How I Blog: Mike Werner
This is the sixteenth post in our “How I Blog” series. To read the rest, visit the archives. Interested in participating? Drop us a note about ‘How I Blog’ along with a photo or yourself or your blogging space at tips [at] blogmedia [dot] biz.
Mike Werner, Motorcyclist, Blogger.
I run several motorcycle related sites, the biggest being motorcycle news (news.motorbiker.org and blogs.motorbiker.org). I started writing in 2001 and have blogging migrated platforms several times.
I am Dutch, but live in Normandy, France and Florida, USA. I travel around the world to cover motorcycle events for my blog, or to post stories for my travellog. When I cover an event, I like to get the news out when it’s hot and fresh. For that, I travel to the event by motorcycle, and have my office built-in. I ride a BMW R1150GS motorcycle, which is a very steady and realiable bike, and it can carry 100’s of pounds of equipment.
I’ve equipped the motorcycle with a Garmin GPS, and in the sidecases are my portable computer, 3 Nikon cameras, GSM/GPRS Palm Treo 650 phone (plus backup phone) and enough cables to sink a ship. Communications between phone, computer and me (in my helmet) is via Bluetooth. (Oh yeah, my rolling office comes with a built-it bar. On my back is a CamelBack -blue tube in the photo – with 2 liters of a mysterious liquid ;-))
Once at an event, I take photos (digital), run back to the motorcycle, transfer the photos, write up the article and send it off (either WiFi or GSM).
This photo was taken last year when I was covering the Dakar race, in the South of Spain.
The software platform I use is unsual for most bloggers; it’s based on IBM/Lotus Domino and the freeware DominoBlog.com. The advantage of using this extremely good software is that I can create my blogs offline, including visualization, and when I’m happy, go online and upload. This means I have a copy of all my work on my PC.
DominoBlog also enables me to send emails to the blog, so if I’m not equipped with my portable computer, I can make photos with my camera phone, type in the text (small keyboard, but you get used to it), and then email it to the server via GSM. The software then publishes it, including photo.
When I’m not on the road, I’m in my office in Normandy sending out daily news bits about the motorcycle world.
Mike Werner resides in Paris, France and blogs at both news.motorbiker.org and blogs.motorbiker.org.
