We’re really excited about the next version of wordpress coming out, version 2.9.

WordPress 2.9 brings major new “bling” to the table. As a reminder of WordPress 2.8, you can see the writeup that Jonathan Dingman brought us last time around.

Features include new or enahnced plugins and flexibility for managing themes (design), and content:
Image Editing, Custom Post Types, Comment Meta, Metadata API, Database Repair Script

Further reading - 10 things you need to know about wordpress 2.9

It has got to be this one from Opera.

Try and watch the video below and try not to laugh, the guy demo’ing these amazing face gestures tries hard not to

 Opera Face Gestures

The other pranks and spoofs this year are well documented on Techcrunch.

Everyone has a list of essential applications for their Mac.

And to emphasize the “Free” in freelancer most of these that I’ve listed cost nothing, or at least free for the standard version.

If you’ve just got yourself a new Mac and totally clueless what to install, or if you are looking for alternatives for some applications you are currently using in your Mac, the following list might come in handy as a useful reference guide.

• Daily essential Mac Apps from Remy Sharp
• Open Source Mac
• 100 free useful applications for mac part 1

Some of these apps have been converted to iPhone apps to, which can work seamlessly with cloud based services.

Some of my thoughts from a recent workshop I attended at The Werks, titled “Developing and demonstrating your reputation“.

The beauty of a workshop about this, is that it doesn’t apply to just web industry, see what points you think you offer and perhaps start working on the others!

Why do some people seem to get all the interesting projects to work on, and be able to easily go from one project to the next? Why are some people able to charge higher daily rates than others?
Here’s a list of reasons why :

1. Employers require from freelancers, that they are pleasant, eloquent and ‘get it’ – no matter what industry you are working in. Also get on well with their in-house full-time staff.
2. Clients want you to do job more quickly than full time employees – there is no shorthand way of communicating with a client or freelancer, it all depends on how are you working with them – you can make it easy, open or hard and slow.
3. You should be honest, and face up to problems by communicating when ‘don’t get it’.
4. Do it on time, especially if you have been drafted in to complete a tight deadline, but if you don’t deliver that will let you and your reputation down.
5. Do it well – quality of work – should be bulletproof, and stand up to audits and reviews, ie: accessibility (WAI) and semantic code (W3C) standards.
6. Price (not the most important in this list – if your reputation is good, you will be worth your costs) unless new clients find you on forum – like freelancers.net will be price only as they wont see the other thing.
7. From what I have learnt from quite a few years contracting and running my own business, you should be proactive with your clients and you suppliers. Be clear what you can offer clients as part of your services/brand.
8. Provide case studies of how you have worked in the past. Testimonials always help as clients can identify with other people hiring you for work.

What works for you? Let me know because this list is obviously not a holy grail, just a list of pointers to make you work more effectively with your employers by providing extra value for them and strengthening your reputation at the same time.

Fantastic link posted today by Jeffrey Zeldman, created a lot of laughter today on Twitter.

Every web freelancer must either sympathise with his thoughts, or can learn when to walk away from dubious projects with new clients.

20 signs you don’t want that web design project

In a matter of hours the blog post has around 80 comments and growing, it’s one of those posts where the comments are just as valuable, worth reading!

Google have announced that there is now a chance to completely customise your webmail inbox.

In the past this has only been possible by using greasemonkey or other javascript themes that only work on Firefox.

To customize your Gmail inbox, go to the Themes tab under Settings. There will be extra themes added over the next couple of days.

As for which theme to choose, I like the “Minimalist” and “notebook” Gmail theme. But the theme that all the ‘geeks’ will blog about is “Terminal”.

Screenshot of Notebook Theme:

A classic book written by Google’r Jeff Veen.

What you have to do to get your copy, either add Sitepoint as a friend on Twitter, or visit Twitaway.com.

You have 12 days from now to download this. Completely gratis.