This week’s links are all about writing – without the writing part in it.

• WordCount has a great post on writing rooms. Now if only there were some in the UAE…
• Freelance Switch has a outlined FAQ’s for freelancer to have on their blog or website. It’s in a ready to use format and all you need to do is make a few changes.
• Linda Formichelli of The Renegade Writer’s blog, has calculated the numbers for freelancers working for cheap. Give it a read and decide if your current rates are too low.
• The Blood Red Pencil has a very useful posts about selling your rights. Its been divided in two parts. Part one and two.
• B J over at Enriched by Words is collaborating for the first time. She explores the idea of collaboration and co-writing. Both are excellent ideas that I plan on trying out sometime in the future.

Found any links that you’ll be going back to again and again for reference?

As time goes by, I keep thinking Sunday Link Overdose has got to be the ugliest titles ever to be given to a weekly post. So I’ve decided to group together links into themes whenever I can and categorize them into SLOD.

This week has been filled with new projects. I’m working on setting up a new blog. Domain, hosting, WordPress – the works.

I found the following links useful in my search to put together a blog that works from the beginning. After all, the amount of information available, its tough to sort through the ones that are actually useful.

• I’ve linked to this before but I keep going back to 170+ must have tools for the Beginning Blogger. I’ve used it as a reference extensively.

• The Docs page of WordPress.org is a haven of information and has a reference on all things WordPress. Excellent for beginners like me.

• Problogger’s 10 Useful Plug-ins for New Blogs was extremely helpful. So was Andy Beal’s list of 21 of the Best WordPress Plug-ins that he’s used. Both these articles helped me decide which plug-ins to install for my blog.

• Want to monetize your blog by putting up ads? Read Blogging for Ads is Dead before carving out an monetising plan for your blog. It’s no longer enough to put up blocks of ads to earn money.

• Once your blog’s set up – you need to start thinking about RSS. Smashing Magazines 10 Useful RSS Tricks and Hacks for WordPress will put you well ahead of the curve. A lot of big blogs haven’t paid much attention to how their RSS feeds look in a reader.

Setting up a blog on WordPress can be very intimidating for a first timer. Even their famous ‘5 minute installation’ can take hours if you don’t know what you’re doing. I’ll forever be grateful for the automatic installation option provided by hosting companies.

Hopefully these links will better prepare you for setting up your blog the way you want.

Good luck!

Technorati Tags: Blogging, Wordpress, Wordpress blog

It’s that time of the week again. I came across a few gems!

1. First up is Write to Done’s ‘10 Free Resources Every Writer Needs‘. While most of the resources don’t apply to me or interest me. This post made the top of the list because I found a link to a free copy of Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr.
2. Freelance Switch listed ‘9 Tips for Brand New Freelancers’. One, five and seven are areas I need to concentrate on.
3. Do you know how many Google Apps there are? Neither do I. But here are 50 Useful Google Apps for Writers. Some of these I know and use, others came as a surprise! I’m going to have fun trying them!
4. Robust Writing hands us a very effective ‘Key to Concise Writing‘.
5. Scribbizy had an excellent post on productivity. Since I have a real problem with focus these days, this post about ‘Ten Minute Online Productivity Strategies‘ is a god send. If you’re doubting the strategies – don’t. I successfully implemented them. My productivity in those 10 minutes was more than it would have been in 2 hours had I been left on my own.

There we have it. The five posts I found useful this week. I hope you do too. I’d love to hear about your favourite links of the week.

Till next week!

Nothing like a weekly post to tell you how fast a week goes by. I’ve recovered from the flu which saw me sleeping for 10-12 hours a day, thanks to all the flu meds that seem to have so much sedatives in them. All that’s past me now and I’d much sooner forget being weak as a babe. This week saw me reading and loving the following posts.

1. The Renegade Writer’s Blog has an excellent post about distracted writers. It was like Linda was inside my head when writing the post. Of course, I was no where near as constructive about my lack of focus as Linda. Must learn.
2. Robust Writing tackles the problems of overstatements in writing.
3. Thinking of starting a freelance business? Freelance Folder has an excellent post that covers the basics of starting a freelance business.
4. I’ve been curious about e-books for a while. So it was a joy to read Confident Writing’s guide to compiling a free e-book. Joanna offers great resources that got her started. I’m thinking it will make for a great fun project!
5. This one’s my favourite. I love books and can never have enough of them! Allena Tapia has an excellent list compiled about writing books. Check out her top ten books to get your freelance writer for Christmas.

I hope you enjoy them as much as I did! And with these gems SLOD takes your leave. Till next Sunday! Before then watch out for a post about a certain stubborn muse I know.

Not the best of names but I’m drowning in cough syrup. Why do they have sedatives in them anyway? I also have a killer flu and I do not have the energy to post anything that would take more effort than this.

When I did a post on ‘5 things I’m doing wrong at the base’, one of the things I acknowledged I wasn’t doing was a weekly round up of links I loved. I’ve decided to remedy that. Therefore, every Sunday, I’ll be featuring (not necessarily) five links that I’ve found helpful.

Therefore, presenting you with my very first SLOD.

1. Blogger dad talks about going from a blogging newbie to pro in three months – A tongue in cheek post it may be, but he just described what I do as a blog reader perfectly. Well, except for the pictures bit. I never have any time to look at them.
2. You have to check out Rachael’s Words on Writing. She has excellent posts about Ten proofreading tips and 16 proof reading errors our brain doesn’t want us to see. I missed out quite a few all the errors except one! Be sure to check the comments. There were a few more mistakes that Rachael pointed out in them.
3. As a new freelancer, Davina’s post about fear closing in struck a chord. Right now, I’m scared of so many things regarding my freelancing that its making me mad!
4. Blogging without a blog has an interesting post about the unseen benefits of commenting. I hadn’t thought of commenting in quite that way but it’s certainly motivation to comment more!
5. A blog to read daily and over and over again is Daily Writing Tips. For some unexplainable reason…every time I comment on that blog my English goes out the window – literally! Want an example? Check out my two comments at DWT’s latest post about irregular verbs. Then come back and find the faults in the sentence I corrected. “Correction: I refuse to even imagine a time where such (bad) grammar was a norm.” Go on, don’t spare my feelings.

On a closing note, I added the word link to the title because the abbreviation of Sunday Overdose was SOD which might not be funny, but in my current state, I’m very amused by it!