Portfolio

I've started to think about my final portfolio and what platform I want to use to publish it, whether that be the repository my school owns or some other kind of software. So I've been playing around with various platforms, and I was very excited to discover that Wordpress will allow me to basically create a free website that does what I need it to do. If I pay a little extra, I could upload mp3 and movie files (for screencasts).

This is awesome. You can look at my other site here. My portfolio is currently password protected, mostly because I don't really have anything up yet. All the pages are blank.

I have a friend who is a graphic designer, and I'm thinking about asking her if she wants to create a logo and/or banner for my site. Sweet!

Homework

I was kinda bored all weekend. Weird, with what all I have to do. On Friday, I hiked to Costco for some ice-cream. That's right. Hiked. That hill is wicked steep! I also practiced my cello quite a bit.

On Saturday, I went for a walk in the morning, had a meeting, and then just played around on the computer. I finally got around to actually getting some homework done. I finished this week's project, and let me say, I'm glad I got it done on Saturday, and that I didn't procrastinate. It took me about 6 hours! Plus I still have a group project to work on. I am really looking forward to the month of May, wherein I will get some time off from school.

Podcast and Encouragement

We had to experiment with podcasting for my class this week on social software and libraries. A podcast is actually an audio series (sort of like a radio show) that listeners can subscribe to using RSS feeds. However, most people will just download the single audio files of what they want to listen to, and don't actually subscribe to the series. So what I did for my class was create an audio file. I wouldn't really call it a podcast because it isn't part of a series...yet.

So for this experiment in audio, I decided to tell the story of the original Norman Rockwell painting that our library owns. It was actually stolen and returned in 1987. My "broadcast" got a great review from my professor and classmates, so I decided to send it to my boss. He LOVED it. That was really encouraging to hear, and he's thinks it could be fun to do a series.

Community in YouTube paper

I just got my grade back on the paper I wrote on community formation in YouTube. My prof really liked it and thought I should try to publish it! That's awesome! I think it would need a bit of editing, some sections could be expanded a little, and there are still some long sentences that I could cut down. I don't know where a paper like this would fit in. I emailed the prof back to ask if she had any ideas about which publications would accept a paper like this. It isn't really a paper that has anything to do with library science.

Community and Craigslist

I just wrote a paper about community formation in YouTube, but I was thinking that perhaps I should have written about Craigslist. Here's the deal, I have a lot of personal examples about how Craigslist has influenced personal relationships. Here's a sampling:

Rob: Responded to a job advertisement posted by the pastor at church. I sat in on his interview and we hired him. Rob and I are now friends and we have been trying to create a faith-based community of high school kids.

Nate: Posted an ad for a cellist. I responded, met Nate, and now we're recording an album together. Not only are we recording, but we hang out. I've met a lot of his family and their friends. Talk about community formation. Music really does bring people together.

My Student Worker: Posted a missed connection. Found her guy because one of his coworkers saw the ad. These two found each other and dated for about 6 months.

F and Jane: You can read about them here.

I am absolutely fascinated by how many of my personal relationships (and community) have been influenced by the use of Craigslist.

A Note

Group project: DONE!

I'm a little sleep deprived and I forgot to set my alarm this morning. I was over an hour late to work. I'm glad that my supervisors allow me to be somewhat flexible in my schedule.

Researching the YouTube Community

I have to write this paper for a class I'm in about how online communities form. I decided to take a look at YouTube.

I think it is an interesting question, How DO online communities form? For example, I'm (obviously) a blogger. However, I do not really have a very large readership (that I'm aware of). I don't really interact with other people in blogger, and all I do is write. I don't comment on other people's posts, I haven't even really met anyone online so to speak. So what is my role in the community? Or am I even a part of one?

I do use both MySpace and Facebook frequently, and usually what happens there is that I'll meet someone in person and then either they will add me to their friends or I will add them. There's only one situation where I actually added someone I didn't really know... he is still on my friends list, but I wouldn't say we're REALLY friends.

However, I do believe in the power of social software... that's how I met Nathan, my bandmate. He had posted an ad on Craigslist, and I responded. We will be in the studio next month.

It is absolutely amazing to me how quickly that all happened, and I NEVER would have met Nate had it not been for Craigslist.

That's just one example of how the Internet brings people together in unexpected ways.