Monthly Archive for August, 2008

Randomness

Published
by
Ricky
on August 30, 2008
in Nothing in Particular
. Comments

I like to keep track of various stats on my blog. One such stat is top search queries that lead to my blog. Here are the top results:

blog liberty heights church
advantages of ear murphs over ear plugs
pretty-virgins fraud

What any of those have to do with my blog, I still haven’t figured out. I thought it’d be fun to figure out what those are, and help out whoever was inadvertently linked to my blog.

Liberty Heights Church

Turns out someone from said church left a comment on my blog. So now my blog shows up on the second page of search results for their church. To whoever searched, you’d probably be better off at http://libertyheights.org

And no, I  haven’t been invited to friend day.

advantages of ear murphs over ear plugs

I’m not exactly sure what an “ear murph” is. Apparently google doesn’t either. I searched for it myself, and I couldn’t find my blog anywhere in first 10 pages of results. Either I missed it, or they just looked really hard for it. Sorry, I can’t help you there.

pretty-virgins fraud

Oddly enough, my blog shows up first for this search. It goes to a post in which I talked about the story of Ruth. Apparently I am the premier source of information about the pretty-virgins fraud. I’ve never heard of said fraud, and apparently nobody else has, either. None of the results actually talk about it. Lots of sites about pretty virgins, but not anything about frauds surrounding them.

Alright, signing off now. Gotta be up at 4am. Oh yeah!

Wannabe Web Developer

Published
by
Ricky
on August 22, 2008
in Nothing in Particular
. Comments

I’m a big believer in the chu.rch doing everything with excellence. If we have the God of the universe on our side, then we ought to be able to put the secular market to shame in terms of quality. Unfortunately, that often isn’t the case. I’m just as guilty as anyone else in that regard, though.

One area that God has been stirring my heart in lately is that of the web. I believe if you took the average quality of church websites, we as Christians would be ashamed of their quality. I am, by no means, an expert on making websites. In fact, I would struggle at this point to put together even a halfway decent one. If, however, I were to start building a website today, these are the things I would focus on the most.

Aesthetics
While some people would rank functionality and content over aesthetics, I would beg to differ. I would argue that aesthetics are equally important. You one get to make a first impression once, and if your website looks like crap, that’s naturally what your visitors will think of the church.  Elements should flow together naturally, and the colors should be easy on the eyes. No hot pinks, please.

Content
Is your church website nothing more than an online brochure for your church? Again, this contributes toward that first impression. If all a visitor finds on your website is your location, service times, and and an overly wordy description of how awesomely Jesuslike your church is, they aren’t going to leave impressed. The content on a church website will obviously vary from church to church, but you should strive to cram in as much information as possible without making it look bad.

Functionality
I firmly believe that websites shouldn’t be static brochures, but living, breathing fountains of information and content. But all the content in the world is useless if there is no functionality to support it. Navigation should be simple and intuitive, and all of the content should be easily accessible. I don’t want to have to fumble my way through 15 html pages to find what I want. If I can’t find it in 60 seconds, I’ll just forget about it. It’s usually not worth my time.

Backend
This is a big one, but one that doesn’t often get much attention. The best site in the world is a pain if it’s not easy to update. You could show me the sweetest website in the world, but if the admin is clumsy and ugly, I probably won’t be interested in maintaining it. The admin should be just as visually pleasing and intuitive as the main website. It should be a breeze for an untrained person to update the website. I don’t want to have to go through a five hour training session to figure out how to change the header image through the admin.

Keep in mind that I’m no web expert. Those are just things I would focus on myself. I’m not currently capable of creating the slickest website in the world, but I’m just a wannabe web developer.

And just for fun, here’s some music that I listened to while I wrote this post. Yeah, it took me a long time. So?

Tell Me - Jonah33 // Can’t Lose - We Are Scientists // Believe Me Natalie - The Killers // You - Switchfoot // I Want a New Duck - Weird Al Yankovic // 33 - Coheed and Cambria // Here is Our King - David Crowder Band // The Call - Fighting Instinct // Brighter - Lee McDerment // Light Up Ahead - Further Seems Forever // How I Could Just Kill a Man - Charlotte Sometimes // Desecration Smile - Red Hot Chili Peppers // Taken Aback - The Rocket Summer // New Wave - Against Me!

Random Thoughts

Published
by
Ricky
on August 17, 2008
in Mind Dump
. Comments

So, it has been entirely too long since I’ve updated my blog. Here’s a few random thoughts to catch things up:

Surviving the Revolution
I am newly minted staff at Revolution church, and I couldn’t be more excited. I’m blown away by what God has done at Revolution, and even more blown away by what he’s setting up for Revolution. If you think the ride has been crazy so far, hold on tight, cause it’s gonna get crazier. I’ve said it a hundred times, but it bears repeating: I’m blown away that God sees fit to use me as staff at Revolution. I’m so far from perfect, I don’t see how God can call me his child.

Here’s a few things I’ve learned since starting at Revolution:

  • It takes 11 members of Revolution staff 3.5 hours to siphon a tank of gas
  • Revolution staff wouldn’t make a good pit crew (evidence, more evidence)
  • The staff of Revolution church is absolutely on fire to reach North Georgia.
  • Revolution staff don’t take themselves seriously, but they are absolutely serious about the mission God has given this church.

30 Days
Last week, Revolution started a new series called ALIVE. The basic premise revolves around this question: If you had 30 days left to live, how would your life change? It’s a tough question to face, but here’s a few thoughts on how my life would change:

  • My relationship with God would increase. This is an area that I have honestly struggled with. One can never be too close to God, and I have dropped the ball on this one so many times. This would be the number one priority for me.
  • My commitment to Revolution would increase.
  • I would put my thoughts to action. I have a bit of a habit of coming up with crazy ideas. Everything from business ideas to how to improve what I do for Revolution to learning how to design websites, and everything in between. I can probably count on one hand how many I’ve tried. Thoughts without action are a waste of time. I would focus on just a few and make them happen.
  • I would manage my time better. I waste too much time. Enough said.
  • I would have an increased commitment to excellence. I can talk the talk, but can I take everything I do to the next level? Am I always trying to stretch myself to do better? There’s always room for improvement.

Well, Revolution’s signs won’t pick themselves up, so I’m out. Maybe I’ll write part deuce of this post tomorrow. I always have more to say =)

Peace