Reflections ideas

Overview/Introduction: the main idea of my introduction would be reflections on my first experiences with online writing communities and some of the useful applications I can use them for (Wikitravel in URI Travel Writing class, general use in planning trips; blog use for entertainment value, potential advertising and networking uses; web design applies to a very wide range of subjects and is in high demand in job skills today)

Enthusiast blog reflection: I enjoyed this project quite a lot, it was very interesting to start a blog and write about something I'm personally interested in. It may be difficult to gain interest and an audience, but even without the gratification of viewers, the experience is enjoyable and potentially very useful in professional endeavors (see above)

Wikitravel reflection: It was also very satisfying to contribute my personal knowledge on something I am intimately familiar with to a large-scale community that the entire world can see. While lacking the same applicable use of a blog or web redesign skills, Wikitravel offers a much more casual use for people interested in new places or planning trips. (Focus mainly on first idea, or develop on latter, or create a new idea as well)

Web Redesign reflection: Experiences with web design open up a host of opportunities if explored in-depth. Getting our feet wet with this project was the equivalent of getting our foot in the door, but extensive web design skills allow a very useful means of furthering personal and professional lives. Especially for people involved in businesses, or in contact with them, most everyone that sells or wants to sell something wants to cater to an online audience, etc.

SNS reflection: Social networking for a positive cause allows mass gatherings of people with a common goal. The difficulty lies in attempting to get the project off the ground, but with enough effort and support, change can be enacted. Outside of the realm of causes, networking can be very rewarding personally and professionally as well. Connecting with other people fosters rewarding relationships on any level. (Focus ideas)

Portfolio theme ideas

1. Breaking into the field of online writing (blogs, online writing/information environments, etc). This would be the most likely candidate for a portfolio theme, since during the course of this semester I had my first experiences with a variety of online writing communities and endeavors, and as such is the most prominent concept I've been engaged with. The difficult thing about this theme is presenting the idea, especially to people have had extensive experience with online communities and tools.
2. Assignment experience useful for future classes. This theme doesn't seem nearly as relevant as the first, but still makes for a useful consideration. For example, Wikitravel could (and probably is) used extensively as part of the Travel Writing course here at URI. The Website Redesign could be useful in Web Design courses, and so on. This information would be mostly relevant to younger students like myself, but is still a close runner-up to my first idea.
3. Contributing to online information ecologies. As outlined in the Boyd and Bennett articles, modern technology calls for a shift in means of communication and interaction. Highlighting this concept could be a theme for my portfolio, but seems the weakest idea and most potentially difficult to express successfully. The theme would reflect the use and importance of the interactions and communications significant to the online communities we saw in this class.

Project Revision Ideas

Of the projects that we did, I think I would most like to revise projects 1 and 2 (my Enthusiast Blog and Wikitravel article, respectively). I would like to revise these projects because they are the ones that I most enjoyed and feel that I would be best able to revise.

Project 1(Enthusiast Blog): I enjoyed this project because it was based on something significant and enjoyable to me, and it was an interesting experience overall because I had never been involved with a blog before, and my first step into the field with this project was definitely an interesting one. I think I would be able to revise this project well because I enjoyed it, and because it is quite simple to edit posts, add posts, and make them longer/shorter, making revision very easily accessible. And because the topics in my blog are widely spread (rather than exclusive to one area or topic, like a written assignment), I have a lot more leeway in what I can do in my revisions.

In my revising, I mostly plan to go back through my posts and rewrite areas that are weak or wordy, establish better ethos (and maybe pathos) in my posts, and add more video or audio content. I may also add further posts if time and creativity warrant it in addition to my revisions.


Project 2 (Wikitravel): I enjoyed this project because it was also based on something important and interesting to me, my hometown. I have used Wikipedia extensively for years before being given this project, and to actually contribute some of what I know to such a large source of knowledge was very intresting and satisfying. I think I'd be able to revise this project well because there is a lot of potential content in my town that I passed over when first completing this project, so there is plenty to add in my revising. Also the tools for editing on Wikitravel made edits, posts, and revisions quite easy as well. Google Sites and Ning were both a bit more complicated.

To revise this project, I plan on adding more places and things to do to my Wikitravel page, since I was focusing more on establishing content in a balance of breadth and depth when first completing this project. Now that I can revise the page after having submitted it, I can pay more attention to breadth, and/or depth, rather than on just one. I also noticed that a lot of well-done Wikitravel pages included images of the place being described, so I will definitely add pictures to my own page to improve it. I'll also read through some "star articles" and look more closely at the language used and attempt to improve my own writing from before.

Cause Project: Finishing Touches

To put my finishing touches on our site, I've added a couple more pictures to the site (although for some reason I can't figure out, they will not show up in the picture slideshow on the main page, though they are present on the Pictures page of the site) and added/highlighted the source citations I needed to include in my blog. My last responsibility for contributing to this project is (as I mentioned in the last post) to collect and compile the links to resources we used for the project and create a site bibliography to post to or Ning group.

Overall I feel like my group has done quite a bit better with this project than in the last one. Maybe that's just because Ning is more visually satisfying than Google Sites was, or maybe it's representing (even if only on a tiny scale) a humanitarian cause, but I can only hope that my satisfaction and optimism for our project result is reflected in our grade. Ning was easy and satisfying to use, though, once you get accustomed to it. It took me longer to get used to Ning than it did for Google Sites or WikiTravel, and granted, there are a few kinks that I still haven't been able to work out (the picture issue from above), but our results for this project just feel more satisfying. Hopefully my opinion on it isn't off base.

I guess after this project is wrapped up on Wednesday, I'll have to start thinking about what project I want to revise for the upcoming assignment.

Oh, and needing to finish the enthusiast blog for Friday! I'm working on my last 3 (required) posts, hopefully I can finish those off with a bang.

Causes Project, post-peer review

Well, a couple of things got left up in the air a little bit since people were away and busy doing things over the long weekend, but we got almost all of our Ning site up to speed with the stuff we needed to do. There are still a few additions and tweaks that need to be made--I need to add a source and citation to my blog post, and we need to add more information to our Facebook Causes site (which we let slide due to working more on Ning). We also need to add a bibliography of our sources to the Ning page, which I will be taking care of. All that's left to do is the number of small, last-minute revisions and additions that usually occur in completing a project assignment.

Aside from the revisions that need to be made, our review was pretty positive. Nothing too critical, other than the coulple of suggestions to add more sources to our blogs and info to our Facebook Cause page.

I'll write more once I wrap up some of the stuff that I have to do to contribute to completing this project.

Cause Project

The project has gone well so far, though it took quite a bit of getting used to Ning and (to a lesser extent, at least so far) Facebook to be able to actively contribute online. After the group settled on a topic (anti-semitism) we started putting the (Ning) site together almost immediately. Over the next several days we've added pictures, videos, a description and welcome statement, a music file, and picked a suitable aesthetic scheme.

I've felt more confident with my contributions to the project this time around, having helped write the site description note, picked the/a song that will be used on our site, and created an order to the blog posts to most effectively highlight the common threads in our drafts. I also think the group is working together pretty well, and I definitely feel like I work pretty well with Rachel after working on the last project together. It's also easier to communicate and set goals and tasks for each person this time around, so I feel like this project is going well.

One thing that's been bothering me, though, is that I can't seem to upload a picture to the image slideshow on our Ning Cause's main page. The photos section of the site recognizes the upload, but not the slideshow. I'm going to keep trying to get it up there, but it's been giving me trouble so far. Thankfully the song upload was much easier. Hopefully the blog, event, and discussion posts will be fairly easy as well.

3 potential discussion topics

1. Splitting up [Ning] blog posts about what can be done to fight discrimination on a local/ state/regional scale between groups members (one person posts about fighting on a local scale, another on a state-wide scale, etc.)--and this way people have a backup blog topic if they can't think of something else to write about.
2. Is our group geared more toward raising awareness or providing resources to fight discrimination, or something else, and what can we do to be most effective in that?
3. What medium would we most like to use to support our cause -videos, images, articles/journals, etc, a combination?

3 blog post topics for social change

1. People that do not actually hate, but still commit intolerant acts (discriminatory/threatening graffiti, messages, etc.) still fan the flames and contribute to the problem.
2. Set the facts straight: anti-Semitism is still a problem, and though numbers are down in America, they are up worldwide [provide statistics and rates for concrete proof and reference] (basically an overview from a statistics standpoint)
3. What can be done on a local/state/regional/national scale to support tolerance and oppose discrimination (pick 1 scale--group members can split up scales for different blog posts?)

SNS articles

These two articles are quite different and take two starkly different stances in the way they analyze SNSs.

Boyd's article presents SNSs as a fact of the new world that people must comes to terms with. She demonstrates a good understanding of the functions of SNSs such as Myspace and Facebook, but seems to regard them with near contempt. She describes them as a platform from with egotists can exhibit themselves and that people can use to reach mass audiences, although she concedes that SNSs are more often used by young audiences to network in groups of friends. The tone and presentation isn't condescending, but seems weary, or simply resigned that SNSs are a reality that everyone must become accustomed to.

Bennett, however, seems much more upbeat and accepting of SNSs, and the overall message seems to communicate that the new reality of digital networking ought to be embraced and used to better shape the next generations of internet users. The message of Bennett's article is a bit harder to read, simply because the context of the writing seems dated, comparing modern internet usage to lifestyle designs of the past several generations. That isn't to say that the information isn't pertinent or useful, just that the tone is almost old-timey. The call to embrace modern lifestyle and realities is definitely a useful one, but Bennett could have helped his cause by showing that he has an understanding of some of the SNSs available today--for all the talk about accepting the modern reality, not once are any SNSs named nor intimate knowledge of their machinations demonstrated. Talking even briefly about some of the SNSs that are influential today would have added a considerable amount of ethos to the article, but even so, Bennett makes a good point in saying that the way young people live, learn, and interact is vastly different, and teaching and learning methods should accommodate this change.

Ning

I've set up a Ning account, but haven't yet created or joined a Ning network because my group hasn't settled on a topic to use for this project, and also because I'm not quite sure what to make of Ning. There doesn't seem to be a clear way of navigating the site. In fact, aside from blog links, I haven't seen that there's all that much to the site at all yet. This is probably just because I'm totally new to the site and haven't gotten accustomed to how it works or what it does, but even so, having seen what little I've seen on the site, I had a hard time imagining how it will fit into this project. A trip to Wikipedia cleared up a good deal of my confusion, however. I'm still not sure how the social networking aspect will work within the context of Ning, but now I do understand that it functions as a kind of host and archive for many social groups and networks. Once my group settles on a topic for our project, it will be interesting to see how this site functions from an inside context.

Thoughts on SNS

The first impression from this page was the pretty stale and uninteresting due to the dull presentation combined with a long page. At least they included a navigation...bar? list? I'm not quite sure what to call that thing there. But putting that aside, some parts of this article were interesting to read, namely the histories of various social networking sites (SNSs), and some of the descriptions of how they worked and what their intentions were. Although I guess that's really just my opinion as someone who didn't know where the Hell SNSs came from (they seemed to just pop up out of nowhere in 2004/2005).

As far as the content goes, I thought it was a decent crash course in the motives and functions of SNSs, but not much else occurred in the article. Judging by the abstract and the title (SNSs: definition, history, scholarship), though, a crash course may have been the desired result.

Considering the article from a rhetorical standpoint, I don't think the author did all too great a job of imparting ideas and using effective language. Most of the time I found myself bored and skipping over sentences or even paragraphs at a time if a quick skim didn't pique any interest. The language was pretty dry and uninspiring, and used (what I feel was) too many technical terms that weren't really called for, nor explained either before or afterwards. As an audience member for this article, I can't say that I feel I took much from it. The areas that shone through as interesting and enlightening were those that were written casually and naturally, seemingly without conscious effort to be eduational. Perhaps the author should have taken that approach toward the article as a whole (though of course, the intrinsic nature of the article is to educate, forcing language to reflect that purpose is counteractive).

Issues & Causes

1. wrongful convictions
2. keep arts in public schools
3. animal abandonment
4. puppy mills
5. stem cell research

Final Revisions for Web Redesign

I was looking forward to the peer review on Wednesday to see what the feedback would be for our site redesign since I was pretty pleased with it, considering what we had to work with. We must've done pretty well, because there weren't any significant changes suggested for our final revisions. Aside from a site map rewrite, mostly what got noted was small issues like font inconsistency and color, keeping the visual themes related and appropriate, those sorts of things.

So, once the peer review was over, there weren't actually that many responsibilities to divvy up amoung our group. Kelly is taking care of rewriting the (old) site map (the new one [for our site] is fine), Steve has handling the proposal memo and font-type consistency, Rachel is making sure that the Scandinavian Sun logo is on every page for a repetition appeal and consistency, and I am checking font colors and aesthetic agreements. It doesn't really feel like that much to do, but luckily that's because we did well enough before the peer review that there wasn't anything very objectionable, so I guess we should feel pretty good about that. Hopefully everything is all wrapped up and looking good for Monday so that the only thing left is to hand it in with a postwrite. This time around I'll try to keep it shorter. And then it will be onto project 4!

Site Redesign Progress

Although it's been a bit difficult to get in contact with other members of my group outside of class, I think we've all figured out who will be taking care of what as far as the last few aspects of the project before final revisions and submission. I was working a bit on what I hope is the correct way of highlighting a website template. I'm not positive about what exactly that entails, whether it's on the site itself or if it can be demonstrated seperately, but I guess I'll find out for sure when I talk to my groupmates again and can revise or add to what I've done already.

That aside, I'm looking forward to the peer review--I'm curious to see what other people think about our revised site; I'm quite satisfied with how it's come along so far. Hopefully there aren't any outstanding oversights in our redesign and we don't get any significant complaints about what we've done, although I don't think the responses will be very negative. I also don't have basis for comparison to other groups in the class, though, so I guess I can't say for sure. Once we get our feedback on the site, I hope we can all pin down exactly what each person should get done for Monday, that way we can wrap up this project as easily and effectively as possible. This is another project that I think I might feel quite proud of once we're through with it, but that does depend on what I can get done before the due date and how well I can do it. Here's hoping it all ends well!

Project 3 (Site Analysis)

So far in this project, we've had to pick a site that was in serious need of rhetorical and format reworking (which we did--Scandinavian Sun), and create a new site that essentially serves the same purpose, but is more effective in both rhetorical and formatting aspects. We also created site maps to better understand the connections of a website's pages to each other and to the main site itself. Before starting on the project itself, we also had to do a site analysis to pick out what the chosen site did well and needed to work on, so that we would know what to do in our reworked version of the site.

My group is using Google Sites to create a new website template for Scandinavian Sun, and although I am not great at site design (at least not with my current experience), I've contributed to information to multiple pages on our version of the site. Despite my contributions and my in-depth site analysis before starting on actually reworking the site, I still have a feeling that I could be doing more to help the group. Since starting the site, I have gotten a better grasp of editing, both textually and in design, so I hope to quell that feeling by the time our project is completed. I am pleased, however, that the two pages that we will be submitting for grading at the end of the project are most likely going to be pages that I have worked on and contributed to.

Palmquist - site analysis

1.) http://www.studybass.com/ (well organized)

2.) http://www.cracked.com/ (could use work)


____________________________________


1.) StudyBass.com is a tutorial site for beginner bass lessons. Since it serves an audience that is most likely unfamiliar with an/the instrument, and also may be (young and) inexperienced with the internet itself, a fairly simple and easy-to-navigate design format is used throughout the site. Each page looks largely the same, and follows an almost identical design. Main links and links to other lesson guides are present on each page, while the relevant information is located right in the middle of each page, with some peripheries to each side. The only thing to watch for is in a given lesson, a user can choose whether to look at the lesson itself, and exercise, a quiz, and exemplary songs by using respective tabs at the top of the lesson under the title. The tabs aren't very big or emphasized, so a casual user can overlook them.


2.) Cracked.com is a comedy website with a host of contributors and fans submitting and commenting on humorous articles, images, videos, and the like. While there is are article archives (in reverse chronological order, as well as a popular and greatest hits list), author archives, and an interactive "category" list of recent articles, the design layout of the homepage looks unplanned, and while there are plenty of good ideas to help the user, they are too scattered to different corners of the page to be ideally effective. That isn't to say that the site is unnavigable--it is--but the casual user may have to fumble their way through the site to find something they are looking for or are interested in, especially as compared to a site with a simpler and more effective design, such as StudyBass.com.

Palmquist

The overarching themes in Palmquist's chapter were design and organization of a webpage, and how the features of online design provides a different experience from print documents. Short descriptions of Links, Information Flags, Pop-up Pages, and Digital Illustrations follow, as well as the impact that they have on online information, as compared to printed information, and the ways that they better serve the audience. The comparisons are quite straightforward and the ways that they serve the audience are nothing surprising (having even just a basic general concept of each online aspect would allow some deduction about how it would work differently, and in some cases, better than, print).

The following section about page organization was also fairly simple, although the illustrations became less clear in what they were trying to communicate until the reader had read through the explaning section of text. Analogies to a printed page document were helpful, though, and the section ultimatley does a good job of showing exactly why site structure and organization is very important to serving an audience.

The last section gave guidelines to create a simple and effective (if basic) site format, and also shows an actual sample website to demonstrate effective use of headers, captions, fonts, links, illustrations, and the like. With a concrete, visible example right in front of the reader, the chapter is able to drive its point home and communicate quite clearly and effectively how website design and organization are important and influential in regard to effectiveness and audience.

Wikitravel Progress

I've noticed over the course of doing this project that there has been an editor or some other contributor besides Alicia and myself that has been adding and editing some of the information on the page. At first I was concerned that my work and contributions might not look as good in comparison, but I feel quite confident with what I've contributed to the Coventry page, and I'm pleased with the results of the several people working on the page.

Adding my final entries to the page was easy, and my feedback was quite positive, so I tried to keep to the way I had been contributing beforehand, and also tried to balance detail with the conciseness of the Wikitravel format. In retrospect, I'm happy with my work and the way the Coventry page has developed, especially considering that I created and started the page myself. I know the page is in no way "my baby" or anything like that, but there's a feeling of satisfaction in being able to go back to the page and know that I contributed to it, looking at it and thinking "I started this."

At first I didn't think I was going to enjoy this project very much since I'm not at all the traveling type (a very big part of the reason I did my hometown), but I did end up liking it, especially, like I said above, the feeling of satisfaction in being able to visibly contribute to a worldwide source of information. It was also nice to be able to share information about my own hometown with other people; many people that live in town are of the opinion that there is nothing to do, nothing around, but I've provided visible proof otherwise on this site that sees worldwide use. It's a nice feeling. I may contribute to other pages in the future since I have a user account now, most likely starting with pages I'm close to in proximity (like the Kent County, RI page), but even if I don't again, it was an interesting and rewarding new experience. It makes me wonder what the next projects will be.

WT progress

Well, I was kind of surprised by how easy it was to post to Wikitravel (WT). I hadn't posted to Wikipedia at all before this, so I really didn't know what to expect. It was probably easier starting a new page than adding to one that was already developed to whatever extent, since I didn't have to check out the organization of the page and make sure I fit my entries in correctly. But otherwise, it was quite easy to add to the page. I thought I would have to try to memorize the Markup and whatnot, since I didn't expect there to be little buttons for bold and italics and other effects. I hope it continues to go as well as it has so far.

Since Alicia and I are creating a new page, I'm glad we don't have to do into great detail and include every facet we know of for each category of the page, because that would take quite a lot of effort, especially considering that Coventry is highly rural. But even so, I hope to have a satisfactory page created and ready for when the project is due on Monday.

More on how things went later!

WT Draft Post Ideas

Buy

Walmart Supercenter, 650 Centre of New England Blvd, Phone: +1 401-823-7780.
The Walmart Supercenter is a larger version of the common Walmart, offering a greater selection of groceries, clothing, toys, electronics and household miscellanea, as well as a pharmacy and garden and automotive centers. Prices are typically about 25% cheaper than other stores like Stop & Shop or Target. The store is quite large, drawing customers from many of the surrounding towns, and is often crowded. Weekend trips can be lengthy and aren't advisable. Almost anything can be bought here, however, and savings are notable when compared to the cost of other stores.


Do

George B. Parker Woodland, 1670 Maple Valley Road, Phone: +1 401-295-8283
Parker Woodland is part of the Rhode Island Audobon Society, and offers free admission to 860 acres of hiking trails and nature scenery. The caretaker's house was built in the 1700s and is noted on the National Register of Historic Places. There is also a converted nature center. The trails are located at the Western side of the town where restaurants and stores are quite sparse, so make sure to bring your own food and drinks. Cell phone service is also questionable depending on your service provider.


Stay

Hampton Inn, 850 Centre of New England Blvd, Phone: +1 401-823-4041 [http://hamptoninn.hilton.com/en/hp/hotels/index.jhtml?ctyhocn=CVTRIHX|Hampton Inn - Centre of New England]
Exit 7 off Interstate 95
One of several hotels located in the Centre of New England, Hampton Inn was just recently developed in the past several years (date needed), and has already seen considerable use. Centrally located to provide fast access to any nearby town and TF Green Airport for eager travellers. AAA Hotel Rating of 3 Diamonds ("These establishments appeal to the traveler with comprehensive needs. Properties are multifaceted with a distinguished style, including marked upgrades in the quality of physical attributes, amenities, and level of comfort provided" http://ww1.aaa.com/Diamonds/prop_ratings.html?association=AAA&clb_id=014).
User Rating of 4/5 stars.

WT Manual of Style Tips

The Wikitravel (WT) Manual of Style was full of articles and tips on how best to shape a topic article, but here are 3 that stood out to me as especially pertinent and/or helpful:

1. Bodies of Water - this subject of this article isn't something that most people would think about until they actually need to start writing about a body of water, which makes sense. When someone does need to write about a body of water, this page makes it clear that said body is to be discussed under the page for the city or town that it's in. If the water is an attraction, it can be part of a See or Do itinerary, or can influence the path of an itinerary in a location near the body of water. The article isn't especially long, but it does give the basic ideas of where information about bodies of water goes and some direction about what to do with it.
2. Tone - this article was much longer, and had a lot of points that should be common sense for informed/informative and objective writing. Some of the more significant points were to avoid personal pronouns (I, we, our, my), although "you" and "your" are fine; being fair doesn't have to mean being long-winded and boring or formal; be concise; avoid cliches; and careful generalizations and humor are alright, but should be carefully considered and worded so that the intention isn't lost on, or misinterpreted by, the audience. This can be a lot to consider when writing, but allows for quality information and presentation in the article.
3. Words to Avoid - another fairly short article, but makes some good points and emphasizes the connotations of partiality in certain words and how they can be misinterpreted by the readers. Tips include avoiding empty, flowery language ("premiere, luxurious"); vagueness ("unique, severe penalties, recommended, affordable") and words that have different cultural meanings ("entree, tourist"). Again, this is a lot to remember for contributers, but it really aids the effectiveness of the language being used in the articles and contributes to the quality of writing.

Project 2: Wikitravel

My 3 potential Wikitravel pages are probably:
1. Coventry, RI
2. Greene, RI
3. Kent County, RI

Since there are no Wikitravel pages for either Coventry or Greene, RI, I could definitely make a page dedicated to either subject, as I am from Coventry and currently live there, and grew up in Greene (a village in Coventry). I know a lot about Coventry and Greene, so I feel that I could contribute a significant amount of information to a Wikitravel page about either, though Coventry would certainly have more to offer in the way of amount of content and contemporary content (information about Greene, RI is mostly from a historical standpoint).

There is a Wikitravel page for Kent County, RI, but it is not extensive and only has linked pages for 3 of the 5 towns listed on the page. As a Kent County native, I think I could provide a good deal of information to this page, should my plan to create a Coventry (or back-up, Greene) page fall through. In fact, almost every section of the Kent County page is left empty, so to contribute to the page, I would not even have to do all that much.

Though my interest in contributing to the Kent County Wikitravel page is piqued, I would prefer to create a page for Coventry, so I hope that I can follow through with that plan. If not, though, Kent County would be a nice and intresting back-up page. Either way, I'll have to do a bit of research on all of my potential topics.
Off to Wikipedia...

Wikitravel thoughts

I knew that Wikipedia had many different sub-Wikis in all manners of subjects, but I never thought that there might be a travel Wiki. Probably because I'm not the travelling type, but I digress. I'm actually quite surprised that Wikitravel hasn't been featured in one of those Travelocity commercials with the Roaming Gnome or William Shatner and Priceline.com.

Wikitravel seems like a very useful addition to the site [Wikipedia] for people who are interested in travelling (duh) or who want to learn in-depth about different countries, cities, states, and so on, especially from a common person or tourist's point of view. The concept of people being able to post additions to a specific Wiki article from any country (or state, city, so on) and be able to share information about that country with other people who are intrested seems a very handy one. All of the information gets very specific, as well, so for tourists who want to know how they would be able to get around a city, what major cities are in a country, where certain churches or airports are, what food is like, etc. Wikitravel is like a godsend for planning trips, creating itineraries, and the like.

The main drawbacks with the site are the expectations as listed in the Policies and Goals/Non-Goals sections. "All text should be fair" is certainly an expected characteristic of useful information, but being a publicly-edited source, there are definitely bound to be opinionated, derogatory and badmouthing posts. There will always be some naysayer or delinquent that takes delight in bashing someone or something or someplace, and hopefully the measures taken by the filtering and editing team will be more than enough to catch and delete any objectionable posts. Also, some of the non-goals listed are going to be difficult to enforce. There isn't even any guarantee that many Wikitravel users will read the goals and/or policies sections, nevermind abide by them. Surely many users will post content that will be in opposition with policies like "do note create a travel anthology" or "do not make an advertising brouchure" simply because users are likely to be casual contributors, and won't always write content in accordance with such rules. And if many people post contributions like that on any kind of regular basis, then filtering information is sure to be an unruly job for the team designated to do it.

That being said, Travelwiki seems like it would be an exceptional site to use in the Travel Writing class offered at URI, simply because of the fact that the purposes and objectives of the two are very likely to coincide. Should I take Travel Writing as a class toward my major in the future, I'll be sure to make use of Travelwiki. I just might add it to my list of Wikis to look at while passing the time, too.

90's blog progress

Although I'm coming along and coming into my own a bit with my blog, which is saying something considering that I had no experience with blogging before, I am finding that it is somewhat difficult to keep concise and focused without wandering in my thoughts and adding an abundance of pictures. I know that the point of a blog is to cater to yourself--that being the point of an enthusiast blog, to do things how you want to--but still, it can be a challenge to condense and trim down content to be mindful of the audience.

In particular, my most recent post, A Matter of Perspective, I cut down and cut out content several times and still feel that I wandered and wasn't very strong in my focus and point. I'm grateful that we can edit posts even after posting them, it makes things much easier and is very useful to be able to go back and reword or reformat a post.

In general, though, I'm enjoying this project and the experience that comes along with blogging; I've never written something for an audience and actually seen results and gotten feedback this way before, and to be able to create and maintain something that is my own is a very unique and gratifying feeling. Even though I've already completed a third of the number of required posts for this class, I look forward to maintaining my blog, building and engaging with my audience, and enjoying and sharing the experience, both of my blog and my memories of the 1990s. Even though assignment 1 is wrapping up, I plan on continuing my blog long after this semester is over, and doing my best to maintain it in a friendly, engaging, and well-written presentation. Wish me luck.

In-class Blog Review

So, yesterday I went into class expecting the peer blog review to be a group chat that would be a bit uninspired, a bit awkward, and maybe if I was lucky, I would get a useful piece of advice or two out of it so I could better gear my Enthusiast blog toward the audience. I've never really been very helpful at critical peer review, I usually don't see any big problems aside from grammar and syntax. I guess I'm just nice that way. But anyway, it turns out it wasn't like that at all; when I showed my blog to the group I was in, I got a far better response than I had anticipated.

I really wasn't sure what would happen when I showed my blog to whichever group I wound up in, maybe they'd be mildly interested and give me a useful bit of advice or two, or maybe they wouldn't have too much to say at all. I was psyched to find out that the people in my group really enjoyed my blog and thought it was a great idea. I'd been having a pretty good time posting entries in the blog myself, but the group response has made me much more confident and happier with my blogging. Granted, I received a lot more praise than advice (but since when is that bad? Never!), so I only have a couple ideas of what to do to modify my blog as a whole, but I look forward to posting future entries confidently and enjoying myself while I do so. I also look forward to improving how my personality comes through in my blogging and helping that along by posting personal entries (personal memories and whatnot), and generally allowing myself to come through to the audience more.

Here's hoping I'll get an even bigger audience and more positive reviews!

Progress on Psyche! (Project 1)

Well, so far creating an enthusiast blog has been interesting and enjoyable, and though it is time-consuming, creating a post that will hopefully interest and entertain the audience, it is quite satisfying viewing the results of each post.

So far feedback has been quite positive, and the criticisms stem from the same facet of my posts-their length. I will be putting more effort into keeping my posts informative and intresting but concise, because a long post is quite a turn off for more than a few readers.

Also, it has been suggested a few times that each post should probably stick to one 90's aspect and explore it in-depth before moving on to another post and another topic. My reason for including multiple topics in my post thus far has been because there are literally hundreds of different topics to potentially write about, and only so much time I can commit to posting for the class. Though I would like to dedicate a full post to every topic I have in mind, I would need to find a way to post dozens of updates without overwhelming the audience. And while I am aware that 12 posts over the course of the semester is not the maximum limit, at the moment it isn't practical for me to consider going very far over that number. I will let my audience decide what they would most like to see, and do my best to serve them as well as myself.

Enthusiast ethos

My credibility as the author of a 90's blog stems chiefly from the fact that I grew up in the 90's; it was my childhood, the decade that defined my culture and who I am as a person. As such, I have experienced many aspects of the decade from an intimate point of view, and hold extensive knowledge of many facets of the culture of the decade. Of course I plan to present my knowledge in an accessible and entertaining way, so that my blog doesn't simply rattle off various facts and trivia, but engages my audience.

Granted, given my age and place as part of a generation that grew up during the 1990's, there are literally hundreds of thousands of people who could hold an equal or even a greater amount of credibility on the subject of the 90's, and I don't dispute that fact. Regardless, I do hold a passion for the decade I grew up in and hope to create and maintain a blog that is enjoyable for me to head and my audience to read, and which allows both parties to remember and appreciate the decade we grew up in.

Enthusiast Blog

The topic I settled on for my enthusiast blog is 1990's (U.S.) culture; as a whole, this topic is probably a bit broad to work with, at least at first. But as a member of Generation Y (born ~ late 70's - ~ early 90's), more specifically, a child of the 90's, I have many ideas of the kind of posts I will make in my blog. Main ideas would be reflection on popular movies and television, music, trends, people, events, and so on. The biggest problem I anticipate with this is organization and a main idea or theme for each post. Since I have an abundance of knowledge of the 90's, I feel that this topic won't be so broad as to be unwieldly, but won't be too specific either as I'm not concentrating on one partciular facet of 90's (although 90's movies itself isn't too narrow a subject, either).

The majority of the audience that I aim to serve through my blog are my coevals (ha ha, a $10 word! Note - coeval: member of the same generation/person of approximately the same age). What I hope to accomplish with my audience is creating a sense of nostalgia and fond recollections of popular culture while they were growing up. I hope that the content of what I post will be things that the audience will find enjoyable and will want to see and read about, and reminisce about. People who aren't typically prone to nostalgia or who weren't fond of the 90's would probably not be thrilled with the kind of content I plan on posting, but I hope and plan on serving my audience well with posts about things remembered from a childhood in the same decade.

Since I aim to make people reminisce about their experiences while growing up, there's naturally going to be an air of nostalgia and fondness for the material being highlighted in my posts. But I also plan on "conversing" with the audience in a relatable way, with a knowledgable but casual, everyman kind of manner. This is something I've been able to accomplish occasionally in my writing, and I found the effect on the readers was quite pleasing-creating a feeling of familiarity and actual, casual conversation. If I'm able to reproduce this manner in my blog, I will be very pleased, and I hope the readers will be as well.
The design on my blog is not something I'm positive about yet...writing is my forte, design is not. My plan is for a design with a casual, comfortable feeling, nothing too serious or intimidating-that isn't the point of the blog. I want the ethos of the blog to be informed but friendly and engaging, and conducive to feelings of fondness and camraderie as part of a generation.

Possible Titles:
A Blog About Nothing
Show Me The 90s
Psyche! The 1990s All Over Again


Post Ideas:
See Paragraph 1, sentence 3. No spoilers yet!

Enthusiast blog possibilities

1. music related (music news? popular/underrated/new artists? music programs/sites?)
2. interesting cracked.com articles
3. more important news than celebrity going-ons
4. movies I don't like because they confuse me (warning: spoilers)
5. guilty pleasures

I really, really hope I can figure out a way to make any of these ideas function on a consistent basis.

Blog clubs

Stefanac starts her chapter acknowledging the drawback of enthusiast blogs (generally, that they will go unseen and unappreciated by the blog-viewing public) before bringing her point around to an encouraging tutorial for creating an interesting and reader-friendly (rehetoric!) blog atmosphere. As one personally at a bit of a loss for what my own enthusiast blog will be about, her words are somewhat reassuring. Her references to Mr. Jalopy's blogs and small section dedicated to showcasing several other blog sites gave plenty of examples of topic-based blogs, so I've got plenty of models to pick apart and use. At the moment, though, my pressing concern is picking a suitable interest that I can actually maintain a steady blog about for several months. I have a few ideas (see next post), but nothing concrete. Regardless of what I pick, though, I'm sure Stefanac's advice will prove to be quiet helpful for me once I settle on a damn topic!

Blogging experience

I can't say a lot about blogging in general since I'm new to it. I have read a few blogs by different people (band members, website owners, etc) to pass time or out of curiosity, but don't really follow any. I don't usually care. The concept of a blog is pretty easy to get, even without having used one before. It's a digital journal, basically. I never really have been one to write my thoughts or feelings down for too much more than completing an assignment, though everyone doodles from time to time. For better or worse, I've typically been the type to bottle those things up =) . But this being my first blogging experience as the blogger, and the seemingly easy to use system here on Blogger, I think my experiences with it in the future will be positive. And I may or may not set up another blog somewhere after I'm done with this one, but that has yet to be decided.
That's all for now!

What is Writing?

Writing is a way of communicating to serve a wide variety of purposes, be it expressing thoughts and beliefs or providing information to an audience. But regardless of the purpose for it, writing is leaving a record of a thought, a bit of information, even the fact of existing at all, for someone, somewhere, at some time, to read.

- My room

- Living room

- Libraries

I can write in most places, but preferably a place that is quiet and without too many people is best for my being able to concentrate. I'm not picky, but I usually stick to the same places out of habit.

Rebecca's Weblog History

http://www.rebeccablood.net/essays/weblog_history.html

Wow. Reading that was exhausting. I never did know where blogs came from, they just kind of forced themselves into the edges of my awareness until I actually saw some. But now that I've read the full history of blogs from inception to the turn of the century, I find myself wondering some things about their evolution.

Granted, every outlet of expression and information sharing goes through its share of changes in format and focus, but I can't see why the original blogs, weblogs, were left to toil in general obscurity so soon after they caught the computer-user's eye. The way that weblogs operated, providing a link to a webpage dedicated to specific information and including a contribution from the blogger, just seems so practical and objective. I imagine they became underappreciated with the advent of personal blogs, but even so, it seems a shame to me that so much objective material got shoved into the background of the World Wide Web. I think that the websurfing public could benefit greatly from sites so conducive to critical-thinking, as opposed to the media machines that pump out national trivia every 8 hours (read: MSN, AOL, Yahoo).

There will undoubtedly be many more changes in information sharing format over the next few years, and the way public internet users find information online may be entirely foreign to me by the time I graduate. This is quite an alarming thought, and not one I will readily accept when that time comes. With the rate of technological developments, my generation will soon be forced to adapt or be doomed to the tech-challenged reputation reserved for stubborn parents and grandparents of today before very long. The ultimatum leaves only one option to today's youth. As students in the age of technology, my peers and I must accept and adapt to change in online operations in order to survive in an ever-changing technological job market.