Here’s one way of getting feedbacks from your readers anonymously. :)

I can’t even remember what lead me to this site. I’m not really a commentwhore or anything like that. I’d appreciate a comment or two, yes, but I don’t exactly hoard comments so when I saw this comment plugin, it’s not the commenting part that got me interested but the cute buttons that come with it. Harhar. So I tried it, and so far, I’m loving it. Try it, you might like it too. :)

Here are the features of PostReach clickcomments as said on their site.

• Make your blog more engaging with easier commenting
• Find out what your readers like about your blog posts
• Get listed on our showcase and receive traffic
• Install onto your blog in 3 clicks
• Free. You don’t even have to register.

Installing the plugin is simple. You just have to upload the postreach file to your wordpress plugins folder, activate the plugin, and viola, it will automatically show up right after each post even without manually editing your wordpress template.

Postreach clickcomments allows your readers to simply click on the icons according to the following criteria: (1) Cool Stuff; (2) Inspired Me; (3) Entertaining; (4) Write More; (5) Creative; (6) Insightful; (7) Touched my Heart; (8) Great Find.

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Okay, she’s not so little anymore. But still. :)

I thought of adding this one to my “is a woman” series of posts but “Junior Problogger is a Woman” just doesn’t sound right. :P Anyway.

13 year old Sarabeth Jasmine of Junior Pro Blogger Dot Com earns from Adsense, offers Ad space, features fellow teen-er’s blogs with her very own “Site of the Month” project, and blogs about stuff that are foreign even to us older bloggers (such as pixeled art and vector graphics). Really now. I remember playing Barbie dolls and rollerblades when I was thirteen. Sarabeth is surely doing something productive out of her time. :)

Take a look at her prettyful site that’s screaming girl power:

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To become a Wordpress theme contributor is among my greatest frustrations. While I’ve always wanted to be able to come up with and distribute my own wordpress themes, my inability and my lack of spare time to sit down and work on developing killer PHP/CSS skills, get in the way of that pursuit. I still want to think that it’s still not too late, hehe, hence I still find ways to learn, and be inspired. But well, the time is NOT yet now.

On another note, I’ve got some “is a woman” thing going on in this blog without really intentionally doing so (and just now I decided that it’s a good idea to continue doing more “is a woman” posts). First there’s “HP’s In-House SEO is a Woman” and just yesterday, “American Idol Winner 2007 is a Woman“. So just for trips, I googled the phrase “is a woman” and, lo and behold, came face to face with some interesting finds, write ups and sites that speak a lot of women concerns and thoughts that resemble mine. Interesting, really. :)

And then I landed on this blog post entitled “If Linux is a Woman..” and found this lengthy comment by Jennifer Hodgdon about her thoughts on being “a woman in a male-dominated field”. She said, and I quote:

“First, it’s always tough to be a woman in a male-dominated field, but after enough years of it, you get used to ignoring the sexism and locker-room atmosphere that often prevails. Younger women may have less experience doing that, and therefore may be put off by the tone of discussions on many tech mailing lists and forums; even I (not in the category of “younger”) have been known to sever all ties to particularly hostile development communities. “

And then she spoke about her experience being a Wordpress contributor:

“I should mention that I found the WordPress community to be much more welcoming and less hostile than others I have been a part of or considered joining, which is why I contribute my time to WordPress and not any of the other open-source software I use on a regular basis.

Another thought is that to contribute to a project like WordPress, you have to (a) have spare time, (b) have expertise (probably), and (c) want to spend your spare time doing something in your area of expertise. I think all three of these lower the number of women participating. For (b), clearly the number of women software developers is much lower than the number of men. For (a), even today, I think women tend to have more home responsibilities and less spare time. As for (c), perhaps most women developers are less likely than their male counterparts to want to do any extra development work after hours? Who knows… but these three factors together could account for the low representation women have among open-source projects.” (Emphases mine)

What’s evident is that, distributing wordpress themes, plugins, and other open-source stuff for Wordpress use is no joke. It takes time, mad skillz, and artistry. That’s why it amazes me that some Filipinas stand out in this particular area, and I happen to know some Filipina Wordpress Theme designers who are silently making a difference in the Wordpress Community by sprinkling some wptheme love around the world. (And, apparently, if you’ll scan through Ratified.Org, you’ll find out that these Filipina Wordpress Theme contributors are at the top of the rank, surpassing even the likes of Macalua.com and well, Yugatech. :P)

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