1. How come, if I click ‘Follow’ I am sometimes automatically subscribed to a blog and sometimes not?
2. In relation to the above, why is ‘Follow’ enough on some blogs but on others I have to do the email subscription thing (which I don’t mind – just wondering)?
3. Is it normal for photos to sometimes take 20 minutes hours to upload?
4. In relation to the above, why will one photo upload in a few minutes, and another take a century, when both were taken by the same camera, at the same time, on the same day?
5. Where exactly did my blogroll go when I unwittingly lost it?
6. In relation to the above, will those ‘lost’ bloggers now hate my guts?
7. How many posts per day is too many? (Yes, I have raised this before)
8. Is it okay to not particularly like the whole award thing or does this seem ungracious and offensive?
9. How is it that all the bloggers I now know seem like perfect people?
10. In relation to all of the above, is scotch the same as whiskey?
jmgoyder 
1 & 2 Don’t know
3. That may be your computer needing more memory capacity
4. Too technical for me
5. Don’t know again
6. No of course they won’t
7. Post only become too many if they are not interesting, you have nothing to fear there
8. It’s perfectly fine not to like awards
9. I’m not and I doubt that many others are
10. Scotch can only be from Scotland where it is spelt without the e as whisky, Whiskey can be from anywhere: Ireland, Canada, USA, Japan even England and Wales
Thank you! That was very helpfulish!
The answer to your first two questions, follow should work just fine, provided you’re logged in. Sometimes the email subscription thing happens if you try to follow someone but you’re not logged into your WordPress account.
3) No it isn’t but that just depends on the speed of your internet and the size of your photos. In case it’s taking that long, re-size your photos and then try uploading them. Other wise, if you use any other platform for your photos, you can just put your photos on here by using the URL process.
4) If you’re saying that it’s the same camera, then it might just be your net speed or how many net using applications/pages you have open at one time.
5) The blogroll depends on your layout and your widgets. Whenever you change your layout, the widgets automatically get reset. All you have to do is go to Appearance -> Widgets -> Link Widget -> Select Blogroll, and it’ll appear on your right sidebar.
6) Probably not. I think they’ll understand. 🙂
7) Depends on what you’re blogging about I supposed. 2/3 blog posts are still acceptable, but when you hit anything above 5, it starts going a little overboard. Its all relative depending on your audience and your content.
8) It’s perfectly fine to not like the award thing. It gets insanely tedious. What I prefer to do is thank the person who’s given me the award, and make sure I refer to the in my post but I don’t do the whole ‘nominating people’ and ‘tell me about yourself’ bit.
9) …
10) There isn’t any difference between Scotch and whiskey, except for the fact that Scotch is basically whiskey from Scotland and whiskey is just.. whiskey.
You are like a fountain of wisdom – thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yay! I’m glad I could help! 🙂 I hope this sorts some of your issues.
Okay but even though I am logged in and just sussed your blog and clicked follow I am still not getting notifications. Can’t you widget an email subscription thingy?
Hmm. That’s weird. Because you’re showing on my following list but yeah, I’ll put up an email subscription thing. Gimme 5 mins. 🙂
Make it 4 minutes!
Heehee. All done already! 🙂
Ok – I’ll be right there!
Aha! I think I found the solution to your problem. Go to your Reader -> Blogs I Follow -> Edit List -> Get new posts by email and choose your frequency accordingly.
Which particular problem are you referring to? Joking – I am now subscribed to your blog. Thx!
People who send out newsletters and run competitions on their blogs do the subsription thingy because they then know that members definately want to be subscribed cos they have gone to the trouble of signing up. and I think it is also to do with whether you are .wordpress.com or just your name.com
sounds like the photos may be too big I’m sure that’s way too long to upload … but hey I’m a novice at all this so I don’t know much!
Scotch is distilled in Scotland and from barley I think and whiskey like bourben is from rye, but I think it’s a bit like the champagne thing – all champagne is sparkling wine, but not all sparkling wine is champagne, so all scotch is whiskey, but not all whiskey is scotch!
Are you sorry you asked!! 🙂
I’m sorry I asked!
Kidding – many thanks!
Errrrr.
Sorry, I’ve just gone ‘braindead’ from writing a post for my new health blog.
I’m better at taking photos (than typing words) these days.
V
xoxo
Where is the link to the health blog?
Errrrr….it’s coming. I’ve written 3 posts & a couple of pages, but I’m not sure that it’s headed in the right direction yet.
I was surprised to get 53 views before I’ve even re-edited the first post – obviously people like reading about health stuff. It’s directed at people with chronic pain/fatigue (or Fibromyalgia which is what I have).
I might erase those posts & start again. Like all new Blogs, it takes a while to warm up. I’ll share a link with just you if you’d like to read some, but it’s not really of much interest to healthy people, only those with chronic pain/fatigue.
I think health is at the forefront of people’s concerns these days and I think your blog will be really helpful. I wouldn’t worry about getting the posts perfect (editorially) because ‘warts and all’ works too!
Ah, seems like your questions are answered 😉 The photo upload thing is a bore. You should find yourself a cheap or free program that compacts the files. If you use a Mac, it comes with Preview which lets you crop and crunch. If you’re on a PC, I’m sure other bloggers can point you to a suitable alternative.
Ok and many thanks!
I am learning too now dear Julie, Thank you for this post and questions. Love, nia
We are all learning but it’s good fun!
post as much as you want – people do not have to read the posts if they do not want to – I personally love your posts
the award thing is lovely, but not my cup of tea
anything technical I refer to my computer savvy son or wordpress help–they are great
no blogger will hate your guts ’cause these things happen to them too
thanks for asking these questions – I have learned a lot from the answers from other bloggers
Next time I am in technical trouble I will ring your son – hehe!
sounds good
I have no clue except that scotch and whiskey are similar but not the same 🙂 Sorry.
Lots of people seems to know lots of things about scotch – hehe!
Scotch is my favorite, especially if its the high end scotch, or if you have some really good spiced rum, I’ll drink with all night (my dad was in the navy – i can drink like a sailor, but I don’t do it very often.) Sorry I wasn’t more help with your wordpress problems, I have those issues too.
Pity you don’t live closer – we could share a bottle of high end scotch – hehe!
I’ve been known to travel quite a ways… 😉
That sounds promising!
I am as much in the dark as you are with regard to all but the last of your questions. I have experinced similar delays with photo uploads, etc. As to Scotch, it is a type of whiskey, as are bourbon and rye, as far as I know. So, I guess whiskey is a more general term.
I’m rather glad I raised those questions now because other people’s answer are proving helpful not just to me but other mystified bloggers!
The answer to question 9 is that blogging allows us to present ourselves to the world as we would like others to see us and for some reason we present ourselves in a way that overlooks our little faults and exaggerates our merits (if any). This is why your blog is a breath of fresh air as it presents you, probably in a way that you like to present yourself, but with many touches of reality that resonate with your readers. Long live the imperfect.
Question 8 is more tricky. I really don’t like them and I reply graciously but don’t accept them. When I get one that comes with money, I’ll change my mind.
I just wrote this really flattering response to your comment but it deleted itself somehow. It was to do with how much I admire how your blog so cleverly and coherently narrate a whole lot of different topics and photographs into a single post. I want to be able to do that better! Also, what you say about ‘imperfect’ is interesting because on the rare occasions that I notice a typo in your posts, I am delighted – hehe!
1. I don’t know.
2. I don’t know this either.
3. Get a faster computer or better internet service provider. Be sure your computer protection is effective.
4. Picture size is sometimes the problem, and see #3.
5. Lost in space. Yes, every format is a little different, and I have to go into my dashboard widgets to change settings when I change formats. I change formats about once a quarter because of boredom; however, I really like the one I have now. I have several blog friends who I read every week. I wish I could read everybody, but I don’t have the time.
6. Very few. I would worry about those that do; mental.
7. Whatever you want. If I don’t have time to read them, I either save them for later or delete them. Sometimes, I get a little overloaded with numerous email notifications, though. I think there’s a fine line of keeping your readers interested and over-producing posts, but I’m not sure where to draw the line.
8. I’ve never been nominated for anything, and I don’t care, so don’t nominate me. I don’t write to gain followers or readers. I write because I enjoy it, and it’s an easy way to keep family and friends informed and entertained.
9. Who??? I’d sure like to read their blogs!
10. I appreciate the above education on the subject. I didn’t know the difference either. Are you drunk?
Thank you for all of this and no I am NOT drunk this morning!
1 depends 2 dunno 3 perhaps 4 depends 5 dunno 6 perhaps 7 depends 8 dunno 9 perhaps 10 scotch is whisky distilled in scotland 🙂
Most entertaining response so far dodsy!
I agree about the awards (a little bit), but they do help bring bloggers together.
Yeah I know – that’s my dilemma!
i will only address the question 9 as so many others have you all sorted out on the technical issues. of course there are many reasons other’s may seem “perfect” to you, they are not being honest and sharing that part we often don’t want others to see or you are so honest the rest of us look like big fakes in comparison!
speaking for myself, i am going to go over some of my own posts and look for that honesty in feelings. remember too that we are not in the same situation you are. i am not caring for someone i love and dealing with a teenage son. as i have said before your honesty and ability/willingness to share so openly for yourself and others is admirable.
also consider you look perfect to others:) why is that?
That’s so interesting – what you say about honesty! And thank you so much for your kind words.
If your photos are taking 20 minutes to upload it might be because they are too big. I tend to resize them to 500 pixels width and let the software resize it to the correct height using the aspect ratio.
I then save them as web images, which makes them into a small size.
I will try to do as you and others suggest with the pictures but I am very ignorant re this kind of thing so will play around.
Post a comment on my website with your email address. I will sent you a PDF file of how to optimize images for the web and also add a link to some free software you can use for this.
Comments don’t get published until I approve of them. I will then delete your comment to keep your email address secret.
Done! My comment was genuine.
I do not have all your answers, but I will say that WordPress has been entirely WONKY of late! It won’t hold my settings preference for Facebook, it keeps disappearing my web pages, and sometimes I do have that problem with the photos. (I secretly think they are mad at me for dissing them in one of my posts not too long ago, but hey, I did make a new post thanking them for fixing their mistake!) Ha.
BUT, it may be that your computer’s cache files are too full. (Don’t ask me what a cache file is, Bob explained it to me, and I am lucky to remember as much as I just told you! LOL!) Anyway, I find that when I work with a lot of picture files that the “cache files” get full and then the computer uploads take a long time. I find that saving what I am doing, and then closing the browser will sometimes help when working on WP (This may also be an entirely different problem than the CF’s). If it is the CF’s then I have to reboot to clear the cache. Clear as mud??? I thought so! 😉
Oh, and one more thing… it could also be a slow connection with your internet service provider. These tend to be intermittent and cannot be remedied by you, well, maybe if you are willing to change service providers, but that just is way too much irritation, YES?
~ Lynda
Thanks so much for the muddy clarity!
I can’t answer all of your questions, but I can answer a few. According to WordPress, “follow” and “email subscriptions” are supposed to be one and the same (however that doesn’t explain why they list followers and blog subscribers separately). It’s perfectly okay not to like the awards thing (sorry, Jules, I just had to do it):). I’m sure all those bloggers are anything but perfect. As far as number of posts, I’d say, post as many as you want, people will read what they want to read, the skip the rest; but you’re probably thinking about market saturation, and I don’t have the answer to that–maybe 2?
Good questions–the one about Scotch Whisky was particularly helpful–hiccup! 🙂
Thanks again! I think the discrepancy with ‘follow’ and ‘subscribe’ is a wordpress problem.
Oh yeah and your award is coming soon hehehehehe!
Hmmmmm….
1. Are you clicking “follow” on blogger blogs? Sometimes that doesn’t work or is a pain.
2. RSS feeds usually ask for confirmation.
3. Are you uploading from your computer to the WP gallery? Probably file size, or your connection. Have you run a speed test? Do you pre-size your photos? I use an FTP server and upload mine by URL, so I don’t know much about the galleries.
7. You can write as many posts per day as you like. How many people read is a separate question. 😉
8. I don’t like “the award thing” at all. I don’t do the posts, either, as I have other content for my blog.
9. You haven’t met some of the bloggers I know!
I am so curious about your answer to 9!!!!
Re: 9 – let’s just say there’s no reason for the blog-world to be any different than the real world. There are some real jerks out there, too. 😉
I have met some jerks but so far must be lucky with the blogjerks!
I only know the answer to number nine. It’s because we ARE perfect people:))) (And I haven’t been struck by lightning yet.
Haha!
Hi,
1 and 2 : I don’t know
3 and 4. Photos will be different sizes even though taken with the same camera, you can find out the size of the photos once they are on your computer by just putting the mouse on them, I always resize photos before I upload them onto the blog. The larger the photo the longer it takes to upload.
5. It all depends on the theme you are using.
6. No
7. It is your blog and personally I don’t think it really matters, but a lot of bloggers follow a lot of blogs and might only have time to visit once or twice in a day.
8. It is OK in my book.
9. There are a lot of nice people in the blogosphere I feel.
10. Scotch is a type of Whiskey
Thanks so much magsx2!
Oops, I put out five or six posts a day. I will stop the torture I’ve inflicted on my followers. I’m glad I read your post today & everyones answers were so helpful.
So many answers – wonderful! Some of my queries are now solved, well, sort of!
1 & 2. Hmmm…I don’t know. Sometimes I find I have to unfollow and then ‘follow’ again to get notifications.
3 & 4. That’s a long time to load…and I thought I had a slow connection. My photos are originally much larger than what I upload, but I resize my photos to around 2.0 mb. and that keeps the loading fairly quick. Larger files take longer to load with my connection.
5. Can’t help you there.
6. No, I wouldn’t think so.
7. It’s up to you. If I like a blog, I try to visit every post even if I have to do a frantic catchup from falling behind. However, the more postings per day, the more difficult for me to catch up.
8. It’s ok.
9.
10. My hubby says they are the same thing. He likes scotch and he is part Scottish. He says scotch has to come from Scotland to be called scotch, but it’s still in the whiskey category.
(Are you feeling like you could use a bit of scotch right now?)
Thank you very much – some of this is very helpful. It’s a little early in the morning for a scotch!
1 – 6 – it’s all a mystery to me too (although I think the follow button just subscribes you to the blog in the WP Reader, so you have to check the Reader for new posts)
7 – when others stop visiting 🙂
8 – absoloodle – I feel much the same as you in the whole thing.
9 – LOL! Put us all in a room together and I think you’d change your opinion on this pretty quickly 😉
10. Does it matter? Cheers, Jules!
Your idea of putting us all in a room together is not a bad one you know. I think we should ask WordPress to host a party!
We are very curious about 1 and 2 too. We’re not sure about the others.
Bella and DiDi
Well, thenks to other responses and my own incredible brain (ha!) sometimes clicking ‘follow’ automatically subscribes you and you get notification emails, but usually it is more usual to have to subscribe ‘properly’ via the widget thing if the person has that option on their blog. Plus, I have just discovered my Reader in which there are posts from everyone I have ever followed so that was interesting. There is still so much I don’t know about this blogging thing!
Thanks for filling us in Julie! Yes, we are still learning too.
You are extremely clever dogs!
I’m going to answer without reading all the other comments and answers:
1. How come, if I click ‘Follow’ I am sometimes automatically subscribed to a blog and sometimes not? — It depends on which theme it is and how the theme author has set it up, and sometimes how customized the theme user has made the theme.
2. In relation to the above, why is ‘Follow’ enough on some blogs but on others I have to do the email subscription thing (which I don’t mind – just wondering)? — I depends on which theme it is and how the theme author has it set up, and sometimes how customized the theme user has made the theme.
3. Is it normal for photos to sometimes take 20 minutes hours to upload? – It depends on what the person uploaded. Right click on the photo and then click on properties. Look at the number of bytes. If it is a seven-digit number, there is the problem. Look at the file size and you’ll see something like 647×400 or something similar. Rarely is the size of the long size over 1,000. So what is happening is that the person uploaded this monster photo of 4.5 MB and it takes WordPress 20 minutes to access the photo and then resize it to load in the blog. I can’t imagine these people doing this because it also takes 20 minutes for them to upload each photo. What do they do? Take the dog for a walk while the pictures are uploading? Prevent this problem by resizing your photos before uploading.
4. In relation to the above, why will one photo upload in a few minutes, and another take a century, when both were taken by the same camera, at the same time, on the same day? – Depends on how they were uploaded to WordPress. See my answer in #3.
5. Where exactly did my blogroll go when I unwittingly lost it? – To the Australian Outback. That’s my answer and I’m sticking with it.
6. In relation to the above, will those ‘lost’ bloggers now hate my guts? – No. Well, at least not until they find their way back from the Outback.
7. How many posts per day is too many? (Yes, I have raised this before). Oooh, Good question. I think more than five is too many. I try to do three per day, morning, noon & night. If I get ambitious (meaning that one of my home inspections was canceled and I’m stuck at home for the whole day), I’ll sometimes to five.
8. Is it okay to not particularly like the whole award thing or does this seem ungracious and offensive? – Oooh, another good question. I like the award thing itself but I don’t like the requirements. I’m not going to nominate 15 other bloggers. Do you realize that if we all did that, we’d run out of blogs in a few days. Do the math 15 + (15 x 15) + (15 x 15 x 15)………..
9. How is it that all the bloggers I now know seem like perfect people? — You have your perfect people glasses on. I used to have some of them but eventually determined that they were quite expensive. Very expensive. Very, very expensive.
10. In relation to all of the above, is scotch the same as whiskey? – Only if it says “Scotch Whiskey” on the label. I think…………….. lol
Yay Russel! I was finally able to approve and to now reply to your incredibly generous and witty wisdoms above. I understood every one of your answers except the ones that involved numbers – ha! Love Julie