Question of the Week for December 5th

I have learned that writing for the web is more challenging than writing for a newpaper or print medium. You have to consider all the people that are users of the web. There are so many different types of people, also their reading levels and things like this. You can use so many different things to interpret a message but you have to make sure that they all say the same thing, don't contradict yourself. I think this is what makes it hard. You have so many options to work with that you don't know where to begin or to end. I think this is the most significant difference of writing for the web then writing for any other medium. You have to be careful of what you say and how you say it, this is a rule that applies to all types of writing though. But with the interent and world wide web, there is so much information on one topic that could infact all contradict itself. You have to make sure that all the media that you do use in an article, whether it is text, pictures, video, animations, sounds anything that they all say the same thing that one message that all of them need to privale.

Questions of the Week for November 21st

I don't see the "longtailed effect " in my own habits but I can see where they are coming from. Chris Anderson, editor-in-chief of Wired Magazine states, "the theory of the Long Tail is that our culture and economy is increasingly shifting away from a focus on a relatively small number of "hits" (mainstream products and markets) at the head of the demand curve and toward a huge number of niches in the tail." I think that this has a lot to do with writing for the web. You know cannot focus on general topics of things, but you have to get specific, this is what the public is now looking for.

Question of the Week for Novemeber 14th

I think that the current trends of the web are very interesting. That is most of the time what pulls the reader into the page to begin with, not necessarily the content comes first. I feel that when we designed our web site for the group project, we worked on the design of the site first and then put the stories in the places that they fit. We saw it easier this way i believe because if we can draw the reader in with our appearence then they will stick around and read our content. Don't get me wrong, we worked just as hard on the content but in our situation we thought about the design first. With our site I believe you can see a bit of the "really wild flowers". This site has to do with intext links, and a lot of them in general. We have a lot of links in our web project and I don't believe that this is a bad thing. I like the links because this way we can go more in depth with a topic but not have the page so congested with all these different topics.

Question of the Week for November 7th

The cartoon has a lot to do with web writing and web design. I interpreted as that the web is always changing and sometimes it is very hard to keep up with. Things appear on the web very fast. For example with Hurricane Katrina, there was information on the web the night the hurricane struck, possible even sooner. The web introduces everything right as it is happening. Sometimes this can be a bad thing though. If the web is changing so much, how are the writers and designers going to keep up with it. In the cartoon I symbolized Daffy Duck as current events possible. Notice how he walks through the scene, but sometimes its all white. Meaning the desingers couldn't keep up with his pace. He was changing too quickly so it took them a minute to catch up.

Question of the Week for October 31st

Vincent Flanders defines “heroin content” as the type of stuff that keeps users coming back over and over again. As a consumer of the web and internet I feel that the "heroin content" on a website contains many different types of media combined as one. Foe exmple an atricle that has just text in it, and maybe one picture is boring. But an article that has text, pictures, possibly a movie on the related topic, also maybe even links to other websites that have related content as well. As a designer we have tried to add all this different media's into our production. We have a page that is dedicated to pictures of the Falls. We also have a blog section were the visitors of our site can add there own content. I think that this is a good way to keep people coming back to our site. If they have peer's opinions on visiting the area and they are good, they would truely want to come to visit. Maybe there outlook is that our site is dedicated to trying to get people to visit Niagara Falls area, but if they see other people's pictures and stories from their trips they will want to come.

Question of the Week for October 24th

I believe that the net had both negitive and positive effects on writers. It is positive in a way that it is so accessible. Writers can write wherever they are. I feel that also there is so much to write about on the web, so many people are wondering about so many different things. A ton of different topics are covered on the web. But according to Mark Amerika, he agrees that the web is good for writers but it probably needs to be expanded. There are so many difference forms of communications on the web. Articles do not only consist of words and maybe one or two pictures, they now are compiled of videos, pictures, text, sounds, etc. I think that the web is easier to write for in the way that there are so many difference ways to explain your story to the reader. You don't have to work with only text to have your reader understand but you also have the options of video, pictures, sound, things like that.

Question of the Week for October 17th

Yes I am a person described in the quote. To keep up with the variety andquantity on the web is very tough. I find one way to help myself keep upis by visiting the web every day. Which I usually do, I am always on theweb every day. I check my email at least 4 or 5 times a day, also withthe facebook craze I visit that site a couple of times a day, but let’sbe serious who doesn’t. I think that once a site contains too muchcontent it should be “shut down” and no more users shouldn’t be allowedto add information. I believe that this is now what Wikipedia is doing.If a subject as too many posts then it is restricted and no more usersare allowed to add to it.

Question of the Week for Oct 10

I blog searched college softball. There were a lot of blogs talking about college softball, some talking about scholarships, pitchers who are having outstanding seasons, graduation rates of college athletes, along with tournaments and games. Typing in those two words: College Softball, I have come up with a variety of topics on that one issue. I think there are a lot of blogs on college softball because it is a big sport in most schools. Just like everyother sport, softball too has championships. Some people follow basketball, baseball, soccer, football, some people too follow softball. One man, Alan, even admits that he does not write about college softball often but that two pitchers award approval. I agree with what this blog writes, softball is just as hard as all the other sports. I just feel that sometimes, softball players don't get the reconigtion they deserve.

Question of the Week for Oct 3

Three major things for me that establish a good web site are: creditabilty, non-bias, and sources. Creditablity is a major issue for anyone I think. You have to know what your talking about to be able to inform other people. You can't just sound like you know what your talking about, you actually have to know. Non-bias is also big on my check list. I believe that you should always give both sides of the story. If you only give the side that you are in favor of, then what about the people that don't agree with you. There not going to want to visit your site because you only write about what you care. Also a form of bais is giving your opinion I believe. Personally, I think that you have to just stick to the facts, nothing more, and nothing less. Sources are also very important because one person does not know everything. So if you get information from another place, cite it. Also the web is great because when citing things, they come with links most of the time, so you have even visit that site and get more information.

Question of the Week for Sept. 26

As a consumer of the web you have to be careful what you read and where you read it. Creditablity is a huge issue dealing with the web. Whoever has access to the web can publish whatever it is that they desire for everyone to see. To establish crediablity you have to be a specialist in a field, I believe. Also if you are a household name then people know who you are and can assoicate your name with past works. As a producer of the web to establish creditablity, I list my education. I feel that in today's world education is everything, and if you don't have one it is looked upon as a bad thing. No I don't believe that corporations should be able to edit their own wiki sites. I also think that they should not be able to filter what is sent to the web about them and not. They could send only good things about information and non of the negatives. I believe that the wiki sites also deal a lot with opinion, and not very much fact. They are very one-way, only giving on side of the information.

Question of the Week for Sept. 12

The Online Publishers Association's study that describes how my demographic uses their media outlets holds very true to me. I am always signing online to find things out. I use the interent to search the weather, to read news, among other things. The interent is also becoming so advanced that you are now able to watch some shows on the internet. But I also read a lot of magazines, but not the informational kind of course. Well the ones with the hard-hitting news stories, I read Cosmo and things like that. Most of the time though it is because I am bored at work that I read a magazine, or I am traveling. Like most things that go down hill, I do believe that once all the older generations have passed away, that the newspaper will be no more. Or it will surely not hold the same role that it does today. I feel that many people still do read the newspaper now a days, but once those people are gone, whose left? The internet generation, thats who.

Question of the Week 1

All of my experiences with writing for the web have been positive ones. As a consumer of writing on the web, I think that it is very useful. But you have to remember that anyone can write for the web so you have to make sure that if you are using information from the web, you have to make sure that you have a creditable source. As a producer for the web you have to watch how you write certain things. You have to make sure you use the correct spelling for certain words and not use shorthand for them. In the future, I believe that writing for the web will become easier. I think it will be based on experience, once you learn the ropes of writing for the web, such as the necessary format and way you need to word things, then it will become easier to do.

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