Thursday, August 06, 2009

I often get asked how I find out about all the new technology, sites and multimedia projects featured here at 10,000 Words. The answer is not as simple as you may think, so I'm giving away some of the secrets of what makes this blog so unique. While I don't want you to literally steal this blog (I will find you and hunt you down), I do encourage you to use some of the tools I've used to grow this blog into the resource it has become.

我经常被问及,10,0000 Words是如何找到所有的关于科技方面的新鲜资讯、网站以及特定的多媒体专题的。答案不像你想象的那么简单。在此，我将透露一些令这个博客如此特别的秘密。虽然我不赞成你复制这个博客（我会找到你并对你穷追猛打），但我鼓励你去使用一些我已经使用过的工具，这些工具已经令这个博客成长成为一个资源库。

The first key to coming up with ideas is thinking about what hasn't been written before. Many blogs regurgitate the same information and while its cool to see different viewpoints on the same topic, a lot of blogs end up publishing similar content. I often write down ideas as soon as I have them whether it's in the grocery store or while driving, even if I won't flesh out the post until months later. I keep a Google Doc with a list of possible posts, some that are written days later, some that have languished for more than a year. But the ideas are there if I need them and if I see an article, site or multimedia project that may complement a particular post, I save it in the Google Doc.

首先要提出的关键点是：考虑那些从未被写过的题材。很多博客反刍同样的信息，尽管对于同一信息发表不同的观点很酷，但多数博客最终发表了类似的内容。通常，一旦我有了想法，就立刻写下来，不管当时是在商店还是在开车，即便我几个月后我都不见得会将它们贴在博客上。我在Google文档里保存一份可能会发表的帖子清单，有些几天后即可完成，而有些则要苦思超过一年。但是，如果我需要它们，那些观点还在那儿；如果我见到一篇文章、一个网站或者一个多媒体作品能完成一篇特殊的文章，我便保存在我的Google文档里。

So how do I find the examples to back up the ideas? To start, I subscribe to about 150 different blogs (most of which aren't actually about journalism) and keep tabs on them using RSS/Google Reader. They range from popular technology blogs such as Mashable and TechCrunch to design sites such as Inspiredology, FFFFOUND!, Smashing Magazine and Motionographer and even blogs filled with awesome randomness such as Neatorama, mental_floss and kottke.org. I bookmark the posts I find interesting or have some sort of journalism angle and save them for later.

那么，我如何找到些例子去支持我的观点呢？首先，我用Google阅读器订阅了将近150个不同的博客（其中大多数都不是新闻类）然后使用RSS/Google阅读器给它们归类。它们包括从Mashable 和TechCrunch 这样的大众技术博客到Inspiredology, FFFFOUND!, Smashing Magazine 以及 Motionographer 这样的设计博客。甚至一些偶然遇到的很棒的博客，诸如Neatorama, mental_floss and kottke.org。一旦我发现有趣的或者新闻观点很特别的帖子，我就会保存起来，以备后用。