Welcome to 2010 and may you have a successful and progressive year ahead
Welcome to 2010. Wasn’t 2009 a hell of year? Come to think of it, wasn’t the decade a bit of a fuck-up. I sincerely wish you a much better year and decade ahead. In fact, I know 2010 will be a good start to a fantastic decade; and I’m eagerly awaiting the discovery of a monolith on the moon – Arthur C. Clark predicted it so it must happen. And there’s a point, where are the flying cars we were promised 20 years ago?
O.K, o.k, Don’t get on my back, I know we’re 5 days into 2010 and this welcome note is a little late but I have been busily trundling away behind the scenes at JournalXtra updating a few older posts and getting a few ideas for new future articles.
WordPress bloggers will be pleased to know I’ve added more plugins to the list of Really Hot WordPress Plugins which has, for the better I think, had a name change to 66 Incredibly Good WordPress Plugins :-) I’ve removed some of the older plugins and deleted those made obsolete as WordPress has matured. Don’t worry backliners, I’ve created a redirection on its previous name so all old links will still lead to the correct article.
Also, for WordPress bloggers, prompted by Sayontan Sinha’s constant progress with Suffusion, I’ve updated my review of the Suffusion WordPress theme which, in my opinion, is the most useful theme of them all. It beams with so many functions and customization options that it’s more like a theme creation framework and WordPress extension plugin than a bog-standard theme. I use it here at JournalXtra and have applied it to three more of my sites. I plan to migrate other sites over to it soon.
For GIMP lovers, I’ve added a few new resources for brushes, scripts, textures and patterns etc.. to All About the GIMP – A Simple User’s Guide. I intend to re-write the article over the next week or two to benefit it with the knowledge I’ve gleaned over the last few months. To say I couldn’t stand the thing a year ago it has certainly turned my feelings around to those of devotion and love (I really should get out more often).
You will notice I’ve changed the layout of the site, again. I plan to stick with two side columns but I’m not entirely sure how I’m going to organise their content. I’ll likely keep all the ads in one column and the site navigation widgets in another. I will change the decor on a regular basis to keep the site seasonal and inline with national holidays around the world. Your suggestions are welcome, just drop me a line at the end of this post.
There have been a few more changes too but I won’t spoil the surprise you’ll get as you stumble upon them. The intention of this site has never been to create loads and loads of posts about essentially the same old stuff as earlier posts. No, dear reader, this site is designed around the premise that posts and articles should be easily understood as well as updated and re-written as required. There’s little worse than visiting a website that constantly regurgitates itself, and JournalXtra will not become one of those sort.
There was good news for JournalXtra on New Years day
Success is a product of perceverence
2009 was a big year for JournalXtra – it transformed from a low traffic forum to a well visited blog with ease. The transformation began at the end of August 2009 when I wrote the Ultimate Guide to 140 Mafia. I wrote it as a favour to a few good friends who were in need of help and I’m glad I did. It brought in a lot of visitors. Back then I didn’t expect to grow JournalXtra quite so much as I have but I fell in love with it so carried on; and my perseverance is paying off. At the beginning of this year (2010) Google finally got around to re-evaluating website Page Ranks and JournalXtra has earned a PR of 1 in a a little over 3 months. It’s a small beginning, a notable milestone, and I fully intend to take JournalXtra to a PR of 3 by the beginning of 2011. With your continued support and help that is an achievable target.
Thank you. You, as a visitor to this site have helped make JournalXtra what it is. Without you, I would probably have left it as the 140 Mafia Guide and spent most of my time with my less mainstream (adult oriented) sites. I look forward to writing more for you in the future, and will endeavour to write regular site updates at the end of each month to help keep you abreast of recent events here. In line with that intention I’ve added an email subscription service to the top of the page – only use it if you want to be kept up to date with the happenings at JournalXtra and with the special offers and freebies that only webmasters seem to know about.
Good luck and success with 2010 and I hope you allow me to accompany along side you as you journey through it.
