New UMW web site

The new web site design for the United Methodist Women is much nore attractive than prior ones. It's also organized well.

One issue appears to be slow loading of images, especially on the mhome page. Visitors might think that the image link was "bad" and get a negative impression. But the overall design, organization, and information is excellent.

• New UMW site

A penny for your searches

Yahoo! has a free service that turns your Internet searches into food for the hungry. Instead of using Google, Bing, or whatever your search engine is now, start using a GoodSearch search toolbar from Yahoo!

GoodSearch is a Yahoo-powered search engine that contributes a penny to your chosen charity -- for example, Decatur Cooperative Ministry (DCM) -- each time you use it to search the internet.

In this case, a penny truly goes a long way!

16 searches = 16 pennies = 1 pound of food from the Food Bank

In just the first week that the DCM staff started using GoodSearch, they raised $3.85. That's 24 pounds of food!

Imagine how much more could be raised if everyone that supported DCM used GoodSearch for all their searches. What if all your family and friends used it?

How to get GoodSearch

It’s easy to install the GoodSearch’s search toolbar in your Web browser:

1. Go to http://www.goodsearch.com/ .
2. Click on the "Get the GoodSearch toolbar" link.
3. Enter Decatur Cooperative Ministry (make sure it’s spelled exactly like that)
4. Select the Verify button.
   This will display “ Decatur Cooperative Ministry (Decatur, GA)” as your choice.
5. Click on "Get the GoodSearch toolbar or add us to your search box".
6. Click on the “Download Toolbar” button.
7. Close any other open browser windows or tabs.
8. Click on “Download the GoodSearch Toolbar” to accept the licensing agreement.
9. When the pop-up dialog box appears, select the “Run” button.
10. When the next security pop-up dialog appears, select the “Run” button (or save it to your hard disk, then run it from there).
11. Proceed with the installation and select the install options you want.
12. You may need to restart your browser (or your computer) to make the new toolbar appear properly.

If you use multiple web browsers, do this when you are in each of your browsers.

So, won't you give DCM a penny for your thoughts searches?

Notice

This process adds a Yahoo! search toolbar. If you don’t want an added toolbar in your web browser, do not follow the above steps.

WordLive

Scripture Union, a UK organization, now has up and running "WordLive". It's a multimedia Bible experience that lets you interact with the Word in whatever form you like.

• Choose the Bible translation you prefer
• Listen to music
• Listen to podcasts (voice)
• Look at images
• Look at video
• Download and print a Bible study

WordLive is now offering a five-week Lent study for small groups or individuals. As of January 5, Parts 1 and 2 area available.

Check out this nifty resource. As Scripture Union says, "Grab a God moment".

Music of the Bible revealed

An interesting 1986 "discovery" ...

UMM have snazzy new web site

The old look and slow speed of the United Methodist Men's web site is a thing of the past. Praise the Lord! The new UMM site has a greatly improved look, sort of mimics the UMC redesign, and is faster.

Some remaining problems:

• A web editor should never let text exceed the "allowed space" (as in the "Nashville news anchor to produce video for 10th National Gathering" text). That's just plain sloppy.
• The web addresses (URLs) contain "gobbdegook" code as part of the address. That's common when a web is based on a database and the web administration team fails to make the system display words, not garbage code in the URLs. To me that shows a lack of focus on visitors and a lack of either expertise or lack of caring by the web administrators.

Overall, though, the UMM web site design changes are a significant improvement.

Audio Bibles online

BibleGateway, part of the Gospel Communications family of sites, keeps expanding its Bible Study tools and Resources. It now offers audio versions of the Bible. Current English language versions are the CEV, ESV, KJV, NASB, NIV, and TNIV. Currently the CEV is only available for New Testament readings.

For most Bibles, you can choose between a Flash Player or the Real Audio Player. I prefer the Flash Player, as it's a bit faster to start.

You may want to try listening to the Contemporary English Version (CEV) for New Testament passages. The CEV was specifically translated with a focus on being easy to understand in modern English when hearing it read. It's not a literal translation and it is more thought-for-thought than the NIV or NRSV, but it's a translation, not a paraphrase.

A Spanish Bible and Spanish audio are also available.

• Audio Bibles at BibleGateway
• Download Flash Player
• Download Real Player

About the new UMC Web site

The United Methodist Church's denomination web site is undergoing some significant changes. Unfortunately, the phase-in of those changes is not as smooth as I'd like to see. There are many disconnects, pages with a lot of "This feature is still under development" pop-up balloons, and broken links.

I was always taught to never use "under construction" type web pages. Make the development on a development server, then go public all at once. The current UMC method may be the result of a desire for feedback while development proceeds, which might also mean that the denomination is still unsure of what the final outcome will be. But maybe this method will get the massive changes done faster.

The new web site has a fresh new look, more color, more animation (for those that like that sort of thing), and either access to lots more information or else links that make the old information easier to find. Of course I do cringe at the heavy use of green in the navigation menus. My web development training has been to try to avoid red and green colors due to people with the most common form of color blindness.

The "Pastor: Overview" page has text overlap problems (at least in IE7) in the right-side "Related information for" box. But you can tell the type information that will eventually be there.

A few new features:

• A horizontal menu and a horizontal submenu that changes with the top menu item selected. Some studies show that people prefer left-side vertical menus, but this one works, though it takes a bit of getting used to.
• The home page has a link to a new "Methopedia".
• Role-based (some say "personality" or "profile") sections of links, in Leader Resources, for example. Four common role-related links appear at the right side of the main horizontal menu: Pray, Give, Serve, Connect, Lead.
• Added syndication capability for webmasters
• Personal Profile pages, "similar to MySpace, FaceBook, and similar social networks", the site says. Sure, go ahead and add a nice sharp photo of yourself and some juicy personal information that an identity thief would love to get his grubby little hands on. Parents need to keep track of this area if their kids use it.
• "Our World" has a collection of feature "stories of faith".
• Most main menu index pages have a nice, medium size color photo. The overall page design is attractive.

UMC seeks feedback on site redesign

United Methodist Communications has been redesigning the denomination's web site, UMC.org. Today UMComm announced that you can take a "sneak peek" at the new UMC.org site as well as provide feedback.

Access the sneak peek at http://www.umc.org/; click the "sneak peek" image banner link (in the center middle of the page) to preview the site.

Following the short introductory video, select one of the links to new features. After checking out a new feature, feel free to select the "Feedback" link. UMComm is actively seeking comments in order to make the final site better meet visitors' needs when the site "goes live" in January 2007.

Add Spirit to your browser

A web site named "Faith Browser" offers Firefox web browser users a free Bible Verse toolbar and free religious button for the navigation toolbar.

The Bible Verse Toolbar adds one more toolbar row, which I loathe, but if you want the verse and can tolerate the decreased vertical window space, go for it.

Of Blogs and Bishops

As more clergy begin to blog, it's including Bishops too. Below are a few examples of Bishops who blog or are quoted in blogs:

• Bishop James Swanson, Holston Conference, has some pointed comments about the decline in United Methodist (and other denominations') membership in his March 10th " Who really cares?" article. Bishop Swanson also has a blog, "SOARING - A Bishop's Blog ".
• Bishop J.L. Hopkins has an entry on a book he highly recommends, "Blood Done Signed My Name ".
• Bishop Coyner (Indiana) is quoted a long posting about pastoral appointments at the Hoosier Pastor blog (I like the pun!)
• Monday Morning with Bishop Jones (Kansas)
• The first Latina United Methodist Bishop, Minerva Carcaño, Desert Southwest Annual Conference, has a series of messages, though it's not really a blog.
• Bishop Scott Jones' Weekly Blog, Kansas East Conference, is really a plain web page that holds a weekly message.

Teens show risky online behavior

Chat, blog, group, and forum web sites attract teens, hungering for contact. Unfortunately, some of that contact is evil disguised. And in seconds an evil person can discover a lot of personal data about them -- if they have filled out a lot of information in their profile, for example. Such areas can be a criminal's dream. Worse, some teens don't seem to think through the consequences of online flirting (or worse) with strangers.

An attorney and child advocate runs WiredSafety.org, which tries to arm parents with information.

Read the full USA Today article »

Feed Reader reviews

You don't really have to come to this web page to read the latest posts. All you have to do is set up to receive the "feed" from this page.

OK, OK, so now you're starting to get glassy-eyed and wondering about "feed". Well, a "feed" is the information about a posting here -- the title, date/time, and text of the post. You can access those via a "Feed Reader". Most are free.

Once you "subscribe" to a feed, your NewsReader automatically checks for new posts when you open it. Of course, you can still just check back here now and then.

cnet has reviews of several feed readers. An executive summary... if you use Internet Explorer, it looks like Pluck is a good one to try. [ Download Pluck ]

If you'd like to read blog feeds via a separate web page that collects "feeds" from different blogs for you, try the Google Reader or NewsGator.

If you are a FireFox user, you can "drag" a web address for a blog to your bookmark bar and it adds an orange "feed" icon. Clicking on that icon lets you see all current posts for that blog. Internet Explorer 7 is reported to also add this feature.