Interesting Article and Blog

An  interesting article in the current issue of Historically SpeakingBulletin of the Historical Society (http:/www.bu.edu/historic) by Professor Marshall Poe entitled “Fighting Bad with Good, or, Why Historians must get on the Web Now.” Title speaks for itself. I cannot find a link for the article because it appears in the current edition of the paper (April 2009). I am sure that our library has a subscription or you can get to it through the electronic databases.

Additionally, check out their blog found at  http://histsociety.blogspot.com/ for some interesting commentary about some of the issues we have been discussing of late in class.

Alan

Thanks and Nicely Done!

Just a quick note first and foremost to say thanks to everyone for their comments last night on my website design. There was no doubt that last night’s presentation could have been considered a tad intimidating given the talent that resides in the group and I am normally only intimidated when the good English beer runs out and I might be forced to drink – dare I write it – Budweiser. Ye Gods!.

Anyway, I thought everybody’s site showed an amazing amount of work and thought process. I meant what I said in the beginning, I am, as ever, in bewildered awe of the people that do this for a living; there are just so many component parts, but I also have to say that as you develop the confidence in putting something like this project together it is amazing how design ideas and concepts come to often out of left field or if you happen to be looking at something or reading something. Last night was definitely a confidence builder for me in being able to present what I did.

Nicely done everyone.

Alan

Photoshopped Out

Just a quick blog with a comment and what I thought was a useful link relating to Photoshop. To say that I was somewhat overwhelmed in last night’s class with the steady stream of information about Photshop would be an understatement. I know that many of you are far more conversant and used to working with Photoshop than I ever am or ever will be but I can see why colleagues of mine here at work and Jeremy say that this software almost seems bottomless and no matter how long you use it there is still a  myriad of tricks, whistles and bells buried in Photoshop.

Again referring back to my last blog, the book is extremely good but I asked someone at work if they had knowledge of any type of site that allows luddites and philistines such as myself to work through and simply learn the basis steps in the quietness of my home office where the only witnesses to my bad language, as I once again manage to fill the solid color onyl with black and not the color I selected, are my dogs. They came up with the following site which I am only too delighted to share with all those who are still in the paddling pool as opposed to swimming in the deep end. I have tried a couple of the lessons and it seems to be a well thought out site.

http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/photoshop/l/bllps5out.htm

Alan

Photoshop Readings for this week

Whenever I read about or try to  use Photoshop I cannot but help think of the pictures of the old Soviet leadership on top of Lenin’s tomb and how at different stages different people would disappear from photographs depending on the political moods in Moscow.

The four-part series by Cameron Moll was interesting to read through and experiment with and for me it was something that I could reallyappreciate simply because throughout my life I have also been a huge model-maker – planes, ships, figures etc – and the notions of shading, aging, creating a more realistic patinaon a plane or figure to make it stand out from simply being ‘ a model’ is a big part of building and finishing the model. But it also took me a long time and lots of practiceseto develop the skill of painting on the correct shading on a figure leaning on his rifle or riding a horse or weathering a model tank to look as though it had been exposed to the elements for months. I get the same sense with Photoshopand the many elements that you can deploy in working on an image or photograph. Like everything else it takes practice, but simply recalling my years of making models – damn the effects can be great once you hone the skills.

I have to admit that I have not read every single word in the Eismann  book but once again I can see the value of at least becoming comfortable with the basic skill-sets that she discusses. I think my biggest concern with this type of book relates to something that I touched on in my last post and that is the time issue for someone like me to really hone this skill. I can appreciate its benefits and would like to spend a lot longer on any number of these various links, execisesand tasks that can help someone learn the skills but how do I fit this in with everything else I am trying to do espeically as I come somewhat late to this issue in as much as I don’t have a background per se in this type of work and I know that I am constantly playing catch-up. Perhaps I juts need to accept the fact that, as has been discussed before, I form part of that bridging generation and that I should feel comfortable that the next generation will be able to work with this type of technology in their sleep and that will benefit all of us. But at least I will know what Photoshop is and the potential that it holds.

 

Alan

Thoughts on Weekly Readings

All these articles were interesting for different reasons. First and foremost, as you read through each you begin to either gain a greater appreciation or have a greater appreciation reinforced as to the finer points of building a successful website. Guevin’s Visual Architecture demonstrates to me at least the old saying that a picture is still worth a thousand words – give or take cost-plus appreciation. She cited the time of 6 seconds (or less) to grab the attention, I have heard and read that ‘less’ is more the norm including some ridiculous ideas of one or two seconds. Perhaps that is a time for a younger generation but for me I like to think that I do take longer than six seconds. I do notice, however, that certain things do put me off immediately such as too many moving parts or just too much clutter on a given website. Her two examples of the milk carton/sunglasses and text and the painting from two looks were very interesting. After I finished reading the articles I went to a website of an art museum to actually look at how their pictures of portraits were presented and tried to keep a mental note of what I first focused on each time I saw a picture.

Wroblewski’s article Visual Narratives presented an interesting take on perception. I was particularly taken with the four principles of perception and immediately began comparing some of our pages at work to these templates with interesting results.  Even more interesting was the almost instant dismissal I received from one of our IT engineers who told me that he cared little about design – surprise surprise – and our head graphics person who fought a continuing battle against those who simply want to fill up a page with everything possible. Once again I found myself more just observing and listening to opinions and appreciating what a huge spectrum of views exists on all these topics. One person’s brilliant design is someone elses excuse for how not to do something.

Erin Kissane’s article was particularly pertinent and I agreed with everything that she wrote. The issue of double hyphens and double primes continues to plague me with authors. One gets the sense that they are in their comfort zone and will not make the step up to the new standards. Kissane’s arguments for usability and style are right on target. The problem I confront a great deal are those people who secured their PhD’s back in the 70’s and even 80’s who truly believe that they are God’s gift to writing and there is not anything or anybody who is going to teach them how to write. In fact, it is not even teaching, gently editing for usability and style is viewed by some of these people as sacrilege. Preserve us please.

I think Mark Boulton has an intriguing template for manging/running an ‘idea session’ and I think it would be interesting next time I am roped in to such an endeavor to see whether his template can be used. I fear the biggest problem, and it always seems to be the problem, is ego. It takes a strong leader to have people check their egos at the door as it were before sitting down to such a  meeting. Once again, I think age difference is a huge factor. I believe that younger people are far more receptive to this type of meeting format and function extremely well; it is a rarity for older people, particularly those who consider that they have a vested interest in a company or idea or theme, to sit back and engage in such meeting without ‘pulling rank,’ or ‘judging ideas.’ I would be very interested to see how some of the management guru’s who have written books on how we need to move as a country to more efficient and open meetings view Boulton’s ideas.

The Photographic Pallettes article brings to the forefront some of the arguments/debates that I have been privy to on what colors go best with which illustration or picture. I have a colleague who continues his struggle with trying to convince people that white space on a page is not such a bad thing and that just because you have a blank page does not automatically mean that you have to fill it with every color known to humanity.  But there are those who see the blank screen as an invitation to ‘add color’ to the point that much gets lost in a presentation.

In all of these things there unquestionaly a skill  involved that is both taught and comes with experience. But it also involves being open to listening to advice and suggestions. I have often found that someone who has no graphics background or layout skills can produce a gem or spark of an idea in a meeting simply because they come at a project from a different view point. The problem is as Boulton notes  “Saving the Spark.”

Alan

Catching Back Up and Baby Steps

Once again I have been confronted with what appears to be the classic problem for someone like me when it comes to keeping up the pace on a course such as Clio-Wired. Take me away from the structure of having classes and I find that doing all those things that I should do on a regular basis and that everyone who works in and around this area does do on a regular/daily basis  gets pushed to one side as I end on concentrating on other issues. I truly believe that this is the biggest problem for someone of my age who literally is caught with a foot in both camps – still of an age where all this ’stuff’ is fascinating and still want’s to learn, but old enough to still feel more at home with books and papers and not worrying about or working on websites, design or otherwise, on a daily basis.

Anyway, as yet another example of where history and the web are moving, I attended a conference at the National Archives last week for historians in the federal government. I sat in on a number of panels wherein the common themes were “how do we deal with all the data that we have/are collecting?” “How do we access it?” “How do we organize it?” What was interesting was to sit and watch the body language of many of the participants in the audience and chart the divide between those to whom doing anything with the web other than using a search engine was totally alien and they would never move out of their safety zone and those who were so comfortable with working with the web in all formats that they were clearly frustrated that they could not move faster.

One of the most fascinating panels was that held by the Army Corps of Engineers. One of their biggest issues was the sheer volume of data being brought back from Iraq and Afghanistan and how to manage that volume. They have neither the people, resources or money to effectively deal with the problem – net result more and more data is piling up. One of the panelists did talk to some new software that is helping in organizing files and data that is helping somewhat but it does not address their major problem. There was a nice plug for CHNM and GMU as a whole from a former MA graduate who was on the panel and spoke highly of the center and its goals. I also chimed in and spoke to the Clio program and put a plug in for Omeka.  But you could tell the vast majority of the audience while agreeing that employing Web 2.0 technologies is the way to go it was up to someone else or “the next generation” of historians as some guy in his mid-50s said during the Q&A session. One of the overriding issues that I took from the conference is the feeling that we are rapidly approaching a ‘gap’ between those of an older generation who don’t want to leave their safety zone and those coming along – much fewer in number – who are going to have to confront some of these issues. And to complicate matters, in the middle are people like me who knows just enough to be a threat to himself and the whole concept of Web 2.0, who see the value of where we are headed, wants to swim in the deep-end of websites and the understanding of Web 2.0 and is desperately trying to let go of the side and swim away. I am slowly prying his fingers off the wall one by one and inching further out but it appears that there are still many in our world of history who, despite the continued reassurances that HTML, Omeka, Word Press etc, are not to be feared do not want to let go of the side of the pool.

HTML Aids

For those of us just coming to the world of HTML I have two useful help suggestions. Both were given to me by one of my IT guys at work who tells me that he was new to HTML many years back and now teaches HTML at his community college. First is a link http://www.htmlgoodies.comThis might actually be a part of the larger web link that Jeremy pulled up last night dealing with websites. It is a good site with a bunch of exercises similar to those we began with last night.

The second helpful suggestion was a book by Deidre Hayes entitled Sams Teach Yourself HTML in 10 Minutes. I realize that many people in the class might find these ‘too basic’ but for those of us just starting out they seem pretty good tools/reference points to help out.

Alan

And yet more ‘things’ through Google

I thought this was interesting. Holly, there are no end of photos of Queen Victoria.

Alan

More than ten million images from the Life photo archive will be available on Google. According to Time Inc. 97% of the collection never have been seen by the public and they include images from some of Life’s army of famed snappers (Alfred Eisenstadt, Margaret Bourke-White, Gordon Parks and W. Eugene Smith) The images will come up in standard image searches at Google or in a more organized way at the Life Collection here.

This has been a massive task, apparently going on for two years with about three-quarters of the ten million images already scanned and tagged. Time Inc. will be monetizing the images through direct links into the art sales site QOOP. Its syndication partner, Getty Images, will handle licensing for commercial purposes. When we clicked into some images, a buy button led us to framed versions of the images available for purchase. The images carry LIFE watermarking and apparently are not intended for public domain use. Time Inc. specified in the announcement that all copyright and ownership remains with Time. “The primary purpose is to make these available to consumers as information and as framed art,” says Life president Andy Blau.

Blau admits that the blogging community may sit somewhere between personal and commercial use, and that Time Inc. will be policing the re-use of images, especially where third parties try to monetize or pirate them. Of course, bloggers swipe and reuse online imagery as a matter of habit. It will be interesting to see how some of these iconic images make the rounds online and whether and how Time will pursue violators. Blau says that whole nabbing bloggers will not be a first priority, the images do carry invisible Digimarcs that allow them to be tracked.

Time Inc.’s and Getty Images’ Life.com site, which also features the photos from Life magazine, is set to launch in early 2009.

Life magzine closed for the third and final time in April of 2006.

Observations from a Friday night’s voting.

I thought long and hard before committing these observations and thoughts down on this blog page. I reasoned that what I am to ‘blog-on’ does not necessarily fit with anything that we are doing on our coursework per se, but I was sufficiently ‘moved’ on events I observed this past Friday night that I decided to commit it to a blog page and will present just a glimpse of what I observed.

Tomorrow, I am an election officer at a precinct in Fairfax County. We have all been encouraged to vote earlier simply because of the anticipated huge turnout. With that suggestion in mind my wife and I went to one of the locations listed on the Fairfax Cty website to register to vote early on Friday night. I had already read that day about the enormous turnouts being recorded throughout the country as people voted early, some estimates being as high as 20 million already.  I had also both heard and read that even in northern Virginia the numbers were staggering. There is no way that we should run into that I opined to wife as we drove over at 6.00pm less than two miles from where we live.

How wrong could I be. I was truly dumbfounded at the number of people waiting to register to vote early. The line was out of the door and the area inside was packed with people. We both debated whether to stay but decided as the next was the last day it would probably be as bad if not worse. We opted to stay. As we were waiting in the ‘queue’ just to get a clipboard and pen to fill out the form I got the idea of making notes on what I was watching and observing. All I had was a book from one of my other courses which only had a couple of blank pages, so with book and pencil in hand I began taking notes and I took them for the next two and a half hours. It was absolutely bloody fascinating to watch.

This is my fifth presidential election since I became a citizen and I have truly never witnessed anything like the events of Friday night. There I was sitting in a regional government center on Halloween waiting to vote. It was truly awe-inspiring to watch. The ethnic breakdown – common for northern Virgina these days – was incredible, whites, African-Americans, Asians, Africans, Pacific Islanders, Hispanics, men, women, young first time voters, old first-time voters, clearly large numbers of new immigrants voting for th first time and a large number of people who while having voted before got the sense that history was being made with this election.

The amazing thing about the whole event was how orderly it was from start to finish. One woman shouted “bingo” when her number was called and everyone laughed.  There was a young group of African males who sat together and kept cracking jokes about the numbers. There were people on cell-phones, blackberries, reading books, doing crosswords, striking  up conversations with complete strangers as they sat and patiently waited.

There was definitely room for things to go badly wrong but they did not I would venture b/c of the unbelievable efficiency of the five polling place officials who I found out had been on duty since 8.00 am and it had been every bit as busy at 8.00 am as it was at 8.00 pm.  As I was making notes more and more people kept lining up, there seemed to be no end to the number of people wanting to vote. I talked with a couple of people who are also scheduled to be election officers tomorrow and they told me that this scene was the same throughout northern Virginia.

One woman caught my eye above all others. She was clearly a very old woman probably from the Maghreb who was there with her daughter. She looked incredibly frail and could barely stand for longer than a few minutes before she had to sit down. But she went into the polling booth and exercised her vote. I got up and waited outside for the couple to emerge and very politely asked them what they thought of this whole process. The younger woman told me that they had been waiting for nearly three hours to vote. It was indeed the older lady’s first vote in the US the family having arrived from the Sudan. She told me that her grandmother could not believe that she could walk into a polling booth and vote by herself with no one threatening her or dictating how she should vote. She then took my hand and kept saying “thank you” I asked the grand-daughter why she was thanking me and she told me that her grandmother did not expect to vote again because of her health and she finally felt free. I have to admit I was totally in awe and was not quite sure what to say. All I could manage in my very rusty Arabic was to wish her peace and long life which she reciprocated with a smile. And still more people kept lining up to vote.

I was trying to observe as much as I could simply because I felt that history is/was being made all around me. I remembered Prof. Cohen’s comments and insights about all those people who contributed to the 9-11 site and tried extremely hard to be as observant and detail-orientated as possible. I kept saying to my wife this is amazing and as a US historian in training just felt that it was an opportunity that I could not let go by without making a few observations. Would my colleagues in Clio-Wired mind me going off on a tangent on this issue, I wondered? But as one of those transitional people, i.e. b/c of my age, when it comes to blogging and so forth I thought this was a perfect opportunity to employ this tool and has actually given me a sense of achievement.

Thanks for everyone’s patience in reading this if you get a chance but how could I let the opportunity pass me by?

Alan

And while we are on the subject…

Also came across this new book  entitled Blown to Bits that some of you may already be familiar with, if so I would be interested in your comments. Likewise Prof. Cohen I would be very  interested in your thoughts. Is it a little bit of hyperbole on the part of the authors or are they on the right path?

Alan

Start of the media blurb for the book -

This sounds very familiar to some of the issues we have discussed in class.

Wherever you go…whatever you say, write, photograph, or buy…whatever prescriptions you take, or ATM withdrawals you make…you are generating information. That information can be captured, digitized, retrieved, and copied –anywhere on Earth, instantly. Sophisticated computers can increasingly uncover meaning in those digital traces–understanding, anticipating, and influencingyou as never before.

Is this utopia? Or the dawning of a 1984/Brave New World horror world? Whatever you call it, it’s happening. What kind of world are we creating? What will it be like to live there? Blown to Bits offers powerful and controversial answers to these questions–and give you the knowledge you need to help shape your own digital future, not let others do it for you. Building on their pioneering joint MIT/Harvard course, the authors reveal how the digital revolution is changing everything, in ways that are stunning even the most informed experts