Common Craft's Wikipedia Page

Yaay! We have a page on Wikipedia. Now what?

As you may know, Wikipedia pages tend to evolve over time as users contribute new information and we're excited to see the Common Craft page evolve.  But first we're hoping to build on a solid foundation - and we need your help. The information that's there is a good start, but it can be better. 

As the owners, it's not kosher for us to edit the page, so we'll be adding suggestions to the "talk" section over time (a few are there now). If a Wikipedian deems the information verifiable, unbiased, accurate, etc. they should feel free to update the article.  Of course, the hope is that information in the article grows organically. We hope you'll consider lending a hand!

If you don't know what a wiki is, you might check out Wikis in Plain English.

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Editors in Brief: Common Craft Article in Seattle Magazine

A few months ago, we spent an afternoon with Jamie Friddle, a writer for Seattle Magazine, who was putting together a story on Common Craft. We were so excited. A few weeks later a photographer came to take pictures.

As Sachi will tell you, the process added a layer of anxiety to her day over the next few months. What would the article say? What photos would they use? I'm happy to report that the anxiety was all for naught. The 4 page feature appears in the May 2009 issue of Seattle Magazine and we love it. Jamie's writing captured, in a compelling and interesting way, what we're all about.

Read the article.

 

 

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The Story of Our First Video, 2 Years Ago Today

It's true. Two years ago today, we posted our very first video, RSS in Plain English. We had no idea what we were doing, or how that video would transform our lives.

We had a tripod, camera and a whiteboard, and that was about. The video was lit with bedroom lamps and I was speaking directly into the microphone on the camera as I moved around the pieces of paper. The video was edited with Windows Movie Maker. It was inspired by a blog post from 2004 with the title "RSS Described in Plain English."

Of course, the technical quality of the video clearly shows that we had many, um, many opportunities to improve:

We posted it about 10pm on the night of the 23rd and by noon the next day it hit the front page of Digg, partially thanks to our first comment by Rob Cottingham, minutes after it was posted. We were both blown away by its popularity. Here are a couple of tweets from that day:

This blog post (which makes me smile) captured some of the initial buzz:

It's been 24 hours since the video was posted and we've seen 15,000+ page views, 800 Diggs , 350 Delicious bookmarks and 50 comments.

Of course, the big question for us became, can we do it again? Soon after we started work on our second video, Wikis in Plain English. Once that was complete, we started to feel confident that this was something we could do.

Looking back at the RSS video, it's a bit painful to see how rough it is compared to our work now. However, I'm struck that the roughness didn't matter. It was the message, the script, the communication that mattered far more than the bad lighting and sound. While we feel good about technical quality now, we still focus the majority of our attention on what made that first RSS video work: a simple and clear explanation.

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CNN Money Uses Twitter in Plain English (With Permission)

Thanks to the folks at CNN Money for contacting us and asking permission to use our video (with attribution) in the segment below:

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Sachi is the PI's Geek of the Week!

Our very own Sachi LeFever is the "Geek of the Week" on the Big Blog at the Seattle PI. The Geek of the Week is a series of short interviews that highlight local Seattle geeks.  Last week's geek was Bryan Zug.

My favorite answer:

When did you first know you were a geek? Describe that moment: My first grade teacher scolded me for finishing too many Schoolhouse Math worksheets, so I began sneaking them until I finished the entire box. 

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We're a Webby Award Honoree for Best Writing, Online Video

This morning we learned that we're an official Webby Award Honoree in the category of Best Writing, Online Film and Video! Woohoo!

But what does that mean?  Here's what it says on the Webby Award website:

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ReadWriteWeb on Common Craft

Marshall at ReadWriteWeb, posted a story today about Common Craft that was actually published a few months back, but has been reposted at a "redux."  It's one of my favorite bits of press and called "How Common Craft Stopped Doing Client Work, in Plain English."  I don't know of any other blog post that tells our story better.

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Edublog Awards: Common Craft Needs Your Vote

This is coming a bit late, but The Common Craft Show has been nominated for an Eddie - An Edublog Award in the category of Best Educational Use of Video/Visual.  The polls close tomorrow - we're hoping for a late-breaking victory. Thanks!

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Interview with Principled Innovation

Yesterday I had a great talk/interview with Jeff DeCagna of Principled Innovation for his P.I. Podcast.  We talked about the Common Craft story, but also about "Being Lightweight", based on the recent series of posts. Big thanks to Jeff for the invitation. 

Have a listen on Jeff's site.

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Teachers Make Our Day

Hi, I am a teacher at a middle school in Ohio, I just shared your electoral college video with my kids and thy got it!!!!!  Your explanation is the best I have ever seen.  Now my kids want more of your stuff.  Just thought you'd like a big cheer from Ohio.

Here's to kids getting it! Yay!  The video is here. 

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