The Start of Something New

𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘵 #2

Starting a new project is always the hardest part. I find that my biggest problem is finding where to begin.

When starting “in my kaizen”, my dilemma stood between what I wanted people to know, what should be kept offline, and the concept of my blog. I have always wanted to put myself out on the internet but there are several things that hold me back.

Firstly, I’m an in-person person. That is, I rather embarrass myself and express my true self in person than send an embarrassing message that you can, at any point in time, go back and laugh at me. This is the result of living through a pandemic where all social interactions were limited to just your household for quite some time.

Secondly, a part of me enjoys the secrecy that comes with being offline. Since most people are online and posting a lot of their daily life, I grew fond of the potential curiosity that comes with being offline.

But ultimately, I wanted to have the concept of my blog make sense to the content it contains and vice versa. And so, I created a list of possible topics I wanted my blog to talk about and a vision board, comprising of images in a certain aesthetic I want my blog to present as well or be associated with.

I then spent time working out the technicals, like pages and categories. It was quite confusing at first but with the help of some google searches, youtube videos, and simply just playing around, I end up figuring it out. However, there are certain changes I want to make that I currently do not if it’s possible. I’m continuing to look into achieving these changes, ultimately making it a site that can be easily navigated.

Strangers In Real Life vs. Strangers Online

𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘵 #1

Strangers were once a type of person I was told to avoid. But it then developed into a task we are encouraged to do on a daily with guides such as, “How to Talk to Strangers IRL” outlining different methods like triangulating to conquer the barrier that lies in between you and someone you do not know to hopefully gain a new connection. However, I have always been a little hesitant to interact with a stranger. A part of the reason is the paranoia that stems from the stories my parents told me for educational purposes when I was a little kid, the news, and recollections of strange or spooky programs that would air when my sister had nothing else to watch on television late at night. Another part is the possible awkward interaction that might occur. Where it feels as though you missed the social cue that they did not want to be spoken with, resulting in a sense of embarrassment. Ironically, I didn’t feel as scared online, especially in the past. Maybe this was because of the lack of education surrounding the internet and internet safety, the ability to conceal oneself identity, or just the inherent nature of technology. Regardless of the reasoning, I was more likely to reach out to a stranger via online than in real life. That is, it seems a lot easier and I preferred it that way, or so I thought.

During the midst of the pandemic, my preference of interacting with strangers online or in real life was put to the test. As the virus began to spread and limitations were slowly being enforced, online interactions with friends and strangers was all we had as in-person interactions was seen as a forbidden activity for a little while. In the beginning, I loved it. It felt like it was just what I needed, a break from the world. However as time went on, it became something I missed. It became a foreign feeling that I frequently tried to remember the feeling of. As a result of experiencing the limitations imposed on us, even if I’m hesitant and a little fearful of approaching a stranger in real life, I prefer to go through the awkwardness in-person than to avoid that tension and talk through a screen.

I’ve learned that if you do not make the situation awkward, then it won’t be awkward. And I live by that. Or at least just let me think so. Thus, I approached the person next to me in the lecture with a little hesitation. As expected, it went well. Maybe it was a little easier because we both can talk about something class related as a topic of conversation versus a complete stranger where you have to find a shared interest or experience through a multitude of various questions. But if this was an online class, I can’t deny that I would have no hesitation in sending a message to another person in class. And so, I guess you can call me an introverted extrovert? Or maybe someone who sucks at talking to new people?

Process Post 11: Alan’s Radio Station

For this week’s post we will be looking at a plan to incorporate more transmedia into my online publication.  Transmedia is basically other forms of media that can integrate into your current online publications. For example, the “Pokemon as transmedia storytelling” says it the best, where you can “watch… it on TV, playing the games on your Gameboy Color, collecting hundreds of trading cards, and decorating your room with Pokemon toys and bedspreads” (Kevinbrittenylauren, 2013). Basically, transmedia refers to multiple different types of mediums, such as being able to exist on both the radio and television. 

For me personally, if I were to ever do blogging as something I would take seriously, I would explore integrating transmedia in the form of a podcast. The reason why I would choose a podcast is because I think my content best translates to this form of media. It also does not compromise the integrity or ideas of my posts in any way.

One more thing of note is that I personally enjoy talking, so I think I am able to tell captivating stories that are better than reading text on a screen.

Podcasts can be then uploaded to various digital platforms, such as Spotify or the Podcasts app on all Apple devices. This increases the reach of my content as I can spread it to platforms other than my website. Furthermore, podcasts are very low intensity, and allow me to create engaging content without too much additional work.

It also has other benefits, such as engaging all audiences, whether they can read my content or not. For example, if you can read and see, you would be able to listen to my podcast and get my perspective with all my expressions, something that cannot be easily expressed through text. However, if you cannot see, then you can hear what the writer intended, as it is coming straight from them. Basically, while it provides an accessibility component, it can also be used for adding another layer even for audiences that can read and comprehend the blogs.

All in all, podcasts are a very convenient way to increase my reach, while adding another dimension to all readers while keeping the integrity of the content that I originally posted. 

References:

Kevinbrittenylauren.wordpress.com. 2013. “Pokemon as transmedia storytelling“

Process Post #12: Community Guidelines

For process post #12 we will be looking at developing community guidelines that are suitable for my site. Community guidelines are very important to protecting all users of the internet no matter who you are. This is especially important on the internet as there is no way to verify if a person is who they really say they are on the internet. For example, I could make a Twitter profile saying that I am Mr. Beast, a famous Youtuber and some might believe it. As a site owner I have the responsibility to protect all users that may comment or interact with my website, or else I could be held accountable legally. This ranges from “Internet trolls … [which] … are doing it for the “lulz,” or laughs” to “harassment … [and] violent threats” (Stein, 2016). 

As this is process post #12, I will hash out 12 rules that all users will have to follow in which I believe protect them the best.

  1. All users must register with an account before posting
  2. Prevents random spammers and bots, especially with reCAPTCHA
  3. No files may be uploaded
  4. Prevents viruses from being spread
  5. All posts must be verified by a moderator before posting
  6. Ensures that nothing slips through the cracks
  7. Word limit will be imposed
  8. Ensures that trolls cannot spam
  9. Suspicious activity will be flagged with a plugin, then reviewed.
  10. Ensures that there is always a watchful eye
  11. Users must be respectful
  12. Ensures that everyone is respectful
  13. Users must not use inappropriate or offensive language
  14. Makes it appropriate for all audiences.
  15. Out of control discussions will result in a mute/ban
  16. Ensures that no conversations cause too much controversy
  17. No copyrighted content may be posted
  18. Protects me legally and ensures that I cannot be legally responsible.
  19. All conversations must be lawful
  20. Same as point #9
  21. False or misleading information will result in a fact check and/or removal from the comments if it is fake.
  22. Ensures that my website is not a source of misinformation
  23. Have fun, this is a place for constructive criticism and discussion, please do not take everything seriously. 
  24. Keeps everything casual and fun

All these rules are designed to ensure that everyone can participate without being bombarded with misinformation or trolls. The Guardian’s article also influenced some of these rules, as they found that “The vast majority of blocked comments, therefore, were blocked because they were considered abusive to some degree, or were otherwise disruptive to the conversation (they were off-topic, for example)” (Gardiner et al., 2016). This is why I included things like the out-of-control discussion clause, because if someone is actively trying to pull people away from the conversation, how can people properly create constructive criticism? Coming up with these community guidelines has taught me that running a platform which involves social discussion is a lot more complicated than originally thought. People are just complicated creatures, and especially when social manners are involved, as you cannot guess most people’s next actions. 

References:

Adventure #12: Walking The Edge Of Glory

Summary / Quick Breakdown 🏃‍♂️ :

Rating: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ 

Location 📌:  290 Bremner Blvd, Toronto, ON M5V 3L9

Good 👍 : Truly breathtaking views on one of the tallest buildings in the world

Bad 👎 : Very expensive

Price 💰 : $$$$

For my final adventure I would like to talk about one of the most recognizable buildings in the Toronto skyline. It is 356M tall and frequently pierces through the clouds above the city. 

It is called CN Tower and is home to many different tourist attractions with breathtaking and stunning views. 

Wide shot of CN Tower looking up
CN Tower

Personally, I visited the tower to try out their EdgeWalk, which is an experience where you walk around the outside of CN on a harness. For the $200 it includes your EdgeWalk, some photos, and tickets to go back up CN Tower on the inside.

The process to do your EdgeWalk is signing a waiver, going to get dressed, get metal detected to make sure you have nothing that might fall out, and then double check again before getting attached to the system. 

After being attached they check you again before you head out, and because of all these checks I never felt unsafe that anything could break. 

When you head out onto the platform for the first time, you are truly in awe, simply because of how high up you are, and how breathtaking the view is. The guide then guides you around the platform doing simple maneuvers like leaning over Toronto or leaning backwards over Toronto. 

Wide shot of Alan leaning backwards over CN Tower Edge
Leaning Back 🙂

When you come back in and successfully complete the challenge, you get a certificate, some photos, and a pass to come back another time. 

I personally purchased all the photos as I am not sure if I would be able to do this more than once in my lifetime. Although I am pretty sure that the answer is yes, it is still a good memory for not too much extra money. Furthermore, I think just like the ZipLine in one of my past adventures, going back to it too often would make it boring and monotonous. 

All in all, this breathtaking adventure is definitely a site to see at any cost and especially if you are not afraid of heights. It is a one-of-a-kind experience that you will never forget and not available anywhere else in the world. 

Reflection on The Site

This is the last process posts for this class and I think it is a good idea to a quick reflection and the things I have learned along the way.

This site has been on so many ups and downs as a reflection of my semester. With no time, I struggled to find ways in displaying my contents online. I found it hilarious that the site is about me being a design student, and it took me almost until the end of the semester to work on the visual design of the site. My defense is how busy I had been. Currently, I would say that the blog is fairly close to the vision I had at the beginning. With the images and content, they portray who I am as an individual online fairly well. I wish I could have more time to work on the public posts, showing my creativity in podcast and videos. I can work on it after this class.

From this class, I am more thoughtful about the content I posted online and the relationship I have with my audience. Also, I make me think about the potential my posts could make to my audience. I hope I could use this knowledge more on my YouTube channel, since I’m going to start working on it again next year.

Hamilton, The Musical, Victoria Palace Theatre, London, UK- a photo gallery

While many people are great fans of the many versions of Hamilton, London is known to be the home of many excellent, theatres, actors, and overall a very large world of musical theatre. 

My Final Post

[Original Post Date: 12/6/22]

Well, this will be my final post of the semester. So I wanted to take this time and reflect on how much I’ve grown as a person over the last couple of months.

I originally set out when making this blog site to become more confident when sharing my art pieces out to the public, outside of my immediate circle of friends or family. Looking back now, I never really understood why I was so scared to share my art pieces in the first place. Maybe the process was something unfamiliar to me. Maybe I was afraid that people would judge too harshly. Or maybe it was simply that I didn’t want to. Whatever the case may be, making this blog site and posting my art pieces was definitely something out of my comfort zone and has helped me grown as a person and as an artist. And, miracoulsly, made me realize that sharing my art wasn’t as scary as I intially thought it would be.

So I wanted to give a huge shout out to Suzanne Norman and Lauren Jeanneau, the teaching team behind this course. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to step outside of my comfort zone and explore something entirely new to me. I’ve always been meaning to share my art pieces out into the world but I’ve been hesitant for unknown reasons. Thinking back at the start of the semester, it’s kinda silly to me that I was so hesitant and unwilling to share my art. But it’s also quite incredible how much I’ve grown in confidence within the span of a couple of months. The people that conducted a peer review on my blog site commented on how all of the art pieces were all really well done. Those small comments gave me a huge confidence boost in my abilities as an artist.

To everyone reading this post, thank you. Even if you stopped by just to view one post, that small act means a lot to me. If I ever make it as a successful illustrator (let’s be honest, probably not. But maybe? Unless?), I will remember this as being a huge stepping stone for me. Perhaps I will continue to post here throughout the coming months. Or perhaps I will just look at this site to remind myself how much I’ve grown during these couple of months, or how much I’ve grown by the time I’m revisitng this site.

And so, a new chapter begins for everyone. And I wish you all good luck on your next ventures, whatever they may be.

Thank you to everyone. Exist in peace.

Goodbye. Now, leave.

Establishing Community Guidelines

[Original Post Date: 11/29/22]

I believe community guidelines are important to establish what type of content is or is not allowed on a site. An example of community guidelines that I have taken inspiration from is YouTube’s set. (link: https://www.youtube.com/intl/ALL_ca/howyoutubeworks/policies/community-guidelines/).

I took inspiration from this site as it had a similar type of content and the main source of interaction between the creator and the viewer was through the commenting system. I took a look through the different sets of community guidelines that YouTube has currently in place. There are three umbrella terms that I would consider adding to my own set of community guidelines; posts that include violent or dangerous content, sensitive topics, and spam.

To me, spam is more likely to occur than comments that contain sensitive topics or violent content as my blog site has not amassed a big enough audience that would lead to someone posting comments. Therefore targeting spam with my own set of community guidelines would make the most sense. I would tackle this by installing plugins that stop bots from commenting on spam in my posts. I would consider using the ‘Block Spam WordPress’ plugin

In terms of tackling comments that include sensitive or violent topics, I would consider the following. If there were to be one or two comments that have been made that include violent and/or sensitive topics, I would manually remove these comments. In the case of there being multiple comments being made throughout multiple posts, I would just disable my comment system.

Transmedia Integration

[Original Post Date: 11/22/22]

Transmedia: where elements of fiction are told through different forms of media (i.e., T.V. shows, movies, books, microsites).

Transmedia can be seen in multiple types of established IPs. Take “The Dark Knight” for example. The Dark Knight utilized transmedia during its marketing schemes leading up to the release of the film. Microsites, which are smaller websites dedicated to advertising a specific product, were created to clue in on key story elements of the film. One of the microsites created was for an electoral campaign for one of the characters within the film named “Harvey Dent” who was running for the position of DA. The microsite showcased a poster with the text “HARVEY DENT FOR DISTRICT ATTORNEY – I BELIEVE IN HARVEY DENT”. This campaign poster was showcased throughout the first act of the film.

HARVEY DENT FOR DISTRICT ATTORNEY. I BELIEVE IN HARVEY DENT
I believe in Harvey Dent Campaign Poster

As the release date of the film was drawing closer, the microsite updated the poster to include a more vandalized version. The left half of Harvey Dent’s face was scribbled with a red marker. A black marker was used to form a crude ‘x’ over Harvey Dent’s left eye, symbolizing that he was half-dead.

This poster foreshadowed what would happen to Harvey Dent and who would cause the harm to turn him into the infamous villain. Two-Face.

"I BELIEVE IN HARVEY DENT" The only sensible way to live in this worl is without rules. FOR DISTRICT ATTORNEY: Paid for by friends of Harvey Dent
Vandalized Version of I believe in Harvey Dent Campaign Poster

How I plan to incorporate transmedia into my blog site is simple. One of the main reasons I created this blog site (outside of the fact that it was required of me to make one for a PUB course) was that it was to be used in a way where I would be comfortable sharing my art pieces with people I don’t really know. Now, I have become a lot more comfortable showcasing my art to the public. Therefore, in the near future, I would create a dedicated account on social media platforms such as Instagram, ArtStation, and Twitter to place all of my art pieces. On these social media pages, I would post pieces that are either ‘work-in-progress’ or fully finished. Within these posts, I would place a link to my blog which would then detail more so of my process for each piece for those that are interested. On my about page on my blog site, I would place links to each of these accounts. I plan to also host exclusive content that would only be available on this blog site in order to incentivize visitors to come to visit.

The Deep Web vs. The Dark Web

[Original Post Date: 11/22/22]

The Deep Web vs the Dark Web. I never really knew that there was a difference between the two. All I knew about them was that they were a part of the internet that cannot be surfaced by regular search engines like Google or Bing. You would have to download a specialized browser that allows you to browse the dark or deep web anonymously.

In the article titled “Clearing Up Confusion – Deep Web vs. Dark Web“, the stated difference between the two different types of the web is that the dark web is a smaller portion of the deep web. The dark web is intentionally hidden due to it containing illicit content that ranges from strange to outright disturbing.

I think what really piqued my interest in the concept of the dark and deep web was from a video game titled “Welcome To The Game” parts one and two. I first heard of this game when one of my favorite YouTubers, Markiplier, did a playthrough of the game. The game revolves around you taking control of your character who is a detective tasked with discovering the location of a woman who has been kidnapped. The goal of the game is to collect these keys that are hidden throughout different websites within the dark web. Welcome to the Game has been described as a very challenging game due to how it mimics realistic scenarios. Your character must ensure that they hide their identity when using the dark web as others can track your location and kill you; game over.

Now, that’s not to say that I would go around snooping the dark web. While I understand that utilizing a specialized browser would help mask my identity and information thus making it relatively safe, if I am not careful, malicious people can track my location or find information about me easily which may lead to dangerous consequences.

Data Trails

[Original Post Date: 11/15/22]

Ever since installing Google Analytics for my blog site, it has been a handy tool to gauge and build my audience. The analytics tool has allowed me to know exactly how each visitor of my site behaves, what time is the most active, and what posts they view the most and I can use all of this information to cater to my content. All of this is possible because of the vast amount of data that users leave behind. Which has got me thinking about how much data I leave behind whenever I visit other websites because I know that it’s collecting a lot of data from me.

Leaving behind pieces of data about you on websites is known as a ‘Data Trail’ or ‘Digital Breadcrumbs’. As described by Dr. Elisa Oregilain in the article “Digital breadcrumbs: the data trail we leave behind us“, digital breadcrumbs are a trace you leave behind where information about you can be stored and dispersed through the internet.

It can be worrisome or stressful for some knowing that their data is being collected wherever they visit parts of the internet.

To be entirely honest, data trails were not something I usually think about on a daily basis as I know all types of data about me are being collected. It’s so ingrained with the process of using any service on the internet that I’d come to just accept it.

I know that whatever service I willingly opt into, there are always going to be some condition within the terms and conditions that states that it would be collecting data to sell it off to some third-party marketing company but since I never bother to read the document, I accept the fact that it’s taking data from me and move on.

So after learning more about data trails, would I be more careful with how I disseminate my data on websites? Probably not. I would probably be warier but I wouldn’t really change how I behave when willingly opt into service on the internet because there’s nothing I can really do to get around corporations stealing my data.