Getgood Guide

Last week was one of a few milestones for me.  Here they are then:

• We Share Stuff became a limited company.  Congratulations!
• Digbeth is Good turned 1 year old – Pete Ashton’s response when I told him this was, “Christ, has it only been a year?”  Oh yes.  And what a year!  I celebrated with drinks in The Spotted Dog, which drew a smiling ‘where the hell else?!’ from many.
• Moseley Barcamp happened, and was brilliant with, many a debate and great idea springing forth from it.
• On Wednesday I started my once-a-week stint at Meshed Media, where I’ll be helping out for 7 weeks.  I had a lovely first day, spent mostly writing blog posts for West Midlands Dance.  My working flow kept getting interrupted by me realising I was getting paid for blogging, and getting an immense kick out of it.  But I managed to get through my task list all the same. (Always so very satisfying, ticking off the items, isn’t it?) So it was a small but very significant milestone for me, and means I can add West Midlands Dance to the ‘Other places to find me list’.

I asked this question on Twitter a little while back but got no response, so I’ll ask it again with feeling in more than 140 characters.

Digbeth is Good has a Calendar page which is basically an embedded public Google calendar.  Although useful for readers, I must admit updating it is a bit of a pain.  I basically have to look at a post for an event and create a new calendar entry in Google – inputting the date, time, location and copying and pasting the text and relevant link into the description.

It would be great if, just as I can simply create links posts using the Postalicious plugin, I could post events links to the calendar, somehow inserting the relevant details on the way so it easily feeds into a calendar entry.

Is there any way of doing this?  It would save me an awful lot of admin if there were!

Nicky Getgood on Digbeth and local blogging at WxWM from Jon Bounds on Vimeo.

It’s time for my very long overdue post about WxWM, brainchild Shona McQuillan’s local alternative to SxSWi. What was most amazing about it was that, within the space of about a week, a BarCamp-style event with back-to-back interesting panels had been organised.  My very favourites were:

Nick Booth: Me and My Troll

A necessary reminder that the internet isn’t Narnia and, just like in life, there are mad and bad people out there who may want to do you down.  There was an interesting discussion around how some environments (such as YouTube) are more tolerant of this behaviour than others (like Flickr).

I feel that I don’t really make an effort to conceal much about myself or my life when writing on the internet, figuring no-one will be nasty or bothered enough to use the details I give out in a negative way.  Some of the stories that came out of this panel were therefore quite frightening – not only how malevolent people can be, but also how ineffective some online communities and the police can be at dealing with it.

Jon Bounds: Internet Memes

The funniest of the panels, not least because of the last-minute editing Jon had to do to protect young, innocent minds. The theory behind the meme is that if you pop something on the internet, people will want to make it have one or all of the essential meme components:

• The rude
• The weird
• The cute

The time this takes to happen – the ‘time to penis’ – is becoming shorter and shorter.

Jon’s parting note was truly inspirational – that we, as the type of people who do Meaning of Briff, are guardians of the rude, odd and weird.  We should let memes evolve without fear of our bosses or parents and, above all, BE WEIRD. Oh, alright then, since you insist.

Ben Whitehouse: Once Upon a Time

An absolutely lovely talk on how we can tell stories and tall tales online.  This has been quite recently demonstrated by Dull Accountant on Twitter, who for a few days had us believing he’d nicked the company credit card for a G20 summit protest bender before admitting it was a well thought out April Fool’s prank.  Ben was most interesting when he was talking about Twitter, and how the people we follow and interact with is us reading the stories of each others’ lives.  I was horrified when he asked the question: ‘What happens when one of us dies and that character is gone forever?’ A sobering thought.

A local blog for local people

Not a favourite (because that would be horribly big-headed), but my panel talk about the local blogging journey I’ve been on with Digbeth is Good (film narcissistically inserted at the top).  The discussion afterwards was interesting, especially when it got around to where things should go next.  Peoples’ (very welcome) suggestions prompted John Hickman to ask Whose Blog is it Anyway?

It made me realise that, thus far, Digbeth is Good has had the freedom to grow quite organically.  But now there sometimes seems to be an expectation to follow certain types of models, be it a Created in Birmingham style handover or Kings Cross Environment style team building (which I’ve actually come round to and am working on).  I suppose John’s post reminded me that, although I can take advice and look at others’ best practice, there is no law that says I have to go down a set path.  In fact, Digbeth is Good got interesting for me when I stopped following the hymn sheet and made the blog more of my personal take on the area.  So perhaps straying from path is no bad thing, even if I do sometimes get a little lost.

Other interesting points raised were:

• Monetising the blog – If anyone has any further advice on this I’d be grateful.  One of the biggest obstacles I’ve hit with Digbeth is Good is finding the time to commit to its development.  Finding a way of being paid for the time and resources I’m currently giving to it for nothing, without detrimentally affecting the editorial freedom, would be brilliant.
• Quality not quantity – Andy Mabbett really struck a chord when he told me he’d rather read one or two good posts a week rather than a daily stream of them.  This made me realise I should slow down and concentrate on creating posts with insightful content rather than trying to keep up with everything, which is just impossible.

Phew.  It seems that no sooner do I have time to stop and take stock of the first WxWM than the next one is being organised – Moseley Barcamp, part of Mozfest, is on 29th June.  There’s also a BrumBarCamp on the cards.

Finally, after weeks of nagging poor Pete Ashton like a fishwife for FTP access to the Digbeth is Good blog, he’s on it. So whilst I wait for every ISP in the world to change, and relish the prospect of total control (mwah-ha-ha) I’m going to use poor, neglected Getgood Guide to do the downright inevitable and blog about bloody blogging. It happens to the best of us.

Antonio Gould’s been telling me for a while I should write a post about things I’ve needed during my induction to bloggery. I’ve kind of listened to him. And decided to do my own thing, which is write a post about things I wish I knew before I started. Here we are then.

I’d need to know a spot of HTML

A couple of years ago, I did an Open University Web Design course, which consisted of learning the basic principles of web design and using these to build a site out of HTML about a saucepan company, of all things. I hated the programming more than I did those stupid pots and pans and after passing, threw away all the books and notes, vowing never to touch HTML ever again.

I didn’t realise my mistake until quite recently. There’s no getting over it, WISYWIG can only get a girl so far. I’ll really need to re-learn a little of that horrid HTML if I want my posts to look not too squashed, not too spaced but juuust right. Arses.

Techie Stuff

There’s a whole, head-spinning world of Wordpress Plugins, Flickr, Twitter, YouTube, RSS Readers, Delicious, Analytics, Feedburner etc. And all this before I’ve even considered podcasting or Flip-ing filming. To be honest, a lot of this stuff isn’t that hard to learn and it just needs a good explanation to get the hang of it. I think what would have been useful is a step-by-step guide of the stuff that new bloggers need to know. Like an online course or post explaining things like image copying, film embedding, linking and the like. The simple tools one needs to get started.

Luckily this type of support is starting to emerge with blogging workshops, the surgeries started by Pete Ashton being duplicated elsewhere, and Ultra Local blogging expert William Perrin’s genius ideas for a UK-wide blogger-starter resource, which I don’t doubt will become a reality.

Where’s my life gone?

I never leave Digbeth anymore. I live and work here but before Digbeth is Good I had been known to occasionally socialise elsewhere. Now, when I’m not going to local launches and events, I’m blogging about them. Venturing to the Jewelery Quarter to see Stan’s Café’s The Rice Show felt like a new mother’s first night out.

When Pete gave me Digbeth is Good, he gave me a rough brief of covering all the arty cultural happenings within the place. There’s a hell of a lot of that going on. And I can’t not mention the regeneration activity or the music and pub culture if I’m going to give the place the overview it deserves. I think I’m spending roughly two days a week on this, on top of my full-time job. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love it, I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t. It’s just that occasionally I’d like to have the time to do other stuff, like clean my flat or talk to my family. People have advised me to take step back but that’s easier said than done when you want your baby to be perfect.

It also means I don’t have the time I’d like to look at it strategically and think about how it should develop. On October 13th Hyperlocalblogger expert Matt McGee wrote a post about What Makes a Great Local Blogger, which I duly bookmarked. 10 days later and I still haven’t managed to read it.

I discussed this problem with William Perrin yesterday when I had the pleasure of meeting with him at the Hello Digital conference. His solution was to relinquish some of that total control I’d been celebrating – get others with something to say writing on the site. I can see how this would widen the scope of the blog and be a nice way to engage and give a voice to people. But I must admit to instinctively hating the idea of letting anyone else help look after the precious baby I’ve nurtured. I’ll have to think very long and hard on this one, about whether or not I could stand it.

Brum Bloggers: you can be a little scary sometimes

I was nervous about writing this for precisely this reason, but I felt the fact that I felt this way was important, so sod it.

When I first started blogging my friend Will Buckingham, who was Birmingham Words before moving to Leeds, wrinkled his nose and asked if I’d become part of the Birmingham Blogging Mafia. I said I didn’t realise there was one. “Oh yeah,” said his girlfriend Elee, “and they meet up and everything.” (I love the meet-ups – it’s great to get to know people you’ve met virtually.)

Then the Surface Unsigned debacle happened. Surface Unsigned sent Created in Birmingham a scary legal letter. Pete Ashton put out an online call to arms and the answer he received, from myself included, was deafening.

After that came the ArtsFest Twitter debate. ArtsFest were experimenting with social media with their new blog and a volunteer started an ArtsFest Twitter account in a way Birmingham Bloggers felt was wrong. They duly commented on Twitter and wrote blog posts debating the issue.

I’m not disagreeing with the verdict, but the way it was done made me feel slightly uncomfortable. It left me, rightly or wrongly, with the impression I that if I made a similar boo-boo it would be discussed and dissected very publicly. I’m not saying that’s necessarily wrong, the only way we’ll learn is to share but as a newcomer it’s bloody daunting. It made me kind of terrified of making a mistake.

But of course I did, because learners inevitably do. Luckilly a friend noticed it first and rang me to explain the error of my ways, because that’s how friends tend correct each other – they take you aside and have a quiet word in your ear rather than exposing you. Of course we need to share and learn from each other, but sometimes the way it’s done can make this Brave New World feel a little unfriendly.

But no friend knew or thought to tell me all of these things before I started on Digbeth is Good, which is probably just well because if they had I wouldn’t have touched it with a barge pole. I know I’ve used the blog-as-child analogy a little too much here but it’s totally true – it’s taken over and completely changed my life, but I wouldn’t be without it for the world.

On Digbeth is Good I recently write a post about Lizzy Piffany’s song I Hate Men after seeing her play it the Sunday Xpress in the Adam and Eve. I had tried to film it, but my crappy camera could only manage the stretched, soundless blur you see here. It’d be great to be able to record things like this, or interview the great people I meet along my way on film. But times are hard and money’s tight. How can this problem be affordably solved?

I should know, I live here. Luckily that’s what Pete Ashton thinks so, after creating the new blog site Digbeth Is Good, he decided to let me blog on it. Which is what I’ve been doing for the past week or so, and having lots of fun with it. It’s basically a blog about arts, culture and life in general in sunny Digbeth. I’ll be covering the myriad of arty stuff going on around here and possibly slipping in the more bizarre aspects of Irish Quarter life when I think I can get away with it.

I’ll carry on posting things about beyond the Digbeth borders here on The Getgood Guide (probably mostly rants that would better off staying inside my head), but from now on posts concerned with my stomping ground will be on Digbeth Is Good. Hope you enjoy it!