By Tayler Mayer Monday, June 29th, 2009

Because DeafRead co-founder Jared Evans lives in Washington, D.C. and I live in Los Angeles, it’s not often that we get to meet in person. We meet frequently by instant messaging and e-mail one other nearly everyday. We were both at the recent DCARA vblog symposium in the Bay Area. We took the opportunity to meet and discuss DeafRead.

The first thing we talked about was DeafRead Custom. We felt that it wasn’t being used enough. Perhaps visitors did not understand how it was used, or what it was for. We decided we would re-brand DeafRead Custom and in doing so, re-name it to DeafRead Hide. The name itself says what it does.

(Currently there are 543 active Dashboard accounts and 257 “hides”).

You can personalize DeafRead to your liking. Blogs that you don’t want to see on DeafRead can be hidden. This requires registering for an account, which is called DeafRead Dashboard. If you’re not logged in, you’re seeing everything. Logged in, you can customize your Hide list. A hidden blog won’t appear on DeafRead.

When you register, an e-mail is sent to your e-mail address to confirm you’re the owner of the e-mail address. Enclosed in the e-mail is a link. Click it to verify and activate your Dashboard account.

There are two ways to hide a blog. The first is within your Dashboard. Click on “Hide”, and on the following page you are presented with a list of all of the blogs at DeafRead. Click the button “Hide” next to the blog you want hidden. After clicking “Hide” for a blog, this hidden blog will be shown on the top of the page. On this list of hidden blogs, click “Show” to undo this.

The other way is from the front page of DeafRead. Under each post summary, there’s a button “Dashboard” with an icon of a gear. Clicking this pops up a menu. Click “Hide” in this pop-up menu.

You can check whether you are logged in by checking the upper right corner of DeafRead. Next to DeafRead Hide: it says either “On” or “Off”.

Register for a Dashboard account and personalize your DeafRead.

By Tayler Mayer Wednesday, May 6th, 2009

Would you believe it if I said DeafRead had 45,298 articles?!

1,028 days passed since DeafRead was born, so this figures to a mind-boggling 44.064 posts per day. In and out! On Saturdays and Sundays. On Valentine’s Day, July the Fourth and Thanksgiving! (Thankfully DeafRead slows down on these days.)

Before you start saying the moderators could do a better job, try doing it yourself! 44 posts per day average. That’s a lot of plagiarism to catch. Lots of excessive negativism to filter. Lots of subtle marketing to detect. Lots of decisions to make, lots of discussions with team members.

Granted, it’s not a job for everyone. It requires a difficult level of neutrality and undying commitment. Finally, it is a THANKLESS job! I want to fix this by writing this post. It is long overdue.

Since DeafRead exists because blogs exist, I felt that team members should be bloggers themselves to understand the real world of blogging. Live, eat and dream blogging. And the occasional nightmare. Jared and I wanted to help deaf blogs reach the masses; without bias. So we wanted moderators that blogged themselves and could still find it within themselves to moderate posts with which they disagree. This includes publishing posts that argued against their very own posts!

Moderators must withstand unprecedented pressure! With a single click, they seem to hold too much publishing power–but thankfully we decided to show the posts that weren’t shown on the front page of DeafRead. We didn’t know it at first, but it uncovered an important tool: check and balance! DeafRead Extra empowers YOU to check the moderators’ work. Did I say pressure?! Oh yes! The pressure!

Keep in mind, the moderators are good at what they do. As we’ve seen, they do this day in and out. Possibly for reasons not obvious to you, the moderators have found reasons not to publish a post. First acquaint yourself with the DeafRead Guidelines. If you still find yourself disagreeing with the decision, e-mail us. Rather than come off with an offish attitude; simply ask why it was moved to DeafRead Extra. We’ll appreciate it very much!

When a hot topic surfaces on DeafRead, all the more meaningful for the deaf community because concerned individuals are gathering and deciding action was now mandatory–the kind of events that result in change. Whether it’s good or bad change–it’s progress! In times of high emotion, people can say things they don’t mean. But stop for a minute to imagine the pressure on the moderators. Think of it. I can personally tell you we don’t always sleep well at night. There has been many strings of sleepless nights.

I cannot possibly imagine being a moderator for DeafRead. Strangely, I am seeing it unfold before my eyes.

Why are they doing it? They tell me they see the impact of DeafRead on the deaf community. The empowerment. The shifts. The communication. The idea sharing. Yes, bad things come with these positives, as many things do. A car can get me to San Francisco in 5 hours, but not without dumping carbon into the air.

By moderating DeafRead, they are contributing to the impact! THANK YOU DeafRead moderators! Thank you, Elizabeth Gillespie. Thank you, Amy Cohen Efron. Thank you, Carrie Gellibrand. By doing the impossible, you are helping the deaf community in so many unforeseen ways. The best part? There’s more impact yet to come!

THANK YOU!

(And of course, thank you, J.J. Puorro, who is no longer with us but our friendship is none the weaker. Hat tip!)

From the bottom of DeafRead Guidelines:

Please remember that…
Human Editors are not created equal; in fact, their unique background and experience are what makes them human. The same goes for blog authors. Because a Human Editor publishes an opinionated post does not mean the Human Editor agrees with it. We will often publish posts with which we disagree.

By Tayler Mayer Tuesday, April 28th, 2009

While this vlog addresses an issue in DeafVIDEO.TV, the same is true for DeafRead. The summary reads on YouTube: “I believe I should be charged with the opposite: being too liberal. Only .09% of videos at DeafVIDEO.TV were removed because of R-List violations.” Here’s a loose (and hurried) translation.

Hello everyone. I would like to address the issue of censorship. I guess maybe when DeafVIDEO.TV and DeafRead was founded, I didn’t expect that I would confront this issue. When building the sites, I wanted to give everyone freedom of speech, but problems arose–negativity, name-calling and so on. Now that I think about it, I should have expected it. But still I wish these things wouldn’t occur.

First of all, I have a short excerpt to share.

“The right to freedom of speech allows individuals to express themselves without interference or constraint by the government.”
Source: http://topics.law.cornell.edu/wex/First_amendment

This quote shows that freedom of speech actually applies to the government only. DeafVIDEO.TV, and also DeafRead, are private properties so it doesn’t apply. BUT it doesn’t mean I will do anything I want. I like to speak out, and I believe that everyone should have the same opportunity. Even if I don’t agree with them. Suppose others don’t agree with me, I would still want my right to make comments. By reciprocating this, I understand how people feel about censorship. For this reason, I want to mirror–copy–the right of freedom of speech although it doesn’t apply to the sites. I believe in freedom of speech so I try to mirror it as much as possible. However, it’s not always possible obviously because, as I’ve said before, of excessive negativity, name-calling, slander, libel, defamation and so on.

I’m going to mention a video I made earlier under the YouTube screenname of “deafvideotv“. In this video, you’ll find the text summary stating that .09% of videos were removed from DeafVIDEO.TV because of R-List violations. This is not .9% which is almost 1%. It is point zero nine. This is almost .1%. This is very liberal. I’ve allowed a lot of videos into DeafVIDEO.TV. That is what I think the DeafVIDEO.TV and DeafRead visitors should be upset about. Upset about me being too lenient.

So when I am removing videos from DeafVIDEO.TV, I’m not hurrying to do so to control information. I put more emphasis on freedom of speech more than excluding videos based on negativity. Remember, this is .09% of videos.  This percentage is minuscule. I remember there was a total of 19 videos removed. I also mentioned this number in the video. This is out of 21,000 to 23,000 videos. Most of the 19 videos were removed because of swear words (addressed at someone) or pornography. So not all of these 19 videos were removed because of excessive negativity, but for other reasons.

So I think I should be charged with being too lenient. I am too lenient because I want to mirror as much as possible with freedom of speech. Obviously we’ve seen abuses. I’ve tried my best to balance this.

What am I doing about this? There will be many new features coming to DeafVIDEO.TV. I need to continue working on it–I’ve already started, but I need to continue and finish building DeafVIDEO.TV 2.0. The features will protect vloggers. The features will protect video commenters. And the people watching. Those features will help greatly, but will not happen until DeafVIDEO.TV is re-launched. I thank you for your patience. It will come, no question. I see the need for it.

Will issues completely dissolve? No–but it will help greatly reduce them. And I will be able to reduce my role, not needing to make such decisions as much. The features mean that you will control more of what you see, as well as what you don’t want to see. This will be done by yourself, without my involvement. If I wanted to censor or control information,  I wouldn’t have wanted to add these features. I want to give–empower you to take control. My role will be then lessened. My responsiblity will be to make sure to build and maintain program code that works correctly so that you can use these features.

I guess when DeafRead and DeafVIDEO.TV was built, I didn’t realize the role I would be assuming. I also now realize that I will be accused of censorship. I accept it. There is nothing I can do about it. People will make their own assumptions, which is fine with me.

I think I should be charged with the opposite: being too lenient. Not removing enough videos. But people will have their own interpretations.

Gallaudet Protest of 2006: Board meeting at Hyatt Hotel

I have an example. It relates to the right to peacefully protest and march. This right is recognized by the government and the U.S. Constitution. It is our right.

I start this story when I landed in Washingon D.C.. At this time, the Gallaudet Protest of 2006 was underway. I immediately heard about a protest taking place at a Hyatt Hotel in Virginia. Because the Gallaudet Board of Trustees were convening there, the protesters took 2 coach buses to the hotel. They stood on private property. Hyatt Hotel’s property which is private. Police came. Hotel personnel along with police officiers let the protestors know that they didn’t have the right to protest peacefully on their property. After a short time of confusion, the police told the protest leaders that they had the right to protest peacefully, but it had to be on government property. As long as the protest was peaceful and on government property, the government could not interfere. I refer to the quote above; the government cannot interfere.

The protest readily cooperated and moved off the hotel’s grounds onto government property. We stood on the sidewalk bordering the grounds, just next to the driveway entrance to the hotel. The sidewalk is owned by the city, the government. We could peacefully protest there, but not on private property. Does the people have the right to protest anywhere? No. This, I think, is a good comparsion with freedeom of speech.

Thank you for listening as always!

Note for DeafRead: A feature simliar to the ones coming to DeafVIDEO.TV already exist on DeafRead. By using DeafRead Custom, you can hide any blogs from your view.

Also, after last summer’s horrible fiasco where some people were hurt, we implemented a new guideline that protects DeafRead when we don’t publish a post based on excessive negativity. This guideline is #8 Name Calling and Discrimination.

By Tayler Mayer Saturday, April 18th, 2009

With DeafRead’s articles recently surpassing its 25,000th, I decided it was time to give DeafRead Search the respect it deserved. There’s quite a bunch of content to be searched for your peruse.

The default search gives you results based on relevancy. Relevancy improves the chances of finding what you are searching for. If the term “deaf” is searched, it’s given lower priority, because there’s probably thousands of this word in the database. On the other hand, let’s say “forest” is a uncommon word in DeafRead. This word will then have higher priority.

The more a word is used in a post, the higher relevancy it has.

The enhanced search now uses natural language searching. “A natural language search is a search using regular [written] language. Using this type of search you can ask the database a question or you can type in a sentence that describes the information you are looking for. The database then uses a programmed logic to determine the keywords in the sentence by their position in the sentence.” (Source: http://www.usg.edu/galileo/skills/unit04/primer04_09.phtml)

As I said, the default search sorts its result by relevancy. If you are looking for a recent post, you can check the box “Search by Date”. This still uses the powerful natural language search, but instead sorts it by date. The most recent posts are shown on top.

Although all this fancy stuff was added, searches are yet faster. I don’t think we will see any noticeable difference however, but as the database grows, this will turn out to be an advantage. Also, we displayed 25 search results. This is now doubled to 50.

The search field you see on the right on this blog searches the blog only. To give DeafRead’s new search engine a spin, click on the DeafRead logo above to go to DeafRead, then look for the search field on the middle column. Or you can do a search on “audism” sorted by relevancy (default), or by date.

Now, how to search for signs in videos!?

By Tayler Mayer Thursday, April 16th, 2009

Hidden deep in DeafRead files, I found a small project that I started but abandoned. Hey, life happens. Since it was started, finishing it was easy.

Basically, what it does is list all published articles in a manner that is easy for search engines to understand. Some popular search engines are Google and Yahoo. Sure, search engines are proficient at mining for information on DeafRead, but in the chance any posts are missed, this special list ensures that none are.

Because DeafRead has a database of 25,000+ articles published over 2 and half years, powered by this list we are very well-positioned to send even more traffic to your blog.

Unfortunately, I don’t have anything to show, because it’s not human-readable. Only computers “understand” it. Do take heart; we’re doing as much as we can to increase exposure to your blogs. It’s what we do.