Lisa posted writing assignments for this panel. This room has had connection problems so I may not be able to post. We shall see.
Lynn D Johnson (who I love – and had the pleasure of photographing in the convertible, heh)
Words are power.
Beth – having trouble moving from tech writing to blog writing. What is blog writing?
Elke (I’m not 100% sure this is who was speaking, I think it was though)- anything you want it to be. Techy writers, politics, daily writing (it’s her email to everyone, her party chat) no rules, tell as much or as little as you like.
Dina – conversations with dina – it’s about conversations. I write like I’m talking to people.
Cross Left. Org (progressive Christian Site) … I write because I can because I want to because I must. Passionate about … change we want to create in the world. Through words we have the power to create change and inspire people.
Ten Types
Readers
Presentation
Word choice
Conversations
Headlines
Attribution
Link blogging
Essay Blogging
Question and answer
Reviews and how tos
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As a publisher, you know what you want your words to "look like" but people are using various types of devices to read you so your words aren’t going to look the way you want them to look. But you want to think about the reader. The layout and presentation are important.
Writing on the web art or science? Both – words are the identity.
Readers – how effective are you? your readers know – ask the readers, ask for feedback, listen to the feedback. Keep it in perspective.
Word choices — choose your words for clarity, professionalism, voice, punctuation, profanity, buzz.
Do you want to have a conversation, or not. If you don’t want to let people’s voices be heard, then why have comments? If you aren’t going to interact, then why have comments? Colleen Lemasters – legal made her close comments and won’t let them screen and then post. They worry due to winery, alcohol (Sutters Wine) – 21 or older, but they still worry. Visitors can email her and she’ll reply via email.
Annette (I think this is audio that Professor Kim did with Annette) – Rosie & Star article. When she visited Rosie’s blog, she wanted to see the comments she got about her comments regarding Star. Rosie closes comments so she thinks it’s cowardly.
Verymom – if you’re writing a personal website and you get mean people that say awful things…. when I turn them off, I miss the friendship and interaction. But sometimes it’s just too much so you have to close the comments. Lisa is talking about people who’ve put up blogs that are anti-Rosie, in response to what she says on her blog.
Ane Marie – Citizen Mom’s family journal… not a real blog. No comments. "Dupont" – people can email her and will sometimes send emailed comments – but it isn’t blogging because there are no bloggers. She’s totally gotten rid of the childfree people on her personal blogs.
Chris foreman? I think is an author – she wasn’t aware that all blogs need to be a conversation…. does a blog have to be a conversation? Reading an author’s journal, is that still a blog without comments? Is that a website or something else. Lisa says as long as you set reader expecatations, you’re ok.
Amy Garhran is talking about conversational media now…. organizations, including news organizations, and they are really scared about comments. They don’t like conversation – it’s we talk, you listen. You don’t have to have comments to have a blog, but you can open up occasionally or in small situations – ease your way into comments, pick and choose your topics that allow comments. (this was a big discussion and it was stopped before it really ended, because of time constraints. )
Minnie says curse when it’s appropriate and when it isn’t. (So when is that?) Having fuck in your headline is not going to bring people to you for the content you want them to come for, unless you’re blogging about fucking (sorry, no profanity rule broken today).
Grace Davis says that using fuck, takes mommybloggers and parenting to another level – it breaks boundaries, its’ not about gingham and teddies. Amy Gahran – listening to the Scoble podcast/Naked Conversations = Shel and Robert had to adjust the language on their blog to deal with the word naked and the comments/traffic it came.
Someone else (?) -saying the word "shit" made her feel powerful long ago but now it just doesn’t. Jory says Scoble named it Naked Conversations because he knew it would get traffic. A music blogger says writers/musicians insist they have to be able to curse. TW says she was reading a corporate blog and saw the word "ass" and she thought "can he say that????" if it had been on a mommy blog she wouldn’t have thought twice but on that blog, was it appropriate?
Lisa Stone – how to write – once upon a time… and then one day, an event happens… (you can say as many "and then one days" as you want) and then there’s some resolution. And that’s how you write a story. Chris Nolan – future of media. Dana Boyd – columbine, myspace in her future of media.
Now Lisa’s "assignments" – writing headlines.