Tamara's Blog » Weblogs

What is Technorati?

tamaraauer — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 08:17:28 +0000

Technorati is an Internet search engine for searching blogs.

Here are some interesting blogs I have come across:

This Flat Bulb an interesting bulb design. It seems like when something revolutionary is developed future designs tend to be very similar. Is there a good reason for light bulbs to be round? “flat bulb is designed by korean designer joonhuyn kim.

Boing Boing

Boing Boing is a weblog of cultural curiosities and interesting technologies. It’s the most popular blog in the world, as ranked by Technorati.com, and won the Lifetime Achievement and Best Group Blog awards at the 2006 Bloggies ceremony.

Ars Technica – the Art of Technology. News, analysis, and in-depth coverage of technology.

The Official Google Blog

The Blog Tutorial Exercises Stages 4 and 5

tamaraauer — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 05:09:11 +0000

Task 4.1 Finding your voice
Article Summaries:
“10 Tips on Writing the Living Web” by Mark Bernstein:
1. Write for a reason – my reason is to document my learning in this subject and to publish my responses to activities.
2. Write often – I must write blog posts frequently
“If you cannot write for a time, and the reason for your absence is interesting, write about it.”
3. Write tight “Omit unnecessary words.”
“…Read your work. Revise it. Don’t worry about being correct…”
4. Make good friends – I will make sure others add me to their blogrolls
5. Find good enemies – I’m not sure about this one unless I try to start a debate about e-learning.
When it’s over, try to make good friends with good enemies.
6. Let the story unfold“The Living Web unfolds in time, and as we see each daily revelation we experience its growth as a story. Your arguments and rivalries, your ideas and your passions: all of these grow and shift in time, and these changes become the dramatic arc of your website.”
7. Stand up, speak out“If you know your facts and have done your homework, you have a right to your opinion. State it clearly. Never waffle, whine, or weasel.”
8. Be sexy“Undressing, literally, figuratively, or emotionally, has always been a powerful force in personal sites and web logs. Pictures don’t matter in the long run; what matters is the trajectory of your relationship with the reader, the gradual growth of intimacy and knowledge between you.”
9. Use your archives
“When you add something to the Living Web and invite others to link to your ideas, you promise to keep your words available online, in their appointed place, indefinitely. Always provide a permanent location (a “permalink”) where each item can be found. Do your best to ensure that these locations don’t change, breaking links in other people’s websites and disrupting the community of ideas.”
10. Relax!“Don’t worry too much about correctness: Find a voice and use it. Most readers will overlook, and nearly all will forgive, errors in punctuation and spelling.”

“How to write a better weblog” by Dennis A. Mahoney: The two main points are – Offer Something New and Amuse Your Readers.
“If you want to share an anecdote or story from your life, pretend the readers weren’t there. Because they weren’t. “You had to be there” never makes a joke funny…Readers crave your anecdotes and stories. They really do. So give ‘em the whole megillah. Instead of, “The party was a riot!” or “I’m depressed today,” carefully explain why. Elaborate. Parties and depression are perfectly good writing subjects. The Great Gatsby, for instance, has plenty of both.”

“Being a writer is funny. Don’t take yourself too seriously.”

“10 Tips for a better weblog” from Rebecca Blood:
1. Choose an updating tool that is easy to use.
2. Determine your purpose.
3. Know your intended audience.
4. Be real. Speak in a real voice about real things.
5. Write about what you love.
6. Update frequently.
7. Establish your credibility.
8. Link to your sources.
9. Link to other weblogs.
10. Be patient. Most weblog audiences are small, but with time and regular updates your audience will grow.
Bonus tip: “Have fun! Whether your weblog is a hobby or a professional tool, it will be more rewarding for you if you allow yourself to experiment a little. Even a subject-specific weblog benefits from a bit of whimsy now and again.”

Task 4. 2: Referenced, informed writing
‘Weblog Ethics’ from Rebecca Blood
Rebecca’s 6 Standards of Weblog ethics:
1. Publish as fact only that which you believe to be true.
2. If material exists online, link to it when you reference it.
3. Publicly correct any misinformation.
4. Write each entry as if it could not be changed; add to, but do not rewrite or delete, any entry.
5. Disclose any conflict of interest.

Completing the Blog Tutorial

tamaraauer — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 03:53:10 +0000

Technology Framework – Stage 1 – What is a Weblog

Task 1.1: Articles:
Blood, Rebecca “Weblogs: A History and Perspective”, Rebecca’s Pocket. 07 September 2000. 25 October 2006.
“The blogger, by virtue of simply writing down whatever is on his mind, will be confronted with his own thoughts and opinions. Blogging every day, he will become a more confident writer” (Blood 2000).

“…More than that, Blogger itself places no restrictions on the form of content being posted. Its web interface, accessible from any browser, consists of an empty form box into which the blogger can type…anything: a passing thought, an extended essay, or a childhood recollection. With a click, Blogger will post the…whatever…on the writer’s website, archive it in the proper place, and present the writer with another empty box, just waiting to be filled” (Blood 2000).

Paquet, Sebastien. ‘Personal knowledge publishing and its uses in research’, Version 1.0 October 1st, 2002
“Weblogs may be viewed as an evolved form of personal Web pages, or “home pages”. The term, coined by Jorn Barger in 1997, refers to a web site that is a “log of the Web”, indicating a record that points to material available on the World Wide Web. A weblog editor is often called a weblogger. The shorthand terms blog and blogger are also commonly used; usage of the word “blog” has become so common that it has recently been drafted for inclusion in the Oxford English Dictionary” (Paquet 2002).

Other definitions for weblogs:
Weblog definition from: http://www.worldwidelearn.com/elearning-essentials/elearning-glossary.htm#b:
”A weblog is a public web site where users post informal journals of their thoughts, comments, and philosophies, updated frequently and normally reflecting the views of the blog’s creator.”

My own definition:
A weblog is like a digital diary. It allows users to post informal journals online however unlike a private diary, weblogs can be published so that other web users can read these entries and comment on them. Users of weblogs can change there style of writing to address a more public audience. There is the feature in some weblogs that allows users to keep posts private.

Task 1.2: Types of weblogs – What type of weblog will we be using?
In this subject I am using a personal blog to document my learning and publish small notes on what I have learnt in this subject. My learning reflections are informal and are published so that other students and my lecture can see what I have learned and what my opinions are on certain subjects. My weblog is also a way for me to prove that I have completed the set class tasks including the activity modules. Through subscribing to an RSS feed of my blog, my lecturer can keep a tab on what work I complete and when I complete it.

Task 1.3: Features of a weblog
I made sure that my weblog contained the following features:
- Categories
- A lists of links
- Other people’s weblogs: A Blogroll
- Archives

Stage 2 – Setting up a weblog
Task 2.1: Name your weblog
Weblog Title – Tamara’s Blog

Task 2.2: My first entry posting
http://tamaraauer.edublogs.org/2008/08/04/e-learning-experiences/ (August 4 2008)