Category Archives: Project Progress

Final Reflection- Deliverables

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In the week of 11/29 after returning from a relaxing break, I returned feeling very excited. During the evening of 11/30 I worked on my second progress presentation. In the second progress report, I wrote candidly about my struggles with having a clear understanding of my project and the end results. I wrote about the ways in which the project made me more disciplined. There were certain elements of the project that was to have been completed however due to timing it was not completed. Also on 11/30 I posted my first image rendition of Humans of New York photo. I interviewed a male friend of mine who is twenty-three years old. He was super excited to share his thoughts on loss. Earlier in the day, after my internship, I met him in China Town, New York where he interns. I took a photo of him from the back because he did not want to show his face. He did not feel comfortable with his face in the photo which is understandable. I took the photo and asked him to send me his quote via text on loss.

The quote: #1 The Loss of Time

Jodieann's Human of New York Facebook

“The worst kind of loss is the loss of time, because it’s constant and never ending, you won’t stop losing time until you die. This can drive one crazy as your goals becomes more immediate and crunched under the weight of time. Time lost also manifests itself in moments spent with others, it’s a little scary how long we can go without seeing someone or doing something and be instantly reminded of that once we see the person or participate in that activity again. Our memories remind us of how fast time flies and how if we don’t use it responsibly we can waste a lot of time, as time waits for no one.”#HumansofNewYork

 

This photo was shared via these four social media platforms Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Black Attire Aficionado. I posted the image and the quote from participant #1 along with the hashtag (#HumansofNewYork). The response was surprising. For the first few moments when I shared the photo via Instagram which was shared to Facebook, there was no response. I was worried that no one would interact with the image which would make my project unsuccessful. Within the next hour my photo received likes on both platforms. The photo via Instagram received 11 likes and 3 comments. Three instagrammers participated in the conversation. Many found the quote on loss to be “powerful”. I did not engage with any of the commenters because Brendan Stanton does not engage with users, it is one of the strategies I listed in my Humans of New York Best Practices, which will be shared on my ePortfolio site on 12/15. I found the photo shared on Instagram to be successful because it received likes and users engaged with the photo. On the platform Facebook, I received 9 likes within a matter of minutes. There was no user engagement on this platform. I did not find this very successful because I have over 700 Facebook friends and was quite surprised by the lack of response. On Twitter, I took a different approach to sharing the image. I posted the image with a short sentence from the quote and linked it to my personal blog Black Attire Aficionado using Bitly and the hashtag #HONY so that anyone searching the hashtag would see the tweet. The photo shared via Twitter, received over 100 impressions(the amount of times people saw the tweet on Twitter), and received over 10 user engagements such as clicking the link, the hashtag and the media(the photo). I would say that the image was successful to some degree because over 100 people saw it but no one engaged. I screenshot these findings and posted it to my blogpost Coming to Grips: Projection Reflection-Round 2.

The following day I met with professor Belli to discuss the progress of my project, I received feedback to revisit my proposed timeline where I did not complete the deliverables. Also, I was advised to write my best practices on the blog Humans of New York. Later that evening I reworked my blog post but for some reason it was not updated. I did not find this out until 12/3 after I presented my Prezi presentation. Also after my presentation, I received feedback from my class that was very positive. In the feedback, I was told that the project had a clearer understanding than before. Samantha mentioned that she would have a prospect for me because I was unable to find someone to share their story on loss.

On 12/5 I crated my second image using my own quote. I decided to write about myself because I could not find anyone and I thought it would be more intimate. On the subject of loss, I wrote about losing my ability to laugh during hard times. I did not want to do the traditional story on relationship. I chose a photo that was taken during the summer and wrote.

The quote:# 2 The Loss of LaughterIMG_2195

“I’m afraid of losing my ability to laugh during moments of hard times. My laugh is what I cherish most of all. Sometimes there are people who come into your life whose purpose is to destroy you and by some miracle it changes you. Often times this can make you a better person and other times it can make you bitter. My laugh is infectious and youthful and losing it is a constant fear of mine. . .” #humansofnewyork

 

This photo was shared via these four social media platforms Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Black Attire Aficionado. I posted the image and the quote from participant #2 along with the hashtag (#HumansofNewYork). The response was immediate. For the first few moments when I shared the photo via Instagram which was shared to Facebook, it received over 20 likes. The responses were “love that smile, hearts <3 <3, I love this picture, you’re glowing and you’re absolutely right keep smiling”. I would say this was a great start, I will continue to monitor it because I have over 700 friends. The photo via Instagram received over 30 likes with only one Instagram comment. I was expecting a more intense response because the photo was of myself and I thought my friends would have engaged more. On Twitter, I took a different approach to sharing the image. I posted the image with a short sentence from the quote and linked it to my personal blog Black Attire Aficionado using Bitly and the hashtag #HONY so that anyone searching the hashtag would see the tweet. The photo shared via Twitter, received over 60 impressions and 2 twitter engagements. I would say that the image was successful to some degree because over 60 people saw it but no one engaged.

 

The quote:# 3 The Loss of a Grandmother

“Losing my grandmother was one of the worst feelings in the world. She was like a second mother to me. She raised me and lived right downstairs from me. All I knew was her being there. She moved to Canada a few years before her passing. It was sudden and out of nowhere and by far one of the worst things that I would have found out. She had an aneurysm. We went to Canada right away to be by her side. When I saw her it wasn’t her, she wasn’t herself and she was not conscious. It’s a horrible feeling seeing someone you love so much in that type of state. I was in the room with her and some family when she passed.

A Granddaughters Loss

A Granddaughters Loss

My heart was sinking and I felt like I was dying inside. When we heard the machine go off I knew she was gone. I felt like I died inside. I starred at her and spoke to her in her ear before she went. It wasn’t easy to deal with at all. But thank God I had my son, Aiden there to hug and kiss and keep me strong and keep my mind busy. I know she’s in a better place, I just think it was too early for her to leave. It’s not an easy thing to deal with losing someone you love so much. I am grateful she was able to be here when my son was born and she knew him for a year and a half. I still miss her to this day but I smile knowing she’s watching over my family and me. I know she sees my son growing up and is proud of the job I’m doing as a mother. I see her in my dreams and sometimes feel that she’s around, either by smell or just feeling her presence.” #HumansofNewYork

This photo was shared via these four social media platforms Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Black Attire Aficionado. I posted the image and the quote from participant #3 along with the hashtag (#HumansofNewYork) on social media sites. The response was slower than I expected. I expected it would have a lot more engagements because it was a quote on the loss of a loved one which I’m sure many people have experienced at some point in their life. For the first few moments when I shared the photo via Instagram which was shared to Facebook, it received 8 likes. The responses were “I love this!”. I would say this was a great start, I will continue to monitor it because I have over 700 friends and it is a great read. The photo via Instagram received over 10 likes with only one Instagram comment. Because the quote was very long, I broke it up into 2 parts. On 12/6 I posted part one and will post part 2 on 12/7. One of the best practices I found in my analysis of HONY was that for long quotes Brandon Stanton broke it up into short quotes and would post the rest the following day.

In some ways I was expecting a more intense response because the quote was powerful. On Twitter, I took a different approach to sharing the image. I posted the image with a short sentence from the quote and linked it to my personal blog Black Attire Aficionado using Bitly and the hashtag #HONY so that anyone searching the hashtag would see the tweet. The photo shared via Twitter, received over 40 impressions and 2 twitter engagements. I have not determined the success of this image because there is one more part to post.

This will be updated on 12/8,  12/10 and 12/12 is the final analysis of the amount of user engagements that occurred on the social media sites.  

Keep Pushing Forward-Reflection 2

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This week has had it’s ups and downs. Last week, my reflection was focused on refining the technicalities of the definitions and deliverables of this project. This week my focus veered greatly from the goals I originally set out to accomplish. When I envisioned this project, I did not foresee the roadblocks I have encountered.One of my biggest issues is balancing life with blogging and vlogging. In the past week I have encountered two deaths that rocked my focus very far from my mission.

Something I have come to realize is that inspiration for blogs are in everything however taking the time in every day to create a post, write a tweet, and advertise my blog have to be clearly timed into the schedule. I have begun to set alarms to stay on track with when a post should be written. The post I am happiest with actually came from a moment of inspiration while walking outside. I have since downloaded the WordPress app on my phone for posting on the go, which works best for me.

As for updates on my success in this week, there has not been many. There have been no new views to the site but I have gained 3 followers on Twitter. It has been a struggle to get much interaction with my content. My newest approach is actively adding individuals that have already been immersed in the natural community. This week has taught me that successful branding requires much outreach to connect others with my content. Going forward, I hope to have 30 views in the next 3 days with proper promotion and interaction with others.

Something I have done is to see if my site appears in many popular natural keyword searches. Some of the words I used were ‘natural hair’ and ‘curl pattern’ which are two common searches. My site was on the 17th page (yes I searched that far). Through the use of more successful promotion and using more keywords and tags in each post I hope to have a more successful week.

Going Forward

In the next week i will be dedicated to the mission I set out to accomplish. While my ePortfolio still needs work, the reflections have put me on a path to complete this project with some success. I will be utilizing strategic social media skills to push this blog in a more successful direction.

Udpate from Original Post

Some of the feedback I received in the last class were key points in further defining my project Since the discussion i am still narrowing down how I will incorporate viewer analytics into the project without shifting the original goal. I have incorporated Samantha’s suggestion to add a mission/vision statement.

Link to Blog

Screen Shot 2015-12-03 at 12.52.24 PM

Screen Shot 2015-12-03 at 12.11.43 PM  Screen Shot 2015-12-03 at 12.43.13 PMScreen Shot 2015-12-03 at 12.11.10 PM

Screen Shot 2015-12-03 at 12.44.51 PM

Feedback

I am open to as much feedback as possible as to how  I can make this blog as successful as possible. Please, if anyone has any critiques of comments I am open to all of it. Also, below is a video that has some light editing. Please view and give some feedback. Thank you!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IELYXtT-isk

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Project Progress- Take 2

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Since our last check in, I have made some progress on my social media account LinkedIn. My focus has been on generating content of the best practices and uses an individual should make in order to successfully present themselves online. This is just some of what I plan to feature in my e-magazine. Although, my project is moving at a slow pace, I am confident I will have all I need to produce a successful e-magazine whether or not my LinkedIn profile takes off.

I have written a small draft of some of the essentials needed in order to present oneself successfully online using LinkedIn that I will include in my e-magazine:

  1. Profile picture- a profile picture must come off as friendly and approachable or professional or however an individual chooses to brand (present) themselves on their personal account. It should look more professional than casual as one may portray on Facebook.
  2. Groups on LinkedIn- this is important because people are joining an abundance of groups but may not necessarily be active in those groups. A user should choose groups that they know they will post content to, answer questions or respond to content, share their perspective and that will also align with the industry they want to be in some day. Users should join groups that they are passionate about.
  3. Posts- It doesn’t hurt to write a post (update) on LinkedIn. It could be about anything as long as it is authentic and true.

I worked on my summary and I know I will probably edit it a dozen more times but while I was thinking of what I should share, there were specific questions I had in mind such as:

  • What am I passionate about? What motivates me? I can answer bother questions in one simple word, children. What about children? I haven’t quite figured out yet.
  • What assets do I feel I can best bring into my field of study/ career goal? What have I done or what are my skills?
  • What are one or two fun facts about me? What makes me unique?

Some of these questions will remain unanswered as there is still a lot to learn about myself and I hope by the time I graduate I will know the answer.

Looking forward, I finally have found a site called LucidPress where I can successfully create my e-magazine and I have been working on producing my e-magazine. It started off rough because I had to go through 24 different layouts to choose one that would be suitable for my project but I think I finally found the right one. I also found a theme for my e-portfolio that I am pleased with and began posting documentation of my academic work on my. I have yet to meet with someone from the professional development team but I’ve decided I will not include my resume into my LinkedIn profile because my work experience in the past does not reflect my summary and where I plan on going in my career aspirations. Although, I hope to utilize the professional development team later in the future.

Samantha suggested that I have people evaluate myself in reality and online. As soon as I feel my LinkedIn account is good enough to be looked at by others who are familiar with myself, I will have them compare my two selves: online and in reality.

Coming to Grips: Project Reflection- Round 2

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Revised as of 12/5 to reflect feedback from Jill

At what point in your life do you acknowledge defeat? The project for Writing with New Media has proven to be quite a challenge for me. I feel as if my heads are still in the clouds, I have not quite successfully articulated in my proposal how I expect to complete this project. It’s very much of challenge to clearly define my purpose of this project as well as the deliverables. I have gone back and forth with trying to clearly state my vision of this project,  I think it is very much a work in progress. I feel that as I go along the project begins to manifest in a weird way. The project requires a lot of discipline which I have not given anything in a while because I have been focused in various places. As a result, it is forcing to rethink my management skills and also how I tackle a project. In a weird way this project is changing the way I think about the word project, deliverables and purpose. It is affording me chance to rethink the way I execute a task. Specifically, how I analyze and synthesize a project brief. I did not use my time effectively in the first rounds of this project and now I am at a hard rock. It is a incredible frustrating point in my project journey but it is a point that I need to be in. With as this built up frustration and confusion and exhaustion it is given me a chance to reflect on who I have been all my life. It is now requiring me to change many of my bad habits. This project required me to clearly define a proposal with specific guidelines and I have veered off the track of my timeline. I am afraid this project will not be as successful as I hoped. Also, because I have veered off my timeline there are elements of my project that I need to rework and clearly state the intent of the project.

My proposed timeline I should have completed the work for the week of the 11/27 which was to create and explain the best practices for HONY brand. I was to analyze their practices and will try to successfully recreate their approach to sharing a story within the online community of Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.

After a careful analysis of the photoblog Humans of New York (HONY). I wrote a guide of their best practices, this will be showcased on my ePortfolio site in a different tab.

For the week of 11/22 I went on a search from a student who was willing to share their story and was unsuccessful. On 11/23 I created my first project reflection of where I was in my journey to completing the project. I worked on defining what success means in my project. My analysis of a successful photo shared via social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Black Attire Aficionado is by tracking the amount of times a photo was likes, favorites, views, retweets, reblog/repost, comments, shareability on other platforms, and if other users share their stories because of the image. In the Prezi presentation, I compared the photoblog Humans of New York and StoryCorps. Humans of New York blog a by Brandon Stanton that shares stories through PHOTOS by providing these individuals with a voice and cultivates a new type of visual experience. On the other hand, StoryCorps is a non-profit by David Isay that provides Americans of backgrounds and all beliefs with the opportunity to record, share, and preserve their life story in a VIDEO. These two photojournalism outlets provides two unique ways in which a participant can share their stories. I reviewed several posts of HONY, many of these images receive over 200,000 views and over 20,000 comments. I was fascinated by the scope in which participants who shared their stories received comments from various strangers who had similar experiences. This completely solidified my reasons for my project on storytelling. I became even more inspired to recreate images similar to HONY. After several feedback from my professor and peers, I decided it was imperative to remove the video blog  StoryCorps from my suggested proposal. It did not serve any purpose because I was not creating a video along with the stories that would be shared via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Black Attire Aficionado. I chose to follow the feedback because it would help to clarify any confusions and make the project goal more clearly defined. As a result of all of the feedback the timeline will change to reflect the feedback.

For the week of 11/29 which has been my most successful week because I found an individual who was willing to share their story within the online community of Facebook, Twitter and I am still working on the WordPress post to my personal blog Black Attire Aficionado. Since posting the image, I have received 11 likes and three comments on Instagram with just using the hashtag (#HumansofNewYork). For the next coming days I will engage with other hashtags and see how they play a roll in user engagement and track how it is perceives via those social networking sites. This is a paramount part of my project because it will show the success how I am able to use the HONY best practices to recreate an image. During that week I tried to find students outside of my class to participate in the creation of “Jodieann’s: Humans of New York,” I was unsuccessful. I think many people were hesitant to the idea because they did not trust me or they were uncomfortable with the idea. My plan B was to ask several friends of mine and one of my dearest friends agreed to share his thoughts on loss. The question I proposed was “Can you share your thoughts on loss you have experienced?”

Examples of Humans of New York post via:

Instagram :

Humans of New York Instagram

Humans of New York Instagram

Humans of New York Instagram

Humans of New York Instagram

 

His response:

Instagram:HONY

 

 

Facebook:

Jodieann's Human of New York Facebook

Jodieann’s Human of New York Facebook

 

WordPress: Black Attire Aficionado

 

 

 

ePortfolio

My ePortfolio site has not been updated since the last time I updated it partly because I like the simplicity of the site. I am partial to simplicity, it is who I am. However, my next steps for my ePortfolio is to update it with a new image since the one that I am currently using is not mine, it needs to be more organic. Over the weekend I captured several photos of flowers that I would like to be a part of my portfolio. I hope to make it as me as possible. I intend to update the site with a few more of projects I have completed as well as accolades.

Looking forward. . .

The next steps of my project will require me to be discipline in my approach to successfully completing this project on time. I will need to revisit the elements of the project such as the proposal, the new media composing experiment, project portfolio, begin practicing how to give a in-class presentation, work on the project reflection and  begin writing parts of the abstract.

After careful examination of my current deliverables it is important that I include another HONY image, one with a female narrative. I think it would be interesting to see how individuals react to different types of stories on loss from a woman’s point of view.

Next Steps

The next steps of the project is to chart the success of the image on Instagram, Facebook and WordPress by how I define success which is taking into consideration the definition of success that I defined earlier. I really look forward to the new approach that I will take towards this project.

 

The Presentation

Can Anyone Recreate a Humans of New York Image?

_____________________________________________________________________________

At what point in your life do you acknowledge defeat? The project for Writing with New Media has proven to be quite a challenge for me. I feel as if my heads are still in the clouds, I have not quite successfully articulated in my proposal how I expect to complete this project. It’s very much of challenge to clearly define my purpose of this project as well as the deliverables. I have gone back and forth with trying to clearly state my vision of this project,  I think it is very much a work in progress. I feel that as I go along the project begins to manifest in a weird way. The project requires a lot of discipline which I have not given anything in a while because I have been focused in various places. As a result, it is forcing to rethink my management skills and also how I tackle a project. In a weird way this project is changing the way I think about the word project, deliverables and purpose. It is affording me chance to rethink the way I execute a task. Specifically, how I analyze and synthesize a project brief. I did not use my time effectively in the first rounds of this project and now I am at a hard rock. It is a incredible frustrating point in my project journey but it is a point that I need to be in. With as this built up frustration and confusion and exhaustion it is given me a chance to reflect on who I have been all my life. It is now requiring me to change many of my bad habits. This project required me to clearly define a proposal with specific guidelines and I have veered off the track of my timeline. I am afraid this project will not be as successful as I hoped. Also, because I have veered off my timeline there are elements of my project that I need to rework and clearly state the intent of the project.

My proposed timeline I should have completed the work for the week of the 11/27 which was to create and explain the best practices for HONY brand. I was to analyze their practices and will try to successfully recreate their approach to sharing a story within the online community of Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Also to describe the image using the Visual Literacies Guidelines which I trying to see if it is still useful for the project.

For the week of 11/29 which has been my most successful week because I found an individual who was willing to share their story within the online community of Facebook, Twitter and I am still working on the WordPress post to my personal blog Black Attire Aficionado. Since posting the image, I have received 11 likes and three comments on Instagram with just using the hashtag (#HumansofNewYork). For the next coming days I will engage with other hashtags and see how they play a roll in user engagement and track how it is perceives via those social networking sites. This is a paramount part of my project because it will show the success how I am able to use the HONY best practices to recreate an image. During that week I tried to find students outside of my class to participate in the creation of “Jodieann’s: Humans of New York,” I was unsuccessful. I think many people were hesitant to the idea because they did not trust me or they were uncomfortable with the idea. My plan B was to ask several friends of mine and one of my dearest friends agreed to share his thoughts on loss. The question I proposed was “Can you share your thoughts on loss you have experienced?”

His response:

Instagram:

HONY

HONY

Facebook:

 

 

 

 

 

 

WordPress:

 

 

 

 

ePortfolio

My ePortfolio site has not been updated since the last time I updated it partly because I like the simplicity of the site. I am partial to simplicity, it is who I am. However, my next steps for my ePortfolio is to update it with a new image since the one that I am currently using is not mine, it needs to be more organic. Over the weekend I captured several photos of flowers that I would like to be a part of my portfolio. I hope to make it as me as possible. I intend to update the site with a few more of projects I have completed as well as accolades.

Looking forward. . .

The next steps of my project will require me to be discipline in my approach to successfully completing this project on time. I will need to revisit the elements of the project such as the proposal, the new media composing experiment, project portfolio, begin practicing how to give a in-class presentation, work on the project reflection and  begin writing parts of the abstract.

After careful examination of my current deliverables it is important that I include another HONY image, one with a female narrative. I think it would be interesting to see how individuals react to different types of stories on loss from a woman’s point of view.

Next Steps

The next steps of the project is to chart the success of the image on Instagram, Facebook and WordPress by how I define success which is taking into consideration the definition of success that I defined earlier. I really look forward to the new approach that I will take towards this project.

 

The Presentation

Can Anyone Recreate a Humans of New York Image?

 

Project Progress 2

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So far my project is coming along slowly but surely.

The person whose website I will be checking for the ranking is out until later this week so I decided to focus on my comparison report. In my effort to understand more about SEO, I decided instead of comparing the two mapping websites, I will compare City Tech and BMCC. It makes sense to use a site that I know rather than a random site. First of all, after opening up both websites, I will say that BMCC definitely looks more inviting. When trying to create traffic to a website, it is important to look nice. You really don’t need to spend a lot of money, just having intrinsic appeal matters as much if not more. And in reality, SEO is an ongoing effort that the more you do the better you become at it.

I decided to use the Side-by-Side SEO Comparison Tool by Internet Marketing Ninjas. This is a site that checks all links and images on a page and it compares two sites in a side-by-side report. At a glance, you can see how your page and a competitor’s page use keywords, how much text is on the page, and which keywords are used. This is invaluable competitive intelligence for SEOs.  Below is a breakdown of the components:

  • On-page analysis: Shows the number of words used on the page, including linked and unlinked text, as well as the number of links and page size.
  • Metadata tool: Displays text in the title tag, meta description and meta keywords tags
  • Headings: Displays text used in <h1> and <h2> tags
  • Keyword density tool: Reveals statistics for non-linked content
  • Link structure tool: Displays the number and types of links used for internal, subdomain, and external links
  • Page text tool: Shows both the total text and specific, non-linked text found on the pages
  • Source code tool: Provides quick access to on-page HTML code

The first comparison I ran was an on-page analysis. By entering the two URLs, I saw that CityTech had 163 words on the page and BMCC had 607. My take on this is that the more words on a page, the more chance of that page being found. Therefore, the more content on a page, the better the ranking. The more links a web page has, the higher it will typically rank on search engines. City Tech has 63 link words compared to BMCC which has 401. The biggest difference I noticed was that City Tech’s page size is 16,205 and BMCC’s page size is 54,156. However, I am not sure if the page size really matters although BMCC uses more of their page and it looks better.

So then I compared the head tag elements. The head tag contains the title tag and it’s important to the spiders or web crawlers. These are programs run by search engines to build a summary of a website’s content. They take web page content and create key search words for online users to use. In comparison, they are pretty similar so not much to discuss there.

The most interesting comparisons I found was the different in the amount to keywords used. I noticed that BMCC more than doubled the amount of keywords used than City Tech. It is good to use keywords but over stuffing too many keywords is not good either because it could send an alert which can negatively affect a ranking. I also noticed that City Tech has links to Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, LinkdIn, Instagram, and BMCC has links to all of them but they also a blog page that is linked to their first page.

So Monday, I logged onto dot.tk and attempted to create a free web page. I was directed to go the 2freehosting to create a domain and will find out tomorrow, Tuesday, to see if it worked.

After trying unsuccessfully to complete the free web page via dot.tk, I decided to create a WordPress account.

Wish me luck!

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My next step will be to continue to develop my WordPress blog using keywords and headings to optimize the site and also a larger comparison of CUNY sites.

Signed Off – Update as of 11/30

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The second week of this experiment was no different than the first; I found myself facing challenge after challenge. I can say that I did not expect to be facing this amount of loss. It actually feels like I have lost a part of myself. I think that this is exactly what withdrawal feels like, I am anxious, I have urges to constantly sign back on to my social networking sites, I am wondering constantly what is going on and what is it that I am missing out on. I do not know how to deal with this. Social networking sites for me have become a part of me; these sites fill me in instantly, create laughter for me, invoke both empathy and sympathy, bring me closer to friends in far places, and help me to present my best self. It seems as though the first week was easier because I had so many things to do. Now coloring is a task, and less relaxing because I know I am only doing it to replace what I really want to be doing. I want to be a part of that community because I need to know what is happening and that is the only reason why. I do not feel the need to share, or part take I just want to know what is happening with the people I follow. It is like a drug and I need to be a part of it.

I wrote that a few days before Thanksgiving and I must say that I thought I was losing it. It is only through retrospect that I was able to see how distract and truly subtractive my social media sites are. This was the first Thanksgiving in how many years that I can say I was able to completely submerge myself in what was happening within my household whole-heartedly. I was the leading chef in the kitchen instead of the being on my phone snapping away to share with people for instant gratification of a like or a comment. I felt myself for once being a true participant. I did not want to share this with anyone else, I did not want to capture through a lens, but capture it in my memory. I did not miss out on what was being said neither did I feel left out. What was so bizarre to me was that I did receive instant gratification. I saw my mothers’ eyes light up with admiration because I was able to prepare so much food, I saw satisfaction in my relatives’ faces with each bite, and I heard it with every compliment. It was a new experience and a new way to experience people and a holiday. I realized I did not care to share nor did I want to share with everyone this intimate moment because it was for me, for my eyes only; it was a moment that no one else would cherish as much as I would if I had made a post on either Facebook or Instagram.

The want and need to capture moments now meant something more for me. It was an opportunity to preserve a moment for a personal keepsake and not for the general public although if I choose to it could be. The moments captured unlike the ones aggregated on Twitter had more meaning. I felt something in each movement and there was a memory, a word, a laughter, a feeling associated with that particular video or picture. I believe this will affect my participation on my social networking sites because when I return I see my pictures in terms of likes but in terms of a moment—a captured gem; a preservation of a time that I may never be able to relive. This experience has been able to so far change my interpretation of what I want and need out of my social networking site and what I actually see them as.

In actuality, I cannot believe that this is the last leg of this experiment. I am sad to say, that in moving forward it has come to my realization that to adequately measure something of this sort there needs to be more time. I believe that the full effects, or the effects of which I am experiencing as of this moment are somewhat forced due to the limited time. It seems as though I am being pushed towards them because of a time constraint. In some ways I feel as though I am pushing myself to feel these alterations but I do not have a definite way of measure this against the time. However, whether I am forcing myself subconsciously or if in fact these are genuine effects of this experiment it has been an eye opening and learning experience. I have forced myself to see beyond how I am expected to present myself. I am beginning to experience my own wants and needs which are not based on those of others and societal expectations because I do not know what they are since I am not a part of that greater society that offers more opinion. I feel freer in a way because I know that my ideas being generated right now are not altered by others nor do they have a great expectation because I am not comparing them to what others are doing or saying. They are my own words of my own thought and I believe that there is something remarkable about that.

Deliverables for the coming week :

  1. As I am now winding down to the last leg of the project I will now begin to refine blog posts that were made to accompany both video and picture of the day posts.
  2. I will also begin to choose what videos and pictures I want to use specifically in the blog posts for last week.
  3. I also have to edit more videos for the final short video which I am putting together.
  4. I have also decided to cut out the aspect of interviewing colleagues which was proposed in my proposal.
  5. I also will also begin to capture videos and pictures for this weeks posts.

Progress Update 11/30

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Last week I outlined my success, shortcomings and plans for the next phase of the project. This week organization has gotten much better and so has picking and choosing content to engage with.

In terms of organizing i started screen shotting note worthy tweets as they happened rather than scrolling back. I created a separate folder on my phone as well as my desktop to store the information quick and easily. I’m finding this makes writing the progress update as well as the power point so much easier as a whole.

In terms of picking content I tried to stick to things that I had real opinions or feelings about because content with no meaning usually goes no place. I also found that evenings are the best time to tweet because they gain the most views. So i’ve been tweeting during the day but mainly engaging at night.

This weeks highlights

This week (albeit a short one) was more successful in terms of my content getting viewed. Though I haven’t gained many more followers my tweets gain more views per hour than they did last week. The most noted tweets this week came on friday the 27th after I tweeted out about Planned Parenthood in the wake of the tragedy in Colorado. I did not tweet directly at anyone or state a clear opinion I merely provided fact about the organization. In the first half hour alone these two tweets had gained 100+ views and engagements. tIMG_2751 IMG_2752

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To date this pair of tweets has been my most successful and I plan to implement this idea in the final week of my project. I thought this project would be a lot more difficult but I’m finding that its really not much different from what I usually did except now i’m doing it with an agenda or strategy and purpose. I think i’ve progressed nicely and I will have a decent amount of data to draw on for the final product.

Looking Ahead

This week will be the final leg of the project experiment phase. The last week will be about cross posting content from other sites to my twitter feed and though I have done this before I will focus on it more in addition to my hashtags and engagement strategies. Originally i was playing with the idea of using hoot suite or tweet deck but i’ve shied away from them because i want to stay genuine to the projects main focus which is twitter. I honestly did not like tweet deck and hoot suite takes a bit of getting used to and I don’t want to taint my projects results because I’m not familiar with the platform. SO! In the final week it will be a hashtagging, topic engaging and cross posting blitz. I hope to have enough data to compare to the sources I based my proposal on as well as the strategies I utilized. I will also break down my final results into categories instead of doing it by week. So far my main content engagement has been with trending topics so I need another week to balance it out.

UPDATE FOR 12/3

-live tweeting professionally (look for local event related to social media, digital, etc.) and compare to personal live tweeting, check analytics
-revisit 3rd party analytics for further insights (especially Hootsuite)
-play around with Jetpack (for analytics) for ePortfolio
-other efforts to increase engagement through social media (your work via Dept. of Education)
-analog efforts for branding, networking (e.g., business cards)

After meeting with Professor Belli I realized there are some important things i’ve been doing but neglecting to mention. So as mentioned last week and with Professor Belli I wanted to toy around with a third party app, I hated tweet deck but i’m going to give hoot suite another run and see if scheduling tweets makes a difference in my user engagement. Live tweeting is also something i’m looking to do but I havent yet found a program or event that fits in with my account or my time schedule so I may just do scheduling tweets as the last element of the project. Jetpack the plug in was pretty complicated and I havent yet gotten access to the instructions so i’ve let it be for now for the sake of time.

Other related elements that i’ve been creating are, business cards to promote my accounts and my brand and i’ve been asked to help manage the NYC DOE district 21 twitter account, which I created for them last week. By applying some of the strategies to that account i’m hoping to be able to get them decent recognition and foot traffic.

Download (PPTX, 1016KB)

 

(POWER POINT NOT YET UPDATED 12/2)

Self Reflection

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The project so far has been a process of constant revision. As of the last class I have created clear guidelines as to how I will define the key points of the process.

Definitions

The key to analyzing the success of the project will be in the definition of successful branding. Successful branding will be considered remaining authentic and transparent throughout the entirety of the development process. The goal is to create content for the benefit of the brand and not to bring foot traffic.

Guidelines

  1. Audience interaction will be measured to objectively view how others interact with my brand.
  2. Daily content must be produced for the purpose of furthering the brand. Any content not directly related to the brand is not considered authentic and therefore unsuccessful.
  3. Blog posts will be daily starting 11/24 and a weekly vlog describing each day’s style will be posted on Sundays.

This past week has pushed me to go beyond my usual process and constantly revise and revisit my work. While I am creating and editing my blogs, I constantly go back to my initial research and question whether I am being authentic. While I want my blog to be consistent with the guidelines that are set, I would like to make my brand appealing. The balance between authenticity and appeal is my internal dilemma.

I am not satisfied with my progress at this point but I am working towards progressing. In the coming week my goal is to post at least 5-6 times on Twitter a day. Since incorporating hash tags in my posts, I have gotten mentioned on the official Dove account. There have also been 5 more views to my blog over the weekend. The hash tag  “natural hair” has been a key aspect of how I have been promoting my brand and it has gotten some attention on Instagram.Over the Thanksgiving break I will be posting consistently.

It’s All a Work in Progress.

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The project so far has been both an outward search, and an insightful inner task. I have had to rely on the research articles in this part of the project to tell me what to expect in regard to what effects such as detachment and worry. I did not imagine that it would be as bad as it is. The first day of Friday the 20th was not as bad because most of it was spent in work, however, when I went on break I found myself lost. I had nothing to do but eat my lunch. I paid attention to the food, the way it tasted, the colors and smells of the food. It was a new experience because I could not remember the last time I looked at the food that was going into my mouth. Most times I am staring at my phone busily scrolling through what seems like an endless feed. I also noticed that the time went a lot slower. Thirty minutes felt like an hour. It is amazing how quickly I was able to gauge the changing sense of time. I was able to give an account for where my minutes went instead of mindlessly wondering if I had really just spent 4 hours scrolling and re-blogging on Tumblr without noticing it.

The second thing Processed with VSCOcam with c1 presetI noticed about myself was the constant worry about what I was missing out on. As a guilty pleasure I read, “The Shade Room” (TSR), a celebrity blog that gives updates about trending celebrity stories. I have grown attached and soothed by this blog. It has been my way to unwind after a long days’ work or school. For the past four days however I have been lost and it worries me. I am worried that I will have to catch up on so much and I will also miss out so much. I have no idea what is going on and I have had to find a new ways to deal with my new time—coloring. In four days I have reassigned and invested my time in more creative outlets. I have never colored so much since the fourth grade but although it does occupy my time I still find myself worrying about missing out on some outrageous seflies or videos.

I have also noticed my ability to pay more attention to smaller IMG_3455things. I notice the people around me, words on the wall, and even the objects on the ground. These things which I have gone months without noticing because my head would be buried in my phone; scrolling through social media. My attention to detail has caused me to become not only more aware of the things I do but the manner in which I do them. I pay more attention because I am not being drawn to or constantly stopping to check my SNS. I am more interested and invested in people and their stories because I have nothing to distract me with.

The last effect of this experiment that I have noticed is that I am relearning how to use my iPhone (who knew there was more to it than my SNS apps). I am more cautious of what I do and how I do it on my phone. Since Friday I have downloaded games, and photo editing apps that allow me to take advantage more of what the phone h
as to offer. I have been taking advantage of my camera and all that it has to offer. I have also noticed that when I take a picture now I take it not for the ‘likes’ but for a purpose. I have found an interest and enjoyment in taking photos that I never knew before. I would before this experiment take a picture for the sole purpose of posting it and seeing people like it or share it; now I find pleasure in capturing a moment for myself and no one else.

So far I thiIMG_3565nk that I have been able to capture videos and pictures that represent these feelings and effects. In moving I plan on continuing to capture more videos and pictures of the day that represent and coincide with the blog post that goes along with it.  I also plan on starting to put my short video together for the final presentation as to give myself enough time to edit.

Lastly, moving away from the project, I have too beeIMG_3575n working on my e-portfolio site as which will house the final project piece. I have been working hard on ‘The Sliding Doors’ theme and I believe I am finding some success.

I ask that anyone if willing take a look and give me some feedback. Feel free to ask any questions that you may have about the project so far. I hope you will be able to enjoy the finished item.