Cassiopeia, Milky Ways Youngest Supernova Guitar Pick

A gorgeous best-selling design. Click to customize or personalize. How would it look with your name or monogram on it - why not have a look-see right now?

Cassiopeia, Milky Ways Youngest Supernova Guitar Pick

tagged with: star galaxies, outer space picture, supernova explosion, supernovae remnant, milky way youngest supernova, neutron star, deep space astronomy, cassiopeia, cosmic ray, hrbstslr cassasn, space photography, supernovae blasts

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series This extraordinarily deep Chandra image shows Cassiopeia A (Cas A, for short), the youngest supernova remnant in the Milky Way. New analysis shows that this supernova remnant acts like a relativistic pinball machine by accelerating electrons to enormous energies. The blue, wispy arcs in the image show where the acceleration is taking place in an expanding shock wave generated by the explosion. The red and green regions show material from the destroyed star that has been heated to millions of degrees by the explosion.
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image code: cassasn

Image credit: NASA/CXC/MIT/UMass Amherst/M.D. Stage et al.

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Cute Purple Day of the Dead Puppy Dog Pink Postcard

Cute Alert!

How can you resist this cute puppy design? Maybe you'd like to see your name or initials on it? Click to customize and personalize...

Cute Purple Day of the Dead Puppy Dog Pink Postcard

tagged with: puppy, dog, puppy dog, day of the dead, day of the dead puppy, sugar skull, sugar skull puppy, day of the dead dog, sugar skull dog, skeleton puppy, skeleton dog, skeleton, bone, bones, rose, roses, star, decorated puppy, decorated dog, cute puppy, adorable puppy, small puppy, pet, day of the dead animal, puppy design, jeff bartels

This cute design features a small black puppy decorated with Day of the Dead patterns. Purple roses appear in the dogs ears while a five point star sits in the middle of the forehead. The black puppy's face is painted white and is decorated with swirls and dot patterns in the tradition of the Day of the Dead sugar skulls. White bones and a rib cage appears on the dog's body which gives it a skeleton look. The over sized head and small body along with the details in the fur create a beautiful combination of a cartoon and realistic look. This unique and adorable puppy is an adorable Day of the Dead design.

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Chocolatexture: A Series of Chocolates to Represent Japanese Words For Texture Created by Nendo

Fun and Random

Japanese design office Nendo has created 9 different types of chocolate. While each are the same size, not a single piece from the Chocolatexture collection look alike. That’s because Oki Sato, who leads the Tokyo and Milan-based firm, rethought the concept of chocolate by focusing on texture. “There are many factors that determine a chocolate’s taste,” says Sato, referring to factors like the origin of cocoa, the percentage used, and the various different flavors. But by instead turning his attention to attributes like pointy, smooth and rough, the designer has created distinctive chocolates that all use identical ingredients but taste completely different due to the various textures.

Each of the 9 chocolates were inspired by an onomatopoeic word from the Japanese language that describes texture. The chocolates correspond with words like “toge toge” (sharp pointy tips), “sube sube” (smooth edges and corners) and “zara zara” (granular, like a file). Chocolatexture was created for the Maison & Objet trade fair currently taking place this week in Paris. 400 limited edition Chocolatexture sets were created and will be sold during the event in Paris at what’s being dubbed the “Chocolatexture lounge.” (syndicated from Spoon & Tamago)

 
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 » see original post http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/colossal/~3/WKXM1IgVjaU/

3 Tips for Accelerated Blog Growth & Online Visibility

Blogging with purpose

original post »

This is a guest contribution from Robert Kramers.

Discouraged with the amount of traffic your blog attracts? Maybe you’re looking for ways to engage more readers, build more business and build a loyal following?

Understanding a few effective strategies can help you attract the readers you want and get them to share your content, grow your readership and increase your overall visibility.

Here are the three super-effective blogging strategies for building your reputation online.

Find Blog Topics you Know have a Proven Record

The trick to publishing content that people share, is to base the content on something that has already worked in the past.

You can take a lot of the guesswork out of publishing content by researching what people have already enjoyed and improving on it.

Hereís a few ways you can do this:

Method #1: Examine a successful competitor

One of the best ways to work out what’s popular on a competitors website is to use Moz’s Open Site Explorer.

Let’s say you are in the social media industry and you’re looking for a topic for which you want to maximize the chance of success. You could throw a competitors home page URL into OSE, and view the top pages of their website.

• Step #1: Find competitor who ranks well in Google search:

 

 

 

 

• Step #2: Enter their home page URL into OSE

• Step #3: Click the ‘top pages’ link to the left of the page (pictured)

• Step #4: Scan the list of top pages on the website. You will often find some of their most popular blog posts in among the top few pages.

Top pages in OSE are based on the authority of the page, which incorporates a number of signals including links from other websites and social signals.

In about 40 seconds of searching, I managed to find: 7 Mobile Marketing Stats that Will Blow Your Mind, which has a heap of social shares, tweets and Facebook ‘likes’ to go with it… It’s popular!

You now have a topic which you know people are interested in. Can you make it better? Add additional information or images? Rinse and repeat for other competitors and you’ve got a solid strategy for creating content you know people love.

Method #2: Work out whatís HOT using Buzzsumo

Buzzsumo is a tool which scans the web for content which has the highest number of social shares, based on keywords you type in to the search.

• Step #1: Search for your topic

• Step #2: Scan the results and find popular topics

Enter more keywords in the search and find a gold mine of topics which have a proven record of success. All you need to do now is make it better, and get it in front of people. Theyíll share it!

Pro Tip: Find out who currently links to your competitors content and show them your more advanced and improved version. Chances are, they’ll either share or link to your content.

Blog Post Titles Matter HUGELY

A great headline can help your content stand out among the information overload. It tells your readers why they need to read your article and why it should be read now, rather than put in the ever-growing stack.

A compelling headline convinces a potential reader that your content is valuable and that theyíll get something out of the effort they put in.

Use effective verbs, and adjectives amplify the effect of your blog post title. You can test some of the common headline structures to see what works best with your audience.

Include keywords in your blog post title to help with your search engine rankings.

Unsure about which keywords? This guide might help.

Adding keywords to your headline is not just good for helping your website show up in Google, but it is also a proven method of increasing the click through rate (CTR) of your search engine snippet.

According to this, if I searched for “social marketing tips” in Google, I would be more likely to click this result (highlighted), than those below it because it’s a closer match to what I initially searched.

Aside from that, it has the most intriguing headline also.

Pro Tip: Make sure to include your popular keywords in your headline, to ensure your blog post has a better chance of ranking for related searches.

Deliver Great Content that Engage the Reader

In the past, obtaining visibility in search engines for your website was achievable with a few simple “SEO techniques”.

However, times have changed.

Google is more advanced and the number of shortcuts have significantly decreased. Search engines are getting better at analysing actual social signals, including shares, re-tweets, and links to your content.

Search engines use this information to determine where your content fits on the continuum of popularity and quality.

“Create something worth sharing and people will share it”.

In order to get this “social currency”, you need to provide something that readers actually want to read and share with people they know.

Blog posts that provide answers, advice, and inspiration to readers consistently generate traffic and can become cornerstones of a successful blog. And when you solicit your readersí, create discussion and get opinions you get them involved with creating and improving your content.

Specifically, consider these types of posts to engage and increase readership:

Craft Useful Answers to Specific Questions

Readers appreciate posts that provide real answers.

Present a solution or range of solutions that have gotten results, and then ask readers for their feedback. Any responses you get back will strengthen your post and help drive traffic. You may get positive and negative responses to your original answer and hopefully some additional creative solutions that readers can try.

Pro Tip: Reverse engineering common questions is a great strategy in itself for finding new blog topics.

Objective Advice / Shared Results

If youíve had success solving a problem, starting a new venture, or meeting a particular goal, share it.

Offer advice based on where you ran into problems or made mistakes. The goal is to provide inspiration to your readers and to make their path easier.

This type of content can add to your credibility as a blogger in addition to driving traffic. It puts you in the position of being the expert and gains the trust of your readers, especially if they are able to replicate your success based on the template you provide.

What strategies do you use to resonate with your readers and drive blog traffic?

Robert Kramers is an SEO consultant at E-Koncept. Want to learn more about increasing your website traffic? Sign up to his newsletter or follow him on Twitter.

Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger


3 Tips for Accelerated Blog Growth & Online Visibility

3 Tips for Accelerated Blog Growth & Online Visibility
 #bloggingtips 

Scientists Develop Hydrophobic Metal That Causes Water to Bounce

Fun and Random

Researchers at the University of Rochester’s Institute of Optics led by professor Chunlei Guo have developed a new type of hydrophobic surface that is so highly water repellant, it causes water droplets to bounce off like magic. Unlike earlier hydrophobic surfaces that rely on temporary (and slowly degrading) chemical coatings such as teflon, this new super-hydrophobic surface is created by etching microscopic structures into metal with the help of lasers. Potential applications include airplane wings that resist icing, a whole new type of rust proofing, or even a toilet that wouldn’t require water. Watch the video above to see the surface in action, and you can read Guo’s research paper here. (via Sploid)

 
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 » see original post http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/colossal/~3/ot8voU5va94/