The last week..

I’ve just been doing the readings for week 12.

I know the first reading, the ‘Day In The Life’ was written in 2006 and based on a 2005 study, but it seems rather obvious to me. I’m not sure if that’s how much the web has infiltrated our lives in the last 3 years, but none of the information presented in this report was really surprising.

Like the man who was the case study in this article, I also go immediately to the web for extra information on anything that interests me. Tickets for concerts that I’ve seen advertised, more information on news stories, information in a format that I appreciate. It just makes sense. Where I differ from this man, though, is that I could certainly go a week without internet (and intend to, starting this weekend!).

I found all the stuff about online advertising interesting, because although the research in the report shows that just seeing an ad online increases a customer’s chances of purchasing goods from the advertiser, I really don’t think that’s the case for me. I mean, maybe it is and I just don’t know it..

I tend to completely ignore online ads, so much so that I couldn’t even tell you what the last one I saw was for. I also have disdain for them, so I think that any company I see online might be lowered in my estimation. But am I just being naive? Have I actually received subliminal messages that have affected my purchases? I don’t know. But I don’t think so.

There are a couple of interesting articles about the effectiveness of online advertising at dynamic logic, and there’s an interesting Reuters article from last year regarding online advertising.

A few things from this week.

Firstly, a couple of blogs that are Australian and that I love – because they’re weird and geeky – Organic Defect and Clyde the Penguin. Both absolutely brilliant!

Also, I’ve updated the group project page with a couple of things that I’ve discovered you can do with WordPress, like the widgets and how to create a page that’s hidden in the navigation bar.

Also – I’m getting married on Saturday and today I feel like CRAP. Damn flu. But my fiance’s brother arrived last night with his wife, who is a nurse, and she’s assured me that I’ll be better by Saturday.

I’m going to go have a lie down now

Exciting!

It may not be exciting for other people, but being the novice blogger that I am, it was very exciting to see that someone I linked to in my last blog – Iain Mosher re. bad error messages – has commented on my page, and linked me back on his blog. Have a look at the comment – he mentions a couple of other good sites that list amusing error message.

How rad!

I feel validated. Hooray!

Also, check out my Blogwatch for an update on what’s happening on GrammarBlog.

So close..

So, I’ve just had a look at the readings for this week, and I can see that they’re useful for people who are creating functional websites from scratch. I, however, still don’t really know how to write HTML (though I did learn about HTML colour values so that I could change the colours etc of our group project to suit the look that we wanted to go for – see my group project page for updates).

Sometimes I have a look at the HTML viewer for this site, just to see if I can figure the HTML out, but it’s really beyond me at this stage. Must do some more research!

In terms of error messages – gee they bug me! Some sites don’t even have error messages – they just keep taking you back to the screen where you’ve made an error, and making you guess to see what you’ve done wrong.

Others ask you for information you can’t give, and some just make the whole process a nightmare.

Gmail has a really annoying message that says ‘Some Gmail features failed to load’, but it won’t tell you what they are or how to fix them.

Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox also gives some good examples of error message etiquette, not unlike Duyne, Landay and Hong.

There’re also a couple of funny examples on this blog, and here‘s a geeky list of the thirteen best ever error messages.

Not much else happening, except the crazy wedding planning and trying to get everything else done. But that’s old news, really, isn’t it? The good news is that I think everything will be done in time.

Just heading over to my Group Project page now to do a bit of an update on what’s been happening.

Distractions, distractions

As if it’s not enough to have all of the end-of-semester stuff due, I’m also planning my wedding, which is to take place in 11 days. Holy moly!

I seem to be getting distracted from my schoolwork by wedding planning, and distracted from the wedding planning by the schoolwork, so I’m kind of beginning to feel like I’m getting nothing done at all! Argh!

Anyway, having said that, I have read last week’s and this week’s readings, so I’m thinking this might be quite a long blog post.. steel yourself.

Firstly, I think it’s completely ridiculous of Fairfax to try and protect their headlines with copyright – really, as the article points out, stating the facts can hardly be considered an original literary work. What will we do if we can no longer write ‘Sam Newman is a tool‘, or ‘Swine Flu panic more dangerous than flu itself‘? It’s a ridiculous idea, as these themes are likely to come up quite often. This exact issue is why we have the fair use policy in place – so people can report on current issues without having to check every single word for originality (good luck with that, I say!).

The second article from week 9, ‘The Poachers and Stormtroopers’, raises some good points about cultural appropriation, and to be honest it’s not an issue that I can comment on particularly confidently. Being a (sometime) writer myself, censorship is something that I disagree with quite strongly, and the fans who appropriate certain material to create something new are surely benefiting personally from the process of creation, as are the people who read and enjoy the new material.

Having said that, I understand that the issue of poaching and misrepresentation of a brand or product is something that needs to be monitored in terms of a company or franchise’s reputation. Even though Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy had a romantic relationship on a PG show, we wouldn’t want to see them in a sexual clinch, would we? That’s not how they exist in the minds of the purist fans.

To sum up, I’m not sure where I stand. It’s a tricky one, but I’d say that in the end it should come down to whether the original artist/producer feels that the misrepresentation of their product will be detrimental to the company as a whole.

I guess Lessig is of the opinion that creativity is the most important aspect of cultural commentary and creation, and demonstrates this by making his book free for all to appropriate to their hearts’ content. And this is really the crux of it – he issues prior consent, and although it works for him, I doubt that it will be  a concept that takes off within the creative industries. He makes a good point, but a lonely one.

I also had a read of week ten’s articles, and have been trying to think about how best to apply them to our chocolate website. See my ‘Project’ link for more details.

I also found a great design blog called Vandelay Design that lists 50 websites with ‘gorgeous naviation menus’. It’s worth a look! There’s also a list of sites that display creative navigation. The examples are really cool, but I think it might be a bit much for my simple tech-brain to figure out for our site.

Finally, I found the article about writing headlines to be pretty useful, because I write articles for a few of our magazines at work, and the headline is always the part that I struggle with the most. I tend to fall into puns very very easily (I attribute this to my awesome sense of humour, naturally).

Well, that’s it for me for now. Off to plan some essays/last minute dress fittings/class presentations/paper lanterns and alcohol delivery.