Instructions

The purpose of this assignment is to get you used to writing in a neutral tone and to practice structuring. Each of the groups will be assigned a topic related to the class. Group #1: Blogs. Group #2: Gimp. Group #3: Wikis. Group #4: Twitter. You are to create a stub, or a short entry about the topic that has been chosen. Be ready to share these stubs with the rest of the class for discussion. Look at the readings for references to style, structure, content, and tone. After discussion, post the stubs to a group member’s blog along with ideas of how the stub can be expanded. Due by midnight on Sunday.

Wiki

Wikis are websites that allow users to add, delete and edit pages as well as the content within them. The content on a wiki is designed to be factual.

Wiki allows users to work on information collaboratively and tracks changes to the document that each user makes. Typically, wikis are self-enforced, meaning the community of users monitors and corrects errors. Most Wiki’s have a “reference” section that allows the user to navigate to a reliable source in which the information on the wiki came from.

There are many types of wikis. Wikipedia acts as a user generated web encyclopedia, while other wikis have a more specific focus for a special interest, such as Bulbapedia, which catalogues information on the Pokemon franchise. 

Expansion

This is a very surface level entry for Wikis. Expansion of the wiki on wikis should go into more detail in many subdivisions of the article. Since wikis are supposed to spiral out in complexity, this entry could expand  to include how wikis are written, what software is used, how they are formatted, how pages are linked together etc. 

Assignment by Blaine Brown, Kendall Johnson, Dawn McGinnis, Mei Chen, and Trey Chumchal

Interpretation

This quote means that you have to challenge yourself. By doing one thing every day that scares you, you can learn what is possible. You can learn about yourself.

Mario represents this quote very well. Mario games are somewhat easy, if you take it slow. The thrill of beating a Mario level comes from doing it stylishly and fast. By pushing yourself to move through the level quickly, you have to trust your ability to adapt. You don't look before you leap; you leap and react. When you leap into the air and see an open pit before you, your muscles tense and you tilt the controller, hoping it will give you a little bit more distance. It is only when you've felt this fear and made it across the other side, that you have truly lived in a Mario game. Always do the thing in a Mario level that scares you, because that is where personal growth lies. 

Process

To create this image, I took the Windows XP default background of rolling hills titled Bliss and set the layer to "Grain Merge" with a red background below it. I took an image of a dragon and a separate image of the fire breath and placed them to confront a Mario graphic. Lastly, I created a new layer with the quote in white letters and smudged each letter (which was very time consuming) to appear to be on fire. I messed with the colors of that layer until it was a nice orange flame. Mario is fighting a dragon on a dark landscape that used to be blissful. Now it is terrifying, as the quote implies.

Image Manipulation and Digital Writing

In the same way that a meme is digital writing, this image says more than the quote could say alone. Even more, although the quote is by Eleanor Roosevelt, I am also making a personal statement about the idea by including my specific Mario example. I am communicating what the quote means to me. 

The Wikipedia article on Super Mario World exemplifies all of the usual criteria for a good web article. Subheadings divide the article into plot, gameplay, development, and reception with additional subheadings within each section. There are links to additional information as well as scores from various game critic organizations. The sidebar has quick information like release date and platforms. 



Older Versions

When exploring older versions, it is possible to see what information has been filled in. For instance the quick info sidebar has much les information than the current version. There have been many changes to the page, updating and expanding its contents as time has gone by.

Talk

Discussions on the Talk page include users trying to determine whether Super Mario World was ever included with a Super Mario All-Stars release. Some people claim to have seen versions where it was included with All-Stars (which included Mario 1, 2, and 3). There are many other discussions such as secrets that were included in the manual, an NES version of the game, and a secret hidden castle. These are unconfirmed, so that's why they are included on the talk page. 

A Trusted Source?

This page shows all the ways in which Wikipedia tries to include only factual information. Factoids that are questionable are relegated to the talk page before they are allowed to be included in the main article. Wikipedia requires sources, which means that it can be as accurate as an academic paper. Often, Wiki articles are written by experts in the field, and to those who find a subject important, falsified information will be policed.

Our group assignment on Thursday was to create a meme. When I first saw this on the schedule, I was worried. I thought this meant we were going to have to edit an image using GIMP together, over the internet. This would have been very difficult to manage, and I believe many of my classmates felt the same. Numerous students asked for details of the assignment during the discussion, perhaps nervous about the upcoming challenge. I relaxed when I found out that we were simply using quickmeme.com and filling a pre-made image.

My relaxation, however, was short-lived. Once we started our breakout groups, we decided to each try and make a meme individually. The plan was to come back and discuss our creations. 

Something that should have taken moments, took tens of minutes. No one had any ideas for the meme. The sudden creativity that was thrust upon us was incredibly difficult, and many of us were surprised at that fact. This is a meme! Banal comedy written in two lines, and we all seemed incapable of creating a good one! 

We talked among ourselves in the chat, discussing the sudden difficulty to make something that seemed so easy. At which point, with the meme editor open, I simply made a joke: Philip J. Fry saying, "Not sure if this assignment is stupid, or if I'm stupid." 

The joke was a hit. It was born out of the assignment, but not in the traditional sense.  It was created spontaneously and we all took a moment to laugh because it related to our situation. Creating a meme should have been a simple endeavor but we had a hard time doing it. I believe this meme sums up how the assignment gave us a new-found respect for the use of the creative process in developing a meme.

It was a project that we thought would be simple. Although, we had other submissions of memes (included below), we chose this one because it spoke to all of us. We were a small community of people for 30 minutes, and we shared an experience of creating a meme. 

Assignment by Blaine Brown, Jessica Tusim, Laura Collmus, and Phillip Owens

Here is something I made by messing around in Gimp. I merged a picture of a desert with a red background to make it look like Mars, and then I added a sandwich. I then used the gradient tool with a radial setting to make the sandwich seem like it's the most glorious thing in the Mars. Delicious.

While working on my site design, I went through the various points laid out in chapter 7 of Letting Go of the Words by Redish. It is a fun exercise to see the differences between designs and how they can affect the presentation of the content. 

It is recommended to use a search box. I wanted to put that in the top of the right sidebar, but Weebly requires users to pay for search functionality. This is a shame because searching is a fantastic way for users to navigate a site when they know exactly the words they want to find. Savvy users could perhaps use a regular search engine, like Google, and type in "site:http://halloweenbagsearly.weebly.com/" and then their search term. Sometimes, however, the major search engines do not crawl blogs often enough.

With that in mind, I figured out a way to get a Google custom site search onto my page. However, searching for "persona" in that custom search yields no results even though one can clearly see two posts below containing the keyword.

I removed my name from the header, because it was off to the right in Passive Space. There's no reason to ever look over at that area, so I just left it blank. This resulted in a cleaner look. The site title in the heading is not a logo yet, (hopefully I can use part of the GIMP assignment to do this) but it is a clean, large font that is easily readable and is aligned with the rest of the content. I made sure the menu was aligned properly as well, even though I only have two pages at the moment. 

The sidebar contains valuable information for the reader, including a quick summary about me (the "About" link in the top menu simply links to my "Introduction" post for now) including a link to my twitter account. I've also included the categories menu which will allow readers to select between "personal" posts and "group work" posts. This might be helpful for our instructor.

One could say my site layout is kind of plain, but I prefer to focus on the content and use a minimalist style. I believe that Redish supports my design sensibilities so hopefully the content on this page will begin to speak for itself.