A couple of sites have caught my eye lately, reminding me of one of the great joys of the web: anyone with a passion or a talent or an obsessive hobby can develop a site and share their wares with the world. Using non-blogs, non-social-networking sites. Doing what they love, and their way. Oh yes, I remember... web content isn't necessarily all about mission statements and top tasks.
Meet David Eisenhauer of Pictopuzzle. He has spent several years developing cryptic crossword-style puzzles based on visual puns. (And he's looking for extra outlets, by the way...)
Next is Russell Self of Rhymingstuff.com, singer, guitarist and poet. Among his sample mp3 tracks are a couple of poems. It's so good to hear a rich, individual voice reading an original poem aloud: podcast technology was born for this. But I was a bit disappointed to find the poem on his home page was metaphorical and not for real. Doh. Never mind. Dial-a-bard and buy a poem: their day will come again.
Rhymingstuff.com reminds me of a plan I had years ago which came to nothing: I wrote heaps of little wee poems which I wanted to sell to Vodafone - a poem a day. They didn't want my bright idea: more fools they. I thought up many names - maybe Phoneapoem? That's the most fun part of all.
I reckon after my current incarnation as co-director of Contented courses I could take up that idea again. I hear that in Japan, more people access the web by mobile phone than by computers. (Bother, the poems are in English.)
Recently I keep seeing articles about creating mobile-specific web sites. So when I'm good and ready, I'll be able to do it all myself. Like Russell and David.
Then anyone with a mobile phone will be able to dial-a-bard for real... And do you have such a plan, I wonder?
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