TRUTH, TECH, TEXT & TAGS

5/7/2012

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QUOTES ON MEDIA TRUTH


The media tends to report rumors, speculations, and projections as facts... How does the media do this? By quoting some "expert"... you can always find some expert who will say something hopelessly hopeless about anything. 
— Peter McWilliams

The media's the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that's power. Because they control the minds of the masses.––Malcolm X

LAUGH OF THE DAY


TECH BLOGS


Here are some of the hot tech blogs in 2011. 

There are a variety of types: TECH NEWS & ANALYSIS; TECH & WEB DESIGN; HOW-TOS & REVIEWS; COMMENTATORS; TIPS, TRICKS & HACKS; GADGETS & TECH RUMORS; JUST FOR FUN

Check them out!


GROUP 1
1. 9 to 5 Mac
2. All Things Digital
3. Ars Technica
4. Bits
5. Boing Boing
6. Boy Genius Report
7. Buzz Machine
8.Cranky Geeks
9. Daring Fireball
10. Design Observer
11. Did I Get Things Done?
12 Digital Inspiration
13 Dustin Curtis
14 Engadget
15 FreelanceSwitch

GROUP 2
16 gHacks
17 GigaOM
18 Gizmodo
19 GoodCleanTech
20 Good Morning Silicon Valley
21 HackCollege
22 Hongkiat
23 I Love Typography
24 Joystiq
25 Lifehacker
26 Lost in Technology
27 Mac AppStorm
28 Mashable
29 Make Magazine
30 MakeUseOf

GROUP 3
31 MinimalMac
32 mocoNewsNeatorama
33 Nieman Journalism Lab
34 Noupe
35 O'Reilly
36 Outlaw Design Blog
37 Pogue's Posts
38 Productivity501
39 ReadWriteWeb
40 Scripting News
41 Search Engine Land
42 Silicon Alley Insider
43 Six Revisions
44 Skelliewag
45 Slashdot

GROUP 4
Slashgear
Smarterware
Smashing Magazine
Swiss Miss
40Tech
TechEBlog
TechCrunch
TechDirt
Techland
Techmeme
TechPresident
TechWeb
Unclutterer
VentureBeat
Webware
Wired
Women in Tech
Xkcd

                                                             

NOT THAT TYPE:

QUOTES ON POWER OF TYPOGRAPHY & TEXT

People who love ideas must have a love of words. They will take a vivid interest in the clothes that words wear. -- Beatrice Warde

Each letter should have a flirtation with the one next to it. -- Mac Baumwell

The most popular typefaces are the easiest to read; their popularity has made them disappear from conscious cognition. It becomes impossible to tell if they are easy to read because they are commonly used, or if they are commonly used because they are easy to read.  — Zuzana Licko

Type is like music in having its own beauty, and in being beautiful as an accompaniment and interpretation; and typography can be used to express a state of the soul, like the other arts and crafts. But like them it is too often used mechanically, and so the full expressiveness of this medium is unrealized. If it is used according to a rule or recipe, it becomes dull and loses vividness. Type appears at first to be a rigid medium; but like other rigid media, it is plastic to the living spirit of a craftsman. --J.H. Mason

TAGGING IN A TEXTUAL WAY

A tagline can make or break a website (well, maybe not, but it is cool to be dramatic). 

Ok, so what is a tagline? 

It is a catchy phrase or line used to build an identity for your product or website. 

Below you will find a collection of current taglines around the Internet. As you will see, blog taglines are often slightly sassy. The mood of blogging can often be casual (although there are some hard core journalistic and business blogs that are much more formal).  Some of them are funny, some are clever; but all of them deliver the message! 

Pay attention to the style of taglines and text on websites today.Hopefully it will serve as inspiration for your own creative "branding, building a memorable personality for your site that fits today's audience.


TAGLINE COLLECTION:

The Straight Dope: Fighting Ignorance since 1973 (It’s taking longer than we thought). 

Maxim Philippines: The best thing that ever happened to men … after women! 

The Consumerist: Shoppers bite back. 

Random Acts of Reality: Trying to kill as few people as possible… 

Joshuaink: Same old shit, different day. 

The Superficial: Because you’re ugly.

Smashing Magazine: We smash you with information that will make your life easier. Really.

The Best Page in the Universe: This page is about me and why everything I like is great. If you disagree with anything you find on this page, you are wrong.

Scaryduck: Not scary. Not a duck.

The Art of Rhysisms: Chronologically inept since 2060.

Needcoffee.com: We are the Internet equivalent of a triple espresso with whipped cream. Mmmm…whipped cream.

Ample Sanity: Life is short. Make fun of it.

Rathergood.com: The Lair of the Crab of Ineffable Wisdom – a load of stuff by Joel Veitch that will probably crush your will to live.

The Breakfast Blog: In search of the best eggs in town.

Dooce: Not even remotely funny.

Pink is the new blog: Everybody’s business is my business.

Shoemoney: Skills to pay the bills.

Oh No They Didn’t!: The celebrities are disposable, the content is priceless.

YouTube: Broadcast Yourself.

Waiter Rant: Do you want Pommes Frite with that?

Newshounds: We watch FOX so you don’t have to.

Sabrina Faire: All the fun of a saucy wench, none of the overpriced beer.

Defective Yeti: A maze of twisty passages, all alike.

All About George: All about George Kelly… you know, if you go in for that sort of thing.

Go Fug Yourself: Fugly is the new pretty.

kottke.org: Home of fine hypertext products.

Slashdot: News for nerds. Stuff that matters.

Gawker: Daily Manhattan media news and gossip. Reporting live from the center of the universe.

Get Rich Slowly: Personal finance that makes cents.

hi5: Who’s in?

Fotolog: Share your world with the world.

Jezebel: Celebrity, Sex, Fashion for Women, Without Aribrushing.

Autoblog: We obsessively cover the auto industry.

Boing Boing: A directory of wonderful things.

Perez Hilton: Celebrity Juice. Not from concentrate.

DumbLittleMan: So what do we do here? Well, it’s simple. 15 to 20 times per week we provide tips that will save you money, increase your productivity, or simply keep you sane.

Lifehacker: Don’t live to geek, geek to live!

Gizmodo: The gadget guide. So much in love with shiny new toys, it’s unnatural.

John Cow Dot Com: Make Moooney Online with John Cow Dot Com
WebWorkerDaily: Rebooting the workforce.
The Simple Dollar: Financial talk for the rest of us.

TrafficBunnies: Making your hits multiply like rabbits.

Mighty Girl: Famous among dozens.

The Sneeze: Half zine. Half blog. Half not good with fractions.

Buzz Marketing: Because everyone is entitled to my opinion.

EXTRA CREDIT:  

Create a TAGLINES Extra Credit page on your site. Answer the following. Post a link to your page on the TAGLINES extra credit forum post here on our ANGEL Extra Credit Forum:

1.) What is your favorite tagline on the list above?

2.) Find three blogs online with taglines you think are great. Post each site name and tagline and a link to the blog. 

3.) Find three blogs with BAD taglines. 

A. Define who the site audience is for ALL THREE GOOD AND BAD BLOGS: Gender, Race, Age, Type of personality.  

B. Write new tag lines for each blog. 

C. Explain why your tag lines are better than the bad tag lines in terms of attracting readers and promoting the purpose of the site. Your tag line must be appropriate for the audience of the bad blog.

D. Create a banner for your tagline page. Write a tagline for your own site. Add the text to your banner on this page, with an eye for the font style, color, size, and placement to create a strong visual. 

(Note: feel free to add your tagline to other pages on your site but be sure that the design of the tagline works with your banner images!) 

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PODCASTING

4/18/2012

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PODCASTING: BROADCAST TO THE WORLD FOR FREE

What is podcasting? Not some strange new method of fly fishing!

Podcasting used to mean digital audio recordings you share on the web. Now that definition is much broader thanks to new technology. Here is today's version:

pod·cast  [pod-kast, ‐kahst] noun 1. a digital audio or video file or recording, usually part of a themed series, that can be downloaded from a Web site to a media player or computer: People can download or subscribe to podcasts .

If you choose to, you can watch this podcast by performance artist ZeFrank. It is his first podcast for a new podcast series he is creating. ZeFrank is a well known, creative NYC performance artist who has had other series and videos on the web. Or just scroll down to watch other podcasts!

WARNING: Explicit Language
http://ashow.zefrank.com/episodes/1

Hey, it is a video! Yes, it is a video AND a podcast.

Why is it a podcast? Because ZeFrank plans to regularly make new "episodes" and I can subscribe to get updates when new ones are posted. 

It is easy to view many podcasts that find online and then subscribe to thanks to Google Reader or Google+, Yahoo, or even MySpace (does anyone still use MySpace???) > These sites and others like them have "reader" features that let you collect all your subscriptions on one page for easy access and reading.

PODOMATIC PODCASTS:

So, how do you create a podcast? There are lots of ways but one easy one is to go to http://www.podomatic.com. You can record or upload files to make a free podcast. 

After you create a podcast, you can choose different sizes for a podcast player, upload your podcast to it and then embed it on your own site.

Below is a podcast on art by Steve Roden, courtesy of Podomatic's list of podcasts available through Podomatic users. This one lasts an hour!

Here is a video podcast I created from a Quicktime movie of my own photography shot around the world. A movie file can be created in another software program and then  uploaded into Podomatic and turned into a podcast. 

Or if you have a microphone built in your computer or an external mic you can plug in, you can simply record an audio podcast in Podomatic.

Below is an audio podcast from the NPR show "This American Life". This is a radio show. Podcasts of the show were made. Now you no longer have to turn on and dial in a radio station to listen! Just subscribe to the podcast and all the new episodes are yours with the click of a mouse. 

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TALKIN' ABOUT A DIGITAL REVOLUTION

4/2/2012

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QUOTES OF THE DAY

Linkedin is for people you know. Facebook is for people you used to know. Twitter is for people you want to know.  -- unknown 

Passion is the gasoline of social media. -- unknown

More social media quotes: http://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-media-marketing/18-social-media-quotes/

I am a man of PASSIONS; absorbed in color. Do not quench your INSPIRATION and your imagination. Look for light and FREEDOM. 

Keep something of your original CHARACTER, for otherwise one has no root in oneself. It is wise to do so, for LIFE IS SHORT and time passes quickly. — Vincent Van Gogh

POLL OF THE DAY

Will Facebook go the way of MySpace? Or will Mark Zuckerberg take over the world? Have you seen "THE SOCIAL NETWORK" flick--(a good one by the way)?  

This founder of Facebook isn't spending HIS energy chatting to friends and might just have the time to do it!

Take this poll and let's find out what the class predicts. Results posted next week.

Hey, it is the easiest part of your CREATE POLLS ASSIGNMENT this week! 
Go for it.

LAUGH OF THE DAY

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TIME ERASES EVERYTHING

60's MUSICAL TRIBUTE TO LOST FORMATS 
(click arrows below to listen)

"Time Is On My Side" — Irma Thomas

"Time Is Tight" - Booker T. Washington

"Let Me Down Easy" — Bettye LaVette

Check out this week's IMAGE & TEXT & MUSIC ASSIGNMENT where you get to add a music player to your own site. Then upload 3 tunes that "fit" the message of an image (cartoon, illustration, photo) you select that comments on technology or the media today. In this case the titles of the songs and the era of the music tie into the notion of outdated formats that are lost thanks to time.

CURRENT TECH NEWS: ARE YOU A CYBER SLEUTH?

Do you know think you know what is going on RIGHT NOW in regards to cyber ?crime?

It is good to stay on top of these current tech news to online protection for yourself, your site, your customers, your blog readers, your clients. Not to mention there is a huge career opportunity in digital global security just waiting for you... 

Find out how much really know about the underworld of spam, botnets, viruses and other forms of cyber crime. 


Take this  CYBER SLEUTH INFOWORLD QUIZ to find out more about what you don't know about technology today!

Keep track of your final score. Write about what you were surprised to discover and what you learned from this quiz for this week's EXTRA CREDIT CYBER SLEUTH ASSIGNMENT.

We have an EXTRA CREDIT DISCUSSION FORUM on our ANGEL. Go there to read directions on posting your optional extra credit assignmentsl

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LET IT ROLL!

3/26/2012

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QUOTES OF THE DAY

"When people talk to me about the digital divide, I think of it not so much about who has access to what technology as about who knows how to create and express themselves in the new language of the screen. If students aren't taught the language of sound and images, shouldn't they be considered as illiterate as if they left college without being able to read and write?" — George Lucas, filmmaker (Sept.2004, Edutopia, Life on the Screen)

"A media-literate person - and everyone should have the opportunity to become one - can decode, evaluate, analyze, and produce both print and electronic media. The fundamental objective of media literacy is critical autonomy in relationship to all media. Emphases in media literacy training vary widely, including informed citizenship, aesthetic appreciation and expression, social advocacy, self-esteem, and consumer competence."— Patricia Auferderheide (1993).

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WELCOME TO INTRO TO MULTIMEDIA

What is Digital Media? 

What about Multimedia? And how is it different than New Media? 

We will be examining different types of media in both non-interactive and interactive formats. Through lectures, readings, presentations, discussions, and collaborative exercises we will take a closer look at how text, graphics, audio, video, and animation intersect and interact in the digital media world today.
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