Blogging.

I liked blogging. I think I might keep it up after the class is over. It is fun to have kind of a soapbox. I think it was good for turning in assignments especially; it would have been a pain to bring assignments like the ones from the blog to class every week. I have enjoyed reading my peers' blogs a lot. I always get good ideas from them, and they are just fun to read in general. Blogs are great! : ) And so was the class, for the most part : )

I'm a student, I'm a friend, I love sports, my name is Alex Rasmussen, and I'm a Mormon.

It seems like with websites, less is more when it comes to written words. I chose to analyze Mormon.org and it does a really good job of letting the pictures do the talking. The main page of Mormon.org features some menus on the top and bottom of the page, giving visitors some choices, but that is not what our eyes are drawn to first. The biggest part of the main page is taken up by pictures of people. These pictures of people pull us right in and invite us to learn more about them. With words, things get confusing and it takes time to read them all, but with a picture we take it all in immediately. Pictures are not only worth a thousand words, they also give us those thousand words in a much shorter amount of time than it would take to read a thousand words. There is just enough of a caption by the pictures that we can form a positive composite image of who the people are that we're seeing and it invites us in with the promise of telling us more of their story. Different options are set in different places and with different colors on the screen. The name of the church is there but doesn't call undue attention to itself. It's separated from the menu items that it's next to by being colored black instead of white, letting us know that it falls in a different category than those other words. The white menu options on top stand out without being obnoxious. They seem to say "Hey, we're here if you want to check us out, but no pressure. You just do your thing and go at your own pace" which works on some people's view of Mormons as pushy about their religion. The menu options on the bottom of the screen are a little more specific, but have to be scrolled down to, again giving the message that the viewer is in control of this experience and that the website is just there to be as helpful as possible. The focus on the people in the pictures shares the message that the best way to learn about Mormonism is to know a Mormon. We're invited to see how normal these people are and we see just how their faith has affected their lives, which is very instructional since, to a lot of people, much of Mormonism is shrouded in myth and misconception. Most of these messages are communicated subconsciously which makes them even more effective. All-in-all, a good website, which makes it awesome for SHARING! Check it out if you haven't.