Sharpening the Point on the Needle

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Submitted by Cathy Davidson on June 6, 2007 - 7:05am.
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Needle Logo
Remember "Needle", our HASTAC online newsletter? I think we only published one or two issues. It had a great name and a hilarious logo designed to remind people that H-A-S-T-A-C is pronounced "haystack." It dwindled because, when webmaster Brett Walters took us to our new fancy Drupal-powered website, we added a collaborative news function where anyone can upload jobs, grant opportunities, fellowship, news, project information, etc. "Needle" lost its point. Why an e-newsletter when the website was not only doing that well but doing it in a way where any HASTAC'er could contribute? It made no sense. We didn't end Needle officially, but just stopped putting our effort there and then, save us, I started blogging instead.
But we hate to lose a great name, a funny logo . . . so, what we are thinking about, now, is aggregating all of those news functions under the old rubric of "Needle" and making it a Web 2.0 version of a "newsletter" or "gazette" when any HASTAC registrants can add information that will be of interest to HASTAC readers at any time.
Like the idea? Please share your comments and ideas. And, even more important, please post your news, fellowships, jobs, grants, and success stories on the site. That's the Web 2.0 Thang: It only works if it is used----so use it or lose it. More to follow!
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Posted on: June 6, 2007 - 10:42am #1
A step up
The traditional newsletter does seem very clunky relative to what we can do with blogs, forums, etc. Aside from the great advantage of allowing anyone to contribute, this format will ensure that we can keep HASTAC easily up to date--most contributions that I can think of would be far less useful by the time they are aggregated into a newsletter.