Writing Online

This timing is pretty good. My goal is to get our class follow-up posts online between 4:00 and 5:00 p.m. It is 4:47 as I begin to write this, so I may meet my goal.

We only scratched the surface of we design today, but I think we got some useful thoughts going about creation of a personal image online, usability in terms of navigation (menu bars, links, etc.), and use of screen space (as a group we seemed to prefer uncluttered pages). Keep exploring websites for design ideas: our class examples of ugly and visually pleasing sites are on the “links” in the Writing Studio and the examples of faculty websites are on our course blog. Here are two sites that I think exemplify good use of visual rhetoric:

Wilco

Wilco’s site is extremely simple in its navigation, and uses a monochromatic color palette that doesn’t overstimulate the eye. It also successfully uses white text on a black background, which is usually quite hard to read.

Ninth Letter

Ninth Letter is a literary magazine published at the University of Illinois. The website serves as a companion to the print edition, and is a good example of how a site can combine multiple media without creating cluttered pages and navigation confusion. It uses a neutral color palette for the background and other large areas of space and reserves bright color for text and links.

For homework, complete the short forum post at the Writing Studio and using pen and paper make a sketch of what you would like your homepage to look like. Remember that you are aiming for a page that exhibits sound visual rhetoric: who is your audience for your homepage? What image do you want to portray with your page? What is the purpose for your page–are you looking for a job, applying to graduate or professional school, promoting a skill or expertise?

Have a good weekend and see you next week!

5:17 p.m. Darn.

Hello patient class members!

I got home yesterday all set to update our course blog, and discovered that the Internet was down–something about a cut cable that would take several days to fix!–so I’m just now back in my office playing catch-up.

As we discussed, you can leave a comment to this post about anything that has to do with yesterday’s class–questions, comments, additional thoughts about class discussion. etc. I will create a post after each class session form now on that will briefly summarize what happened in class and clarify any homework instructions or unfinished business. If you leave a comment that adds to the class discussion (i.e., not a question about due dates or other class management business) it will count toward your participation grade. This will allow those who are quiet during class an alternative space to contribute.

So, for class tomorrow, please read the article and explore the websites that are listed on the readings page (scroll the whole way to the bottom of the page). Also, surf the web to find an example of a website you think is really ugly/poorly designed and one that you find visually pleasing/well designed. Be ready to show your examples to the class tomorrow.

As I explained in class yesterday, those of you who completed the technology manifesto forum post before Tuesday’s class have the bonus option to make the necessary small revisions that I will suggest (I’ll send comments via e-mail by Friday at 5:00 pm) and post your manifesto to your blog. You can then skip one blog post during a week of your choosing. If you did not complete the forum post before Tuesday’s class, you should still complete that assignment in order to receive partial class participation credit.

I also created a page the details the guidelines for your blogs that I explained in class yesterday (see page listing in the sidebar to the right.

Have a good evening, and see you tomorrow!

Here’s a video that we can add to our class discussion for Tuesday. It was made several years ago and it presents a science fiction style “history” of the Internet. The creators have an updated version, Epic 2015, that extends the “history.” You can view them both here.

There are copies up on YouTube that I could have provided here, but the video quality is pretty poor so you’ll have to go the website

I have made the daily schedule of readings, homework, and project due dates available at the bottom of the “assignments” page. Right now there are some gaps in the schedule during the second half of the semester to leave room for topics of discussion that we decide upon as a class, so if you read an interesting article or hear a good news story about writing/communication in online spaces, please pass it along to me and we’ll add it to the list of readings.

I have also created a “Readings” page that provides access to all our online readings for the course. Right now you can find the links to the readings for next Tuesday’s class discussion. To find the page, click on the “Links” page and then look for an additional link to the readings page in the left-hand column menu.

Final note: I’ll be adding the schedule to the Writing Studio calendar in the morning.

More later…

As promised, here are all the videos we talked about or viewed in class today. Take a closer look at the the text in “The Machine is Us/ing Us,” especially if you are just learning the differences between HTML (the code used to create traditional web pages) and CSS and XML (code that allows you to create sites that use templates and pull “content” into it from a database).

And, let me say that I am a true novice when it comes to using any computer code, so don’t feel like you have to know how to code anything by hand. That’s why in class I demonstrated how to cut and paste the “embed” code right from the YouTube site into a blog. The embed code for the video is a little complicated, but it essentially follows the same formula as this code for embedding an audio file in a blog post:

The part in red is the web address for the audio file. If you typed the part in red into a browser (Explorer, Firefox, etc.) it would take you directly to the audio file where I have it stored, and it would look like this:

The part in blue indicates how high and wide to make the audio player. If I set the sizes too small you wouldn’t be able to see all the control buttons. The last part of the code in blue, “autoplay=false,” tells the browser loading the blog not to play the audio automatically, but to wait for the user to click the play button. The code in green that surrounds all the other information is the actual “embed tag.” This information tells the browser what it should do with the information in the middle–that is, embed the audio file in the blog post.

See, coding can be simple and fun! Now back to those videos I promised:

This is “The Machine is Us/ing Us”

Here is the original “I’ve Got a Crush on Obama” video that we watched in class.

This is “Obama Girl” at the Democratic YouTube debate. If you are unfamiliar with this debate, it was a debate where the questions were asked by citizens who videotaped their questions and posted them on YouTube. You can read more about it here and you can watch video of the actual debate at YouTube.

Now go to our forums at the Writing Studio to post your follow up to the videos and our class discussion. (Note: I’ve spent so much time putting together this blog post that I’m going to wait till tomorrow morning to set up the forum space. So, if you are reading this Thursday evening, check the Writing Studio sometime after noon tomorrow.)

Hello all! The course blog is now up-to-date.

I will use the main page here to post updates and thoughts about the course and you are invited to post comments and questions to any of my posts. Also, throughout the semester I will propagate the “Links” page with readings and resources for class discussion and assignments. We are a group with diverse interests and knowledge, and I’m looking forward to getting to know you all better and to learning from you.