Conorthoughts

Bea, blogging pandas and Dante Alighieri

Bea was been in touch again. I am still hoping that she will set up a blog and lead me into the light. Dante had his Bea, and so do I, in my own way. Dante never got any missives from his Beatrice. I'm lucky! Perhaps I should start a new category 'Beatrix'. Done! (See the categories on my right navigation bar!). So Bea wrote:

Hi Conor,
last time my email on hotmail didn't work. I don't know why. I suppose "Bill Gates and his gang" are at work again ... ha ha!
Yes, I know that I haven't got anything done AT ALL yet on my site, and I repeat, YET.
I'm going to work on it now ...
Bye,
Bea

["Bill Gates and his gang" is a reference to a comment about Microsoft that I made towards the bottom of a post 'Bea to the rescue'.]

I replied:

Bea,

maybe it didn't work because, at Hotmail, if you don't use your email for a month, it gets semi-closed down, but does leave you the option of waking it up again (It used to be if you didn't use it for three months). Might that have been what happened?

I looked on your site again. I think that it probably doesn't have blogging software built in. If it did, I think that it would advertise this fact.

Can I make a suggestion about where to go to build a state-of-the-art open source - meaning free! - blogging site for the panda bears? [Bea is setting up a site with her cousin to save the endangered pandas.] I would suggest Word Press. Ultra cool cats - cool at least in my world - use it. I don't know about cool pandas.
I should switch to it myself and intend to but, for the moment, I'm paying about $7 a month (I think it is) at Typepad . The functionality at Word Press would be pretty much the same - in fact probably better - but building  a blog there would involve a bit more work and application of brain power. But for a brain box  like you, that wouldn't be a problem, and open source, as I mentioned, is the way to go (Bill and his gang probably hate it. They may have nightmares about it.).
I'm waiting to get a bit more wind behind the sails of my blog before switching it into Word Press. For my $7 I get free support which has been helpful. In its place, Word Press would offer, I imagine, very active community help-one-another fora, where cool pandas just might hang out.

Love,

C

Bea replied:

Hi Conor,
yes, I think you're right about my site. It hasn't got that blogging thing that I have on my MSN site (my MSN 'space', as they call it).
Thanks for giving me the site for cool pandas, or whatever.
I'm going to check it out.
Bea

Bea to the rescue Part III

Bea has finally ridden to the rescue in response to my most recent call for help and has posted a comment further down that I paste here. 

Hi Conor!

I have finally got myself to look at your blog. Suprisingly, it's quite good. Only, that bit about your day or something was very long and boring. Try to make it a bit shorter, so that people don't look every minute to see how much more there still is to read! Anyway, if you couldn't get hold of my blog, then you must be right about "Bill Gates and his gang". Ha ha!
I think I have another website somewhere but the site is on the other computer, and I can't remember what it was called! Still, a shame that you can't read my MSN blog.
No, I don't mind you using that photo! I think it was a great idea, making me famous ... ha ha!
I'll try to make a new blog on a not "Bill Gates and his gang" site ... ha ha!
Well, bye for now,

Bea

["Bill Gates and his gang" is a reference to a comment about Microsoft that I made towards the bottom of a previous 'Bea to the rescue' post.]

Bea to the rescue - Part II

No word from Bea yet in response to my last post. She must be busy. I have got some encouraging words, however, from my therapist:

Dear Conor

thanks. I got your cheque today. Whilst glancing at your blog it struck me again how well you write. So please, keep this going!

Blogging probably has a greater potential to build confidence than does the old Ivory Tower. But might it encourage plagiarism as well? How often does one get feedback, I wonder.

Regards

Michael

 

Plagiarism is the least of my worries. Readers are what I lack, and I will have to go and find them. Plagiarism can be a risk for bloggers but it should not be overstated. In any case, I am confident that I have not posted anything so far worth plagiarising. 

I am not paying Micheal to praise me but in as much as 1) building my self-belief is an aspect of what he is trying to do, 2) encouraging a writer who is not writing very much to write can help his self-belief and 3) praise is being used here to encourage, I will not argue that Michael's praise is that objective. But here it is: I am in need of praise just now, with winter descending.

I will write to Michael to answer his question about feedback, the answer being that it depends on the blog.  Jonathan Schwartz is near one end of the feedback scale and I'm at, rather than near, the other end.

Bea to the rescue

I've been trying to get Bea (my clever niece) who lives in Malden, near Nijmegen in the south east of Holland, to start a blog and help me get my blog going. For lack of blogging company, I still haven't figured out how Trackback works or, indeed, what it is exactly.

I emailed.

Bea,
hello. Hope you got those photos.  Please have a  look at my blog (at http://www.conorthoughts.net). I am not doing too well for the moment in getting it going. I need blogging companions. It would be good if you started a blog. There must be lots of places where you can start them for free.
Love,
Conor

Bea, however, is very busy. It is difficult to get hold of her. I eventually get get her on the 'phone. She tells me that she has a kind of blog on her website and suggests that I look at it. She emails the link.

Hey Conor,
this is what it says in my address bar when I go to my website:

http://spaces.msn.com/members/darkvlightbea/PersonalSpace.aspx?_c01_blogpart=myspace&_c02_owner=1&_c=blogpart"

I know it's very long but ... I don't think it works. Try anyway, or else try:

http://spaces.msn.com/members/darkvlightbea

That might work.
I havn't had time to look at your blog yet, and I have to do homework now. I'll try to look at it soon.
Bye,
Bea

Neither link works. Bill Gates and his Microsoft gang are, I assume, responsible. It is less than half a blog that they are offering MSN users, a pseudo-blog.

Bea, as I imagine you are aware, MSN is keen to keep you within MSN once you are in there, the better to sell you products, either directly or by making you dependent on its software by getting attached to more of the features that it has to offer the better to then sell you services and products. One of the many ways it does this is, I assume, to only let you blog - pseudo-blog - with other MSN bloggers. So it keeps you within its walls. 

There is no technical reason for MSN to do this i.e. no good reason why I can't just paste your MSN URL and look at your MSN blog. The reason is ultimately commercial. Bea, before Bill Gates and his Microsoft gang get you, I think that you should consider going open source, beginning, perhaps, by switching to the Firefox browser, using it instead of Bill's Internet Explorer, a switch that I have made recently and not regretted. Firefox is 'brill' as Martha [Bea's late aunt, my late sister] would have said.

I have emailed again.

Bea,
I have just posted something on my blog that might - or might not - interest you. To make it less boring, I have included a photo, of you. I hope that's O.K! I have also reproduced in it - published -  a recent email from you. I hope that that is also O.K.
Love,
C

Bea wearing my glasses in Dublin airport this summer while we were killing time with Paul (Bea's father, my brother) between flights

Advice from Beatrix Joyce (my niece)

I just came across by chance an email from Bea that I hadn't seen. I missed it over the summer while switching email software, from Microsoft Outlook to Thunderbird. I wish that Bea would start a blog. That would get me going here. I paste her email.

Hey Conor,

I read your blog. It was OK. You know Conor, why don't you try to do something exciting, you know. Something like dramatically saving someone's life, by jumping off a cliff while he was falling and magically flying. That would be a great story instead of looking for a place in London! Otherwise, if you haven't dramatically saved someone's life, try to make it funny or interesting! Talk about how you feel at that very moment, what you want to achieve in life, and why you think philosophy is good. I should know. I kept a diary for months, at first it was interesting, but then all I wrote about was what I did. It's much more interesting to write about how you feel and stuff. If something, however, does dramatically happen, don't forget to write it down. But also write how you felt when it happend, and what could have happened.

Also, try to look for an adventure! Don't sit and wait for it to come. And write books about what you've done and felt and stuff. You'll be a best seller in no time!

Keep the blog up to date so that I can read it!

Love,

B or Bea or Beatrix, as long as it is not Be!

The post of mine to which Bea was referring is this one.