Wordle

13 Things Blog



This word cloud gave me an incredible insight into the words that I tend to reuse over and over again in my blog.  This is a very helpful tool to visually see the words, and also to come up with a wider variety of vocabulary to incorporate into my 13 Things.

Gladiator Speech



Doing the Wordle for the Gladiator speech was very interesting, because I did not realize that some of the words were used so frequently.  I like the fact that they emphasize the size of the words that are used more than once.

I really enjoyed using this tool as a way to visually see themes being represented in my work and others. It also allows me to see the words that I tend to repeat in my blog.  This is a nice way to change up your style of writing so it doesn't make you sound so redundant.  It almost forces you to expand your vocabulary and actively use a thesaurus to come up with new words to use.  This can be used easily in a professional setting especially if you are constantly writing documents for work.  I plan on using this in the near future if my word usage becomes a problem.

Visual Thesaurus

Words Searched:  Guilty

Alternative Words:  Finable, Delinquent, Culpable, 

Definitions:

Finable-liable to a fine

Delinquent-guilty of a misdeed

Culpable-deserving blame or censure as being wrong or evil or injurious

I often use a thesaurus to find alternative words if I tend to be constantly using the same word over and over.  It helps me expand my vocabulary and learn new meanings to similar words.  I tend to look up new words when writing papers, and coming up with action words for my resume/cover letters.  I have never really had much trouble using a thesaurus, due to the fact they are pretty straight forward.  

I would not consider myself much of a word nerd, but it does become useful when broadening your overall vocabulary.  

Creative Commons

I found the use of Creative Commons to be extremely beneficial.  It is nice to know that there are things out there online that you don't have to worry about whether or not you will be flagged for copyright infringement.  That is one of the scariest things about using photos, media, text, and much more from the Internet.  I tend to worry about whether there will be some sort of legal suite brought upon me if I am not careful in choosing my content wisely.

I like the idea of being able to share your works with other people in order to create this sense of online community collaboration.  The thing that makes this type of copyright successful is being able to be still credited as an author.  Even if you share your information you can always limit users to certain aspects of your work.   If this were lost within the sharing of everything, I would not partake in putting any of my material online for sharing purposes.

There are a ton of projects that I have done in my Advanced Media class that I would be interested in seeing how other people attack my work.  That's what makes Creative Commons so fun, is the fact that you have no idea the possibilities that may exist within your work.  Everyone has different ways to approach a topic, and they bring their culture and experiences into this online sharing.  The only thing that I would not want to share with other people might be some personal stories, or something that I truly want to keep my own.

Google Reader

I thought being able to sort all the news into one single page was very useful.  It is such an annoyance to constantly open up multiple pages in order to look at some of your favorite websites.  Now, with Google Reader, I can look at everything all at once and see if there's anything interesting that I want to read about.  This could be used professionally in about any kind of organization.  This can keep you up-to-date on any events that may be happening in your community, and also anything that could potentially harm your business.  I definitely will be using this in the near future.  It just makes life so much easier.