Analysis – The Digital Nomad Website
The world of weblogs, or blogs, is a fascinating one – people can use them to air their thoughts, document their lives, and contribute something from their own experience to the world. One subset of blogs is the travel blog: these kinds of websites follow one or more people’s travels through the world, documenting what they see and giving tips for those who wish to go to similar places. Evaluation consists of determining the worth or value of a subject based on a series of criteria; for this essay, the website being evaluated is digitalnomad.org. This website documents the life and travels of Merrill Hartman, a longtime traveler and teacher who is currently retired and living in Memphis, Tennessee. There are photos, travel notes, and a constantly evolving status of where he is and what is next for his life and travels. This website will be evaluated on the criteria of aesthetic value, readability, tone the design and navigation of the website, the criteria for which I will use to determine the website’s overall quality. Despite the passion and informality of the way that Hartman writes his blog entries, the navigation and aesthetics are definitely facets of the website that could use some work, and the overall website has a problem actually explaining its greater significance.
The design of the website is nice enough, though it is somewhat dated. The color scheme of the website is a very ugly, textured tan, with splotchy blue and red menu buttons on the sidebar. The text on the website is written mostly as prose, diary-like entries that are very informal and attempt to create a sense of camaraderie with the reader. “If we’ve met and I took your picture, look in PHOTOS, find the year we met, then look under the country where we met.” While this is an attempt to connect with people, it also presumes that people will know enough to check a website about someone they’ve otherwise never heard of, and will gain some value from seeing their picture with him. There is an entire photo section that is slightly redundant, as it is meant for just one person at a time – there are not whole audiences that will want to see these pictures. Hartman is attempting to create his own homegrown fan club who will follow his adventures, but that seems incredibly unhelpful to the average person seeking travel tips.
The readability of this website is decent, though there are many things the author could do to clarify these issues. The font is a large serif-y font with hyperlinks and clip art logos on them, giving a very 1995, Geocities feel to it. On the subject of travel tips, this particular section is very confusing and wordy. It is presented as a database, a chart divided by country and time of stay. These blog-like entries do not so much present travel tips as they are his own notes about his own journeys. They do not offer an incredible amount of information to the reader; it is not recommended that you read them if you want to know things about traveling to a specific location, but only if you know this man and want to be more involved in his life and travels.
The navigation of the website is fairly low in quality. The only way to reach the desired information is through a table of contents that is far too long and disorganized. The site map is also disorganized and the links to top and home are somewhat difficult to find. Instead of having a table of contents, inserting these entries into an actual, scrollable blog would have been more prudent. It is more evidence of a shoddily designed website that resembles an info dump for this single man’s individual adventures throughout the world and not a resource that others can learn from. The informal nature of the writing makes it seem disorganized, making it virtually impossible to find what you are looking for without following his strange inner narrative. At the same time, Hartman attempts to offer explanations for his jargon-y headings (“Been There, ““Done That,” “Lessons Learned,”), but they are just as vague as the navigation. “Motorcycle is about my favorite way to tour” is a somewhat confusing sentence, and I do not know without clicking on it what it involves. What exactly about motorcycles does it offer the reader? Why should we care?
When evaluating this website, the criteria leave the overall quality of the website wanting. Digital Nomad seems to be more of a vanity project for an individual more so than an educational resource for others. While there are some travel tips peppered in among all of the anecdotes and photos, it seems like the information is mostly secondhand and extremely informal. Hartman seems to show off more than inform, this information being just a log for his own accomplishments and hobbies (reflected in the “Motorcycle” and “Equipment” sections). The only real positives I can offer the website are a very personal story and an informal format that is very much unlike other travel websites. However, the average person looking for travel tips would find little to benefit from here; the only reason to look at this website are if you are Merrill Hartman or know Merrill Hartman.
Works Cited
Hartman, Merrill. "The Digital Nomad." The Digital Nomad. Web. 18 May 2011. <http://www.digitalnomad.org/>.
