PORTFOLIO 05/29/2010
 
I have decided to make a portfolio website. This way I can work on a website and I can also have a try creating a platform to launch my own artwork. I really admire simple clean portfolios and I think it should just have a sample taste of what my work is about, even if it is ambiguous or limited in what there is to offer. I would be treating it like a digital business card where I can lead people to see a quick glimpse of what I am about and contact details. 

 
www 03/21/2010
 
I have been looking at so many sites and paying attention to many things I have never really noticed. I really like the superbad website. This is something similar to what I would like to create.
 
text 03/15/2010
 
I really enjoyed working with the text based website building..working through the html dog instructions was fun but was limited with the creative side...which is where css comes in. 
 
bit boring... 03/14/2010
 
Even though this blog looks a bit boring I feel it's what sets it apart from others as they mostly seem to be over the top. I can add youtube and design the entire layout...complete control.
 
Web design 03/09/2010
 
I am happy with this blog service as the terms and conditions are ideal for my situation. I own everything I put on here and I am extremely flexible with the design to "make it my own".
 
Bubblecam!!!! 03/06/2010
 
Here is a link to the Garden Bubble Cam. This was one of my first (and favourite) experiences with a web cam/web site back in roughly 2000. You can remotely activate bubbles in Florida!

This interaction via a webpage is something I haven't really seen since, but I would like to. 


http://www.andieandmike.org/bubblecam-push.stm

 
 
1. 
I remember getting (very) excited over GIFS...

2. 
I always liked the websites with the 'return to top' option at the bottom of a page.

3.
Innocence has been lost. Everyone is so damn opinionated now. The option to comment is a good thing but usually people can be so incredibly horrible. 

4. 
I can't stand pages that take more than 10 seconds to load.

5.
I wish there was more simplicity in regards to web design. There seems to have never been a stage of simple web design. Back in the day everything was garish and clunky and bad graphics with too much text and advertising. Now it seems we still want to overload each page with too much information and imagery. 


 
 
I visited a website to see the timeline of the internet. Here it is http://www.designtimeline.org. It has been super helpful for the brainstorming of my experience with the net over time. There are hundreds of questions that help kick-start the brain to salivate and digest the infinite world of the WWW.
Here are some of the questions (and my answers) that popped out at me...

DO YOU REMEMBER YOUR FIRST EXPERIENCE WITH THE INTERNET?

I can't really remember my first website but I do remember challenging the search engine by typing in numerous words and topics of interest to see if it returned results. It always did. I loved to ask Jeeves questions (askjeeves.com). I ended up being a huge fan of pointless trivia.  Rotten.com was a huge part of the internet shock culture. I was truly disgusted and in love with this site. For me the internet was simply a way of seeing/hearing things I could not find anywhere else. 



WHAT DID YOU INITIALLY USE THE INTERNET FOR?
I found plenty of independent bands and artists that could promote themselves. A lot of the band sites were run by fans and not by companies, creating a more down to earth feel. Art and music were the main areas of interest.


WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST BROWSER YOU USED?
Netscape
WHEN DID YOU GET YOUR FIRST EMAIL ACCOUNT?
I have had my Hotmail account address since I was 16 (2000AD). I recently received an email from Hotmail saying a big thank you and congratulations for having the same address for 10 years. This seems to be a strange phenomena in this day of extremely disposable email addresses. 


HAVE YOU EVER USED A CHAT PROGRAM ONLINE? 
My internet communication has changed dramatically over the years. I started using the chat program ICQ and went through a couple more that never really lasted. I didn't know anyone who was using chat
programs so everyone I 'met' was a random person from all over the world. 

Skipping ahead a decade, nearly everyone I have met 
is on some form of a chat program i.e MySpace, Facebook. I don't like Facebook for almost all reasons, except everyone happens to be on it. The internet (Facebook especially) has been a device for me to use to contact my family in Italy.  I can share photos and words in a virtually free real-time environment. My Grandfather, cousins, uncles and aunties have all been in contact with me and I have been able to use the online translators so there is absolutely no communication barrier. I can see the communication aspect via the web perhaps becoming more personal.
 
 
I have been fiddling with this blog site and I am happy to say that so far so good! No advertising, I still own everything I put on here and I'm guessing that it will stick around (unless it wants to let down 3 million people). I can also do extreme customisation using html and css, plus I can do a more basic custom job by being able to place images and text where I want and generally create my own layout. I have chosen the latter for now until I am more comfortable with html. 
The last class we had (week 2) included a bit of html history and subsequently doing a basic tutorial coding with html. Messing around with the basics was fun so I'm looking forward to extending what I learnt a little further, and eventually applying it here. 
 
 
So, after much necessary filtering through blogs and their options with a fine-tooth nit comb (and discarding almost 20 possibilities), I think this one could be a winner!