Why Does This Website Exist?

Why does this website exist? Like most real life questions, there are several correct answers. It’s a hobby that combines several interests such as computer technology, photography and travel. It’s an attempt to facilitate communication that otherwise would be quite difficult. It gives me an incentive to organize and contemplate things that otherwise get ignored for too long.

Is it just a big ego trip? After all, what’s with that site name? Actually, I first tried to get a domain that was more representative of the whole family. Unfortunately, everything I tried was taken. When I found out my name wasn’t taken, I grabbed it. The new country domains (like *.us) opened up a lot of new options but they are going fast. If you ever want to have your choice of domain names, grab it now. It doesn’t cost much and you might never get another chance.

The real incentive to start this site was communication. I’d had another homepage on America On Line and it worked. However, even though it was free with AOL membership, it was so limited, the performance was so poor and it was so difficult to maintain it ultimately wasn’t worth the effort. After our high school reunion in 2002, it occurred to me that catching up on things once every 5 years wasn’t the right way to do things. E-mail requires too much specific effort and doesn’t seem to meet the needs either. I decided to try another Internet page and see if that would be useful. So far, it’s not particularly effective but it’s just starting.

Of course, the communication challenges go far beyond high school. As I’ve moved around and life has changed, there are lots of people I’ve more or less lost track of. People I’ve worked with, ski club buddies, photography club friends, etc. Is anyone really good at keeping up those links over the years? Even with e-mail, how can you really keep track of the hundreds of people you’ve met? The thought was that I could add a few photos or other info from those times and perhaps people would enjoy being able to see them (or not). I think most people will probably just take a look and move on and that’s OK but I hope some may enjoy contributing.

One question I’ve gotten a few times is “Why did you spend so much time on this website?” I’m not sure how to take that one. Does that mean it’s not worth it? Actually the time necessary to create and maintain the site is not much. As you may notice it’s simply formatted. I have no desire to dazzle people with graphics. The time required to scan and edit the photos is actually greater than the time required to create the pages. For anyone who is curious, I have a number of web editing programs including Microsoft Front Page. However, almost all the pages are prepared and maintained using NotePad. I find it much easier to maintain the pages when I have complete control over the HTML.

Photography is obviously a key element of this site. I have been working more or less seriously on photography for about 30 years. I’m not a professional, of course, but I’ve managed to come up with a few images I think are fairly good. However, it recently occurred to me that precious few of those pictures have been seen by more than a dozen people. Taking the pictures was fun but it seems that they are seriously underutilized. One option, of course, would be to collar people on the street and say “Look at my pictures!” The results might be disappointing, though. The other solution was to put them on this website and hope to get some visitors.

Is it working? OK, this website is not exactly nationally known. However, after a couple of months it’s getting 5 or 10 visitors a day. At least a few people are looking at it now. I will continue to add things, to update the content once or twice and month, and to try some new things. Comments are welcome on the Message Board or email me at Ken -at- KenGreen.us. (Replace the "-at-" with "@" of course.)

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