When I look at where community guidelines within the NA community, most blogs do not have a set of rules. Where strict community guidelines come into play is in the Facebook groups set up by Authors and monitored by their assistants and others hired to monitor the groups. My own set of community guidelines is inspired by these groups as the audience for these groups will be quite similar to those reading my blog. Here are my community guidelines: Be nice and be respectful. Treat others the way you would want to be treated. This is the ultimate rule No bashing of authors, and books. This blog is supposed to…
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Week 11 Process Post: Transmedia Integration and Channels
This week centred around the use of transmedia integration and channels. It is the nature of book blogging to be on multiple platforms, pushing out content on multiple platforms. Besides maintaining blogs many book bloggers maintain their Goodreads account, post beautiful #bookstagrams on Instagram, push affiliate links and promotion graphics through tweets, reblog fandom related posts on Tumblr, and communicate with other book bloggers in communities on Facebook. This is a lot, that is why the most prolific reviewers, review full time. While many others pick and choose what tasks above to do in order to balance the rest of their life with book blogging. I have been maintaining a Goodreads…
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Author Spotlight on Fiona Cole (and Mini Assignment #6)
For this next installment of author spotlight, I am going to highlight someone I have discovered quite recently. I cannot remember which Facebook group it was but in one of the groups I am apart of I saw someone discuss their love of Fiona Cole’s Voyeur. I decided quite spontaneously to pick it up and by the next week not only had I devoured Voyeur, but I had also subsequently picked up: Deny Me, Imagine Me, and Shame. I sincerely hope you consider picking up some of Fiona’s books after reading my breakdowns and thoughts surrounding them. She has so few reviews on Goodreads but has written some phenomenal stories. I am going to discuss the books in…
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Peer Review #3: Train, Eat, Sleep, Repeat: An Exploration of the Fitness Lifestyle
Train, Eat, Sleep, Repeat: An Exploration of the Fitness Lifestyle follows Chris Pham and his fitness goals and journey. Content Chris mentions that he is not an expert specifically saying that he is not “a personal trainer or gym expert.” Due to the effect of minimizing authority that John Suler explains in his piece The Online Disinhibition Effect, it does not matter that Chris is not an expert as the internet minimizes the authority of an expert and further validates the personal accounts Chris provides. The content Chris produces is well informed, his use of hyperlinks is superb. Looking at the posts from a reader’s perspective, someone who does not frequent a gym, but…
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Week 10 Process Post: Google Analytics
I have really enjoyed diving into my analytics. I decided to look at my blog on a large scale and I’ve looked all the way back to when the class started. I’m diving into both my acquisition and behaviour statistics and using those to determine the conversion I should set. Let’s start with Acquisition… My blog tends to acquire an audience from social media. This comes as no surprise to me as I have been actively using social media to recruit an audience. When you dive deeper into Social, my traffic appears to be only coming from Twitter. This also makes sense to me as I have been more active on Twitter…
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What ClaryNathanWill Has to Offer You (and Mini Assignment #5)
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Week 9 Process Post: Monetization and Advertising
After discussions that occurred this week, I decided to look into other ways to monetize my site. I made the choice to become an Amazon Associate. This means I can now get Amazon affiliate links, and I went this route because I am reviewing books that will primarily be bought on Amazon so why not place my monetization there rather than in banner ads that will distract from my content. When Monique spoke in class about her personal book review blog and how she uses affiliate links on it, it inspired me to test run them on mine. I also tried my hand at creating an advertisement. I actually…
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Week 8 Process Post: How Other People’s Work Benefits My Blog
Through discussion both in lecture and tutorial surrounding copyright and attribution, it got me thinking about just how much other people’s work benefits my blog. I have had people compliment me on my widgets and sidebars believe that I have some vast knowledge of code and have done them myself. In reality, most of my fanciest widgets were made on Goodreads. Goodreads actually has a page that builds widgets for your blogs and lets you customize them to your heart’s content. The other big contribution to my blog is all the banner and promotion graphics I get sent from the PR companies I work for. Someone at that PR company…
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Are You New to NA… These Are the Hockey Romance Novels You Must Read (and Mini Assignment #4)
I am going to come out and say it, I love reading hockey romance. First of all, you need to understand that I am not a fan of hockey, not of sports in general. Why then do I enjoy the trope?! Hockey Romance is the best way to convey a story on the premise that the guy has a reputation and the girl judges him for it. But as they fall in love as she realizes that he is more than just the rumours, that she never really understood who he truly was at the beginning of the story. This premise is such a beautiful way to read about…
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Essay #1: The Descent of Online Democratic Dialogue into State Incited Violence
The existence of social media has brought a sense of democracy to the internet. Never before has there been a place where we can be seen as an equal, where a university student can talk directly to celebrities and corporations. This democratic dialogue has become twisted, and in places such as Myanmar what was being used for just a tweeted complaint from a consumer to a company has turned into state actors inciting violence through social media posts. This democratic dialogue that existed in the first place, was born out of widespread access to social media. John Suler writes on the online disinhibition effect, and how it presents itself in…
