Do you blog?

Blog- first named "weblog". In simple terms, it is an electronic journal you could update. Blogs are used in many different ways; some use them as a diary, some to share work from a class or work setting, and informational blogs. despite what you write in a blog, you can add pictures, videos, projects, links, etc.

*Key terms*

Blog: online journal

Blogger: person writing/updating a blog

Blogging: the process of writing or updating your blog

One particular site used for blogs is Blogger. It was launched in 1999 and has been the home for millions of blogs since the start.

I have personal experience with Blogger (hence I am writing this post on Blogger). I had never had a blog until my Elect Comm class this Spring semester. My blogs consist of the work I have done for this class and my reactions to the work. So far I have about 4 or 5 postings (more to come because the class is not over) and along with written reactions I have pictures, links and animations.

Since I only have experience with Blogger, I will mostly give information about this site.

Some of the key features Blogger offers are:

1. Blogger Comments: Anyone is allowed to comment and give feedback on your blogs. The comments you don't want on your blog can be deleted by you. Posts can be an optional choice per blog.

2. Access Controls: This is for deciding who can see and comment on your blogs. There are options in which there is more than one author, or a single author for personal items.

3. Blogger Profiles: The privacy settings give you the options to to be found, if search for, let others see certain things in your profile (interests, name, etc). This setting can be removed for safety or personal preferences.

4. Templates: To personalize your blog, you are offered different blog templates that come already made and if preferred you can change the HTML to your liking.

5. Custom colors and fonts: As with any other website, you can change the font and color to your liking.

6. Drag-and-drop page elements: You have the option to add any animation or picture and choose where it goes.

Caslon Analytics Blogging states the following:

"In July 2006 the Pew Internet & American Life Project estimated that the US "blog population has grown to about 12 million American adults", some 8% of US adult internet users. The number of US blog readers was estimated as 57 million adults (39% of the US online population), although few of those people read widely or read often. David Sifry reported in April 2007 that growth in the number of blogs created had slowed - "matured" - with other observers noting that the percentage of active blogs are compared to the total number of blogs tracked by Technorati was declining, down from 36.71% in May 2006 to 20.93% in March 2007".

"In July 2003 BlogCensus suggested that there were 701,150 "sites we think are weblogs", of which 380,657 appeared to be in English. It claimed that Portuguese, (with 54,496 blogs), Polish (42,677) and Farsi (27,002) were the next most popular languages - well ahead of French (a mere 10,381) and German (7,736). On a per capita basis the language with highest blog penetration appeared to be Icelandic, with 3,542 blogs. "

*LINKS*

http://hnn.us/articles/1572.html

http://www.blogger.com/tour_start.g

http://www.geardiary.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/blogger.png

http://www.dailyblogtips.com/wp-content/uploads/blogs.jpg
http://www.blogger.com/tour_con.g

http://www.caslon.com.au/weblogprofile1.htm

Animated font poem- Assignment #4

This project I thought was rather difficult the whole time I did it. Getting the poem together and making the pictures wasn't a challenge. It was putting the words in the animation form and getting the pictures together. I had hoped to add more animations to the words but as I kept going and following my notes I still couldn't figure it out. I made the choice of just having the words appear (as you see above) in different orders but looking the way it does on the regular non animated poem. I do love how the pictures go together from the blending of one set of colors to the next, it does look very appealing I think, and that makes me happy.

One of the big challenges I faced was when I was making the words into separate slides. This was difficult because numerous times the placing of the words didn't look right and when I tried to get animations just for the words it didn't work so that process was frustrating. One of my fellow students helped in making the words look appealing in the separate slides so that made it not so stressful anymore. The last problem was when I had thought I saved my work I accidentally deleted it and the work I had done for two hours had to remade.

What I enjoyed about this project was gaining the knowledge and experience to be able to do similar and advance projects in the future using Photoshop. I was able to teach my boyfriend how to do this project and by teaching it I was better aware of what I had to do.

I am most proud of the final outcome of the project. I think the words go together in a good order when they appear and the photos are awesome and just bring the whole project and meaning of the poem together. If I had more time I think I would have made the words look better with animation and better layout affects. But I am happy I was able to successfully complete this project.

Font poem- Assignment #3

The third assignment was taking the animated postcard and put a poem to it.

The most enjoying part was being able to successfully complete this project. I stressed about it alot, but in the end I was able to make a project I'm happy with.

If I had more time I think I would've been able to make the words animated. I wasn't sure how to do it and it became too late to fix it. I don't have photoshop on my laptop and I commute to RWU which doesn't give me the time to work on these types of things.

I wanted to put emphasis on the word "if" because not only is it the first word in the poem but if read out loud then it makes you wonder "yeah, what if". The same with "just". If you read it and actually put it out then it could make or break your message.

"Good enough" is in all caps because thats the message of the poem. Being good enough is equivalent to being perfect, and that is how some societies want us to be.

"Life" and "Easy" go hand in hand because in life things don't come easy. In reality nothing that comes easy is worth it. You have to live life with some challenges to really enjoy it.

"Nobody" is emphasized because different people would think maybe there is nobody to show me how to live my life "growing up"

"Hard" is what sums up the whole poem. It concludes that life is worth living if your able to enjoy the hardships.

Overall, the project was challenging and it made me push myself to get the work done in a way that made me happy. I'm glad with the final product and I can teach others how to do it was well.