Module 3 - Optional Blog Task

5 Rules for Creating a Great Blog (Well worth the read)

1. Transparency: Great blogs are blog that leave no question of their motives, who their parters and affiliates are, and who their authorship is. Transparency means that no matter what the blog is about, the readers know what they’re getting into. Because transparency is really about trust. Great blogs have earned the trust of their readers through their posts, their opinions, and their engagement. But they are also not misrepresenting themselves, or the reason why they’re blogging in the first place. At the end of the day, trust is the only real currency in the blogosphere, and people who read blogs have the expectation that they’re getting at the truth — in whatever form the truth is to them. And because there is the presumption of truth, readers will often react in an intense fashion to being manipulated, hoodwinked, and otherwise bamboozled.

ACTION: Do reveal as much as you can about yourself in the about page; Do reveal potential influences on your blog, particularly the monetary ones; Do communicate how advertising and content are separated; Do communicate when your content isn’t because its sponsored.

2. Authenticity: Great blogs are ones which are startlingly “real”. They give the details and the raw juicy information in a way that only the author is able to deliver. In that way, authenticity is really about delivering a uniquely fascinating experience — with the emphasis on “unique”. And being the unique experience means that its the sum of all of the elements on your blog which are part of the authentic blog; and beyond the literal parts, such as the logo, the color scheme and the wordpress theme (if you’re using wordpress), it also reaches deep down into the special content that bloggers are privvy to, the voice that they communicate in, and the personality that the blog exudes. Authentic blogs are blogs with a great deal of unmistakable personality that you just can’t find anywhere else.

QUESTION: What is the blogging landscape that your blog lives in? Where does your blog fit in? Do you know what your voice is? What can you bring to your blog that no one else can? What kind of personality does your writing project? How can you make your entire blog congruent to that personality and voice? Where can you find content that is uniquely reflective of your own experiences?

3. Integrity: Great blogs know what they stand for, and what values are meaningful to them. Integrity means standing up for those values when the winds of change might call for any blog to be challenged by them. Often times, it means saying “No”, when everyone else is saying “Yes, Yes, YES!”, and the courage to do so even if you risk the chance of being unpopular. Having integrity can be particularly challenging when you’re starting out, as when you have the feeling no one reads your blog, you tend to devalue it yourself. Devaluing your own work is a step away from making all kinds of concessions because you start thinking that no one is looking — or no one will know. But if you’re in it for the long haul, caving in can have disastrous consequences as the record will exist for perpituitiy, and the blogosphere will remember. Blogs are funny that way. They’re derided as mentally delayed cousin of other more mainstream media, but even amongst their own, are often held to a higher standard. Whether its paid advertising from a company that you’ve called out on, entering a partnership with a blogger you’ve publicly denounced, or suddenly changing your value judgement on a critical news piece, integrity has a funny way of calling attention to you in a most unappealing light. Great blogs are able to stand tall for what they value, and have justly earned their respect for doing so.

THOUGHTS: What does your blog stand for? What does it NOT stand for? What are you willing to compromise for the sake of more publicity? Traffic? Money? Would you ever cave in “real” life if someone made the same offer to you? Why would your blog be any different?

4. Passion: Great blogs are written with an incredible passion for the topics at hand, and much like great sex, it can’t be faked. Passion and intensity for your topic is something that’s palpable and energizing, and what I call the “X-factor” behind a great blog. And its the litmus test behind your blogging efforts. If you find you can’t work up the energy and enthusiasm to get excited about your own blog, maybe its time to start asking yourself some hard questions about whether you need to change your goals (or blog). Because if you’re not excited, your readers will know — and they sure as heck won’t be. Passion is the energy of emotion. Its what motivates righteous anger and incandescent outrage. But it also adds verve to thoughtful insight, compassion to solicitous pleas for help, and a quivering sense of excitement behind a long awaited piece of news. Passion is what elevates blogs that have otherwise stale nonsensical content into something immenently readable, and it shoots into the stratosphere blogs that have something fresh, innovative, or insightful to say.

REFLECTIONS: How excited were you about your last post? Were you bored? Did you sound bored? Do you think your readers noticed? How many of them wrote comments to tell you what they thought about your post?

5. Engagement: Great blogs live in an ecosystem of thoughts, opinions, ideas and personalities, and are active participants in those relationships. They are engaged. Engagement means actively participating on other blogs. It also means replying back to emails and comments. It means growing and cultivating your own readership. It means contacting and creating relationships with like minded (and sometimes not) bloggers. And sometimes (often times), using your blog as a platform to rebut, support, or even start opinions on a given issue. Blogs that can afford to exist in vacuums are blogs that are powered by individuals who have fame or fortune outside of the blogosphere, and are bringing that to their blog. However, for the rest of us who are not celebrities, our blogs need to grow organically, using the rich loam of networks and relationships to grow, and the collegial debate of ideas to encourage it to be strong and resilient.

ProBlogger (nd)
Retrieved February, 6^th, 2007 from
http://www.problogger.net/archives/2007/01/09/the-rules-behind-creating-a-great-blog/

Module 3 - Legal Issues Task

Legal Issues/ Copyright Laws

Question1. Have you used images or words on your web page or website that contravene copyright laws?
Answer:On this learning Log, I have used the image of a PC with a wave splashing through it (left), that I downloaded from a clip-art website. The website states that the animations and graphics on the site are 'Free for personal use only, so I feel its OK for me to use this graphic as long as I don’t use it for commercial purposes.

Question2. Would you be in breach of copyright if you put the Curtin logo at the top of your web page for an assignment?
Answer:I’m actually using the Curtin Logo for with my university studies, http://malcolmsresourceproject.blogspot.com/ and I feel that using the Curtin logo in this case because I'm an enrolled student would be OK under the 'fair dealings' rule of the Australian Copyright Act.

Module 3 - Optional Standards Task

5 Rules for Website Writing/Design

Lead with Interesting Text : Online readers scan pages for information, if they don't find the information quickly they will get bored and look elsewhere, so capture their interest by putting the best content of the web page at the top of the page.

Inform with Interesting and Meaningful Links: Web visitors decide in a matter of seconds whether your page is worth reading, When you choose bland content neutral words for your hyperlinks they lose interest, make the links interesting, so they are enticed to investigate further.
Another way to make your links more interesting is to follow them with a Blurb. A blurb is a short paragraph that previews what's on the other end of the link.

Employ Consistent Navigation Throughout The Website : Put a Home link in the upper left corner of very of every page, but if your website has more than six pages put a link in at every other page. You should group your pages according to function (an archive, a marketing page, catalogue, membership directory etc.) and give each main section it's own local table of contents. You should provide links on every page to the main sections of your website.

Chunk The Text : Chunking means breaking up the text so readers do not see a solid block of text. Text that has been chunked effectively should stand alone and work well with the rest of the hypertext document. Chunked text improves screen reading by giving the eyes a rest and helps the reader retrieve and process information more quickly and remembering it longer.

Simple Website Design : Most Internet users don.t search for a WWW to be impressed by the graphics the web author has used, they go for the information contained there in. Sop when designing and laying out a website take it easy on the animated/ large graphics and flashing buttons, not only does it take longer for the page to download, but it can be annoying and detract from the information on the site. If a site is taking a long time to download some user will simply give up and look for the desired information elsewhere

Module 3 HTML task

Well I've now finished the HTML task for module 3 and it seemed quite straight forward. I found it easy to understand, although I had to read lesson 14 ( bulking and splitting ) a couple of time to get a handle on it. When it came to uploading the file I was going to use the FTP software I downloaded for module 1 but when I came to use it the 30 day trial period had passed. I removed t downloaded it again, but it seems I had to by the software to keep using it . So I decided to use Filezilla to upload the file to the presentations area at Curtin. Unfortunately I wasn't familiar with Filezilla and had to ask for assistance from my fellow students. After my confusing cries for help were answered, It was suggested that I use the upload facility at the presentations area. Why didn't I think of that <:) I did this and everything went smoothly... well not quite, I had to muck around with the files to get them to work properly and now everything is fine...well almost, I still have to fix the lava graphic that's gone AWOL, I've probably written the tag incorrectly.
Overall I have enjoyed & learnt quite a lot doing this module 3 task, but as I have said previously, it will take a lot of practice before I am proficient at writing HTML.

Study Update

Because of a few of life's dramas, I've been neglecting my blogging and have fallen a little behind with my studies, But now everything has been sorted and I can now catch up, which I don't see any problem doing .
In my last entry I had just started module 3, well I'm still on module 3 working my way through the lessons (currently on lesson 9) and have found them to be enjoyable and easily to comprehend... remembering HTML tags is another story, but I guess that will come with lots of practice.

I've also made a hard copy of all the HTML lessons so I can do some revision wherever I go. I think I may be turning geeky :-)... not that there's anything wrong with that!

ICQ Revisited

I had yet another attempt at the ICQ task and again NO RESULTS FOUND I'm starting to think that there is a glitch in the system somewhere stopping me from finishing that task.

Now for my change of heart ... At first I wasn't sure if I liked this type of thing, but I must say that since becoming more familiar with the software I can see how people can be drawn to it, it's a very interesting medium, and for anyone wanting to converse with someone on subjects ranging from Ants to Love to Zebras it's not a bad way of doing it. I do think that it's purely for adults, children if allowed to use the software should be monitored at all times, after all, there's some creepy people in cyberspace.

Module 3 update

Last night I finished reading the module 3 readings (links) and then printed out and read the html tutorial, I found it to be a well written tutorial, really interesting and the content surprisingly easy to understand, but having said that, I reckon a person would have to PRACTICE A HELL OF A LOT to become fluent in writing html, I suppose that's why you can get software like Dreamweaver to make the whole process easier.

But personally I would like one day to be able to be fluent with html as it would be much more beneficial for students studying the Internet to understand and implement the "behind the scenes" of web sites.

Update

Last night I finally read the module 3 introduction and will continue to read from the links supplied over the next few days. I have also began to collate my on going resource project which I will publish it soon on this blog or start a blog especially for that purpose.

I also checked out some other students blogs and noticed Anna's ICQ task, which has confused me even more as I typed exactly the same in the appropriate boxes and received no results found??? Computers are fickle things aren't they %-)

Yet another attempt at the ICQ task

I have again attempted the ICQ tasks by logging on, going to the add/find contacts window typed NET11ers and then advanced net studies and still I get NO USER FOUND !!!!!

Alternate Task

I downloaded and installed the mIRC software for the 30 day trial, using the username ITSME in the options menu, then added the following server iinet.wa.au.austnet.org to the list.

I then tried that server and after a couple of attempts it connected, when the favourites window popped up I joined the BEGINNERS group and another window popped up for chatting with a list of other users you can talk too. I was going to add step by step illustrations of my progress through this task, but for some reason I can't drag and drop or cut and past a print screen to this blog???

Finally, although I've learnt quite a lot during the last two tasks (never used this type of software before) about ICQ and mIRC chat I don't think I will be using it in the near future, but if I had to choose I would use mIRC type software, as ICQ seems to be more relationship/dating related which doesn't interest me.