My Blogfolio

Just as God created the earth in six days and rested on the seventh, there comes a time when one should take a break from his or her work and reflect on what he or she has created. My first year of college is already wrapping up, and needless to say I’ve been working my butt off. As summer approaches and I get my well-needed rest from academia, I look back at all my work and, more specifically, this blog I’ve been writing this semester. The whole blog-writing experience has been one of great pleasure, and I’ve learned a lot about myself as a writer, especially what I enjoy in writing.

I’m sure this goes for a lot of people, but I enjoy writing SO much more when it’s about something I’m truly interested in. In my blog, I’ve had the opportunity to write about the internet, music, socratic discussion, and even my experiences with new media, from Reddit to Tumblr to word clouds. In addition, it’s so much easier to write when you’re not bogged down by formatting or having to write in an academic style. I can write however I want! Writing this blog has shown me that I’m a casual writer by heart. It’s just so much more enjoyable when I have creative freedom over my writing style.

Another thing I enjoy about blogging is having the ability to use hyperlinks. This was actually something I noticed myself about my writing in this blog as well as something that my Composition professor pointed out about my blog-writing. I really like using hyperlinks. I think hyperlinks are really useful in bringing in other sources of information beyond my own knowledge, from pictures, videos, Wikipedia pages, and potentially anything else on the internet. For example, if I’m discussing a topic that may be foreign to most people, I can easily lead them to a Wikipedia article or website that introduces the topic better than I ever could all with the click of a button. Hyperlinks are an easy way to supplement one’s writing.

I’ve written a lot in this blog, so I wrote up this “Blogfolio” to highlight some of my favorite blog posts. So without further ado . . . my Blogfolio:

My Favorite Comment on Another’s Blog: My Organized Mind’s “How Tennessee Helped Me Get Over My Fear of Making Mistakes” – Here, I found myself really examining myself and my behavior. My Organized Mind helped me uncover a bad habit of mine that I would really like to rid myself of. I probably never will get rid of it, but it never hurts to try.

Another’s Blog Post that Inspired Me: Once again, My Organized Mind’s “How Tennessee Helped Me Get Over My Fear of Making Mistakes”, for the same reasons as before.

My Most Intellectually Stretching and Analytical Post (#1 Strongest): “Does Art Need an Audience?” – This post was a response to a socratic class discussion about writing, art, and other deep, thought-provoking topics. During our discussion, someone asked whether a work of art, in order to be art, required an audience. And what was my answer to the question? Read and find out.

My Personal Favorite (#2 Strongest): “Music.” – In this post, I got to combine a personal narrative of my musical education with a discussion on why music is awesome. I also got to list some of my favorite musical works, or simply works that were on my mind at the time. Writing this blog post was a pleasure and a joy.

My Best Use of Images: “An Unintentional Fasting” – I put photos alongside all of my posts, but this picture, artistically portraying the exact problem I discovered after the events covered in the post, was the most relevant in relation to its accompanying post. The image is a side-by-side comparison of two pictures; in the first, people are bowing down to some form of the all-seeing eye, and in the second, people are on their computers and phones, and the all-seeing eye is replaced by a wifi symbol. This comparison shows how so many people become addicted to technology that it’s almost like worship. Being forced out of my own technological addiction (the circumstances of which are discussed in the post), I was able to see from the outside looking in just how inconsequential technology and the internet can be. Sure, technology is an amazing tool, but most of what I tend to use it for is shallow entertainment.

My Best Use of Hyperlinks: “Exploring the Blogosphere” – My first blog post also had the most effective use of hyperlinks. I used hyperlinks to easily refer readers to articles I was discussing, as well as to familiarize readers with the musical works of Joe Hisaishi. ( I suppose this Blogfolio also has some good use of hyperlinks too. . . .)

After all of this practice I’ve gained this semester with blog-writing, I feel that is could be a springboard to a long-term blog-writing venture and not just a short-term class requirement. I’ve really fallen in love with blog-writing. I have complete freedom over the subject matter, and I can write casually, which gives me more creativity over the style. As for what I’ll write about in the future, well . . . I suppose I could pick a central theme to guide my writing, or I could simply write about whatever the heck I want, like coffee brewing techniques or anime. I’ll figure it out when the time comes.

Taking a Break from Reddit

Hey everyone. You probably saw my recent post about my recent dive into the Reddit community, but to sum it up real quickly in case you haven’t, I had been lurking (browsing but never posting or commenting) on Reddit for a several months, so I recently decided to make an effort to start posting and commenting more on Reddit. That way I could actually contribute to the Reddit community. And honestly . . . it’s not going so well.

Last night I decided that I would post a couple of image macros on Reddit just for fun. In hindsight, I totally regret it. It’s not like my posts were met with harsh criticism or anything. In fact, I didn’t really get much of a response. However, something happened when I was sitting there waiting for a response on the post. I felt a type of anxiety I hadn’t felt in a long time, a type that I had during a very rough time in my life. I don’t know why I would get so worked up over something so simple as posting some memetic material on the internet, but this has felt like some kind of a red-flag warning for me. Call me paranoid, but that’s what it felt like.

All this is to say that I’ve decided to take a break from the addictive world of Reddit. Something about last night made me feel very uneasy about Reddit. I need to get away, at least for a little while.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I will take solace in my God and in music.

A Miniature Rhetorical Analysis on Project for Awesome

This is the official logo from last year’s Project for Awesome.

Project for Awesome, created by the infamous Vlog Brothers, is a Youtube video competition/charity drive intent on “decreasing world suck.” The gist of Project for Awesome is that people upload videos to Youtube that advocate some sort of charitable organization, and viewers watch these videos and vote on their favorite ones. During this time, an IndieGoGo fundraiser page is available for viewers to make donations to Project for Awesome. The five (or ten in 2012) videos with the most votes then split the donations amassed by all of the viewers. The 2012 Project for Awesome alone raised $483,296.

For my final project in my Comp 2 class, I was assigned to investigate a case of using digital media such as social media or online videos to support some sort of cause or community organization. I chose to perform a case study on Project for Awesome, or more specifically, the winners of the 2012 Project for Awesome. By investigating these winning videos and identifying the characteristics which led them to gain the most votes from their viewers, I can glean insight regarding writing or media techniques to apply to my own work. It would be especially relevant if I ever end up making Youtube videos.

Here’s a list of the videos/organizations that won the 2012 Project for Awesome:

1. Office of Letters and Light
2. Not Forgotten
3. Wildlife Waystation
4. Alzheimer’s Society
5. Harry Potter Alliance
6. Save the Children
7. BGSU Dance Marathon
8. Uncultured Project
9. Techo
10. Love146

Now for the rhetorical analysis. Here’s the agenda: (1) Identify the author and the intended target audience (2) Determine the intended purpose (3) Point out examples of ethos, pathos, and logos being used (4) Evaluate its effectiveness in achieving its intended purpose.

So what is the author of the winning videos? Obviously, there are many of them. Some examples would include Charlie McDonnell (AKA CharlieIsSoCoolLike), Gunnarolla, and the Harry Potter Alliance. The intended audience of these videos would be (again, pretty obviously) the entire Youtube viewership, which could be a combination of all sorts of different people (here is a page of the Youtube viewer demographics, courtesy of Youtube).

Next, what is the purpose of these videos? Well, as we’ve previously established, the videos are designed to advocate a charitable organization of some sort and to gain votes from viewers in order to win a share of the donations for the charity.

Now here’s where it gets fun. What are some examples of ethos, pathos, and logos within these videos? With all of the different videos that won just in 2012 alone, I have seen examples of all sorts of rhetorical strategies. For ethos, the most common strategy was charisma, using charm or humor to draw the audience in. Also, the fact that a lot of these video makers already had massive followings prior to Project for Awesome would have been helpful, since many of the viewers would have already been familiar with or were fond of the video makers. Some of the videos included firsthand experience from the speaker. One example would be Charlie McDonnell who, in his video advocating the Alzheimer’s Society, described his experience of having a grandfather who had Alzheimer’s disease and eventually passed away as a result. This one was particularly effective for me as it showed that Charlie McDonnell had a strong reason to be advocating the organization he/she was supporting.

These videos also had numerous instances of pathos. Since most if not all charities are established to solve some sort of world problem, it is easy to appeal to the audience’s emotion by describing in detail the problem they seek to solve. Appealing to emotion can also be easily achieved simply through language. One video supporting the Wildlife Waystation was effective in using pathos by making me feel responsible about helping their animal sanctuary since they are primarily funded by donations. The video said that it was up to me to help these animals. I immediately felt an emotional response. I didn’t want to feel the guilt of seeing those animals suffer, so I felt compelled to donate and support them. Now that’s pathos.

Finally, we have logos. Logos is probably the most upfront of the rhetorical strategies, and that makes it effective when used correctly. The most common use of logos I noticed in these videos was the use of statistics and general logical statements. The Harry Potter Alliance video showed an impressive use of statistics to inform the viewer of how many members they have amassed, how much money they have raised, how much supplies they have donated, and other useful information. While doing so, the video remained organized and engaging.

Overall, these videos were fairly effective. By using a mix of the three different rhetorical strategies of ethos, pathos, and logos, they got their points across and compelled me to take action as well. I saw instances of authority through firsthand experience, charismatic presentation, appeal to emotion and morality, and factual data and evidence. In addition, what I believe to be effective about Project for Awesome is that even though it is over for this year, the videos are still online and can still raise awareness about these various charities and nonprofit organizations. I hope to gain even more insight into the effectiveness of Project for Awesome through my digital activism project.

A Leap into the Reddit Community

Reddit. “The Front Page of the Internet,” as some people call it. Just like the Internet, Reddit can be a scary and disgusting place. On the other hand, it can be home to creativity, collaboration, and community. To be specific, Reddit is a social media site aimed at creating online communities based on common interests or beliefs. Besides the Reddit Front Page, which is composed of the hottest content on Reddit, Reddit is broken up into subreddits which are run and moderated by other redditors just like yourself. Each subreddit is built around some common interest or theme, and they are as numerous as the hairs on your head. Some popular subreddits include /r/aww which is dedicated to providing pictures and videos or adorable animals and /r/funny which is home to all sorts of comedy.

Reddit operates on an up-vote/down-vote system. (Up-votes and down-votes look a little something like this.) Any posts or comments on posts can be voted up or down once by each viewer. Content that receives more up-votes (also known as Karma) rise in popularity on the site, and those that are down-voted sink into obscurity. In a perfect world, original content that is witty, humorous, informative, creative, or otherwise awesome would receive up-votes, and tasteless, boring, and unoriginal content and “reposts” (posting something previously submitted to Reddit) would receive either no attention, or worse, the dreaded down-vote by the viewers. Because of the presence of up-votes and down-votes, Reddit can tend to get rather competitive. This can be a good thing, however, as it may spur redditors to contribute original and creative content that is deserving of karma, thereby increasing the overall quality of the content of Reddit. Unfortunately, reposts are common, and due to redditors being unaware that certain posts are indeed reposts, they can be rewarded for copying someone else’s work.

So I’ve been on Reddit for several months now. However, I’ve been what Reddit calls a “lurker,” which is basically someone who browses Reddit but never really contributes to discussion or posts any content. And honestly, it’s hard to get out of “lurker” status. Much of the Reddit community is overly critical, so even something as trivial as a minor typo in a thread post can get you “down-voted to oblivion.” Despite the danger of being attacked by overly critical redditors, I’ve recently began making an effort to become more engaged with the Reddit community. So far, I believe today has been the most successful for me for engaging in the Reddit community, as I mustered up the courage to go on /r/coffee and start a thread asking for advice on buying replacement parts for an espresso machine I recently purchased at a thrift store. When I posted my questions, to my stupefaction, someone responded within a few minutes! Moreover, the response was informative, helpful, and polite! For someone who was nervous about diving into the Reddit community, this was an encouraging moment. (If, for some reason, you want to see the my post on /r/coffee, here it is.)

In the future I hope to become even more engaged in communities on Reddit. Being a former lurker, I have already scouted out many a few subreddits that have piqued my interests (such as the aforementioned /r/coffee or /r/food), so now the next step is to continue contributing to online discussion and to submit my own original content however and whenever I can.

I must warn you, however, that you can find some nasty stuff on Reddit, just as you can on many other internet sites. Please use caution when browsing.

I got a Tumblr.

Tumblr is enthralled with pugs at the present moment.

So recently I succumbed to peer pressure (my brother, that is) and signed up for a Tumblr account. If you don’t know, Tumblr is yet another of those social networking sites but with an emphasis on sharing content instead of simply conversing. The setup is simple. Get a username and password, start subscribing to pages, and presto! Those subscriptions will begin filling your dashboard, and you can begin posting your own content or even repost other people’s stuff. Honestly, Tumblr wasn’t what I had originally expected. I had thought that Tumblr was more of a blogging site much like WordPress. However, once I dove into the Tumblr world, I realized that it composed mostly of one single thing:

Gifs.

Oh yes. You know those short little videos that people post everywhere on the internet? Well they’re called gifs, and they’re everywhere on Tumblr. People love to post gifs of scenes from their favorite movies or TV shows, or perhaps from other visually pleasing video footage. One of my favorite things about Tumblr is the many “#What Should We Call —” sites, which are dedicated to using gifs to illustrate certain common feelings and reactions to events. The prime example of such a site would be “#What Should We Call Me,” which I believe was the first Tumblr site of its kind. One that is especially relevant to me, being a musician, is “#What Should We Call Conservatory,” which is chock-full of gifs relevant to any aspiring musician. As an example, this one illustrates the horrifying feeling of being called in for an audition. The gif humorously represents the common gut-wrenching experience of music auditions. That’s what I love about Tumblr, and especially about gifs: they’re so relatable! It’s always a refreshing feeling to see that other people go through the exact same things on a regular basis as you do.

Despite the heavy focus on visual content like pictures and gifs, there are some writing aspects to Tumblr. I’ve seen many instances where internet celebrities will use Tumblr to host Q&A sessions with fans. I’ve never participated in one, but I would love to in the future. Also, I do believe that Tumblr has a blogging/writing option, although I’ve rarely seen it used. Indeed, Tumblr is very addicting mainly because of the plethora of stuff on there. And yes, I’ve taken many a few breaks from writing this to look at Tumblr. I’m sorry.

Now my goal is to actually start sharing some original work on Tumblr. So far I’ve only been reblogging other users’ content, which is fine, but I really want to start contributing to the Tumblr community.

My Practice Blogfolio

Instead of posting a picture alongside this post, I figured that it would be fun for you to listen to some music with it. But I wouldn’t want to force you to listen to something I picked out for you, so I simply ask you to listen to a song that makes you really really really happy.  (If you need a recommendation or are simply curious about what I would choose, click here please.) So put those headphones on, hit play, get happy, and start reading.

It only seems like only a couple of months ago that the semester began, and in reality, it’s only been a couple of months. While thinking about the end of the school year, I found myself reminiscing about my newly-begun journey as a blogger. Again, it’s only been a few months since I started this blog, and I have already amassed 4,000 words of original writing (4,600, if you count what you’re reading now). I know it’s not that impressive, but being someone who usually doesn’t engage in much casual writing, I am impressed in myself. And apparently it’s already time to look back and recall my fondest moments while writing. I guess it’s a good idea for a writer to frequently bring to mind his or her past writing and reflect on it. In my case, I was quite fond of the few posts I made about music as music is a subject I am wholly passionate about. Those posts were some of the easiest to write simply because of my interest in the subject.

So without further ado . . . my (practice) Blogfolio:

My Favorite Comment on Another’s Blog: My Organized Mind’s “How Tennessee Helped Me Get Over My Fear of Making Mistakes” – Here, I found myself really examining myself and my behavior. My Organized Mind helped me uncover a bad habit of mine that I would really like to rid myself of. I probably never will, but it never hurts to try.

Another’s Blog Post that Inspired Me: Once again, My Organized Mind’s “How Tennessee Helped Me Get Over My Fear of Making Mistakes”, for the same reasons as before.

My Most Intellectually Stretching and Analytical Post (#1 Strongest): “Does Art Need an Audience?” – This post was a response to a socratic class discussion about writing, art, and other deep, thought-provoking topics.

My Personal Favorite (#2 Strongest): “Music.” – In this post, I got to combine a personal narrative of my musical education with a discussion on why music is awesome. I also got to list some of my favorite musical works, or simply works that were on my mind at the time. Writing this blog post was a pleasure and a joy.

My Best Use of Images: “An Unintentional Fasting” – I put photos alongside all of my posts, but this picture, artistically portraying the exact problem I discovered after the events covered in the post, was the most relevant in relation to its accompanying post.

My Best Use of Hyperlinks: “Exploring the Blogosphere” – My first blog post also had the most effective use of hyperlinks. I used hyperlinks to easily refer readers to articles I was discussing, as well as to familiarize readers with the musical works of Joe Hisaishi. ( I suppose this Blogfolio also has some good use of hyperlinks too. . . .)

I’ve come a long way from the beginning of this semester. However, this is only the beginning. All of my blog-writing thus far has been for assignments for my composition class, but I feel that I want to continue writing in my blog well past the conclusion of the class. As for what I’ll write about, well . . . I’ll figure that out when the time comes.