My conversation with the IU School of Informatics Alumni Association podcast
Indiana University School of Informatics Alumni association logoI was interviewed on November 19th of last year by John Blue for the Indiana University Informatics Alumni Association's "Bits of Informatics" podcast, and I'm pleased to say it's now online for your listening pleasure. Over lunch at Aesop's Tables on a cloudy, wintry day, John and I chatted about my telecommunications and new media experiences at the Bloomington and IUPUI campuses; surround-sound production and my 2-song Capstone presentation; how I met my wife in ballroom-dancing class; and List-en up, the Angie's List podcast, which was in its infancy last fall. Though my first name's spelled incorrectly (I'm sure John will fix it soon), I got a kick out of listening to the podcast episode. It's quite strange to hear my voice in a context outside of List-en up, but it was exciting to be the interviewee rather than be the interviewer. It was a bit nerve-wracking, as well — can you tell?
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Beautiful 100% Recycled Business Cards from Natural Printing
Natural Printing logoI received an order of business cards for Adopt An Animal the other day from Natural Printing, and they look great! (Check out the design below.) This is the first time I've designed and ordered business cards for myself, and I'm quite pleased with the final product. I originally thought about using a service such as VistaPrint to get free cards, but they didn't offer 100% recycled (as far as I could tell), and I couldn't quickly figure out a way to simply upload the custom card I designed myself instead of using their templates (such was the case with similar free-business-card sites.) I found a few other places online offering recycled cards, but most required huge orders and were considerably expensive. Natural Printing allowed me to order a relatively small number of 100% recycled cards (don't be fooled by the rather unattractive example) for a relatively cheap price ($60.) Sure, it was more expensive than VistaPrint's free cards, obviously, but with Natural Printing, I got exactly what I wanted, quickly, and supported a small business at the same time. This being my first business card design, I was a bit apprehensive that I may have set up the printing layout incorrectly. Natural Printing's website gives guidelines on how to set up your design's layout so it prints correctly, and though the directions are easy to follow, Mark from Natural Printing let me know of a minor problem shortly after I submitted my order - the version of Adobe Illustrator I was using (CS2 12.0.1) was too high, even though it's a few years old. So I saved the design as a PDF, sent him the update, and quickly heard back from that my design was good to go. About a week and a half later, the little box showed up, stuffed with perfectly aligned little cards. I chose to use a one-sided design. I originally thought about including Adopt An Animal's services on the back of the card, but I realized that many times when people give me business cards, I write notes on the blank side about the organization or the person I met. I could've used lighter ink on the card's backside had I used it, but chose to go the simpler one-sided route. I also figure that it's a good idea to use matte printing, because glossy cards are virtually impossible to write on. The one minor issue I have with my order is that the heavy-duty, pure-white cards say nothing about being 100% recycled, which I think would be a nice feature and selling point for Natural Printing. I'll probably let Mark know about this and see what he says, but in the meantime, if I order more cards, I might just put a small watermark on the bottom mentioning this fact. It might look a little self-congratulatory ("Hey, I use recycled products!"), but with so many business cards floating around out there, people may as well start printing them on recycled paper! Adopt An Animal business card
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Grrr!!! WordPress settings: now you see 'em, now you don't.
I switched this website to a different server today, following these instructions from WordPress. I followed them to a T, or so I thought, but as soon as I signed in to my newly transferred site, I realized I had a lot more work ahead of me than I'd bargained for (almost 4 hours' worth, to be exact.) WordPress's simple instructions failed to mention the fact that nearly all of my settings for this site (descriptions and preferences for plug-ins, widgets, thingamajigs and doo-dads) would be erased. So, I've reconstructed the broken or missing pieces as best as I can with my evaporating patience. If you've read this far, I would greatly appreciate it if you would spend a minute, 30 seconds, or even 5 seconds poking around, clicking on things and seeing if you notice something broken, out of the ordinary, or missing. If you do, or have any recommendations in general, please post a comment or email me. I would truly appreciate it! I think I can finally let this computer (and my eyes) rest now that my blog is up and stumbling along again on its Frankenstein feet.
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