As a concept test, I have created this Journals board. Every UER member is allowed to create one thread, in which they may post journal entries. Only the member who created the thread is allowed to post in it.

Please title your thread in such a way that it is easy to identify. Please place your name at the beginning of the Journal, so that alphabetic sorting can find it.

Good:
Kowalski's Journal
MacGyver's Thoughts & Personal Details

Bad:
my journal
the place for stuffs
the journal of John

This effort is an attempt to get people to tell more stories about where they go, so it's easier to keep an eye on your favourite explorer and learn about what they do in a day. Kind of like blogs, except this should be UE related.

Add new entries into your journal by using the "Reply" button. Don't use "modify" because this will not update the Read States.

Note: You may reply to this thread with suggestions and comments.

I'm too lazy to check, sorry... but is this area viewable to unregistered visitors and search engines, or just registered members?

This is a cool idea, but may I suggest being able to have a list of "favourite" journals so you don't have to look through the gigantic (well, once it becomes gigantic) list? Just some way of knowing when your favourite explorer updates.

I will start one soon.

Muahahahahhahaha!

The entire site isn't visible to search engines, and hasn't been for months.

Anyway, may I direct you to the "Favourites" feature in your web browser, which allows you to bookmark pages you like, Tux?

-av

Posted by Avatar-X Bad: Freak's Freak-O-Rama my journal

Oh, just for that I'm starting one called "Freak's Evil Clone World-Domination Log"

Nice. I'll start a journal as soon as I explore something.

Might be nice to comment on it, maybe have the comments inlined or something so people can say stuff, but not be confused with the authers journal entries...

Please do not create a journal until you have something to say.

-av

very cool.

I don't see why we can't name them whatever we want, within reason. As long as it has the person's name somewhere in the title, we all know its a journal. I see nothing wrong with Freak's Freak-o-Rama or Freak's Evil Clone World-Domination Log. Allow the creativity to flow Av!

Yeah I wanted mine to be Asylunt's Fear and Loathing in Minneapolis.

Then it magically changed to the boring drab Asylunt's Journal.

Eh, nice feature, and I understand it's in the test stages, but yeah, what Bizzy said, let the creativity flow.

Asylunt

I still say there should be comments. Whats the point of posting your adventures if theres no listening ears to talk about them with? How do you even know anyone reads your journal if theres no way for anyone to reply? Doesn't it make you question your very existance?! Well, maybe not that far, but who knows...

People can easily PM you their thoughts.

Damn, if only Wrabbit was still around.... I would've loved to see his journal


Could we post about anything in our journals? providing it doesn't violate the forum rules...

Hmm, you know Av, the comments feature isn't that bad of an idea. I know you don't like it and I'm not begging for it, but it could be something you could add in the future when you have time.

Asylunt

I don't think it's that he doesn't like the idea, necessarily. I know, as a fellow programmer, that it can be a pain in the ass to write the code for something like that sometimes.

IMO, if you want a full-featured blog, shell out a couple bucks a month and host a blog somewhere, instead of going on about all the knifty features Av's free doohickey doesn't offer. The URL at the top of the page is uer.ca, not liveuejournal.com.

But that's just me.

I think it'd be an interesting experiment to have some kind of UE blog portal. There are lots of blogs and livejournals written by explorers who sometimes talk about exploring... having all that content amalgamated into one interface (why not UER.ca?) would be awesome.

I think though, Av, if you're serious about this journal thing, you oughta do AvJournal and integrate it into the site. The thread thing can work, but i don't think it's ideal. Now that I've had more time to think about it, I'll probably code up my own blog.

maybe this should go under the encyclopedia since it's UE related? just a thought!

I appreciate the idea of not allowing others to reply to the journal entries. Its a sanctuary where we can share our thoughts, experiences or personal stories without a thread denegrating into yet another bash festival. Too much of that happens already.

The journal concept is a nice new feature overall I'd have to say. Often there are times when something comes up during exploring that is interesting, but doesn't quite fit in to any of the already-existing forum threads. The journals would be a perfect venue for such stuff.

Plus, as Avatar points out - its a cool way of simply keeping others up-to-date with ongoing exploits and such. Undoubtedly there are many 'armchair UErs' out there (for one reason or another) who experience places vicariously, and quite possibly develop regard for a favorite UEer (sorry, no autographs please <kidding>).

I hope this new feature endures. Its a great addition to the UER website.


Silent Knight

I think people could produce creative, innovative blogs and sites with real personality if they did it themselves instead of relying on this site's location database and this new journaling board.

It's generous of Av to offer these features to people who are too lazy or too computer illiterate to establish projects of their own, but I really don't understand the general drive to amalgamation and centralizaton. The template-driven, fill-in-the-blanks (and you had better damn well fill in those blanks correctly!) style encouraged here is bound to diminish or kill off any passion, creativity and innovation people might otherwise have brought to their sites.

These journals might be fine, but they can't be great under these conditions. Who can feel passionate about a mere thread on someone else's board? Do it yourself, if you can. Diversity is good.

Ninj
http://www.infiltration.org