Publishing Principles

Mission Statement

My goal is to provide high-quality, accessible, free educational content on various software packages, hardware, and online services. Simply stated, helpful content. The website offers 150+ original articles and tutorials to help readers at all skill levels better understand and utilize technology.

Editorial Policy

I author all articles and tutorials on this website. This ensures a consistent and reliable approach to the information presented. Each article is developed with the goal of simplicity, comprehensibility, and user benefit. 

I do not accept guest posts or externally created content.

Ethics Policy

I am committed to originality and authenticity. All articles, including product reviews, are based on personal testing and use. If a vendor has supplied a product reviewed, it will be explicitly stated. Screenshots included in articles are original, taken by me.

Affiliate relationships do not influence the content or evaluations presented in our articles.

Correction Policy

I value accuracy but make mistakes. And sometimes, I disagree with Grammarly suggestions. Readers are encouraged to use the Contact form to report any errors. Once verified, the necessary corrections will be made, and the article’s modification date will be updated.

Verification/Fact-Checking Standards

I thoroughly fact-check all the content published on our website. Every effort is made to ensure the information’s accuracy, relevancy, and reliability.

I also try to maintain that outgoing links to other sources work as intended. However, some companies, like Microsoft, have an annoying habit of taking pages offline and not redirecting users to their new content or a useful page.

Content Authorship

I am the exclusive author of all content on this site. I don’t allow guest posts or sponsored content. My apologies for mentioning this point several times, but some people “haven’t gotten the memo”.

Advertising Policy

The website is monetized through online advertising via our trusted ad provider. I maintain an exclusive advertising relationship with MediaVine.

Sponsored Content/Disclosure Policy

I do not publish sponsored content. I have affiliate partnerships with various entities, including TextExpander, TechSmith, Backblaze, and Amazon. 

The presence of an affiliate relationship does not influence our content or reviews.

Content Update Policy

Our content is updated routinely to ensure the relevance and accuracy of the information provided. Updated articles maintain the same URL with a new modified date. I also try to maintain the same image URLs when I update them.

Occasionally, irrelevant content, such as articles about discontinued products or outdated technology, may be removed. Think of things like Palm, Pocket PCs. I deleted much of that content when I switched over to WordPress. If there is an old article you need, I may be able to find it in the Wayback Machine .

User Comments Policy

We currently do not provide a comments section for users. Been there and done that. Sadly, monitoring the comments for spam and irrelevant content takes too long. However, feel free to send me questions or comments via the contact page.

Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

AI is used in certain aspects of content production. 

  • I use Grammarly to help catch spelling and grammar mistakes.
  • I may use AI to provide suggestions for a post’s meta description.
  • I may use AI to provide suggestions for the post excerpt.
  • I have experimented with AI from Descript for video narration of the scripts. I wrote the script, but am not using my voice.

I don’t use AI to write articles, as it doesn’t sound like me. I find AI-written content is wordy. And sometimes, it just makes stuff up. I don’t envision AI writing my content, but if I do use it, I’ll alert users.

On the other hand, it is good at short, focused tasks such as excerpts and meta descriptions. I can provide my article so the AI has context and ask for suggestions. 

I’ve also been experimenting with using AI to suggest article titles. I’ve written many articles with a title starting with “How to.” The problem is when I looked at the search results page (SERP), I noticed too many times when authors had the same title. That makes it harder for the reader as it looks like a “sea of sameness”.

In some ways, AI reduces the time it takes me to write or update an article. But creating and rewriting the prompts can be exhausting. The good thing is it does teach you to be specific and disciplined. And yes, when I find a good prompt, I save it to TextExpander.

I will be writing more about AI because people need to know how to use it and understand its limitations. Just like any tool, it can be misused. But it can also be exceedingly helpful such as helping people understand code.

Modified: 3/16/2024