Patrick O'Keefe

I have 2 site ideas that I would really like to do, but my lack of programming knowledge is holding me back. :(

Stinks.

It’s a slow day, so here is that funny story I promised. I think it’s funny, anyway. I have shared this with a few folks, so maybe you have heard it.

Anyway, several years back, my family and I are visiting my Grandparents. We are on a little trip, of sorts, with them to a museum and we are going to stop for lunch. We find this barbecue place. I believe it was called Woody’s. So, we stop there and go inside.

We sit down at our table and look over the menu. One of our party decides that s/he would like turkey. So, s/he orders turkey.

Guess what?

No turkey.

Alright, so that person will have some barbecue chicken then. Chicken ordered.

Guess what?

No chicken.

That’s right. No chicken at a barbecue restaurant. (One of us actually asked if they had chili, but they didn’t have that, either!). I mean, what type of barbecue restaurant has no chicken (and then no turkey and no chili)? Why even open the doors?

We got up and left. But, it was an experience.

Are you kidding me? Who’d he have to kill, anyway? Has to be like meeting some sort of lower level celebrity, I tell you…

Found this over at whoisd.com.

Interesting stuff.

Sure, there was the exciting new Nintendo DS as well as some nice offerings for the GBA (but, I’m not much into portable games) and who knows what else.

But, with the time that I do have, I prefer to play games on our GameCube. I’m excited. There are some really neat games that were/have been announced. This is why Nintendo is so good – because of the games.

The ones that come to mind/that I know of that I am looking forward to are Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, the new Zelda game, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2005 (we skipped 2004, so I am looking at maybe picking that one up), the obvious Madden 2005, maybe the new NBA Live, the next GameCube Star Fox, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Spider-man 2, maybe Mario Tennis and who knows, maybe even the GameCube version of Four Swords.

Crimity. I definitely won’t be getting all of those. Or close to all of those.

Just found a service that allows you to ping multiple sites with your new blog entry with just a click. I had previously not been pinging anything (that I know of) but I may start now.

Thanks to Chu Yeow

Edit: Forgot the link to the site!

There are a lot of ways that that phrase can be applied, but let’s hit on an example I (and a very anonymous – ;) – good friend) just ran across. I had already noticed it, but him bringing it up in the context of “this is what makes you different” brought it up to me a bit more and I wanted to blog about it.

This is the same issue brought up to two different administrators of two different communities. One of them being me.

On both sites, you have a banner that, all of a sudden, starts talking to you. This is annoying to some, so my/his users started threads at the respective sites bringing up the banner and voicing displeasure.

How the other guy handled it:

Basically, he defended it and said it didn’t bug him and that it isn’t as annoying as this or that or this and how other people he knows like it and so on.

What is being missed here is that none of that really matters. Comments like that only increase the users annoyance level. If you are going to keep the banner ad, fine, say so. Don’t say things that are just going to add even more frustration onto the fact.

How I handled it:

Here’s the thread.

After only 2 people had voiced their displeasure, I responded saying I would remove it. I would have done it after 1, but I didn’t view the thread before then. After I read their posts, I considered to myself, just how annoying is this? Do I want to hear sound come out of nowhere on a page, unexpected? I mean, I can live with it. But, why should I have to? If I take the banner off, will I go broke? No, no and no.

Even if I liked it, it is still obtrusive. So, I decided, we don’t need that banner.

It took me a while to get it taken care of, but eventually we figured out what banner it was and where it was and I took care of it.

I’m not saying that you should do whatever your users say, but I am saying that you need to definitely consider the facts of the matter. And, after all that, if you still wish to go the other way, don’t say things that add to the displeasure of the users who don’t feel the same way.

I’ve added a link to Common Craft, which is a community management strategies blog (or weblog – he doesn’t like the word blog apparently) by Lee LeFever. Interesting stuff.

I’ll be posting a funny story when I get some time, as well…

… for not allowing illegal content on my communities.

I had a guy who started a thread with a link to a site and the subject matter of that site is an illegal substance (in some areas, including the one I am in). Against our guidelines, post removed, polite notification site.

The guy didn’t really like that and gave me the usual censorship and childish idiocy. He also threw it a “fear”, which I was kind of puzzled by.

Nonetheless, it is the responsibility and every community to decide what they will allow and a guideline prohibiting illegal discussions or links to illegal content is perfectly reasonable and understandable.

I wish I could have heard the boos for that one.