Wednesday, February 02, 2005

The Naming of Names

What’s in a name? Surely a rose by any other name still smells as sweetly.—William Shakespeare [Romeo & Juliet]

Some people seem to be ‘dissatisfied’ with the name of this blog. Indeed, some have reacted as if I were a Capulet and they of the house Montegue. Not exactly sure as to the whys and wherefores. I do have some interesting ideas. But I’m not quite as ‘arrogant’ as some people may like to think. If I were, I would not be open to suggestions.

So, here’s what I’m suggesting….

I’d like to see some suggestions on what this blog might be better named. Here are the criteria I’d like to see satisfied in a proposed new name.

[1] It has to be relatively short. We don’t want people fat-fingering long names like thegreatandwonderfulcityofpueblocolorado.info. Preferably eight characters between the dots; e.g., http://www.12345678.info. We can go as high as ten if it really ‘sings’.

[2] It needs to be snappy. Something that people will remember when they hear it once. Panache! Maybe even with a bit of an edge to it.

[3] A bit of a ryhme would be very good. OHNO Pueblo is a good example. Pue and View was also a good rhyme. So think along those lines.

[4] It should be easily identifiable with Pueblo. And I mean this in a fashion that cannot be confused with any other city. I’ve heard Steel City mentioned, but anyone outside of southeastern Colorado would likely think of Pittsburgh if they heard it.

[5] It may not be vulgar or obscene.

We will take suggestions over the next thirty days. After that, I think I can come up with a system to vote on them. I’ll have to hammer that out as I’ve some concerns about voting fraud. Lord knows we’ve seen enough of that several months ago.

To submit a proposal you can do it by e-mailing me. Just click on the Administration item in the box below this entry. Or, you can register with the system and make a comment by clicking on the Comments item in the box below.

Additional thoughts on all of this….

• The only person spending money on this operation is myself. No one else has ‘bought into’ this activity by showering me with filthy lucre. And I doubt if anybody will. But that’s not a problem for me. However, if someone wishes to buy me out, I’m willing to listen. Think five figures.

• It’s intended as a public service and a place for people to discuss issue germane to the city. Issues such as you’ve seen here lately.

• I’m willing to let anyone have their say here, as long as they abide by the rules (see Registration). They don’t have to invest any money, which makes it ideal for organizations that cannot benefit from governmental largess, i.e., CDBG.

• Nobody is holding a pistol to anybody’s dog, threatening to shoot if they don’t read this blog. At least not as far as I’ve heard. If there is such a situation going on, please, Please, PLEASE, get in touch with Pat Heine. She can use the job security and it would make an interesting read in the Pueblo Chieftain’s Crime Beat.

• Finally, I’ve learned that it is best to be able to laugh at oneself. It makes one less brittle and not quite so overly sensitive. Therefore, when people start saying things, intentionally or unintentionally, you don’t go ballistic on them. At least not until you know if there is mens rea; malice of forethought, a “guilty mind”.

“Do not be quick to anger,” some wag said, about 2000 years ago.

All that said, I look forward to seeing what others have to suggest.

Sunday, January 30, 2005

We’ve Got Stats

The Statistics button!

It works, now.

We’ll try to expand its capabiltiies in the future. But at least now you can watch what’s happening, in terms of visits, postings, etc., etc., etc.

Looking for a Few Good Images

Need things to put into the banner.

Looking for some sharp images to add to the banner at the top of the page. The idea is to represent many of the good things of this town in the banner.

If you’ve got a great image of a building or car or locomotive or some such thing and you’re willing to share it, please contact the Administration. We’ll take the image and, using PhotoShop, do something like we did with the Rosemount mansion. We plan to turn the banner into something of a collage.

Saturday, January 29, 2005

We’ve Got Mail

E-Mail available via Puetown.

For those in need of e-mail capabilities, we’ve established an e-mail server to support you. This will likely be used mostly for administrative capabiltiies and inter/intra-agency communications as necessary.

If you’re group needs to have an e-mail network and your group is associated with Puetown Views we can likely accomodate your needs. Please contact the Administration for arrangements.

Registration On-Line

Now accepting new members!

Okay. We have the registration system operational.

You only need to register if you are intent upon making comments or, even better, becoming a contributor to the entries published here.

Just click on the REGISTER button at the top of the screen. If you are a registered member, click on the LOG-IN button to make a comment or, better still, publish an entry.

Enjoy….

Friday, January 28, 2005

Limitations

Some of this stuff….

...isn’t working quite right just yet.

We’re still trying to stand this thing up properly. Not to mention the almost austere appearance of the page; some of the buttons along the top of the page do not work, just yet. Particularly, REGISTER, LOG-IN and STATISTICS are not available.

Over the course of the next few weeks, we hope to bring the rest of it on-line.

One item of importance, Guests are not going to be allowed to make COMMENTS on this system. We had some interesting experiences with spammers of the most nefarious form in the last few days of OHNO Pueblo. We do not intend to let THAT happen again. Therefore, if you wish to make comments here, to express yourself, you will need to register with the system. This is nothing personal. Indeed, we’ll keep personal information completely confidential. You can use a nom des blogs to identify yourself in comments or even in entries, if you are a co-author. However, we will need to know who you are as part of registration. And that information will be kept very close hold. The only way anyone will get it out of us is with a valid search warrant.

[Note: Those spammers ARE pernicious and of a most distasteful demeanor. This is the only way we can think of to prevent them from doing what they did there, here.]

Artists Wanted

Looking for a few good kids. Age is not an issue.

Last Monday night, while waiting for the opening of the regularly scheduled City Council meeting, we were regaled with the introduction of a group of bright-eyed, bushy-tailed eager beavers, i.e., kids. These were members of the Pueblo Teen Council. We’re not exactly sure what their charter is but it looked to us like they were primed and ready to sink their collective teeth into something juicy.

I remember those days myself; the heady days of youth when I discovered that adults might actually listen to me, if I made sense and was focused on something outside of my own nihilistic benefit. We need more kids like that. Actually, we probably shouldn’t call them ‘kids’. They’re acting more like adults than all too many adults actually act.

But, getting to a point, if we had some people like that, particularly of the artistic persuasion, we could do some interesting things here. But we shouldn’t limit it to artistic pursuits either. We could benefit from the talents of any ‘adults’ who think they could do something for Pueblo. This being either visual, audio, written or other talents.

So, if you know someone hankering for an opportunity to ‘express’ themselves for the benefit of not only their own development, but the rest of us denizens of Pueblo….please….direct them here.

The Old OHNO Pueblo Entries

What’s become of all those entries of time gone by.

We’ve managed to save the main entries from OHNO Pueblo. In due time, we’ll resurrect them and have them available for future reference. This will be particularly useful when we start looking at what happens with regards to water and transportation issues in the county. But that will take some time to implement.

In the meantime, the old blog side, www. ohnopueblo.org, is still accessible. We’re not sure what is going to happen with the domain name, but we’ll see. And, if you REALLY need to have some information from the old site made available, please contact the Adminstration and they’ll see what they can do.

Puetown Views

A new start.

A funny thing happened the other week. I tried to get into do some work in my favorite blog, OHNO Pueblo and found I was locked out. After some investigation, it seems that the outfit that was providing the hosting services went out of business. And to add injury to insult, the guy who had founded the business seems to have got himself in a whole heap o’ trouble; he had registered all the domain names in his own name.

Being faced with a dilemma, I decided to continue the blog, but rename it and expand its operational area. So now, we’re opening under new (mis)management. We’ve got a new domain name, we’ve got a more powerful version of the software, a new mission, a larger audience and a new format to assist with all of this.

Over the last year, we’ve built up an audience that was resulting in about a thousand ‘hits’ a day. That will drop off for a while with the new domain name, until people become aware of the move. But, in due time, we’ll have them back and more. We’ll have more contributors as well. We’re looking at the whole town now. In support of that, we invite every neighborhood association and any public-service-oriented citizens’ association to participate in this activity. If you’ve got something to share with the members of your community or the citizens of Pueblo relating to the quality of life here, please contact the Administration.

We’ll be setting up categories to assist in looking for what it is that you want to find out about.