Bit of a “crisis” knocked me off course for part of the morning, so post count is down a bit today. Might do a bit later on.

Blogging

• BlogRush is as good for the blogger as the visitor

Tech: General

• SAGEM launches my150x: thin and stylish mobile phone
• Doro launches NeoBio range of designer home phones
• Evesham unveils OXEGEN gaming PCs: SX1000, SX5000, SX9000
• Artificial Intelligence meets remote-control cars and lasers. Fun-and-a-half
• F456 dual-front design PMP and 1.3 megapixel camera, and lyric sync
• Mobile dating to become $1bn global phenomenon

Tech: High Definition

• High definition disc format war to continue until at least 2011

Tech: iPhone

• UK iPhone announcement today: London, 10am
• Jason Bradbury, Suzi Perry, Barcelona: best iPhone review yet (and trouncing a Nokia N95)
• 3G iPhone coming in 1Q 2008
• 8GB iPhone coming to UK: 9th November with O2
• iPhone UK: How much free Wi-Fi can you get?
• iPhone UK: O2 has Visual Voicemail
• iPhone UK: Just how “unlimited” is the O2 data plan?
• iPhone UK: What Steve and Matthew wouldn’t say

I’ve noticed a laziness creeping into my blogging routine over the summer, which has led to frustration, lowered productivity, and longer work hours.

At the same time, I’ve been aware that I needed to ramp up some of my own personal projects, both from a financial point of view as well as to broaden the subject areas that I write about.

I’m a morning person, in as much that, if I can peel myself out of bed and do something useful in the first hour or so, then I’m generally fairly well set up for the rest of the day.

If I don’t, things tend to go wrong no matter how hard I try. That’s not being defeatist; it’s just a fact.

I spent the weekend thinking about how I could change that, and also decided to go and read some of the posts over at StevePavlina.com. I think in a lot of things we’re quite on the same wavelength, and he doesn’t try to obfuscate a lack of knowledge with big, fancy words the way some self-professed “experts” do.

Anyway, I was most interested in articles such as How to Become an Early Riser, How to Get Up Right Away When Your Alarm Goes Off, and a lot of his Productivity articles.

Based partly on what I’d read, things I already knew but had let slide, I came up with the following ten points that are most important to me at the moment:

1. Get up early:
   

   Absolutely essential. I’d taken to either waking “naturally” and then drifting, sometimes until around 8am, instead of setting my alarm for 6am and getting up as soon as it went off.

   Consequently, I felt sluggish, was often frustrated with myself for losing time, and started work late and in a bad frame of mind.

   This morning I was bolt upright as soon as the alarm starting beeping, up, dressed, and downstairs by 6.05am. Brilliant!

2. Avoid distractions:
   

   I find that if I am motivated and have purpose in my work, I’m much less easily distracted. I wasn’t put off by noise in the street, the postman, or any similar irritations.

3. Don’t multitask:
   

   I had told myself that multitasking was a fine attribute, and indeed, in certain circumstances (when one task is menial, for example) it can be. However, for brain-intensive and/or creative working, it’s not. This leads on to…

4. Stick with one subject for as long as possible:
   

   I had started to flit backwards and forwards between subjects. This works sometimes, particularly if the next point is to be fulfilled. However, flitting around for the sake of it, when there’s plenty of material on one subject to write about, seems counterproductive.

   Today, I created chunks of time devoted to the different blogs I write for. Only towards the end of the day, when the pressure of other targets had eased, did I relax into alternating the writing of articles for two or three different blogs.

5. Just write:
   

   Research and reading are great, but at the end of the day, I’m a writer.

   I used to find myself spending so long reading articles, going through Google Reader looking for leads, and seeking out press releases, that I’d be exhausted before I’d even written anything.

   Chunking into subjects helped, as it meant that I could focus on research on just one subject (but still able to siphon off related articles for other blogs if they came up) for maybe 30-40 minutes, then write a decent block of articles, with plenty of mental energy.

6. Keep an ideas list:
   

   I’d already created a Google Notepad for ideas for articles. I’m still working on it. I need to remember to write down any ideas — even fragments — as soon as they occur to me, so that I don’t lose potentially valuable information that could be worked into future posts.

7. Banish email, social networking sites, and games:
   

   Don’t talk to me about the curse of email and Facebook!

   Yes, I checked email pretty much every time it went “Bing”, and usually it was something that could have waited.

   It’s not always easy to ignore, as some important things do come in via email, but today the timings worked very well indeed. Let’s hope it continues that way.

   I also put a “Not Available” on Skype, which is not as harsh as “Do Not Disturb” but gets the point across. At least, no-one Skyped me this morning.

8. Drink plenty of water:
   

   Keep forgetting to do it, stupid boy. Today I had the bottle of water sitting right in front of my monitor. It’s definitely helped, particularly as I’ve cut down the caffeine recently, too.

9. Exercise at least once a day:
   

   Our new dog takes care of this for me. Come rain or shine, I’m out every morning walking him in the woods. It’s a great head clearer at the start of the day.

10. Tell others what you’re doing:
    

    As of today, I’m going to be summarising all the posts I’ve written on various blogs. That way, we can all see publicly what sort of day I’ve had. Not that I expect to be beaten up about it, but it’s another incentive to write more than five posts a day!

So there you go. Day One of new regime down, plenty more to go.

These aren’t earth-shattering tips by any stretch of the imagination, but they’re working for me. Sometimes things have to be relearned so we can move forward to bigger and better things.

I’ve written a number of topical posts here, based on current news events that I’ve felt passionate about, and it’s attracted a fair number of visitors and created a small amount of conversation in the comments.

I’ve also written a couple of posts about minor celebrities, which still pulls in a respectable number of visitors looking for information on them.

I’ve also written one post which has become quite a honey pot for people searching for help and advice about an ongoing software issue.

In March, I wrote about Micro Bill Systems’ software, which effectively takes a PC hostage if users refuse to pay a bill.

I hadn’t been personally affected by the issue, but wrote about it because I read an article in the Guardian newspaper and felt angry about those who were caught up in the mess.

It wasn’t a particularly well-planned article, but because I was one of the few bloggers who picked up on the issue early on, it was indexed well in Google.

Then the conversation started. Generally emotive. Sometimes heated.

The post currently holds the record for most visitors over a sustained period (over 17,000 in six months), and comments (345 to date).

And yet, the post has done more.

It has brought people suffering a common affliction together.

It led to the creating of the MBS Victims Forum – a more structured way to discuss the issues (standard blog comments tend to get a little unwieldy once you hit the hundred mark).

It provided a springboard for people to take action, and know that they weren’t alone.

It could yet be challenged by MBS’s lawyers, though I’ve not been told to remove it – yet.

Proof that, even if a post isn’t “dugg” or “stumbled upon”, and doesn’t get huge amounts of traffic in a short period of time, it can, over time, have a significant impact on a situation or a group of people.

Writing about topical events simply to get traffic isn’t advisable. It’s like writing a blog simply to make money.

Passionless writing tends not to get you very far, but if you have a genuine interest in topical subjects, people, and situations, then go for it, because your post could become a focal point and online community for other like-minded people.

Andrew Crofts has written an interesting post over at Freelance Writing Tips entitled “The best time ever to be a freelance writer“.

Yes, it’s a plug for the latest update to his book “How to Make Money From Freelance Writing”, but it makes some useful points for anyone considering, or starting out in, freelancing.

People keep telling us we live in the Information Age and the Entertainment Age, so what better time could it be to be one of the people who creates and sells both products?

Absolutely—if you have the tenacity, drive, and can strike the first deal that gives you the freedom to do it, and still put food on the table.

My aim in the book is to inspire readers with the necessary hope, ambition and nerve to give it a go, and to lead them through the various preparation stages so that they have a sensible, realistic plan and an understanding of the marketplace they’re entering. I then try to show them how to turn their writing skills into a business that will support them in whatever lifestyle they’ve set their hearts on.

There are many ways to make a decent and pleasant living from writing, but it’s all too easy to be carried away by unrealistic dreams. We all need dreams to get us out of bed in the mornings but to make them come true we must have the basic tools of our profession. Becoming a successful freelance writer is difficult, but it’s perfectly doable if you go about it the right way. People just need to think how to put themselves in positions where they are likely to be offered the lucky breaks, then all they need do to succeed is produce the best work they are capable of.

Read the rest of Andrew’s post here.