this is why:
Do I know David Marriott? No. But I went to his blog because it looked interesting to me. Based on my interests and friends of friends’ blogs, this came up. If you want people to discover and read your blog, this is one great way to do it, and reach a more targeted audience.
Blogged with Flock
Tags: facebook, blogs, blogfriends, socialnetwork
The Linguist: Dad? what is Patrick?
Me: What?
The Linguist: What is Patrick? on SpongeBob? (disclosure: she does not watch SpongeBob at home, only at the IKEA play room, and sees it at Swiss Chalet on the kids menu placemat and toys)
Me: Umm, I think he might be a starfish?
The Linguist: Yeah, I think you’re right. He does kind of look like a starfish. And Squidward, he looks like a squid, with all his legs! (wiggles her fingers) How come SpongeBob and Squidward have names that say what they are, but Patrick doesn’t? Actually, Patrick and Gary just have regular names, like Gary our neighbour, but SpongeBob and Squidward have names with the kind of animal they are. Why is that, I wonder?
Me: Uhhh, I’m not sure, honey.
Blogged with Flock
It’s been over a week now. A week of no pull ups. A week of numerous trips to the bathroom, but a week of no pull ups nonetheless. Wow. Both of our kids are out of diapers, finally.
It’s strange, it’s a day that we as parents look forward to, but it means our little ‘babies’ are growing up. So with only a little sadness I celebrate no more pull ups. Next… first day of school (2 weeks and 2 days to go!)
So almost as quick as I started a YouTube account, I’m abandoning it. Well, not exactly, but I’m not going to be posting a lot of recent videos there. You see, I’m concerned about privacy, and about my children. Now, it may seem that personal blogging and privacy are pretty much at odds with each other, but when it comes to my kids, I feel that I should be more cautious than I have been. So I’ve been thinking of a privacy ‘best-practice’, if you will, regarding images and videos of my kids online. How should I manage my kids’ online presence?
Some Thoughts:
1. Random strangers shouldn’t be able to easily find my kids’ images or videos.
This means that you won’t be seeing videos here on the blog. Sorry. I get enough random hits from all over the world that I need to change how I use this space. If I put videos on YouTube, they are essentially open. I know there’s a privacy feature, but it’s limited to 25 friends, which doesn’t work for me. Vimeo lets me specify exactly who I want seeing what video. As their tagline goes: “Because everyone shouldn’t see everything.”
My spaces for safely adding random strangers are twitter, pownce, and virb.
2. If we know each other, you should be able to access images and videos without major hurdles.
For this reason, I’m going to put the current 5 videos on Facebook, and the rest on Vimeo. I’m pretty much only adding people that I know on Facebook, or that I’ve started some kind of meaningful conversation with. And I’ll be letting them know about Vimeo too. Thankfully, it’s dead easy and super fast to sign up on Vimeo, so it shouldn’t be too much of a hurdle. Facebook for the current 5, Vimeo for the complete archives.
I’m also transitioning my children’s pictures onto Facebook as well, and will keep my kids’ Flickr site family and friends only. This way everything’s a little more protected.
3. My kids’ videos shouldn’t show up next to NSFW or inappropriate content. A “G” rating all around would be appropriate.
Another strike against YouTube. I can’t control what shows up around my kids videos when you view them on the page.
4. What’s done is done.
I’m not going to go back and remove all the pictures that I’ve previously posted here, as I think that would seriously compromise the blog. But as time marches inexorably onward, and as the kids are at an age where they are changing month by month, I’ll be ok with those old pictures being on here.
I hope I’m not being paranoid. I would like to think that honesty and openness are still commodities that are traded here. And I would like to believe that there are more good people than bad people in this world. But I just need to be a little more careful, for my own peace of mind.
Blogged with Flock
One of the other reasons I activated a YouTube account was to have a place to upload all the videos that I plan on taking now that I got a new digital camera I bought my DW a new digital camera. Heh. I ended up with a Canon A570IS, which I got as much for it’s video capabilities as it’s photographic capabilities. It’s able to do 640×480 video at 30fps until your memory card is full, or the video clip reaches one hour, whichever comes first. Since I just got an 8GB card today (he he) I should be able to do 2 hours of video. That’s crazy.
Why use a digital camera for video instead of a camcorder? I like it because there’s no tapes to get jammed, or mistracking, or anything like that. It’s quick to transfer to the computer to edit, instead of having to transfer it in real time like you do with a camcorder. (I’m assuming a tape based camcorder like MiniDV. If you have a hard drive based camcorder it’s a different story) No moving parts to break down. Takes much better stills than a camcorder does. The only downside is there’s no optical zooming during video, you have to zoom to where you want before you shoot. The stabilization does wonders for shaky video, it almost feels like a SteadiCam. Well, not quite (sorry to all you SteadiCam operators out there, I didn’t mean to offend you). But it’s pretty steady.
Now I just have to remember to hold the camera level, and my videos will be great!
