I was just in a discussion about this with _refugee_ who was wondering if it was time that she had a website. Here's one way to look at it: If there is anything that you do in the real world that would be enhanced by this sentence: "For more information, see . . . " Then you should have a website.Who should create a personal/professional website?
Hi bileuze - I used to do talks that were sponsored by various organizations. They'd put a brief bio or brief workshop description on the poster or e-mail notice. At the bottom they'd put For more information, see ...website. it helped people get -- more information, which they seemed to want before signing up for something. The website was also useful for job applications. At graduate schools, they encourage students to have a departmental website so people could see their research areas. I can see lots of reasons to have one. I've done a really bad job, though, of keeping my website up to date.
doesn't Facebook cover that in theory? Edit: I wasn't thinking in context of business. Of course if you are trying to promote your writing to get it in a commercial field with aims of selling/getting published, i think you should have a website presenting yourself to do that-- or at least profiles on a few websites dedicated to that field (I used to sell photography on society6.com, for example). I took the "for information see.." idea too literally.
Facebook is personal. Or at least, it used to be, maybe it's changed for you whippersnappers these days, but mostly, you connect to people on Facebook because you: -want to be friends; -are trying to flirt/hook up with them; -pretend to be friends; -are related or otherwise socially tied to a person in a way that you feel like you should accept their invitation when it comes. LinkedIn is business, but as I mention later on I think it's best at what it does for industry businesses or, to put it differently, "jobs where people will hire recruiters to help them find staff." I don't think LinkedIn is as appropriate a forum for artistic stuff, but I haven't tried very hard at it and I may be wrong. I have a LinkedIn profile for my day-to-day work, I don't have one for writing. I think in part because of the privacy controls and the walls Facebook has put up against casual, non-friends viewing your Facebook (with good reason), Facebook isn't friendly to the casual web-wanderer. Moreover Facebook promotes low-quality, low-effort content as it pushes for daily users providing daily updates. If you write, like me, "Notes" are in a weird place and nobody much uses them any more, but they're probably the best spot for writing...Except mostly they get used as personal blogs. There is an option of a Facebook page but again, for some reason, Facebook just doesn't strike me as a good option for casual web-wanderers. If I'm trying to find more information about a business and all I can find is their Facebook page, my thought is generally: "Oh. They can't afford to have a real website." I don't always find the information I need on Facebook (for some reason, businesses don't put down their hours anywhere. or a restaurant won't have their menu) which I think is in part due to bad management of the website and also the capabilities of Facebook. The lit journal I work for has a Facebook page and I think it's good at getting people to see content as it goes up but I'm not going to get many new views or users from it. Maybe Facebook is for people who already know and are interested in you/your product/output? Anyway this is a great discussion as I'm trying to grapple with whether or not I need a website for writing. It would provide a place for a digital resume; I've been published a couple places now and I could provide actual links to these websites, for one. I don't really want another blog though because I've already got the Kenning blog and it is a fair bit of work as it is. But if people read one of my poems and google me, I figure having my own personal website come up at the top of that search could only benefit me. humanodon, you write and have a writing website. How's it work out for you? Pros, cons? P.S. thanks lil! i didn't get a notification for your shout-out (weird) but this is a great thread to come up as we really were just discussing it.
I've been lax about my website recently and I'm trying to retool it as a place where I post published stuff, but I'm in that limbo of waiting to hear back about submissions. Once I have a decent amount of things published, I figure a website is a good platform for poetry chapbooks. The pros might include that it can add visibility to your name or your projects and the cons are that it takes time and effort to create content and to keep traffic steady (which mine is not). Still, it's nice to have that space and in a way it's kind of like having a plot of land somewhere. Yeah, you might not build on it, but you could if you wanted to. Of course, that comparison is vulnerable to criticism on a number of fronts, but for you it might not be a bad idea. The Kenning blog does feature your voice, but in a very focused way. For you, a website might be a way for people that follow the blog (and your content) to get more of that without derailing the focus of the blog.
When lil said "For more information, see..." Then you should have a website. I wasn't thinking in context of business. Of course if you are trying to promote your writing to get it in a commercial field with aims of selling/getting published, i think you should have a website presenting yourself to do that-- or at least profiles on a few websites dedicated to that field (I used to sell photography on society6.com, for example). I took the "for information see.." idea too literally.Here's one way to look at it: If there is anything that you do in the real world that would be enhanced by this sentence: