Reference List

American Soldier (2005) first viewed 15th March 2005, http://www.soldierlife.com/index.php

Blogger.com (2005) Blog Host Site, first viewed 5th March 2005, http://www.blogger.com/start

December, J. (1993) Technical/ Professional Communication Summary, December.com, viewed 29th March 2005, http://www.december.com/john/teach/techcomm/summary.html

Difference between Paper and Online Presentation (1994-2000), Sun Microsystems, viewed 22nd March 2005, http://www.sun.com/980713/webwriting/wftw1.html

Engst, A. (2000) ‘Hacking the Press- Part 2: Types of Publications’, TidBITS, viewed 23rd March 2005, http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=06037

Gahran. A. (2000) Fluff & Contenders 2000, Contentious, viewed 29th March 2005, http://www.contentious.com/articles/V2/2-6/fc2000-intro.html

Kurzel, F. (2003) ‘Text & Design’ Lecture Notes 7th April, Multimedia Concepts University of South Australia (Magill)

Nielson, J. (1997) How Users Read on the Web, useit.com, viewed 19th March 2005, http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9710a.html

Nielson, J. (1999) The Top 10 New Mistakes of Web Design, useit.com, viewed 26th March, 2005, http://www.useit.com/alertbox/990530.html

Paul, C. (2000) When Web pages don’t work, IBM, viewed 15th March 2005, http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/library/web-work.html

Place page elements carefully, (1998) Good Documents.com, viewed 22nd March 2005, http://www.gooddocuments.com/techniques/pageelements_m.htm

To Blog to Not to Blog, first viewed 13th March 2005, http://www.blight.com/~mick/Weblog/archive/2005_03_01_archive.html

Wallace, N. (1999) Web Writing for Many Interest Levels, E-gineer, viewed 21st March 2005, http://www.e-gineer.com/articles/web-writing-for-many-interest-levels.phtml

Williams, R. Good Design Features, viewed 24th March 2005, http://www.ratz.com/featuresgood.html

Further Reading

Berners-Lee, T. (1992) How big to make each document, W3- World Wide Web Consortium, viewed 29th March 2005, http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/?DocSize/html

Garcia, M. (2002) ‘Dealing With Volume in News Design’ Poynter Online, viewed 26th March 2005, http://poynteronline.org/column.asp?id=33&aid=3299

Kaplan, N. (1995) ‘E-literacies’ Computer- Mediated Communication Magazine, Vol 2, No. 3

Maquarie Encyclopedic Dictionary (1990) Maquarie Library Pty Ltd, NSW Australia

Vaughan, T. (1998) Multimedia, Making it Work, Osborne- McGraw Hill Publishers, Berkeley

Navigation

“You can have the best looking site out there, but if users can’t navigate it, they won’t come back” (Paul, 2000). As this quote suggests, good navigation is an essential part of any weblog or website. Navigation is the basic movement in and around a computer website and should function to guide a user without needing to provide instructions.

Both the ‘American Soldier’ and the ‘To Blog or not to Blog’ weblog have a basic, consistent and fully functioning navigating system. None of these blogs have an index or site map but this is thought to be useful only on large websites (Wallace) and in this case, does not disadvantage the user.

Hyperlinks to other sites with supporting information increase the credibility of web pages (Sun Microsystems, 1994-2002). For example, information and issues discussed in the ‘To Blog or not to Blog’ weblog has been accurately supported using weblinks (to places such as the Parramatta Eels website, news articles and other websites) which the user can click on in order to be navigated directly to the relevant website. However, unlike the ‘American Soldier’ weblog, this site does not open a new window for these links. Although the user can use the ‘back’ button to go back, I believe this is something which may result in the loss of users to the original site. Supporting this is Nielson’s statement that “Designers open new browser windows on the theory that it keeps users on their site” (1999). However Nielson himself believes it’s more of an annoyance and says “Don’t pollute my screen with any more windows. If I want a new window, I will open it myself” (Nielson, 1999).

Both blogs (although there are only a few featured on the blog of the American Soldier) contain hyperlinks (links to other websites) which are underlined to ensure they are clear to the user. As both weblogs display and as Paul (2000) says “Users should be able to easily tell what a link is and what is not. They should be able to hit the Back button and get the expected behaviour of returning to the page they just left. When they click something, they should receive some sort of feedback”.

As users can enter a site at any page and move between pages as they chose, it is necessary that each page is independent (Sun Microsystems, 1994-2002) and has a title and links to the home of the original site. Both weblogs do have independent pages which do not rely on other pages for explanation, however I believe the ‘American Soldier’ is more successful in doing so as this weblog is generally more clearly organised and presented.

Because there is such a large amount of text on each weblog, both designers have taken advantage of scrolling, where the user can move the text up and down with relative ease and efficiency. However, like Good Documents.com suggest (1998) neither weblog kept important information (such as ‘profile’, ‘archive’ and ‘contact’ sections of the page) in view. “Information that a reader needs no matter where they are in their reading should always be visible” (Good Documents.com, 1998).

Online Writing

Computer screens need layouts that are different than paper (Good Documents.com, 1998) consequently writing for online and writing for a printed publication is significantly different.

The web is an informal and immediate medium, compared to print, so users appreciate a somewhat informal writing style and small amounts of humour (Sun Microsystems, 1994-2002). The ‘To Blog or not to Blog’ weblog is a fantastic example of this. Mick uses a lot of humour to get his point across to his audience and he also utilises a casual and informal style of writing to make it easier to read. Although the ‘American Soldier’ does not use much humour (as the subject of this weblog is more serious), he does use simple sentence structures as “…Convoluted writing and complex words are hard to understand” (Sun Microsystems, 1994-2002).

Content

The content of each weblog is significantly different as already discussed in posting titled ‘Audience’. Both weblogs however have archives of old and previous postings. “Old information is often good information and can be useful to readers. Even when new information is more valuable than old information, there is almost always some value to the old stuff and it is very cheap to keep it online” (Nielson, 1999).

The web is a fluid medium and pages should be updated as time goes by to reflect all changes (Sun Microsystems, 1994-2002). Both weblogs are updated on a daily (if not every couple of days) to keep up with current events and detail their latest news.

I think both weblogs are successful for the reasons that they have rich content, are appropriate for the target audience and are easy to explore. However I agree with Gahran (2000) that a “…fluffy, poor or off-target content prevents the site from achieving its core goals”.

Despite the content of each weblog being so different and despite the casual conversational type language used in the ‘To Blog or not to Blog’ both have used correct spelling and grammar (a must for any publication!).

Audience

Creating information that meets an audience involves a process of development. According to December (1993), this process includes creating, drafting, testing and revising the message so that it meets the audience needs. However, I think it is necessary first, to briefly discuss the context of this information exchange. In this case, the context is the medium (that being the World Wide Web). The delivery medium is a computer screen and therefore the audience at any one time and location, is likely to be an individual or (in some cases) a small group of people.

The ‘American Soldier’ attracts people interested in war, army, discipline, America, Iraq and anyone who is interested in current affairs in general. It also has a wide audience of friends and families who may know someone fighting in the war in Iraq (therefore, there may be a significant and important relationship between the writer and the audience). The ‘American Soldier’ weblog not only provides details of battle (and training) and day to day workings of army life, but also includes the emotional and mental struggles and achievements that a soldier endures. I suspect that this website would appeal to a wider audience than the “To blog or not to blog’ weblog. The site meter (correct as of 30th March 2005, The American Soldier) reveals that 141326 people have visited the ‘American Soldier’ weblog.

In comparison, the blog “To Blog or not to Blog’ has a different and not so specific audience. There are a range of issues discussed by Mick, (the host of the blog) such as the weather, his family, the Terry Schiavo case, music, cricket and football culture, the Danish Royals and abortion. Since there is such a vast range of topics discussed on this weblog, I personally believe it is harder to pinpoint an exact audience. However I assume the audience would be young, mostly male, have an interest in current affairs, enjoy music and sport and would possibly have a family of their own. There have been 6719 people to visit this site (correct as of 30th March 2005, To Blog or not to Blog) so although the amount of people to visit this site aren’t as great as those who have visited the ‘American Soldier’ weblog, it reveals that they both have a significant number of people interested in their weblogs.

An important element of the ‘To Blog or not to Blog’ weblog was the presence of a photo of Mick. According to Nielson (1999) “Users want to know the people behind information on the internet”. Nielson also believes that photos of web authors help to make the web a less impersonal place and therefore build an author- audience relationship and increase trust. “Personality and point- of- view often wins over anonymous bits coming over the wire” (Nielson, 1999). For reasons of security the author of the ‘American Soldier’ weblog can not be revealed, however there is an ‘About’ page were users can learn more about the American Soldier (without knowing personal details).

(There is also the capability to add a photo of my own to this Document Design & Publication Weblog, however I was unable to figure out how this function works, so I apologise!!!)

One thing that each of the weblogs have in common is that the aim of each of the weblog hosts was to create a message that matches a given purpose, audience and medium (December, 1993) and I believe both have achieved this goal. Both weblogs represent an investment of time, money and other resources which are invested in the hope of informing their audiences, developing or supporting relationships and sharing resources (Gahran, 2000).

Design/ Layout

There are many types of publications; fact sheets, magazines, reports, bulletins, websites, newspapers, case studies, books, journals and newsletters (Engst, 2000). But no matter the type of publication, most of these follow similar design and layout guidelines. However for this assignment, I’ll be making specific reference to a weblog as the type of publication.

Kurzel states that “…a busy screen cramped with many elements presents an immediate distraction and makes text difficult to read” so keeping this in mind; simplicity appears to be the key in the successful layout or design of a webpage or weblog. Both the ‘American Soldier’ and the ‘To Blog or not to Blog’ weblogs have both employed a range of visual techniques to shape information. According to December (1993) these techniques include unity, balance, proportion, emphasis and sequence.

The ‘American Soldier’ weblog has carefully used a couple of fonts, ensuring that the fonts don’t distract the user from the content of the weblog. Proving this theory is Kurzel (2003) who recommends that utilising too many fonts on the one page can be distracting and often results in bad design (the industry name given specifically to this bad design technique is ‘ransom note typography’). Where differentiation between text was needed, the designer of the weblog used two different fonts (one for all of the headings and another for the text in the body of each posting). To ensure consistency, this pattern has been employed throughout every post and in the ‘Main” ‘About’, ‘Archive’ and ‘Contact’ sections of the weblog.

Similarly the “To Blog or not to Blog’ weblog has employed a san serif (without tails) font. Traditionally, for printed publications serif fonts (with tails) are used as they guide the reader’s eye along the line of text. However by looking at both blogs, it is easy to see why sans serif (without tails) fonts work, as they are far more legible (especially when used in small text fields on screen (Kurzel, 2003).

Kurzel suggests that “When you need variation or accentuation of information, vary the weight and size of the type” (2003) and this is what the producer of ‘To Blog or not to Blog’ weblog has done. I believe this website could be improved by keeping the font identical in the body of each blog. There is one post detailing the categories of the Parramatta Eels fans (dated Tuesday 29th march 2005) which has used a different font which makes the weblog appear crowded. There is an element of consistency however, in the use of colour throughout the weblog and through the placement and alignment of text (Kurzel, 2003) which is pleasing on the eye.

Another element of design and layout of a publication (with online publications being no exception) is white space. The term ‘white space’ is one which designers use to describe roomy blank areas in between focal elements of a document (Kurzel, 2003) and is an element which stops cluttering on the screen. White space has effectively been used in the blog ‘American Soldier’ as it helps to highlight each posting’s heading. However the use of white space in the ‘To Blog or not to Blog’ weblog is probably less effective as there is a significant amount of line spacing which detracts from the areas of white space.

Consistent on both weblogs is the hierarchy of information (Williams). Each blog displays the most recent posting at the top of the page and lists postings in date order in the archives. Another important design technique which is evident and consistent on each blog is the use of a design grid. “When taking into consideration aspects of design such as proportion, balance and consistency- a design grid is often employed as a way of setting up consistent design between screens and sections on a website” (Kurzel, 2003). For example, when you select the ‘About’ screen on the ‘American Soldier’ weblog, the only thing to change is the content in the main body of the page

Introduction

With reference to two weblogs (the URL’s for these weblogs are featured in the last posting), I plan to discuss issues of design/ layout, online writing, audience, content and navigation. However, to make the most of the blog software, I will present my discussion in several weblog postings to enhance the standpoint I have taken.

Found: Two blogs to critique for DDP Assignment 1!

I've conducted some research on Google.com and have discovered two weblogs.

The first is called "To Blog or not to Blog" and is written by a young Australian man living in Canberra named Mick. His postings reflect his personal life (including his wife and children, music interests, pet hates and less important postings, such as one which discusses the miserable weather in Canberra).
This blog can be found here: http://www.blight.com/~mick/Weblog/toblogornottoblog.html

The second blog I discovered details the life of an American Soldier fighting in the War in Iraq. The name of this blogger has been kept annonymous to ensure that This weblog delves into the daily happenings and stresses of the job and the emotions which accompany his work. The following is a link to this blog: http://www.soldierlife.com/index.php

I plan to critique these two blogs for my first DDP assignment.

Welcome to my DDP Blog!

Blogging is a new experience for me, so firstly I'm planning to play around and familiarise myself with the software to gain confidence in making and editing my profile and (more importantly) posting some responses.

In the next few days I will be analysing two other blog sites and posting my responses on this blog site. Using the Google search engine, I have been able to locate some very interesting blogs, however I'm yet to decide on the two I will be critiquing for assessment!