Heal Your Church WebSite

Twitter, Facebook, Myspace.  If you’re using any of these tools to communicate from the summer mission field, then please communicate with me. FriendFeed, Orkut, Tumblr, Linkedin, Bebo too.

I’ve been asked to write some technology articles for a major Christian publication and I figured what better audience than the savvy, geeky HYCW cult to provide me with the low-down on such hi-tech replacements to Paul’s parchment?

So what I’m seeking is feedback from individuals participating in summer mission trips who have/are leveraging social networks such as Twitter and/or Facebook to communicate their work in the field back to the home folks.

ALSO, I’d also be interested in any church webmaster/IT administrator who is mashing-up such inbound life-streams onto their church web site.

And I don’t want/need just success stories. If your experiences are a poster child for ‘FACEBOOK FAIL’ or a total ‘TWITTER DISASTER’ I’m equally interested as we all learn so much from such … ummm … character building endeavors.

So leave a comment below or if you like more privacy, introduce me your story via our handy-dandy contact form. I always ask for reciprocal links and spellings of names to make sure you and your organization get the attention and attribution deserved.

Did I leave anything out? Yup … thanks in advance to any and all who respond to my call for content.

UPDATE 18-Jun09: If you have, are, or are going to tweet from the mission field, help me write an article on the topic by answering these questions I’ve placed on a handy-dandy Google form: http://is.gd/15Q7O

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Here’s another lesson we can take from Twitters poor handling of their @ replies notification setting problem: don’t tell users that they’re the problem when it is your system that’s sick

Jumping the credibility shark

Wikipedia explains that the colloquialism “jumping the shark” …

… refers to a scene in a three-part episode of the American TV series Happy Days, first broadcast on September 20, 1977. In the third of the three parts of the “Hollywood” episode, Fonzie (Henry Winkler), wearing swim trunks and his trademark leather jacket, jumps over a confined shark while water skiing …

… The infamous scene was seen by many as betraying Happy Days’ 1950s setting and its earlier character development by cashing in on the 1970s fads of Evel Knievel and Jaws.

I’m thinking that Twitter’s blog response to #fixreplies and #twitterfail entitled ‘Whoa Feedback‘ in a way betrays the trust of their community, thereby jumping the proverbial shark - at least in terms of their credibility.

In English please?

Sure thing, let me break this thing down:

• Last night, Twitter opted to remove the @ replies feature;
• Twitter initially explained on their blog that the reason for removing the feature was due to metrics and feedback that indicated @ replies was an ‘undesirable and confusing option‘;
• yours truly speculated in ‘While Twitter fiddled, their users burned‘ that we weren’t buy the user experience issue;
• a day later, Twitter responded on their blog to complaints with the reason for removing the feature being due to their inability to scale it to their millions of users

In short, I believe that Twitter potentially bought themselves some significant public relations problems by not explaining the real reason for removing the feature up front. One need only review the tweets hashed under #TwitterLied as proof of this.

So what has this got to do with me?

Simple, when something breaks or under performs on your church and/or charity website - don’t blame the user’s browser when you know the problem exists on your server.

Put another way, don’t blame shift problems to your users, and whatever you do - don’t lie to those whom you are called to serve.

As stewards to the Internet presence for your church and/or charity I’d ask that you remember these wise words:

Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy. - 1 Corinthians 4:2

Want to learn more?

Here are some useful URLs to additional articles on the topic:

• Twitter: Covering Up Incompetence
• Twitter Waffles About Why @Replies Were Dumbed Down
• Twitter Reverses Policy Change, For Now. This is Nuts But Here’s How It Works
• Twitter overestimates itself on the diffusion curve « John Peltier on Products
• Twitter States Technical Issues with Reply Issues | Emergent Future

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Twitter, in fiddling around with their @ replies notification setting, created a firestorm of outrage among the known twitterverse manifesting itself into to hash mark campaigns entitled ‘#fixreplies‘ and ‘#twitterfail‘ respectively.

Their explanation for this ‘Small Settings Update‘ that removes the @ Replies Notification Setting completely?

We’ve updated the Notices section of Settings to better reflect how folks are using Twitter regarding replies. Based on usage patterns and feedback …

… receiving one-sided fragments via replies sent to folks you don’t follow in your timeline is undesirable. Today’s update removes this undesirable and confusing option.

I’m not buying this as it is the the 2nd time in 2 years the folks at Twitter have attempted to remove a feature that clearly is part of the average Twitter User eXperience and expectation.

So what’s the big deal?

Why is the Twitterati up in arms? I think usability expert Jeffrey Zeldman summed it up best with his retweet (RT) that reads:

“RT self: Discovering people, topics, and conversations through friends’ @ replies was one of the joys of Twitter. #fixreplies“

Here are two real-world use cases in which I’d offer in support of Zeldman’s popular assertion:

1. Back in August of 2008 I was kvetching about some ASP.NEt anomolies when I got a pithy reply from an @jerobins whom I wasn’t following - well wasn’t following until I found out he and I shared a passion for or code, our kids and our neighborhoods which were only a mile or two apart.
2. Similarly, back in November of 2008 I offered a #deanlink. I got a reply from @timbert of Belgium that the web services testing tool I found useful was just what he needed! Such words of encouragement are … well encouring that my #deanlink tweets are indeed useful to others.

So what’s my point?

So what has the whole dust up over Twitter’s @ Replies Notification Setting have to do with the daily operation of our church and/or charity website?

Glad you asked.

I’m currently in the process of sorting out the fairly consistent stream of email I’ve received recently regarding web site do-overs and/or content ‘manglement’ tools.

As some loyal cult members might guess, I’m going to reply with some solid, tangible technical solutions - but only after first preaching the tenets of understanding who your websites’ visitors are and what they’re seeking to accomplish.

Meaning, before I render judgment on WordPress, ExpressionEngine, drupal, Joomla, MovableType, TypePad, Blogger, and/or any other means of managing a church and/or charity website on the cheap …

… I am first going to provide some practical steps in getting information about those consuming your online services that in some cases include … wait for it … making actual contact with actual human beings about how they actually use your website.

I suspect the folks at Twitter could have and should engaged the same … though the skeptical me speculating that either that if indeed the folks at Twitter were aware of said actual usage (as I suspect they are), then they are trying to modify user behavior to …

• reduce spam, and/or
• reduce service questions regarding the feature, and/or
• attempt to decrease their 60% twitter-quitter attrition rate

… take your pick, as this is all just wild speculation on my part.

The bottom line?

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!

Want to learn more?

Here are some useful URLs to additional articles on the topic:

• Twitter Fiddles, Users Burn
  (yes, I ‘borrowed’ the title for this post from Mark Evans of twitterrati.com - thanks!)
• Twitter Puts a Muzzle on Your Friends: Goodbye People I Never Knew
• Twitter Screws Up « A Fresh Cup
• Twitter Kills the Party | Ocell.blog
• Twitter breaks its social network: how quickly can it fix it? | Technology | guardian.co.uk
• Unbelievable: Twitter Hides Partial Converstions AGAIN — Climb to the Stars
• From the Eyes of an Enterpreneur: Dear Twitter, we are your community, please talk to us
• Twitter Assumes Too Much | SociallyRed

Or just leave a ‘love note’ in the form of a comment, question, etc …

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Last Friday I posed the question “what actually heals a church website?” Now it’s Tuesday and I’d like to talk about this in light of the many excellent comments received.

But first a BIG THANKS to all who participated in this dialog - this was both good and healthy and it is much appreciated.

1. If it’s broke, please fix it

“The medicine that heals depends on the illness — if you’ve got a spinning gold cross, removing it becomes job #1″ - Mickey

It’s such a simple point, yet a very salient one. There are some very obvious maladies that afflict our church websites. When we see them, we should fix them.

For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, I prescribe my post entitled:

• The Seven Deadly Sins of Church WebSite Design

Even if you do know what I’m talking about, it’s a fun read … don’t worry, we’ll be here when you get back.

2. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!

“I fixed up my church’s website with WordPress and a user-friendly, inviting design. Within months they’d wrecked the colors, changed pictures of people to pictures of furniture, and otherwise mucked it up.” - Jeremy

Okay, I’m not trying to be a wise-guy here, but I’ve seen this happen all to often. Usually this occurs when an individual has an agenda that it outside the scope of what the church website is trying to accomplish. Two that come to mind are:

1. On the job training or skills advertising
2. An ego that can’t share nice things

Often, I find it’s a combination of the both. My post “Mr. Zeldman meet Mike Boyink, one of ‘The New Samaritans’” comes to mind.

3. Content is King

“Even if it has to be black Times New Roman on a stark white background, I’d say job one is relevant content. When, where, what, who, and how, and for good measure, don’t forget why.” - lemon

I’m thinking ‘lemon’ pretty much summed it all up rather nicely with his/her enumeration of the basics that help us avoid the “Seven deadly sins of web writing.”

4. Identify your target audience

There are really (at least) two distinct audiences for a church website:

1. People not part of your normal congregation, seeking information about your church …
2. People in the congregation who want to know what’s on this week …

Since the introduction of this  blog back on May 17, 2002 I’ve been preaching the importance of identifying the purpose and personality of your church website - and then aiming all content, controls and/or contrivances at seekers and members alike.

Put another way, “A church website that fails to convey the purpose and personality of the congregation and staff will also fail to bring new members into the door.” - Empty Parking Lot Tabernacle

5. Identify your process & work-flow

“Unfortunately I think its a people problem, the site is just a symptom. People need to see it as a communication medium and commit to its use. I’m surprised at how poorly email is used by churches, let alone websites.” - David J

Unfortunately, I think the master of the B2Blog has offered a diagnosis that is as incisive as it it accurate. David accurately points out that unless we understand the work-flow that defines how we:

• identify things that need fixed;
• identify things that work;
• identify what makes compelling content; and
• identify the target audience of your church’s purpose and personality …

… then a church website is likely never to get healed no matter what content management system it employs, …

… no matter how much Flash animation the site does or does not have, …

… no matter how many social networks the church-geek API’s into the site.

In short, unless church doesn’t have well defined processes for how to effectively get the right information out to your target audiences, then you’re efforts are like the person Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 as aimlessly batting at the air.

At least that’s my take. What about you?

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I want comments on the following question: what actually heals your church website?

Is it:

• using WordPress as a content management system on the cheap?
• using Joomla or Blogger instead of Wordpress?
• is it adding a Twitter plugin or widget?
• is it adding more spinning animated gifs of gold lamé crosses?
• is it hiring someone to wordsmith your pastor’s boring sermons?
• all of the above?
• none of the above?
• something else …

Of course the list above is more a conversation starter than a poll … meaning … I want your feedback on what YOU think heals a church website.

Thanks in advance!

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Twitter gives our mundane lives meaning, that’s why it beat the snot out of a more ‘feature-rich’ Pownce.

To prove my point, let’s rewind about a year and a half ago to Tamar Weinberg’s comparison entitled ‘Twitter vs. Pownce: Who Pwns?‘ Dutifully she does what many of us do while shopping for software, cars, and food processors - she compares and scores the features of one product against another to a conclusion that reads:

Pownce 5, Twitter 3. Pownce wins!

There’s only one problem with that approach, while features may sell a product, it is ultimately functionality that sustains a product; software or otherwise.

Which is why I think Scoble succinctly hits the nail on the head while unwittingly predicting Pownce’s demise in his Twitter vs. Pownce post also from early July 2007:

“But, anyway, I still like Twitter the best. Why? No complications. It does only one thing. I find that on my cell phone I go back to Twitter before I go back to any of the others. It’s lightweight.”

Put another way, when it comes to microblogging, Twitter has it all over Pownce because it makes it easy to do the one thing we all want from microblogging - making the mundane instances of our lives meaningful, while learning new things about our friends without coming off like a stalker.

Disagree as some “new media marketeers” might, the reason we like Twitter is the same reason we fell in love with Blogger, it got out of the way and let us opine reflectively about how our cats would join us in contemplating the lint in our navels.

For example, why anyone would follow my own Twitter page is beyond me, yet some find the fact that I fertilize my lawn in December and enjoy smash-mouth football entertaining and interesting.

And like blogging, Twitter easily allows our friends and relatives to quickly comment at their convenience - only with the excellent 140 character excuse for not engaging in exposition and detailed explanations.

All this while providing others context about ourselves that may not come out in our blogs, lectures, books and top-rated podcasts. This latter point is nicely explained in this 2:25 YouTube video from the good folks at the CommonCraft Show aptly entitled ‘Twitter in Plain English.’

Pownce unfortunately lost sight of these primal purposes for microblogging, and in the process ‘featured-creeped‘ their product to death. Not an uncommon instance for software in any era. Especially when said offering described its services with a church-speak-like mission statements:

“… Pownce is a lightweight productivity app, built on top of the stream, and it has all the pluses and minuses of a productivity app (including that you can use it to share music with friends!)”  - Pownce is competing with 37Signals, not Twitter!

Any wonder we all stopped using Pownce around 160 days ago?

So what has this got to do with your church and/or charity website? Glad you asked.

Remember, software features are only relevant to the primary activities you’re trying to accomplish with the assistance of automation.

Put another way, when you’re picking or designing a program to get something done - ignore all the fluff-n-stuff that has little or no bearing on what you want to get done.

For example, if all you want to do is post 1-up snips of your daily life, then Twitter is just enough software to get it done. No need to worry about file storage, groups, rooms, etc …

… which is also why I’m thinking Twitter is also likely to eventually beat the snot out of FriendFeed; but I digress … so more on that topic latter.

For now, here are some related links on this topic:

• Lessons to Be Learned From Pownce’s Demise - Mashable
• TechCrunch - Pownce Deadpooled, Team Moves To Six Apart
• Twitter-Competitor Pownce Closing Down - Switched
• Download Squad - Pownce gets pwned: Six Apart acquires and plans to shutter service
• Pownce vs. Twitter -  Joe Duck
• GetSatisfaction.com - What’s the difference between Pownce and Twitter?

Your mileage may vary on this one, but deep in your heart, you know I’m right about making the mundane meaningful vs. marketing appeal of Twitter.

Now please, if you don’t mind, link this post in your next tweet, add it to all your social network links so I can be proven wrong about the marketing thingie. A simple @deanpeters reply is all it takes!-)

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. - 1 Corinthians 9:24-26

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I’ve been a bit dissatisfied with the HealYourChurchWebsite look-n-feel since early this summer. After a lengthy search of various WordPress themes, I’ve settled on Vigilance 1.16. Here are some of the reasons why along with some of the things I discovered and/or did to make it more suitable to my tastes.

What I was looking for:

I was looking for a 3 column theme that had a clean look, was configurable, and wouldn’t put be behind the 8-ball with later versions of WordPress.

I also wanted to avoid one of these themes offered by various and emerging “clubs” as they tend to focus more on ad revenue generation than providing one’s users with the ability to get things done.

In my case, my users want to get these things done:

• aggregate my posts with ease
• find stuff to help with and/or addresses specific issues
• quickly and easily link and/or copy the title or content on their blogs
• print my posts and read them offline and/or nail them to the door of their church

Some other themes I considered were:

Ashford

I had a hard time NOT using this theme. Under the hood, it is very well thought out and implemented. That said, it is suited to a slightly different audience than mine - that is small organizations or businesses and not so much individual webmasters and developers. That said, don’t be surprised if I make the switch to it one day - or at least implement it immediately on other projects.

DarkZen

From the folks at Daily Blog Tips, this theme had many elements I liked, but there were just too many sacrifices of semantic markup for SEO and/or layout to make me want to use this long term.

Copyblogger

Another theme that had many elements I enjoyed, but to me had too many ‘highly styled’ element treatments that to me, made implementation of any custom CSS a bit more hassle than I wanted.

LivingOS UPSILON

Similar to Ashford, this theme was better suited towards church and charity websites. That, and while it did have several SEO-centric elements, there was enough there that I wanted to re-code or customize that made me look elsewhere.

Fresh Editorial

Again, an attractive theme that while nice, would have locked me into some renderings that would just drive me a bit bananas.

There were other themes but the above list themes I might use for other projects - and just what type of stuff I want to get into or avoid for a personal blog such as HYCW; including:

• Has a good WordPress Admin/Configuration screen or screens
• Is easily modified via CSS and through the Vigilance Child Theme
• Does not sacrifice usability for SEO visibility
• Is coded clean and clearly enough in PHP that I can confidently make modifications
• Shows a history of active updates, participation, and interest
• offers easy upgrades

Oh yeah, one other big thing I was looking for:  easily allow my users execute on the actions and/or activities they desire, need, and seek.

Oh yeah, one other big thing I was NOT looking for:  force me to sell my first born child into some SEO club.

How I made it work:

Having some time over this past holiday weekend, I figured it was time to bite the bullet and make it happen. Here are some steps you may find useful:

Install the theme

cd wp-content/themes
wget http://themes.jestro.com/vigilance/vigilance.1.16.zip
unzip vigilance.1.16.zip
wget http://themes.jestro.com/vigilance/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/myvigilance.zip
unzip myvigilance.zip
cd myvigilance
nano style.css
nano vdean.css

As you can see, ‘myviligance’ is the name for the basic child theme for Vigilance - which I immediately took advantage of that by adding the following to the file /wp-content/themes/myviligance/style.css:
@import url("vdean.css");Oh Sure, I could have just added all my code into style.css directly, but I just felt more comfortable working this way - and was glad myviligance was set-up in such as way that I could.

Configuring the Theme

First stop was the vigilance options panel, which is immediately available after you select the “myvigilance” child theme as your default:

With it, I was able to modify things such as:

• Layout and Colors
• Top Banner Image
• Alert Box
• Sidebar Image
• Sidebar Feed Box
• Footer

Then using Chris Pederick.com’s Web Developer extension for FireFox, I got busy with the CSS:

What I did was make test changes I previewed in the “Edit CSS” panel of the Web Developer extension - then once satisfied, physically modified vdean.css either through the command-line editor on the actual Linux platform … or the CSS “Theme Editor” link provided via the WordPress “Design” tab.

Hacking the Theme

Hey, what red-blooded coder with 25 year’s experience isn’t going to make some code changes here-n-there?

1. I moved the tags to the bottom of the post. I know it’s less SEO friendly, but it is ALOT friendlier to my readers whom use tags as a way of finding related articles. I also added the CSS class “post-tags” to the markup for easier modification: <p class=”post-tags”>
   … Said changes needed to be made in index.php, page.php and single.php. Perhaps the use of an include file can consolidate this in future iterations of the program?
2. Downloaded and modified some of the colors of some of the icon images.
3. Uploaded a number of header images to rotate.
4. I moved the admin edit link to the top of the post, which is generally where I need it and look for it. I also gave it the class “edit-this” for easier management later:  <?php edit_post_link(’Edit This’,'<p class=”edit-this”>’,'</p>’); ?> … Likewise, changes were required in index.php, page.php and single.php.
5. In sidebar-feedbox.php, I added the class ‘rss-feed-title’ to the header tag.
6. install the Social Bookmarking RELOADED plugin in place of the Gregarious social bookmarking plug-in that stopped working after v2.3 of WordPress.
7. in search-form.php, I added the class ’search-form’ to the header tag.
8. Then in sidebar.php, searchform.php, and sidebar-feedbox.php - I changed all instances of<h2> to <h3> because semantically, I just believe that’s the way God intended it.

While these hacks mean I’ll have to do the same for future releases, I’m at least hoping that the good folks over at Jestro.com will at least consider adding some additional classes to the header tags I cited above to make for easier CSS management of various elements.

Conclusion

There’s enough available out-of-the-box with Vigilance 1.16 that most webmasters of church and/or charity websites could use it out-of-the box. And whle the same can be said for worth themes such as Tim Bednar’s Ashford, I’m hoping my choice - when finally tweaked to perfection - will provide my particular user-base the best interface needed for their required activities.

Until then, I’ve still got ALOT of modifications I need to finalize. For example, I’m not pleased with my treatment of hyperlinks, image/caption boxes and/or a few other elements associated with the post layout.

Still, this is all managable through the CSS file at this point - so suggest away.

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I believe it was the slam of a large piece of plywood falling 2 some-odd stories onto other lumber that rudely awoke me at 7:40 AM this Thanksgiving morning.  An no, I couldn’t go back to sleep as the hum of a noisy air compressor placed precisely next to the property line driving the pneumatic hammers were equally annoying. That was the scene at my home this holiday.

trash heap at 5244 levering mill rd, apex, nc

D&G Builders of Fuquay Varina proceeded to work on a new house.

A house next door being constructed on behalf of PenfieldHomes.com.

And after a few emails and phone calls to a project manager of construction who informed me that “Mexicans don’t celebrate Thanksgiving like us …”

So after telling said project manger that I didn’t want a feud, I apologized if anything we said or did offended (though I’m truly hard pressed to think of any such word or deed) - and he in turn called off the work squad - and I began to think of how similar situations can impact the peaceful operation of our church and charity websites.

In other words, just as noisy neighbors and/or construction are a nuisance in the real world, so too can the virtual home of our organization’s web presence can be disrupted by inconsiderate acts.  Here are some analogies that come to mind:

1. Noise

I had an experience lately where some blogs I run on a shared server were inaccessible due to the incoming noise from a bunch of spammers and ‘bots. This was because a neighboring domain sharing the same IP had put up a BBS in an unsecured fashion.

2. Obstructions

It’s only happened once, but a truck was recently parked that partially blocked our driveway. In the same way, access to your site can be obstructed in part and/or in whole when those working on and/ror running the website ‘next door’ with an improperly parked modules and/or run-away program that consumes all the server’s memory and ports.

3. Trash

Nobody like’s picking up someone else’s garbage. My wife is no exception, as she recently found herself picking up unsecured McDonald’s bags that had blown into our yard. In the same way, neighboring website projects can also leave rubbish in the form of temporary files, no-longer used compiler settings and the like.

4. Boundaries

The Wake County, NC ‘UDO‘  defines a minimum number of feet in which a new home structure can be built next to another, how much noise is acceptable and other fun stuff like that. However, just because these rules are on the books doesn’t mean they’re going to be enforced. Meaning, it is going to be up to me to look out for instances of encroachment. In the same way, don’t expect or assume the host of your shared server is going to have your best interest in mind. They don’t and won’t. It is up to you to be diligent be on guard for those times neighboring websites and/or webmasters wander into your domain - and to work within the boundaries of good citizenship and the rules to resolve such issues.

5. Communications

If possible, establish one point of contact and a protocol for those situations where you feel you’re on the receiving end of some inconsiderate instances or situations. For example, know the correct channels of communications for your web host, and if feasible, for your IP Neighbor. Similarly, understand that email, though convenient, can lead to a breakdown that leads to unnecessary and unfortunate bad blood. Especially true when individuals on the other side are already having a bad day due to some other unrelated inconsideration. In all cases, keep track and logs of all such communiqués as you never know when you’ll need them.

Anyway, those are my thoughts this Thanksgiving morning as I ignore the slam of pneumatic hammer guns and the humming whir of the air compressor and set my thoughts onto some delicious Greek Chopped Meat Stuffing and football.

Well that and all the wonderful ways in which I’ve been blessed, including my family, my friends, my job, my church, and also the hundreds of visitors to this site - many of whom have sent me private messages of best wishes. Thank you all. I’m very grateful for every remembrance of you (Philippians 1:3).

And with that, here are some links to some other related articles I’ve posted in the past. These include some practical advice on “how-to” implement some of the safeguards, countermeasures and logging I’ve mentioned above:

• Who is my IP Neighbor? And just what is his domain up to?
• How to block a range of IPs from spamming your church website
• find-a-bot.sh - a nice little script to ID bots bugging your website site
• How to block spambots by user agent using .htaccess
• How to quickly check your error logs for oddities
• How to secure your church’s dedicated Linux server
• How to block a range of IPs from spamming your church website
• When good Hosts providers go Bad
• Turning Spam Pings into a HoneyPot

Now if you don’t mind me, I’m off to E-Bay and/or Craigslist to find an affordable ANSI S1. 2-1962 sound level meter to leverage. I’m hoping I don’t need it but one never knows.

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“According to Pew, almost half of adults said they needed someone to help them set up or learn how to use their gadgets. Once they finally get them going, however, things aren’t all smooth sailing—44 percent of adults with home Internet connections reported service failure sometime in the last 12 months.”

With apologies to Ars Technica’s Jacqui Cheng for so shamelessly ripping her pithy headline “Study reminds us why we’re always fixing our parents’ PCs” - I only do so because she’s so on target to point out the relevance of a recent Pew Internet & American Life Project report entitled “When Technology Fails.”

So Dean What’s your point? Glad you asked …

Just a quick reminder that any technology we introduce into the operations of our church and/or charitable organization is going to have an infrastructure cost. Here are some specifics from the aforementioned PEW, that though specific to a home setup, translate easily enough to the IT operations of our own religions institutions:

• 44% of those with home internet access say their connection failed to work properly for them at some time in the previous 12 months.
• 39% of those with desktop or laptop computers have had their machines not work properly at some time in the previous 12 months.
• 29% of cell phone users say their device failed to work properly at some time in the previous year.
• 26% of those with Blackberries, Palm Pilots or other personal digital assistants say they have encountered a problem with their device at some time in the previous 12 months.
• 15% of those with an iPod or MP3 player say their devices have not worked properly at some time in the prior year.

Consider the first bullet point in terms of operational impact. The internet goes down. Here’s how home users react - which I suspect would be similar to how your pastor, music minister and/or church secretary might behave:

• 38% of users with failed technology contacted user support for help.
• 28% of technology users fixed the problem themselves.
• 15% fixed the problem with help from friends or family.
• 2% found help online.

What that tells me is that those of us running a church and/or charity website, because of the our conspicuous computing prowess, may in fact be part of that 53% (38%+15%) contacted when anything from a printer to an internet connection goes down.

Yeah, okay, so I get those calls - what can I do about them? Glad you asked!

Some suggestions of how I’ve kept my part-time work as a church webmaster from turning into a full-time IT support desk:

1. Identify other members of the congregation willing to help with non-website related IT issues
2. Learn what service contracts the church has, and be willing to remind individuals (in a grace-driven and loving way) that’s where the call needs to go
3. Establish a help/ticket system. I like Mantis Bug Tracker, but there are just as many others out there that get the job done.
4. Establish an internal Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) and/or WIKI system that can be used for quick reference.
5. Get buy in for the above four points from the church staff. If they don’t enforce said policy, then you’ll quickly run into a polity issue.

I know I can’t be the only one whose experienced this - so let me know what you’ve done to remedy this situation.

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Ever get that annoying email from a church, friend, and/or family member who ‘accidentally‘ sent a rant to everyone in their address book and/or a group-related email directory? With the recent election, my wife and I have been getting more than our fair share.

And while I’ve written about how to address ‘Christian SPAM‘ in the recent past, I wanted to share with you my most recent response to what I sub-categorize as Christian SPAM email bombing runs (CSEBRs):

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Hi {name withheld to protect the guilty};

Next time we get together, make sure I spend about 5 minutes on my laptop showing you 5 cool — and free — things about the web that don’t rock like it’s 1995. For example:

• Twitter - a “microblog” mechanism that lets you post 140 characters on any topic you want as often as you want. This is especially great as you’re standing around bored, upset, amused, and/or excited about things while equipped with nothing more than your cell phone. For an example, check mine out at http://twitter.com/deanpeters - no great shakes, but I’ve got enough subscribers whom seem interested.
• Facebook - a social networking service where friends and families can subscribe where you can post thoughts like the ones below and then engage people in dialog and/or banter as they can post comments, etc .. It’s also a nice place to throw out some family pix. If you’d like, I can also show you how to “plug-in” a Facebook app that update to your “wall” every time you post on Twitter (synchronization is an amazing thing). Here’s a link to my profie http://is.gd/6MgW … note how I used the http://is.gd mechanism to shorten the URL.
• Blogger.com - now I know Twitter and FaceBook have obviated bloggery to some degree, but I still love it as it allows me to venture deep into topics I enjoy such as healing church websites and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Moreover, less constraints on what I can post - and if you like, you can make some buck$ via instruments like Google’s adsense. Oh BTW, I’ve got my WordPress-driven blogs set up with the ‘twitter tools plugin‘ to update my Twitter and Facebook pages when I post. Best thing, again, people can subscribe to your blog’s RSS feed to keep up to date.
• Google Reader - note I’ve mentioned subscribe 3 times now. All of the above allow individuals to subscribe either through the site’s syndication feed (RSS) and/or through email alerts with links to the juicy and compelling content. And not just from annoying friends like me, but any blog, news wire, newspaper, microblog and/or social network to which you’re inclined to observe.
• BCC - finally … and I can’t stress this enough … if you must use email, that’s cool. But please, do me and others on your distribution one favor - use the BCC mechanism to distribute the email. Blind Carbon Copy is cool in that it’ll protect your friends, family and loved ones from nasty spammers and idiots like me from exposing their email addresses “into the wild.“Oh, and if you use a free email service like gMail, you can create categories for both incoming and outgoing email addresses - which is really handy when you quickly send out email broadcats to select groups of your address book (using BCC of course).

Anyway, have a great Sunday - and give  {spouse name withheld to protect the innocent} a hug from us.

Your (annoying) friend;

Dean

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Feel free to use any portion of this email to respond to Christian SPAM email bombing runs aimed in your direction. Or better yet, just send them a link here.

I’ll be glad to respond to their rationalizations and excuses by explaining how the are endangering the tax exempt status of their church by dumping a political kvetch on the Sunday school rolls.

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Last week, while attending the MS PDC 2008, Ray Ozzie got all jumbo-tron’d at me about Azure and cloud computing. Here’s what it means to you and your church computing operations - now that I’ve had a bit more than a week to catch up on work and think it all through.

First, I suspect some of you are wondering “Dean, what is cloud computing?” Glad you asked.

For the purposes of this conversation, and to avoid all the jargoneeze this IT buzzword is currently enjoying, the could is a metaphor for the Internet.

Cloud computing is effectively outsourcing applications, services, and/or infrastructure you might otherwise host in-house.

For example Amazon’s Elastic Compute Cloud, or EC2 for short, basically is a service where you’d rent a fully-managed computer to host your applications - that is accessible via the Internet. What you lose in paying rent is theoretically recouped in terms of not having to worry about the hard and soft costs of systems administration, housing, and/or securing such a computer in the basement of your church.

What Microsoft’s Windows Azure will provide is platform for developers to create applications that will leverage the following services via the Internet:

• Live Services - where everyone logs in, so this is where you’ll see social networking apps happening. Single Sign On (SSO) federation as well.
• SQL Services - where the data is kept, though right now, the service is not much better than someone else hosting a MySQL database for you. There are no triggers, stored procedures or other fun stuff yet available.
• .NET Services - while you’ll eventually be able to use PHP, Ruby, Java, and a bunch of other languages, currently this is where you create ‘federated’ applications that run locally and/or on the cloud itself (hosted by MSFT).
• SharePoint services - still a future thing, but basically taking what is effectively this Intranet service and providing some or all of its functionality outwards.
• CRM - also a future thing, but also taking this customer relationship management (CRM) system and providing some or all of its functionality outwards.

By now, I suspect some of you are asking yourselves “Dean, what does this have to do with my churhc website?” Glad you asked.

If you are blessed enough to be part of an über, mega-church complex that benefits from having your own IT operations, developers, and product support:

• you can save money in infrastructure costs by leveraging some of Azure’s services
• you can save time in having applications hosted via Azure’s servers
• you can save collaboration headaches by developing applications via the Azure platform
• you can save user login complexities by leveraging Azure’s security federation

If you’re part of a smaller church or charity organization, it likely means that sometime in your future may find yourselves subscribing to any number of “software+service” applications via Azure, such as:

• a social network
• a content management system
• a customer relationship management
• an office suite

On that last point, office suite, bear in mind that Microsoft is very good about eating its own dog food. Meaning, expect more product offerings by the Bellevue behemoth to also leverage or become part of the Azure platform - specifically Microsoft Office applications such as Word and Excel across a variety of platforms in a number of collaborative contexts.

In fact from what I saw last week, they already are - but more on that in the very near future when I blog about what I learned about the upcoming Windows 7 at the MS PDC 2008.

Finally, some of you may be wondering, “where can I learn more about Windows Azure?” Glad you asked:

• Video of Ray Ozzie’s Day One Keynote in both WMV-HQ and MP4 formats.
• Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform: A guide for the perplexed - ZD|Net, Mary-Jo Foley
• Microsoft’s “What is the Azure Services Platform?” page
• Cloud computing - WikiPedia
• C|Net - Microsoft launches Windows Azure
• What cloud computing really means - InfoWorld
• The Register - What Ray Ozzie didn’t tell you about Microsoft Azure
• Microsoft Azure Aims to Re-define the OS - ReadWrite Web

Here are also some recent blogs on the topic I found worth noting:

• Microsoft Azure Vs Google App Engine - Jon Paul Davies
• About.com - Is Microsoft Azure a Last Ditch Effort?
• Microsoft’s Azure is So 1997 (and Why I Love it) - Mashable.com
• C|Net Negative Approach - Microsoft’s Azure–I remain perplexed
• Microsoft Azure - Contribute or Cannibalize? - Enterprise 2.0 Essentials
• Perils of Parallel - Microsoft Azure Just Says NO to Multicore Apps in the Cloud
• Microsoft’s Azure is not Hailstorm, but what’s the point of it? - Guardian UK
• InfoWorld - Making sense of Microsoft’s Azure
• Windows Azure from a Developer’s Perspective - Dare Obasanjo aka Carnage4Life

Interesting stuff, no?

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I cut you man! Seriously, it’s rare that I review a non-church nor charity website, but this site was so chock full of great lessons in what not to do on your church and/or charity website, I couldn’t help myself.

The basic message today being: don’t let fear of copyright violations drive your website design.

Site review

So first, let’s analyze and review what we’re up against, starting with the annoying Flash animation introduction that’s so important and relevant to the site’s conversion goals that we’re offered a “skip intro” hyperlink.

Oh but wait, that’s not all. After the little show of factories and knives, you are presented a copyright statement which you MUST agree to before proceeding.

From the language, I’d surmise that the folks presenting the site are likely worried about the images and text of their items winding up on E-Bay.

Basically sending the message “before you proceed, we know you’re here to rip us off.”

Oh but wait, click on the menu choice labeled “home” and you’re forced to agree with the copyright statement a second time.

Basically sending the message “hey, we know you lied to us, so let me hear you agree again!” in the form of a copyright notice splash page a user has to accede to each and every time they “go home.”

Oh but wait, click on their “What’s New” menu choice and there’s even more fun.

Click on any images of the new knives, note I said click - not just right click - and once again with you’re threatened with both criminal and civil penalties that could range as high as $150,000.00.

Basically yet another message to their users “stop being the crooks we know you are or we’ll cut you up in court.”

Oh but wait, view the source and you see that the site is made search engine hostile by displaying the images of the knives as background images to individual tables, and then overlaying that with a hyperlink to their copyright message via a transparent .GIF image that spans the size of the table dimensions. And don’t expect any use of ALT or TITLE tags to compensate.

Basically a way of telling search engines and individuals with accessibility issues that they’re not wanted nor loved.

Oh but wait, click on their videos page and you get blasted with a single, un-streamed QuickTime video that on my fast computer connected to a T1 froze.

Basically saying “yes, we know there’s this thing called YouTube out there, but we’re old school.”

Oh but wait, go the knife care page and you get a short snippet instructional videos or providing a link to their knife care PDF they offer on their downloads page.

Basically saying “if it was hard for us to make this site, so it should be hard to find related stuff all in one convenient place.”

Oh but wait, click on their “Newsflash” link on the upper right and you’re taking to a related site.

Basically saying “we wanted to create a navigational experience that simulated what happens to a kid who is sent to camp, following by his parents moving without providing a forwarding address.”

Oh but wait, other pages aren’t so insidious, however they’re also not that useful in terms of conversion goals.

Basically, you can click to enlarge an image when you’re not getting hit up with a copyright threat - but even this is problematic. Meaning, if you want people to buy your new knives, then why not transport them to a sales or shopping cart page when they click? Or at least provide that option somewhere. Duh!

Oh but wait, after scuttling the sites usability and accessibility, click on the “Press” menu option and you’re sent to a page entitled “links” where they offer downloadable images of their products!

Basically saying “never mind that we have inconvenienced and confused you everywhere else …”

Lessons learned

Okay, so what five things can we learn from this site that are applicable to our church and charity websites?

Taking a page out of the pulpit, let’s try to remember these items using the acrostic “K.N.I.F.E.”

1. Know - Figure out who these honest users are and speak to them, rather than ignore their needs to threaten the idiots.
2. Navigate - Don’t make your users have to think. Instead, make sure your menus, page titles and hyperlinks work consistently and easily.
3. Invite - On the web, overdone copyright paranoia translates to honest users as unusable and annoying.
4. Find - Determine what are you trying to get the person to do when they visit your site, then lead them to that goal.
5. Examine - You’re not your user, so don’t assume that your message and/or navigation schema will make sense without engaging in some user and use case testing.

By the way, a bit hat tip to long time, über HYCW cult member, Don Elbourne. As a result of his input, he’s being elevated to “level 5” status with all rights, privileges and honors that go along with said rank.

Don offers several sites worth visiting including:

• Lakeshore Baptist Church
• Rebuilding Lakeshore to the glory of God (after the hurricanes)
• Pastor’s blog: Locusts & Wild Honey
• The Coolest Church WebSite, Ever! (the link actually is to my review, then to his site)

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