Comments on: Building off of a coral reef – a Whitman blog network http://www.andrewspittle.net/2009/06/10/building-off-of-a-coral-reef-a-whitman-blog-network/ A blog that wanders through journalism, technology, and politics Wed, 03 Mar 2010 03:35:36 -0800 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Daniel Bachhuber http://www.andrewspittle.net/2009/06/10/building-off-of-a-coral-reef-a-whitman-blog-network/comment-page-1/#comment-1061 Daniel Bachhuber Wed, 10 Jun 2009 21:19:35 +0000 http://www.andrewspittle.net/?p=984#comment-1061 Good post, Andrew. I think my thoughts were leaning more towards structured data about the community, but these are good ideas too. Two thoughts for you. One, I think the blog network idea would be really easy to implement with WordPress MU installed on your blogs subdomain. You could then move your Pio blogs to that as well as offer the opportunity for community members to create theirs as well. Joey raises a good question, however, because I haven't a clue what the uptake would be. It might be that a lot of people are interested in writing, or maybe you can't even get one person. It would be very interesting to have professors blog as well. Another idea is something I've been mulling over for quite a while but haven't seen anyone do. What if you were to create an "Alltop" for the campus, or an aggregator that brought in the 5 most recent headlines from every blog on campus? I think there might be value in that. Good post, Andrew. I think my thoughts were leaning more towards structured data about the community, but these are good ideas too. Two thoughts for you. One, I think the blog network idea would be really easy to implement with WordPress MU installed on your blogs subdomain. You could then move your Pio blogs to that as well as offer the opportunity for community members to create theirs as well. Joey raises a good question, however, because I haven’t a clue what the uptake would be. It might be that a lot of people are interested in writing, or maybe you can’t even get one person. It would be very interesting to have professors blog as well.

Another idea is something I’ve been mulling over for quite a while but haven’t seen anyone do. What if you were to create an “Alltop” for the campus, or an aggregator that brought in the 5 most recent headlines from every blog on campus? I think there might be value in that.

]]> By: Andrew http://www.andrewspittle.net/2009/06/10/building-off-of-a-coral-reef-a-whitman-blog-network/comment-page-1/#comment-1059 Andrew Wed, 10 Jun 2009 17:40:20 +0000 http://www.andrewspittle.net/?p=984#comment-1059 Thanks for the comment Joey, here's some further explanation: There would definitely be a way to feature certain posts and curate the content (without that I think the endeavor would be useless). I've already got some ideas in mind for design and we'll see where they go. Submissions would be what drive this thing (I'm hoping to feature it on the homepage so that people can't miss it. I do think that the ability for people to make their own blog would be a ton of work and it's definitely further down on my list then the network in general but at the same time I think that it could be really cool to provide this as an option. We'll see where it goes. Thanks for the comment Joey, here’s some further explanation:

There would definitely be a way to feature certain posts and curate the content (without that I think the endeavor would be useless).

I’ve already got some ideas in mind for design and we’ll see where they go. Submissions would be what drive this thing (I’m hoping to feature it on the homepage so that people can’t miss it.

I do think that the ability for people to make their own blog would be a ton of work and it’s definitely further down on my list then the network in general but at the same time I think that it could be really cool to provide this as an option. We’ll see where it goes.

]]> By: Joey Baker http://www.andrewspittle.net/2009/06/10/building-off-of-a-coral-reef-a-whitman-blog-network/comment-page-1/#comment-1058 Joey Baker Wed, 10 Jun 2009 17:34:54 +0000 http://www.andrewspittle.net/?p=984#comment-1058 My initial reaction: • Collecting all the blog content is a good first step, but you're gonna want to curate it. You'll need to have some blog posts get featured, to draw attention to the good stuff, and give people some incentive to write well and … be featured :) • Design on this one is gonna be tough • Make sure you let people submit their blogs to you! • Offer the ability for people to make their own blog, but really… good luck. I've not really heard of anyone doing that successfully. Do what you do best and link to the rest. Give people step-by-step instructions on getting them setup on WordPress.com. Make it easy for them to get into your blog network. Even give them a pointer URL if you like – but trying to manage a blog system is a ton of work with little reward. IMHO My initial reaction:

• Collecting all the blog content is a good first step, but you’re gonna want to curate it. You’ll need to have some blog posts get featured, to draw attention to the good stuff, and give people some incentive to write well and … be featured :)
• Design on this one is gonna be tough
• Make sure you let people submit their blogs to you!
• Offer the ability for people to make their own blog, but really… good luck. I’ve not really heard of anyone doing that successfully. Do what you do best and link to the rest. Give people step-by-step instructions on getting them setup on WordPress.com. Make it easy for them to get into your blog network. Even give them a pointer URL if you like – but trying to manage a blog system is a ton of work with little reward.

IMHO

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