Week of 1/26/2009 Blog Post
Question: Comment on communication, transparency, and participation (the three points listed on the WhiteHouse site), and if/how those three point fit into your homepage and your second (re)design project.
The entire point of a webpage would seem to be communication. Why have a website at all if it does not communicate something? If not something important to a large community, it should at least be something important to the person creating the website. This was a large part of my struggle in the deciding what to put on my homepage. What did I want to communicate with others? I decided that I wanted to communicate the story of my weight loss struggle. My weight loss is very meaningful to me; it saved my life. Maybe, if I do it right, I can help some others too. In addition, my professional work belongs to my employer; they hold the copyright to all of it. Therefore it does not belong on my website.
I think that transparency is essential to good communication. For my personal website, I have to be transparent in my story to establish the trust of the readers. If the reader/user does not develop a trust relationship with me, why would they continue to read my website or listen to my thoughts and ideas.
Participation is the most difficult thing for me to incorporate into my personal website, but it is the key to success for websites. Yes, the reader/user will be reading the sit, following links, and perhaps commenting on the blogs that I intend to include. But how do I develop that deeper participation and interaction that makes a website a success. I am still thinking about that aspect. I have been working diligently on the framework for my homepage. It is taking my a great deal of effort just to put the basics together at this time, but I will get there, and I am enjoying the process.
The degree to which communication, transparency, and participation will be applied to the artist’s homepage is entirely up to the artist; I can only suggest and perhaps attempt to show the importance of these things to the artist. I have not yet put a great deal of thought into what I will do specifically for the artist because I am still working on learning about web design. I would prefer to make the vast majority of my mistakes on my own page and provide the artist with my best work.
The updated White House site is an attempt to move toward communication, transparency, and participation. How successful this will be and how truly the designers will embrace the concepts is yet to be seen. By the very nature of the job, there must be limits on how much transparency President Obama can employ. For example, the debate over the dangers of his Smart Phone. Nothing can be posted that would allow someone to seek out the President, his family, staff, etc. for nefarious purposes. While the ideals may be grand, the execution will by necessity be limited.
The entire point of a webpage would seem to be communication. Why have a website at all if it does not communicate something? If not something important to a large community, it should at least be something important to the person creating the website. This was a large part of my struggle in the deciding what to put on my homepage. What did I want to communicate with others? I decided that I wanted to communicate the story of my weight loss struggle. My weight loss is very meaningful to me; it saved my life. Maybe, if I do it right, I can help some others too. In addition, my professional work belongs to my employer; they hold the copyright to all of it. Therefore it does not belong on my website.
I think that transparency is essential to good communication. For my personal website, I have to be transparent in my story to establish the trust of the readers. If the reader/user does not develop a trust relationship with me, why would they continue to read my website or listen to my thoughts and ideas.
Participation is the most difficult thing for me to incorporate into my personal website, but it is the key to success for websites. Yes, the reader/user will be reading the sit, following links, and perhaps commenting on the blogs that I intend to include. But how do I develop that deeper participation and interaction that makes a website a success. I am still thinking about that aspect. I have been working diligently on the framework for my homepage. It is taking my a great deal of effort just to put the basics together at this time, but I will get there, and I am enjoying the process.
The degree to which communication, transparency, and participation will be applied to the artist’s homepage is entirely up to the artist; I can only suggest and perhaps attempt to show the importance of these things to the artist. I have not yet put a great deal of thought into what I will do specifically for the artist because I am still working on learning about web design. I would prefer to make the vast majority of my mistakes on my own page and provide the artist with my best work.
The updated White House site is an attempt to move toward communication, transparency, and participation. How successful this will be and how truly the designers will embrace the concepts is yet to be seen. By the very nature of the job, there must be limits on how much transparency President Obama can employ. For example, the debate over the dangers of his Smart Phone. Nothing can be posted that would allow someone to seek out the President, his family, staff, etc. for nefarious purposes. While the ideals may be grand, the execution will by necessity be limited.
posted by Jessica Badger at
12:17 PM
7 Comments:
Jessica,
You presented an issue that I recognized but did not address in my blog: trust. We as technical communicators need to ensure that what we communicate establishes our relationship as trustworthy communicator with our audience.
To support this, I went back to the ATTW Code of Ethics and found that our code does not specifically address honesty or trust. (The Code does mention ethics and "acting responsibly.") I think this omission is a mistake. We need to prioritize our efforts to be trustworthy, and, as you stated, this requires transparency.
Well stated, Jessica!
[By the way, I cannot get that BADGER-MUSHROOM-SNAKE song out of my head. It's driving me insane! My kids and I changed the words to ROCKY (our puppy)-FREEDOM (our cat)-and "It's a cat! It's a cat!" Of course, they think I'm a cool mom because I know about the badger website, but AHH! I have to get that out of my head!]
Jessica,
I appreciate your openness and willingness to work transparently as you start this site. The information age is strange in the way that anyone suddenly can broadcast anything -- and I mean anything -- to anyone in the world instantaneously.
Dipping in a toe means finding how comfortable you feel with people, potentially strangers around the world, knowing what you are thinking. And how much you want them to know. There are all sorts of privacy issues to consider and comfort issues. I really struggled with this idea of how personal to be on my "personal" web site, finally deciding to have my site be my "public personal," like if I was in a job interview or chatting at a party with a stranger, what I would say. That's where I felt comfortable. I have friends who bare more personal thoughts and ideas, minute by minute. They are comfortable with that, and they have their audience, so more power to them, I suppose. But that's not ever going to be me.
In your search for the space you want to create, I suggest imagining an audience, who you ideally want reading your blog (family, friends, colleagues, strangers, people in your line of work, potential employers, whomever) and then write as if you are writing directly to them. At least that helps you to think you are reaching someone, and not just tossing all of this information into the wind. Good luck!
- Brett Oppegaard
Jessica, two of your points really resonated with me: the comment about establishing a relationship of trust with your viewers and also your struggle to incorporate participation. As Brett says, it is disconcerting to have your thoughts -- particularly those about personal matters -- available to the world at large. I am just getting comfortable with having my one-line status appear on Facebook, accessible to only my "friends" -- so I have some ground to cover on the transparency front. As for participation...it seems difficult on a personal site. I am still thinking about that one...
I like how you talk about how transparency is important to building trust with your readers and that if you don't establish trust, people won't come back to you site. I think that's a very important point that can be overlooked with some websites. But websites need to reach out to their audience too. It is important to establish a relationship with your audience no matter what media you use.
- Ashley O.
My thoughts on participation and your particular site: I posted this originally as a reply on my blog, but wanted to put it on your own as well, where it might add to the conversation here.
I think your own homepage provides a LOT more possibilities for interactivity. In presenting your own story and inviting others to change their own stories (maybe even become part of a community of changed stories; indeed maybe even having them offer up their own story), you are definitely asking readers to interact--how exactly you manifest their participation on your homepage then becomes a technical question. Do you provide forums? Compare data? Add recipe submissions? Have readers add their own narratives to yours? I think you've got some cool possibilities with this particular site idea.
Jessica,
I think we all have our limits on the degree to which we are all willing to be transparent, just as the administration needs to have limits on how transparent they can really be, for the sake of "safety".
The development of a Homepage about a personal issue that so many Americans struggle with, and actually showing that you have won the battle, is surely to be a study in "knowing thyself". I think you're going to learn a lot more than how to build a Homepage, and I admire your willingness to go through this process of loss of some (how much is up to you) anonymity. That's what transparency means to me...loss of some amount of anonymity.
Did you know that we have an onsite PhD student in TCR doing a dissertation in "Fat Studies"? She interested in how the rhetoric of the medical community when dealing with obesity. You may be interested in contacting her. Let me know in the MOO if you are.
Lastly, in my mind, you already convey a sense of transparency that inspires trust in these few blogs of yours I've been following. You question yourself outloud! That inspires trust and, it generates participation. Look at all the responses in front of this one, with great classmate participation, offering helpful suggestions.
Thanks for sharing the journey!
Melody
I agree with your notes, especially you ideas about participation. If one goal of any website is to keep people on it, and if another goal is to keep people coming back to it, participation is key. Making content meaningful to others is crucial then. So, how does that inform what you plan to incorporate in the alumni site?
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