Blog is the new black.
A lot of this class has focused on the new technologies in writing. Here’s an interesting article I found in my issue of last week’s TIME magazine about the overload of blogs.
How Many Blogs Does the World Need?
I found this interesting because not only does it relate to what we discussed in class, but also because I agree with the author Kinsley. Blogs are a fun new technology in our society and certain ones can be excellent sources of information – especially for things like an election as was the case this year. However, because anyone and everyone can easily create their own blog, there are thousands to sort through to find a decent one. Thanks to sites like this one, WordPress.com, it was super simple for everyone in our class to create their own blog. And that means people with insufficient skills and unreliable information have just as much authority as those who are credible to express themselves for all the world to read.
I don’t really think there’s a solution to this problem of blog overload. It’s not something that can be regulated. Freedom of speech and the accessibility of the internet prevent that from happening. It’s just kind of annoying that so many blogs about every possible subject exist. As the article says, it’s oppressive. They supply an information overload not to mention pressure the journalists who have to keep one step ahead of their peers to have the most current information.
And I regret that I wrote about this in the form of a blog. But hey, I credit that to Professor Wolff’s 5 per week requirement.
Nursing & Writing
I’ve been trying to find out for a while now on how exactly nurses use writing. For those of you who don’t know I’m transferring out of the Writing Arts major and going into Nursing. Quite a switch, I know. I’m aware that nurses write about patients and case reports and I imagine nursing supervisors write even more. I’ve tried to search for the correlation between the two but it’s been hard. On one website that is joined by nurses and students, one asked how writing is used in nursing and many mentioned that it barely is. I know that can’t be completely true but it just confuses me as to how strong the role of writing truly is. I imagine it’s important for nurses to be able to communicate verbally and through writing, and hope that further in my education in nursing that I can strongly tie the two together. Here is the one forum I just mentioned if any of you are curious as to what nurses responded with :
http://allnurses.com/forums/f8/attn-nurses-how-do-you-use-writing-everyday-basis-328570.html
Writer’s tip: braindump.
Sometimes the hardest part of writing is successfully expressing all the ideas in your head. You have all these great thoughts and they just don’t come out the same when you go to write the paper. The meaning or maybe a few key points get lost in translation. I get so frustrated when I know I had a great thought but forget what it was before I can get to my laptop or grab a pen and paper. Gathering ideas and getting started is often the biggest step in writing anything, so organizing and planning is important in the early developing stages of any writing.
A great way to get started is to execute what one writing professor has dubbed a “braindump.” Think of it as your pre-draft. Literally just sit down to your computer and get out all your ideas. No grammar, sentence structure or coherence is necessary. It’s all about writing from the heart first, then going back to make sense of it with the brain. It’s a “dumping” of all your ideas to fully express your message.
When I first gave this method a try, I didn’t think it would have any impact on my writing process, but it has proven to be beneficial. When I have a braindump paper to build my draft on, I have a full set of ideas to start with. It’s like a map has been laid out in front of me. Getting the writing process started this way is easier and less stressful. It’s something I think will be very useful to any writer who gives it a try.
Transferring
I keep hearing that writing is very important in the nursing field and that nurses are constantly writing. Lucky for me at one of campuses I visited this fall a woman at the college took particular interest in me. She loved the fact that I was transferring into Nursing as a Writing Arts major. I didn’t mind that she was the head of admissions for nursing. Following up about applying, she said that if for some reason I don’t get accepted that I should call her. She then offered to help tell me which classes of mine would transfer over into the program. Now I haven’t applied yet, but when she responded to my email I was ecstatic. She said, and I quote, “I have indicated on the attachment, my best guess about how the courses you have taken would be accepted at ******. You have a number of writing courses. I am so happy that you like to write and obviously do it well. This skill will serve you well in Graduate school. The Undergraduate nursing program is very science focused and structured program so you would still need many courses. We would still love to have you as a student and would facilitate your success in any way that we can.” Yes folks that’s right, she basically said I’m accepted and I haven’t even applied yet. I think it’s safe to say that starting out as a Writing Arts major was a magnificent choice!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Since today is Thanksgiving, I think we can take a break from the usual academic writing. Remember in grade school when holidays meant class activities related to the season? Arts and crafts in September and October were for Johnny Appleseed Day, Columbus Day and Halloween. Teachers would have us dress as Pilgrims and Indians and act out the First Thanksgiving in November. Christmas called for macaroni ornaments decorated in Elmer’s glue and glitter to take home to Mom and Dad. *sigh* I miss the days of simplicity.
So because today is a holiday, I don’t feel like doing grown-up writing. No insightful thoughts today, no academic seriousness.
Turkey turkey run away!
If you don’t,
You’ll be sorry.
Thanksgiving will be your end of days!
Thanksgiving is my favorite,
Family time is a must.
There’s so much amazing food,
I’m always overstuffed!
Don’t throw out the leftovers,
That’s all part of the fun,
Being able to eat the food
On more days than one.
Online identities.
Today’s class discussion about Facebook and online identities honestly got me a little concerned. Facebook is a relatively safe social networking site because of the way it is monitored by those who run it, but now that we’ve looked at it closely, I’m feeling a little vulnerable by having a Facebook page. It’s an honest representation of me, but do I really want to keep personal information in such a public space? Facebook is regulated so that only those I approve as friends can see my information, but let’s be honest, we all approve people as friends who we don’t really know that well. Maybe we just remember going to the same high school or know they sat in the back row in that one lecture from last semester. Just because we know OF a person doesn’t mean we KNOW them, yet we approve them as a friend and allow access to our information and consequently anyone hanging around their computer at the time of Facebooking can see it too. I’m torn between wanting to keep in touch with various people and wanting to delete my account because it’s starting to feel a little too public.
As for those Multi-User Domains where people live virtual lives through an avatar – those worlds seem to me to be drawing people away from real life experiences. Instead of going out, being social and actually doing activities, people play on their computers and have their avatar do things they could be doing. To me, this is taking away the value of personal relations. A virtual relationship – friendship, romantic, any of the sort – is not the same as a real life relationship. I think setting oneself up with expectations for a social life in a virtual world will only lead to an eventual disappointing realization that their social health has suffered after focusing on a virtual life rather than their real life.
The extent to which my computer stores information is also worrisome. I love that it saves and stores favorite Web sites, music, documents for school, and pictures for my personal use. However, since I’ve learned that Web sites track my internet habits and use cookies (not the tasty kind) to store information on my computer, I feel as if my privacy is invaded. I don’t like that certain advertisements are showing up on my computer because the browsers track trends they see about me. Sometimes it’s good to have information relative to my interests brought to me, but mostly I prefer it didn’t work that way. If someone in advertising knows what my interests are or random demographic information about me, what else might they know? What might some tech-savvy creepo hacker know about me?
I’m not liking how smart the internet has become. And yet I need it to be super smart as my go-to source for almost any information I seek these days. Technology and its evolution seem like necessary evils that yield positive and negative contributions to society that we could not live without. Good grief!
Response to “Who Am We?”
Getting sucked into virtual simulations in not a rare occurrence. When I was in high school most of my best friends played World of Warcraft religiously, every night, for hours at a time. Thankfully my computer was too low-tech to play WoW, or else I may have been sucked into the same virtual prison. Sherry Turkle in her article Who am We? describes player’s of MMORPG’s, or massively multiplayer online role playing games, but the games that she describes are a little different from WoW. In WoW, players level-up their character, making them stronger and faster through various means like gaining experience to acquire skills or arming their characters with powerful weapons and armor. But the object of WoW is not to be realistic. Everyone’s characters look “cartoonish,” as do the enemies, and the deadly magical spells and gigantic swords played by superhuman warriors adds to the fantasy. Teamwork is encouraged in WoW, actually it is very necessary, but unlike the MMORPGs, or MUDs that Turkle describes WoW is not about forming strong relationships. The players of Turkles study are playing to form strong social bonds as well as to let their inner voices come out in a virtual alter-ego. Although my friends spent days (some…literally over a year of game time) chasing dragons with hundreds of people for a two inch purple sword, the MUDs that Turkle describe do seem far more dangerous. But this obsession or even addiction to immerse oneself in false reality is a relatable one for almost all people. Some people go to the movies, some people take drugs, and some people write. Writing by ones self is a very different way to let inner voices to the surface of consciousness than playing games, because it is private. Creative writers can contruct their world around them and play god with their diverse array of characters. Unlike the games, the writer can completely manipulate his or her world. Technology has delivered us the blog so that a community can cluster around a sect of writing arts. Some people spend hours and hours a day on their blogs, like the game players, and identities can easily be concealed so that the author can let out their most intimate and candid thoughts. In my opinion writing is often a more productive form of expression than games because of the limitless creativity it offers, not to mention a finished product one can look back to or even profit from.
Be the writer, be the reader.
As we continue to write with different intentions - educational, professional, recreational - let’s never forget the importance of the reader.
Without him, your writing never comes to life. What good are words if there is never anyone there to read them? If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around, does it make a sound?
The reader plays a major role in the life of writing. However, it is often overlooked. Writers should consider their audience in every step of the process. The purpose of your writing may be completely lost if you don’t write for the right audience. If your message isn’t received, in my mind, that’s unsuccessful writing. Game over – goal not met. Back to the drawing board. When your message is received, the response from the reader holds a place in the life of the writing. Whether it’s praise or criticism, maybe additional support or information that you may be mistaken on something, the reader contributes to the existence of the piece. As we read in an article from Professor Courtney’s module, some describe writing as an ongoing “human conversation.” The writing initiates the conversation, and the readers and critics that follow contribute and keep it going.
Change roles.
>>Think of yourself as your reader. Remove yourself from your writer’s seat, sit on the other side of the table, and read your writing as the reader.
>>Consider how your writing will be perceived by different audiences. If it’s targeted to one group, will they have the desired response? If it’s targeted to one group but others may also read it, should you reword and include all possible readers and will it affect the quality of your work?
It’s not easy to be sure your writing will reach the right people and have the desired response. But with some extra effort, you can at least be headed in the right direction. I think the results are well worth the extra work. Without it, we may never hear that tree fall.
Writing for “Family Guy”
Deciding to incorporate more than just words into my blog, I gave YouTube a visit. Looking forward to warming up under a blanket and turning on the television in a few minutes, I saw a link about the very popular show “Family Guy”. For a few years I dreamed of writing for a television show, creating scripts for some type of comedy. I always just guessed as to what that would be like and now it seems funny that I never did any research on it. The writers seemed to have a lot of fun with there job. This video is a clip about writing the 100th episode of “Family Guy”. Enjoy!
Hey! Read this!
So since we all need to make five postings a week and no one seems to be keeping up (sans Rachel) I figured I’d post a little something something that we could all discuss. I did this paper in my aesthetics class about a month ago. It’s about a Cake show I went to (the band not the food) and I raised some topics about people’s dispositions toward live musical perfomances. The bulk of it is spent describing the show but only to emphasize on what a spectacular show it was which, in turn, reinforces the the philosophical issue. The philosophical issue comes toward the end, though my professor said it was more of a social scientific issue. Regardless, I’m sure you’re all music lovers and would have at least something to comment on about it. Plus, the final product was somewhat rushed and I’d like to expand on it. Any of your thoughts would be appreciated. Anyway, here’s my paper (sorry if it’s a little long):
As an appreciator of music, I have been going to see live performances for many years now. Be it a grand concert in an enormous arena or a five dollar show in a random kid=s basement, I=ve been to them all. I can find enjoyment in any of those places as long as the music is good (sometimes even when it=s not). I recently attended a Cake show earlier this month at Jersey=s own Starland Ballroom, a venue that=s not so much a ballroom as it is a glorified bar with a stage. Taking all the bad with the good, the show ended up being thoroughly entertaining.
While I=ve known about Cake for some time now, I only recently fell in love with the band. I don=t know what it was. My friends have all been huge fans of them for years now and I=ve been familiar with their music and their distinct sound for most of that time, yet for some reason they never earned more than a passing admiration from me until the last year. For the short time that I=ve been a big fan of their=s, I=ve immersed myself in their entire discography and liked nearly everything I=ve heard by them. I decided I had to see them live as soon as I possibly could and jumped at the chance to see them at Starland.
Cake opened with the song ARuby Don=t Take your Love to Town,@ a cover of a Kenny Rogers song of the same name off of their B-Sides and Rarities album. The name of the album itself should tell you that this was rather unorthodox of them. Most bands don=t open with a cover, let alone a song that=s on a compilation and isn=t a single. Regardless, I wasn=t complaining since it happens to be one of my favorites by them. After I thought about it for a while, it made more and more sense that they open with this particular song. One of the defining qualities of the band is the lead singer John McCrea=s voice. He uses it in a way that=s not quite spoken word, but doesn=t necessarily sound like singing in a traditional sense. I=ve heard it described as Ahalf singing, half talking.@ Not only that, he emphasizes each syllable while he sings, instead of stressing vowels like most vocalists. In that sense it makes it fundamentally similar to rap, but it certainly doesn=t sound like traditional rap either. It can only be discerned as McCrea=s distinct sound and it=s the first thing you hear in ARuby Don=t Take Your Love to Town.@ While everyone there knew who they came to see, it was like the band came out and said, AHere is Cake. Enjoy.@ There was no other band it could=ve been cause no other band has a singer like McCrea.
The set started out strong and while I would=ve chosen a better set list, I was still more than content with what they played. AJolene,@ one of their first hits and my second favorite song, made it=s way into the set. Many other hits were played as well, including ANever There,@ Short Skirt/Long Jacket,@ ALove You Madly,@ and the non-single yet still popular AStick Shifts and Safety Belts,@ all of which I=m fond of. I did notice that they played a lot of covers though. They played AWar Pigs,@ a Black Sabbath cover, ASad Songs and Waltzes,@ originally a Willie Nelson song, and the aforementioned ARuby Don=t Take Your Love to Town.@ While it=s not a terrible thing to play three covers in one show, and all were performed incredibly, I still prefer to hear original material by a band when I see them live. This might just be bitterness at their failure to play my favorite song, AHaze of Love,@ but I digress.
For me, it always makes a show much more entertaining when the band interacts with the crowd. Some people prefer that they just stand up there and play without making conversation, and while I can see the point to that argument I just can=t agree with it. I don=t wanna just hear their music, I can do that at home. When I see a band, I want their personality to come out. This can happen while a band plays, but a little respite in-between songs always helps. I need nothing fancy, just a few words here and there to remind me that I=m not seeing some sort of musical automatons on display. While McCrea was the only band member to interact with the audience, he did his entire band=s worth of doing so, like a true frontman. Whenever there was a part of a song where clapping or singing from the audience was appropriate and McCrea wasn=t tied up playing guitar, he rallied up the crowd and got everyone to do so. There were times where he got a clap going and, after some time of clapping, the audience stopped. As soon as he noticed this, McCrea ran to the front of the stage, with the most urgent of looks on his face, and got the crowd clapping again. I=ve never seen a performer so concerned with what the audience was doing. During one of their songs, someone took it upon themselves to throw a water bottle past his head, dousing him in whatever liquid was in it. The look on his face when this happened was something no words could do justice. Practically the whole audience laughed when they saw it, but he continued playing. After a few more songs, he berated the audience member who threw the bottle, which served to rile up the crowd again. It was magnificent.
McCrea had one more spectacle in his performance when he told the audience that the small sapling of a tree potted in the center of the stage is to go to the first audience member who could properly identify it. He claimed that we were to do this Ain an orderly fashion@ meaning Aeveryone raise their hand and I=ll call on you one at a time.@ This was during the set that he did this. And we obeyed. He gave us a couple of hints and scolded the people shouting out answers without raising their hands. After a series of failed attempts at naming the plant, McCrea claimed that we=d Abe here doing this until Starland Ballroom closes if we had to” until someone guessed correctly. When somebody finally gave apple tree as their answer, he told him to hang around until after the show to claim his prize. When the whole ordeal was over, they resumed playing their closing songs, only to come out and play two more songs as an encore. No one in the audience moved or stoped cheering until the stage hands came on and started unplugging the equipment. McCrea=s manipulation of the crowd and the rest of the band=s exquisite, spot on playing made this show phenomenal.
As fantastic as the show was, there is that eventual Ahowever@ in my critique. I=m beginning to see the value of other factors that go into a live performance that can mean the difference between a phenomenal show and a truly perfect one. The major ones being the audience and the venue itself. I have a personal and strict policy that I only dance to music that I love (a trait that makes me rather unpopular at most parties around here) and, as I mentioned before, I love Cake. When the opening band (nobody worth mentioning unfortunately) finished their set, me and one of my friends moved our way toward the center of the crowd in front of the stage in hopes that there would some sort of dancing during Cake. We arrived at where we would normally find such things only to encounter the exact opposite: a crowd of people who seemed to believe that this crowded oversized bar distributes tickets in a fashion that yields a first come, first serve, pseudo stadium arrangement where wherever you first stand on the flat concrete floor is your designated area; who then proceeded to give us dirty looks for trying to get closer and made snarky remarks to themselves. Now I have no problem with people wanting to just sit back, chill out and simply enjoy the music, but if you wanna do that there=s no difference between standing up by the stage or back by the bar area. Leave the center area for the people who can=t sit still to adequately appreciate music and have room to move. The whole show I stood still, barely bobbing my head or shifting my weight because no human contact or motion seemed welcomed by anyone. It was a shame. Hopefully next time I catch this band it will be at a bigger venue with a friendlier crowd.
