[New post] Kick Off 2012 with Project 365

New post on WordPress.com News Kick Off 2012 with Project 365 by Erica Johnson If you were going to blog about one thing for an entire year, what would you choose? Would you post photographs of your favorite place? Interview different people from your hometown? Create a new piece of art each day? Here are eight unique blog projects (some are updated every single day) to inspire you to kick off 2012 with your own Project 365: Blog Radstone RichardRadstoneBlog.com The goal, every day for the next year, approach one stranger, photograph them and promptly blog the experience. Rain or shine, hot or cold, healthy or ill, no days missed. I'll do my best to create interesting photos, and for the sake of entertainment, work to get myself into a sticky situation from time to time. It's a huge commitment. I'm sure there will be some hero photographs and some not so magnificent ones. Let's see what happens! The Creative Panic TheCreativePanic.com The project right at this moment is to illustrate something (anything!) as quickly as possible every day. 36ixty5 36ixty5.WordPress.com Each day a new image will be uploaded with a small caption, phrase, quote, poem or whatever. Everything Burger EverythingBurger.WordPress.com I created 365 pieces of burger artwork for a year from May 17, 2010 until May 16, 2011. An Afternoon With AnAfternoonWith.com This is a project about people. It is a project about our space and the things we keep and the things we don't throw away. It is a project about looking for and finding connections we all have. It is about seeing yourself in these spaces. Every picture is a portrait of the owner – be it a room, an object or a view. Every portrait in the end becomes a self-portrait. So in the end this is a project about me. Footballists Footballists.WordPress.com I often walk around the city in my beloved Liverpool FC jersey. I never miss to notice every other person wearing a soccer shirt, no matter how big the crowd. I've decided to approach and meet them, and photograph. Here are my brief encounters, far away from the pitch. A Drink with Chicago ADrinkWithChicago.com Since making Chicago our home, we have found that all it takes is one great conversation over one drink to create a long lasting friendship, change your outlook or learn something new. We have had so many of these experiences that we thought we'd start to share them as we continue getting to know the many fascinating people around our city. Join us as we sit down and have a drink with local entrepreneurs, chefs, celebrities, socialites, artists and athletes who all love Chicago as much as we do. {365} Breakfasts OneBreakfastADay.WordPress.com Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. A blog to celebrate this is worth it. So, do you have any ideas for your own Project 365? For tips on choosing a topic, check out the Learn WordPress.com tutorial on Getting Focused. You can also find writing ideas, blogging tips, and photo challenges at The Daily Post. Happy New Year from all of us at Automattic! Erica Johnson | December 27, 2011 at 6:41 pm | Categories: Community | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-2sj Comment    See all comments Unsubscribe or change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2011/12/27/project-365/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com

[New post] New Theme: Nuntius

New post on WordPress.com News New Theme: Nuntius by Michelle Langston If you've been itching to turn your blog into an online newspaper or magazine, Nuntius could be your perfect companion. Based on the highly-popular News theme designed by Justin Tadlock, Nuntius contains many smart features that help your readers to stay on top of all your latest scoop. Upon activation, Nuntius displays your posts in a traditional blog format on the front page. If you're happy with this, you can use it as is. If you'd like to showcase your content newspaper-style, then you can use the special News Page template. The News Page template includes a slider for your sticky posts, a featured widget area, and featured categories that display posts in nifty blocks. That's not all — Nuntius lets you customize the link color and the background color of the header and main menu from the theme options page, in addition to the Custom Background and Custom Header features. I'll stop raving long enough so that you can head on over to the Theme Showcase to get all of the details on Nuntius and its features. We look forward to seeing what you do with this one. Michelle Langston | December 21, 2011 at 2:37 am | Categories: Themes | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-2sd Comment    See all comments Unsubscribe or change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2011/12/21/new-theme-nuntius/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com

[New post] Holiday Desktop Backgrounds from WordPress.com

New post on WordPress.com News Holiday Desktop Backgrounds from WordPress.com by Matt Thomas Illustration by Caroline Hadilaksono We've got a little year-end tradition here at WordPress.com. Every year, we commission an artist to spread some WordPress-themed holiday cheer. For 2011, Caroline Hadilaksono has created a warm and joyful scene that's sure to get you in the mood for the holidays (and some blogging). We've made some desktop backgrounds from her illustration that we'd like to share with you. Here's to a safe and happy holiday season for all of you, from all of us at Automattic. Large (2560x1830px · 6.4 MB) Small (1280x915 · 1.8 MB) For tablets (1024x1024 · 1.6 MB) For smartphones (640x960 · 971 KB) Need help changing your wallpaper? Here's instructions for Mac OS X, Windows, and Ubuntu. A tip: Choose an image larger than your screen size, and set the position to "center" or "fill screen" (not "stretch"). If you missed them last time around, be sure to check out our illustrations from 2010 and 2009. Matt Thomas | December 20, 2011 at 5:00 pm | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-2rU Comment    See all comments Unsubscribe or change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2011/12/20/holiday-backgrounds/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com

[New post] WordPress for Android 2.0 Now Available

New post on WordPress.com News WordPress for Android 2.0 Now Available by Dan It's Android blogging, re-imagined. Today we're announcing the release of WordPress for Android 2.0, a major update that focuses on a new UI and enhanced post editor features. Check the video: So what's new? Brand New Look The Dashboard We've completely redesigned the look and feel of the app, now placing the actions you want to make with your blog all in one place: The Dashboard. You have one-tap access to create new posts and pages, upload media, view your stats, read blogs and more! There's also now a beautiful comment count ribbon to show you how many comments you have in your moderation queue. The Action Bar up top allows you to quickly get to other areas of the app as fast as possible. You can tap the blog name to switch blogs, refresh your content, and call up the dashboard from wherever you are in the app at the time. New Editor The post editor has been enhanced with many great new features.  A formatting toolbar has been added that displays above the keyboard as you type, allowing you to easily format text and add links and media. The post editor also goes full screen, giving you as much room as possible to create your posts while on the go. Media attachments have received an awesome boost as well. You can now insert images among the post text wherever you'd like. Tapping on an image will bring up many new options you can set per image, including Title, Caption, Placement and Size. Tablet Support We paid special attention to tablets for this release, adding special layouts just for Android Tablets. From Galaxy Tab to Xoom, we've got you covered. Download and More Info You can get the app for free in the Android Market. If you're hungry for more details on WordPress for Android 2.0, check out the launch post over at the WordPress for Android blog and follow @WPAndroid on twitter. What do you think of the update? Dan | December 19, 2011 at 9:32 pm | Tags: android, WordPress for Android | Categories: Mobile | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-2rB Comment    See all comments Unsubscribe or change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2011/12/19/wordpress-for-android-2-0-now-available/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com

[New post] Get Instant Feedback When You Publish

New post on WordPress.com News Get Instant Feedback When You Publish by Scott Berkun For months we've been studying how, when and why people publish their posts, and what the common tasks are people perform afterwards. We know many of you immediately want to see what your post looks like, check for typos, and then share your post to social networks. Starting today you'll see a much improved design for giving you feedback and supporting how you work. The first thing you'll see, after your browser finishes telling WordPress.com you have a new post, is positive feedback your post was successful. We now notify you as soon as possible that everything went smoothly. At the same time, we're loading your actual post to show you. Once the post loads, which can take a few seconds, you can confirm it looks as you expected. If you find a typo in your post (which can be easier to spot in the published post, than on the edit screen), you can quickly click Edit and switch back into edit mode to fix it. If everything in your post looks good, you'll notice some smart things we've done to both help improve your post, and to inspire you for the future. The progress bar: we now show a simple progress indicator that helps direct your efforts at a specific target. The goal is automatically set to increments of 5 posts (yes, we are considering allowing this to be customized). An inspiring quotation appears under the bar, as a reward and as motivation for next time. When you reach the goal, you get a nice surprise, and the bar will be reset for next time. Of course posting quality matters as much, or more, than quantity, but research shows having clear goals helps both. Sharing: if you have the Publicize feature turned on, we show how many people were notified through social networks like Twitter and Facebook, with some of their Gravatars so you can learn more about them. If you don't have Publicize active, you'll see easy to use buttons for manually sharing your post on Twitter, Facebook and Google+. Tagging: we also know adding tags to your post can make it easier for people to find your work. Based on the content of your post, we use an algorithm to recommend a few tags to add, which you can do with a single click. We'll continue to study how you post and improve what we do to support how you work. Happy posting. If you'd prefer the classic experience, you can turn Instant Post Feedback off from your Dashboard, at Settings, Users, Personal Settings. Scott Berkun | December 12, 2011 at 6:07 pm | Categories: Features, Posting | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-2fW Comment    See all comments Unsubscribe or change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2011/12/12/get-instant-feedback-when-you-publish/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com

[New post] The Long and Short of It

New post on WordPress.com News The Long and Short of It by Matt Would you like some more Twitter in your WordPress? We got ya. As an update to our ever-popular Tweet embedding functionality we're supporting Twitter's new embed API to enable richer, better looking, and more functional Tweets inside your blog posts. To embed a Tweet just put a permalink to it on its own line or use our new shortcode that allows for extra formatting. But wait, there's more! Have you ever wished that when you're on Twitter and come across a link to someone's blog post, like this one, you could see a preview of the post without having to click on the link? Now you can, our friends at Twitter have made it so that all wp.me links can be previewed, including snippets of posts and photos, directly on Twitter.com. In addition to this being something I've personally wanted for a while, we think it'll get a lot more people visiting your blog.   Finally, if you link your Twitter account on your Gravatar profile we've made it so it's easy to follow you right from that page. Now go forth and tweetify. P.S. You can follow me on Twitter here, and WordPress.com here. The Long and Short of It wp.me/pf2B5-2pL — WordPress.com (@wordpressdotcom) December 08, 2011 Matt | December 8, 2011 at 6:00 pm | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-2pL Comment    See all comments Unsubscribe or change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2011/12/08/the-long-and-short-of-it/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com

[New post] New Themes: AutoFocus, Imbalance 2, and Reddle

New post on WordPress.com News New Themes: AutoFocus, Imbalance 2, and Reddle by Philip Arthur Moore Today we are absolutely thrilled to warm your creative hearts with the announcement of three new themes: AutoFocus, Imbalance 2, and Reddle. AutoFocus is an elegant, minimal theme designed for artists, photographers, and other creatives seeking a simple but beautiful way to showcase their talents online. Designed by Allan Cole, this oft-requested theme simultaneously boasts impressive featured images throughout and a clean, unobtrusive design that gets out of the way of what truly matters—your creativity. AutoFocus Home Page If you publish single-serving images on a daily photoblog, AutoFocus will accommodate you with ease. If you insert large galleries into your blog posts with the intention of writing assignment recaps, AutoFocus will also elegantly serve up your photo sets and stories. Wordsmiths will also enjoy the sleek and readable aesthetic that AutoFocus delivers. Point is, AutoFocus works on so many levels for so many different types of creators that it's simply a perfect fit here. Read more about its features on the Theme Showcase or dive right into previewing it on your blog from Appearance → Themes. Imbalance 2, designed by WPShower, is yet another gorgeous theme that strikes a perfect balance between functionality and minimalism. Combine that with its modern style and your choices of use with this theme are quite varied. Photo-heavy blogs, online portfolios, and online magazines are all intelligently handled by Imbalance 2. One of the first cool things you'll notice about this theme is how everything on its home page automagically snaps into place regardless of whether you have a habit of publishing lengthy blog posts or tighter, short-form entries. Imbalance 2 Home Page Along with a full-width layout template Imbalance 2 comes with several theme options: a site-wide theme color selector, which affects links, background hovers, and borders; sticky post handling; and the option to make your image and post grid fluid or fixed. Read more about Imbalance 2's features on the Theme Showcase or dive right into previewing it on your blog from Appearance → Themes. Our final theme for you today is Reddle, a deceptively minimal, multi-purpose theme that impresses upon its user both versatility and simplicity. The elements of Reddle's layout were inspired by an older theme called Rubric but there's really nothing basic about its minimal layout. Everything about the design adapts to how you want to use your blog and what you want to use it for. Want to you use your blog for a simple one-column link blog? A two-column business site with a custom header and no posts? Reddle can do that. It even adapts its layout to visitors reading your blog from a device like an iPhone. Reddle Home Page Reddle also provides support for two additional Post Formats: Image Posts and Aside Posts. Aside Posts are ultra-minimal. They don't have a title or tags. Image Posts will highlight the first image in your post along with a short excerpt. You can see both post formats, as well as many other of the theme's features, by visiting Reddle's Theme Showcase page or dive right into previewing it on your blog from Appearance → Themes. Philip Arthur Moore | December 6, 2011 at 4:32 pm | Categories: Themes | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-2oS Comment    See all comments Unsubscribe or change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2011/12/06/new-themes-autofocus-imbalance-2-and-reddle/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com