Content Is King -- Even Better When It's Free

How many times have you heard that phrase, "Content is king." If you are a blogger like me, you hear it a lot. It becomes an unending drumbeat, pushing you back to your keyboard to update your site to grab more visitors, page views, etc.

And, I can tell you, it's a lot of work. It becomes a job in and of itself.

There is a website that can help -- with free content. This site offers a variety of content, including Reference Articles, Science Articles, and many more. Almost any topic you cover on your blog or site, there is likely some content there to help you out. The site boasts more than 60,000 active authors and half a million pages of content. Some articles are technical and specialized, and others are very consumer-friendly

And, did I mention, it's free.

If you are a blogger or a webmaster tired of "feeding the beast," so to speak, click one of the links above to start getting some free content help today.

This was a sponsored post.

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Real Help From Real Travelers

Are you tired of useless travel help from the so-called experts. Are the travel books on your shelves just woefully out of date?

Thanks to the Internet and Real Travel, now you can get actual, practical and hands-on information on the destinations you've wanted to visit.

Real Travel is a travel guide with a difference. You connect with real travelers just like yourselves. Folks like the Hallgrens are blogging from the Galapagos Islands and Ralph and Pat are in Santa Fe. They give you the lowdown you need -- real information on the hotels you'd be staying at and the restaurants you'd be visiting.

Meanwhile, Real Travel also lets you peak at real travelers' travel plans. Right now, for instance, you can see Toni and Dwayne's Europe itinerary and many more.

Also, you take what you learn on Real Travel and use it right away because Real Travel will also book your hotel, flight, and car right on on their site, too.

Real Travel is the travel site for the rest of us.

This post sponsored by your friends at Real Travel.

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Video: Recap of Blogger Confab

James Taranto of OpinionJournal.com recaps the antics at the Yearly Kos blog confab in Chicago. The event also attracted the leading Democratic presidential candidates, including Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York.

Watch the video now:

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Video: Interview With Technorati Vice President

Technorati is at the heart of that fabled place, the "Blogosphere."

Based in San Francisco and founded by David Sifry, Technorati is the Google of the blogs, performing as a search engine for more than 75 million weblogs, according to one estimate.

Today Technorati finds itself competing with Google and Yahoo for blog search.

Watch this interview with Derek Gordon, vice president of marketing at Technorati:

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Egyptian Blogger Gets 4 Year Prison Sentence

An Egyptian blogger has been sentenced to four years in prison by an Egyptian court due to the content of his writings.

Karim Amer is the first Egyptian blogger to be tried for writing blogs criticizing Egypt's al-Azhar religious authorities, President Hosni Mubarak and the religion of Islam. Charges against Amer included "spreading information disruptive of public order and damaging to the country's reputation," "incitement to hate Islam" and "defaming the President of the Republic."

"This sentence is yet another slap in the face of freedom of expression in Egypt," says Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Middle East and North Africa deputy program director of human rights group Amnesty International. "The Egyptian authorities must protect the peaceful exercise of freedom of expression, even if the views expressed might be perceived by some as offensive. Amnesty International considers Amer to be a prisoner of conscience who is being prosecuted on account of the peaceful expression of his views."

Egypt is a top receipient of U.S. foreign aid.

"The Egyptian authorities must repeal legislation that, in violation of international standards, stipulates prison sentences for acts which constitute nothing more than the peaceful exercise of the rights of freedom of expression, thought, conscience and religion," adds Hadj Sahraoui.

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Majority In Poll Say Bloggers Important To Journalism

A majority of Americans (55%) in an online survey say bloggers are important to the future of American journalism and 74% say citizen journalism will play a vital role, according to a new poll.

Most respondents (53%) also say the rise of free Internet-based media pose the greatest opportunity to the future of professional journalism and three in four (76%) say the Internet has had a positive impact on the overall quality of journalism.

The results are based on a recent We Media -- Zogby Interactive poll.

The We Media survey results were released by iFOCOS and pollster John Zogby as part of an iFOCOS conference on media innovation hosted by theSchool of Communication at the University of Miami, with major support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

In the national survey of adults, 72% say they were dissatisfied with the quality of American journalism today. A majority of conference-goers who were polled on the subject agreed -- 55% say they were dissatisfied,and 61% say they believed traditional journalism is out of touch with what Americans want from their news.

Nearly nine out of 10 media insiders (86%) say they believe bloggers will play an important part in journalism's future.

"We are now seeing mainstream acceptance of what we call the Power of Us -- the value, credibility, and vital expression of citizen and collaborative media," says Dale Peskin, a managing director of iFOCOS, the organization that conducts the annual We Media conference. "We've arrivedat a tipping point. A new definition of democratic media is emerging in our society."

Peskin says that, until recently, many traditional news enterpriseshave been skeptical about We Media. "They were either fearful or dismissive of our 2003 research forecasting and documenting the change in the media ecosystem," he says. "Now the Zogby poll provides additional evidence that 'We Media' is an essential component -- perhaps the essential component --for the agenda for news and information into the future."

"The research documents the widespread recognition that control and influence on how we know what we know is shifting to a vastly moredistributed network of empowered individuals and organizations," says Andrew Nachison, co- founder of iFOCOS. "This obviously will have a big impact on how media organizations evolve and conduct business, but it's really about how we all discover, create, share and apply information, and that's important to all industries, to entrepreneurs, to non-profits, to governments, to individuals and to society as a whole. We are all part of the ecosystem."

The Zogby Interactive survey of 5,384 adults nationwide was conducted Jan. 30 - Feb. 1, and carries a margin of error of +/- 1.4 percentage points. The Zogby Interactive survey of 77 members of the media who attended the Miami conference carries a margin of error of +/- 11.4 percentage points. While periodic audits show the results from Zogbytelephone and Internet surveys closely track each other, a companion telephone survey of this topic was not conducted.

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