Here is the Turk comment of the day, this one made me laugh:

“good survey except question was not professional where an option was something like not a chance in #$%^ or something like that. That would never be an option on a professional survey. Other than that it was well done”

I am flattered that you think our survey even remotely resembles professionalism. Thank you. It was written by a couple of us business students at BYU.

When I got to this question, I was bored. I knew that if I was only getting paid a nickel to take this survey I would feel like cussing at this point. I thought I would throw in something to spice it up—even give you a chance to let out your frustration.

In my class, I learned that a “likert scale” question on a professional survey would have been worded something like this:

If you do keep a blog?, would you be interested in automatically importing and printing your blog (personal journal) into a hardbound journal with photos?

• = strongly disagree
• = disagree
• = neither agree nor disagree
• = agree
• = strongly agree

I could be wrong, but I thought this was much more entertaining:

If you do keep a blog?, would you be interested in automatically importing and printing your blog (personal journal) into a hardbound journal with photos? *

• I don’t keep a blog
• I would for sure!
• likely
• maybe
• maybe not
• not likely
  
• Not a chance in *%$^#@!
  

I personally don’t really swear. On the way home from church, one of my roommates (who also took the survey) pointed out to me that no cuss words fit into “*%$^#@!”. Most swear words are just 4 letters. Who would have thought? But, it made for an educational conversation about swear words on the way home from church
Here are some other comments on the quality of our survey:

Very good survey, simple to take.

Thanks for the survey opportunity.

Beautifully designed!

The survey was excellent.

It’s “I couldn’t care less,” not “I could care less.” (We fixed this, thanks!)

Maybe a brief paragraph at the beginning could bring some perspective over the entire survey. At the beginning, I didn’t think of journaling and blogging as so closely related, but towards the end I started to see value in keeping a hard-copy of a personal blog.

The casual answers to questions (like, “I could not care less”) seemed unprofessional. (My response: I could not care less)

Thanks!!

This has been a very easy to use survey system. Thank you.

Pretty good survey!

very nicely put together, plus it loads rather quickly as compared to other mturks

this is a very good survey, keep surveying people! XD

pretty decent survey

Thank you for providing many options, especially differentiating “would not use” vs “i would use, but only if it was free” when asking how much we would pay. It is frustrating as a survey taker to not be able to answer a question accurately.ok survey

thanks

Glad to here you like our survey! We are mostly happy to see the incredible response we have received about pyxlin. Thanks!

Publishing your journal into a hardbound book is a great idea. Naturally, many of you have immediately thought, “I could do all kinds of things other than journals with this!” Here are a few comments from that Turk survey so far about this:

“Have you considered marketing this as something that could be handed down to children or as something to catalog specific life events (i.e. pregnancy, wedding planning, etc)?”

“I would use this service only on specific occasions, to record those events. Examples: specials trips/vacations, weddings and surrounding events, other big family events, etc.”

“This service would be good for other self-publishing purposes: Family recipe books, Writing down family oral traditions , travelogues, photojounals, personalized guest books…”

“You should reverse your questions because all the interesting questions are at the end. By the way, this is like a personal publishing site. I would not be very likely to journal online (i would just use my mac). But I might be interested in publishing little private books for christmas presents that have photos and other text. So although I *said* I would only use the service it were free, I might have answered differently if your questions had been asked in a different order. Ask for demographics last for heavens sake…. Good luck. Might turn into something cool.”

“I almost feel that I’d be more likely to use this service to see some of my work published- stories and poems that haven’t made their way into literary journals but that I still would like to see in print, even if it is just for me.”

“interesting concept. might be interesting if presented it as a special events type service/book, such as an alternative to yearbooks, where multiple individuals can contribute.”

There is no reason why pyxlin couldn’t be used for these personal-publishing purposes. But you would probably be better using iMemoryBook BETA (soon to be MemoryPress.com).

MemoryPress is literally the world’s first online typesetting system. There is nothing to download because it is completely online. MemoryPress is collaborative (kind of like Google Docs mixed with Adobe InDesign) letting you get together with your family online to publish your own family library.

Just like pyxlin, MemoryPress will also have a blog import for family history blogs and such.

In March we created a wedding memory book for my younger sister using iMemoryBook BETA. She wrote her story of how they met and how they got engaged, then she got her future husband to write his story. Then we invited all of his family in and our family to come and write memories, add photos, and give marriage advice for the wedding. Everyone was able to read, and add to the book online, before the book was published. The wedding book is beautiful.

MemoryPress is still being developed, which means it is FREE to use right now. It will also give you a kind of preview for pyxlin (both systems will be using the same core typesetting system). Let us know what you think. Thanks for all the comments! Keep them coming.

Here is a great comment:

“I also submit poetry to online websites and would incorporate those into a hardbound book. But I would want it to be something people could buy.”

My Response: if you are thinking to resell your books, pyxlin is probably not the best option for you. Not that pyxlin books don’t look good enough, in fact they are probably too high of quality for retail. I would recommend that you publish your poetry through our friends at LuLu. They do cheaper perfect bound books that are made for reselling. They even help you sell your books.

Even though we will probably offer a less expensive journal option (softbound books), the majority of pyxlin books will be built to last for your posterity. Pyxlin is personal-publishing. Pyxlin will be far higher quality than any cheap booking company or photobook company out there. I will be posting more on our book quality later. Stay tunned.

This is the best comment of the day from the Turk survey:

“I think this is a really cool idea - it would be great as an heirloom, or in fact to help individuals with memory loss like the couple in the movie The Notebook only MUCH better because there would be pictures to go along with the words. “

The Notebook. Three out of four girls I know would rate this as their favorite movie of all time. Yahoo! Movies explains The Notebook:

“An epic love story centered around an older man who reads aloud to an older, invalid woman whom he regularly visits. From a faded notebook [his journal], the old man’s words bring to life the story about a couple who is separated by World War II, and is then passionately reunited, seven years later, after they have taken different paths. Though her memory has faded, his words give her the chance to relive her turbulent youth and the unforgettable love they shared.”

Here is The Notebook trailer off YouTube:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-y7PYWHxgjI]

I know I record all of my intensely romantic dating life in my journal. I think I would have to stick a bunch of lies in it to make it as dramatic as this movie. The best part is that I could, if I wanted

Two weeks ago, we did a random survey of 575 (our stats class says that anything over 480 in any demographic is indisputable) BYU students for pyxlin. We learned three things:

1. BYU student are regular journalers - Out of the 575 students, over 40% of them write in a personal journal at least once a month. Over 20% at least every week. The interest was phenomenal. We were surprised at how many people loved the pyxlin idea.
2. BYU students don’t have a sarcastic bone in their body.
3. BYU students LOVE pyxlin - 38% of those surveyed at BYU left their personal email address requesting to be contacted when pyxlin is released. That is unbelievable! Neal (President of FamilyLearn) explained that this is how you know that someone is really interested. Most people don’t just pass out their email address to strangers. We can safetly assume that 38% of those surveyed are VERY interested in a pyxlin journal.

BYU Journaling Survey:

Click here to take the survey

Real-Time Summary Report Preview

Daniel (an advertising major at BYU) has been working on a little pyxlin’ cartoon movie. This movie is where John Pyxlin came from. The cartoon will be made in flash. “The animation will be similar to a simple South Park look.” Daniel told me.

We have already recorded the audio (a 1 min and a 30 sec) for the movie. Daniel has been working on the flash end. I have added little screen shots from the movie below.

BEFORE YOU GO ANY FURTHER CLICK TO LISTEN TO THE AUDIO IN THE TOP RIGHT—————————->

Click here to skip this post

If you actually made it this far, let us know what you think. Do you think the movie will work? If you have any more ideas we would love to hear them. As I said before, we plan to build the social part of pyxlin around this quirky little cartoon, John. We have already posted him on Facebook.

We have had some great comments in the Turk survey. Here are some interesting ones on handwritten journals:

“I consider my written personal journal a completely different animal than my blog. What makes my written journal unique is the fact that it’s handwritten and unproofed, which makes it most personal to me. I would never want it to be electronic, it would lose the qualities that make it special. “

I know that this is a concern for some because it has come up before. Here is my best answer:

I thought that this photo I used in our marketing presentation at BYU did a better job of answering this comment than anything. You can see Ben and myself in a car on the way home from California, we were driving about 80 mph. It is comparing Ben’s pyxlin journal with Ben’s old handwritten journal.

Here are some other comments from the survey:

“I think this is a really cool idea and love that the journals can be bound with text and photos!!! ”

“Was very interesting and fun to take.”

“This sounds like a great idea.”

“Sorry, just not a blogger or a journal writer.”

“Very good survey, simple to take.” (thank you)

“Neat idea but I have never really had a journal. Requires too much commitment. I can imagine it would be a nice gift for someone.”

“interesting service if this ever comes into fruition”

“I think this is a good service but I dont really keep a journal or write any blogs. I can definately see value in the service and I think its a great idea. The question of course is how much people would be willing to pay.”

“This is a great idea - but I don’t think you can charge all the services in one bundle. Some people wouldn’t want to publish, others would probably want to publish quite frequently. Maybe a two-tier cost system for those who do and don’t want to publish? Awesome idea, though… “

We love your comments. I have saved a few that talk about: the system being FREE, keeping your journals on your PC or Mac, and those who think pyxlin is just a blog. Stay tuned.

If you have any ideas to help us out, we would love to hear them.

After creating John Pyxlin’s profile on Facebook, I started a profile for John on Myspace. About halfway through the process I noticed an ad with a girl in very little clothing that said something like, “find your true love”. The offensive ad was paid for by True.com, a dating website. I was disgusted and logged out of Myspace.

My experience started the discussion of whether or not John Pyxlin should have a profile on MySpace. MySpace is fifth on alexa for overall traffic on the web. Here is a link comparing Facebook to Myspace for traffic. MySpace is a link to millions of consumers world-wide. If this was just about traffic I think we would not hesitate to have John Pyxlin create a profile there.

The main difference between Myspace and Facebook is that Facebook is clean. Unlike Myspace, you do not have to fear stumbling onto sensual content when you are using Facebook.

Any honest person who has used or uses Myspace knows that from the advertising to the lack of content control Myspace is plagued with inappropriate content. A user doesn’t have to search out this content, it is commonly put right on the home page.

myspace & pornography

Two weeks ago, Mari and I went to see a documentary on pornography called “Traffic Control“. The purpose of this film is to help the public understand how the porn industry is targeting minors and what we can do to stop them. It is an excellent documentary. I purchased a copy of it.

In the film they interviewed teens from all over the country. Interestingly enough, the teens said that Myspace was the most common source of porn for people their age. The documentary claims that the porn industry has targeted Myspace and now uses it to market to the teenage crowd. Terrifying, considering that millions upon millions of minors are actively using Myspace. I have also talked to several Myspace users, each one said that they get regular “porn spam” friend requests.

Whether or not myspace is propagating pornography, they are certainly not making it hard for, or stopping, the porn industry from promoting it on myspace servers. There is no doubt that addictive salacious content has helped fuel the rise of Myspace.

So, do we allow John Pyxlin to create a profile on Myspace? Do we turn our heads to the fact that Myspace is becoming a representation of everything that FamilyLearn is not? Or do we stand our ground and hold to our principles of family?

Today I had John Pyxlin’s profile removed from Myspace. FamilyLearn will not put John Pyxlin on Myspace.

So what do you think? We would love to hear your feedback.

Last week we posted “John Pyxlin” on Facebook. We will be building the social piece of pyxlin around John. Here is a screen shot of his Facebook profile:

John now has 48 friends, including our friend Paul Allen (the founder of MyFamily.com)! Yesterday Ben saw how many friends John has made and said, “Man, this dude isn’t even real and he already has more friends than I do on Facebook!”

One girl created a group:

I hooked up with John Pixlin

The group now has 7 members.

John has also joined the groups:

pyxlin’ - journal smart

A Toast for Change: The Freedom Writers Foundation

Write-this! Writer’s Group

I keep a semi-regular journal…occasionally

Freedom Writers

So if you are a member of FaceBook, look up or even hook up with John Pyxlin. After all he is a pretty adorable little guy.

Today we relaunched the Turk survey. Turk is a service provided by Amazon. They call it the “artificial artificial intelligence”. People from all over the world can submit and complete little tasks for pennies. We are paying people $.05 to $.10 per survey taken. It will be interesting to see if we can get accurate data from Turk. It is amazing to me that people on Turk will actually take a survey for less than a dime.

In the past two hours about 30 people have taken the survey. I was worried that all we would get from this survey is foreigners. It seems like a dime would be worth it for someone from India, but in the US it would have to be more of a hobby. Happily 80%+ have been from the US.

Real-Time Summary Report Preview

(once you scroll through all the countries it is less boring)

For all of you who are dieing to take the survey and haven’t click here to take it!

Over the next few days I will be discussing questions and comments from the Turk survey, just like you can see from the past about the BYU Student Survey. I will also be giving more peeks and updates about pyxlin. Please let us know if we can answer any of you questions.