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if you’re still running WordPress 2.3.3, now might be a good time to consider an upgrade. a recent exploit seems to turn your blog into a spamlink-farm, which might ultimately lead to a site-wide ban from Google’s index (as happened to Austrian proto-blogger Helge). to check if your blog is affected, look for the existence of the folder “wp-content/1″. more info on the exploit can be found at wordpress.org, as well as an upgrade-guide to 2.5 (highly recommended).

I’ve installed WordPress 2.5 on my blogs last week, and so far everything is running smooth. plus, the new backend-interface is really looking niiice. however, keep in mind that some minor plugins aren’t working on 2.5 yet!

ps: 2.5 finally features automatic update of plugins… however this doesn’t work on both of my installs - everytime I try to update, I’m just prompted for FTP-credentials - any ideas? thx!

pps: is there a tool to import UltimateTagWarrior-taggings into WordPress’ own tagging-system?

when Andy Pealting sold BuddyPress to Automattic (makers of WordPress) a month ago, buddypress.org went into maintenance-mode. now that Andy had a chance to bundle the code into a handy SVN-repository, the site is back up again, giving every developer the chance to toy with BuddyPress. But what’s BuddyPressm you might ask?

BuddyPress will transform a vanilla installation of WordPress MU into a social network platform.

BuddyPress is a set of WordPress MU specific plugins, each plugin adding a distinct new feature. BuddyPress contains all the features you’d expect from WordPress but aims to let members socially interact.

got it?:) [note, this won't work with your typical Wordpress-install, it's for WordPress MU only!]

(more…)

• DowngradingBaseband - iphone-elite - Google Code -
• OpenSocial - Google Code -
• Programming « Portfolio | lesterchan.net -
• Hassle-Free PC - Forbes.com -
• SVN vs CVS quick comparison -

• A VC: Biz Stone on Read/Write Talk -
• MySpace: How To Devalue a Platform in Three Easy Steps - SWiK -
• Going Viral like the Common Cold (Not Always a Good Thing) -
• MMOGCHART.COM -
• GigaOM A First-Hand Look at a Chinese Second Life, HiPiHi « -
• Retro MacOS Theme -

• Why We Twitter: Understanding Microblogging Usage and Communities -
• DVD Reviewer - Multi-Region Hacks - Harman/Kardon DVD 27 -
• Facebook News Feed RSS– Nemik’s Blog -
• WordPress: The Complete Post-Install Checklist - Download Squad -
• blog optimization @ Scatterings -
• Wordpress tips and tricks - custom login page » Binary Moon » The home of Ben Gillbanks -

don’t forget to upgrade your Wordpress installation to version 2.2.2 (2.0.11 if you’re still on the legacy-branch). there have been some security leaks disclosed last week, so this is mandatory. the update should’nt break anything…if you encounter any problems on this blog (which has just been upgraded), feel free to shout - thx!

Automattic, makers of notorious blogging-software Wordpress, have released their neat simplified statistics plugin for standalone installations last week (until now, the plugin has been available on their hosted service only). Automattic Stats breaks down access statistics to a few key-benchmarks, providing an easy first-sight overview. furthermore it’s supposedly stable even in high-traffic times (unlike some others stats-plugins out there…) and allows easy syndication of multiple blog-stats within one interface (just use the same API-key). given it’s a 3minute install, I recommend every Wordpress-user trying it out!

• Wordpress commandline-interface (CLI)- & Commodore 64-styled themes (via Hackszine)
• Mozy - online backup service with client-software for Windows & Mac OS, 2gbyte of free storage and very easy to use. there’s really no excuse to go without a daily backup of you local files anymore
• Bluegrind is a free text-to-voice synthesis engine. though being hyped as a ‘textcasting’-tool, the site (currently in early beta) only offers its service by uloading or copy&pasting the source-text. no automatic translation of RSS-feeds let alone an API - yet. quality sounds good though! (listen to the translation of my last post here - they also should add possibilities to embed the clips into other sites). moreover,  Bluegrind offers a really nice version of their site aimed at users with impaired sight. bluegrind.com/blind is controlled by audio-clips and keyboard-shortcuts only, very much like a phone-information system.

Netscape.com is the latest major brand after Digg, Netvibes and Wordpress joining OpenID. band wagons don’t get any larger, hm?

obsessed with PageRank? Scott Vivian posted a list of websites with a PageRank of 9 or 10…there’s really not that many! (via Google Blogoscoped)

hosting your own WordPress-installation and fancying OpenID? Christian Spanring has tried the WordPress OpenID Plugin+ and shares his experience…

Yariv Ben Yehuda  released a song called “The Googler” (via Google Blogoscoped)