Tips for Church Websites

I am on to Mark Stephenson’s book: Web-Empower Your Church.  I was hoping to get his latest book, until I realised the book sites were telling me it wouldn’t be released until February 2011; just a few weeks too late. 

He has 14 years experience at running a church website, so I am keen to use his information.

Part of my second essay will be looking at a variety of church websites and comparing them so I will start looking at tips offered, and use them to create a checklist.  I can already use it on our facebook page, take out the picture of the church and put in the people!

Oh dear there are 70, perhaps I will just do the first 20 today. (He says, “Almost all these tips are the direct result of a not-so-nicely-learned lesson.”)

1. The people on your team are more important than the task of building your website.
2. Start with static content first, and add changing content only as you are able to keep it up-to-date.
3. Don’t post personal phone numbers or addresses without permission.
4. Never post private e-mail addresses; instead, create e-mail aliases.
5. Don’t violate copyright laws, and especially watch out for copyrighted music.
6. Design for people with low-end PCs, modems and 800-by-600 pixel monitors.
7. Keep the total page size with graphics under 150 kilobytes.
8. Use a common CSS file that can be cached by the browser.
9. Don’t use frames.
10. Restrict page width to 760 pixels or less, or to 100 percent.
11. Don’t use graphic backgrounds; white or black is usually best.
12. Don’t make pages longer than three screens vertically.
13. Never require horizontal scrolling.
14. Keep the link colours the same throughout the website, and use an obvious colour.
15. Never underline text, because it will look like a link.
16. Use animation sparingly and purposefully.
17. Never allow banner advertisements on a church website.
18. Include many pictures of people.
19. Get written permission to post pictures of kids; get at least verbal permission from adults.
20. Put a church logo or pictures of people on the front page instead of pictures of your church building.

The Social Network

This flim shows the development of Facebook, with a focus on the two lawsiuits Mark Zuckerberg, the founder,  is involved in.

Mark shows symptoms of Asperger’s, a brilliant intellect, yet showing little expression and ability to socialise and relate to other people.  In spite of that, he creates a startlingly innovative social network that the university population take to like a duck to water.  Perhaps it is because he isn’t able to unconsciously absorb the social rules that he can be more conscious of what the rules actually are, analyse them and apply them to his computer programme. 

And he seemed to be learning with each interaction.  He gets better at recognising mistakes and better at finding sensible people to give him advice.  He becomes more aware of what is appropriate self revelation on the internet and what isn’t. 

It was like he used the internet as a mirror to discover about himself those things he wouldn’t ordinarily be able to see and he developed a social network which enabled the less computer literate population to do likewise.

I was left with a number of questions:

What did Mark think of this portrayal of himself?

What is Mark’s background?  There seemed to be no mention of parents or siblings.  He seemed to rely so totally on himself unlike the rich kids who were suing him. 

I felt that I would like to read the book sometime to fill in a few gaps. (The Accidental Millionaires by Ben Mezrich) but of course then there is Wikipedia, and I was able to find some of the answers there. 

When asked about the film he said he just wished no-one made a movie of him while he was still alive.  He thought what his character was wearing was accurate to the last thread, but that the past 6 years had been mainly hard work with a focus of writing the code for Facebook, not nearly as exciting as the film made it out to be.

A co-worker said that the representation of him as a socially inept nurd was overstated.  Although a  co-worker might not be the best judge of that, his background does seem to support it; he was captain of his prep school fencing team and earned a classics diploma; hardly nurd type achievements.

His dad is a dentist and his mother a psychologist.  They encouraged his gift for programming when it emerged as a child.  He has three sisters.

A well made and thought provoking film.

Facebook

I am off to watch 'The Social Network' today. (6.55 Nova)  I am not sure what relevance it will have to the church and the internet, but I always enjoy a good film and it has good reviews.  A bit more background won't hurt.

Acrimony

Friday 14^th January

I am back to The Blogging Church by Brian Bailey particularly his discussion called ‘Do I live in the Town of Acrimony?  Blogs, and this can include Facebook posts which are really just mini blogs, are often full of acrimony (bitterness and ill feeling).  People are quick to post comments that they would never (hopefully) say face to face.  Competition plus arrogance in cyberspace make a volatile mix.  In Bailey’s experience it is often about Christians attacking other Christians more than non believers.  He gives the guidelines for handling communication with people who are only interested in attacking.  Give them one chance but only one.  It is better to spend time with people who want to be part of a conversation rather than those who want to derail the discussion and attack. (pp 151-2)

But it is also something we need to check in ourselves.  It can be a trap.  Criticism tends to generate a high volume of traffic and a high number of comments.  If you are too keen to get your blog working well and start playing the numbers game, you might get caught in this trap.  (p. 151)

But this is where I think the internet is a really good tool for getting to know ourselves as well.  The evidence is there.  We don’t have to try to remember what we did or didn’t say, we just need to read back.  We can see our mistakes and make amends, change and grow.  If our last ten posts are full of pointing out others mistakes and criticizing we may well have settled in the Town of Acrimony?  It is easy to move suburbs.

Internet Friendship

Facebook friends

This article came at a great time for my essay.

It tells of a young suicide victim who left a message on Facebook on Christmas day and not one of her 1048 Facebook friends checked on her.
It came with a really fabulous range of replies from:

Facebook is just another one of life's "idiot detectors". If you wish to communicate with friends via a computer, then what is wrong with E-mail? If you have a Facebook account you really are a "loser". Society today is dominated by selfish, self-obsessed, fools who believe that whatever they read on the Internet is truth. With more technology, the human race becomes less able to look after itself, nor realise what is truly important.

Mitch | Sydney - January 13, 2011, 7:52AM

To:

The reality is that the existing communications and transport networks available in modern society have transformed the way we live.

Home telephones were a rarity when I was growing up, as were motor vehicles, so your social life was limited to those around you. That had good and bad implications. Realistically you had no choice but to follow the leader regardless of how poor a personality they had.

Facebook, e-mail, all modern communications, and modern transport has changed the social fabric of the world.

No longer do we face restrictions on who we can talk to, or the thoughts that we can express.

Dominant personalities can be ignored, or "blocked" if they overstep the mark, and we can choose to live where we want without worrying about whether we will be accepted in that community.

Sadly, the boost in technology has also changed the way some of us perceive ourselves. Sadly, some have become socially isolated because they don't have access to the technology and those they live around do.

Sadly, some people judge their self worth by the acceptance they receive on Facebook and other social networks.

Psychology needs to move with the times to understand the issues arising from this change in communication on people in our society.

Please don't blame Facebook for these issues. It is simply a technological advance that society needs to catch up with.

Persoanlly I am very sorry for the young person who announced their suicide on Facebook, and also to those they left behind.

Fairdinkum | NSW - January 13, 2011, 9:01AM

I agree with Fairdinkum.  I think the newer tools of the internet like blogs and social networks give everyone a voice.  Despite the advertising you have a great deal more control over what is there for you to read and interact with. It is less invasive than emails.  Which is perhaps why ‘Mitch” objects to Facebook. 

Facebook seems to me to be a microcosm of life. Bullying occurs in real life too. Facebook the tool can be used and misused.

The article talked about the concept of friendship being devalued in Facebook.  That is perhaps more a language problem. If you haven’t experienced Facebook you couldn’t know the range of activities.  A facebook friend could just be someone to transact with on ‘Farmville’ or any of the games played on Facebook.  Or they could be family or friends that you meet with regularly and share with intimately. Yes a microcosm of life.

100 days of Blogging

I am just back from Melbourne and should be in bed.  I had a good trip and did some more reading, still on “The Blogging Church” by Brian Bailey.  I also started Simchurch by Douglas Estes which is quite an eye opener.  

Under my sisters guidance I had a bit of a play with the set up of my page and I have a bit more of an idea of how it all works.   I am not quite happy with all the effects.

No time for a bit entry before bed but I liked this bit from Bailey’s book (pp. 159-160).  All this is obviously a bit addictive if it gets too competitive!

A Typical Tragic Blogger’s Tale or 100 Days of Blogging

Day 1.    What’s a blog?

Day 4. Wow, people who blog have way too much time on their hands.

Day 11. I would never consider having my own blog, but I can’t believe how many cool ones there are out there.  Have you seen the one about...?

Day 23. Welcome to my new blog!  This is my first post.  I finally decided to see what this blogging thing is all about. I love to write so this should be fun.

Day 42. My last post got three comments and over a hundred hits!   Some guy in San Francisco just linked to it.  I noticed that when I post before 9.00am on the East Coast, I get more traffic.  By the way, what does “Technorati rank” mean?

Day 46. I got plenty of sleep last night.  I just wanted to wear this shirt again today.

Day 58. You don’t have a blog?  You don’t know what you’re missing.  I’ll set one up for you so you can play around with it.

Day 74. My Google page rank hit 6!  All of those inbound links from A-List bloggers have really helped.  My AdWords revenue is definitely going to be up this month.  Now that I post at least three times a day, my traffic is growing like crazy.

Day 89. Wow, son, when did you learn to ride a bike?  How did I manage to miss that?

Day 93. I can’t believe this guy started his blog ten days ago and he already has more traffic than me.

Day 100.  I quit.