Post-launch content schedules

June 30, 2010


Oh, man, the brain trust at Blend gave me the keys to the blog wagon and here I go posting about content strategy stuff again.

Chances are, most of the content strategy stuff that used to be here will now be over there, but don’t worry – I’m vain enough to link to it from the ol’ personal blog. Over. And. Over. Again.

Anyway, I’m over there with this nugget. From “On Post-Launch Content Schedules: or, Who’s Taking Care of the House?”:

In the Web industry, we build Web sites. But we might as well be building houses. Except, instead of populating homes with people, we’re filling them with information, application and entertainment. Words and pictures need a home on the Internet, and Web sites are the three-bedroom, two-bath ranch home they’re looking for.

Web companies exhibit pride of ownership, too. As long as we hold the deed to our site, we’re keeping up with routine upkeep. It’s easy for us – after all, the construction was all handled in-house, for the most part, so we understand the corners and rafters and concrete better than anyone else.

Then, we hand the site off.

We’ve prepared it for sale. The site is at its peak – top notch, totally updated, ready to move in. The paperwork is signed, the Realtor has been paid – we’ve reached the finish line, you’d think.

Nope. The launch of a Web site isn’t the finish line. New content will move in. Updating will happen. Upkeep will be needed.

Are you ready to handle it?

CLICK THROUGH FOR MORE! (Do it. Now.)

Tags: Career, Content Strategy, Grandpa Boyer |

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A quick talk to the new-school locals who are resettling Jackson, Wyoming, from someone who never was a local but probably should be

June 25, 2010


You can go ahead and talk about how you’ve moved to Jackson, how you’ve done well in life and can now afford a stately 500k home in the ghetto part of town, how you brave the traffic and float your kayak down the Snake and how, sometimes, you run into Teton Village for dinner at some restaurant that just opened.

Something Thai, I’m sure. Something expensive and trendy.

Go ahead. I know I’ve never formally lived in the Jackson Hole area. I’ve never called it home, and that nowadays I only visit every four years and barely have any family connection in the town. Even my grandma had to ditch the place. Probably the fault of people like you. I’ll pin that you y’all, if you don’t mind.

Here’s the thing. I might not be from Jackson, but I’m fiercely protective of it. That Thai restaurant wasn’t here when I wandered its streets every summer for years. Teton Village was just a tiny little ski resort. Jackson was still overrun by cowboys, not Subarus; ranchers, not transplants.

Maybe you’ve got your own personal Jackson – some place you’ve never lived but still stick to, allowed to become a part of your soul, of which you shun visitors and push away the people who just don’t get it. That’s it, right?

They just don’t get it, do they?

Jackson isn’t my home. It never has been. Still, I consider myself a local – thanks to generations of family and history and a bunch of my own experiences – and I’ll be damned if I’m going to feel guilty about it.

Sorry, man. I know you just moved here.

But unless you’re new place has some way to replicate three decades of tradition and sheer force of connection, you’ll never be a local.

At least not in my eyes. Not in my experience.

Not to THIS local-who-never-was.

Tags: Family, Grandpa Boyer, Home, Travel, Vilhauer |

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Harvest never sounded so good: on uncovering my grandfather’s turntable

April 19, 2010


I doubt my grandfather’s turntable ever spun a Beatles album. I’m almost equally positive that John Lennon’s Imagine and Neil Young’s Harvest never crossed its needle. In fact, of the records I played tonight – in tribute both to the art and the history of this turntable – only Johnny Cash was a probable match.

I don’t know how long he had it. I know that my grandmother sent it home with my father after my grandfather had passed away, and my father gave it to me yesterday now that I have room to store it along with his and my mother’s collection of albums from the 70s and 80s, along also with my grandfather’s collection of 50s and 60s country albums, along also with my great grandmother’s collection of 40s 78 rpm albums, most of them big band and classical.

Three generations of record collections. Four distinct different styles. All together, all ready to be rediscovered.

The first album sounded awful – the record player must be broken, I thought. The next sounded better. Not crystal clear, but good enough to bring a wave of nostalgia.

The third – the aforementioned Harvest – sounded crackled and muted and flat, its grooves popping sound into a decades old needle, the album itself waving up and down like a nearly-calm lake, the entire contraption just one bump away from a horrendous record scratch, like the ones you hear in cheesy radio ads.

Which is to say it sounded perfect.

But it was Johnny Cash that tuned my ears to history. I didn’t realize it at the time, but the record player sat beneath a picture of my grandfather. Looking on. Wondering, probably, what the racket was all about.

In the picture my grandfather stands, holding a fish, shirtless and stern and young and optimistic. And hopefully he understands that, though he’s been gone for years, though he never would have approved of the music I was playing, though we had nothing in common music-wise outside of a slight appreciation for Cash and Hank Williams and Merle Haggard, I was at least walking in his footsteps, even with this one little act.

Lift the arm. Set the speed to 33 1/3. Line up the grooves. And relive history.

Tags: Grandpa Boyer, Music, On..., Vilhauer |

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Pickin’ on huckleberries

August 25, 2009


Despite their common appearance, there is little similar between a blueberry and a huckleberry.

A blueberry is pale, with a subdued taste. It’s common. It’s boring.

A member of the same family, the huckleberry is tart and wonderful, every bite similar to what caviar must feel like.

Blueberries are typical. Huckleberries are rare. In fact, blueberries are often used in less particular creations that claim to be made with huckleberries. One huckleberry to every three blueberries – enough to keep everything legally “huckleberry-ish.” They cost a fortune when offered pure, and they’re almost as good when offered muddled.

They’re like gold. Except worth more, it seems.

Huckleberries can’t be grown in captivity.

They are a mystic fruit, dripping with old west legend. Their name is rustic in a way no other can claim. Nestled in the family tree next to the cranberry and the blueberry, they serve as a backwoods cousin.

Like homemade whiskey, they pucker your lips. You shudder, waiting for the next rude smack of insolvent country manner. Instead, you’re treated to a taste that blueberries still fight to attain.

Though I’ve grown up around both, only one carries the legacy of hand-picking, the plunk of a tin bucket as we wind our way through a wooded hill, speaking loud to keep the bears away and wondering if all of the work is worth it – if these few handfuls of berries will be able to ease our sore knees and purplish hands.

But a few handfuls are all you need. And yes, once paired with cream, or siphoned into jelly, it’s more worth it than any food you’ve had the trouble of fighting for.

You’d get in trouble for stealing a few, but Grandpa Boyer scolded in jest. After all, his lips had the same purple tint as yours.

They’re irresistible. And no amount of blueberries will ever suffice.

Tags: Food, Grandpa Boyer, On..., Outdoors |

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On losing a great grandfather.

May 1, 2009


I never knew any of my great grandfathers.

Most of us probably never got the chance. Nature doesn’t make it easy, and despite advances in technology and medicine, it’s still difficult to make it to 80 years old, a time when you’re most likely to have great grandchildren. For men, it’s even harder.

I never knew any of my great grandfathers, but Sierra’s known two: Great Grandpa Joe and Great Grandpa Burt, both on Kerrie’s side.

Yesterday, Great Grandpa Burt passed away. Suddenly, without warning, in his sleep. Peacefully and with dignity.

I’ll admit, I’m without easy words. Though I’ve gone through this before with my own grandfather, it seems so foreign – to see a man who has been so large a part of so many lives just leave the world without warning, leaving his wife of 63 years – Kerrie’s grandma Mardell – and the rest of us behind, lamenting, celebrating and remembering.

A World War II veteran. A wildly successful businessman. One of the kindest people I’ve ever had the privilege to know – a man who instilled caring and pride and common sense into every member of his family, from his children to his grandchildren.

His range of influence reaches farther than anyone I’ve known. Every name leads to another, each handshake holding the memory of a thousand more. Burt saw things I’ll never see, lived lives I’ll never imagine. Took everything as it came, with knife between teeth, crawling through life when needed and relaxing when the time was right. He fought wars I’ll never fight, flew next to French authors and catered ice cream to South Dakota’s future leaders.

He held every memory close, held each smile as if it would escape him. Manifesting in more of a frown, struggling to stay hidden despite the grasping urge to be set free, each smile came wryly, as if a present wrapped tightly. And once it broke through, it was absolutely beaming, each tooth seeming to smile itself, both eyes blinding in their joy.

Smiles that most often came from the screech of a little girl or boy. One of his great grandchildren – kids that naturally gravitated toward him despite their shyness, despite their need to stay latched to mommy.

That’s what always amazed me. Sierra was a different child around Burt. During her most shy days, she would gather up the courage to muster toward Burt, melting immediately into his arms, grasping as his glasses and gazing into those smiling eyes. The bond was evident. Though both probably never thought about, they were part of something special. Something legendary; a relationship spanning four generations.

I can’t attest to much more than what I know – that Burt was a brilliant, soft hearted man who had lived a long and illustrious life. Sprightly. Animated. Filled with vigor even as the years caught up with him. Always ready with a sly smile, always ready with a grandfatherly concern.

But I can attest to something special I witnessed in the past year and a half: a relationship so unique and rare that most don’t get to experience it. The relationship between a great grandfather and great granddaughter.

Every person hopes to live long enough to see just one of his or her great grandchildren. Burt was lucky enough to have six.

And Sierra was lucky enough to be one of them.

Sierra and Great Grandpa Burt

“When you look up at the sky at night, since I’ll be living on one of them, since I’ll be laughing on one of them, for you, it’ll be as if all the stars are laughing. You’ll have stars that can laugh!”

And he laughed again.

“And when you’re consoled (everyone is eventually consoled), you’ll be glad you’ve known me. You’ll always be my friend. You’ll feel like laughing with me. And you’ll open your windows sometimes just for the fun of it… And your friends will be amazed to see you laughing while you’re looking up at the sky. Then you’ll tell them, ‘Yes, it’s the stars. They always make me laugh!”

- The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Tags: Grandpa Boyer, On..., Sierra |

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Naming number two

January 27, 2009


When it came to naming Sierra, the choice was easy. I had an affinity for the name for a while, thanks to a song by the same name by one of my favorite bands, Cursive. I thought “Sierra” was beautiful. Original enough to be creative, but not so out-there to be weird. I mentioned it as a name to Kerrie, and she agreed, without any doubt. We knew that “Sierra” would be our girl’s name.

Sure, it’s not as original as I had thought – it was in the to 100 for baby names in the mid 2000′s, though it’s been dropping in recent years – and there’s always that damned GMC behemoth, but all in all I still think it’s perfect. I can’t imagine her being called anything else but Sierra.

Nothing else would fit.

Thankfully, we had a girl.

I say thankfully because, well, we never really managed to nail down a suitable boy name. They were all just “okay.” We had several chosen, ready to anoint upon birth, not knowing what the final answer would be until seeing Baby Boy Vilhauer for the first time. And, again, thankfully, we didn’t need to make that decision.

Which brings us to today.

For us, it seems as though girl names are infinitely easier to choose. We’ve already got a girl name picked out – a beautiful name that harmonizes with Sierra and sounds nearly classical with Vilhauer. First and middle name. Chosen. Done and done.

But for a boy? Nothing.

I think of this because we have an appointment today for an ultrasound. The ultrasound where we can discover the gender of the baby. The ultrasound where we could, if so moved, determine what our future will hold – a couple of beaming girls or a pair better suited for mixed doubles.

We’re not quite sure if we want to find out. Why spoil the surprise, right?

One reason is the name. What if it’s a boy? What if this perfect girl name is trashed in the name of an extra Y chromosome? And, what then?

Boy names are by nature more difficult. Clever names seem too cutesy, and the typical seem so generic. I wasn’t a typical boy growing up – as in, I wasn’t tied to cars and sports and the other things boys are expected to discover and latch onto – so I’m not sure what a name is supposed to represent. I was named after my father’s dog, after all. True story.

It’s been mentioned hundreds of times before, of course – a name is more than a word. It’s an identity that sticks with a child for his or her entire life, from birth until adulthood, along for the ride, written and mispronounced and branded onto every item that he or she encounters throughout every single stage of growing up.

And I think that makes the decision so important. I wonder what goes though the minds of those that use child names as some kind of personal fantasy, as some kind of joke or reaffirmation of ideals. I wonder why a Miami Dolphins fan would name their kid “Phin,” or why someone who was enamored with marijuana would name their little girl “Sweet Leaf.”

We hope that Sierra finds the beauty in her name as she grows up. We hope she understands every aspect of the word – the naturalness and creativity, and the historical aspect of her middle name: Dawn, a female version of my grandfather’s name, Don.

And we hope that, no matter what happens, Baby #2 finds joy in his or her name. Because it’s important. We realize that.

That’s what makes the decision so difficult.

Tags: Grandpa Boyer, Isaac, Miami Dolphins, Sierra, Vilhauer |

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Days With My Father

January 23, 2009


Photography and words that move.

That nearly moved me to tears as I looked at it, here, at my work desk.

Days With My Father, by Phillip Toledano – a portrait of the photographer’s father as he descends into a form of Alzheimer’s-like short term memory loss. It’s amazing. Touching.

I’m going to go back to missing my grandfather now, thanks.

Found via an older post by Bill at MTLB.

Tags: Grandpa Boyer, Photography |

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