Interactive >> Article "Unappreciated"

Author's Note: I wrote this when I was espeically angry about a rude demand I saw on a favorite site of mine. You may agree with this article, you may disagree, but it's still a fun little piece to read, and may be an eye opener for some.

Webmaster. What do you think of when you hear that word? The owner of your favorite site? The layout-savvy guy who just put up more content you like? Your Sailor Moon episode distro? I bet not one word that comes to mind unless you ARE a webmaster / misstress is hardworking. Sometimes, I feel like most of today's society underappreciates webmasters and webmisstresses.

Putting up a website requires a LOT of time. To put up a decent website, you need to know basic HTML. To memorize such simple codes as how to put music on a page or how to work frames can take anywhere up from a few hours to a few days to memorize and completely understand. Pagebuilder is widely looked down upon, because it's too easy to do. You can't truely understand something unless you do it both the easy and the hard way. Just about all decent webowners have pretty good HTML know-how and try to pour their soul into their site though their coding.

Most people make their own images for their website. Depending on the image, it may take an hour just to get a banner done. Then we have to make sure that the images go smoothly with the layout and sometimes go against our initial plan about where images go to make the site pleasing to the eye. Graphics make a good first impression, and that's what we webmasters / misstresses want: A good first impression so you'll explore our site deeper.

After we get our codes and togther, we have to punch them into our editor. We take time to make sure everything is just right. If you miss ONE quotation mark in a code, you can screw up the whole page's layout. Then we go back, sift through the code after pinpointing what exactly went wrong, and do our best to fix it. An average page is reviewed three or four times before it's deemed "good enough" to show to the public.

Then we have to upload the page and everything relating to the page. If we miss one image, the whole thing looks ugly. We try and fix everything to make sure YOU get the best quality viewing pleasure. We make sure that you, the viewer, are able to find EXACTLY what you're looking for. That what we're here for: To share our knowledge with the public and let them find out something new.

There are a good share of webowners do not do this process, and make stupid mistakes on their pages, bad images, and generally confuse people, blind people with bad color coordnation, and frustrate people with piles upon piles of broken links. There are some people who are willing to make review sites to cut down on the amount of bad sites, or help alert the public to them. Reviewing is a lot of work, and most reviewers have their own websites to manage on the site.

There are lots of good perks with putting up a website. We can win awards, which uses images to show off how special our site is. Lots of people will compliment a site, and give honest and helpful tips to make the site even better than it is. There are lots of people who email you randomly with something nice, and it makes us feel good most likey. We can make new friends though other webmasters, and expand our site. We look back on our work, and are proud about the big accomplishment we've made. Of course, there are lots of negative effects.

Especially a problem for multimedia-focused sites, there are lots of rude demands we get. We don't mind nice questions, like "Do you think it would be possible to add an image of Sailor Mars on your profile page? I'm not quite sure what she looks like." But rude demands like "Get up the next Sailor Stars episode now! I can't believe how unreliable you are you stupid loser!" are generally ignored and shamed. We did NOT have to put up a website for you. In the case of domain owners, we did NOT have to pay for you to come in and make rude demands. We most certainly did NOT have to take time out of our busy lives to even give you access to all of this in the first place. If cases get severe, there's a good chance that a site will shut down.

You may be wondering "Why do you put up a website then?" For some it's a hobby. For some, it's an escape. For some, it's a way to learn something new. For some, it's to share something wonderful with the world. Rude demands and flames and the like take all the fun out of it. A website isn't a crucial part of your life, so don't dwell on what the webowner can and can't do.

Then there's the update demands. "Update now! You haven't updated since last week! I can't believe how lazy you are!" Excuse me? All webmasters and webmisstress have busy lives outsite their website building world. We have jobs, we have school, we have family, we have friends, and we have other activities. While some are strongly based off it, no webmaster or webmisstress's life is based solely around their site. Dissapointment for an update lag is natural, but demanding an update is plain out rude.

While there are many people who appreciate all the hard work, time and effort the respective webmaster / misstress puts into their site, there are quite a few people who don't. We don't have to do ANY of this for you. Webowners take time out of their busy lives to bring a website to you that we didn't have to do in the first place. Webowners are more than just the faceless people who enable you to listen to music you want to hear. Just a thought.