When we said user avatars were going to be important, we surely meant it and if you check out any one of you comment threads (which has had a few comments recently), we hope you can now see why.

Basically, now whenever you leave a comment on another Edublogs blog your user avatar will show up, and likewise, when another Edublogs user comments on your blog, their avatar will show up, linking back to their blog. Neato huh!

Now, a byproduct is that if the people leaving comments who aren’t signed in edublogs users get an anonymous avatar… but that’s easily remedied by them grabbing a free account (they can get ‘Just a username’ or a blog if they want) and uploading an avatar. It’ll take them less than a minute and it’ll also mean they won’t have to fill in all the forms next time they leave a comment.

So, head to your ‘My Profile’ or ‘Users’ tab, click on ‘Your Profile’ and get uploading straight away… you could even leave a comment below to show it off :)

So, we thought that it was about time that we had some decent publications dedicated to all you wonderful edubloggers out there, and with that in mind we’re completely proud to introduce two very special Edublogs publications edited by two very special bloggers.

First up we have The Edublogger, edited by the multi-Edublog Award nominee Sue Waters.

To put it simply, The Edublogger is a damn good resource for anyone with an edublog, thinking of getting and edublog or just wanting to know how cool having an edublog can be.

So far Sue’s got a heap of articles up ranging from getting more out of widgets, to getting yourself a blog makeover and adding photos to your sidebar. We strongly recommend you subscribe asap!

And as if that wasn’t enough, today we’re also launching our first foray into some seriousl publishing, The Edublogs Magazine, edited by none other than uber-blogger Lorelle VanFossen.

The Magazine aims to provide for all your news, views, ideas, information and general edublogging and educational technology needs, and in our first issue you’ll find articles on what’s up around edublogs, how edubloggers have fared in recent major blog awards and, of course, our welcome post where you can let us know what you think of the venture.

We’re also aiming to make it a genuine collaborative publication by edubloggers everywhere (not only on Edublogs) and we want you to contribute, so please let us know if you’d like to take part.

So, what a great way to get the year started :) I can’t tell you how excited we are to have Sue and Lorelle in these roles at Edublogs and can’t wait to see how these develop and progress over 2008!

Christmas comes early at edublogs this year, partly because the day itself isn’t much known for teaching and learning ;), partly because we want to give the team a break… and partly because we just wanna spread some cheer!

So, as of today you should have, available in your edublog:

• A snazzy new editor option (click it to get more editing options :)
• Tags for every post (and also on every theme!) – tag clouds for your sidebars etc. all coming soon
• Ten swanky new themes to choose from (two of which are pictured below)

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Unfortunately there are a few hiccoughs associated with the gift (sorry) which include:

• Themes switching back to the defaults one (FIX: just go back into ‘Presentation’ and choose the original theme)
• /s appearing in your titles and taglines (FIX: Just edit them out under ‘Options’)

Sorry for the bother with these, with one hand we giveth and with the other we annoyeth!

But most importantly, have a happy Christmas and new year from all of us here at edublogs, and we can’t wait to bring you even more goodies in 2008!

Unfortunately, EduSpaces announced today that they’re shutting up shop in January.

Needless to say that leaves a lot of bloggers looking for a new home…  and we’d like to extend them all a warm welcome here :)

One blogger who’s already made the move, Alicia Wyatt, has posted a quick ‘how to’ (and associated issues) for moving from EduSpaces to edublogs.

And if you get stuck / need some extra help please feel free to contact us at support (at) edublogs /dot/ org for assistance.

There’s a wonderful range of blogs, posts and resources in the 2007 edublog awards and included among them are some fabulous edublogs blogs.

So, we salute… and encourage you to salute too… the following brilliant edublogs.org blogs to make the shortlist this year (click on the category name to go and vote!):

Best Individual Blog

Mobile Technology in TAFE
Mobile Learning

Best Group Blog

In Practice

Best New Blog

enlighten education
Mobile Technology in TAFE
mrs. amy’s preschool press!
The Random Thoughts of Louis Schmier
Spotlight 4
thinking 2.0

Best Resource Sharing Blog

Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites Of The Day For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL
woodchurch science

Most Influential Blog Post

The Ripe Environment – Discourse about Discourse

Best Teacher Blog

Betchablog
Teaching Generation Z
Science is fun with the right teacher

Best librarian / library blog

Techno Tuesday

Best Educational Tech Support Blog

Mobile Technology in TAFE

Best educational use of Video / Visual

Mr. Smith’s History

Wow! Good luck to all of you!