Creative Commons Photo Credit by zigazou76

I hope 2011 was a great year for you and your family.

Here are the 10 most read posts of 2011:

10. Nobody Talks About Sin Anymore

9. Social Media In 2011

8. Who Am I?

7. Write It Down

6. I Want to Know You

5. The 3 Signs of a Miserable Job

4. Bell & Hell

3. Where Are The Men?

2. I’m Scared

1. Let’s Do Something

Thanks for reading (re)made in 2011.

Yes, 2011 was a great year, but what’s that one thing that you’re looking forward to most in 2012? You can leave a comment below in the comment section.

Your bio.

This is probably the biggest part of the first impression you give online besides your photo. It quickly tells everyone else what you are about. Then there are those people that put up bios that really don’t tell you anything about the person. Maybe they like being mysterious?

Here’s a small glimpse at who I am…

My twitter bio: beatmaker slash mountaineer

My blog bio: i am husband to the amazing, @jasminerachel. i am a big-mountain climber who has a big dream of climbing the highest peaks on each continent. i am also a beatmaker. i am a brand-builder of the jackalopekid. i am a mac user who will never look back. and most importantly, i follow the creator. i do all these things while blogging about it every step of the way. this is me.

They’re definitely not perfect, but they work for now.
I am always thinking of how I can make these better an maybe you are, too.
These both used to be a lot longer and have changed quite a few times.

Anyways, here’s an exercise for you to be thinking about your bio and if it (still) fits you.—

If you had FIVE words to write a short bio and tell us about YOU,

What would it say?

2010 was a big year all around, folks. Some big things happened here on jackalopekid.com. I’m two years into this blogging thing and this is my 332nd post. Beautiful. I just want to say thanks to you folks that come back day after day to read and comment on the junk I have to say. (more…)

Don’t do something halfway.

Most people seem to get that. But, when looking at the online world, some folks obviously disregard that great advice. Even though there are different organizations that fall in the “bad website” category, I want look at what the church looks like online.

Before I get started I just want to say I’m not wanting to pick on anyone here. Look at this as more of a favor…

Ok. I will say that some churches get it. There are definitely some great church websites out there. But, there are also some terrible looking ones. I really can’t say it any other way. I mean, you can obviously see what I’m talking about here. Click on that link and view those sites. It ain’t pretty.

I have some notions on why this happens.

Churches first decide that they want a hip website to stay relevant so they can let all those hipsters know what’s up. After this decision is made, they lack one or some of these necessary components…

Someone who actually knows how to put together a site.
Time.
Focus.
Resources.
Maybe you can add something else to the list

Your website shows who you are a lot more than you think. If your website looks like junk, then people automatically assume that your church looks like… well, junk. Last week we talked about how a church building can sometimes change a person’s perspective on the church, even before setting foot in the church building itself. And I don’t think that a website is any different.

If you think that you, your church or your business may need to go in a different online direction, I would challenge you to take a close look at your site. It is sometimes hard to look at things through a reader’s eyes when we become so accustomed to the way things look. You may even find that you need to change the theme, take some unnecessary items off of your site, find a professional that may know more about building sites or maybe even take the site down while you and your team reevaluate where you stand. It can only help, right?

Where do you think a website fits in on the representation of a church/company/organization? How much does it matter?
Also, what are some church websites that are doing it right? Why do you like those websites so much?

I have been thinking about social media a lot lately.
This includes each social media site that I use and what they exactly do.

The three that I mainly use are…

my wordpress blog, facebook and twitter.

With my blog I can write long posts, but I really can’t see what everyone else is doing unless they comment about it on my blog.

Twitter is pretty limited with the 140 character rule. I really love the interaction that happens on twitter, but like I said, it’s limited.

Then there’s facebook.
It has everything.
You have space to write long posts, chat, play annoying games and you can see what everyone else is doing.

It really pains me to say this, but facebook is my favorite social media site overall for those reasons.

If I had to use one site, it would be facebook.

If you can’t be my friend anymore, I understand.

So, would you choose facebook, twitter or your blog to communicate with your readers and why?

let me be honest here.

for me, blogging started out as a “trying to be like everyone else” thing and ended up being a way to express myself and let my thoughts out on a page. except it’s not that personal journal thing. instead it’s where the whole world can see it. never thought i’d like it really. social media surprised me, too. i like to keep everything to myself, except for this area.

so, when i started reading others’ blogs i noticed they had a niche for the most part. a place where their blog fits in.

but, lately i’ve been thinking about finding where this blog fits. i mean if i just stuck to music or climbing or church, i don’t know if i’d even stay interested. i guess writing all over the place is for my enjoyment, too.

yep. this blog fits in the random category.

so, what do you think?

Should blogs have a main subject or do they work when they’re all over the place?

I’m  sure somewhere along the way you’ve had writer’s block. I know I have. Here’s an easy cure that has worked for me, so it might help you.

Sometimes I forget that other people might like what I like to read.

Sounds simple enough.

People subscribe to blogs because of similar interests. So, I’m guessing you like Christian stuff, climbing, music, or random thoughts. I guess you could just be a friend stopping by as well.

If you’re looking for recipes this is probably not your place.

What do you like to read about? If you have a blog, please share it below and tell us what it’s about.

Sometimes I write blogs to see your opinion on a matter. Sometimes I write a blog to let you know my opinion on something. Sometimes I just write to empty my mind.

The one thing that I sometimes forget about blogging is that it was partly invented to let other people know what is going on in life. So, here are my happenings and thoughts as of late:

• Haiti trip with SafeWorld has been moved to August 12-16. So excited about this!!!
• I have my book, “Perfect Church” 90% completed. I should have this finished within the next three months.
• Even though my twitter profile says I am located in Denver, CO I am actually located in Fort Collins, CO, which is an hour north of Denver. I list it like this for more exposure on twitter.
• There will be a new jackalopekid.com launching on July 19th. This is version 3.0 and it is by far the best yet. I can’t wait for you guys to see it.
• I am thinking of getting my first tattoo. I don’t know where I want to get it, but I know I want it to say “To the Summit” in Latin, which is “Ad Alta”.
• We are helping plant orchardchurch in Westminster, CO.
• I am at 20 highpoints overall and plan to climb five more by the end of 2010. This will get me to the halfway point.
• My thoughts right now are that I have a farmer’s tan and I need to do some laundry.

There are some other things I have up my sleeve, but I can’t tell all of my secrets here.

So tell me, What’s going on in your life?

I spend a lot of time dealing with blogging, facebook and twitter. It seems everybody does this social media junk these days. This has me thinking about the future of social media and how long it will even be around. Will I be 80 years old and tweeting about my false teeth and my walker? Maybe so. I will not blame you if you don’t read my tweets when I’m 80 years old.

Or maybe my thoughts will be broadcasted for the whole world to see… Nevermind.

The internet is a beautiful thing.

Where do you see social media heading? What are some things you would like to see in the next big social media craze?

The one thing that I rate blog posts on is how many comments they have. If they don’t have many comments, then I’ll skip right over the post. If the post has a lot of comments, then I’ll dive right in. This is usually because I don’t have a lot of time to read tons of blogs, so I read the most popular posts. I also make sure to use RSS feeds, which makes reading a lot of posts on different blogs a little faster. Maybe you rate blog posts by looking at comments, or maybe you read each one. If there is another way you rate posts besides how many comments they have, please let me know. So, all of this got me thinking today…

What if bloggers took away commenting systems? Would you still read their blogs? Would it make the reading experience better since you don’t feel like you have to leave a comment? Would the blog experience be worse? Let me know.