Speaking of Faith Wins a Webby!
Image by On Being
Just as we were getting used to our Peabody success, we learned we won a Webby Award — yes, the "Oscars of the Internet" — for our site. Our fellow nominees included some heavyweights we think highly of: BBC Religion & Ethics, NPR's This I Believe, Beliefnet, and Faith & Values Media's Youthroots (our former underwriter). There's electricity in the air and Kate won't stop buying food, everything from bagels and five tubs of cream cheese to yogurt-covered pretzels and cinnamon gummy sombreros. She said she would eat her hat if we won both awards in the same year… and so she did. ;) In 2005, we were the first public radio program to win a Webby. Back then, it was more of a one-man show trying to create and expand an online identity for a burgeoning radio program with unbelievable content and an unrepresentative site: small images, swooping lines, baroque hues of gold and red with a visiomaticized (great term from Tufte) navigation scheme (Would you like to see a snapshot?). My intent was to defy those uninformed stereotypes, break the rules on image size and quality, bring a human perspective, and create content that paralleled the depth people were hearing on the radio.In 2008, we have a different story to tell. The staff mindset has shifted and stepped up in unbelievable ways and contributed significantly to the effort — through blog posts, writing particulars, producing multimedia elements, etc. — a true group effort:Krista writes a weekly essay exclusively for online use and even blogs on occasion. (I'm working on this busy professional to post more with less, but she always has so much to say that's worthwhile.)Kate is a blogging wunderkind who's armed with an iPhone. She's got the camera mastered. Now we need to put her vocabulary arsenal and vivacious sass to work and begin "tweeting/twittering" (look for that later this year *fingers crossed*).Mitch, well, this guy does it all: accommodates my video requests, blogs, creates best-of playlists, produces narrated slideshows, you name it.Colleen does more quietly and thinks in online ways from the get-go. Her interview with a choral director for a multimedia piece on the marginalia on Bach's Bible is fascinating, along with her putting John O'Donohue's reading of a poem to pictures. She blogs from the inside and from the outside (see post about her doggy Oban). The list goes on...Shiraz and Rob are relatively new staff members, but these young whippersnappers (How old am I?) have already posted some incredible material. Shiraz blogs the news, religious conventions, and sci-fi like nobody's business -- not to mention recently producing a wonderful audio slideshow of black belts mastering acts of kindness in the ultimate test of skill. Rob is the Cliff Clavin of SOF. He has an uncanny ability to take disparate facts and little-known trivia and weave meaningful blog posts (cue entries on Mr. Rogers and the personality of numbers) and interesting anecdotes in each week's annotated guide to the program.Andy, the latest staffing addition. He's only been on staff six weeks but has had a major impact in subtle and dramatic ways. He's finally got our free transcripts to print within the margins — important indeed — and coded a dynamic mapping application that gives voice to hundreds of Catholic stories that would have otherwise been silenced in a database. It continue to grow. And, even our interns have stepped up: Anna was the first production intern to contribute, and Alda has become a blogging regular, as well as a compiler of links and resources for each week's program. Honestly, we didn't think we would win. We appreciate that our graphic design and navigation paired with our content was recognized as something special. Hoka-hey!
Bikago: In Context
Image by Ryan Hageman
A silkscreen print exploring Japanese language and graphics. The word Bikago indicates the idea of "word beautification", the process of embellishing vocabulary through the addition of the honorific prefix "o-". For example, osake and okashi, rice wine and candy.
Bikago: Multiples
Image by Ryan Hageman
A silkscreen print exploring Japanese language and graphics. The word Bikago indicates the idea of "word beautification", the process of embellishing vocabulary through the addition of the honorific prefix "o-". For example, osake and okashi, rice wine and candy.
Bikago: Poster
Image by Ryan Hageman
A silkscreen print exploring Japanese language and graphics. The word Bikago indicates the idea of "word beautification", the process of embellishing vocabulary through the addition of the honorific prefix "o-". For example, osake and okashi, rice wine and candy.
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