-level classifier that will better detect when an article is intended as a spam – repeated words which serve as over-optimization to rank higher in the search engines, automated blog comments (this really brings me pleasure, you have no idea how many spam comments I need to delete every day) and also a better detection of hacked sites.

Google will also tweaks its algorithms to better detect sites copying somebody else’s content which seem to thrive lately and also to detect “content farms”, websites that are full of material which is both low quality and also keyword stuffed, designed to rank high in the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages).

Matt also said that new ways for users to interact with Google and report spammy websites will be provided (Google Webspam Report extension for Chrome being one of these venues). Let’s just hope a physical person is behind and check these reports, otherwise I can foresee a war between various competitor websites declaring everybody else as a spammy site

via Google Blog

Today, Microsoft announced that it will replace its current blogging technology behind Windows Live Spaces with the very popular WordPress (also used here, at Review Horizon). It looks that about 30 millions users are currently using Windows Live Spaces and the first thing Microsoft will provide is a smooth transition to the new WordPress based technology. The transition process will include tools to move posts, photos and comments to WordPress.com and URL redirection, while also keeping a copy, at least until they completely kill the old service. You can also save the full content of your blog to your PC for later processing.

WordPress.com will integrate Windows Live authentication together with Windows Live Messenger integration.This way you’ll be able to nag your friends easier than ever when you make a new post. To make the transition complete, Microsoft will also make WordPress.com the default blogger when the new version of Windows Live Writer releases later this fall as part of the Windows Live Essentials 2011.

You might have noticed already that Digg.com has a new face. With the new interface comes also some new functionality that should facilitate bloggers to submit their content faster and easier than before. First, if you are already logged-in with your Digg/Facebook/Twitter account, you are not asked for the annoying CAPTCHA code anymore. Second, the categories are somewhat simplified and third, and most important, the bloggers can now submit their RSS feed to Digg.com and have Digg post their articles as they get written.
If you want to submit the RSS feed just log-in into your Digg account, go to Settings and from the left menu chose Import Feeds. You will then have to create a new post and embed a special sequence provided by Digg to validate that you are the feed owner. You might need to wait a couple of hours until the feed is processed and then push Verify Now so Digg can verify your feed. From the moment your feed is verified, Digg will publish the new articles for you. Neat, isn’t it?

I recently needed a solution to insert an Adsense add after the first post in WordPress. As you might have figured it out, Review Horizon is built around WordPress plus Atahualpa theme (currently at version 3.5.3). Inserting an Adsense add between posts is easier than you might think, considering WordPress design. On the first page, all the posts are displaying in a loop, and in this loop, you can add your own code as well. First, you will need to go to your Adsense account and create the Ad that fits your layout. For me, this was 728×90. Then, you navigate to Appearance->Editor and open the main index template (index.php). In this file you will need to make two changes:

1. Find the following text:

Read More…