English 5365 - Internet Writing: Week 8 Post Topic

Have read a range of materials this term, some familiar and some new, on what topic do you want to research or read more about and why?

The readings for this class have been interesting overall because they have expanded my reading on Social media, Internet Writing, Interactivity, etc. For my paper and presentation, I chose to delve into the Semantic Web and Semantic Tagging. I would like to continue to keep up with research about the Semantic Web and how it is impacting online publication, especially in the Sciences. It is embraced more in Science than in Journalism, etc.? Is it being embraced or rejected? How it progresses over time from the end of my research until adoption by the Web.

The Human Machine Culture and Social Media readings were interesting, and if time allows, I would like to read more in those areas. In many ways these things interest me because they are so different from my personal viewpoint. As people embrace Social Media and Machines, I have been pulling backwards from it because it costs me too much of my precious off-screen time. I would like to examine how people balance their on-screen lives with their off-screen lives. I was having difficulty creating that balance with work and school both being on-screen.

In general, I want to read about the future of the Web and the future of Social Media. These things impact me not only on my job but also in my personal life; therefore, it is in my best interest to keep up with the latest news.

English 5365 - Internet Writing: Week 7 Blog Assignment

As a user of visual media online, what aspects of interactivity and visual presentation have you come to expect in online publications and Web sites?

I may be slightly strange in that I do not like a lot of visual whirl-a-gigs. Flashing bits here and there drive me to distraction. Overambitious Flash menus make me queasy. So I may be a bit of a curmudgeon when it comes to visual presentation. I expect a clean display with easy to read text. If something on the page flashes or blinks, I expect it to do something or be a link to something important. If it just sits there, flashing, it annoys me.

If I watch a video online, I expect it to be no more than a couple of minutes. Though I have occasionally watched a television show on Hulu with my husband, the rule generally applies that I will stop watching a video if it is too long or if it is boring or poorly made.

In most websites, interactivity is represented by the comments. I expect someone to read the comments, although I do not necessarily expect a reply. That said, I rarely look at the comments on news stories. Those leaving the comments seem to take advantage of their anonymity to be divisive, dismissive, and downright rude. They seem to be more the type of thing one would expect to see on a bad day time talk show.

CNN recently addresses the issue of negative comments. The result is that no one quite knows what to do about these types of comments on the larger blogs or news sites. It is easy for me to moderate comments, but sites that get many comments struggle with the task. They also struggle with the representation of free speech; they cannot be perceived as favoring one side of an argument over another. It is a difficult position.

Since we expect interactivity, we have to take the good with the bad and perhaps find a way to police ourselves.

English 5365 - Internet Writing: Week 6 Post Topic

What does your set of commonly used social media and tools say about you as a participant of the human + machine culture? Give examples to illustrate.

My set of social media is actually fairly limited. I use Facebook and that's about it. I signed up for Facebook because one of my college friends said that another college friend was on Facebook. I make it a rule to only accept Friend requests from people I know face-to-face, so my circle is actually fairly limited. This keeps me feeling a little safer than accepting requests for networking, even though I know that nothing is truly secure. Though, I do have some Friends on there from high school and college that I haven't seen in years. I started our playing the games, but recently deleted all of my games because they started to annoy me.

I signed up for Twitter while taking Web Accessibility and Disability Studies. I think that you could count my tweets on one hand. I actually have 3 blogs: one LiveJournal blog that is largely inactive but still up, my weight-loss blog (more cathartic for me than expecting an audience), and this blog.

I participate in two message boards actively: Metal Mouth message board, which is a board for people with braces, and the Weight Watchers message board, which is self-explanatory. I used to participate in the SoulCysters message board but have not done so recently.

What does this say about me as a participant in human-machine culture? I think it says that I expose myself to the world more than I realize. I try to keep settings private on Facebook, but I have 3 blogs. The message boards on which I participate reveal that I have braces, a weight problem, and a chronic medical problem.

I am not fully emerged in the human-machine culture. I would rather go for a walk in the park than play a walking game on the Wii. I didn't like Twitter because I felt that it was pointless, and I stopped liking Facebook games because they took to much time from my real life. On the other hand, I am happy to use the human-machine culture where it benefits me by giving me information that I need or support that I can't find elsewhere.

I spend 8 hours a day staring at a screen at work, so what I choose for my free time, by default, must be more selective.

Semantic Web video

While I was running down additional sources for my paper on Semantic Tagging and the Semantic Web, I ran into this video. It is a nice little introduction.

English 5365 - Internet Writing: Week 5 Post Topic

As a technical communicator, what tools comprise your toolset? What advantages do they have over other tools? What one dream tool would you add to your list (something you'd like to learn)?

The tool that I use most often is called Arbortext XML editor. This is program that my employer chose to create our end-to-end XML workflow. Generally, what we see looks very much like Word, but it is backed by multiple internal enhancements specific to our product and our DTD. In addition to Arbortext, we use a variation of Documentum, of course, greatly enhanced by our talented IT staff. Without these two programs, we could not do our jobs, though I am certain that my employers could use other programs if they chose, and I would learn how to use whatever programs were mandated.

At home, I use a Mac Mini on which I have Word, Excel, Powerpoint, iMovie, and most of the standard software. In addition, I use RapidWeaver and MacRabbit’s CSSEdit to build webpages because I simply cannot afford DreamWeaver. I used Scribus for my Document Design class as well as GIMP, and I feel pretty comfortable with both. I prefer open source and freeware programs for personal use because they fit within the constraints of my budget. I have experimented with OpenOffice on my laptop because I only have one license to Microsoft Office.

I have used a combination of Powerpoint and iMovie to make presentations in the past, but I would like to learn some of the more sophisticated presentation software, if I can obtain it affordably. I would also like to learn about LaTeX because so many of our authors choose to use it. I have no experience with the program because we have never loaded it on any of the work computers.

I am sure that there are many programs that I will need to learn before my career is over, but I have learned that a basic understanding of how tags work and a certain fearlessness when it comes to menu exploration are key to quickly learning a new program and incorporating that knowledge into daily use.