#that'll be fun for blog viewers right??

[daydadahlias]

scale of 1-10 how much fun do you have when you send asks to yourself

a lot more fun than this ask

[seasideretreat]

French

I play video games to learn French. It's actually really tough. My favorite one is Planet Zoo. You know, many people want to be zookeepers I've heard. I can imagine why, it's really fun to work with animals I think, especially exotic animals. You know, last night I was thinking of the numinous. Numinosity is a concept introduced in the Western world of thought in the early 20th century. I believe it is a crucial concept: it points us to the spiritual difference of religion, that pushes us to do stuff like meditation, cryptic philosophy, prayer and reading the Bible. We want to connect with the numinous, and this can actually be a really practical question; religions offer us many ways to do this, like adhering to a particular lifestyle or reading the Bible. You know, I got up early today again, not necessarily to write, but this is my new philosophy: if I get up before eleven I will write my blog in the mornings. It's quite nice because then I can have the rest of the day off. You know, I really get to write nice things all the time, because I have a better process these days, but I still don't really know what to do when writing; you know, I want to do research, you know, to write nice things but I just can't think of anything to research; well, I guess I could study English history, I am interested in that, but it doesn't do me that much and I know a lot about it already. Right now I am listening to a Let's Play by GhazPlays, he is a really good Youtuber, but he doesn't have that many viewers, still, he is really productive; I was listening to an album called Haunted Mountain by a guy called Buck Meek just now, and I kind of liked it, but I find Let's Playing more relaxing; not very much so necessarily, you know, writing is work, mostly, and you can't really relax whilst you're typing you know, but I am thinking later I could just sit in my chair and make a few Sudoku puzzles, that'll probably be relaxing, you know, it's not that hard to get through the day I suppose, when you just stay happy; and that's what religion is for, to allow us to stay happy, although it's hard; I don't know how religion really works, you know, and I don't know what the purpose of religion really is, but it's something with being a guide for life and the numinous, et cetera. You know, I really kind of regret not sleeping out, but that's the thing, I don't really want to stay in bed necessarily, you know, I just got nothing to do, and I usually get up at eleven, you know, I just brave the day anyway, but yeah, recently I started writing in the mornings, you know, and it's kind of harder because you don't get to prepare I'd say, but yeah, whatever.

You know, the point of a day is to have a good time. Sleeping is really pleasant, but writing can be pleasant too, you know; and if you know how to get through the day it ain't so bad; life is very weird, you know, and we do weird things all the time; this is the thing, I start writing at eight or around eight, and then just have a slow day until eleven o'clock; and what happens at eleven o'clock? Nothing, I just find something else to do. I suppose having an eventful morning is all right. I always really liked it when I got down the stairs in my parents' house in the morning when I was young and my mother would be sitting there, listening to the radio. My dad would always get up much later, just like my sister. My mother and I were the early birds. You know, I also really like talking I suppose, but these days I don't really talk so much, I can't think of anything to say. My dad said I was laconic, which is an admirable quality, although maybe he was just teasing me because I say so little. Tomorrow I have to work for the mail again, I feel okay regarding it, I think it will be okay; you know, its actually kind of nice; you know, I don't think I'd mind working in an office, but I can't think of any nice job in an office that I could take, probably since I don't have a very competitive degree. I studied Asian Studies. You know, I still don't know what I really learned there. I used to study history and I got my Bachelor of Arts in that, and I kind of learned how to write there, and kind of how great Dutch history is and all that, you know, random things; but with Asian Studies, I really have no idea what I learned; I didn't learn how to write, you know, I barely felt any of that teacher was saying in the tutorials, and the lectures were all so chaotic and specific; I really don't know what I learned, I suppose I will find out eventually, but it's all not so funny, you know, it's just bad. I did a course on Mongolian history, you know the history of the Mongolian empire, and that was a nice course, but also quite chaotic maybe, and not very companionate. You know, history was just really my thing, I guess, and I shouldn't have switched to Asian Studies; but yeah, I did a specialization that focussed partially on history, so I guess I can just profile myself as a historian; in which case, studying Asian Studies I just learned the glories of Japanese, Chinese and Middle-Eastern history. You know, I sometimes wish I'd have taken the opportunity, after my Bachelors, to study theology. I feel like theology is a much more academic and professional field than history. You know, it's really weird that history is such a big field in academia, considering theology is what university was all about in the beginning; and someone actually called theology history from the inside; you know, history is just a big pile of facts without the religious aspect; you know, we are kind of doubting the Whig version of history nowadays; you know, I did kind of learn something specific at Asian Studies, basically to ask big questions; you know, that's someting we don't do at history, I think; in history, you ask ridiculously small questions and then do a ridiculous amount of (virtual) work to answer it. But yeah, was studying Asian Studies of any practical value? I have asked myself this question a thousand times and I cannot figure it out. I didn't learn to speak Chinese, which would've been a great boon for my curriculum vitae, and I didn't learn how to hold a Confucian sermon or a Buddhist seminar or something like that, which might've given me a direction in life; but I did learn something about how we try to understand a foreign place, and I learned to think hard on historiographical questions. Of course, that ain't a practical value, but yeah, this is the age old question: what do we learn from history? I'd say we learn the most general truths from history, because it is the most general science, but people don't consider it a science, they consider it an art.

What do we learn from philosophy? They say history is just philosophy teaching by example. Philosophy may teach us that reality is an illusion. Or that we ought to be ourselves. History can teach us those things too, only it does so only after empirical investigation. Really, history is just telling stories, but the purpose of university is to figure things out based on this history. We often imagine history as reaching back into the past to discover more about a question. But I have heard it said that the news is also a form of history. Cicero said that history is the mistress of life. We are simply stuck in history and we have to do as she says. In this sense, history is just context. Studying history has no point, but it can serve a function when we try to learn something, since it gives us insight in the meaning of the science. In this sense, from studying Asian Studies I learned nothing, but I did get a better vision on things I already knew, such as war, or religion, or philosophy. But yeah, what is science? History is a part of science, not a science in itself, so studying history teaches you to think critically, but about very general topics. We might say that studying history is pointless, but it does make a difference. Without history, we'd not know the context of the science, and then we wouldn't see the point of anything. You know, it's clever to study history, because it helps you improve your science. I don't know.

[novelistash]

Wattpad & Twitch?

I saw the term Writeblr. Am I a Writeblr? Is Writeblr a page or a person? Well, this Jon Snow has been dipping their toe into the wide world of Wattpad. Any other writers on there? Drop your links! I've been reading stories live on Twitch, and it's been a lot of fun! There's a lot of lost talent there, as with all writing spaces, but it definitely needs some help finding air to breathe.

Why did I decide to read Wattpad stories live on Twitch? Read more. (I hope I'm using this feature right.)

About two and a half years back, I decided that it was time to stop dragging my feet and get traditionally published. (Well I try to get trad pubbed.) I knew that Twitter would be the place to promote and Wattpad would generally be the place to share, but I also knew those places would be full of competition. November was coming up so I thought, "why don't I live stream Nano? That'll be fun." It wasn't.

As much as people don't want to read, they definitely don't want to read while an author is writing. Twitter had a very small writing community then and I haven't seen it get any more popular. Which isn't to say it couldn't get popular, but I don't think it works as a way to GET an audience. I could talk about those who've found moderate success, but if I'm going to do that I'd like to talk to them and maybe interview them. Something I've considered putting on my ghost town of a YT channel.

Regardless, I was on Twitch for about a month. I never gained any kind of following and every viewer I saw on those channels were people like me, those who were trying to promote their own writing. So, yes, I could gain followers of other writers, but I couldn't build a brand that way. I had too much experience with similar platforms to think otherwise. If I wanted to get readers, I needed to be on the platform that readers were using.

That lead me to more or less wasting two years on Twitter. I mean, I met some cool people while on there and had good interactions. But was it good for my brand? Did it help me find readers? I'd say a resounding "no" on both parts. The funny thing about Twitter is that it's great at making you think that people care about you. Shit post about a bad day? Hundreds of replies. Link to a blog going into detail about that bad day? Now you're starting to see how little people actually care. At some point I can go into the nuances of my time in the trenches of Twitter, but the point is that it didn't help my writing career.

For me, the biggest problem with Twitter was the same problem with all writer-centric spaces: we are sellers without customers. I like to describe these spaces as towns of vendors. We each have our vendor stall set up, and see lots of people walking. This is great! That means there are customers! Except all of those people walking on the street are also vendors. They're only there to sell their own wares. Yes, there's mutual inflation and reciprocal commerce, but writers make a poor basis for a readership. If someone is selling eggs, they want to sell to bakers, cooks, and the common man, not their fellow ranchers.

Regardless of fame and fortune, I want a readership. I write for myself, yes, but once those words are on the page, I want someone to read those words. I've been writing for over twenty years by this point and during that time my perspective has almost always been, how do I get readers? It's a natural question to ask, but it's driven by selfish desires at its core. I think for the writers of today, the bigger question might need to be, "how do I get people to read?"

The larger problem with readers, is that there aren't that many of them. If there are ten billion eggs in a town of a hundred, most of those eggs are going to rot. And even though most everyone knows that the general public doesn't habitually read, there seems to be this stigma against talking about it. Ever since I started writing, the talking point has always been "people thought comics would destroy the novel, but it didn't."

Okay, so, there are still readers, but could you say that a majority of the people read? Comic books, television, movies, and video games all offer more senses than the written word. They offer experiences that books never can, so why would anyone choose to read a book when they could instead watch that same story play out on screen?

Well, the written word can actually offer things that other media can't. In general, novels are closer to the emotional landscape of the story. Books invite the reader to be a part of the creation process, rather than a passive observer. The lack of a spoken word or portrait lets the reader construct whatever voice or face they desire. Beyond all of that, readers tend to spend more time with a book than any other media. (I'll hold off on a thorough debate of the narrative quality of iterative gameplay loops in video games for the time being, but I'd be hard pressed to find someone who enjoyed Preston Garvey's procedurally generated missions more than any of the designed quests in Fallout 4.) The point is that the written word is not without value, simply that its qualities are losing appreciation.

That's where the idea of reading stories came about, not as a way to increase my visibility, but as a way to increase the number of readers in the world. Opera single handedly created a boom in book sales by doing little more than talking about books. I think that modern entertainment can take interest in reading farther. Podcasts and Twitch streams are filled with content that is actually dead air, but people will tune in and listen. They connect with the player, the streamer, the speaker, and they are content to be apart of somebody else's discovery. A big part of what makes Twitch successful is simply watching these personalities react.

Wattpad is literally an endless supply of new stories that are available for free online. For some, anything that isn't traditionally published is a book not worth anyone's time. But there are hundreds of thousands of people submitting entire novels to literary agents every single year. Statistics alone supports the idea that great books are not going to get the representation they deserve. What are those thousands of unpublished authors supposed to do with their novels, wait patiently for exterior validation?

I don't think there's any shame in self publishing a novel and Wattpad and platforms like it are a perfectly reasonable way of putting out that content. Is there under edited content on Wattpad? Of course, but can anyone in good faith say the same isn't true of all published works? Yes, some writers are just starting out, and they dump their content onto Wattpad, but I don't understand why that's immediately a reason to balk. The writers liked the idea enough to bring it to life. Sure, finding a way to manifest those ideas is complex and difficult, but I honestly believe that a first body of work can still have an unironic entertainment in them.

I've been streaming on Wednesdays from 10am-noon pacific time. I might change that moving forward, but right now it's looking like I'm only going to be adding more time. If you're interested in joining me for story time, check me out on Twitch.

https://www.twitch.tv/ashnovelist

[stingyjack-blog]

10 social media marketing that'll Stone The Coming Year

Each and every time you write a new posting for your business blog page, add links to social media. By back-linking to your site, you will be able to tell your cultural media followers you have new content obtainable.Post movies of interviews with experts or influential individuals in your niche market on YouTube. Whenever your name becomes attached to leaders in your field in this manner, you not merely provide interesting videos to your customers but you appear to be an authority for the reason that niche also. This knowledge and improved reputation will make it easier to tout your product giving within your chosen niche.You will have to understand how to navigate each social internet site to properly use marketing for social media. One good way could be to go through the postage time of a particular tweet. This will place the tweet on its own permalink. That works well for a web of links that point to 1 particular tweet of yours, instead of your entire stream or profile.If formatting isn’t a solid point for you, consider utilizing a list style for your social press posts. This is a means you can present the information in a manner that can provide your users a map. Because a sizable portion of social networking users are in more youthful age ranges, concise and relevant info may be your best bet.Is a relationship with you as well as your business something your customers want? Keep your advertising ploys simple by using social channels.

Try to communicate with your visitors and followers in a natural method when interacting on sociable media, just introduce yourself and your products to start. Your customers will show you just how from now there.As you’ve certainly seen advertisements on Facebook and other such social media, they often times contain interesting photoshopped photos. This utilization of images is quite clever and can draw audience to your items or website. Obviously, the probability of a customer browsing your website are higher after looking at your advertisements, than if indeed they ignore your advertisements.Tempt customers to interact with your company by holding contests with benefits that are hard to avoid, this is an excellent strategy to help you publicize your firm in a fun and innovative way. Because social mass media is certainly quick at spreading information, having a contest will create a certain amount of buzz. Make the contest fun, creative, and related to your products and services. A good contest example would be to see who can come up with the best logo for a future product you are putting out.

If you quickly and professionally respond to comments posted to you on social press, you will see that your popularity stays positive, regardless of what the comments say. This may be make or break for you personally in social media attempts. Pay special attention to negative feedback you receive through social media. If you ignore these kinds of postings, it can leave a poor impression on other site visitors. When responding to these people swiftly, and in a great way, it makes things even more positive.Twellow and Tweepi are great equipment in researching who in your niche happens to be hugely influential. These types of programs can locate the most frequented Twitter feeds and offer you with details about who is in charge of it. Then, you can send text messages suggesting that your account be put into their lists.Look closely at any social advertising companies you may want to hire to broaden your presence. Many of these companies are preying on inexperienced owners of Online marketing businesses with scams. They'll create fake social mass media accounts using automated bots, proxy servers and also websites like Mechanical Turk. Your ads will be observed by their false accounts to ramp up the numbers, when you get no benefit from your investment.To improve the reach of your marketing, connect your social media sites together with your LinkedIn profile.

Placing a talk about button for LinkedIn on your own blog enables you to reach a wider viewers. When your readers discuss you with their close friends, even more attention comes the right path. 100 million users on LinkedIn who might possibly share your blog with their friends translates into a whole lot of potential profit for you.Try setting your Twitter account to where it gets automatic tweets. You may even choose a few bloggers that may post high-quality content and updates that include links to their written posts. The publicity will be valued, and the quality articles provided will be appreciated by your followers.It is a good idea to make use of Twitter in the advertising of your business. In the event that you study how to use Twitter and what it could do for you, you will get hundreds of thousands of people to see your items. Make sure to learn how to use hashtags, keywords, and other things important about how Twitter works.

Ensure that your YouTube videos all have got links to most of your site in your descriptions. Also, make sure your YouTube channel is tied to the others of your social press presence using the correct control keys. Getting YouTube users to follow you on Facebook is particularly interesting because they are more likely to talk about your videos.Choosing the best way to market your business through social media marketing will help to increase your company’s visibility. Whenever your business is visible and accessible through the internet sites, it'll successfully grow. Continue to seek information to assist you, and utilize the great information you learned here to truly get you started.

If you want to learn more about social media marketing, including instagram, facebook, twitter, linkedin, etc promotions you can check this practical guides

[michaelandy101-blog]

27 Striking Examples of Minimal Design That'll Kickstart Your Creative Process

New Post has been published on https://tiptopreview.com/27-striking-examples-of-minimal-design-thatll-kickstart-your-creative-process/

27 Striking Examples of Minimal Design That'll Kickstart Your Creative Process

If you’ve been on the internet, chances are you’ve come across stark, simple websites or ad creative. In fact, this design sensibility — known as minimalist design — has been rising in popularity, though it’s far from a passing trend.

What is minimalist design?

Minimalism is a design aesthetic that embodies the phrase “less is more.” With minimalist design, you push an idea by stripping it down to essential (sometimes bare) elements, using clean, modern, and minimal aesthetic, font, and color choices.

Whether you’re curating an Instagram feed or designing a web page, there are plenty of advantages to minimalist design.

Minimalist Graphic Design

Rather than bogging your audience down with vibrant patterns or paragraphs of text, a minimalist approach allows you to focus on a few key components of your brand you feel are truly important.

However, minimalist isn’t as simple as white space. To avoid creating boring or uninspiring designs in your attempt to become minimalist, it’s critical you take a look at some successful examples of minimal design, ranging from posters to logos, to kickstart your creative process.

1. Braga Da Cruz

These Braga Da Cruz jewelry store business cards, designed by Luke Halota, are a good example of how minimalism can help brand name stand out on the page. Halota uses grids to center the company name on one side, with a small, unobtrusive logo placed above. On the back, he makes sure to use simple white space to make Francisco Cruz the focal point.

2. Visme

Minimalism doesn’t have to be boring. Here, Visme created a pop-up ad where the primary focus remains on the “Join us!” blue button, which contrasts nicely against the orange background. Additionally, to grab the viewer’s attention, Visme placed a large lion’s head image on the left side of the ad.

3. Heather Shaw Book Design

Heather Shaw ensures true simplicity in her Ocean Conservancy book, which grabs the reader’s attention with minimal text and colors. The information is plainly outlined and easy-to-follow. Additionally, there’s a lightly outlined sketch of an ocean behind the text — while not overbearing, it adds texture to the design.

4. Helix Sleep by Stefanie Brückler

These Helix Sleep referral cards look both sleek and helpful. Stefanie Brückler uses contrasting colors and clean font to ensure the cards can do their jobs without seeming unoriginal.

5. Pixite by Peter Komierowski

On his page, Komierowski explains, “I was asked by Pixite to create a set of nature-inspired shapes for their app Fragment.” Ultimately, his design is aesthetically-pleasing and fun, with simple, cohesive lines that form the shape of a fox.

6. Mastercard by Pentagram

One of the most iconic minimalist designs, Mastercard’s financial design is undoubtedly a staple of the brand. The simple red and orange circles signify connectedness and seamlessness. The circles are recognizable enough that Mastercard can use the icon in place of any brand text, and still convey its ownership.

Minimalist Web Design

You can take the tenets of minimalist design and apply them to brand websites, resulting in clean interfaces that guide users where you need them to go. Here are great examples of minimalism used on the web:

1. Huge Inc.

Huge Inc.’s homepage is clean and polished, with minimal text to ensure a new viewer doesn’t feel overwhelmed by the page. Additionally, the small details — like the black that appears in the logo as well as the second half of realtor.com, and the small jagged line in the bottom right corner — signify a sense of cohesiveness.

2. Bedow

Bedow, a Stockholm-based design studio, knows its viewers priorities, and thus doesn’t waste time with a busy homepage — instead, they include a short blurb about their studio, and then leave a section of white space before displaying some of their designs.

3. Reducing the Obvious

One of the more simple designs in the list, Reducing the Obvious’s design is compelling and mysterious, with little information displayed on the homepage. However, the page is still helpful and inviting, with a small “Use buttons to navigate!” command in the bottom left.

4. Jorgeriera Flores

Jorgeriera Flores’ page is fun and inviting, with a blinking, life-like design and a clean navigation bar. Additionally, the creature’s nose serves as a “J”, demonstrating Flores’ attention-to-detail.

5. Design Co.

Oftentimes, minimalist design enables a brand to convey its purpose more powerfully than it could with a busier page. Design Co., for instance, is able to capture the viewer’s attention with its compelling message — spreading the creative spirit across 7,107 islands — by ensuring its background, while colorful, is devoid of distracting add-ons. Additionally, the small white logo serves to reinforce their main point.

6. Evoulve

It’s impossible to see a page like this and not find yourself curious to explore further. Evoulve does a good job expressing a sense of innovation and sleekness — with its world-icon and bright, futuristic design — without needing any additional text or imagery to compel the user to explore further.

7. Tim Brack

Brack’s use of white space and overlapping elements serves to create a clean and inviting homepage. Additionally, the photo of himself with a pig highlights a sense of playfulness and humor, and you’re able to obtain most relevant information — including Tim’s title as art director — instantly, without any distraction.

8. Tinker

Minimalism is often accomplished best when a brand knows exactly why a visitor might come across their website. In this case, Tinker understands its viewers are looking to browse and potentially purchase a watch, so it aims its design-elements to drive attention toward that single purpose.

9. ETQ Amsterdam

The close-up of the shoe offers a new viewpoint, making ETQ’s homepage intriguing and original even in its simplicity. Additionally, the small white font looks simple and clean against the photo background.

Minimalist Logo Design

The logo is one of your most important elements in your design arsenal. You don’t want a beautiful minimalist design to be supported by a clunky and overdone logo. These brands used minimal logos to support the feel of the rest of their brand:

1. UBAR

The bold block text and black-and-white contrast lends itself well to Simon McWhinnie’s UBAR design. The simplicity allows the text to dominate the logo and evokes a sense of power and strength.

2. Cloud Bed by Michael Spitz

If you have one product you sell well, why complicate it? This logo, designed by Michael Spitz, communicates the brand’s product — bedding — without text. Additionally, it’s clean and calming, particularly with the use of light blue and white, which ensures a sense of calmness for the viewer.

3. Varnom Ross by Bibliothèque

Varnom Ross’s logo is bold, powerful, and striking. Additionally, the replicated box shape around the Varnom, used again as the “o” in Ross, signifies a sense of cohesiveness.

4. The Row Apartment Homes by PurdyLogo

This logo looks retro and funky, but it uses plenty of white space, as well as white lines within the letters, to maintain simplicity. Additionally, the colors work well together, ensuring “Row” stands out most prominently in the logo.

Minimalist Poster Design

Posters need to say a lot in a finite amount of space. That’s why minimalism works so well in poster design. Here are some great examples that support this idea:

1. Miselu

Miselu’s graphic design undoubtedly supports the notion that less is more. On their page, Miselu explains the design as “simultaneously edgy, approachable, and clearly expresses our core business: music”. Ultimately, these posters, along with their other designs, reinforce their core products while remaining simple enough to be adaptable as their brand changes over time.

2. Ilmars Rumpeters

Ilmars Rumpeters created multiple simple covers for Jauna Gaita magazine, and this one in particular stands out as attention-grabbing and bold, with its vibrant colors and intriguing font. With minimalism, you want your focus to be on one or two elements — in this case, Rumpeters succeeded in drawing primary attention to the apple, and then to the magazine title itself.

3. Paul Rand

Paul Rand, a famous logo creator and graphic designer, created this poster to advertise the International Design Conference in Aspen, 1966. Ultimately, the piece is intriguing and complex even in its minimalism, causing viewers to likely pause and wonder over the significance of the black splatters or egg-shape in the background.

Minimalist Text Design

You’ll notice in each of the designs above, the text is chosen intentionally and displayed in a way that adds rather than detracts from the visual elements. With a minimalist design, one of the first things you’ll want to consider is the font choices used throughout the website or marketing collateral. You’ll want to choose fonts that are:

Crisp

Clear

Legible

Easy to read (even at small sizes)

Simple

Consistent

Geometrical

Here are some examples of fonts used in minimalist design:

1. Open Sans

Because serifs can be more difficult to read, especially on the web, minimalist designs often use sans-serif fonts. Open Sans is the quintessential sans-serif font (except perhaps Arial) and is easy-to-read and modern. The body text in particular is particularly crisp, making it ideal for long-form text in a minimalist setting (like a blog).

2. Libre Baskerville

Even though sans-serif fonts are a staple of minimalist design, serifs still have their place. Libre Baskerville does a great job of providing an air of elegance and class without sacrificing readability. The body text is just as easy on the eyes as Open Sans, and even the italicized subeading text is legible (though you wouldn’t want to rely on it too much).

3. Montserrat

Montserrat has some lovely rounded lines, making the letter shapes easily recognizable, and the italicized subheading provides a more dynamic look when paired with the bold headers and clean body font.

4. Poppins

Minimalist text design certainly doesn’t mean devoid of personality, as you can see from the graphic, web, and poster designs above. Poppins is a great font family that adds a bit of fun to the minimalist style with overly rounded and almost cartoonish letters. At the same time, it looks modern and professional.

5. Overpass

Overpass provides a more industrial look with its narrow letter shapes and sharp corners.

Now that you’ve seen several iterations of what minimalist design looks like in action, you can begin to create your visual marketing strategy and design marketing materials that supports your brand in a clean and modern but still attractive way.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in February 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

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