MonkeyPong Blog

Matt Mullenweg announced that Wordpress 2.6 is now available, like almost a month ahead schedule. Version 2.6 makes WordPress a more powerful CMS, you can now track changes to every post and page and easily post from wherever you are on the web.

To understand more, view the video below:

Popularity: 5% [?]

From the guys at ReviewMe, now comes BlogRolled.

As you would have already guessed it, BlogRolled serves both the bloggers/web site publishers and the advertisers. Bloggers sell their blogrolls instead of text link, advertisers choose blogs to advertise, bloggers add the advertisers’ links and get paid, it’s that simple!

Since selling text links is illegal, and may get your Google PageRank penalized, exchanging blogrolls are legal " who in the would know you actually sell them?

Popularity: 27% [?]

Entrecard finally has the ability to add more than one blog to an account!

Starting today, you can add all your blogs to Entrecard simply by going to your Dashboard and clicking “Linked Blogs” in your Dashboard navigation. You will be able to choose whether to link your account with another existing account, or to register a new blog with Entrecard, and automatically link it to your account.

You can switch from one blog to another, and drop or advertise as either one, from the very top right of your Entrecard screen besides where your email address is displayed.

Awesome, ain’t it?

Also, don’t forget to check out the new Official Entrecard e-book.

Popularity: 26% [?]

Websites that are not social networks may still want to be social like Mashable — with Google Friend Connect (check out http://www.google.com/friendconnect/).

By using little snippets of code, you can connect your web site with your friends using OpenID, Facebook, Google, and MySpace account. Easy?

It seems like Google’s aim to overtake Facebook and MySpace are getting stronger.

Popularity: 37% [?]

What do you get when you add Instant Messenger, Email and Social Networks together? You get Digsby, of course. Digsby is one of the most advanced applications as it combines instant messaging with email and social networking.

Instant Messaging

Digsby combines a buddy list for all your AIM, MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, Google Talk, Jabber, and Facebook Chat Accounts. It can even merge duplicates, i.e. your friend, Monkey123 on Yahoo and MSN into a single contact!

Email

Digsby lets you manage your Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo Mail, AOL/AIM Mail, IMAP, and POP accounts in one place. You’ll get popup notifications when there are new emails.

Social Networking

Digsby connects you to your Facebook, Twitter, or MySpace account so that you can receive alerts of events such as new friend requests, messages, group invites and more. You can even update your Facebook and Twitter status right from Digsby.

So, what are you waiting for? Download Digsby now.

Popularity: 37% [?]

Less than a month after Wordpress 2.5 is out, Wordpress has released version 2.5.1 which includes a number of bug fixes, performance enhancements, and one very important security fix.

Read more on Wordpress 2.5.1 announcement page

Download the latest Wordpress 2.5.1 here.

Popularity: 90% [?]

SocialSpark is a Social Marketing Network that connects advertisers and bloggers through an online advertising marketplace. Advertisers are able to target blogs based on conversational topics and make cash sponsorship offers to the bloggers who publish them. Bloggers can make money by either placing display advertisements on their blog or by writing sponsored content. The sponsorships offered through the SocialSpark marketplace allow advertisers to build buzz, generate traffic and maximize social media exposure.

Created by the people who brought you The Blogger’s Choice Awards, currently SocialSpark is still in Beta.

The Benefits of SocialSpark for Bloggers and Advertisers

Unlike the other pay per post, in SocialSpark, you will not only get paid to write sponsored blog content on a per post basis, you can have advertisers pay per day to sponsor your blog too!

So, will SocialSpark spark? Only time will tell.

Popularity: 33% [?]

Google Analytics has come out with a new feature — Benchmarking which is still in beta. Benchmarking is an optional Google Analytics service and is located under the “Visitors” section of your reports.

What is Benchmarking?

Benchmarking shows how your website’s statistics compare against other industry verticals. In the beta version of this service, you are able to compare your site’s Visits, Pageviews, Pages per Visit, Bounce Rate, Average Time on Site, and New Visits data against benchmark data from categories of other participating websites. From this data, you know where your site stands among your own niche market and you can use the data to gain broader context for your site so you can identify additional opportunities to improve your site’s metrics.

Google Analytics’ Benchmarking Service

How to Enable Benchmarking?

As this service is only available for those who share the account data in an anonymous, aggregated format, you must select the option to share your Analytics data “Anonymously with Google and the benchmarking service” from the Edit Account and Data Sharing Settings page. To get to this page, click the link that says “Edit Account and Data Sharing Settings” from the Analytics Settings page (the first page you see after logging into your Google Analytics account).

Need Help?

If you need more help on using the benchmarking service, visit Google Analytics Help Center.

Popularity: 28% [?]

After six months of work by the Wordpress community, Wordpress 2.5 is the result — a cleaner, faster and less cluttered customizable dashboard, multi-file uploading, one-click plugin upgrades, built-in galleries, salted passwords and cookie encryption, media library, a WYSIWYG that doesn’t mess with your code, concurrent post editing protection, full-screen writing, and search that covers posts and pages.

Check out the 4-minute screencast of the new interface in action or just go to the Wordpress download page.

Otherwise, you may want to check out Matt’s post from WordPress blog for further details on User Features and Developer Features.

Wordpress.org spanking new layout

And yes, Wordpress.org got a new layout as well! Well done!

Popularity: 100% [?]

Techcrunch has reported that Facebook has been testing a new instant messaging service and will be launching it some time next week.

The instant messaging service may be something like MySpace, which proves unsuccessful. For now, Facebook will not be making it a desktop software like Yahoo! Messenger, MSN or AIM meaning users will have to log into Facebook to chat with their Facebook friends.

Yay to instant poking!

Popularity: 38% [?]