Becoming something…

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I finally got the back end blog stuff upgraded (Wordpress 2.5.1). I celebrate with a laugh…enjoy!

I’ll be updating my back end blogging software tonight. There shouldn’t be too much down time.

After about a week of technical issues and bunch of wasted time, my end of the site is back up. On your end you may not have noticed much except a few more error pages and/or slowness. I barely had access to the administrative side of things, which meant no posts or often not even being able to log in. Thanks for you patience, there is so much yet for us to share.

Of course it is.

This weeks Web 2.0 word is widget. In its most basic form, it is a component of a graphical user interface with which a user interacts. Basically, a space that contains data you are able to interact with. For our Web 2.0 sake, it’s an applet that user generated/guided content can be entered. Other terms used to describe web widgets include: gadget, badge, module, capsule, snippet, mini and flake. The theory behind the widget is code re-use. A standardized chunk of code that can be “dropped-in” with out much configuration, often standardized by individual site environments. You will see their intense use on the startpage sites I am reviewing but you can also notice them elsewhere; Google advertisement, MySpace, Flickr, and YouTube content is also widget based.

Now, I’m just delaying the reviews of the startpages until later this weekend. Turns out there were a lot of them to look through. Until then, I still need to post some sort of 2.0 nonsense.

I realized I haven’t spoken much about the functionality of my site. It is quite 2.0.

Register. Your profile is user generated content that allows for you to participate and create the user generated content on this site. Finally, the widgets on the right sidebar are yours to move. You can “grab” them by the title bar, click and hold, and move them to the position you want. The great thing is that if you have cookies on, your browser will remember where you placed them last and keep it that way. So if you’ve grown tired of my cute cartoon face, don’t hesitate to move it down.

There were a few comments on my entry regarding my site being blocked in China. I figured the whole issue deserved a blog entry, especially since controlled free-speech isn’t something we can all relate to very well. I’ll begin with the cut and dry of the situation but also direct you to my own personal knowledge and some interesting articles.

Now to the questions posed specifically about my site and why it might be banned. There are a few possible reasons:
1) My content has been read randomly by government moderators and has been blocked because of content.
2) Automatic filters picked out specific keyword combinations from my entries and deemed the content inappropriate.
3) My blog runs on a WordPress.org platform. This is important because I know that all WordPress.com hosted blogs are blocked.

[Note] My chances of “detection” on any of those three counts was increased by the fact that my site is a blog. Blogs, forums, and other discussion formats can be closely watched and quickly banned or event destroyed if hosted in China. Subversive or dynamic sharing of information is the most threatening. Even texting has proved a recent challenge to the Chinese government as it as been used to suddenly form public protest through instant coordination (but don’t worry, they are working on systems to monitor that too).

So I could have been blocked for hosting a blog, using WordPress, or based on content.

I hope this answers any questions and brings up many more. Please read further, Continue reading »

I feel so controversial! I also feel sad because I really planned to step up my blogging for the trip, sorry for the lack of content over the past week.

I’m not kidding though, I had no access to any part of my site (even uploads) the entire time I was in Beijing. Even friend’s computers couldn’t access the site (sometimes it just depends on what government controlled up-link it leaves on). It’s kinda cool to be among the ranks of Wikipedia, banned historical truths, and other such controversial information.

I do plan to look into it, as it is a group of people who might appreciate my Chinese content and other such life changing information. Oh, China.

I AM JustinFenwick.Net

Thanks to a great anniversary gift from my significant-other, the artist (Mary Rochelle Burnham), and a few of my own edits, I’ve woven more of myself into the blog.

Let it be.