I'm going to be out out town this weekend. please text message me the info my number is 270 535 0962
Thanks, Micah McAllister
Friday, August 31, 2007
DebateThis logo
(Click on it to see it in non-jagged-lines-mode)
Like? Dislike? Anything?
I can mock up a homepage next, but a rough sketch from someone would be helpful. Not really sure where to start on that one.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
root canal, great drugs..
I was a little tipsy when i wrote that. The drugs worked very well. I was hoping that I could incorperate a game into locker stalker. One idea is to guess where a presidential canidate is campaining. The questions can range form simple facts about the state down to particular issues that are affecting the state. I think that facts about the state tied in with issues can be a unique way of asking the questions. A question might be: The state that John Doe is campaining is known for it's wine it's currents govener was a former profesional bodybuilder. Where is John doe campaining?
Little Groggy
I just had a root cana...fun. I want to work on the Carman Sandiego bit a liitle more. It would have to be attatched to the locker...stalker? One idea i had for it had to to with geography. I have to go to work i will post more tonight.
Monday, August 27, 2007
mLive
I briefly mentioned mlive. This is what I was talking about.
mlive stirs together news from over 8 seperate reporting outlets in the mid-Michigan area. It's nothing fancy, but it does have RSS feeds and stuff of that nature.
This sort of hub site would be a perfect switchboard for a localized DebateThis.
We also might want to think about organizations like Gannett or Knight Ridder
They specialize in tying together strings of local news outlets under one house. If we went for the company or publishing house, it would spread to a large regional sector. That covers local and could push into national.
mlive stirs together news from over 8 seperate reporting outlets in the mid-Michigan area. It's nothing fancy, but it does have RSS feeds and stuff of that nature.
This sort of hub site would be a perfect switchboard for a localized DebateThis.
We also might want to think about organizations like Gannett or Knight Ridder
They specialize in tying together strings of local news outlets under one house. If we went for the company or publishing house, it would spread to a large regional sector. That covers local and could push into national.
Join DebateThis
DebateThis is a good idea. Join DebateThis.
If you think DebateThis is a great idea and you see a vision for how it would work, please join.
If you think DebateThis is alright but want to come in with some major changes, please join.
If you think DebateThis is terrible but like where it's heart is at and want to change everything, please join.
Please contact Steve
(248) 214-1609
patte294@msu.edu
I really suck and technical and artistic things. So I would love to be the idea man/point person. If you have skill(s) please don't be shy about what they are. Comment here.
We need...
People with creative ideas
People who can maybe draw things
People who can maybe build things
People who can maybe design things
People who can offer advice
People who can offer criticism
Thanks.
If you think DebateThis is a great idea and you see a vision for how it would work, please join.
If you think DebateThis is alright but want to come in with some major changes, please join.
If you think DebateThis is terrible but like where it's heart is at and want to change everything, please join.
Please contact Steve
(248) 214-1609
patte294@msu.edu
I really suck and technical and artistic things. So I would love to be the idea man/point person. If you have skill(s) please don't be shy about what they are. Comment here.
We need...
People with creative ideas
People who can maybe draw things
People who can maybe build things
People who can maybe design things
People who can offer advice
People who can offer criticism
Thanks.
Andrea Contact Info
agosselin@smcvt.edu
Email me if you want more info than that ... I'm not putting it on the blog.
Thanks. Have a good night.
Email me if you want more info than that ... I'm not putting it on the blog.
Thanks. Have a good night.
DebateThis
Hey Everyone,
Sorry I'm late, but I had a lot to say and I wanted to make sure it didnt sound stupid and was relatively easy to understand.
So here it is....
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
DebateThis is a web-based, utility-style application that allows users from all over the country to exercise, share and expose their news knowledge by competing in digital online debates.
DebateThis is a revolution in learning, critical thinking and competition. By creating a forum for people to share conflicting opinions, members of the DebateThis society will have to be well informed of the current events and issues that surround them.
As new media churns out new ideas and ways to gather information, DebateThis is a way to funnel that into something both immediately positive and instantaneously appealing. DebateThis will cultivate news knowledge into competition, competition into status and status into digital fame.
Demographics
DebateThis is aimed at the politically and socially informed, ages 15-30. More importantly it is aimed both at the section of youth that is both competitive and used to a certain level of digital recognition and fame.
This covers both the iGeneration and yGeneration, two groups of young people who expect technical simplicity, creativity, style, entertainment, instant gratification and most importantly: themselves.
These are the children of YouTube, Myspace and Facebook… where fame is not only a possibility; it is, to a certain extent very expected. DebateThis feeds into that desire in such a way that allows news and the ability to gather news to take center stage in that hunt for notoriety.
How does it Function?
DebateThis is a widget. A clickable, linkable icon that can attach to nearly any web 2.0 savvy web page. DebateThis will feature its own website where you can customize you're own user profile and install the browser-embedded software, ala StumbleUpon or Skype.After the software is installed, an icon will appear at the bottom of all stories from participating news organizations.
For example if CNN and The New York Times both pick this up, the icon will appear at the bottom of nearly every story the DebateThis user reads.
Clicking on the icon takes you to TheArena, a sub-page that is back within the DebateThis website itself. There you will see a enclosed version of the article along with a section to "Spark a Debate."
Basically, the first person to comment can say anything he or she wants about the article in controlled but challenging manner. The idea is that the person comments on something in or about the article that in effect, challenges the other members of the DebateThis community.
That challenge can be in an audio, video, print or multimedia format and is displayed prominently on the articles own arena page (and also linked to each individual poster's blog).
Other members then come out of the woodwork to counter the argument, statement or question.The motivation is that each time a user posts something thought-provoking and directly tackles whatever was said in a way that it almost trumps the other user, it earns points for that user.
The user community can vote on each post. Points are awarded for the number of positive ratings as well as number of hits per each post. Accumulating points allows each member to become more influential in the community.
The top point earners are always displayed on the homepage where users can find out more about that person. A senior point earner may be able to write his or her own articles for the page or have his own featured space where other users can listen to more of what he has to say.
A member may become such a good and knowledgeable debater that his fame can travel across the entire community. With enough points and position in the community, he may even grow a following and then a team, where other members work to post together under his leadership.
Starting/signing up
To begin using DebateThis…
1) A new user must go to DebateThis.com and choose to sign up for a new account, this correlates with the automatic installation of the DebateThis browser-embedded software (think StumbleUpon)
2) After installation the user is than taken to his new Debater homepage. This is similar to a facebook-style community network page complete with interests, contact information, etc. However there are changes for the news and political angles of Debate this. (more on that later)
3) The user may then customize his homepage and Debate settings.
4) That’s it. After the software and customizations, the user is then able to go to any participating news network organization homepage and a DebateThis icon will be selectable at the bottom of every relevant story.
5) Start debating!
DebateThis Homepage
The DebateThis homepage is the hub of the network. This is ground zero for everything in the DebateThis community. It is here where you will find links to specific arenas, participating news homepages, interesting articles, DebateSpace community profile pages, relevant videos and clips, blogs and opinions from top debaters, links to debater status and the DebateThis leader board. This is also where new users will come to sign up for the community.
DebateSpace
DebateSpace is the network of individual Facebook style profiles that features the DebateThis user community. Every registered member of DebateThis receives DebateSpace upon signing up.
DebateSpace comes with contact information, places for relevant pictures, audio, video, progeganda, etc. It also has space for rants, write-ups and blogs.
Instead of a wall, DebateSpace features an ongoing log of all postings from previous debates. The format is similar to an online journal and the user can make comments on his or her performance.
The hook for this is that DebateSpace is completely organic. It is based solely on the number of points a DebateThis user accumulates from competing and debating in various news arenas. The more points a user has, the more he can customize his individual DebateSpace.
Here is an example: A user new to DebateThis will have space for his profile picture, debating log, the standard DebateThis color scheme and basic contact information
A DebateThis master or senior point earner will have purchased (through the point system) space for hundreds of pictures, audio files, videos and weblinks, he will have custom colors, subgroups, dynamic contact information, space for rants, custom widgets and a whole host of other material at his disposal.
The News Arenas
A News Arena is basically a chain of DebateThis debating. With the DebateThis software, any relevant news article by a particiaping news organization can turn into an arena.
Here’s how it works:
1) A DT member clicks on an article, reads it and scrolls down to the bottom. Lets say the article is titled “Obama Inexperienced for 08.”
2) Member X is infuriated by this article and clicks “DebateThis!”
3) From there, the member is taking to the “Obama Inexperienced for 08” arena. He is the first to enter as this is a brand new article so he clicks the “Spark a Debate” icon.
**The length, format and extensiveness of each user’s post is completely organic and based once again of the DebateThis point system.
Example: A brand new user is limited to creating only a text post with a very limited space (maybe one or two paragraphs max).
An advanced user has a whole page for posting, can create audio and video clips featuring whatever creative message he chooses to get across as well as links, pictures, etc.
Basically an advanced point earner has an extensive arsenal at his disposal for gaining points and respect in any given arena, where a new user can only use a very brief and limited medium.**
4) After choosing to spark a new debate, the user (lets say he is a new user so is limited to restricted text) posts a short paragraph on Obama. Maybe he agrees with points in the article that say he’s experienced or maybe he agrees with the ones that say he is completely inexperienced.
Whatever he chooses to write about, he does so and posts it on the area wall. After the post, DebateThis then asks him to pose an open challenge. It could say “prove me wrong” or “why exactly do you think Obama is experienced” or “There is nothing you can say to trump my argument.” This statement prompts other users to jump in.
**What I’m visualizing for the arena is very hard to convey. But I see the acuall article in a stylized flash format with almost like tree branches of differing debates.**
5) Member Y sees this post and wants to post and can either decide to post a well thought out rebuttal or spark another debate.
6) As the debate continues to sprawl, every member in the community can make a simple vote to decide how many points he or she will give the user for his or her post.
The Point System
Voting, like everything else, is organic and dependant on user points. A new user can only select “I liked it” or “I didn’t like it” to each member’s post while an advanced user can select a range of options from “This is a horrible argument” to “Apply to promote this user now.” His points may also open up a star system (1/5 to 5/5 stars) and a comment/message system for offering advice or criticism.
The most advanced users may become so high ranking that they, in effect, become moderators who check for the content of posts and may choose to censor or delete posts based on the DebateThis user agreement. (Think GMs in role playing games, etc)
The more points you obtain for users, the more options become available, the more cool stuff unlocks and most importantly… the more famous you become in the community.
There is also a ranking system which correlates with the point system. In other words having 0 to 100 points is the status of “New User” where has having 1,000,000+ points grants the status of “Master” or something cool sounding.
Loose Example: Milestones
00 points: New User Status Obtained
15 points: 100 words of new space available for posting!
30 points: search feature unlocked
45 points: New DebateSpace widget available!
70 points: 15 seconds of Audio posting now available!
100 points: Rookie User Status Obtained
New widget unlocked
New DebateSpace Custom color available!
Etc.
Think gaining rpg levels + a cashing in carnival tickets for junk + gaining status in a community.
**Any post with clearly bellow the belt, over the line, unrelated/spamcious or just plain offensive will be moderated by a team of the site's moderators (probably including senior point earners if they so choose). That user is then subject to loose points, status, privileges or may be outright blocked from usage.**
Why people will eat this up…
Fame, rewards, competition, a chance to be heard, people love critizing everything, people think they know everything, huge political, moral and ethical divide in this country right now.
How is it news relevant…
Its completely based on reading/watching the news, user must be prepared or will get embarrassed, user’s status depends entirely on his or her dedication to news and how well they articulate that.
Why will new organizations like it…
Users absolutely can not debate without going through each article from the news provider, a chance to advertise ‘coolness’, more hits, more excitement for reading generic stuff, more volume.
-----------------------------------------
That’s all for now, thanks for reading.
Sorry I'm late, but I had a lot to say and I wanted to make sure it didnt sound stupid and was relatively easy to understand.
So here it is....
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
DebateThis is a web-based, utility-style application that allows users from all over the country to exercise, share and expose their news knowledge by competing in digital online debates.
DebateThis is a revolution in learning, critical thinking and competition. By creating a forum for people to share conflicting opinions, members of the DebateThis society will have to be well informed of the current events and issues that surround them.
As new media churns out new ideas and ways to gather information, DebateThis is a way to funnel that into something both immediately positive and instantaneously appealing. DebateThis will cultivate news knowledge into competition, competition into status and status into digital fame.
Demographics
DebateThis is aimed at the politically and socially informed, ages 15-30. More importantly it is aimed both at the section of youth that is both competitive and used to a certain level of digital recognition and fame.
This covers both the iGeneration and yGeneration, two groups of young people who expect technical simplicity, creativity, style, entertainment, instant gratification and most importantly: themselves.
These are the children of YouTube, Myspace and Facebook… where fame is not only a possibility; it is, to a certain extent very expected. DebateThis feeds into that desire in such a way that allows news and the ability to gather news to take center stage in that hunt for notoriety.
How does it Function?
DebateThis is a widget. A clickable, linkable icon that can attach to nearly any web 2.0 savvy web page. DebateThis will feature its own website where you can customize you're own user profile and install the browser-embedded software, ala StumbleUpon or Skype.After the software is installed, an icon will appear at the bottom of all stories from participating news organizations.
For example if CNN and The New York Times both pick this up, the icon will appear at the bottom of nearly every story the DebateThis user reads.
Clicking on the icon takes you to TheArena, a sub-page that is back within the DebateThis website itself. There you will see a enclosed version of the article along with a section to "Spark a Debate."
Basically, the first person to comment can say anything he or she wants about the article in controlled but challenging manner. The idea is that the person comments on something in or about the article that in effect, challenges the other members of the DebateThis community.
That challenge can be in an audio, video, print or multimedia format and is displayed prominently on the articles own arena page (and also linked to each individual poster's blog).
Other members then come out of the woodwork to counter the argument, statement or question.The motivation is that each time a user posts something thought-provoking and directly tackles whatever was said in a way that it almost trumps the other user, it earns points for that user.
The user community can vote on each post. Points are awarded for the number of positive ratings as well as number of hits per each post. Accumulating points allows each member to become more influential in the community.
The top point earners are always displayed on the homepage where users can find out more about that person. A senior point earner may be able to write his or her own articles for the page or have his own featured space where other users can listen to more of what he has to say.
A member may become such a good and knowledgeable debater that his fame can travel across the entire community. With enough points and position in the community, he may even grow a following and then a team, where other members work to post together under his leadership.
Starting/signing up
To begin using DebateThis…
1) A new user must go to DebateThis.com and choose to sign up for a new account, this correlates with the automatic installation of the DebateThis browser-embedded software (think StumbleUpon)
2) After installation the user is than taken to his new Debater homepage. This is similar to a facebook-style community network page complete with interests, contact information, etc. However there are changes for the news and political angles of Debate this. (more on that later)
3) The user may then customize his homepage and Debate settings.
4) That’s it. After the software and customizations, the user is then able to go to any participating news network organization homepage and a DebateThis icon will be selectable at the bottom of every relevant story.
5) Start debating!
DebateThis Homepage
The DebateThis homepage is the hub of the network. This is ground zero for everything in the DebateThis community. It is here where you will find links to specific arenas, participating news homepages, interesting articles, DebateSpace community profile pages, relevant videos and clips, blogs and opinions from top debaters, links to debater status and the DebateThis leader board. This is also where new users will come to sign up for the community.
DebateSpace
DebateSpace is the network of individual Facebook style profiles that features the DebateThis user community. Every registered member of DebateThis receives DebateSpace upon signing up.
DebateSpace comes with contact information, places for relevant pictures, audio, video, progeganda, etc. It also has space for rants, write-ups and blogs.
Instead of a wall, DebateSpace features an ongoing log of all postings from previous debates. The format is similar to an online journal and the user can make comments on his or her performance.
The hook for this is that DebateSpace is completely organic. It is based solely on the number of points a DebateThis user accumulates from competing and debating in various news arenas. The more points a user has, the more he can customize his individual DebateSpace.
Here is an example: A user new to DebateThis will have space for his profile picture, debating log, the standard DebateThis color scheme and basic contact information
A DebateThis master or senior point earner will have purchased (through the point system) space for hundreds of pictures, audio files, videos and weblinks, he will have custom colors, subgroups, dynamic contact information, space for rants, custom widgets and a whole host of other material at his disposal.
The News Arenas
A News Arena is basically a chain of DebateThis debating. With the DebateThis software, any relevant news article by a particiaping news organization can turn into an arena.
Here’s how it works:
1) A DT member clicks on an article, reads it and scrolls down to the bottom. Lets say the article is titled “Obama Inexperienced for 08.”
2) Member X is infuriated by this article and clicks “DebateThis!”
3) From there, the member is taking to the “Obama Inexperienced for 08” arena. He is the first to enter as this is a brand new article so he clicks the “Spark a Debate” icon.
**The length, format and extensiveness of each user’s post is completely organic and based once again of the DebateThis point system.
Example: A brand new user is limited to creating only a text post with a very limited space (maybe one or two paragraphs max).
An advanced user has a whole page for posting, can create audio and video clips featuring whatever creative message he chooses to get across as well as links, pictures, etc.
Basically an advanced point earner has an extensive arsenal at his disposal for gaining points and respect in any given arena, where a new user can only use a very brief and limited medium.**
4) After choosing to spark a new debate, the user (lets say he is a new user so is limited to restricted text) posts a short paragraph on Obama. Maybe he agrees with points in the article that say he’s experienced or maybe he agrees with the ones that say he is completely inexperienced.
Whatever he chooses to write about, he does so and posts it on the area wall. After the post, DebateThis then asks him to pose an open challenge. It could say “prove me wrong” or “why exactly do you think Obama is experienced” or “There is nothing you can say to trump my argument.” This statement prompts other users to jump in.
**What I’m visualizing for the arena is very hard to convey. But I see the acuall article in a stylized flash format with almost like tree branches of differing debates.**
5) Member Y sees this post and wants to post and can either decide to post a well thought out rebuttal or spark another debate.
6) As the debate continues to sprawl, every member in the community can make a simple vote to decide how many points he or she will give the user for his or her post.
The Point System
Voting, like everything else, is organic and dependant on user points. A new user can only select “I liked it” or “I didn’t like it” to each member’s post while an advanced user can select a range of options from “This is a horrible argument” to “Apply to promote this user now.” His points may also open up a star system (1/5 to 5/5 stars) and a comment/message system for offering advice or criticism.
The most advanced users may become so high ranking that they, in effect, become moderators who check for the content of posts and may choose to censor or delete posts based on the DebateThis user agreement. (Think GMs in role playing games, etc)
The more points you obtain for users, the more options become available, the more cool stuff unlocks and most importantly… the more famous you become in the community.
There is also a ranking system which correlates with the point system. In other words having 0 to 100 points is the status of “New User” where has having 1,000,000+ points grants the status of “Master” or something cool sounding.
Loose Example: Milestones
00 points: New User Status Obtained
15 points: 100 words of new space available for posting!
30 points: search feature unlocked
45 points: New DebateSpace widget available!
70 points: 15 seconds of Audio posting now available!
100 points: Rookie User Status Obtained
New widget unlocked
New DebateSpace Custom color available!
Etc.
Think gaining rpg levels + a cashing in carnival tickets for junk + gaining status in a community.
**Any post with clearly bellow the belt, over the line, unrelated/spamcious or just plain offensive will be moderated by a team of the site's moderators (probably including senior point earners if they so choose). That user is then subject to loose points, status, privileges or may be outright blocked from usage.**
Why people will eat this up…
Fame, rewards, competition, a chance to be heard, people love critizing everything, people think they know everything, huge political, moral and ethical divide in this country right now.
How is it news relevant…
Its completely based on reading/watching the news, user must be prepared or will get embarrassed, user’s status depends entirely on his or her dedication to news and how well they articulate that.
Why will new organizations like it…
Users absolutely can not debate without going through each article from the news provider, a chance to advertise ‘coolness’, more hits, more excitement for reading generic stuff, more volume.
-----------------------------------------
That’s all for now, thanks for reading.
Sunday, August 26, 2007
I sent out an email wiht conference call info
and info about the conference
if ya didn't get it, let me know and i'll forward it
if ya didn't get it, let me know and i'll forward it
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Update: Gathering Info
Hey Everyone.
Tomorrow I'm going to publish a mega-post about DebateThis. All of its features, positives, negatives, targets, goals, yada. So far, Christina has contributed to the research and has emailed me a few of her thoughts and concerns:
"Hey Steve,
I just wanted to check-in with you about some ideas I had about
DebateThis. If I seem a little nit-picky it's just because I want to
figure out the potential problems now instead of down the road when we're
stuck...
First off, I don't think Micah's idea should be crammed into this idea
unless it's a tiny accessory on the site. The two ideas seem to be aimed
at different things, I don't see a natural connection between the two...
Also, we will need a news organization to run this in the real world, and
I see the appeal of them wanting a 'DebateThis' button on the bottom of
the article, but not any appeal in maintaining the DebateThis site itself
if it's going to take people away from the news organization's site. (evil
$$)
Back when this project started I worked on a debate site idea, and one of
the problems I had was that the community that we create is going to
decide what it wants... and it may totally stray from debate. What if
people just post jokes or irresponsible/unresearched info?
I also worry about the whole 'senior point earner' system. It'll be a
great way to spark competition when the site is new, but once it becomes
established, I worry that new-commers will see how much work they have to
do to gain recognition and get discouraged and leave. Also, we're
assuming that people are going to want to debate multiple things. I think
it is likely that there are people only interested in one debate issue
(ex. Abortion may be important to them, but not the war in Iraq) How do we
make the site appeal to them if they have no desire for the social fame?
I'm not really sure where we go from here. We should talk about the
step-by-step experience a user goes through when they visit the site. If
you want to post this all to the blog to get other people to comment on
what I wrote here, that's cool too."
If anyone wants to join team DebateThis or has other concerns, thoughts or ideas... please let me know before early tomorrow evening.
Thanks guys.
Tomorrow I'm going to publish a mega-post about DebateThis. All of its features, positives, negatives, targets, goals, yada. So far, Christina has contributed to the research and has emailed me a few of her thoughts and concerns:
"Hey Steve,
I just wanted to check-in with you about some ideas I had about
DebateThis. If I seem a little nit-picky it's just because I want to
figure out the potential problems now instead of down the road when we're
stuck...
First off, I don't think Micah's idea should be crammed into this idea
unless it's a tiny accessory on the site. The two ideas seem to be aimed
at different things, I don't see a natural connection between the two...
Also, we will need a news organization to run this in the real world, and
I see the appeal of them wanting a 'DebateThis' button on the bottom of
the article, but not any appeal in maintaining the DebateThis site itself
if it's going to take people away from the news organization's site. (evil
$$)
Back when this project started I worked on a debate site idea, and one of
the problems I had was that the community that we create is going to
decide what it wants... and it may totally stray from debate. What if
people just post jokes or irresponsible/unresearched info?
I also worry about the whole 'senior point earner' system. It'll be a
great way to spark competition when the site is new, but once it becomes
established, I worry that new-commers will see how much work they have to
do to gain recognition and get discouraged and leave. Also, we're
assuming that people are going to want to debate multiple things. I think
it is likely that there are people only interested in one debate issue
(ex. Abortion may be important to them, but not the war in Iraq) How do we
make the site appeal to them if they have no desire for the social fame?
I'm not really sure where we go from here. We should talk about the
step-by-step experience a user goes through when they visit the site. If
you want to post this all to the blog to get other people to comment on
what I wrote here, that's cool too."
If anyone wants to join team DebateThis or has other concerns, thoughts or ideas... please let me know before early tomorrow evening.
Thanks guys.
Friday, August 24, 2007
Political PUB style game
My overall goal for my application was to essentially have a game that would increase your awareness about politics. All of you made some comments that mean a lot of. Unless you’re a person that just likes trivia you won’t be interested in this application. I also did research on how everyone could be on the same leaderboard. Being on the same leaderboard wouldn’t be hard but you might rack up a lot of charges on your phone bill for Internet use. Then people would just delete the application anyway. My initial idea would put this in competition with Tetris or any other java based phone game. The problem is phones are getting more like laptops and politics are not as interesting as Facebook. If I was to do anything with this idea I would go about it all the different. I would aim it at younger children. One game show that I’ll try to model is where in the world is Carmen Sandiego. I watch that show all the time , Most of the time I couldn’t get the answers right on the show unless it was a rerun. But I watched a lot a TV so eventually I learned a lot. I also don’t think people are wanna go to a web site to check their scores. Unless the leader boards were put in a newspaper or attached to a larger application like Facebook I don’t think it would work.
Lock Stocker: summarized
Here's the summarized list of what we've come up with for the "final discussion/vote":
Features:
*notebooks serving as groups (aka Haverhill High Soccer or Hilary '08). These will have to purposes: 1.) to direct what sort of news clippings get posted in your locker and 2.) to help jumpstart community involvement. One gripe we had with facebook groups was the show who wants to make a change, but really do nothing to make a change. Therefore, groups about national issues, etc (not so much "Haverhill High Soccer" will instead give you contact info, ideas, ways to go about an action.
*leave "post it" notes to your friends - security was a concern. Because security is our top concern, we discussed making this feature similar to when AIM asks you if you want to accept a message from a user not on your buddy list. That way, you're not accepting strange notes from strange people. Friends are going to only be within your network, not just randoms (also, security purposes).
*Use of a flip book feature to encourage the sharing and creating of ideas, which seems to not only be a big trend right now, big to this project, but also very popular among this demographic. Your flip book could turn into something very similar to a yearbook to keep with the whole "school" theme.
*News - Ironically, this is probably our biggest hole, and not for lack of research/discussion/effort. We're still very open to opinions on this, but for now these are what we've narrowed down to our two (I think) options: 1.) Go with a local news sponsor who can gear your news toward your more "local" groups as well as your network. For instance, continuing with the Haverhill High Soccer example, your news could be whatever coverage they are getting from local news sources. These same sources most likely carry, to some extent, basic coverage at a national level (so the story might not be covering every political decision like the NY Times politics section, but it likely will touch on candidates who have been in the area locally. 2.) A national carrier. We discussed how having a larger, national sponsor could have it's advantages, and compared Locker Stocker directly to MySpace in this sense. So for example, CNN might sponsor this site (although it wouldn't necessarily be attached to CNN) and therefore be the news provider. This has its advantages when it comes to national groups/issues (for instance, the Hillary '08 group would receive a lot more news than having a local sponsor). So it's still up in the air, and an opinion outside of our group is definitely being sought!
One other way to connect news was again through the idea of sharing, and joining this idea with groups (we looked into Girl Scouts, 4-H, Catholic Youth Organization, and Camp Fire USA teens). A lot of these groups have a community service involvement component (probably the Interest Projects of the Girl Scouts being the highest). Anyway, a lot of times they are encouraged to "share," which can easily be done through writing ... thus, the idea of the girls writing for a Locker Stocker newspaper. This would prevent the fear of "I heart Justin Timberlake 4eva!" becoming news. They would contributing, but it would be in a more controlled manner.
*Marketing to parents /privacy - we want security to be a high priority. Discussion of no photos (drawings acceptable, but no digital images of yourself) and no need for contact information. This isn't a social networking/educational device to be turned into a method for stalking middle school girls, because quite frankly the idea of that is sickening. No official decision on whether parental permission would be a requirement - what do others think? A plus for parents and educators, and something that would allow this site to stand alone from the mess of others aimed at this demographic.
Remaining questions:
Just to summarize what was mentioned above, our big remaining questions are:
1. National versus local: we've outline above our argument for both
2. Parental permission? Either way, security/privacy is huge for this (look at the stats posted by Kate).
3. Promoting it. Jordan suggested advertising on sites these girls already use (although the whole competition factor might come into play here).
What exists:
We're definitely not saying this is an untapped market, because sites exist that are more than obviously going after this market. What we hope we've created is something that is a mix between social networking and education ... it's not a place where you're going to go to post pictures of your friends, write on walls, and declare your love for a latest movie or song. It's also not a place where you are going to read about how to make your closet better or how to deal when you have a "crush" on your best friends boyfriend. It's also not a site where you go to practice math facts or get a summer reading list. So what is it? It's social networking in that it's connecting other people within your networking and giving you a place to make change. Also, you have the ability to create your own space and the FlipBook feature gives you the option to express yourself and include flowers and sparkly, glittery letters that are found all over these other sites. It has the ability to connect you to other organizations your a member of. Getting them involved in the news is going to help them toward their other projects. They're going to read the news, make their own news, and then write their own news.
And finally...
So there's the reasoning on why Locker Stocker is innovative and news oriented.
We fleshed out all three original ideas and the discussion in one post, so for something more super specific than this, look below, becuase that's what we've been working off since Sunday.
Features:
*notebooks serving as groups (aka Haverhill High Soccer or Hilary '08). These will have to purposes: 1.) to direct what sort of news clippings get posted in your locker and 2.) to help jumpstart community involvement. One gripe we had with facebook groups was the show who wants to make a change, but really do nothing to make a change. Therefore, groups about national issues, etc (not so much "Haverhill High Soccer" will instead give you contact info, ideas, ways to go about an action.
*leave "post it" notes to your friends - security was a concern. Because security is our top concern, we discussed making this feature similar to when AIM asks you if you want to accept a message from a user not on your buddy list. That way, you're not accepting strange notes from strange people. Friends are going to only be within your network, not just randoms (also, security purposes).
*Use of a flip book feature to encourage the sharing and creating of ideas, which seems to not only be a big trend right now, big to this project, but also very popular among this demographic. Your flip book could turn into something very similar to a yearbook to keep with the whole "school" theme.
*News - Ironically, this is probably our biggest hole, and not for lack of research/discussion/effort. We're still very open to opinions on this, but for now these are what we've narrowed down to our two (I think) options: 1.) Go with a local news sponsor who can gear your news toward your more "local" groups as well as your network. For instance, continuing with the Haverhill High Soccer example, your news could be whatever coverage they are getting from local news sources. These same sources most likely carry, to some extent, basic coverage at a national level (so the story might not be covering every political decision like the NY Times politics section, but it likely will touch on candidates who have been in the area locally. 2.) A national carrier. We discussed how having a larger, national sponsor could have it's advantages, and compared Locker Stocker directly to MySpace in this sense. So for example, CNN might sponsor this site (although it wouldn't necessarily be attached to CNN) and therefore be the news provider. This has its advantages when it comes to national groups/issues (for instance, the Hillary '08 group would receive a lot more news than having a local sponsor). So it's still up in the air, and an opinion outside of our group is definitely being sought!
One other way to connect news was again through the idea of sharing, and joining this idea with groups (we looked into Girl Scouts, 4-H, Catholic Youth Organization, and Camp Fire USA teens). A lot of these groups have a community service involvement component (probably the Interest Projects of the Girl Scouts being the highest). Anyway, a lot of times they are encouraged to "share," which can easily be done through writing ... thus, the idea of the girls writing for a Locker Stocker newspaper. This would prevent the fear of "I heart Justin Timberlake 4eva!" becoming news. They would contributing, but it would be in a more controlled manner.
*Marketing to parents /privacy - we want security to be a high priority. Discussion of no photos (drawings acceptable, but no digital images of yourself) and no need for contact information. This isn't a social networking/educational device to be turned into a method for stalking middle school girls, because quite frankly the idea of that is sickening. No official decision on whether parental permission would be a requirement - what do others think? A plus for parents and educators, and something that would allow this site to stand alone from the mess of others aimed at this demographic.
Remaining questions:
Just to summarize what was mentioned above, our big remaining questions are:
1. National versus local: we've outline above our argument for both
2. Parental permission? Either way, security/privacy is huge for this (look at the stats posted by Kate).
3. Promoting it. Jordan suggested advertising on sites these girls already use (although the whole competition factor might come into play here).
What exists:
We're definitely not saying this is an untapped market, because sites exist that are more than obviously going after this market. What we hope we've created is something that is a mix between social networking and education ... it's not a place where you're going to go to post pictures of your friends, write on walls, and declare your love for a latest movie or song. It's also not a place where you are going to read about how to make your closet better or how to deal when you have a "crush" on your best friends boyfriend. It's also not a site where you go to practice math facts or get a summer reading list. So what is it? It's social networking in that it's connecting other people within your networking and giving you a place to make change. Also, you have the ability to create your own space and the FlipBook feature gives you the option to express yourself and include flowers and sparkly, glittery letters that are found all over these other sites. It has the ability to connect you to other organizations your a member of. Getting them involved in the news is going to help them toward their other projects. They're going to read the news, make their own news, and then write their own news.
And finally...
So there's the reasoning on why Locker Stocker is innovative and news oriented.
We fleshed out all three original ideas and the discussion in one post, so for something more super specific than this, look below, becuase that's what we've been working off since Sunday.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/resources/educational/teaching_backgrounders/internet/popular_childrens_web.cfm
This is an article pretty much bashing sites for not utilizing privacy features on web sites aimed at children. It says that:
88 percent collect children's personal data, but more than a quarter do not have privacy policies, the CME study stated. Less than 26 percent ask for parental permission before collecting the information.
We were sort of mulling over the privacy policy of a children's web site. I really think it needs to be a key feature to the site. The anti-myspace. Parental permission might be pushing it, but who knows, really. Maybe that it something we should be talking about. I don't think we should be giving out personal info at all, not even a picture. Maybe kids can draw their pictures or something, but no pictures. No names of schools besides groups, and groups of that nature can't be viewed by the public, only by people invited into the group by the admin. These are jsut some thoughts. Any ideas?
This is an article pretty much bashing sites for not utilizing privacy features on web sites aimed at children. It says that:
88 percent collect children's personal data, but more than a quarter do not have privacy policies, the CME study stated. Less than 26 percent ask for parental permission before collecting the information.
We were sort of mulling over the privacy policy of a children's web site. I really think it needs to be a key feature to the site. The anti-myspace. Parental permission might be pushing it, but who knows, really. Maybe that it something we should be talking about. I don't think we should be giving out personal info at all, not even a picture. Maybe kids can draw their pictures or something, but no pictures. No names of schools besides groups, and groups of that nature can't be viewed by the public, only by people invited into the group by the admin. These are jsut some thoughts. Any ideas?
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
time to be overwhelmed
check out http://simplespark.com/catalog/guides/
a list of 5000+ web applications in all kinds of fields.
Totally overwhelming
but might be worth a look to see what kinds of htings are out there being done
And folks - keep posting - anybody still doing music? How're the political guys doing? Give us some updates
Kim
a list of 5000+ web applications in all kinds of fields.
Totally overwhelming
but might be worth a look to see what kinds of htings are out there being done
And folks - keep posting - anybody still doing music? How're the political guys doing? Give us some updates
Kim
Playground Networking, Now Online
Hey everyone,
I know we're not really suppose to post full articles/links but rather summarize the article, but this one is really worth reading, especially if we end up contininuing on with the middle school girl demographic. I'll summarize some main points, but definately read it, as it specifically alludes to 14-year-old girls.
Playground Networking, Now Online
Basically, the concept of social networking is becoming increasingly common among this age group. What is being aimed at them, specifically? Avatars, chat, and "adult activities such as e-commerce." It touches on Whyville and the recent changes as Club Penguin.
The argument is these cites claim to be both educating and entertaining Young girls. That's their claim at least. The whole idea of Internet marketing (through ads, etc) is feared to have the capability of having similar effects as TV ads, which can lead to stagnant development, obesity, violence, etc ... as well as the always dangerous brand loyalty (my thoughts: I feel materialism definitely starts at this age, yes?).
Anyway, it's worth a read.
I know we're not really suppose to post full articles/links but rather summarize the article, but this one is really worth reading, especially if we end up contininuing on with the middle school girl demographic. I'll summarize some main points, but definately read it, as it specifically alludes to 14-year-old girls.
Playground Networking, Now Online
Basically, the concept of social networking is becoming increasingly common among this age group. What is being aimed at them, specifically? Avatars, chat, and "adult activities such as e-commerce." It touches on Whyville and the recent changes as Club Penguin.
The argument is these cites claim to be both educating and entertaining Young girls. That's their claim at least. The whole idea of Internet marketing (through ads, etc) is feared to have the capability of having similar effects as TV ads, which can lead to stagnant development, obesity, violence, etc ... as well as the always dangerous brand loyalty (my thoughts: I feel materialism definitely starts at this age, yes?).
Anyway, it's worth a read.
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Compilation of MS girls stuff for Kate, Jordan, Andrea
This is just for us to work in an 1/2 organized manner until we repost our compilation of ideas on Friday, so it can be ignored. If you want to comment on / add to ideas for the middle school girl demographic, it can all be done under one post now, instead of sifting through 3 like before.
Andrea-Beginning Idea
Beginnings to my idea....So these are a couple things that came to mind after last night:
One thing I thought of was definitely based off the Locker Stalker or Stocker or whatever we're calling it these days ... but what's important is there would actually be an actual, all out, middle school locker. Perhaps is something you would add on to an exisiting site (and for this, I'm not just talking about social networking in terms of Facebook/MySpace ... something that could go on the plethora of sites we came up with that already have the attention of these girls. For one, we know messaging is a big thing (who doesn't get excited when they have a Facebook message?). Through this, however, I was imagining the messages would be inside the locker, almost like on Post Its (or a similar paper product idea), written in handwriting -- the whole idea that someone left you a "real" note in your locker. Although this is more the social side of things, I'm sure there are ways we could turn it to incorporate news. There would also be a photo aspect that would work in 2 ways: 1. personal pictures of all your little pink shirt, mini skirt wearing middle school girl friends and 2. for news events ... the whole idea of a picture speaking a thousand words. Dave mentioned the idea of pictures telling stories when were first broke into this group in Ithaca (I remember mentioning the similarities to MSNBC's Week in Pictures). So there could be captions ... or even VIDEO in your locker. The real catch here is the news through text though. In this version of Locker Stalker it would be newspaper clippings in your lockers that would be actual news stories ... maybe with a little animation so they would actually float around your locker and pop up once it's opened (ok I'm thinking way down the road on that one). These would be news stories that would not only affect this demographic, but maybe written in a way to convey a "regular" hard news story, but with details to this level. Koz also originally mentioned the idea of having stories about your friends in the orginal idea, too.
I'm not entirely sold on what I've come up with so far, and my details may not be the best, but it's the idea that I like. I firmly believe they need to be getting this news without it being forced upon them, or without them really realizing it. So if we could come up with a way (better than this) to mix their socializing needs (which we've found out are their prized posession) with their news needs (which they don't realize they have) it'll be the perfect combination.
Comments:
Kate said...
Andrea:Love the first idea. We could combine a lot of ideas from our two sites to develop the greatest site of all time. How, besides the notes (which is way sweet) could we get kids to want to go on it? I'm having the hardest time figuring that out myself.
August 15, 2007 8:21 PM
Andrea said...
Okay for some reason it won't let be edit my idea right now ... but I just had a thought. What if somehow we included a "school newspaper" in the locker ... but it had elements of what a middle school paper would have (i dunno, horoscopes, gossip columns, you get the idea). But there's like blank spots in it (a template ... think InDesign) and then you have a selection of stories that you can drag and drop in to complete your newspapers. But those are actual "news" stories. So you end up with a combination of hard news and girl news.Again, you run into the whole problem of why do they want to complete the newspaper / who says they're going to read it anyway. We have to trick them into it, somehow.
August 16, 2007 4:48 PM
Jon Taylor said...
I really like the direction that you're going in with the middle school demo research. I was thinking about that book Branded that we had to read for VisComm and the ideas from the book are reflected in your approach to this project.I like the concept behind the drag n' drop that the girls can do within their personal lockers - their news, their way. Using the ideas behind Branded, we can easily convince this demo to complete their newspapers - maybe offer incentives if they do - more access, etc.
August 16, 2007 10:13 PM
Jordan said...
love the idea of a locker app on facebook, and maybe we could literally just get it sponsored by the partner from ONA. It kind of goes off of Kim's idea of having something easy and fun like the Washinton Post did. Just make it an app and people can add and take away from their locker and maybe like a little secret wall that only they can read or something. I mean, I doubt it would get the high traffic that some of the older apps do, but it seems really cool.
August 18, 2007 2:30 PM
Jordan-Beginning Idea
I will be working on some sort of news game for our tween girl demographic.Wed Aug 16, 2007 12:30 AMOk so I’ve been brainstorming ideas for the past couple days and looking at more girly web sites and I keep going back to Flip.com… I think I might be obsessed with it. It’s the quintessential tween girl web site, which is probably why I’m obsessed with it – that was not meant to be creepy as much as it was meant to be gay.The great part about it is the girls get to put things they like, an expression of themselves in the flip book and then pick out different background and tacky sparkle letters, etc. But it can be so much more… you can link videos and web sites to it, etc.Here’s a link to one that I made when I was fooling around with it months ago. It was something for my blog (I write a weekly top favorite things in my blog). I never ended up using it or finishing it, but I still thought it would give you all some kind of idea.Jordan’s Flip Book.It also only has one page, which I know defeats the purpose of calling it a flip book, but just imagine more similar pages…Here’s one that Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour made.Now how to add the news to this platform? More coming later. Mull over these ideas (is that the correct phrase?). And I’ll start thinking of the news elements that are or could be involved.
Thursday 9:00 AM
I was thinking of an idea of “Things that affect me” kind of deal since tweens are all about themselves. It kind of plays off of that idea I said for locker stalker of adding like if a photo of you ended up in the paper, you could save it in your locker. This would be a bit different.
The target publication would no doubt be local, probably a local paper or something. And online they would have available their normal content. What I propose is a type of widget where tweens or really, anyone, could highlight text, or click on a picture and an option would be to add to “Their Content.” I don’t know how many papers are putting comics online, but they could do it with those as well. So that would basically just be a personal space where all these things would be collected and archived.
The fun part comes next.
They can put that content into a flipbook like deal. Archiving different articles and events, adding their own commentary and pictures. Telling the story in a different way. They could chose to make it a lot like a timeline. So they could go back to a day or a week and see what was important to them. I think it wouldn’t make sense if we didn’t allow them to add their own pictures, text and content to their archives so they could add that to the book as well.
The flip.com thing is really easy to use as far as erasing and resizing. Sure it’s not the best quality ever, but it seems good enough for teen girls.
Thursday (or I guess technically Friday) 1:00 AM.
I’ve been trying in my head to iron out the details of how to get these girls onto a news web site. It would be nice to add a news element to an existing site, but that makes me nervous because I doubt Flip.com will be at the ONA, nor do I think will many girly fun sites. This will probably be a continuous problem, especially since we really have no clue which organizations will be interested. I almost find this as a huge flaw of the project. We have to create something for news organizations, a very broadly defined thing, but yet it would seem the best ides have a narrower scope about them.
At least last year the people who did it knew they were doing it for AOL or Time Warner or whatever so they already had a strong base to build off of, innovate a new idea for AOL to use. Sounds way easier than just make an idea that’s adaptable to all sorts of demographics, but have no idea what kind of news you’ll be presenting, how much money you’ll have or how many resources will be provided. Or really even, if anyone even will want it.
Anyways, I was thinking about what andrea commented below and it seems to me that the best way to get the kids involved is to force their involvement. (I really didn’t mean for that to sound like we would be inflicting pain on them… ) So let’s say a local paper picks up the idea. Even in a town like mine which has about 50,000 people, I think getting a test group of girls in middle school would be easy. Kids love getting out of class and the local newspaper has a great relationship with the school district. So you pick 50 girls out from different classes, ask them to play with the site and see what they think. Really that would just be a marketing ploy because you know they’ll tell all their friends exactly what they were doing and their jealous friends will want to see for themselves. If it’s cool enough, it will stick. If not, we’ll look like asses and the girls will laugh at us.
Comments:
Kate said...
A). Anna Wintour's flip book was the funniest thing I've seen in recent memory. Thanks for bringing it into my life.B). I really like the idea of using the site the girls are already on, and I like it a lot more than using myspace. Is there a way for the girls to see each others (is it a social network?) Or is it more of just a personal thing. I also wonder if there would be a way to present the girls with the news on the site, as I can't really see a bunch of 11-year-olds running off to CNN as soon as they can post things the affect them.
August 16, 2007 6:43 AM
Andrea said...
Okay first off, Koz you would find the Anna Wintour thing funny. Secondly, I agree with the idea of adding on to another site (probably becuase I, too, had this idea).Now to the new stuff ... I REALLY like the idea of highlighting things you see in a newspaper and using having that added to my content (to sit on the shelf next to your "book" groups and your notes), but there's one problem ... how many middle school girls are visiting their local newspaper site already? And do you blame them? We've seen things that they are interested in through our audience research last week, and plain newspapers sites appear to have zero attraction to them. So although I love this idea in theory, how can we ensure they're going to the site? The end idea/product is great, too. But it goes back to the whole "they're not getting the news" thing. Doesn't it always?
August 16, 2007 4:36 PM
Christina said...
I think the whole 'add to their content' idea is really great, but, like Andrea was saying, there's that big problem of getting the girls to the news site.... What if there were some sort of incentive to adding news content to your flipbook/locker/whatever? What if there were some sort of reward/bait?? That may be a terribly lame suggestion, but think about it.
Kate-Beginning Idea
Locker Stocker (note spelling change)
The basis of this idea would be what we talked about before: A Web site made to look like a simulated locker. The inside would house a section for uploading pictures as well as an area to store books. The books would, in actuality, would be links to differnt groups. For instance, the "Hilary 2008" book would sit on top of the "Haverhill High School Football" book. Each book would house different articles and topics, similar to a message board. Each layer would hold a different set of disscussions. Users could link to articles, videos and pictures. On the door of the locker would be what looked like a newspaper clipping. The clipping would change regularly and would be news delivered to each user based on the groups he or she (she) has chosen as well as a section for top stories. Top stories would apear on everyone's clippings (maybe based on geography?) and would encourage users to gain interest in different subjects and join groups (get books) to talk about them. The stories (could be video) would be writen or broadcast in such a way that younger audiences could activly engage in them and reallt take something out of them. This might be becuase it is easier to read, or because more background is given.Just a start... any ideas?
Comments:
8 Comments -
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Andrea said...
I reallly really like the idea of group being books in the locker. What I was struggling was with the news thing - with my idea of the newspaper clippings, I feel like you would have to use RSS feeds to know what each person wanted or for their general area (and lete's face it, what 12-year-old girl wants to deal with RSS feeds? At least not the ones we're targeting at). So a broader scope on the news thing would probably be the answer.As for your question of how to get people to come to the site .. that's why I was thinking that the Locker could somehow be an application or something (I'm not good with all the technological wording with everything) that were added to all the existing tween sites out there (think back to the gazillion we all posted). But then again, you get into the whole competition thing. I just really don't think it's necessary for another site ... or I guess more importantly why are they going to join a news one over another one. It all goes back to the whole idea of you have to catch them with the news when they're not looking.Also, should we combine our posts because they're about the same thing? I'm alraedy confused looking back and forth at them both, and I'm writing one of them. Just a thought...
August 16, 2007 4:23 AM
Kate said...
I didn't really invision it as RSS feeds, more as a Pandora-like thing. By choosing groups, the girls would choose what the wanted to recieve news about- it would all be mechanical. They say they like it, so its sent to them- automatically.And you are right. How are we going to pull a Daily Show on them? I was sort of thinking, maybe stupidly, that the site would be hooked up to another, like Flip and Teen Vouge. So, in that case, girls who read Teen Vogue because it makes them look older would see the site and think it was cool and use it. Only problem, kids aren't reading the news already. The locker aspect would allow kids to post pictures and decorate and things which they might think is cool. I guess the draw of being able to really choose the content isn't all that cool either. We could always consider marketing it to adults who would then force kids to use it, haha. We could also market it to those parents who do not allow kids to use myspace and other sites, as an educational alternative. I guess I really envision a combination of Flip and a news site in locker form (corny) where girls will be drawn to the site because they can do whatever they want with the locker, as well as leave notes for each other (which is an idea I loved, Andrea).I don't know, any more thoughts?
August 16, 2007 2:29 PM
Andrea said...
Okay, after reading the comments ideas from me, Kate, and Jordan ... we all have the same problem: we've come up with what the three of us seem to think are pretty decent ideas geare toward these MS girls based on what we found already exists last week ... but we all seem pretty clueless on how to infuse the news into that (although Jordan took a stab at it wiht the highlighting / my content thing). I still say, however, and I think Kate's agreeing ... we can't send them out to find the news. We can't make them responsible for getting the news. Because that's status quo ... and they're not doing it. The news has to already been present on the site / flip book / locker already so they have no choice but to watch it.
August 16, 2007 4:41 PM
Kim Gregson said...
what if you sent them out to write the news? to find the news in their own life/school? instead of finding news on the internet - let them be news creators. Remember - the whole let people tell the stories they think are important, let htem tell the news professionals what they (the consumer) thinks is important as news.then the news goes out from them - to other users, to the general news publicWould that help any with the issues you're discussing (and good job with the back and forth - thanks)
August 16, 2007 8:40 PM
Andrea said...
I really like Kim's idea about sending them out to get the news - then, if they are using it on a social networking site that allows themt to be connected through networks (think Facebook, but maybe like your town or your school instead of "Boston") you could use someone elses news. It could be incorporated with my school newspaper idea somehow (that ideas under my original post).
August 17, 2007 4:00 AM
Christina said...
Maybe this is silly, but if we send 14 year old girls out to write the news, I see it turning into a real fiasco...I think that before long it would be gossip-driven clique-like behavior brought to a whole new level. I can totally see some mean chick writing an article about how the weird girl in English class has a moustache or how how so-and-so was dumped because she was a prude. You know what I'm saying? It's a cool idea to have them write the news, but how do you regulate it and make it responsible and not "I <3 Justin Timberlake 4eva !!"??
August 17, 2007 8:15 AM
Kate said...
Haha, I agree. I think it would be cool and certainly innovative to have girls write the news, but it could get very Cady Heron and Regina George, very quickly. The idea of girls posting there own stuff is really exciting to me, just I don't really see it playing out with any significance. Instead, I'm thinking we could get them in a bunch of ways. Market the site, as strange as this might sound, as a sort of consolation prize. Sure, mom and step-dad won't let you on myspace, but they are letting you go on Locker Stocker. You can still write notes to your friends and set the site up how you want to. I'm envisioning picking music, like myspace. I'm also envisioning a note book, which would be like a flip book, and girls could even link to their actual flipbooks from the Locker.I don't really see how the sire lends itself to becoming an application on another site. I've been trying and can't.I love you all, Kathryn Kozlowski.
August 17, 2007 6:15 PM
Kim Gregson said...
again - you guys have to give up control. The news organizations can't keep control of what is news. The users get to decide.and who decided paris hilton was news? the news organizations. so maybe the little kids won't do much worsehow about tying it in with some writing education/girl scout badge project to get htem writing better news?
August 19, 2007 5:29 PM
Andrea-Beginning Idea
Beginnings to my idea....So these are a couple things that came to mind after last night:
One thing I thought of was definitely based off the Locker Stalker or Stocker or whatever we're calling it these days ... but what's important is there would actually be an actual, all out, middle school locker. Perhaps is something you would add on to an exisiting site (and for this, I'm not just talking about social networking in terms of Facebook/MySpace ... something that could go on the plethora of sites we came up with that already have the attention of these girls. For one, we know messaging is a big thing (who doesn't get excited when they have a Facebook message?). Through this, however, I was imagining the messages would be inside the locker, almost like on Post Its (or a similar paper product idea), written in handwriting -- the whole idea that someone left you a "real" note in your locker. Although this is more the social side of things, I'm sure there are ways we could turn it to incorporate news. There would also be a photo aspect that would work in 2 ways: 1. personal pictures of all your little pink shirt, mini skirt wearing middle school girl friends and 2. for news events ... the whole idea of a picture speaking a thousand words. Dave mentioned the idea of pictures telling stories when were first broke into this group in Ithaca (I remember mentioning the similarities to MSNBC's Week in Pictures). So there could be captions ... or even VIDEO in your locker. The real catch here is the news through text though. In this version of Locker Stalker it would be newspaper clippings in your lockers that would be actual news stories ... maybe with a little animation so they would actually float around your locker and pop up once it's opened (ok I'm thinking way down the road on that one). These would be news stories that would not only affect this demographic, but maybe written in a way to convey a "regular" hard news story, but with details to this level. Koz also originally mentioned the idea of having stories about your friends in the orginal idea, too.
I'm not entirely sold on what I've come up with so far, and my details may not be the best, but it's the idea that I like. I firmly believe they need to be getting this news without it being forced upon them, or without them really realizing it. So if we could come up with a way (better than this) to mix their socializing needs (which we've found out are their prized posession) with their news needs (which they don't realize they have) it'll be the perfect combination.
Comments:
Kate said...
Andrea:Love the first idea. We could combine a lot of ideas from our two sites to develop the greatest site of all time. How, besides the notes (which is way sweet) could we get kids to want to go on it? I'm having the hardest time figuring that out myself.
August 15, 2007 8:21 PM
Andrea said...
Okay for some reason it won't let be edit my idea right now ... but I just had a thought. What if somehow we included a "school newspaper" in the locker ... but it had elements of what a middle school paper would have (i dunno, horoscopes, gossip columns, you get the idea). But there's like blank spots in it (a template ... think InDesign) and then you have a selection of stories that you can drag and drop in to complete your newspapers. But those are actual "news" stories. So you end up with a combination of hard news and girl news.Again, you run into the whole problem of why do they want to complete the newspaper / who says they're going to read it anyway. We have to trick them into it, somehow.
August 16, 2007 4:48 PM
Jon Taylor said...
I really like the direction that you're going in with the middle school demo research. I was thinking about that book Branded that we had to read for VisComm and the ideas from the book are reflected in your approach to this project.I like the concept behind the drag n' drop that the girls can do within their personal lockers - their news, their way. Using the ideas behind Branded, we can easily convince this demo to complete their newspapers - maybe offer incentives if they do - more access, etc.
August 16, 2007 10:13 PM
Jordan said...
love the idea of a locker app on facebook, and maybe we could literally just get it sponsored by the partner from ONA. It kind of goes off of Kim's idea of having something easy and fun like the Washinton Post did. Just make it an app and people can add and take away from their locker and maybe like a little secret wall that only they can read or something. I mean, I doubt it would get the high traffic that some of the older apps do, but it seems really cool.
August 18, 2007 2:30 PM
Jordan-Beginning Idea
I will be working on some sort of news game for our tween girl demographic.Wed Aug 16, 2007 12:30 AMOk so I’ve been brainstorming ideas for the past couple days and looking at more girly web sites and I keep going back to Flip.com… I think I might be obsessed with it. It’s the quintessential tween girl web site, which is probably why I’m obsessed with it – that was not meant to be creepy as much as it was meant to be gay.The great part about it is the girls get to put things they like, an expression of themselves in the flip book and then pick out different background and tacky sparkle letters, etc. But it can be so much more… you can link videos and web sites to it, etc.Here’s a link to one that I made when I was fooling around with it months ago. It was something for my blog (I write a weekly top favorite things in my blog). I never ended up using it or finishing it, but I still thought it would give you all some kind of idea.Jordan’s Flip Book.It also only has one page, which I know defeats the purpose of calling it a flip book, but just imagine more similar pages…Here’s one that Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour made.Now how to add the news to this platform? More coming later. Mull over these ideas (is that the correct phrase?). And I’ll start thinking of the news elements that are or could be involved.
Thursday 9:00 AM
I was thinking of an idea of “Things that affect me” kind of deal since tweens are all about themselves. It kind of plays off of that idea I said for locker stalker of adding like if a photo of you ended up in the paper, you could save it in your locker. This would be a bit different.
The target publication would no doubt be local, probably a local paper or something. And online they would have available their normal content. What I propose is a type of widget where tweens or really, anyone, could highlight text, or click on a picture and an option would be to add to “Their Content.” I don’t know how many papers are putting comics online, but they could do it with those as well. So that would basically just be a personal space where all these things would be collected and archived.
The fun part comes next.
They can put that content into a flipbook like deal. Archiving different articles and events, adding their own commentary and pictures. Telling the story in a different way. They could chose to make it a lot like a timeline. So they could go back to a day or a week and see what was important to them. I think it wouldn’t make sense if we didn’t allow them to add their own pictures, text and content to their archives so they could add that to the book as well.
The flip.com thing is really easy to use as far as erasing and resizing. Sure it’s not the best quality ever, but it seems good enough for teen girls.
Thursday (or I guess technically Friday) 1:00 AM.
I’ve been trying in my head to iron out the details of how to get these girls onto a news web site. It would be nice to add a news element to an existing site, but that makes me nervous because I doubt Flip.com will be at the ONA, nor do I think will many girly fun sites. This will probably be a continuous problem, especially since we really have no clue which organizations will be interested. I almost find this as a huge flaw of the project. We have to create something for news organizations, a very broadly defined thing, but yet it would seem the best ides have a narrower scope about them.
At least last year the people who did it knew they were doing it for AOL or Time Warner or whatever so they already had a strong base to build off of, innovate a new idea for AOL to use. Sounds way easier than just make an idea that’s adaptable to all sorts of demographics, but have no idea what kind of news you’ll be presenting, how much money you’ll have or how many resources will be provided. Or really even, if anyone even will want it.
Anyways, I was thinking about what andrea commented below and it seems to me that the best way to get the kids involved is to force their involvement. (I really didn’t mean for that to sound like we would be inflicting pain on them… ) So let’s say a local paper picks up the idea. Even in a town like mine which has about 50,000 people, I think getting a test group of girls in middle school would be easy. Kids love getting out of class and the local newspaper has a great relationship with the school district. So you pick 50 girls out from different classes, ask them to play with the site and see what they think. Really that would just be a marketing ploy because you know they’ll tell all their friends exactly what they were doing and their jealous friends will want to see for themselves. If it’s cool enough, it will stick. If not, we’ll look like asses and the girls will laugh at us.
Comments:
Kate said...
A). Anna Wintour's flip book was the funniest thing I've seen in recent memory. Thanks for bringing it into my life.B). I really like the idea of using the site the girls are already on, and I like it a lot more than using myspace. Is there a way for the girls to see each others (is it a social network?) Or is it more of just a personal thing. I also wonder if there would be a way to present the girls with the news on the site, as I can't really see a bunch of 11-year-olds running off to CNN as soon as they can post things the affect them.
August 16, 2007 6:43 AM
Andrea said...
Okay first off, Koz you would find the Anna Wintour thing funny. Secondly, I agree with the idea of adding on to another site (probably becuase I, too, had this idea).Now to the new stuff ... I REALLY like the idea of highlighting things you see in a newspaper and using having that added to my content (to sit on the shelf next to your "book" groups and your notes), but there's one problem ... how many middle school girls are visiting their local newspaper site already? And do you blame them? We've seen things that they are interested in through our audience research last week, and plain newspapers sites appear to have zero attraction to them. So although I love this idea in theory, how can we ensure they're going to the site? The end idea/product is great, too. But it goes back to the whole "they're not getting the news" thing. Doesn't it always?
August 16, 2007 4:36 PM
Christina said...
I think the whole 'add to their content' idea is really great, but, like Andrea was saying, there's that big problem of getting the girls to the news site.... What if there were some sort of incentive to adding news content to your flipbook/locker/whatever? What if there were some sort of reward/bait?? That may be a terribly lame suggestion, but think about it.
Kate-Beginning Idea
Locker Stocker (note spelling change)
The basis of this idea would be what we talked about before: A Web site made to look like a simulated locker. The inside would house a section for uploading pictures as well as an area to store books. The books would, in actuality, would be links to differnt groups. For instance, the "Hilary 2008" book would sit on top of the "Haverhill High School Football" book. Each book would house different articles and topics, similar to a message board. Each layer would hold a different set of disscussions. Users could link to articles, videos and pictures. On the door of the locker would be what looked like a newspaper clipping. The clipping would change regularly and would be news delivered to each user based on the groups he or she (she) has chosen as well as a section for top stories. Top stories would apear on everyone's clippings (maybe based on geography?) and would encourage users to gain interest in different subjects and join groups (get books) to talk about them. The stories (could be video) would be writen or broadcast in such a way that younger audiences could activly engage in them and reallt take something out of them. This might be becuase it is easier to read, or because more background is given.Just a start... any ideas?
Comments:
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Andrea said...
I reallly really like the idea of group being books in the locker. What I was struggling was with the news thing - with my idea of the newspaper clippings, I feel like you would have to use RSS feeds to know what each person wanted or for their general area (and lete's face it, what 12-year-old girl wants to deal with RSS feeds? At least not the ones we're targeting at). So a broader scope on the news thing would probably be the answer.As for your question of how to get people to come to the site .. that's why I was thinking that the Locker could somehow be an application or something (I'm not good with all the technological wording with everything) that were added to all the existing tween sites out there (think back to the gazillion we all posted). But then again, you get into the whole competition thing. I just really don't think it's necessary for another site ... or I guess more importantly why are they going to join a news one over another one. It all goes back to the whole idea of you have to catch them with the news when they're not looking.Also, should we combine our posts because they're about the same thing? I'm alraedy confused looking back and forth at them both, and I'm writing one of them. Just a thought...
August 16, 2007 4:23 AM
Kate said...
I didn't really invision it as RSS feeds, more as a Pandora-like thing. By choosing groups, the girls would choose what the wanted to recieve news about- it would all be mechanical. They say they like it, so its sent to them- automatically.And you are right. How are we going to pull a Daily Show on them? I was sort of thinking, maybe stupidly, that the site would be hooked up to another, like Flip and Teen Vouge. So, in that case, girls who read Teen Vogue because it makes them look older would see the site and think it was cool and use it. Only problem, kids aren't reading the news already. The locker aspect would allow kids to post pictures and decorate and things which they might think is cool. I guess the draw of being able to really choose the content isn't all that cool either. We could always consider marketing it to adults who would then force kids to use it, haha. We could also market it to those parents who do not allow kids to use myspace and other sites, as an educational alternative. I guess I really envision a combination of Flip and a news site in locker form (corny) where girls will be drawn to the site because they can do whatever they want with the locker, as well as leave notes for each other (which is an idea I loved, Andrea).I don't know, any more thoughts?
August 16, 2007 2:29 PM
Andrea said...
Okay, after reading the comments ideas from me, Kate, and Jordan ... we all have the same problem: we've come up with what the three of us seem to think are pretty decent ideas geare toward these MS girls based on what we found already exists last week ... but we all seem pretty clueless on how to infuse the news into that (although Jordan took a stab at it wiht the highlighting / my content thing). I still say, however, and I think Kate's agreeing ... we can't send them out to find the news. We can't make them responsible for getting the news. Because that's status quo ... and they're not doing it. The news has to already been present on the site / flip book / locker already so they have no choice but to watch it.
August 16, 2007 4:41 PM
Kim Gregson said...
what if you sent them out to write the news? to find the news in their own life/school? instead of finding news on the internet - let them be news creators. Remember - the whole let people tell the stories they think are important, let htem tell the news professionals what they (the consumer) thinks is important as news.then the news goes out from them - to other users, to the general news publicWould that help any with the issues you're discussing (and good job with the back and forth - thanks)
August 16, 2007 8:40 PM
Andrea said...
I really like Kim's idea about sending them out to get the news - then, if they are using it on a social networking site that allows themt to be connected through networks (think Facebook, but maybe like your town or your school instead of "Boston") you could use someone elses news. It could be incorporated with my school newspaper idea somehow (that ideas under my original post).
August 17, 2007 4:00 AM
Christina said...
Maybe this is silly, but if we send 14 year old girls out to write the news, I see it turning into a real fiasco...I think that before long it would be gossip-driven clique-like behavior brought to a whole new level. I can totally see some mean chick writing an article about how the weird girl in English class has a moustache or how how so-and-so was dumped because she was a prude. You know what I'm saying? It's a cool idea to have them write the news, but how do you regulate it and make it responsible and not "I <3 Justin Timberlake 4eva !!"??
August 17, 2007 8:15 AM
Kate said...
Haha, I agree. I think it would be cool and certainly innovative to have girls write the news, but it could get very Cady Heron and Regina George, very quickly. The idea of girls posting there own stuff is really exciting to me, just I don't really see it playing out with any significance. Instead, I'm thinking we could get them in a bunch of ways. Market the site, as strange as this might sound, as a sort of consolation prize. Sure, mom and step-dad won't let you on myspace, but they are letting you go on Locker Stocker. You can still write notes to your friends and set the site up how you want to. I'm envisioning picking music, like myspace. I'm also envisioning a note book, which would be like a flip book, and girls could even link to their actual flipbooks from the Locker.I don't really see how the sire lends itself to becoming an application on another site. I've been trying and can't.I love you all, Kathryn Kozlowski.
August 17, 2007 6:15 PM
Kim Gregson said...
again - you guys have to give up control. The news organizations can't keep control of what is news. The users get to decide.and who decided paris hilton was news? the news organizations. so maybe the little kids won't do much worsehow about tying it in with some writing education/girl scout badge project to get htem writing better news?
August 19, 2007 5:29 PM
Sunday, August 19, 2007
The Dave and Kyle Webinar
Just wrapped up my webinar with Dave. It went like this:
9:30 - Hello? Hello? Is this Kate? No it's Kyle. Where is everyone? I don't know-I'll wait ten minutes.
9:38 - Let's try entering again. Okay.
9:40 - Dave, the meeting was at 8:30. We missed it.
Anyway we're both very sorry for our absent-mindedness. Both of us could swear the blog said 9:30. We hope the meeting went well and that someone could maybe fill us in on the key points of tonight's other Webinar.
9:30 - Hello? Hello? Is this Kate? No it's Kyle. Where is everyone? I don't know-I'll wait ten minutes.
9:38 - Let's try entering again. Okay.
9:40 - Dave, the meeting was at 8:30. We missed it.
Anyway we're both very sorry for our absent-mindedness. Both of us could swear the blog said 9:30. We hope the meeting went well and that someone could maybe fill us in on the key points of tonight's other Webinar.
sunday chat
Last things first - the next chat is tentatively scheduled for monday night at 8:30pm instead of Sunday because of everybody moving and getting ready for the start of school. Let me know right away if that doesn't work for you.
With the people preesent at the chat we seem to have narrowed it down to 2 demographics - little girls and politically interested types like the ones who watch the daily show. Interesting ideas were presented for both groups - more on the locker stocker idea and 2 for politics (current event contest on the cellphone and a debate on issues idea with digg features)
For next week they're going to more fully develop the ideas, flesh out the role of the news organization, of the user. Specifics. Examples. List of features, what the user will do. During hte week, they'll post ideas and developments. Look hard for competition or things similar to what they're proposing. Think about hwat makes it innovative. Then before the end of hte day on Friday, each group will post a summary, a final write up of the idea - with all the specifics and details ordered to make the idea as clear as possible for us. We'll all read and post our last round of comments on the idea. On monday we'll go over them again. Ideally we'd pick one idea to develop. If we end up with 2 ideas that are really innovative and well-developed, we'll go forward with two ideas.
The more work ya do now - the easier it will be to make the owrking model and put toegether the presentation.
* We definintely have to make sure there's no competition.
* And we have to identify the innovative angle
* And we have to make sure there's a news tie in, a way for the news organization to tie in. Someone posted about what kinds of news organizations. Think about local news - how could they tie in. Then think about a national organization - would they tie in any way differently? There's more local news organizations so more individual groups would pick it up. The national groups might have more resources but there are few of them. So take time to think at both levels.
If you weren't at the chat, probably a good idea at this point to get into one of the two demographics that seem to have emerged. Or make a really good case right away for something different. The two demos discussed had some good research done about them, the ideas are developing, and features from one project could easily fit in with the other so there's cross over possibilities.
Thanks for all the hard work so far - keep it up.
With the people preesent at the chat we seem to have narrowed it down to 2 demographics - little girls and politically interested types like the ones who watch the daily show. Interesting ideas were presented for both groups - more on the locker stocker idea and 2 for politics (current event contest on the cellphone and a debate on issues idea with digg features)
For next week they're going to more fully develop the ideas, flesh out the role of the news organization, of the user. Specifics. Examples. List of features, what the user will do. During hte week, they'll post ideas and developments. Look hard for competition or things similar to what they're proposing. Think about hwat makes it innovative. Then before the end of hte day on Friday, each group will post a summary, a final write up of the idea - with all the specifics and details ordered to make the idea as clear as possible for us. We'll all read and post our last round of comments on the idea. On monday we'll go over them again. Ideally we'd pick one idea to develop. If we end up with 2 ideas that are really innovative and well-developed, we'll go forward with two ideas.
The more work ya do now - the easier it will be to make the owrking model and put toegether the presentation.
* We definintely have to make sure there's no competition.
* And we have to identify the innovative angle
* And we have to make sure there's a news tie in, a way for the news organization to tie in. Someone posted about what kinds of news organizations. Think about local news - how could they tie in. Then think about a national organization - would they tie in any way differently? There's more local news organizations so more individual groups would pick it up. The national groups might have more resources but there are few of them. So take time to think at both levels.
If you weren't at the chat, probably a good idea at this point to get into one of the two demographics that seem to have emerged. Or make a really good case right away for something different. The two demos discussed had some good research done about them, the ideas are developing, and features from one project could easily fit in with the other so there's cross over possibilities.
Thanks for all the hard work so far - keep it up.
DebateThis
So we've basically been mentioning some sort of debate style forum since Devastator day one. I'm really excited about this idea. I think it'll be entertaining, informative and competative enough to create a real user base.
You are the Star.
It would be aimed at the pollitically disgruntled and otherwise informed college demographic: 15-25. This covers both the iGeneration and yGeneration, two groups of young people who expect technical simplicity, creativity, style, entertainment, instant gratification and most importantly: themselves.
One of the things I came across in my research is that these kids crave fame. This is a whole generation of people who desire a certain level of internet recognition. From Facebook to YouTube to Myspace, the ability for us to see ourselves and for other people to see us has become paramount.
One of the founding pricnipals of DebateThis is that if you are knowledgeable enough and you work hard enough, you WILL be known in this community. You can be famous. You can be infamous. Or you can just be.
Functionality
DebateThis is a widget. A clickable, linkable icon that can attach to nearly any web 2.0 savvy web page. DebateThis will feature its own website where you can customize you're own user profile and install the browser-embedded software, ala StumbleUpon or Skype.
After the software is installed, an icon will appear at the bottom of all stories from participating news organizations. For example if CNN and The New York Times both pick this up, the icon will appear at the bottom of nearly every story the DebateThis user reads.
Clicking on the icon takes you to TheArena, a sub-page that is back within the DebateThis website itself. There you will see a enclosed version of the article along with a section to "Spark a Debate."
Basically, the first person to comment can say anything he or she wants about the article in controlled but challenging manner. The idea is that the person comments on something in or about the article that in effect, challenges the other members of the DebateThis community.
That challenge can be in an audio, video, print or multimedia format and is displayed prominately on the articles own arena page (and also linked to each induvidual poster's blog). Other members then come out of the woodwork to counter the arguement, statement or question.
The motivation is that each time a user posts something thought-proviking and directly tackles whatever was said in a way that it almost trumps the other user, it earns points for that user. The user community can vote on each post. Points are awarded for the number of positive ratings as well as number of hits per each post.
Accumulating points allows each member to become more influential in the community. The top point earners are always displayed on the homepage where users can find out more about that person. A senior point earner (or something) may be able to write his or her own articles for the page or have his own featured space where other users can listen to more of what he has to say.
A member may become such a good and knowedlgeable debator that his fame can travel accross the entire community. With enough points and position in the community, he may even grow a following and then a team, where other members work to post together under his leadership (or something).
Other Things
-Any post with clearly bellow the belt, over the line, unrelated/spamcious or just plain offensive will be moderated by a team of the site's moderators (probably including senior point earners if they so choose). That user is then subject to loose points, status, privileges or may be outright blocked from usage.
-The length and extensiveness of every post a user makes while debate (wheter it be video, audio, print or otherwise) is directly correlated with his standing in the community. A top earning, popular member may have up to a full minute more or chunk of white space comapred to a rookie member.
-All the various social networking stuff is here. Every member has a profile and blog all geared towards the community. Again, the amount of information and content that can be posted on this section is determined by community status.
-If a debate is already sparked, a user can always spark a new one. The debates branch off in a cool presentation like a brainstorming bubble chart thing. Flashy and fun and such.
-I want to somehow implement teams, competetion and triva events later on.
-----------------------
Hope you like or hate this idea. Sorry I waited so late to post, I've been thinking about this one for awhile. Ask questions during the conference. It'll be fun.
talk to you then.
You are the Star.
It would be aimed at the pollitically disgruntled and otherwise informed college demographic: 15-25. This covers both the iGeneration and yGeneration, two groups of young people who expect technical simplicity, creativity, style, entertainment, instant gratification and most importantly: themselves.
One of the things I came across in my research is that these kids crave fame. This is a whole generation of people who desire a certain level of internet recognition. From Facebook to YouTube to Myspace, the ability for us to see ourselves and for other people to see us has become paramount.
One of the founding pricnipals of DebateThis is that if you are knowledgeable enough and you work hard enough, you WILL be known in this community. You can be famous. You can be infamous. Or you can just be.
Functionality
DebateThis is a widget. A clickable, linkable icon that can attach to nearly any web 2.0 savvy web page. DebateThis will feature its own website where you can customize you're own user profile and install the browser-embedded software, ala StumbleUpon or Skype.
After the software is installed, an icon will appear at the bottom of all stories from participating news organizations. For example if CNN and The New York Times both pick this up, the icon will appear at the bottom of nearly every story the DebateThis user reads.
Clicking on the icon takes you to TheArena, a sub-page that is back within the DebateThis website itself. There you will see a enclosed version of the article along with a section to "Spark a Debate."
Basically, the first person to comment can say anything he or she wants about the article in controlled but challenging manner. The idea is that the person comments on something in or about the article that in effect, challenges the other members of the DebateThis community.
That challenge can be in an audio, video, print or multimedia format and is displayed prominately on the articles own arena page (and also linked to each induvidual poster's blog). Other members then come out of the woodwork to counter the arguement, statement or question.
The motivation is that each time a user posts something thought-proviking and directly tackles whatever was said in a way that it almost trumps the other user, it earns points for that user. The user community can vote on each post. Points are awarded for the number of positive ratings as well as number of hits per each post.
Accumulating points allows each member to become more influential in the community. The top point earners are always displayed on the homepage where users can find out more about that person. A senior point earner (or something) may be able to write his or her own articles for the page or have his own featured space where other users can listen to more of what he has to say.
A member may become such a good and knowedlgeable debator that his fame can travel accross the entire community. With enough points and position in the community, he may even grow a following and then a team, where other members work to post together under his leadership (or something).
Other Things
-Any post with clearly bellow the belt, over the line, unrelated/spamcious or just plain offensive will be moderated by a team of the site's moderators (probably including senior point earners if they so choose). That user is then subject to loose points, status, privileges or may be outright blocked from usage.
-The length and extensiveness of every post a user makes while debate (wheter it be video, audio, print or otherwise) is directly correlated with his standing in the community. A top earning, popular member may have up to a full minute more or chunk of white space comapred to a rookie member.
-All the various social networking stuff is here. Every member has a profile and blog all geared towards the community. Again, the amount of information and content that can be posted on this section is determined by community status.
-If a debate is already sparked, a user can always spark a new one. The debates branch off in a cool presentation like a brainstorming bubble chart thing. Flashy and fun and such.
-I want to somehow implement teams, competetion and triva events later on.
-----------------------
Hope you like or hate this idea. Sorry I waited so late to post, I've been thinking about this one for awhile. Ask questions during the conference. It'll be fun.
talk to you then.
Newswarriors
While I do agree with what Jon just said, that we have too many ideas and too little time, I figure I couldn't call myself a member of Devastator unless I came up with my own project.
A long time ago I pitched an idea that dies swiftly but now that our ideas must be so audience-specific I think it's time for that old stinker to make a return. The target audience is retired old people, the kind who can't figure out their computers and make no effort to do so. It's called Old People News, or something less offensive. Think the Jitterbug cell phone of internet news. The site will feature big pictures and big fonts and no arrested celebrities. Also, there won't be any buttons to push, as the entire paper will be on one page. There will be an option to have Wilford Brimley read you the news, but that costs extra.
A long time ago I pitched an idea that dies swiftly but now that our ideas must be so audience-specific I think it's time for that old stinker to make a return. The target audience is retired old people, the kind who can't figure out their computers and make no effort to do so. It's called Old People News, or something less offensive. Think the Jitterbug cell phone of internet news. The site will feature big pictures and big fonts and no arrested celebrities. Also, there won't be any buttons to push, as the entire paper will be on one page. There will be an option to have Wilford Brimley read you the news, but that costs extra.
Before tonight...
I think we all have some wonderful ideas going on throughout this group, but they're all spread out among vastly different groups. Now, I'm not sure what the official timeline leading up until Toronto is supposed to be, but we should probably move towards a definitive topic soon, so that we can flesh out the ideas that are already out there within the group.
We should use the data from each of the groups that we already have and make some kind of democratic decision soon. But that's just what I think.
We should use the data from each of the groups that we already have and make some kind of democratic decision soon. But that's just what I think.
Posting
Hey Guys,
Sorry I've been absentee on the posting this week, I just got a job near my school and had to scramble to move my life there the day after I got back from NY.... only to find that they have no internet and the guy I usually steal a connection from has moved on.
So I'm going to post allllllll my ideas after a little family function today. If you have time, take a look. (It's called "DebateThis" It's going to be hot.)
Thanks guys.
Sorry I've been absentee on the posting this week, I just got a job near my school and had to scramble to move my life there the day after I got back from NY.... only to find that they have no internet and the guy I usually steal a connection from has moved on.
So I'm going to post allllllll my ideas after a little family function today. If you have time, take a look. (It's called "DebateThis" It's going to be hot.)
Thanks guys.
Tyler's Google mockup would be useful...
...on a site like www.prettytheworld.com.
In the vein of fan sites, this site - a fan site for Matt Nathanson - has the bare minimum of what's needed for diehard Matt fans like myself, but could use new media elements, like the Google maps feature that Tyler created for Wilco's tour, or some kind of interactive media feature with videos and audio. This site could benefit greatly from some extensive web design to increase fan input and interaction.
In the vein of fan sites, this site - a fan site for Matt Nathanson - has the bare minimum of what's needed for diehard Matt fans like myself, but could use new media elements, like the Google maps feature that Tyler created for Wilco's tour, or some kind of interactive media feature with videos and audio. This site could benefit greatly from some extensive web design to increase fan input and interaction.
INteresting Post on Lost Remote
http://www.lostremote.com/2007/08/18/poll-says-majority-find-news-orgs-biased/
which has a pointer to a new Pew study
People don't trust the news, find it biased. Don't trust news organizations. Think the news criticizes the country too much
But they like their local tv news - go figure
Worth a read - and a cuple of minutes thought. Is there a way your idea can help re-establish trust and respect of the news organization in the audience you've chosen?
Maybe if we implement some of the ideas you guys had about letting people tell their own stories, letting people say what is news? That might increase trust and decrease how biased people think the news organizations are.
Remember - chat tonight. Be sure your ideas are fully fleshed out. Read thru everyone's ideas and comment. Go thru the comments on your site - respond to them.
which has a pointer to a new Pew study
People don't trust the news, find it biased. Don't trust news organizations. Think the news criticizes the country too much
But they like their local tv news - go figure
Worth a read - and a cuple of minutes thought. Is there a way your idea can help re-establish trust and respect of the news organization in the audience you've chosen?
Maybe if we implement some of the ideas you guys had about letting people tell their own stories, letting people say what is news? That might increase trust and decrease how biased people think the news organizations are.
Remember - chat tonight. Be sure your ideas are fully fleshed out. Read thru everyone's ideas and comment. Go thru the comments on your site - respond to them.
Saturday, August 18, 2007
No Internets :(
Hey guys. Sorry my postings have been lacking this week. We're without the internet at my house until Thursday next week so I'll just have to rough it at the library for the next few days. Catch you all on the conference call tomorrow night.
Friday, August 17, 2007
Hope this is helpfull.
As a standalone program I don't think my deal of work. This would have to be something that you have to sign up for online on that newspaper's site. The increased traffic to the newspaper site could lead to increased sales. I think that college age students are very competitive I think that the schedule that the questions are put up, difficultly of the questions, and the amount of exposure that a winner gets what all play and two how successful the program would be. It might take awhile to catch on but it took me a year and 1/2 to use facebook.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
My idea is tight... I think
I think I ever really good idea. One of the main reasons why people don't read the newspaper is because they don't understand politics very well. Most people are taught the basics of politics as child. Even though I'm in journalism my understanding of government and how it works is limited. I'm sure that if people knew more about politics and government they would be more interested in the news.
Here's my idea. Politics as a whole is pretty boring. The reason why are we will watch the Colbert Report and the Daily show is because it's fun. I was at buffalo wild wings eating that Asian zing wings. I looked at a TV and it had trivia on it. And that's when it hit me. None of the stuff that it on the TV was very interesting but there is a sense of competition. What I want to do is have an application that can be used on a high end cell phone or a laptop. I think it would be real cool if thousands of questions about politics were broadcast to cell phones and laptops. It's not like people aren't text messaging and playing Tetris instead of listening to the professor. So I would like a a multiple choice game that is broadcast all. At the end of a the day a leaderboard will go up. We can also compete against other schools.
Here's my idea. Politics as a whole is pretty boring. The reason why are we will watch the Colbert Report and the Daily show is because it's fun. I was at buffalo wild wings eating that Asian zing wings. I looked at a TV and it had trivia on it. And that's when it hit me. None of the stuff that it on the TV was very interesting but there is a sense of competition. What I want to do is have an application that can be used on a high end cell phone or a laptop. I think it would be real cool if thousands of questions about politics were broadcast to cell phones and laptops. It's not like people aren't text messaging and playing Tetris instead of listening to the professor. So I would like a a multiple choice game that is broadcast all. At the end of a the day a leaderboard will go up. We can also compete against other schools.
Passing along an email
Hey everyone,
This is an email I got today (I somehow ended up on some sort of email list) from Clip Syndicate. It's one the video editing software guys I was in contact with back in Stage 1 when we were looking into programs for NewsReal. Anyway, if we do anything significant down the video route, he included a list of different live channel Webs made using this program (everything from nuclear to medical services to gang). It might be worth checking out if any of your ideas include extensive video...
Hey there!
Just a quick note. We have gone live with over 30 new stations in the past 60 days, including major markets ranging from New York and Los Angeles and ranging all the way to my personal favorite in Anchorage, Alaska. No matter how vertical your editorial focus is or how niche your interests are, we now have enough content to help provide your online properties with a truly robust and unique video channel that can be updated hands-free and in real-time, or daily by you as an editor.I invite you to take a look at the platform again today at www.ClipSyndicate.com and I sincerely urge you to email me with any questions or ideas - especially if you need any help getting started!The dev team and our engineers have helped me bring over 2,500 vertical channels live on partner sites this year alone, so I’ve probably encountered and overcome just about every integration hurdle you might encounter!Here are just a few examples of some great live integrations we’ve taken note of lately:
American Nuclear Societyhttp://www.ans.org/links/vc-video EMSVillagehttp://www.emsvillage.com/
News Of The Oddhttp://www.newsoftheodd.com/index.php
PennWell Dental Grouphttp://pennwelldentalgroup.com/news/
My ID Backhttp://www.myidback.com/
KnowGangs; The Nation’s Leading Gang Experthttp://www.knowgangs.com/ PostalMag.comhttp://postalmag.com/ CorrectionsOne.comhttp://www.correctionsone.com/news/
Underwater Timeshttp://underwatertimes.com/
We are currently putting together a more formal newsletter that will include tips and tricks based on some of our partners’ success stories.
Talk to you soon!
Jim
This is an email I got today (I somehow ended up on some sort of email list) from Clip Syndicate. It's one the video editing software guys I was in contact with back in Stage 1 when we were looking into programs for NewsReal. Anyway, if we do anything significant down the video route, he included a list of different live channel Webs made using this program (everything from nuclear to medical services to gang). It might be worth checking out if any of your ideas include extensive video...
Hey there!
Just a quick note. We have gone live with over 30 new stations in the past 60 days, including major markets ranging from New York and Los Angeles and ranging all the way to my personal favorite in Anchorage, Alaska. No matter how vertical your editorial focus is or how niche your interests are, we now have enough content to help provide your online properties with a truly robust and unique video channel that can be updated hands-free and in real-time, or daily by you as an editor.I invite you to take a look at the platform again today at www.ClipSyndicate.com and I sincerely urge you to email me with any questions or ideas - especially if you need any help getting started!The dev team and our engineers have helped me bring over 2,500 vertical channels live on partner sites this year alone, so I’ve probably encountered and overcome just about every integration hurdle you might encounter!Here are just a few examples of some great live integrations we’ve taken note of lately:
American Nuclear Societyhttp://www.ans.org/links/vc-video EMSVillagehttp://www.emsvillage.com/
News Of The Oddhttp://www.newsoftheodd.com/index.php
PennWell Dental Grouphttp://pennwelldentalgroup.com/news/
My ID Backhttp://www.myidback.com/
KnowGangs; The Nation’s Leading Gang Experthttp://www.knowgangs.com/ PostalMag.comhttp://postalmag.com/ CorrectionsOne.comhttp://www.correctionsone.com/news/
Underwater Timeshttp://underwatertimes.com/
We are currently putting together a more formal newsletter that will include tips and tricks based on some of our partners’ success stories.
Talk to you soon!
Jim
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
I don't see a lot of posts being added to
some interesting ideas - but remember you're supposed to be posting every day to the post - keep working hte idea, growing it, looking for more support for it, for competition.
not enough just to post a line or two about hte idea - need to see it being developed so we can comment
and remember - look at the posts and comment
not enough just to post a line or two about hte idea - need to see it being developed so we can comment
and remember - look at the posts and comment
A new video editing site - mogulus
AN interesting video site with built in editing tools that let people make their own tv stations
http://mogulus.com/
it's in beta now - you have to request an account - i haven't tried it yet - if ya try it, post and let us know how it works for you.
Kim
http://mogulus.com/
it's in beta now - you have to request an account - i haven't tried it yet - if ya try it, post and let us know how it works for you.
Kim
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Sunday's meeting
Argh I hate to be a pain in the arse but I'm scheduled to work until 9:30 on Sunday. Lovely timing for only the third time all summer I've worked on a Sunday night. Anyway if you guys are cool with pushing the meeting to 9:30 and I can check in via cell phone, that'd be cool. But if that doesn't work that's alright, I don't want to mess everyone up just because of my bad Target luck. In the mean time I'll see if someone will pick up my shift but it's not likely.
-Tyler
-Tyler
Just Came In
Hey gang-
It looks like we're heading in an interesting new direction here; I'm just not sure what that is. We're picking projects/topics to work on? I'd appreciate it if someone would please clarify that assignment for me, and maybe fill me in on what was discussed on the meeting.
Thanks,
Kyle
It looks like we're heading in an interesting new direction here; I'm just not sure what that is. We're picking projects/topics to work on? I'd appreciate it if someone would please clarify that assignment for me, and maybe fill me in on what was discussed on the meeting.
Thanks,
Kyle
Monday, August 13, 2007
Editing Posts??
I don't know if I'm doing this right, but I just added my beginning thoughts/ideas to my original idea of what I was tackling for the week?? So they appear in the original blog post because I just edited the existing one? I don't know if it's right, but that's where it is...
check out http://www.buzzmachine.com/innovation/
It's a blog post from Jeff Jarvis about journalism and innovation - he's teaching a class on it in the fall. He points out journalists need to take responsibility for the business of journalism, keeping it in business as it were
Remember to grab a topic to work on this week - and remember to read thru the other folks posts and offer suggestions and comments.
Kim
It's a blog post from Jeff Jarvis about journalism and innovation - he's teaching a class on it in the fall. He points out journalists need to take responsibility for the business of journalism, keeping it in business as it were
Remember to grab a topic to work on this week - and remember to read thru the other folks posts and offer suggestions and comments.
Kim
ms girls
I'm also working on something with middle school girls. I had an idea last night developing on the original stalker locker idea, too. Sorry I just got to posting this, I'm at my family's cottage with no Internet so I just came home for an appointment, but I'll post my ideas before I head back tonight.
Beginnings to my idea....
So these are a couple things that came to mind after last night:
Beginnings to my idea....
So these are a couple things that came to mind after last night:
- One thing I thought of was definitely based off the Locker Stalker or Stocker or whatever we're calling it these days ... but what's important is there would actually be an actual, all out, middle school locker. Perhaps is something you would add on to an exisiting site (and for this, I'm not just talking about social networking in terms of Facebook/MySpace ... something that could go on the plethora of sites we came up with that already have the attention of these girls. For one, we know messaging is a big thing (who doesn't get excited when they have a Facebook message?). Through this, however, I was imagining the messages would be inside the locker, almost like on Post Its (or a similar paper product idea), written in handwriting -- the whole idea that someone left you a "real" note in your locker. Although this is more the social side of things, I'm sure there are ways we could turn it to incorporate news. There would also be a photo aspect that would work in 2 ways: 1. personal pictures of all your little pink shirt, mini skirt wearing middle school girl friends and 2. for news events ... the whole idea of a picture speaking a thousand words. Dave mentioned the idea of pictures telling stories when were first broke into this group in Ithaca (I remember mentioning the similarities to MSNBC's Week in Pictures). So there could be captions ... or even VIDEO in your locker. The real catch here is the news through text though. In this version of Locker Stalker it would be newspaper clippings in your lockers that would be actual news stories ... maybe with a little animation so they would actually float around your locker and pop up once it's opened (ok I'm thinking way down the road on that one). These would be news stories that would not only affect this demographic, but maybe written in a way to convey a "regular" hard news story, but with details to this level. Koz also originally mentioned the idea of having stories about your friends in the orginal idea, too.
I'm not entirely sold on what I've come up with so far, and my details may not be the best, but it's the idea that I like. I firmly believe they need to be getting this news without it being forced upon them, or without them really realizing it. So if we could come up with a way (better than this) to mix their socializing needs (which we've found out are their prized posession) with their news needs (which they don't realize they have) it'll be the perfect combination.
- The second idea I had involved incentives ... and I'm not really sure what they would be. Anyway, it would be a pop up news quiz (again, hard news, current events, etc) that would be an add-on to their exisiting sites (same feeling as above). Depending on how many questions they got right, what they scored, etc... they would receive an incentive. Kind of like if this was being done in SecondLife, you would receive Linden dollars (I think that's what they were called). Although sites aimed at this age group don't necessarily include things they have to "purchase" to make their sites cooler, maybe it could even be paired with a sponsor. Or work on a points system. The idea behind this is they want to be attentive to the news so they can score well on the news quiz so they can get someting "new and cool," be it for their site or not. This goes with the idea we discussed last night about "sparking interest" which I think, combined with establishing habit, are the two keys to engaging this demographic.
The other thing that was mentioned last night, which I haven't really developed anything off of, was the idea of pairing kids with already-popular adult media forms (the idea of Time Magazine and Time for kids). I was trying to thing of popular "adult news sites" that would could possibly add the game feature, or idea of interactivity to?
Anway, the top two are my ideas in a very rough form that I'll continue to flush out this week, but wanted to get them out because they might spark something with someone else working with this demographic.
My Project
I also would like to develop a game for kids. I think what I'm interested in hitting on is a questioning of the blind patriotism kids are taught in schools. Choose Your Own Adventure style.
Friday Aug. 17th
Hmmm... So I've been really struggling to find a way to get over the issue that while a game is fixed (it's the same set-up from week to week, month to month..) how to constantly incorporate breaking news into the game without it becomming a really expensive venture.... I've sort of worked around it in the game below...
What I was thinking was to have a set of issues... perhaps overly simplified issues that kids (I'm not just shooting for girls) can take a stand on, then they are presented with a number of options to choose from, which they then pursue to discover the outcome.... Think of those Choose Your Own Adventure books you read as a kid... you'd make a decision and it would say 'turn to page 36' where you'd have to make another choice and it went on and on until you conquered aliens on Mars or died.
So.. for clarity's sake... here's an example...
Lets say a kid is presented with 'The War in Iraq'
They choose to 'Support or Oppose'... (lets say they choose oppose)
Then they are asked 'What do you want to do about it?' and are given the options to 'Attend a Local Meeting' 'March on Washington' 'Write a Letter to your Congressman' etc. etc...
Let's say our kid picks "Attend a Local Meeting" - When they click on it they would be told "You attend a local meeting to learn more about the war in Iraq... When you express your opinion a man accuses you of being unpatriotic... What do you want to do? Select: Dissent is Pariotic! OR Go Home"
If they select Dissent is Patriotic they get to read a quick quote about how one of the founding fathers (I forget) said that dissent is one of the most patriotic things a person can do in wartime, after that they would continue to play until they've made some sort of impact (mobilized people)... If they select Go Home they basically start over.
The whole idea behind the game is to show kids the relative impact they can have on the world, and to give them a reality-check about how some tactics may have hidden consequences...
For example.. Say a kid chose to Support the War in Iraq... and then they chose to Join the Military... The game would then show a short blurb about how when you join the military you lose many of the liberties civillian's enjoy, like the right to speak freely about the government or to choose how you dress... etc. etc.
At the end of each game, the player is shown a summary of their choices... this might look like a map, showing where they went, what they did... and here's the killer part... news organizations could then incorporate local information to direct the kids to participate directly within their community! So say they went to a local meeting within the game... On the summary/map at the end of the game the news corporation could then say "To see a real political meeting, check out the 7:00 meeting at 234 Clinton St." or if the player chose to write a letter to their congressman, they news corporation could invite them to send it for real... or if in the game a player started a local drive for voter registration, the news organization could tell them how to really do it in the real world.
So basically the game would be a tool for empowerment. Kids would tinker with political issues from the safety of their homes and then be nudged to continue their political involvement in the real world. Whatever they choose to do, they're learning something... and that's pretty cool.
I'll post more later...
Friday Night
Okay, so I've been thinking about how we could go about making this actually happen... the technical side of things.
As we don't have loads of money, I imagine the interface would have to be fairly plain and simple. I imagine a player just having an omnicient view over the game, therefore we wouldn't need any avatars to walk around. I don't see it being super-flashy, and that can only work in our favor as we are short on time and money.
It seems in this project that stand-alone sites are being discouraged, therefore, the game would have to be tacked-on to some news site, which isn't problamatic per se, but it would require the news site to perhaps revise the game in order for it to meet their needs (local issues).
Comments???
Friday Aug. 17th
Hmmm... So I've been really struggling to find a way to get over the issue that while a game is fixed (it's the same set-up from week to week, month to month..) how to constantly incorporate breaking news into the game without it becomming a really expensive venture.... I've sort of worked around it in the game below...
What I was thinking was to have a set of issues... perhaps overly simplified issues that kids (I'm not just shooting for girls) can take a stand on, then they are presented with a number of options to choose from, which they then pursue to discover the outcome.... Think of those Choose Your Own Adventure books you read as a kid... you'd make a decision and it would say 'turn to page 36' where you'd have to make another choice and it went on and on until you conquered aliens on Mars or died.
So.. for clarity's sake... here's an example...
Lets say a kid is presented with 'The War in Iraq'
They choose to 'Support or Oppose'... (lets say they choose oppose)
Then they are asked 'What do you want to do about it?' and are given the options to 'Attend a Local Meeting' 'March on Washington' 'Write a Letter to your Congressman' etc. etc...
Let's say our kid picks "Attend a Local Meeting" - When they click on it they would be told "You attend a local meeting to learn more about the war in Iraq... When you express your opinion a man accuses you of being unpatriotic... What do you want to do? Select: Dissent is Pariotic! OR Go Home"
If they select Dissent is Patriotic they get to read a quick quote about how one of the founding fathers (I forget) said that dissent is one of the most patriotic things a person can do in wartime, after that they would continue to play until they've made some sort of impact (mobilized people)... If they select Go Home they basically start over.
The whole idea behind the game is to show kids the relative impact they can have on the world, and to give them a reality-check about how some tactics may have hidden consequences...
For example.. Say a kid chose to Support the War in Iraq... and then they chose to Join the Military... The game would then show a short blurb about how when you join the military you lose many of the liberties civillian's enjoy, like the right to speak freely about the government or to choose how you dress... etc. etc.
At the end of each game, the player is shown a summary of their choices... this might look like a map, showing where they went, what they did... and here's the killer part... news organizations could then incorporate local information to direct the kids to participate directly within their community! So say they went to a local meeting within the game... On the summary/map at the end of the game the news corporation could then say "To see a real political meeting, check out the 7:00 meeting at 234 Clinton St." or if the player chose to write a letter to their congressman, they news corporation could invite them to send it for real... or if in the game a player started a local drive for voter registration, the news organization could tell them how to really do it in the real world.
So basically the game would be a tool for empowerment. Kids would tinker with political issues from the safety of their homes and then be nudged to continue their political involvement in the real world. Whatever they choose to do, they're learning something... and that's pretty cool.
I'll post more later...
Friday Night
Okay, so I've been thinking about how we could go about making this actually happen... the technical side of things.
As we don't have loads of money, I imagine the interface would have to be fairly plain and simple. I imagine a player just having an omnicient view over the game, therefore we wouldn't need any avatars to walk around. I don't see it being super-flashy, and that can only work in our favor as we are short on time and money.
It seems in this project that stand-alone sites are being discouraged, therefore, the game would have to be tacked-on to some news site, which isn't problamatic per se, but it would require the news site to perhaps revise the game in order for it to meet their needs (local issues).
Comments???
Sunday, August 12, 2007
...
I will be working on some sort of news game for our tween girl demographic.
Wed Aug 16, 2007 12:30 AM
Ok so I’ve been brainstorming ideas for the past couple days and looking at more girly web sites and I keep going back to Flip.com… I think I might be obsessed with it. It’s the quintessential tween girl web site, which is probably why I’m obsessed with it – that was not meant to be creepy as much as it was meant to be gay.
The great part about it is the girls get to put things they like, an expression of themselves in the flip book and then pick out different background and tacky sparkle letters, etc. But it can be so much more… you can link videos and web sites to it, etc.
Here’s a link to one that I made when I was fooling around with it months ago. It was something for my blog (I write a weekly top favorite things in my blog). I never ended up using it or finishing it, but I still thought it would give you all some kind of idea.
Jordan’s Flip Book.
It also only has one page, which I know defeats the purpose of calling it a flip book, but just imagine more similar pages…
Here’s one that Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour made.
Now how to add the news to this platform? More coming later. Mull over these ideas (is that the correct phrase?). And I’ll start thinking of the news elements that are or could be involved.
Wed Aug 16, 2007 12:30 AM
Ok so I’ve been brainstorming ideas for the past couple days and looking at more girly web sites and I keep going back to Flip.com… I think I might be obsessed with it. It’s the quintessential tween girl web site, which is probably why I’m obsessed with it – that was not meant to be creepy as much as it was meant to be gay.
The great part about it is the girls get to put things they like, an expression of themselves in the flip book and then pick out different background and tacky sparkle letters, etc. But it can be so much more… you can link videos and web sites to it, etc.
Here’s a link to one that I made when I was fooling around with it months ago. It was something for my blog (I write a weekly top favorite things in my blog). I never ended up using it or finishing it, but I still thought it would give you all some kind of idea.
Jordan’s Flip Book.
It also only has one page, which I know defeats the purpose of calling it a flip book, but just imagine more similar pages…
Here’s one that Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour made.
Now how to add the news to this platform? More coming later. Mull over these ideas (is that the correct phrase?). And I’ll start thinking of the news elements that are or could be involved.
Thursday 9:00 AM
I was thinking of an idea of “Things that affect me” kind of deal since tweens are all about themselves. It kind of plays off of that idea I said for locker stalker of adding like if a photo of you ended up in the paper, you could save it in your locker. This would be a bit different.
The target publication would no doubt be local, probably a local paper or something. And online they would have available their normal content. What I propose is a type of widget where tweens or really, anyone, could highlight text, or click on a picture and an option would be to add to “Their Content.” I don’t know how many papers are putting comics online, but they could do it with those as well. So that would basically just be a personal space where all these things would be collected and archived.
The fun part comes next.
Thursday (or I guess technically Friday) 1:00 AM.
Live Music Mashup Site
At the moment I'm working on an HTML template for a tour that hasn't happened yet. In the mean time, anyone have ideas on how this might be able to used in a more news-y context? I'm open to applying something like this in a different way. Maybe following presidential candidates around the country, I don't know.
----------
I've created a mockup of what this little shindig might look like using Google MyMaps. Very easy to do. The hard part would be making this so any user could submit info and the system would automatically know what to do. I had to manually find the links on the last.fm pages, and I got my setlists from a Wilco-dedicated website. But it gives you a good idea. Next I'll work on one for a tour that hasn't yet started.
Wilco's Summer 2007 tour, first leg.
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=102205740458521019897.0004379bb47dd8005acc9&ll=39.571822,-78.442383&spn=19.480747,41.352539&z=5&om=1
----------
Herein lies posts about my live music Google Maps/Flickr/Youtube mashup thing.
(although I would encourage somebody else to do something about games, or a widget-y thing, for the tween demographic.)
----------
I've created a mockup of what this little shindig might look like using Google MyMaps. Very easy to do. The hard part would be making this so any user could submit info and the system would automatically know what to do. I had to manually find the links on the last.fm pages, and I got my setlists from a Wilco-dedicated website. But it gives you a good idea. Next I'll work on one for a tour that hasn't yet started.
Wilco's Summer 2007 tour, first leg.
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=102205740458521019897.0004379bb47dd8005acc9&ll=39.571822,-78.442383&spn=19.480747,41.352539&z=5&om=1
----------
Herein lies posts about my live music Google Maps/Flickr/Youtube mashup thing.
(although I would encourage somebody else to do something about games, or a widget-y thing, for the tween demographic.)
Locker Stocker (note spelling change)
The basis of this idea would be what we talked about before: A Web site made to look like a simulated locker. The inside would house a section for uploading pictures as well as an area to store books. The books would, in actuality, would be links to differnt groups. For instance, the "Hilary 2008" book would sit on top of the "Haverhill High School Football" book. Each book would house different articles and topics, similar to a message board. Each layer would hold a different set of disscussions. Users could link to articles, videos and pictures. On the door of the locker would be what looked like a newspaper clipping. The clipping would change regularly and would be news delivered to each user based on the groups he or she (she) has chosen as well as a section for top stories. Top stories would apear on everyone's clippings (maybe based on geography?) and would encourage users to gain interest in different subjects and join groups (get books) to talk about them. The stories (could be video) would be writen or broadcast in such a way that younger audiences could activly engage in them and reallt take something out of them. This might be becuase it is easier to read, or because more background is given.
Just a start... any ideas?
Just a start... any ideas?
interesting seto f quotes
from a new media Journalist - Pat Thornton
I like where he talks about how journalism needs to survive by giving people the news they want in the formats they want in the 4th paragraph
http://patthorntonfiles.com/blog/?p=38
I like where he talks about how journalism needs to survive by giving people the news they want in the formats they want in the 4th paragraph
http://patthorntonfiles.com/blog/?p=38
"I DONT LIKE WHERE THIS IS GOING" A summary of my findings for tonight's discussion.
The more and more research I continue to do about the news gathering habits of our generation... the more I'm starting to disrespect my own peer group. Even scarier is the next wave of punkly messy-headed hooked in kids. Maybe I'm just getting old. Some of it is ok, like a graf I took out of this article about the shifting generational habits.
"People call our generation apathetic. We're not apathetic toward the news, we just don't want to hear the same old bull crap all the time," said John Fiske, a 22-year-old law student in San Diego and a classic Gen Yer. "Nobody caters to us," he said, adding that the big television news cable networks—CNN, Fox News, MSNBC—"think they can attract young people by playing rap music at the beginning and end of their shows. We see right through it."
True. But it seems that more and more the habit of bleeding out to alternatives is becoming suspect. I guess because it's hard to pinpoint exactly what we want. Like our parents. Their goals where pretty simple: raise a family, picket fence, golden retriever, minivan, solid job, close circle of friends, respect.
Our generation has somehow seemed to poisoned itself. Actually, it seems that we have poisoned ourselves with... ourselves. Everyone is famous. Anyone can be a YouTube star or a MySpace vixen. Hell, its tough nowadays to find someone who isn't connected to an aging reality show reject. Life-styles of the broke and famous. This USATODAY article seemed to capture our spirit pretty damn well.
"Eighty-one percent of 18- to 25-year-olds surveyed in a Pew Research Center poll released today said getting rich is their generation's most important or second-most-important life goal; 51% said the same about being famous."
I'm weary because I'm not sure if its the format of news that is changing, but news itself. Are we trying to bring hard news back to our generation? Are we trying to dilute news with sugarcoated garbage so the next generation can swallow it? Or are we saying news isn't important anymore. That because we don't respect current news the way our parents did, that news really isn't that relevant in itself anymore... unless of course its about gadgets, video games, avatars, funny stuff, pseudo-reality or of course, celebrity gossip.
I digress, read the latest GEN-Y headlines for yourself.
Still not convinced? Why not do some "research." And of course everyone knows the best way to that. After all, we probably wrote it.
We need some serious talk about making this project ABOUT NEWS. Talk to you guys tonight.
"People call our generation apathetic. We're not apathetic toward the news, we just don't want to hear the same old bull crap all the time," said John Fiske, a 22-year-old law student in San Diego and a classic Gen Yer. "Nobody caters to us," he said, adding that the big television news cable networks—CNN, Fox News, MSNBC—"think they can attract young people by playing rap music at the beginning and end of their shows. We see right through it."
True. But it seems that more and more the habit of bleeding out to alternatives is becoming suspect. I guess because it's hard to pinpoint exactly what we want. Like our parents. Their goals where pretty simple: raise a family, picket fence, golden retriever, minivan, solid job, close circle of friends, respect.
Our generation has somehow seemed to poisoned itself. Actually, it seems that we have poisoned ourselves with... ourselves. Everyone is famous. Anyone can be a YouTube star or a MySpace vixen. Hell, its tough nowadays to find someone who isn't connected to an aging reality show reject. Life-styles of the broke and famous. This USATODAY article seemed to capture our spirit pretty damn well.
"Eighty-one percent of 18- to 25-year-olds surveyed in a Pew Research Center poll released today said getting rich is their generation's most important or second-most-important life goal; 51% said the same about being famous."
I'm weary because I'm not sure if its the format of news that is changing, but news itself. Are we trying to bring hard news back to our generation? Are we trying to dilute news with sugarcoated garbage so the next generation can swallow it? Or are we saying news isn't important anymore. That because we don't respect current news the way our parents did, that news really isn't that relevant in itself anymore... unless of course its about gadgets, video games, avatars, funny stuff, pseudo-reality or of course, celebrity gossip.
I digress, read the latest GEN-Y headlines for yourself.
Still not convinced? Why not do some "research." And of course everyone knows the best way to that. After all, we probably wrote it.
We need some serious talk about making this project ABOUT NEWS. Talk to you guys tonight.
Saturday, August 11, 2007
This counts as two posts..... there are two articles.
I found two articles that I think are worth taking a look at. The first article is entitled Young Adults Are Giving Newspapers Scant Notice (7/17/07). This article basically confirms what we already know, but it mentioned two concepts that are worth considering in determing our product. The first is that young people do not make an appointment with the news every day, and therefore do not have an ingrained news habit. The second is that the article suggests that we have in general become more of a viewing nation than a reading nation. Perhaps the way to capture our audience would then be to create an online product that gears 65% of its resources toward viewing the news and 35% toward reading it.
The second article entitled, entitled A Portrait of Generation Next (1/9/07), provides some well-developed research on how much and how young people engage political issues. The article's main focus is on Generation Nexters, or young adults between 18 and 25 years of age. Some of the findings from the research include:
Overall, I feel that the second article could help us select the demographic with the most potential.
The second article entitled, entitled A Portrait of Generation Next (1/9/07), provides some well-developed research on how much and how young people engage political issues. The article's main focus is on Generation Nexters, or young adults between 18 and 25 years of age. Some of the findings from the research include:
- When asked how Generation Nexters watch/listen to the news, 64% said they check in on it from time to time compared to 34% who watch it regularly. 55% follow the national news only when something important is happening, and 73% follow international news only when something important is happening.
- Of all the news venues mentioned, the only area where young people surpass their older counterparts in terms of news consumption is in online news.
- Young people consume less local news and network television news thatn do older generations, that gap is smaller on cable news channels such as CNN, MSNBC or Fox news.
- 13% of Generation Nexters reported watching the Daily Show with John Stewart regularly, compared with 6% of the general public.
- Generation Nexters tend to have more positive views of government, and are more pro-government than older age groups on several dimensions.
Overall, I feel that the second article could help us select the demographic with the most potential.
Dear Devastator
Hey guys- I won't be around for the webinar, as I'll be flying to Florida tomorrow night. It's an unexpected inconvenience that nobody is happy about. I don't envy you who are going to be making the call, however, because it looks likely to turn into an unproductive hour of audience research babble. I should have said this sooner, but this blog is a mess.
We've made pages and pages in a week, and no post seems to get more than one comment. Those that do get one usually aren't about audience research at all. I kind of just feel that audience research was a wrong first step. Not a step backwards, but maybe an awkward sideways step. Starting with audience statistics seems so business-driven to me; I think of advertisers who want to market cars to women and desperate radio stations that want kids to listen again. Artists don't start don't start creating with audience research and journalists don't start a story with audience research. Maybe those "don'ts" should be "shouldn'ts."
A charge was made that we're supposed to produce "the iPod of Journalism." I wasn't so bothered by the analogy because the iPod was conceived through a creation net strategy like ours, but I can think of a couple key differences right now. For one, I'm pretty sure they didn't start with audience research. "Let's just make an MP3 player that isn't completely terrible," they probably said. They had a problem to address right there. Then they probably started scribbling some ideas down, hardcore brainstorming, researching current technologies, that sort of stuff. When the iPod was presented to Steve Jobs, I'm sure he didn't say, "This is great, but who do I sell this to? Where's the audience research?". It was just awesome, you know? Our idea does need an audience, or a community at least, but I think it might be more natural to start with awesome idea and then figure out who to sell it to, if it isn't already apparent.
Also, I'm pretty sure those in the iPod creation net were not required to do five posts a week on some sort of bottomless blog. If I'm wrong here please disregard everything I've said, but this blog homework has only seemed to muddle our goal. Are we seriously going to acknowledge each post tomorrow night? What are we going to resolve? Did you all really want to know about the internet habits of yuppies before we revolutionize journalism? If the answer to that last one is yes, I guess it's not too late for me to go find a couple pages of unsurprising statistics if you promise that it will lead to an iPod-caliber idea.
And yes, I know this whole post wasn't cool, and unnecessarily grumpy, and douchey. I think it's less dead grandpa and more "I'm never getting paid, am I?". I realize that audience research could have been a good way to spark ideas, to get people thinking about problems and to weed out the slacker kids who hate this kind of stuff, but it all seems like a wasted week for me.
The collective innovation incubators' number one principle is Fun. I'm pretty sure half of us picked it as a joke, but I think that only strengthens the notion. I double-checked the thesaurus and this blog is actually the complete opposite of Fun. It's an antonym. My suggestion for next week is that we blog about journalism problems that matter to us, in fewer than five posts if one chooses. I'm just saying- it might spark more of a dialogue than audience research has.
Forever with love,
Kyle
"Thinking and winning do not mix."
We've made pages and pages in a week, and no post seems to get more than one comment. Those that do get one usually aren't about audience research at all. I kind of just feel that audience research was a wrong first step. Not a step backwards, but maybe an awkward sideways step. Starting with audience statistics seems so business-driven to me; I think of advertisers who want to market cars to women and desperate radio stations that want kids to listen again. Artists don't start don't start creating with audience research and journalists don't start a story with audience research. Maybe those "don'ts" should be "shouldn'ts."
A charge was made that we're supposed to produce "the iPod of Journalism." I wasn't so bothered by the analogy because the iPod was conceived through a creation net strategy like ours, but I can think of a couple key differences right now. For one, I'm pretty sure they didn't start with audience research. "Let's just make an MP3 player that isn't completely terrible," they probably said. They had a problem to address right there. Then they probably started scribbling some ideas down, hardcore brainstorming, researching current technologies, that sort of stuff. When the iPod was presented to Steve Jobs, I'm sure he didn't say, "This is great, but who do I sell this to? Where's the audience research?". It was just awesome, you know? Our idea does need an audience, or a community at least, but I think it might be more natural to start with awesome idea and then figure out who to sell it to, if it isn't already apparent.
Also, I'm pretty sure those in the iPod creation net were not required to do five posts a week on some sort of bottomless blog. If I'm wrong here please disregard everything I've said, but this blog homework has only seemed to muddle our goal. Are we seriously going to acknowledge each post tomorrow night? What are we going to resolve? Did you all really want to know about the internet habits of yuppies before we revolutionize journalism? If the answer to that last one is yes, I guess it's not too late for me to go find a couple pages of unsurprising statistics if you promise that it will lead to an iPod-caliber idea.
And yes, I know this whole post wasn't cool, and unnecessarily grumpy, and douchey. I think it's less dead grandpa and more "I'm never getting paid, am I?". I realize that audience research could have been a good way to spark ideas, to get people thinking about problems and to weed out the slacker kids who hate this kind of stuff, but it all seems like a wasted week for me.
The collective innovation incubators' number one principle is Fun. I'm pretty sure half of us picked it as a joke, but I think that only strengthens the notion. I double-checked the thesaurus and this blog is actually the complete opposite of Fun. It's an antonym. My suggestion for next week is that we blog about journalism problems that matter to us, in fewer than five posts if one chooses. I'm just saying- it might spark more of a dialogue than audience research has.
Forever with love,
Kyle
"Thinking and winning do not mix."
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