Getting the most from Uppitywis.Org
This book will serve as a small guide to getting the most out of Uppitywis.org. It will go through many of the features of the web site, and how you can get the most out of it. As time goes on this will expand, and you will be able to learn more. Follow along through the different pages, and you'll learn about how to use the site.
A Blog of One's Own
Okay, so maybe you aren't Virginia Woolf. Still, that doesn't mean that we don't want to feature your blog on Uppity Wisconsin. You can have your own blog here -just sign up for an account (you know, over there on the left column) and you'll immediately have your own blog. You can write about anything you want, though of course we'd like you to mostly stick with progressive politics. We're looking for more writers to write about Wisconsin topics, anywhere in the state.
It's all pretty straightforward. We promote articles from your blog to the front page if we think they're of general interest.
Help save our readers from having to listen to me all the time, and give them a break. Write for Uppity Wisconsin. Become famous in the Blogosphere. And in the process, help improve the state and the country.
So come on in - get an account, go to Create Content -> Blog Entry, and get whatever it is off your chest.
Editing Your Content
How Do I Edit Content Successfully on this Web Site?
This confuses a lot of new users, and I'll try to go over the basics here. There should be more later on some other help pages.
When you go to edit a page on this site, you'll see a page that looks roughly like this (top of page only)
Top of a blog entry page on Uppity Wisconsin
You'll note that you can put in a title for the article, and that there is a selection box below the title where you can select categories. This is useful so that we can organize the web site based on topics, and people can find things that way as well. We'll be doing more with that in the future. In any case, select a topic from the list. You can select multiple topics by using the Control (or Apple) key on your keyboard while selecting.
After you've selected a title and a topic, you can enter the body of the article you're submitting. There are two ways to enter your text:
- You can enter simple text directly into the web site, along with a few kinds of simple HTML editing.
- You can select a "rich text" editor called TinyMCE to edit. This is much more like using a word processing program, but on the web. You'll notice that there is a small button below the editing box that lets you select the rich text editor or not. You can also set the default for this for your account on your account management page. (more on that in another article soon).
Most of you will likely want to use the TinyMCE editor if you're going to be doing any formatting of your article. I'll go through some of the more important options for that:
You'll note that the editor above has a lot of different buttons below it for formatting your input. There is a help popup for each of the buttons that will tell you briefly what it does, and give you a shortcut key you can type instead of clicking on the buttons. I'll go through a few of them that almost everyone will use at some time or another -
The big B button will bold any characters you've selected. You can select characters with the mouse, much like you would in a word processor. Likewise, the I button will italicize. The Link symbol lets you put links in an article - select the text you want to make a link, then click on the chain link symbol. A window will then pop up allowing you to put in the URL, etc. that you want to link to.
Pictures, you ask? Yes, you can insert pictures - that's a little more complicated. You can upload an image to the site and insert it using the little icon that looks like a camera. Select the place where you want to insert the picture, then click on the camera icon. After you do that, you'll get a fairly complicated dialog box that will let you upload an image, or select an image from ones you've already uploaded.
Img_assist window: This is the image assist window that lets you select or upload pictures. Note that in my case, I've already uploaded a lot of images. To upload your own, you need to click on the Upload button to create an image entry on the web site. Fill in the form you get, and then click on submit. That will upload the image to the site, and you will then be able to select it, and insert it into your article any of a number of ways.
At the bottom of the page, you'll find a preview button and a submit button. The preview button lets you see how the article will look formatted on the web site. Most article types on the site have a teaser portion that will appear on the front page, or any other teaser list - it's normally just the top part of the article. The rest of the article will appear if someone selectes read more at the bottom of the article. You can change where the break is for the bottom of the teaser, although in a lot of cases the editor will override what you do there anyway, so for the moment, just ignore that.
How do I submit a Story?
Once you've registered on the site, this is pretty easy. Make sure you are logged in. Then go to the menu on the left side of the page, and go to Create Content->Story. Once you've done that, you will go into the story editor. Put a title in the story. Select a topic from the menu (or you can select multiple topics by holding down the control key and clicking on multiple topics). Fill in the body of the article - you'll get a simple editor that will let you do lots of different things like set bold face, italics, etc. You can even put in a picture, but thats going to be a different page in here. In most cases, that's all you're going to have to do - click on submit at the bottom of the page. Stories are held for moderation by the editors. Once it's approved, it will show up on the main page of the web site.
Reading the News
We aggregate progressive and Wisconsin News to the site from many different sources. You can read the news by clicking on the NEWS button at the top of every page. It will show you the news organized by its source, and then inre backwards time order.
If there are any news sources you'd like us to add to the incoming aggregator - please let us know.
Registering for the Site
To get the most from this site, you must first register yourself. Registering will allow you to post content on the site, have your own blog, post comments without having them approved first, and as time goes on much more.
To register, click on the register/login link on the left menu on the web site. This will ask you for some information, including your email address. After you have filled out the form, the site will send you an email with further instructions. You need to follow the instructions in the email to become fully registered. This is done as a precaution to keep other people from registering you on the site.
Submitting A Web Link
Anyone can submit a web link to the site. People who have registered will be able to immediately post them. People who do not have logins can contribute, but their web links will need to be approved before they appear. Just click on the Submit Web Link tab at the top of all of the web pages, and you'll be given a form to fill out. Put in a small description of what the web link is for, and select categories in the selection boxes so that we'll know where to put the link. Don't worry too much about the categories - we go look at them every so often and will fix anythihg that's really wrong.
If there is a physical location for the link (say it's an organization with an office) then please also enter the location information for it (this is under the section of the form marked "Location"). This will let people find the office, and get driving directions to it. If there is no physical location, just leave that part of the page blank.
Thanks for contributing!
The Man From Clear Lake: Earth Day Founder Sen. Gaylord Nelson
(5 customer reviews)
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"Widely regarded as one of the leading environmentalists in American history, Gaylord Nelson is best known as the founder of Earth Day. This political biography tells the rest of the story—how a small town boy from Wisconsin became a national champion of a progressive agenda. Nelson's record on civil liberties, consumer issues, and Vietnam is remarkable. His story is an inspiration." —Al Gore
"Gaylord Nelson was one of the great public servants of the post–World War II era. This illuminating book is a priceless account of his life and accomplishments."—Tom Brokaw
"A fun book to read—filled with fascinating stories of politics in the twentieth century. We yearn for more political leaders like Gaylord who always voted his conscience and led with integrity and humor."—Bill Meadows, president, The Wilderness Society
Book Description
On Earth Day 1970 twenty million Americans displayed their commitment to a clean environment. It was called the largest demonstration in human history, and it permanently changed the nation’s political agenda. By Earth Day 2000 participation had exploded to 500 million people in 167 countries.
The seemingly simple idea—a day set aside to focus on protecting our natural environment—was the brainchild of U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin. It accomplished, far beyond his expectations, his lifelong goal of putting the environment onto the nation’s and the world’s political agendas.
A remarkable man, Nelson ranks as one of history’s leading environmentalists. He also played a major role as an early, outspoken opponent of the Vietnam War, and as a senate insider was a key player in civil rights, poverty, civil liberties and consumer protection issues.
The life of Nelson, a small town boy who learned his values and progressive political principles at an early age, is woven through the political history of the twentieth century. Nelson’s story intersects at times with Fighting Bob La Follette, Joe McCarthy, and Bill Proxmire in Wisconsin, and with George McGovern, Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Russell Long, Walter Mondale, John F. Kennedy, and others on the national scene.
From the Back Cover
"Widely regarded as one of the leading environmentalists in American history, Gaylord Nelson is best known as the founder of Earth Day. This political biography tells the rest of the story-how a small town boy from Wisconsin became a national champion of a progressive agenda. Nelson's record on civil liberties, consumer issues, and Vietnam is remarkable. His story is an inspiration."--Al Gore
"Gaylord Nelson was one of the great public servants of the post-World War II era. This illuminating book is a priceless account of his life and accomplishments."--Tom Brokaw
"A fun book to read-filled with fascinating stories of politics in the twentieth century. We yearn for more political leaders like Gaylord who always voted his conscience and led with integrity and humor."--Bill Meadows, president of The Wilderness Society
About the Author
Bill Christofferson, a former journalist who has worked in local and state government, is a political campaign consultant based in Milwaukee.
What's this points thing?
People who register on the site and put content up wil receive points for everything they do. Submitting a link to another site is worth a point. Submitting a news article/story is worth 2. And so on. Points are set by the editor and are not negotiable, but they are assigned in an automated fashion. If we unpublish your article, your points for that article go away.
The long term plan is to make these points redeemable for something. This will be things like an Uppity Wisconsin T-shirt, or a bumper sticker, or credit at Amazon. That part of the plan is still in the works, although it's not much of a problem until people start contributing more.