Writing for New Media

For the most part, I had some prior knowledge of each of the subject areas we discussed in class.  Through the class I have expanded that knowledge:

On Twitter: I learned that it can be used to catch up on the news, find out events that are happening right now, and to follow celebrities.  I received a direct message from someone who is somewhat of a “YouTube celebrity” which makes me sound like a geek, but I was excited to hear from them. 

Also, I really enjoyed learning about the basics behind the creation of Twitter and learning that it was just a small team that was responsible for the site and they are highly accessible.  We talked about skyping them, but never got around to it.

On Facebook: I didn’t expand too much on Facebook, but I did end up creating a fan page for my viral marketing campaign and explored how to use that to its fullest extent (more on this later). 

On LinkedIn: I realized how much Linkedin can do for me in the business world.  I never knew all the aspects of the site which I would not have explored if we had not had to expand our profile past a certain percentage. 

And added accounts on Tumblr and Bebo which I found through the class but they were not part of the class.  There were other areas that I expanded my knowledge in:

In viral marketing:  With our viral marketing campaign I got a great response from family and friends and ‘friends of friends’.  I created a Facebook group called “Your Creative Spark” which gave a creative outlet for people to use on an everyday basis

In social networking: I knew before the class that social networking is important.  It is even more so now that I am graduating.  I want a way to stay in touch and also a way to get my ideas and plans set in motion.  Social networking is an outlet for me to stay in touch and bounce ideas off of everyone I know and then some.

In the creation of a personal website/online portfolio:  My personal website was the biggest challenge for me.  I had one class early in college where we worked on a website, but it was very basic and it was a completely different program.  In Com 315 I feel that I have expanded my knowledge of how the website process works.  For my second attempt ever at creating my own personal website, I think it is pretty nice.  A little rough around the edges, but it works.

I learned so much in this class and really enjoyed it.  It was a whole different field of study for me and I only wish I would have taken it sooner in my college career so that I could have taken more communications classes.  I really appreciated the one on one support and the help I received from my classmates as well even though I am not a communications major.  This was a great class to go out of college on and I feel as though I am a bit closer to being ready for the real world.

For our viral marketing campaign, I decided to do something that meant something to me and would be fun.  My choice was World Creativity and Innovation Week.  It started April 15 and went through April 21.

One of the methods of communication and networking that I used to get the word out was through the facebook group I created.  I had daily wall posts on the group page of ‘Your Creative Spark’, messages to members of the group, and status updates on my personal page.  I posted on my twitter almost daily as well.

I wanted to get at least 100 members and just get people to participate and be creative.  Being creative is something that people should do on a daily basis.  I hoped to prompt that creativity and get them to express and share it with others.

The facebook group started to grow and when I got my first post I was ecstatic!  I thought, someone is paying attention!  Then, I started to send out the messages to the members each day with an inspiring subject.  The posts slowly started to trickle in and ‘Your Creative Spark’ grew.  By the end of the week, I had 37 posts, 122 members, 7 links, and 1 reply to the discussion board.  I was very happy with the outcome and I think that I really struck a chord in some of their right brains.

My Site

I am enjoying learning about HTML and web design for my site though I feel that I am just touching the surface of all possibilities.  It is nice to be in a place, however, where I can help others with the very basic functions of Dreamweaver.  There are still some things that sump me, like how to actually create a template since that was already made, but I am feeling pretty good about what I have been able to accomplish so far.

I am currently finished with my bio and networking sites and almost finished with my resume site.  Also, my photos page should be finished soon after I start a picasa account.  My writing samples should be up soon.  I will be working on my holder pages as well.

I would like to learn as much as possible and be able to start my own website from scratch, but I believe that would be a whole class in itself.  After college, I might look into taking one of those classes.  For now, I’ll take what I can get.

Twitter equals freedom.  Freedom in this sense would be the ability to write what I want about who I want, any time I want.  Literally any time because I get the tweets sent to my phone.  I was not quick, however, to jump on the Twitter band wagon.  I thought it was an extension of a Facebook status update page.  The realization for me was that I didn’t have to behave on Twitter. 

When Facebook started hitting the older generations I started to receive friend invites from my dad, my aunt, my mom, my boss, my pastor, etc.   I realized that my days of just complaining in my Facebook status were numbered.  At first I didn’t mind this too much.  As a person looking for a job, I realized that I should keep it clean with my internet activities and I should probably stop dropping certain words into my status.

Then my friend introduced me to Twitter (that doesn’t sound like a commercial at all…).  At first, I just wrote generalizations like I would for my Facebook status.  Some of my first tweets included, “I just got Twitter!” (lame), and “I can’t believe I caved!”.  Also, for a while after I got Twitter I kept trying to start my tweets  with ‘is’ like I used to on Facebook.  I can only laugh at myself when I look at the attempts I made to talk back to someone before I realized you needed the ‘@’ sign.

My next realization about Twitter was that I now had a place to quote my friend’s stupid comments.  Since you can write just about anything in an article if it’s quoted, I decided that if I put my friend’s one-liners on Twitter in quotation marks and added a citation, then I could get away with a lot.  My friends say a lot of stupid things and they make for good business (if this was a business…).  Some of my favorites include: “What I can’t understand is who ever wanted ranch when they had a pumpkin?”, “S: ‘I kick box!’ J: ‘Well I badminton!’”, and “It’s my birthday, I can walk in lava if I want”.  Some of them are just ‘You had to be there’ moments, so I apologize.

My best friend and I have tweeted our friends to the point that as soon as they say something, we grab our phones and they ask if we’re tweeting them.  We also have it down to the point where someone will say something and one of us will turn to the other and just ask, “You got it?”.  It’s kind of pathetic, but it makes for a great pass time and also leaves a trail of memories (cheesy, but true).  We have also shared many a rant, vent, or complaint on Twitter which we could not say out loud at the time or were frustrated about but could not change.

This brings me back to my original point that Twitter is freedom.  For me, it is a place where I can share quotes with my friends, talk about someone behind their back (need to work on this one…), and, occasionally, get a good news story.  Without Twitter I would go crazy.  Okay, probably not, but I have accepted it into my life and I will be sad if it turns into just another Facebook status.

Rachel Witkovsky is a senior theatre major with a concentration in performance and a minor in creative writing.  Her studies at Elizabethtown College in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania will end with her graduation in May of 2010.  Rachel hopes to find an acting job soon after college.  She does, however, also have skills in box office, stage managing, and technical crew.  Eventually Rachel hopes to do some sort of service – Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, or BVS – and go to graduate school for theatre or creative writing. 

Rachel has worked at both Camp Blue Diamond (in PA) and Camp Shepherd’s Spring (in MD).  She has also worked in a theatre box office at The Summer Theatre in Meredith Village (in NH) which she hopes to return to again this summer.  On campus Rachel is part of Sock & Buskin, Emotion, and is President of Alpha Psi Omega, the National Honorary Theatre Society.  She has traveled to Italy and Germany and has gone on a service trip with Faith in Action to Mississippi to help with clean up from hurricane Katrina.

Rachel lives with her parents, Kim and Dave, in Huntingdon, PA where they moved in 1999 from Roaring Spring, PA.  Her brother Matthew now lives and works in Lancaster, PA as BVS Volunteer and a manager of the Lancaster Habitat for Hummanity ReStore.  Rachel enjoys writing fiction, reading a good regency romance, and acting on stage as a number of different characters.  Her ultimate dream job  is to have her own cooking show on television, combining her love for acting and her love for cooking.  She hopes the rest of the year will run smoothly and that after graduation things will start to become clearer – wishful thinking of course.

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Rachel Witkovsky is a senior theatre major with a concentration in performance and a minor in creative writing.  She has worked at Camp Blue Diamond (in PA),  Camp Shepherd’s Spring (in MD), and The Summer Theatre in Meredith Village (in NH). Rachel enjoys writing fiction, reading a good regency romance, and acting on stage as a number of different characters. She has traveled to Italy and Germany and hopes to see more of the world as soon as possible.

Technically, I would say my hometown is Roaring Spring, PA, or at least it was until 1999.  That was when my family moved to Huntingdon, PA so that my dad could start work as Chaplain of Juniata College.  My home is in Huntingdon, but my hometown is still Roaring Spring.  That is where all my childhood memories are — Girl Scouts, elementary school, swimming lessons, and day care.

Roaring Spring, PA is known for its railroad, Roaring Spring Paper Company, and the spring from which it gets its name.  On a good day one can only faintly smell the wonderful scent of the papermill.  There were days in school, though, when it was better to be a little warm in the classroom than to open the windows and deal with the smell.

Growing up, one of the biggest events that rocked the whole town was the day McDonald’s came to town.  Up to that point all we had was Subway and BurgerKing.  McDonald’s was amazing!  They put it where the old Giant Eagle used to be.  Which leads us to the other big ‘to-do’, which was when they rebuilt a new Giant Eagle on the way out of town.

For being such a small town, it provided very big memories for me.  I was only there for 10 years of my life, but those were great 10 years.  The thing about Roaring Spring is that one is within walking distance of almost everywhere else in town and therefore everyone was very close.

The Roaring Spring children grew up together and shared many memmories such as being locked in a closet, sledding down Cherry St. Park hill, hanging out at Stump’s (small store – in picture to the right), or swimming in the Bears’ pool on a hot summer day.  I was even lucky enough to be one of the children allowed to design the local community playground and help name it.  There are many memories that I will cherish for some time to come from Roaring Spring, PA, my home town.