Tuesday, March 6, 2007

Reading Notes 3/6/2007

Scott McCloud's online comic "Porphyria's Lover"


  • McCloud presents an interesting take on this poem through his comic.
  • Looking at his other online comics, I felt his graphics could have been better and more detailed.

Scott McCloud's "I Can't Stop Thinking Columns"

  • (1) "The HTML Blues" June 2000: "Today's HTML standards reflect just a small part of what the web is capable of."
  • (2) "The 99.9% Solution--Online Diversity" (chess example) "Diversity can be a doorway which non-comics readers can be drawn to the form itself through pre-existing areas of interest."

***Can't Miss This (My recommended Scott McCloud Online Comics--listed under The Morning Improv)

  • #24 "A Bucket Full of Kittens"
  • #10 "Meadow of the Damned Conclusion"
  • #2 "Proto the Pet"

"What We're Doing When We Blog" -Meg Hourihan June '02

  • Weblogs vs. Warblogs
  • Weblogs traditional definition= "links-plus-commentary" (1)
  • Commonality of weblogs=the format
  • Blog characteristics (1) conversational tone (2) post is not a full argument but open to discussion
  • Readers join the conversation by commenting
  • A weblog "post is a self-contained topical unit" (2) There is no minimum or maximum on its length
  • Weblog has the newest information at the top (immediacy and timeliness play a role here)
  • I like Hourihan's discussion under The Time Stamp about moments of shared experience. While you may not even know the person's blog you're reading, there is a connection, especially if you comment back and the blogger reads it. To describe this, Hourihan uses the term "bloggers dinner." (3)
  • Hmm, what does Hourihan mean by her statement, "What we say isn't as important as the system that enable us to say it?" (3)
  • Final idea: I think Hourihan gives us a nice perspective into blogging, since she is a blogger herself. This class's blog is the first blog I've had. It's interesting to learn what else in the form of blogging exists our there in cyberspace.

"Bloggers: A Portrait of the Internet's New Storytellers" Summary of Findings

-Amanda Lenhart and Susannah Fox July '06

  • #1 reason for blogging=personal journal with politics and government as runner-up (I don't think that finding would surprise anyone)
  • I like hearing that blogging is evenly split between men and women. And just as we've talked in class, it's no surprise that bloggers tend to be younger.
  • Wow, 74% of users are white to 9% African American. I didn't think this data would be even; however, I did expect African American users would be higher.
  • It's good to hear that bloggers are focused on checking facts and citing original sources. If this is true for high school age bloggers, this could be a great help for students already knowing that citing sources is important for their classroom papers as well.
  • I think being aware of what's going on in your world in community is an important thing. It's great to see that 72% of bloggers also look online for new or information about politics.
  • "Blogging is bringing new voices to the online world" (I totally agree, thanks for the Findings @ a Glance)

*Be looking for notes on "In Teens' Web World, MySpace Is So Last Year" and "Etiquette for the Bar" in my blog for our next class meeting.

-AAK

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