Windowsill

I decided to wait until my retrospective section at the end to add hyperlinks. I think this type of writing needs to give the reader the experience of being there, so taking them off on web surfing side trips seemed unwise.

I mention in my intro remarks that I intentionally avoided researching the speaker or the background before my live blog of the event. I thought about referring those who were interested in background material to the retrospective section, but again didn’t want to take people out of the experience that early on. So, my compromise was to allude to the presence of background material that would come later. This seemed like a chicken or egg dilemma, so I am still uncertain if this was the best strategy.

The retrospective section features all the hyperlinks and so acts as a footnotes section. My hyperlinks focused on the topics that were brought up in the event, and focused on people and places that have significance to our subjects of study. I also struggled with what type of material to link to. I mostly used Wikipedia material, because it is so objective and concise and because its open source nature applies to the topic at hand.

I also considered downloading the podcasts from Ibiblio and placing the download link directly on my blog, but I determined that the Ibiblio servers would probably be quicker and the secondary link wouldn’t be too much effort to use. Since the links appear at the end of my post, I allowed the links to load in the same page. I struggle with the pros and cons of new windows for links a lot lately.

Another decision I struggled with was the inclusion of photos. I am still considering adding them after the fact (hopefully this doesn’t violate blogging etiquette). In this case, the photos aren’t that compelling or unique. They include shots of the outside of the building, the filled auditorium, the speaker and the audience. However, I do think the visuals would help to bring in a sense of time and place and would break up the text heavy presentation. Maybe I will add a couple as a compromise.

As for formatting, I didn’t see much occasion for bulleted lists, and I didn’t feel sure that breakout quotes would make sense in a live event blog. This assignment was a real learning experience, as it was my first try at covering a live event.