Evaluation of the Group Blog

photo taken from Clipartof

The week is over and it has not been long since I pressed the "publish" button to put my last post on the group blog wandersee. I'm really sad that it's over, because I enjoyed being part of that group so much.

The blog was all about collaboration. Each day the bloggers commented on what a word means to them. The interesting thing is that every individual was so completely different. The only thing that each post had in common was that it was a statement of the same idea or concept. I think the idea is brilliant, because it allows people to share their memories, ideas and feelings. The bloggers could show their personalities by expressing their thoughts in different ways. Sophie for example often used poems and photographs, Jade always linked words to broad things such as drugs and the Middle East conflict, Metthew always managed to mention alcohol in every post and I used a lot of music, lyrics and play on words.

Having said this, I have to say that it was quite challenging for me to write my posts as I am not a native speaker and it was all about language. However, that kind of writing is what I love most. Some might argue that it is not journalism, but I say it is. It is some arty way of dealing with words, puns, words twisting around - and I enjoyed it so much. It might have been hard, but I did not only improve my English a little bit, but I also gained more confidence that I can write in a creative way, even in English.

Wandersee is a blog that is using multimedia. It's all in there: the written word, literature, audio, photographs and videos. That is something arty print magazines cannot offer. Additionally there is an option for people to choose the next word that is going to be discussed - so the blog also offers interactivity. Moreover the posts are more informal and therefore closer to the readers. Reading a post of wandersee is like reading an e-mail from a friend.

It was quite a challenge to publish posts every day. That is maybe something that did not quite work. Some bloggers did not manage to publish their posts in time. But before judging someone, it has to be said that this project started two weeks before the term finishes, which is the time when all essays have to be handed in. It was a busy week. But in principle, I think the blog idea would work if people had time for it. They'd have time to take own pictures, write own poems, go out and ask people on the streets what a certain word means to them or make documentaries.

It was quite hard to get along with the wordpress template. In my opinion, it does not look very nice, the sidebar does not allow much flexibility and the categories are not shown clearly. With a better template, the blog would look so much nicer.

I am also not sure about the name of the blog. Wandersee? I had to ask Sophie what it means. It is very hard to figure out what the meaning is - or I am just a bit stupid or slow. I think there are better solutions. But, I was lying in bed with fever when the decision was made, so I did not contribute to it at all. Therefore it is not my place to criticize it.

I am quite satisfied with my posts. I really like my post on "boobs" as it was quite linguistic and I tried to use puns. I am also happy that I managed to find documentaries on the topic "home". Maybe it should have been my job to go out and interview people about what "home" means to them, but because of lack of time and camera I could not. However, I succeeded to find videos of people who already did my job. So this was the most journalistic post I guess.

I always tried to use photographs and paintings that illustrate what a certain words mean to me. I also put some music videos of songs on the blog that expressed my thoughts about that word.

I had the chance to have the experience to post on a daily basis - which was quite a lot of work, but a wonderful experience as well. Every morning I woke up with the thought that I have to pay attention to a certain concept. As I mentioned above I improved my English a little bit and most important of all, gained more confidence in my writing skills.

I think the blog idea of wandersee is brilliant. There are some things that have to be improved, but we only had five days to work on it - with other deadlines looming. I would love to continue blogging posts in that way and I think it has a potential to become larger and maybe successful as well.

Whereas the target audience now consists of young people from 18 to 30, students and people interested in art, photography, music and literature, it could possibly target all kinds of people who enjoy reading some deep thoughts of ordinary people. I also think readers could build up a relationship with the bloggers and get to know them only by reading their posts regularly.