Frankly, I’m still withholding judgment on the news. Here’s why:

This reminds me of when I used to work for this one company who was into buying other websites (mostly looking to buy communities). Rather, the owner was into buying websites because of their communities, the owner who didn’t develop the network, but instead bought it. Mind you, he had a good thing going there, with one cash cow website, but I’m digressing.

(FYI: I don’t work for 9Rules, I’m a member of the network. Independent in every way shape and form.)

Anyway, so a few months after getting hired the owner ended up buying this website for people with an “addiction” to overclocking their computers. Great site, great content, spectacular community, beautiful design (for the time)…

…but it wasn’t a smooth transition.

Right away a lot of people in the crowd were displeased. In fact, we were about to have an exodus from the community, rendering the property almost totally worthless because not only would the hardcore readers and those who interacted be gone, but also because that site had it set up so that site authors and forum moderators were pretty much one and the same. No community meant no mods stayed meant no authors wrote articles. As editor-in-chief of the site, that would be very bad for me, especially since the owner still expected that the site would post with the same frequency as before. To resolve this, I ended up calling ALL of the moderators/authors during non-business hours. (I can very specifically remember a call made during a movie outing with my family.) Considering a lot of these calls were to Canada, this wasn’t exactly cheap, made worse by the fact that I was never reimbursed for these calls.

Anyway, long story short, it was a struggle, but eventually the site started churning out stories again. Then the site’s format was changed. Again, revolt then exodus, then peace. Then the owner up and changed the layout of the site; another exodus, another revolt, and even some hacking attempts from members of a rival website made up of ex-overclocking addicts (now they were hardware wizards). Eventually there was this whole truce made and some fake FBI threats from the network owner, and… Well, anyway, it got messy, then clean again. Then website name was changed to something that previously belonged to an NC-17 site (with a logo to match), and that led to a bunch of jokes, followed by another name change which didn’t match the content at all: the owner now wanted consumer tech (phones, PDAs, cameras, etc) instead of what the community was there for, which was tweaking PCs to perform at their best. Another exodus, another revolution, and then an infusion of new(bie) blood, which was good for the owner, bad for anyone wanting to do more than babysit.

Seriously, this was one of the most botched takeovers I had ever seen, and I had by that time already seen a few.

So where’s this whole messy story taking us? Back to the 9Rules takeover. My experience with this kind of buyout hasn’t been good. Last time I was on the other side of things, and saw how different the public and private personas of the owner were. Online he was great, though he sometimes acted like an 8 year old boy on a tantrum. Offline he was a drunk, manipulative bastard who sometimes acted like an 8 year old boy on a tantrum. As you can guess, given my experience, I don’t exactly trust the new ownership yet. I don’t really have any reason to, but other than my own hangups I also don’t have any reason not to.

Good luck to the Triad on their future endeavors, and thanks for what was put together.

As for SplashMedia, well all I can promise is that I’ll stick around, see what happens, see how things change, and work to make the best out of this situation.

Quality.

Recent events

I started examining that aspect of my work after a few recent events: a couple of recent posts in blogs and forums, and the cancellation of an appointment.

First, there was a post by my favorite mommy blogger, Melissa, who questioned whether she should keep blogging past this year (and the ensuing followup). There she said something most of us don’t really have the guts to say, to ourselves or out loud, though anyone who’s blogged consistently for more than a few months has come across:

I’m running out of things to say that I think really matter

As a blogger, that’s one of the most important things to keep in mind. What happens when you no longer believe that what you say really matters? (If you want to see where I stand on that, read the first post, then read my overtly verbose comment in that post.)

The second thing that got me thinking was a question asked by Scrivs in the 9Rules Members forum:

This is something that I think about at times and the question basically is would you take yourself out of 9rules because you know that your content is slipping? How many of you know that your content isn’t what it used to be, but convince yourselves that you will pick it back up eventually?

I suppose even Camelot has its errant knights.

Along with that question came this link which asks about original blogging, and why it’s so difficult. Fact is, if you’ve never run a blog you don’t know how challenging it can be to keep content coming on a steady basis. If you have or do run a blog, then I’m sure you can appreciate where I’m coming from. And through all this comes the question of quality.

Speaking of which, recently 9Rules celebrated the conclusion to Submission Round 6, which netted some excellent, phenomenal blogs like Novelr, Dumb Little Man, and Newly Ancient. I’ll be honest, the quality of these entrants made me wonder whether I should re-apply for my membership, in order to ensure that my quality really is to the level it should be. Unfortunately, this type of judgment isn’t one I can always makes subjectively. I am, after all, human, with and ego, with insecurities, with hopes, fears, dreams and doubts. So why didn’t I? Because I still believe I’m good enough. But to alleviate any fears, I started working on improving my quality, not just here, but in all areas of my life.

How much is too much?

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a bit of a perfectionist. Mind you, not everything has to be perfect, but I’m always wondering about what I bring to the table in terms of quality. Not just in blogging (though it is supremely important to me), but in all I do. Whenever I write a script, I wonder about it. Whenever I’m working on a Visio diagram, it’s the foremost thing on my mind. Whenever I write a short story, or set up a computer system or do anything which will eventually affect anyone else — especially something to which my name will be attached — I think about quality.

But with all this wondering about whether or not something is of quality, I’m often left wondering “how much is too much?”

The simple answer, I believe, would go something like this: Use the law of diminishing returns as your guide. If you’re working harder and harder to attain increasingly smaller gains, then maybe you should call it quits. But then this raises another question: even if you’re getting diminishing returns, will that extra bit of quality make the difference? Conventional wisdom says “no”: if your work can’t stand without it then there’s a problem with the rest of the work, not with that bit. Unconventionally, one could argue that the extra bit of quality is what makes the difference between great and memorable, between that which is held in high esteem and that by which all others are judged. I suppose that’s why Hemingway was so picky about his sentences. (If you go according to popular folklore, Hemingway would spend days ensuring that a line was just right.)

Between two masters

For the past week, I’ve been working on a project for work, one on which a major contract depends. Due to its importance, I’ve treated everything for this is with utmost import, focusing on both the speed (due to an approaching headline) and, more importantly, the quality with which it is accomplished, to the point where it’s less important for me to go home on time than it is to get things done just right.

The funny thing about quality is that if you’re working hard on something, something else usually has to suffer. Because of this project, during the week I had to cancel an appointment. I hated doing it because it was so very last minute. I despise when people cancel on me last minute, and I despise even more when I have to do it to others, since what suffers there is often the quality of my word. But I couldn’t help thinking — after the fact, unfortunately — that I could have gotten away with doing a little less in the way of quality for the project in order to keep my appointment. On one hand, I had a project which needed to be finished. On the other, I had an appointment to keep. Had I hurried the project, I could have kept my appointment. The work would have been good, mind you. Not great, but good. Instead, I decided to go for the gold, so I sat there, reviewing what I had written and touching up the illustrations which had been made, in order to ensure that whatever work I turned in, whatever was associated with me, would also be associated with excellence. The price of this was, of course, a tarnish to someone’s idea of my accountability. Was it worth it?

In feudal Japan, if a samurai had two masters, and he received conflicting orders from each, he would instead choose death, so that he would not disgrace either, nor disgrace his name or family. I didn’t have two masters, but I can’t say I didn’t feel the convergence of two conflicting orders forcing me to sacrifice a part of myself. Had I a sword I wouldn’t have used it for seppuku or anything, but maybe I would have poked myself with it.

The next day, I returned to find a complement from the project leader on the work I’d done the day before, specifically referencing something I could only have accomplished by staying late. While the complement was good and all, I can’t help wondering whether it really made a difference, and whether the price paid for that was too high.

A search, a hindrance

Often times, when I don’t post for a while, it’s not because I’m not writing. It’s because I’m writing and I’m completely dissatisfied with the product. I write stories, short ideas, little funny quips… none of which satisfy. At those points I can’t help but wonder whether I’m simply writing a lot of crap or whether I’m being too hard on myself. (You know, like when you’re at a forum and want to reply in a thread, but don’t feel you have anything interesting to say, so you write a reply out anyway and then decide not to press “Submit” because you don’t think it’s any good. Wait, does that happen to anyone else?) I’ve seen that happen lately. A lot. And it’s getting annoying. But what can I do?

When does the search for quality become a hindrance? When it brings you to a grinding halt? Could be. Then again, maybe “searching for quality” is an excuse to be lazy.

As for that Fark post, maybe I’ll just post it in a forum somewhere, and if it isn’t any good, then it isn’t.

Update: Time’s up on the 9Rules submissions. If you submitted, good luck.

First, if you’re reading this through an RSS reader, you’ll notice you now get the full post, instead of seeing the (more…) link. That’s because I’ve updated to the latest version of WordPress. Fear me, or something. Better yet, enjoy never having to actually visit this site to get what you’d actually come here for in the first place. I mean, let’s face it, you’re not here for the design, right?

Speaking of design, I’ve added a little widget to the sidebar titled “This Came Across My RSS Reader And I Think You Should Read It”. Basically its a list of five recently “shared” posts from my own RSS reader (Google Reader), stuff I think you’d benefit from reading either because it’s important or interesting. The title links lead you to the site of origin, the name of the site leads you to the homepage of that site, and the link at the bottom that says “Read More…” takes you to my Google Reader Shared Items page. I’m starting to [Heart] Google Reader.

Finally, for those of you bloggers who read this (I’m guessing that’s the bulk of you), you may be interested to know that May 7 is the first of three scheduled submission dates for joining the 9Rules network. (As I write this it’s May 6, so tomorrow.) This is affectionately known as Round 6. (Gnorb.NET became a very proud member of the 9Rules network on December of 2006.) To quote one Kamigoroshi, of Footsteps in the Mirror:

Since this is pretty much a blink-and-you-miss event, try not to blink and try not to miss it. The last time they had it, out of 1190 blogs that applied to join 9rules, only about less than 10% made it through to become members. That’s something to think about should you decide to join the community, being the best of the independent web.

So there you have it, the news for the evening. Now, back to your regularly scheduled reading.

This new version of 9R has been redesigned so that the usage experience becomes both more personal and more community oriented. I will warn you, though, the site’s deep. Very deep, lots of pages. In fact, I’d almost say it’s less of a site and more of an online application for information gathering and discussion. This makes it all the cooler.

Anyway, go check it out. If nothing else, it’s a great place to find awesome content. Lots of good business, personal development, science, politics, commentary, and writing blogs.

Disclaimer: Gnorb.NET is a proud member of the 9Rules Community of sites.

If you’ve been reading for a while you know that my posting frequency has diminished from a high of five (and sometimes more) posts per week to a paltry weekly posting. The reason for this is multi-fold, but it really boils down to a few big reasons:

1. I’m looking for better quality. See, while I like writing and posting stories here, I’ve come to realize that in order for me to really be able to show the site off to others (potential clients and advertisers, for example) as something more than the basic ramblings of a self absorbed, pale faced fat man behind a keyboard, I have to do little things like proof read. Mind you, for the stuff I post here the first draft is usually the near-final: it’s not often I read through a post and reorganize thoughts, eliminate superfluous words, or look to create a better flow for the story. Still, I take care to re-read, at least once, what I have written so as to ensure that what comes out doesn’t make me sound like an ignorant jackass.

   But that’s one of the things that have recently started to change. I’ve actually started the habit of writing something, saving it, and reading it later. I’ve come to the frightening realization that most of my first drafts are, while not utter crap, sadly amateur at best. In short, one of the reasons for the lack of frequent updates is the direct result of my search for better quality.

2. Often, I feel like interacting with others, so I post on other sites, like 9Rules, Pownce, and other social services. (The results of that can be seen on the sidebar, in the “Random Thoughts” section.) I guess I’ve never been self involved enough to hold a one-way conversation with the ether, especially without allowing it the courtesy of an answer, which is why I leave comments on. Lucky for me, this feature is finally getting used on a fairly regular basis by about three or four people, and a few others somewhat sparingly. Still, sometimes, more often than not, it feels like a one way conversation. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not here begging for comments: the fact is that many of my posts just don’t lend themselves to commentary. Also, there are few blogs that really get a lot of comments. Nevertheless, I appreciate the readership all the same. (On the bright side, my AdSense numbers aren’t all that bad, but frankly I’ll take a good conversation over a penny from ads any day.)
3. I’m spreading my writer’s wings. Or fingers. Or… whatever. With my foray into the world of literary fiction, I’m starting to make it a point to write stuff that I intend to either sell or give away as advertisement. Unfortunately, this means that a lot of what I write — namely, a lot of the short stories — don’t make their way here, since a clause for publication is usually that these stories not be published anywhere else. Of course, that’s had me thinking about using this site as a place where I put my stuff I either can’t sell or don’t consider marketable, but doesn’t that then defeat the purpose of #1? True, it probably doesn’t, and I’m probably just being a chicken about posting fiction. But the fact remains that I’m not all that comfortable with it.

So that’s the short of it: looking for higher quality, lower stuff quality going somewhere else, and looking to write in other places.

You know, considering I’ve been writing professionally since around 2000, it’s a bit surprising I’m still thinking like this. Then again, maybe this is all part of the continual improvement cycle. Or maybe it just has to do with my life’s focus changing from what I had to do to what I’m supposed to do.

A story about a young Puerto Rican boy growing up in the city of Tampa and overcoming cultural differences.

And here’s a clip:

Like everyone else that comes to the States, I thought that people here spoke only English, lived in either Disney World and New York, wore jeans and denim jackets and sunglasses, break danced, and ate nothing but hamburgers and pizza. Well, heck, except for the English, the Disney World/New York thing, I was pretty much an American-by-proxy: I watched all the movies, wore all the clothes, and ate all the deliciously fattening McFood. I even tried my hand at break dancing, though that failed rather miserably. And I, like the rest of the world, got my chance to make fun of Americans for being… well, Americans.

The site’s run by fellow 9Rules member Andrew Eglinton, who also runs the London Theatre Blog, and his brother, Alan. Both wanted to create a site where Americans could share stories about the US in their own words, stories which the mass media wouldn’t cover because they may not be flashy, and to show the 90% of America overshadowed by Hollywood and foreign policy.

The idea for the site came after their first visit across the pond. From their About page:

American without ever having been to the United States. American without ever having met an American person face to face. More intimate with America than perhaps with our own native England. But soon came the New Millennium, and with it a great shock. We had reached maturity and had begun to think for ourselves. And in analyzing our youth, we had grown critical of America: it was all a construct, a figment of some wealthy Hollywood director’s imagination, a lie greater than the myth of Santa Claus! – And indeed the source of our malaise. We had built the foundations of our youth on an imaginary land and the cracks were beginning to show.

In 2004 I was fortunate to travel to the US for the first time. It was all too brief a visit that took me to a few cities along the North-East coast: New York, Philadelphia and Washington DC. But in the space of that week and as writer and friend, Patrick Judd, has described it, “all the clichés were at once confirmed and rejected”.

(By the way, Andrew, I just realized that I borrowed that “American by proxy” line from you. Great descriptor, though.)

The site is open to submissions, so if you feel like you have a story to share, drop them a line. You don’t need to be a professional writer. You don’t need to invent or embroider, just tell it like it is. And you certainly don’t need to write a novel, since most of the entires they look for should be between 500 and 1500 words, with videos and pictures also accepted. (I must confess that, in my verbosity, I sinned and wrote a 2500 word monster. Mia culpa, mia culpa, mia big time culpa.)

Again the site’s CallingAmerica.co.uk. Check it out. And read my article. You’ll like it.

Edit: I just realized how well timed this is. In the article, I talk about Tampa’s pirate history. Turns out that today is (once again) International Talk Like A Pirate Day. Hurray!

True, I haven’t been in college since 2002. Yet the rituals of dead week — lack of shaving, burying myself inside my headphones, staying up and working until the whites of my eyes have gone pink — are apparently still there for me to turn to during times of great pressure. At work, we’re getting towards the end of a software release. At home, I’ve been feeling the pressure to finish up my novel. My family’s been requiring more time from me for technical reasons. And of course my blog needs updating.

Notice something about that list? Blogging’s at the bottom of the list. That’s because by the time I’m done with the first three items, I feel like I’m out of words. The funny part is that I have a few posts here with wonderful ideas in them, I just can’t seem to find the drive to finish them. There’s the one about Bookwise in Boca Raton; one about buying hurricane supplies in preparation of Hurricane Dean, or “H. Dean (D-estruction), as I so mockingly named it (you politicos should get that one); one about Dell’s adoption of Linux and the development cycles of Ubuntu; one about how sci-fi killed sci-fi; one about parallel cashless economies, a story challenge titled “Instant Cowboy: Just Add Water”, for which I’ve yet to develop a good plot (I have a notion which I’ll eventually turn into a concept which I might just turn into an idea), etc. I keep viewing and reviewing them, making notes of things to add, deleting superfluous passages… and yet there they sit, in the queue, waiting to see the light of day. All 27 of them

Am I being too picky? Probably. But then, I guess putting a self-imposed limit on the number of words in my articles (I don’t like to make them under 500 or over 4,000) and my increasingly stringent eye towards substantive quality (if not editorial) has been a two edged sword. On the one hand, I’m much happier with the quality of posts I put out. On the other, I’m increasingly dissatisfied with the amount of posting I’ve been doing. Here, at least. If you go to 9Rules Notes you’ll see I put up a lot of stuff there, mostly because I tend not to get as many comments here as I do there. (That, I suppose, is simply a function of the sites’ differing readership numbers.) Of course, that content is of generally lower quality, probably because I’m more comfortable posting a one paragraph note there than I am in doing the same here. (Honestly, can you remember the last time I put up a one paragraph note?)

But back to the main point: I haven’t been posting a lot because I’ve been busy with work, family, and “outside commitments” (a term encompassing everything about my writing life not related to my job or this blog, like other blogs I write on but don’t tell you about). Sorry about that. I’ll start posting more again soon, I promise. I’ll even start posting some of the short stories I’ve been writing, about the instant cowboys and killer hurricanes, and some of the writing analysis I’ve been working on. For now, it’s just this, which I promise I won’t save to post later (because I’ll then likely just forget it). As for the rest… I blame dead week.

As a child…
It was night. My best friend, Fabitin, and my cousin, Jesus, were engaged in a basketball that I found absolutely no interest in. While I wanted to play with them, I didn’t particularly care to take part in the game. As a 6 year old I was short, fat, and frankly much more interested in my little red T-Bird convertible than losing again to either — or worse, both! — of them. Of course, this time the court was my front driveway, which didn’t matter at all except for the slight, 5-degree incline between where I sat and the road.

The game had no timer, not set score at which victory would be declared, and no real rules other than the usual “no hitting, biting, or using weaponry”. Heck, there really wasn’t even a boundary, other than maybe the grass and the road. Realizing this, I decided to give the game an end point (after which I would most certainly gain two new playmates) and announced “OK, when the car rolls on to the basketball court the game ends. OK?” I presumed their lack of acknowledgment meant that they understood, and felt no need to waste time responding.

A few minutes later, having grown weary of watching them play (and of being alone), I triumphantly rolled the little red car down the driveway, did my imitation of that obnoxious buzzer at the end of basketball games, and watched as they both paid just enough attention to the car so as to not step on it. They just kept playing.

This was about the time when I decided that maybe they didn’t want to play with me, so I took my little red car, now parked safely on that little dip between the driveway and the road, and went inside to… well, I don’t remember what, I just remember going inside. (I was 6, remember? I wasn’t exactly remembering much those days.)

As an adult…
A few years ago, I was responsible for creating contests in order to increase readership at a few websites and a magazine. Unlike in the basketball court, the response was surprisingly… meager. Not only was the announcement not acknowledged, the contests were pretty much ignored. In fact, winners were usually that by default.

When I was given the position of Community Leader for the Commentary community over at 9Rules I decided to come up with a way to stimulate readership (and commentary) throughout the community by introducing a contest (The CCCC) where I could grant the best note over the course of a week in the commentary community three, then six points. (At that time six points could be considered a bonanza.) Having failed miserably so many times before, I was confident that I could come up with something now. I mean, you can only fail so many times before you succeed, right?

I spent a week studying similar contests with similar communities and eventually came up with a set of rules and regulations, none of which involved a plastic T-Bird rolling down my driveway. This one not only failed, it failed spectacularly: not one person entered.

You know, after writing this I sort of feel like the King of the Swamp in Monty Python’s Search for the Holy Grail, who related his history so: “When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that’s what you’re going to get, Lad, the strongest castle in all of England.” Of course, none of my contests have yet stayed up, but I’m sure that’ll change. Eventually. If I just keep at it. Right?

If I can’t run one…
Anyway, so what’s the point in all this? Well, about a week ago, fellow 9Ruler Ben Gillbanks put up a contest on one of his blogs, Binary Moon, the Binary Moon Links Competition. The contest is simple: write a post about a Binary Moon post, then link it there. — which is exactly what you’re reading right now.

Now, Ben also runs a number of other sites, the most interesting of which for the sake of this post is Binary Joy. While the Ben’s contest has nothing directly to do with that site, indirectly it does.

Think about it: the guy runs a site where he writes news and reviews about games. He comes up with the contest which is not only incredibly simple, it’s also chock-full of rewards, for both him and the winners. (And if you don’t understand the reasoning behind that last statement, don’t worry about it.) What’s more, the contest is VERY well responded to. Why? Is it because he’s offering great prizes? Well, yeah, actually. But also because it’s incredibly, sickeningly simple: Write a post. Link it here. Tell me about it. You’re entered. Not many rules and regulations to follow, clauses and stipulations, legal mumbo-jumbo — nada. Just a contest. That’s it.

Why can’t I come up with any cool contests like that? Who knows, maybe next time I will. (And if you read my last post, I hope you saw what I did there.) For now, if I can’t run one, I might as well enter one.

[Edit: Didn't win, but was as a finalist! Thank you, Ben!]

Before I start I’d like to give a special thank you to the folks without whose assistance this project would have both taken longer and not been anywhere nearly as successful. (These are listed in no particular order other than maybe when they chirped in. Maybe. In any case, note that all of these are people who I highly respect, making the process all the better.)

• Derek Punsalan: The Gnorb.NET 4.0 theme is based off of Derek’s “Grid Focus” theme, which not only offered an extremely flexible layout to workwith, but also allowed for the introduction of a few key features (most notably the new “Categories” listing).
• Ronald Heft: A couple of times throughout this process I had somewhat in depth, WordPress/PHP related questions which Ronald answered both quickly and completely, by showing me not only what I should do but why I should do it. The cool thing was that he did this more than once. (The “Best of the Best” list at the bottom and the Pownce plugin used in the “Random Thoughts” section are both direct results of his help).
• Hrafn Thórisson: When I put up the Sandbox post (where I first announced the new theme) Hrafn (a.k.a. hthth) was the first person to jump in and tell me what he saw as the strengths and weaknesses of the theme, and it was his comment that gave me the confidence to know that I wasn’t doing something stupid.
• Joe Lencioni: Joe was the first to offer his thoughts when I asked for opinions in the super secret 9Rules Member forums, answering one very specific question about how to avoid having the theme look like total crap in Internet Explorer versions 6 and previous. (Really, you people using that should be using at least IE 7, if not Opera or Firefox.)
• Ben Gillbanks: Honestly, I was actually really surprised to get Ben’s help. For years I’ve been reading his blog, Binary Moon, but I make it a point to go to his page instead of using the RSS feed. Why? The guy’s such a good designer that every time I go to his page I just about lick my screen so I can taste the design. I actually remember thinking “Oh my God, this is so cool!” when he offered his comments. Yeah, I know: fanboyish. Everyone’s a fan of someone, right? By the way, Ben’s responsible for the “Regulus” WordPress theme.
• Abi Jones: Abi came at this from the angle of the blatantly obvious, stuff I totally missed and am still wondering how the hell I did. It’s because of her that you can now increase the font size one notch up without making the site look like total crap. As someone who uses that functionality all the time, I’m still wondering why I didn’t think of that.

I believe that’s about it. If you helped and I missed you, my apologies: please know I am super grateful.

Now, about those extra features. Aside from the fact that the site is now much cleaner, it is also somewhat more dynamic.

• On the front page there are now only five (5) articles. This was done in order to keep the scrolling to a minimum. A big “Older Posts” link can be found directly below the front page posts, allowing you to read as far back as your heart desires.
• The two regions at the bottom of the front page list a bunch of links — for friends, for articles, for my own other sites, for visitors. Again, these only appear on the front page because, frankly, do you really have to see these everywhere?
• Likewise, the sidebar has a few pieces of content that only appear in pages. These are designed to draw your attention to recent and related content. Also, there’s the Random Thoughts section, which is actually an RSS feed of my public Pownce messages (thanks again to Ronald Heft for that plugin). Additionally, there are a few networking links on the side of stories (no longer will there be a garish line of icons at the bottom of articles), and I’ve gotten rid of all the sloppy looking RSS icons. (Frankly, I wish these people would use a standard icon for their “Add to your RSS reader” link. W3C where are you? Are you still relevant?) The only outside links there are the random 9Rules links at the bottom of the sidebar. Go ahead, hit “Refresh” a few times and discover some great blogs.
• Finally, you’ll also see a slightly more muted advertisement scheme. This may change, though, once I start actually selling advertisement, including trading it in exchange for site customizations (like, say, a new banner or RSS button). Of course, if you want to advertise here money works just fine, too.

Anyway that’s about it. enjoy the theme, go visit some awesome blogs by clicking on the links above (or the 9Rules links in the sidebars) and enjoy some content. I’d really be interested in hearing what you think, and if you find any weirdness, please tell me (as well as the browser and operating system you were using when you saw the weirdness).

First event: The Book

Here’s the lowdown: A few of the 9Rule members (including myself) got together in our top secret, for-members-only forum and decided that we’re going to write a book. Now, I’ve written books before, but they’ve all been for private parties, so none of them are for sale. (Unless you just happen to work for government housing and financing agencies and use a specific type of software, you’ve probably never seen my work.) From the looks of this, however, it looks like this will be an honest-to-Guttenberg, real life, buy it at Barnes and Noble’s book. Pretty cool, no?

The book will be comprised of a set of pieces (articles, stories, poems, photo collages, etc.) reflecting the various communities featured in the 9Rules network, as well as being themed after the 9 rules themselves. While I’m in the process of writing a piece for that book, that’s not what has me the most excited (although it’s right up there). What really has me fired up about the project is that I was actually chosen (by decree?) to help Tyme, one of “The Rulers” (the 9Rules founding members), organize the project and make sure it moves along. In other words, I’m back in the familiar position of managing editor.

The challenge, of course, is keeping everything organized. In a collaborative project like this (or any time you’re managing that herd of cats known as writers — especially bloggers whom you’ve never met and who are volunteering their time) you have to try to keep everyone on schedule while tip-toeing around whatever events may be taking the lion’s share of their time in their real (or even second) life. In addition, when stuff comes in, you have to make sure you edit it, discuss it, and if necessary ask for a rewrite of it. As an editor I hate when I have to to ask this, but as a writer it’s usually not all that bad to hear it, unless your editor has some sort of agenda.

Side Note: For example, I once had an “editor” (actually a micromanaging boss who knew nothing about journalism) who wanted me to write an “even handed” story about Google. After writing what I thought was an even handed story, I was forced to remove 2000 words from my 5000 word piece and add in 1000 words outlining what amounted to a conspiracy theory of how Google could potentially crush businesses they didn’t like or who didn’t pay them some sort of fee, sort of like mafia-style bosses, by eliminating them from the search engine. Frankly, I hated having my name attached to that piece, and I almost resigned that job over the changes. (The name of the piece was “Google: God or Devil”, a title which I was opposed to at that time due to religious reasons, in addition to the fact that I didn’t believe the stuff I felt I was being forced to write.) Unfortunately, I didn’t resign, mostly because of the insipid belief that I needed that money. Lesson learned: if your ethics are telling you “no”, refuse. Worst thing that can happen is you get fired. You can get over that by getting another job or source of income. Getting your integrity back is much harder, and the memory of it is not so easily erased. Interestingly enough, a conversation about following a leader you don’t trust or disagree with showed up on 9Rules Notes not too long ago.)

Needless to say, this is totally different than when you’re working with only one writer, since you only really have to worry about two things: the speed of the writer and the speed of the editor. In some cases you also have to think about the speed of the printing press, but that depends on whether you’re going through a mass publisher or an independent, and the reliability of that independent publisher. In any case, it’s usually easier and much less frustrating.

Anyway, here’s a list of some the people who, in addition to myself, are currently helping out with the project. I’ve linked to their blogs so that you can get an idea of what you can expect from the book:

• Phil Renaud
• Tammie Lister (Karmatosed)
• Lelia Thomas
• Eston Bond
• Chris Poteet
• Paul Stamatiou
• Elliot Swan
• James Meister (RightOn)
• Christian Montoya
• John Phillips
• Ronald Heft (CaveMonkey50)
• Gordon McLean (SnowGoon)
• Justin Ruckman
• Joe Lencioni
• Claire Louise Kemp (Cas)
• Tyme White

Of course, not everyone listed will be contributing as a writer. Some are editors, some are designers, and some will grace the pages of the book with their photography, but the flair of all will be what this book presents. This is what has me truly excited.

Second Event: The Redesign

If you haven’t been to 9Rules lately, you should. The site has been totally redesigned and now features a ton of seriously cool community functionality. (The new design is called “Ali”, by the way, as in Mohammed Ali.) If you haven’t been there before at all, check it out and explore it. You’ll find a ton of cool features which allow you to interact with the rest of the 9Rules community (including yours truly). If you haven’t been part of the whole “Web 2.0″ (buzzword) scene, then this may be the perfect opportunity to start getting into it. Heck, if you load up the page and hit reload every 30 minutes its like you have your own, impersonal RSS reader which features great content you know almost nothing about.

While I haven’t gotten to use all of the site’s functionality — especially in the my.9r area — I’ll won’t go into much detail, other than to say that a lot of buzzword-type functionality has made it into the pages. (You know what that means as well as I. Probably better.)

(By the way, is “bloggebrity” still used? Ever? Anywhere?)

Now, my only real complaint about the new site is the focus factor on the front page. By that I mean that it seems like everything is vying for your attention, all of the time. Seriously, when I look at the front page, I don’t know what to focus on. I think this may be caused by the use of so many contrasting colors and patterns in one place. Also, the dark background of the site doesn’t help.

With that said, here are a couple of featured I’d like to see:

1. I use 9Rules.com as pretty much my RSS reader. It would be nice if they could make the 9Rules Community tab (the green one) would
   1. have a “General” category in addition to the current categories of “Tech”, “Fun”, “World”, “Opinion”, and “Business”, then present only the feeds related to that category when that tab is selected, and
   2. if the page (or at least that portion of it) auto-updated every few minutes or so (this way I can keep the page open and just take a look at it once in a while without having to hit “reload” all the time.)

   Now I know I can probably find a Firefox extension that will do this for me (Opera does it right out of the box), but c’mon people: AJAX! AJAX! More buzzwords!

2. Like in the Community tab, I’d like to see the Notes tab auto-update every few minutes so I can see what’s going on. Again, extension, AJAX, whatever.
3. It’d be real nice if they had some sort of badge that I could put on my site featuring stories from other 9Rules sties (maybe separated according to all the categories in the Community tab, including “General”, for sites like mine). True, this isn’t a 9Rules site thing, but it’d be cool nonetheless.

So that’s about it. Of course, the changes to 9Rules weren’t just technical, they were also structural.

Third Event: Community Leader of the Commentary Section.

Along with the change in design, new Community Leaders (CLs) were selected for some of the categories. In a move that may prove to be as unwise as this unfortunate event…

…I have been selected as the Community Leader for the Commentary section of 9Rules, along with Tyme. Of course, when I saw this (no one told me; I just kind of saw it on the Commentary page) I had about the same reaction as Karmatosed:

Karmatosed:…yes I did jump about the room in excitement (not sure if should be ashamed by that…)

me: Like Karmatosed, I too jumped about the room in excitement. (Well, sort of: I’m at work.)

Nostrich (Richard Dunlop-Walters), however, put it best:

nostrich: I didn’t get excited and jump around because I’m a man and men don’t do that. I just sat there in silence concealing my erection.

Like a man.

I couldn’t have said it better myself. Like any position of leadership, this comes with the burden of responsibility, which here translates to starting and continuing stimulating conversation in the Notes section, reading and keeping up with the other Commentary category blogs, and making sure to crush all opposition with my mighty keyboard of death and the +2 mouse of invincibility. (For $15 you can get one of those at Best Buy, or from The Wizard, if you talk to him about the hidden Mario 3 levels. You game geeks know exactly what I’m talking about.) This is all stuff I was doing anyway, so it isn’t a burden the link at the top of the Commentary section makes for a nice bonus.

Anyway, so now you’re all caught up with what’s going on with me and 9Rules. This aside, belonging to this group has helped me see a number of things in different ways. Hopefully this will translate to better writing and marketing skills, though I fear there’s a longer journey than what I anticipate with that one. Still, like anything, it begins with a single step.

Time to walk my thousand miles. Like a man. As for you… well, happy dance for me, will ya? And toss a little good luck mojo my way, if you can spare some. It looks like I’ll bee needing it.

This has been one really screwy week. I’ll start with last night and sort of jump around from there.

For a few weeks now, The Wife and I have been talking about rearranging the furniture in our apartment. While the setup we have isn’t all that bad, the desire for a home-office area has been a pretty strong one.

Currently, our home office area consists of a bookshelf, a desk, and two storage racks in the storage closet. Unfortunately, everything’s not all in one place: it’s strewn about the apartment, with the different items in very different places within the house, none of which are really easily accessible. Living in an 800′ compartment, this arrangement just screams I look nice, but I’m just sort of ‘here’.

The biggest problem with this arrangement is that it makes it hard to track some client-related materials which, by their lack of prominence, are costing me money in the long run. Not good.

As such, we’ve decided to rearrange the furniture in our apartment so that it is more business friendly.

The first step in all of this was to buy a better laptop for business use. As I’ve mentioned before, our 600MHz PIII Inspiron 8000 running Windows ME just wasn’t cutting it anymore. Mind you, it makes a great laptop for just taking somewhere and writing, so it’s not all bad (especially when I load VidaLinux (VLOS) on it), but it isn’t up to the task of doing things like running Money 2006, Word 2000, Excel 2000, WinAmp video, accessing a wireless connection, and running Firefox all at once. If those seem like stringent standards to you then sorry to inform you, but you’re obviously not a computer geek. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

We ended up picking up an Inspiron 1501 for about $1200. It came with a $300 discount, so we were fairly happy with it, and includes a AMD Turion 64 x 2 TL-50 (1.6GHz/512KB), 1gig RAM, 120gig hard drive, 9-cell (5.5 hour) battery, Microsoft Office Basic 2007, PC-cillin Antivirus (2 years, I think), Windows XP Home (no Media edition available in business computers), 2-year at-home service, accidental damage protection, and a car/air power plug. We figured that while this isn’t exactly a graphics and multimedia powerhouse, we don’t exactly expect to be playing World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade or anything nearly that graphics intensive on it, so it’s fine with us. (I might get Civ IV, but only for those long plane rides, and when I’m really really bored.)

In addition to the new computer, we needed to get a couple of bookshelves. This would give us more storage place for our (my) ever growing collection of books, as well as some of the customer-related materials. A couple of weeks ago went down to Target to pick up a couple of bookshelves which matched the bookshelves we already had (since we also bought those at Target) and picked them up on special for $15.00 each. Unfortunately, this was two weeks ago: after we bought them, the boxed bookshelves sat behind the couch, gathering dust until last night. I’ll come back to these.

The past couple of weeks at my job have been pretty stressful. With a software release upcoming, the job of the technical writer has shifted from documenting existing software, to keeping up with the constant last minute changes from all the programmers, to making sure he knows about the last minute changes so he doesn’t spend hours documenting something which no longer exists. As annoying as this sounds, this isn’t inherently bad: I enjoy the excitement, and since I actually like my work (most of the time), it’s not something I mind. Last week, however, things went from stressful to annoying: because of the quickly arriving deadlines, in order to get the job done (and get it done right) I had no other choice than to stay late every night, usually until about 10:30pm. (To put in in perspective, I normally work from 8:30am to 5:30pm, so the extra time was about 4-5 hours, depending on the night.) Add to that my weekend work time of 8 hours on Saturday, 4 hours the previous Sunday, and I’m sure you can tell last week was a pretty long week for me.

(By the way, if you’re wondering why I haven’t written all that much, this is the biggest reason why: I’ve been at work. A lot.)

On the bright side, I seem to have gotten a lot more work done from the hours of 5 to 10 than 8 to 5, which is why I got to thinking that maybe I should ask my boss to hook me up with a laptop. Heck, I can do most of my job from home anyway, if I can do it at night, then all the better: I hate working during the day, preferring instead to work when it’s dark. (The later, the better.)

Another bright side is that I got to watch a lot of sci-fi shows and movies via WinAmp (Shoutcast TV, actually): Lost in Space, The Matrix, Swordfish, War Games, The Day the Sky Exploded, Stargate SG-1, and a few others. While I’m not much of a TV person, the infusion of sci-fi was a welcome one. I needed to do something to relax.

As all of this was going on I was informed that my “uncle”, Berto (my maternal grandmother’s brother) had just passed away. He was the closest thing to a maternal grandfather I had, the man who taught my dad about the pizza business (the primary source of income for our family for the first decade of my life), and the closest thing to a father my mom ever had. My mom took an immediate flight to Puerto Rico when she found out, but the death was especially hard in light of recent events: her aunt (my grandmother’s sister), who she was also very close to, died in December. Here’s the reall scary part: all of them — my grandmother, her brother and her sister — all died of diabetes. Needless to say that this makes for a very uncomfortable reality for my mom, as well as for the rest of us: Puerto Ricans have something along the lines of a 25% rate of occurrence in diabetes, and even with drastic changes to our diet, there is still a very large possibility we’ll end up with the condition.

Anyway, so back to the job: Friday night I finally got where I wanted to get as far as documentation was concerned. I could have gotten further ahead by going in yesterday (Saturday), but decided that I needed to spend some time with The Wife. Frankly, I couldn’t have picked a better day: 75^oF, just a couple of clouds in the sky, and soft winds. The perfect Florida day. I got up early to go work out, then got to spend some time in the steam room, the sauna, and the jacuzzi. I was tempted to spend a bit of time out on the beach: the white sands and deep blue water were particularly inviting. But it was almost 10:30am by this time (I had started working out at 7am) and I wanted to spend time with The Wife, even if she hadn’t yet woken up.

While yesterday was fun — we went out to eat and went to a couple of places for fun — I was really excited about what we would be doing at night. Remember those bookshelves I talked about earlier? Well, the plan was that we would go ahead and build those, then re-arrange the furniture into whatever new configuration we decided. This is when things got ugly.

Now, a disclaimer: I suck at manual labor. SUCK. Badly. Harder than a Hoover. And I hate it: I hate building computers, I hate working on cars, and most of all, I hate — haaaaaaaate — building bookshelves using crappily written instructions. (I also hate computers, but that’s another matter entirely.) Nothing brings out my anger more than having to build something like a computer or a bookshelf. That’s because since I suck at it, I usually do it wrong. Seriously, I’m a pretty talented guy, but when it comes to stuff like this, I stink out loud.

So, three hours after I started, I finally finished the first bookshelf. Unfortunately, it was wrongly built, since all the shelves were upside down, and the bookshelf looked hideous. Frankly, I didn’t mind all that much — after all, they were going to be covered in books — but The Wife… she likes her style. So, in order to make her happy. I tried to take the bookshelf apart. This turned out to be a rather huge mistake, since cheap Chinese particle board doesn’t exactly take well to being taken apart. Before I knew it, the bookshelf had already broken. In frustration, I decided to help it along by destroying the rest of it with my mighty hammer.

Man, that felt good. It left me with a shattered, useless bookshelf, but man… that felt good. I should smash up stuff I’m angry at more often.

Scratch that. No I shouldn’t.

About an hour later — after I had cooled down some — I started building the second bookshelf. By now it was midnight, and I couldn’t get to sleep. The Wife decided to help me out, probably for my own safety. In about 30 minutes we got the bookshelf done. While we didn’t get to re-organize the house like I wanted, that little act alone was enough to give me a small measure of peace, enough to sleep, at least.

This morning I got up around 8:30am. The first thing I wanted to do is write a bit and catch up with my life. I have a number of blog entries I want to get out, but most importantly, I need to start working on a story I’m writing for a book I’m collaborating on with other 9Rules members. Seeing as I’ve also been chosen as/picked up the role of managing editor (I guess) I have to get a few things moving with the book. Last thing I want is to see a project like this fall to the way side because of laziness and excuses.

With that I’m off to do my life thing. Plans for today include buying a new bookshelf to replace the smashed one, cleaning up the house (which looks like a bomb exploded in it), upgrading to WordPress 2.1, and continue working on the 9Rules book project.

[Edit: During the process of moving the second bookshelf so I could clean up the remnants of the first, that one, too, broke. I really, really hate this.]

• First and foremost, my apologies for not writing any long, insightful articles recently. Right now I’m in the middle of a rather tight deadline at work and business has been picking up (as expected due to the season), so long insightful posts are few and far between. Also, my recent addiction to the TV show Firefily, which I received as a gift from The Wife, hasn’t helped any. (Damn you, Joss Whedon!) In any case, I should be back into the swing of things by next week, Firefly permitting.
• If you’re wondering about whether I’m going to write about my vacation, the answer is “barely”. I’ll be writing about the part of the trip where I spent time in Southern Pines with Third-Child and Peacecraft. Combine the beauty of North Carolina with great friends in the state and the temptation to move there is pretty high. Except for Charlotte, which I would only live in if I had to choose between it, Mogadishu, Bagdad, and Detroit.
• For those of you sickos who, like me, incessantly look at the FeedBurner box, you may have noticed a sudden drop in the RSS counts. It seems that for some reason, the Rojo RSS reader hasn’t been showing up in the FeedBurner stats lately. Yes, there are that many readers using Rojo to read this blog. I love every single one of them. Even if they don’t show up in the stats.
• Remember that little giveaway I was running? Yeah, well it’s over. Due to (a) nobody responding to it, (b) annoying requirements, and (c) nobody responding to it because I totally screwed up the advertising part of it, Junior wins the contest. Why? because he covered for me while I was gone with a few rather good articles. Also, because he actually commented on the article. Finally, because he’ll be writing some more and that’s all I can really afford to pay him. So, congratulations, Junior!
• A few days ago I found out that Gnorb.NET has been listed in the Commentary category of the 9Rules Network. I’m not sure I totally agree with the decision, but I don’t disagree with it, which I guess is what matters. Heck, I’m the one that suggested it. Didn’t think Tyme would take me seriously, though. I thought this would be more of a Personal blog, you know? I even though it might classify as Humor, but after having read other 9Rules sites like Internet Zillionaire I realize I’m fairly… unfunny. Don’t tell that to The Wife, though. Keeping her laughing is one of my favorite things to do, so let’s keep the “Gnorb’s not funny” thing under our collective hats, ok? At any rate, the Personal category is way too full anyway, so Commentary’s just fine. Besides, I’m in good company.
• While we’re on the topic of 9Rules, I’ve been discovering a ton of spectacular blogs recently. Not surprisingly, the Business, Anime, and Writing categories have caught the bulk of my attention. If you’re looking for good reading, for the love of all that is bloggy, check out 9Rules. Also, Firefox users may be interested in the 9Rules Search plug-in available, which adds the 9Rules search to the Firefox search options. I’ve been using it since I discovered it a couple days back and it keeps leading me to amazing sites I would have otherwise ignored.
• Speaking of sites, check out Melissa’s Little Wool Gatherings. Honestly, I can’t believe I’m actually recommending a site like this. It’s a frigg’n CRAFTS site, for bloggy’s sake! Still, Melissa is a very talented writer who obviously loves what she does, and that comes out in her writing very nicely. Heck, she even delves into Gnorbesque topics like finances once in a while. Anyway, go check out her blog. For another blog along those lines — sorta — check out BlogLily, who’s also a member of 9Rules (admitted, like me, during round 5). Again, I’m pretty surprised I’m actually recommending these blogs, considering their content. Along with the pottery shopping I did recently (and you’ll hear more about that soon), it seems my world is opening up to the more pansy things of life.

  By the way, Melissa: talk more about finances, yoga, and granola recipes. You’re great at that. Also, next time 9Rules has a submissions round, enter your site. I think — and I’m talking pretty speculatively here — you stand a fair chance at making it, even if you do use Blogger. (Ever thought of upgrading to WordPress? It’s much better, really.)

Alright, that about does it for the updates. Any questions or suggestions? Put ‘em in the comments section.