Oye! Tech Can Be Frustrating

So I decided I would “help a brotha out” by playing with some of the tools that @cogdog has compiled on his 50 Ways to Tell a Story wiki. I decided I would try the tools that didn’t have very many examples created, with the thought of helping @cogdog build his collection. Well, let me start by saying there is a reason some of the tools don’t have a lot of examples. I was about ready to shoot somebody.

I’m not known for my patience when playing with new Web 2.0 technologies. If I can’t figure it out within 5 minutes or within 5 minutes you’ve already pissed me off because of wonky behavior, I’m out of there. Heck, there are over 60 tools listed. I’ll just try another. I started with Joggle. After about 15 minutes and a mild hissy fit, I gave up. There’s a reason why “Dominoe” is the only story listed there. I’ll be nice and leave it at that. Next was ImageLoop. This site left me pining for more. I was able to produce a slideshow, but only after taking forever long to get an account. Kept saying my username was taken. I am the only “soul4real” so gimme my account! Had to settle for something else. All that trouble only to discover ImageLoop is just a basic slide show creation tool. So I load up pics from Flickr just so I can make a slide show like I could have made on Flickr. Nope. Not impressed.

So I decided that maybe I was in the wrong genre of storytelling tools. Maybe I should get out of the Slide show tools if I’m not impressed with slide show tools. Good idea. Timeline tools? Nah. Mixer tools? Now that sounds fun. Unfortunately I lost my focus on the first one and wandered off task. While I was checking out Vuvox, it reminded me of Shwup, yeah, yeah, I know – strange ass names. I just clicked over for a second, honest, to check something out. Thirty minutes later, Vuvox and “helping a brotha out” was forgotten, and I ended up with this.

So the point of the story is, I don’t really have anything to share with @cogdog, but I sure had fun playing last night.