Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with oldmedia

Help me be web-savvy again (does anyone still use that term?)

embrangled — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 04:25:46 -0800

I was once a teenage web design nerd. Now I'm an old-media content producer with horribly out-of-date new-media skills. What should I learn, and where should I learn it? It's been nearly a decade since I last designed a website. Web 2.0 happened while I wasn't paying attention. Clearly, the world no longer needs hand-coding in Notepad, clever onmouseovers or anything else I learned as a nerdy 14-year-old.

So as a journalist/producer who wants to stay relevant in years to come, what should I be learning? HTML, CSS, Flash, content management systems, search engine optimisation? Something else I haven't thought of? Which skills do employers love to see in their online editorial staff?

Is it still possible to learn this stuff online, for free? Bonus points if you can suggest websites that pitch their lessons at a level somewhere between "We teach you to code back-ends in 14 languages" and, "We teach aging journalists how to use Google".

Web Site Launch Best Practices

redarmycomrade — Fri, 25 May 2007 16:03:23 -0800

I am an old media expert, but I need to understand new media pronto! Due to a large failure in our company, I am now tasked with developing and managing a workplan for launching our new online publication. I am looking for best practices and common pitfalls in launching an online publication. Case studies, white papers, articles, books, (even dictionaries focused on IT terminology) would all be helpful. Ideally, there is a seminal work detailing mistakes big media companies commonly make in planning, developing, testing and launching their sites.

What do I do with dead media and old discs?

amanda — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 13:12:01 -0800

The tyranny of data: what should I do with dead media and old data? I've just moved and am trying to boldly face the clutter which came with me. This includes a significant amount of 3.5" floppy discs and zip discs (oh, and some 5.25" floppies -- they're so cute!). I have a zip drive but I don't think it will work on this fancy-pants Mac laptop I have, nor am I sure that I want it to. As a former internet content producer and web freelancer, I've got lots and lots of discs marked Company Logos, Silly Ancient Website for Small Business, Photoshop Images, Pagemaker (!) Files, etc. Not to mention three (PC) hard drives from who knows which machines and who know what's on them.

There are a few which are marked as containing family photos which I should try to view and reclaim somehow. But, what about the rest? What do you all do with all this old media, stuff you'll never look at. This stuff might be pretty fun to show around the old folks' home someday (Lookit this here craaazy markup!) but my husband is going to kill me if I try to squirrel these away as some sort of memento. Because, that would be nuts, right?