You can create frames around your photographs using any background image you want for the frame—without creating new graphics. Just use this easy table technique:

<.table background="bg_name.jpg" width="220" height="300">
<.tr><.td align="center" valign="middle">
<.img src="yourPhoto.jpg" width="180" height="250">
<./td><./tr><./table>

You'll have to adjust the sizes to fit the picture you're framing and the width of the frame border you desire. Change the image source to reflect your image and add the path to image if it's kept in a different directory. The align=center centers the picture horizontally inside the table, and the valign-middle centers the picture vertically.

You can get even fancier by using CSS to define and color the frame borders. Amazing frames can be created with a little imagination and experimentation.

» Note: In code examples I had to include a period after the left arrow brackets in order to make it show up on the page. The blog software even interprets the character entities as code. To use the code example you'll have to remove the periods.

There's a spanking new web site coming online designed to review products and services for the average user. What does this mean to you as a vendor?

It means users won't be bored with high-brow editorializing, techy terms, and egos that think they have to sound officious and sterile so they sound like an expert. In other words, your product, if accepted for review, will be written about in a friendly and personal way the average person can strongly identify with—and that should translate to more sales!

As a consumer, it means you can find honest reviews that are easy to understand. The reviewer also rates his or her own level of expertise with the reviewed material. So many times reviewers pretend to be experts and aren't, or are experts and make everything seem easier than it really is. With this system you'll have a much better idea if a product or service is suitable for your needs and your own level of expertise. 

You'll find this site here: http://www.i-critique.com. It's just now in the construction stages but keep an eye on it. I'll be offering some of my products for review as soon as they're taking requests. It costs nothing, except for providing a copy of your product or use of your service for review purposes. That's nothing compared to the publicity this will bring when the site catches on.