pete seeger Posts

• Wandering Gavin wonders who waits for the clearness committee's report?
  Does anyone wait for the results of a [marriage] clearness process before deciding that they are getting married? Is it necessary? Have we ever, as a Society, had this as a practice?
  (tags: quaker.clearness quaker comment)
• Barry C promises to start blogging again
  I've missed all of you who chose to share in this experience with your insights both supportive and challenging. All of this is to say, I think you'll be hearing from me regularly again and I hope you find that a good thing as time goes by.
  (tags: comment)
• A Nobel Peace Prize for Pete Seeger
  Petition drive to give the folkie a Nobel! "We are seeking volunteers, organizational and individual endorsements, photos, statements in support, documents about Pete's life and work."
  (tags: nv music)

This morning I'm working on the Pete Seeger section of Quakersong.org, the website of Annie Paterson and Peter Blood (I'm their webmaster). Parts of their site are amazing--the Quakers and Music page has become a directory of sorts for all the many Quaker musicians out there (who knew there were so many!). But the Pete Seeger is still mostly a collection of CDs that Peter & Annie have for sale.

So I was wondering what a good Pete Seeger page might look like and starting surfing around. There's a great fan page which is regularly updated but has bravely decided to maintain its original design since it was founded eleven years ago. And Wikipedia does its usual fine job at a biography. But the gold mine is YouTube.

A year ago a user uploaded three clips from Rainbow Quest, a short-lived TV program Pete put together for a low-wattage UHF station out of Newark in the mid-60s (it's now a Telemundo affiliate broadcasting recycled Mexican soaps for its prime time schedule). I don't know what kind of copyright issues there are on something like this but it's great fun to see these old clips. Making this material widely available is one of the joys of YouTube (well, that and watching recapturing the innocence of our over-commercialized youth). I'll leave you with this, a clip of Pete singing with June Carter and Johnny "I'm soooo stoooned" Cash a few years before they married.

About Martin Design Philosophy Marketing & Publicity Geek Talk

Some might wonder how I manage to make ends meet with two kids on a Quaker salary and all this blog work. Well, the truth is that I don't. Not quite. Even with pennies pinched the supermarket run is always a struggle. One way I make up the difference is with freelance web work. As of today it now has its own website at martinkelley.com.

In the past few months I've put together Quakersong.org for Peter Blood and Annie Patterson of Rise Up Singing fame, two lovely folks I know from Quaker & activist circles and most recently through their membership at Middletown Meeting (their site has a great Pete Seeger section!). I've also put together a customized blog for journalist James Maguire who liked the design of Nonviolence.org and asked me to put together his site. My latest FGC design is the brand new Youth Ministries site, Quakeryouth.org, which is our most ambitious & interactive yet!

Since coming back from the Gathering I've spent most of my free time ignoring the latest blogger bruhaha to put together Martinkelley.com. There's lots there about my design philosophy and my experiences with online communities (social and commercial). There's also a few silly features: Little Known Facts of outrageous claims. Check it all out and tell your friends and business associates!

New, 8/2/06:

I've added a web design blog, a place to talk design philosophy. How do we use the internet to build a community or a movement? What would a Quaker design aethetic for the internet look like? Sign up or surf over to martinkelley.com/blog.