fallen verses

Okay. Last theme was seriously pissing me off in IE7 and since half my readers seem to use IE (courtesy of Woopra analytics), having things not work right in IE was a problem, which, unfortunately, I couldn’t fix. Add to that Christine’s very valid point about background color and reading… well, I scrapped the last theme. got a new one. I think it works. Now I just need to put a header image. Usual caveats apply: let me know if anything is broken and if you care to share your thoughts I always listen. Might not do anything, but I listen.

Making some changes to the theme, namely, scrapping the old, pink one, and putting in a new, grey one. But things are going to be a little broken while I recode some of it. And I’m at work, so it may be sporadically addressed.

UPDATE: I think I’m basically done, and everything should work. The “need to do” list includes putting up a better header image (well, putting up a header image) but to do that I need to install photoshop. If anyone encounters any problems, let me know tom (at) fallenverses (dot) org or leave a comment. You can also leave a comment to just say the new look is ugly and you don’t like it, if that’s how you really feel.

UPDATE2: Still no header image, but that is next on the list. Being mindful of Christine’s comment, I tried out a “white” look and I don’t care for it. However, I did write up a second version of the stylesheet with a white look. Firfox users can go to View -> Page Style -> white if they would prefer to use it. Internet Explorer users should download Firefox appear to be unable to switch rendered stylesheets. Or, if IE can, I have no idea how. I’ll look into a method on the page to switch views, but that won’t be right away.

I adjusted the colors in the normal style to have greater contrast between the text and the background- previously the text was only about 80% white, so that may help in reading as well. As far as black being scary… well, ’tis the season, I guess.

UPDATE3: Everything seems to be completely broken in IE7. le sigh.

UPDATE4: Less broken in IE7. everything loads and all that, but some of the margins are not being respected. On single-post pages, the previous and next post linsk should be above the title of the post by a fair bit and IE7 doesn’t like that idea. On pages with multiple posts, there should be more psace between posts than IE7 is displaying. IE7 knows web design better than anyone and thinks standards are for the weak. I hate IE7. And I don’t know how to fix this.

I haven’t much to say about this. It’s a good, if lengthy essay. I found the link on both Mind Hacks and World of Psychology.

Virtual Friendship and the New Narcissism

Christine Rosen

For centuries, the rich and the powerful documented their existence and their status through painted portraits. A marker of wealth and a bid for immortality, portraits offer intriguing hints about the daily life of their subjects—professions, ambitions, attitudes, and, most importantly, social standing.

…

Today, our self-portraits are democratic and digital; they are crafted from pixels rather than paints. On social networking websites like MySpace and Facebook, our modern self-portraits feature background music, carefully manipulated photographs, stream-of-consciousness musings, and lists of our hobbies and friends. They are interactive, inviting viewers not merely to look at, but also to respond to, the life portrayed online. We create them to find friendship, love, and that ambiguous modern thing called connection. Like painters constantly retouching their work, we alter, update, and tweak our online self-portraits; but as digital objects they are far more ephemeral than oil on canvas. Vital statistics, glimpses of bare flesh, lists of favorite bands and favorite poems all clamor for our attention—and it is the timeless human desire for attention that emerges as the dominant theme of these vast virtual galleries.

Although social networking sites are in their infancy, we are seeing their impact culturally: in language (where to friend is now a verb), in politics (where it is de rigueur for presidential aspirants to catalogue their virtues on MySpace), and on college campuses (where not using Facebook can be a social handicap). But we are only beginning to come to grips with the consequences of our use of these sites: for friendship, and for our notions of privacy, authenticity, community, and identity. As with any new technological advance, we must consider what type of behavior online social networking encourages. Does this technology, with its constant demands to collect (friends and status), and perform (by marketing ourselves), in some ways undermine our ability to attain what it promises—a surer sense of who we are and where we belong? The Delphic oracle’s guidance was know thyself. Today, in the world of online social networks, the oracle’s advice might be show thyself.