| « Time for a chat | Post #20 of “The Japan-related Web†guest-blogging-series on Rising Sun of Nihon » |
Post #19 of “The Japan-related Web†guest-blogging-series on Rising Sun of Nihon
On January 24, 2008 in #The Japan-related Web Debate, Announcements
| If you are just joining us, this month Bill from Rising Sun Of Nihon has invited me to use his blog as a platform where we can all come together and discuss the Japan-related web! Here is today’s snippet. |
Today we will look at something plain and simple you can do that is truly powerful… assisting others.
I have been following your series of articles but am sad to see that a lot of discussion hasn’t ensued via comments. I know I am guilty on that count! I wonder if the dedicated bloggers on Japan have been distracted in a good way by JapanSoc. This series is making me think about the way I approach my blogging but it’s not really encouraging me to act via commenting.
I also wanted to comment on your wiki project. I think it’s a great idea and I would like to contribute but don’t know the best way. I don’t want to put myself out there as en expert or to duplicate other content that is already out there…I would be interested to hear your thoughts.
JapanSoc is a good idea as long as your not a teacher…apparently? Most posts of mine languish in upcoming (my posts are short but someone must have a question or two or a comment?) while posts about toilets( I have had one of those for 6 years? is that interesting to anyone? we have them in Hawaii too) and ramen ice cream sit on the front page…wtf?
I worry that the Soc is just becoming a place where people are copying and pasting other sites posts?
I can find most of the stuff on my own and to be honest the cosplay garbage is a big turn off. I know most people can’t wait to finish teaching but some of us love it and it would be nice if ANYONE was interested.
Instead of bitching (which I do very well as you can see) I should try to make something geared towards teachers (something I thought a lot of us did over here???) and take on some responsibility myself.
The Karma thing? Does it work? and there should be a “who buried this” tab as well.
@Nick, nothin personal. You have sure a f_ck done lots more than me for the community. I’m just giving my 2 cents!
@Tori, Once I finish playing around with CSS/XML I will have more ideas.
Hey guys, let’s not get carried away. JapanSoc is still far too small to distract anyone or have an anti-ESL audience. I count 45 registered users, but only a dozen of them participate regularly. With those numbers, it’s far too early to make conclusions. Chris, Karma doesn’t seem to be working, so I’ll look into that, and the lack of a “Who buried this” counter is a fault with Pligg, the platform JapanSoc is built on. Hopefully, later versions will have it.
@Nick,
I was just venting Bro, don’t ever sweat it. I don’t think it’s an “anti” thing just “not a lot of energy put into it” type thing?
Or something like that.
Okay, quick update. I’ll have to wait a few hours to see if the cron job works to automatically update user karma three times a day, but I’ve got karma showing on the Top Users page. I don’t quite understand how the formula works myself, and we could probably argue about why so-and-so is above so-and-so, but hey, if it encourages people to be more active then great!
My comment was definitely not a slam on JapanSoc - I was just thinking out loud so-to-speak. How many active bloggers are there that actually want to work on a community vs. going solo would probably be a better question? Maybe not as many as we’d have thought or wished for…
The point I was trying to make is that “The Japan Related Web” series doesn’t seem to be generating any conversation and that’s too bad.
@Chris B
Isn’t the purpose of a social bookmarking site to let the users decide what they want to read about? I will not be in Japan to teach English and therefore don’t Soc your items as they are not of particular interest to me. I do however read the headlines to determine if I want read more. I also don’t care for cosplay and don’t Soc those items either - all you have to do is bury the items you don’t want to look at. I think people are being really friendly right now and not burying anything unless it really bugs them (I’ve only buried a couple of things so far). As the group gets larger, and I hope it does, I think that we will find more use for the bury button. Who buries something doesn’t matter to me - I am more interested who Soc’s the same things as me as that indicates that we have something in common.
As far as rehashing old posts we are all guilty of that. I do not Soc solely my own items and I do not Soc every article that I write unless I think that there may be interest from the group as a whole - sometimes I get more Soc’s and sometimes I don’t - that’s not the point. The point is to share what we think is interesting and let the group take it from there.
This is the kind of conversation we should be seeing regularly on the Daily J!
On the “community vs. going solo” point, I would guess most people would prefer to go solo, and then maybe use Adsense to earn some income. Of course, without the support of a community, it’s hard to get seen. Interestingly, a lot of foreigners in Japan prefer to “go solo” in their offline lives, instead of joining “foreign” communities.
@Shane, I don’t use the bury button as it can’t be reflected in the stats. I think getting credit for boosting someone and not getting the opposite for burying is a big mistake. By the way I could not give a ____ whether you soc anything but I would like some more discussion about my proffession.
@Nick, Go take a look at the # of socs and comments between me and the #2 guy? How in the ____? I have been commenting second to only you and I get that?
By the way…
I’m glad to see some lively debate over here
@ Chris, Pligg is still in beta, and they are currently working on improving the karma system for the release of version 1.0. I’m pretty sure comments are not included in the current karma formula (which would require a mathematician to understand!), and also in its present state, it is just a number, with no weight given to votes from people with higher karma.
You guys are fast! or I’m moving to slow.
@Chris #9
I’m glad to see some lively debate too!
Ok. Let me start now from the beginning.
Shane, thanks so much for your feedback! I was also hoping the series would spark a more lively discussion. And at the beginning (and on a few other posts) it did.
Whenever something is new I try not to be too optimistic about the early results because not everything will go as expected. So my goal was to spark some conversation, as opposed to being completely ignored (which was the most likely outcome). By those pessimistic standards the series has been a success.
And by no means should the discussion stop after this series on RSON. I hope that it will be a continual discussion and on different sites (this is Bill’s idea actually). There might even be more guest blogging in the works
About Japanopedia
I’m glad to hear your thoughts, please continue to give them!
Short posts explaining the wiki project will probably become a regular thing on DailyJ (but hopefully that won’t distract from interviews). There are so many possibilities with the project that it is hard to say yet what the best way to contribute is. I suppose having the passion and desire to do something (and finding other like-minded people) is the most important thing right now. And as the wiki grows the community will probably determine what projects to work on.
BUT, in the meantime there needs to be direction. You bring up a very good point about not wanting to duplicate others work or claim that you are an expert. Duplicating things available elsewhere is one of the main things I plan to address going forward.
Rather than duplicate I think that pointing to those external resources and describing/summarising what they have to offer may be the best way to go. What do you think?
In that case we would mainly build lists of what is available. Since it is a group effort, lists could be compiled that would be nearly impossible for one person.
Right now I am adding sites to the directory. From there I make pages about different subjects (photography for example). I talk a little bit about photography in Japan and list sites that focus on photography.
That is a really good question. I’ve experienced, from going out and trying to interview them, that some bloggers are not interested in interacting with others. But then other bloggers are, so I focus on them.
Nick’s comment about “without the support of a community it is hard to get seen” seems spot on to me. Maybe if you pick a really hot topic like TvInJapan.com people will find you without you doing anything. But most likely you will need to build relationships if you want to build traffic. Actually that is what the next few posts of the series are about (from #22 - 27).
@ Chris,
)
(I had better make this my last comment
I’ve saved the best for last. I think your posts are being ignored (probably not purposely) a bit. There are two reasons for them being ignored that I can think of:
1) The titles you use on Soc might not be catchy enough
2) An issue with digg-like sites and crowds
1-
What do you think about using flashier titles like “An eikaiwa game that will really get your students talking” or “Are children better students than adults? What I’ve seen from experience” ?
Ok. Maybe those are a little gimmicky but I think if you show people how the posts can help them (ex: a game they could use with my own classes) then they will be more popular.
2-
This one is more difficult (and hard to explain). My frustration with Digg.com is that if I submit something Japan-related that is not very general and universally appealing it will go no where. Digg.com is general mass-appeal news, not niche news. I think that is why there are so many Digg-clones popping up, they are trying to fill the niches (also the software is available).
JapanSoc is going to face the same problem. Japan is actually a rather broad topic. You have all kinds of possible niches.
And you have something else too.
News vs. personal stories vs. tips & resources
Some people on Soc are posting news about Japan.
Some are posting personal stories
Chris, I’d say your posts would fall between tips and personal
And I have posted some “news” about Japan-related sites, not really news about Japan.
Can all of this co-exist? That is the challenge.
I think that regardless of the differences we should all push on, supporting the project, because I think the Japan-related web needs this type of website.
Let’s keep discussing this and brainstorming. What do you guys think?
On the subject of Japanopedia maybe in your future posts you could highlight a certain task or a way that people can contribute. An example would be to link their site or start a page on a subject that they are interested in with all of the valuable links that they have found doing their own research. For example we could collaborate on a Kotowaza page since that is something we are both interested in.
I also agree with Nick’s comment that “without the support of a community it is hard to get seen”.
On the subject of Japan Soc - you are right that Japan is a broad topic to cover. As a social site it will only reflect the values of it’s users and they number around 45 right now. In order to see what JapanSoc will grow up to be we need to help Nick promote the site and make sure that we are contributing, Soc’ing, and commenting on content that we would like to see more of. How can we help Nick?
I personally hope that the site remains fairly broad in it’s scope of coverage and that it will tempt users, like me, to explore different niches/subjects through it’s content.
@Chemist,
I honestly don’t care enough to change anything I’m doing. I just like to bitch when things don’t seem quite right. When the weather gets nicer and we start having school events I’ll be putting less and less time in the computer so…meh….whatevers!
@Nick,
Then what good is it? Forgive me , but I thought “commenting” was one of the main things trying to be stimulated yet Karma does not reflect it? The non trackback to who buries what, is a big error. If I bury something I want that person to see me so they can get some feedback as to why? and visa versa which is far more important that getting credit for boosting someone.
[...] There are many posts, updates, and interviews in the works but I am going to skip them for today. That is partly because I need a little break, but also that is because all of the action is in the comment section of this post. [...]
About JapanSoc
@Chris, I agree that the number of comments should be considered when calculating karma, and I’m sure the Pligg developers are working on it. I can only assume it’s been left out of the current “formula” because it might lead to comment spam. Currently, it is simply a number that represents recent contributions (posts and votes) to the site, and serves no other purpose. As for…
“If I bury something I want that person to see me so they can get some feedback as to why? and visa versa”
What’s more likely is that someone who gets a post buried will be annoyed and return the “favor” to whoever hit the bury button. This wouldn’t be very productive. Actually, I should point out that the “bury” button in JapanSoc is not equal to a -1 vote. In fact the word “bury” isn’t used in the code at all. Instead it is referred to as a “report” because it is used to report spam. With the current settings, there need to be three times more spam “reports” than votes to delete a submission. Hopefully, a proper negative voting feature will be available in the future, but I wouldn’t implement it unless we had hundreds of users.
@Shane, the easiest way for people to help promote JapanSoc is by submitting articles from sites other than our own. That way, those site owners will be happy to have been linked to and might even register to vote up their own post
About Japanopedia
I agree with Shane when she says “highlight a certain task or a way that people can contribute”. You need people working on real content otherwise it will just get used for self-promotion.
“What’s more likely is that someone who gets a post buried will be annoyed and return the “favor†to whoever hit the bury button. This wouldn’t be very productive.”
That’s pretty sad.
What a buncha winners!
I post at your and Soc site cuz I feel like it and for no other reason. I
don’t get posts on my site and honestly don’t care. (my beef is with the lack of any discussion whatsoever about my occupation)
I have a dream….
I have a dream that some day…
little white boys and little black girls can hold hands
and live in a world
where people don’t hide behind aliases, and they don’t stuff their sites with adsense trying to milk every last penny they can get cuz it’s lame and it always will be.
Do your real job and do it well (like me) and you’ll never have to do that.
My vent is now over.
It is your turn people of the net-osphere
Ok. I am going to comment a little more later but first I have to address the big issue.
NO!
Chris you can’t leave us! We luvz ya and you have to stay. Forget the students (I’m sure they will pick up English somehow) and stick with us on the net; maybe even pick up an alias (you’ll feel like superhero).
Ok. On a serious note, you have to put first things first. So be the best English teacher ESL has ever seen. Somebody has to do it for the children!
@Chris, haha you’ll be back at your computer when it’s too hot to go outside. 40 degree days are coming!
@Chemist, I don’t know how much artistic control you have on Japanopedia, but I’m going to be honest and say that it doesn’t look as clean, crisp and welcoming as it should. Compare it to Eigapedia. In Japan, presentation is everything because people do judge a book by its cover.
Okay, I’ve done some reading up on wikis (though I’m still pretty clueless) and it seems that Wikia uses MediaWiki, which in turn can use different skins. The original Wikipedia skin is called Monobook and looks like it can also be used with Wikia. Chemist, that’s all I know, and changing the skin on Japanopedia is just a suggestion.
Japanopedia is definitely not eye candy.
You should take a wrecking ball to the template.
I agree about the way Japanopedia looks right now. It’s difficult to navigate through and it’s purpose/content is not really clear. I wouldn’t know where to start if I was searching for something - sorry
…
@Shane #15
Great ideas there. I plan on future posts covering what you’ve suggested.
I need to beg now for patience. I know that the Japanopedia homepage isn’t beautiful and that I really haven’t given enough direction with the project yet. And I know that is not good.
But I think the project has a lot of potential. It’s ugly now, but it could be a swan later.
Back to the JapanSoc “bury” discussion.
I think I might have a solution (or a half-solution):
In Nick’s defense, he does not have much control over certain functions of the site. It is running on a content management system (CMS) called Pligg that contains lots of code and is difficult to modify. Unless he can either create a mod himself (not easy) or get help from some one on the support forum to create one for him, there is nothing he can do. So it is not that he doesn’t want to do everything we suggest, it’s that he can’t.
BUT, it seems to me that this “bury” button should really be a “report spam” button.
As Nick said: “it is referred to as a ‘report’ because it is used to report spam”
I think Nick could change the text from “bury” to “report spam” (you can edit all the language of the site in the Pligg admin panel). That way people will know NOT to click that button for Japan-related items, only for spam.
Chris, I know that this doesn’t solve the problem of people not talking about your profession. I guess there are not many teachers as serious as you are about their work. That is sad.
(The last post in a row from me)
@Chris #19
Nice dream
I’m not big on ads either (that’s why I have a no ad policy for this blog. Yell at me if I “sell out”). There are a lot of J-sites full of ads though. Some people go way overboard. But at the end of the day it is their site. Meh.
@Nick
Yep. It is running on mediawiki. You can use html and css, or the special wiki formatting.
Thanks for letting me know about eiagpedia!
I think that this project will progress bit by bit. It will be ugly/imperfect for awhile but once it reaches a certain point the growth will take off.
Patience is going to be the main thing. It won’t be done tomorrow.
It is the same for JapanSoc. It won’t make everyone happy immediately but over time if the issues are worked on it will be great. The key I think is to keep supporting it.
What do you think about creating a project on Japanopedia for JapanSoc?
For example, we could have a page with a list of all the Japan blogs on the net (I already have the list). You could ask people to visit each of those blogs, find an article they like on them, and then submit it to JapanSoc. Once they submit it they could cross it off from the list.
What do you think?
[...] there are many comments that I want to discuss in posts (especially some of the great discussion going on in this post) so look forward to that eventually. You guys always give such great [...]
On the JapanSoc bury vs. report spam issue. I like the concept of bury as it allows the user to filter out what he/she doesn’t want to see. I think people would be more hesitant to use the button if it was reporting spam.
Spam is a harsh classification if the item is just something that you dont’ want to read about…one person’s spam is another’s filet mignon…
@Chemist, changing the name “bury” to “report spam” is a possibility I’ve considered, but I’m going to leave it for now because it isn’t currently causing any problems. As for Japanopedia, I’ll put together a JapanSoc page soon, and depending on how the wiki develops, a JapanSoc “project” could be done later in the year.
30 comments! Is that a Daily J record?
@Nick,
Yep! 30 is a new record. It’s great to have all of your comments.
You know about it already, but just in case someone comes along and reads this that doesn’t know:
There is now a JapanSoc project page on Japanopedia
http://jproject.wikia.com/wiki/Category:JapanSoc_Project
I’m using the list of sites on the JapanSoc project page, along with StumbleUpon and all the feeds on my iGoogle page, to help me find material to submit to JapanSoc. The more choice the better!
I’ve also added a Japansoc.com page to Japanopedia, which is a little meatier than most of the other pages I’ve seen on the wiki so far. I’m quite proud of it and will be adding to it over time.
Deas (rockinginhakata.com) has made a Mac OS X dashboard widget for JapanSoc if you use a Mac (I don’t), and I’m looking at making a Google gadget but am a little lost at the moment.
Hi Nick,
Sorry this reply is late. Your JapanSoc page looks great!
About a Google gadget, I’ve never made one before so I don’t know exactly how they are made. But I can give you the javascript I used for the button on the Nipponster Japan Toolbar. Maybe that will help? Here it is:
javascript:location.href=’http://japansoc.com/submit.php?url=’+(location.href)
There are already many ways to submit to JapanSoc so from an current user position a Google gadget might not be so important I suppose. But the good thing about having one is that it will be listed among the other Google gadgets and might bring in new users, right?
Add A Comment