I invented two projects:

• A real-estate website requiring a CMS to list homes for sale complete with property details and the option of a photo walkthrough.
• A travel blog for daily entries while on trips and separate photo galleries for each trip.

I planned to ask for quotes for those two independent projects from each designer, but I had to do some pruning first. I removed one listing due to distance. I wanted businesses or designers I would consider local to Jamestown, and if I included Irving, NY, I may as well go all the way to Buffalo. I removed a second because the designer did not list web design as one of her primary services. It was mentioned under a “can do” list, but it didn’t inspire confidence. A third was removed due to a very negative review and its association with another group of websites that screamed “Scam”.

I began looking for websites associated with the remaining five listings. I couldn’t find anything for The Graduate, Inc., or Mirror Images Web Services. If information exists, I can usually find it. It just wasn’t there. The telephone numbers for both companies were out of service as well. They don’t seem to exist.

Spann Enterprises, LLC., actually sells fire-proof safes. While the woman who answered the phone mentioned that she used to do web design, she said she doesn’t do much any more. She also explained that she doesn’t know how to build shopping carts for eCommerce or work with streaming video.

The number for ThinkPlayDesign went to a personal voicemail box. I didn’t leave a message, but his website is the best of the lot. I didn’t check prices, but he most closely meets my standards for quality and competence.

Lastly, the number for The Maytum Company was answered as Star Media Group, which is a division of the Toronto Star Newspaper, Ltd. This was the only listing to whom I could actually pitch my two projects. They might get back to me in a few days, but I’m not counting on it.

Follow-Up — December 2, 2009: Star Media Group never did get back to me with a quote.

Overall, I wasn’t very impressed. My goal was to get an idea of pricing in the area and to see if it’s capable of sustaining designers. I still can’t decide if I want to try seriously freelancing around Jamestown, and I feel I need to do a little more research. It doesn’t look promising.

Excuses, excuses. I’ve come down with a sinus infection and was distracted by Fable II yesterday. I decided to complete the storyline mission and spent some hours today playing with additional quests. It’s almost inspired me to finish Fallout 3, but I know there’s no gameplay once the main questline is finished. These are the problems I face.

Nearly every job post I’ve reviewed today was in the UK. None of them interested me. It’s not that I’m against leaving the US, but it would need to be something special. Oh, and relocation assistance would be a must. Can’t afford a plane ticket right now, so even an apartment would be out of the question. Then there’s the bit where I figure out how to get all of my belongings.

I’d rather stay near home anyways. That whole family thing, y’know. An hour or so travel time is ideal so I could say “Know what? I wanna go give mom a hard time today.” And so I will.

• Reviewing no fewer than six new job opportunities daily.
• Sorting out my resume, references, and writing cover letters.
• Being chewed on by a puppy.
• Staying up later, and sleeping in later, than I should.
• Playing World of Warcraft, Fallout 3, Fable II, and Left4Dead.
• Inventing all sorts of delicious sandwiches in my head.

I’ve learned a few things during these months of unemployment. The most important of which is that I’m not interested in many jobs. As I detailed in my long-overdue update, interest and passion for work is somewhat of a necessity for me. I really don’t care about insurance agencies or law firms, and I wouldn’t be passionate about working for them. As a result, my work for such employers would be sub-par.

I really need to work for a special company. Not only do I need to care about the work, but the environment needs to be casual. Comfort is another factor in quality of work. Jeans and t-shirts make up most of my wardrobe. They’re what I’m comfortable working in. Now, in most lines of work that doesn’t really matter. You’re up, moving around, and interacting with people. Not to say graphic design is more difficult than whatever it is that you do, but I have trouble being creative when I’m being forced into an image of somebody I’m not.

Just my two cents.

It’s been more than a year since my last completed blog post. Sure, I began writing a few during the last twelve months, but they never made it very far. I’d lose my train of thought, decide that my topic of choice wasn’t interesting after a few paragraphs, or come to the realization that nobody reads my blog so it’s not worth the time I was putting into it.

I have a lot more time now. I was laid off in the first week of November and am finding that the job market sucks right now. There just aren’t many jobs I’m interested in. Sure, I sift through a dozen or two job postings each day, but I’ve only found one that made me say “Wow, I want to work there!” Let’s be honest; as a graphic designer, one needs to be passionate about their work. If my heart isn’t behind it, it’s not my best work. I just can’t settle for that.

Perhaps I’ll chronicle my job search…

We are still alive.

Last week brought us a historic event. Barack H. Obama was sworn in as the 44th President of the United States. Some people might argue the significance of this, believing that it’s no big deal or that he’s going to do more damage than George W. Bush. Let’s be honest: You can’t predict the future, and neither can I. Give up on McCain already. He’s the one who lost, and he’s handling it better than half of the people who supported him.

Breaking it down: Barack Obama is not a Muslim.
Obama is one letter off from Osama, but it doesn’t make him a terrorist. (Consider: Santa is just one juxtoposition off from Satan)
His middle name of Hussein was given to him (1961) before Saddam Hussein gained power in Iraq (1979). This means there’s no connection.

Still Alive

Rock on, GLaDOS. Rock on.

With the advent of applications, what little privacy Facebook lent its users has flown out the window. Each one requires the user to authorize the application to access certain information in their profile. Just what information is accessed is unknown. If it is stated somewhere, it is where only a law student would be able to find it. Knowing law students, I’m well aware they haven’t bothered to look. In fact, the only people who would bother looking for, and reading, a privacy policy are a select few obsessive compulsives and the paranoid schizophrenic.

The following article summaries are courtesy of Slashdot.org [/.].

The Implications of Facebook on Society

“The site Switched.com is taking a look at the slow death of privacy at the hands of social media sites such as Facebook and MySpace with a link to a report on the creepy practice of Facebook employees monitoring what pages you look at and a thought-provoking video interview with social media expert Clay Shirky — who says that social networks are profoundly changing our ability to keep our private lives private. ‘Eventually, Shirky theorizes, society will have to create a space that’s implicitly private even though it’s technically public, not unlike a personal conversation held on a public street. Otherwise, our ability to keep our lives private will be forever destroyed. Of course, that might already be the case.’”

The New Facebook Ads – Another Privacy Debacle?

“Facebook recently announced a new advertising scheme called ‘Social Ads.’ Instead of using celebrities to hawk products, it will use pictures of Facebook users. Facebook might be entering into another privacy debacle. The site assumes that if people rate products highly or write good things about a product then they consent to being used in an advertisement for it. Facebook doesn’t understand that privacy amounts to much more than keeping secrets — it involves controlling accessibility to personal data. ‘The use of a person’s name or image in an advertisement without that person’s consent might constitute a violation of the appropriation of name or likeness tort. According to the Restatement (Second) of Torts 652C: “One who appropriates to his own use or benefit the name or likeness of another is subject to liability to the other for invasion of his privacy.”"

Facebook Users Complain of New Ad Based Tracking

Tech.Luver noted a story about facebook users complaining over ads where their shopping habits are shared with their friends as if they are endorsing products. The neatest part is that you can opt out- if you click a box that disappears after 20 seconds… wait to long, and they assume you are totally fine with it.

As always, this is just something to take into consideration. I really don’t expect it to change anything, but… knowledge is power.

It’s no secret that I dislike Social Networking websites. I’ve watched as the fad moved from Live Journal to MySpace and then Facebook. I’ve registered with each to keep track of the few friends for whom I give a damn.

It was with intrigue that I registered with Facebook. Restricted to persons with .edu email accounts, it seemed geared towards true social networking rather than a place for the dumb masses to make the trivial events of their meaningless lives a soap opera for the public. It was simple to navigate, wasn’t overwhelmed with meaningless information, and lacked the feature of both Live Journal and MySpace that I loathe: Customization.
Face it, you’re not a web designer. Chances are you lack any visual artistic ability. Your profile is heinous.

The change was slow, but it happened. Facebook has slipped down the slope slick from shit and will never climb out. Instead, it will suffocate in methane and die a horrible death snorting fart. It all started when Facebook opened to the public. While this upset many people, it was a step forward… but in the wrong direction. The Facebook population exploded, as did the demand for senseless features. Then… they started to appear.

It started with a few invitations to add this application or that every week. But, it wasn’t long before that became five or more a day… I’m a Pirate! I’m a Vampire! I’m a Werewolf! I’m a Zombie… all at once! Are you one of my top friends? Wanna get Leid? Answer my question! Are we so goddamn the same we’re like twins?

This rant has been turning in my mind for months, but tonight is when I lost it. I found an IM from Facebook notifying me of my friend’s status update. I figured I might have mis-clicked this morning and opted in to that feature… but I was wrong. Instead, my friend had imported his buddy list — this was out of my control. I found no way to opt out of messages from the Facebook website.
My solution? Facebook has been added to my long list of blocked AIM accounts.

Spam is one of the most annoying side-effects of the Internet. However, nothing annoys me more than IM spam. Sure, the Textile Import spams I get on Yahoo! are entertaining, since you can actually end up talking to a human… they’re great to fuck with. That’s the end of the entertainment value IM spam holds.

Yeah, I’m pissed. Just one more of the holy-fuck-stupid features to be added lately. Just one more step closer to my account ceasing to exist.
Strange that the only social networking site I don’t mind is the one that doesn’t bug the shit out of me. Perhaps the rest of them could take lessons from Deviant Art… it has purpose, true entertainment value, and is beneficial to both those who submit and browse.

On with the ramble!

Every now and again I look around and see just how much we humans destroy everything we encounter. It’s to a point where many believe we have changed the climate across the globe. We shape rivers and streams in order to direct them where we need them, or to get them out of our way. We dam them up to produce electricity, reservoirs, and inhabitable land. If that’s not an option, we simply relocate enough earth to create a new lake.
We do this for convenience.

We level entire forests for building materials, fuel, or simply because it’s in our way. We destroy the habitats of thousands of creatures simply… for our convenience. We tunnel through mountains because we don’t want to go over or around. We detonate whole regions to collect hardened chunks of carbon. We drill holes and suck wells dry.
We do this for our convenience.

We hunt creatures until they no longer exist because we desire their muscle, flesh, and fur. We do this after we have eaten our fill for entertainment and vanity.

There are few creatures in the world who actually shape their environment. Fewer who do it simply because they can. But, it’s what we do. We research, we develop new technologies, we examine every quark of our surroundings — all for our convenience. Automobiles, natural gas heating, air conditioning, television, radio, Internet… these aren’t necessities, these are conveniences of modern technology.

Some have claimed that we will terraform Mars within the century so we can begin to settle there. A clean slate, a new world to destroy.

Don’t get me wrong, I love modern technology. It’s my hobby, my vocation, and my passion. I enjoy the luxuries technology provides. The ease of transportation and communication, and the various forms of entertainment provided by the same technologies. I’m not about to throw everything I enjoy away, and I’m not asking anybody else to do it either. But, some nights I sit outside and think about the world around me. I look at the sky and the stars, and think about how miraculous and beautiful it all is. I look at everything around me — the plants, animals, life in general — and think about how improbable it all is. This is nature, pure and simple, not a god. We haven’t pissed anything off, we’ve simply changed nature — and unless we do something about it, we’ll have changed it enough that it may no longer support human life. At least not at its current capacity.

Think about it. Go outside on a clear night and look up at the sky. Ponder how far away those points of light are. Consider how unnatural the red and blue flashes are as planes fly over head. Stare in awe as bats, blind as they are, track down mosquitoes — just as the mosquitoes are drawn to the carbon-dioxide you exhale, how they siphon your blood to continue their existence just as we change the world to make ours more convenient.

Think about it.
I don’t ask you to change anything, just think about it.

As usual, I was strangely calm in a situation where I should have been stressed. I worried before, I worried after, but I set that aside at the time. There were no other interviews for the position, and it ended with “We’ll see you Monday.”

Crap… I’m still living in Findley Lake. My internship hours aren’t turned in yet, though I have them completed. I have a job in Jamestown starting in a few days. I’m hungry… so much to do in very little time. This doesn’t even include work I have for other clients. So, I started with the obvious. Move back to Jamestown.

It’s strange being back home. As has been the case for the past two years, most of my time there is spent sleeping –but it’s home once again. It’s essentially come down to home being wherever my computer is. Hopefully that doesn’t become too confusing once I have a laptop, which I estimate to be two to three months.

Now, about work…
For the first few days it wasn’t too exciting. Just learning how things are run, moving from workstation to workstation because I don’t have my own and need to use whatever is free, and doing whatever is asked of me. Oh, and my usual habit of picking up on things rather quickly. I just don’t know what I’m going to do Monday once everybody is supposed to be back in the office.
I keep mentioning that I have no problems working on a Macintosh. Nice big G5… shiny. That thing puts out a lot of heat.

Aside from having to wake up at 7 AM again, the only real change in the past week is that I drink coffee a little more often. Caffeine is a good thing, and if it’s strong enough to burn more than vodka you can’t really tell it tastes like dirt.

Things don’t seem too bad any more.

I have been a college student for four years. I have been both a Computer Technology major and an Art major. I have paid too much for too little information and a silly degree. That’s not to say college is a waste and nobody should seek a higher education, but it wasn’t all that educational for me.

I enrolled as a Computer Science major with two years of training under my belt. Having been Cisco and A+ certified, the only thing that was relatively new to me was programming, and I had done enough of that on my own to pick up the basics. I really wanted to focus on website design, and I was told Computer Science was the road to take for that. After two years of teaching my peers what the instructors failed to communicate — including Programming — I took the single web design focused course they had to offer. At this point, I wasn’t surprised when I managed to teach my instructor more than she taught me. I began to notice a pattern… I know more than my teachers. I was paying them for little more than a grade.

I decided to enroll in the Erie Institute of Technology. Their Multimedia Graphic Design program focused more on the artistic aspect of things, and covered a few areas that I had no experience in. As a true opportunity to learn, I had high expectations. The truth is, I’m not an incredibly artistic person. While I’m creative, I have difficulty taking ideas and representing them visually. Some classes helped me with this, some gave me new tools to work with, and some… failed to deliver. I’m surprised at how much I actually put what I learned in Typography classes to use, even though I’m still convinced they were a waste of time. I’m surprised at how horrible I am at 3D modeling and animation, but I never expected to be great. What did surprise me is that, during the three website design focused courses, I still managed to teach my instructor more than he taught me. There is only so much you can teach somebody about the design aspect of websites, which is what I needed. When it came to programming, though — I just have a better grasp of it than anybody who has tried to teach it to me.

I suppose that’s why they’re teachers rather than programmers.

The biggest issue I ran into during my schooling was that I feel I ended up paying more money for a piece of paper than I did for an education. I picked two very vague majors. A Computer Science degree essentially says “I might know something about any of a bunch of subjects,” while a Multimedia Graphic Design degree simply means “I managed to pass the classes, but whether I’m a good artist is personal opinion” — isn’t that always the case with art? Luckily, I have my portfolio. It’s always growing, and is living proof of my skill. Employers and clients now have something to compare: my portfolio to the rest of the Internet.
Still feeling great about myself.

That ends this rambling. No clue where I intended to go with it, but this is where we ended up.

Networking with other people does have legitimate purposes. With a little time, some business cards, and diligence, an individual can form a productive and profitable professional social network. These are great for creative professionals and freelancers who frequently work with people in other branches of their field. An example would be a graphic designer networking with a printer. You exchange business cards, talk about what you specialize in, whatever… if anybody comes to the designer looking for a printer he says “I know a guy”. That person then goes to the printer, has his job printed, and says something like “I’m really glad that designer referred me to you. This is great work!” Chances are, if that printer is asked about a graphic designer, he’s going to say “I know a guy” and the designer has a new client. It’s the old you scratch my back, I scratch yours situation—except you’re better off scratching first.

Social Networking as the Internet knows it, however, is little more than a magnified version of the popularity contest that is supposed to end with High School Graduation. It appears to be nothing more than a game of “Look at how many friends I have” with a nice little counter to keep track of score. The only thing I haven’t found on these sites is a leader board. In the end, it’s just as meaningless as aimfight.com.

That’s not to say Social Networking websites don’t do more. Beyond the popularity contests, havens for sexual predators, and a stalkers’ wet dream, there are a few who manage to rise above this and look to the future. The Internet is a great resource for employers to find additional information on you, and Social Networking sites are full of information. But, what information do you present? While I feel keeping your profile limited to career related content is a little silly, if most of the pictures of you revolve around a drunken stupor or a pile of marijuana large enough to fill a swimming pool, you’re probably shooting yourself in the foot.

Let’s face it, our generation is making a lot more information available to the public than previous generations have. With a little searching, an individual can come up with more information on you than you’re aware of. A little Egosurfing comes in handy here; find out what a potential employer can discover about you. That’s not to say Google will come up with every possible result, but it doesn’t hurt. Remember that anybody can register a MySpace account, and most profiles have their security set as loose as that college whore you, and all of your buddies, slept with last weekend (no offense if you’re said whore). There are also many organizations registered with Facebook, and the networking isn’t difficult to figure out. Facebook is slightly more private, but a lot of public information remains.

I know the chances of me making a difference are slim, but the purpose of a rant is ranting for rants sake. I’m not here to make the world happy, I’m here to tell the truth. The truth is: We need to be careful what information we make available. The Internet is largely an insecure medium of data transmission. MySpace and Facebook are considered public, and information about you can help or hinder your future.
Think about it.

If you would like to read more about the subject, see the following articles:
How to use Facebook without Losing Your Job over it —//engtech
MySpace Is Public Space When It Comes To Job Search —CollegeGrad.com