Feb 08 2010
Apologies for the break in posts recently — server issues were experienced left, right and yes, even centre too.
However, I’m back now so it’s all back to normal.
…Or, at least as normal as one can expect ’round these here parts.
Feb 04 2010
We had a minor hiccup yesterday, which resulted in me not being able to access this blog from home. Something about servers being unavailable. I probably upset some internal server elves at some point.
Today, this has been rectified, and normal service shall resume in the regular time-slot tomorrow.
Dec 22 2009
Apologies for the drop in programming this afternoon. I tried to update WordPress to 2.9 and next thing I knew, I couldn’t reach my blog. Or Mum’s blog, or indeed John’s (*tumbleweed blows by*) blog.
The man himself was asleep when I fubared the server, so I went off and watched the 3rd episode of Glee (my new love). John got up about an hour ago and fixed it though :-)
Normal programming back now!
Nov 27 2009
I’d like to share with you a couple of invaluable tools that I use in the course of my writings.
1. Jazz Biscuit’s CC Search
link
Jazz Biscuit is a site that searches Flickr’s (one the biggest image hosting websites out there) CC photos. CC stands for Creative Commons, and refers to photos that the author has allowed to be used elsewhere, sometimes with strings. The most common are that you have to link back to them (the original author, which Jazz Biscuit does automagically) and that you can’t sell the images.
It’s by far the easiest image website out there – working on what I call the simple ‘press button, receive stuff’ concept (based on this) – there’s no registration involved no nothing.
The only downside is that it only searches though posts people have tagged – which leads to two problems: firstly, people who are lazy and don’t tag their photos or add any CC license don’t get their pictures noticed. Secondly, people who abuse the tagging feature – either by applying tags of no relevance to their photo to gain views or by the more innocent simply uploading 80 photographs of the same event with the same tags screw up the search process.
2. SXC.hu – Stock Photography
link
This is a stock imagery site, so the photos are all staged, but in some ways that’s good. It’s a bit of a fail though because you need to register. The process is relatively pain-free though, and the benefits once you do are quite nice. SXC differs also from Jazz Biscuit because all the images are much bigger – usually about 2 MBs; and a lot larger in size: 3000px photos are the norm over there.
Both are very good sites which I use regularly, and would highly recommend :)
Nov 15 2009
I was going to start off this post by saying how much I loved it, but that’d be kind of redundant, wouldn’t it? I mean, you’re reading this, aren’t you? If I didn’t then I’ve wasted a lot of my time writing this blog, haven’t I?
It would seem like the natural step forward, then, to want to write a novel. I could never do that though. I look at some of the books I read and marvel about how much detail goes into every single book, and it overwhelms me. I can manage basic plots but the depth at which some authors bring to their characters is, being honest, a little scary. I was never able to describe any of my characters past their superficial hopes, dreams and failings.
That’s why, I think, I went for blogging: I can write about a given subject one day, and once I finish talking about it – I leave it go and the next time I come back to write, I can think about something completely different, which is nice. My attention span for these sorts of things is a little bit lackluster, so this ‘love and leave’ blog thing I’ve got going really does suit me down to the ground.
One of my (many) aspirations in life, however, is to write a book. I think that a book is a wonderful imprint of the author, even if it’s fiction. Especially if it’s fiction, in fact. When I read a book, I want to be told a story. Good storytelling is hard to come by these days. Books, I believe, should be as easy as films to follow. Any less than that and I just get restless.
Does that mean that films that are based on books (for example: Harry Potter, Twilight, Lord of the Rings) should simply be the book on screen? No. Take the Harry Potter movies for example. I think I speak for the majority of people when I say that the Potter movies got better as they went on (disclaimer; I haven’t seen the 6th one) – but that was because the first and second were very true to the book- at the expense that they were only average movies. I think the new directors have realized this, and the later movies have steered away from the books, but are better stand-alone movies because of it. The best description of the later movies comes from my cousin:
“They’re grand movies if you don’t compare them to the books. They stand alone fine”
What do we think? Bear in mind I’m using Harry Potter only as an example.
Oct 24 2009
10,000 tweets
100,000 page loads.
I’m planning a get-together in Dublin to celebrate these, more details as they emerge.
Oct 08 2009
Regular readers of this blog will notice that some of the images that I use on the blog are of much higher quality than anything a year-old iPhone’s able to come out with, and of particular scenes that I probably wouldn’t come across in my daily life.
The images, marked with a “Photo owned by
In a nutshell, the people who took these images have released them under a license – more often than not, it means you can use these images so long as you don’t profit from them and you attribute them properly (that’s the “Photo owned by
In my work for Irish Student Blogs (I’ll shut up about it soon, I swear!) I discovered a new website/tool for bloggers who want good, high-quality images to use on their website.
Enter, stage right, SXC. This requires a bit more work, and also requires you to sign up but I believe it worth it. Entering in a search term (my most recent one was ’studying’) will bring you a huge list of incredibly large. (Some of them are 4000px by 3000px. For non-tech folks, that’s absolutely massive!) You can search without logging in, but to download the high resolution version of the image, you’ll need to be a member. You download the image to your desktop and then upload it through Flickr or Wordpress and insert it into your post. It’d be nice to add a small note somewhere, maybe in the description, that you got the image from Jazz Biscuit or SXC. A simple ‘gotten from JB’ will do.
As I’ve been asked so much about where I get the images I insert into my post, I thought I’d answer all your questions about it and write a big long post about it. I’d really recommend the two websites because images are so crucial to blogs.
However, one word of advice, especially for personal bloggers: don’t make every image some stock photo from Jazz Biscuit or SXC.. people read personal blogs because they connect with the author. Adding your own images helps them connect with you :)
Sep 15 2009
I’ve talked about this point before, so I’ll be concise. It’s how people who write personal blogs have an onus placed on them to lead interesting lives. Unfortunately, this isn’t always possible. Like, sure, there are somedays where I get off my ass and do stuff, like go to the zoo, which is great. Then, on the 364 days, I’m back on my ass.
There are a lot of people I’m friends who I know would make fantastic bloggers. They’d also make fantastic debaters because me bringing up the suggestion of them blogging leads to a powerful argument about how they lead boring lives: I got up, I went to school, I came home, did my homework, watched TV, ate dinner and went to bed.
That’s their average day but.. is mine all that different? We don’t currently have a working TV but apart from that I’m not thaaaaat unusual. I (apparently have crap tastes in music but at least I don’t like Kanye!). 5 days a week, school is a big part of my day too. The weekend is where all the fun zoo trips happen.
So how do personal bloggers combat boring days and find something to write about?
- Talk about something really small and expand it to blogpost length – example
- Go do something worthy of writing about – example
- Write about a memory – example is on thursday, in a scheduled post, because I’m at a wedding.
- Write a short story or poem. If you’re musically inclined, play some notes on your instrument and stick them online – example
- Confess your crap music tastes – example
- Do a video – example
- Do a meta post about writer’s block – example? erm, this post :D
Sep 13 2009
One of the things that people seem shocked at when I talk to them about blogging is the sheer fact that I report so intimately on what’s happening on my life. It’s so public! they cry. They say the same about Twitter – but that’s usually more about every day things, like gastro-tweeting what I have for dinner some nights. Why would you be telling them what you had for dinner?, they exclaim. Yeah, you now know what I had for dinner that night, but that’s not hugely important information. It’s not like it’s my political views are on show
Oh wait, Facebook lets the cat out of the bag.
But just how personal is personal?
Okay, on the one hand, you know that I was at the zoo last Saturday, or that I’ll be at a wedding on Thursday – I’d have no problem saying something like that. Is there a problem with that? It’s not embarrassing for me, the zoo isn’t some.. I dunno, gentleman’s interest club (or if it is, I missed it) so it’s not like the zoo is something you wouldn’t want your wife to know about.
You might notice that I never really go into some details about school. Yes, I had double Business on Friday, but what’d did I do at break? I intentionally never talk about my friends and, no, that isn’t because I have none, which has been suggested, but merely because they mightn’t be as comfortable to be mentioned on the web, and that’s fine.
The secret to a good personal blog is knowing what’s personal, yet not too personal
People connect with personal blogs more than other blogs, so they don’t read them to find out what the sea forecast is for Sligo – they’re interested in the life of the author.
But, we know readers are hungry people whose quest for knowledge is rarely satisfied, so you have to find a balance.
I’m currently reading Without You by Anthony Rapp, an autobiography of an American stage actor. It carries the message that “some names and identifying characteristics have been changed”. See, that’s how to do it. You write something personal, but change it so that people who’d know the event are protected from identification. Now, I’m reading it 3 years after the book’s published, and often about 10 years since the events described therein actually happened. Is my reading experience tarnished by the guy being Frank instead of Kevin, or him having blonde hair instead of black? Not at all.
It’s when you start talking about real world relationships without putting some shroud of anonymity over it that things start to get sticky.
So, yes. I fully condone the changing of names to protect identities. In fact, I recommend the practice wholeheartedly.
Oh dear, you got another piece of personal info out of me!
Sep 11 2009
The scare of this morning is over.
I woke up this morning and found a post of an unsuitable nature for this blog. Basically, something you wouldn’t want your mother/employer to see. It was stickied at the top of the blog, had no comment field and didn’t show up in my list of posts, and once I reloaded the page, the post was gone.
As it transpired, it was only John and Patrick having a laugh. Thanks guys. I really don’t have enough panic attacks at 07:28 in the morning.
Normal service….
