ParentPower Interview with Christine Louise Hohlbaum of Mama’s Musings

May 9th, 2008 HACK

Following the launch of the ParentPower Index and Application (BETA), Geoff Livingston of Livingston Communications had the opportunity to speak with parent blogger Christine Louise Hohlbaum, author of the book DIARY OF A MOTHER, and “SAHM I AM: TALES OF A STAY-AT-HOME MOM IN EUROPE”. She also is the publisher of the blog, Mama’s Musings.

A part from being an award-winning American writer and frequent commentator on NPR’s The Parent’s Journal with Bobbi Conner, Christine is one of a few American bloggers operating overseas in Germany - providing a fascinating perspective on life and parenting.

GEOFF: The parent blogosphere is extremely diverse. How is it different in Europe?

CHRISTINE: I don’t think you can make geographic delineations. I live in Europe, but my voice is distinctly American. That’s the beauty of the blogosphere. You can blog from wherever you are and carry on the conversation as if you were at home. If you read some of the foreign blogs, you get a distinct flavor for their culture as well.

GEOFF: Tell us about your book: Sahm I Am: Tales of a Stay-at-Home Mom in Europe?

CHRISTINE: SAHM I Am is the sequel to Diary of a Mother: Parenting Stories and Other Stuff, my first book about the transition from being an Ivy League educated career woman turned housewife. Mind-blowing stuff.

Diary of a Mother sort of left my readers hanging. “So what happened once you got to Europe?” they chimed. SAHM I Am was the answer.

In reality, I find blogging to be a fabulous extension to my other writing. It’s also very liberating as I can write whatever I want (within reason – I don’t like to use profanity because one day my kids will read it and then they’ll roll their eyes that they aren’t allowed to curse like Sailor Mom…)

GEOFF: How does Mama’s Musings continue the conversation?

CHRISTINE:I suppose you could look at it in terms of the grieving process.

My book, Diary of a Mother, was about denial through humor, then anger.

SAHM I Am is less desperate and transitions into acceptance.

Mama’s Musings is really a celebration of life with kids, what will make moms’ lives better, and a motley of personal stories tossed in the mix. It’s meant for people to feel better about themselves when they walk away, chuckling to themselves about the silly things that happen in life, and feeling grateful for what they do have.

GEOFF: What could you leave behind in the parent blogosphere?

CHRISTINE:It’ll be a blast for my children’s generation to read what preoccupied their parents’ generation. Most likely they won’t understand all the references, but what a great way to leave a legacy.

GEOFF: What do you hope your children will get out of social media?

CHRISTINE: Social media has an addictive component to it. Trust me. I know. I was offline until today for five weeks, yet I still blogged when I could (bloggers are Creatives – we get creative when we can’t get online any other way than to beg the local Internet café owner for one more minute – please, just one more minute, man!). I never knew how much time I spend in front of the computer until my DSL subscription didn’t transfer when we moved to a new house!

What I’d like for my kids to get out of their interaction with social media is a sense of place in the Universe. Sound lofty? It really isn’t. They can connect with people from all over the world, establish relationships with kids in foreign countries and learn new things.

GEOFF: Thanks so much for your time, Christine. If people want to reach your blog, where do they go?

CHRISTINE: Well, thank you. My blog is at: http://diaryofamother.blogs.com

If you are interested in being interviewed for ParentPower, please let us know. We can be reached at: myvoice@parentpowerindex.com

Posted in Blogger Interviews | 4 Comments »

High-quality parenting information highlighted in new ParentPower application

May 9th, 2008 HACK

Today we at ActiveAccess launched the Beta version of the ParentPower Index application. As many of you know, ActiveAcess develops custom-branded applications for media companies, corporations, colleges and universities, non-profits and government agencies. This application launch represents the first time we have developed one of our own for an existing community.

In developing this application (and its corresponding Index of the top 200 parenting bloggers), we have been working for several months with many bloggers in the community - gathering their input. We want to especially thank the focus group participants for their great suggestions for improvement. We are still gathering ideas on how to make the application and Index better, and appreciate the continued input.

As of today we have added over 200 bloggers into the index and hope that the community will add many more fantastic parent bloggers over the next few weeks.

We also hope that during our Beta phase you will continue to help us make a number of tweaks to our offering. Be sure to give us your feedback. We have set up a survey at PollDaddy, and you can access us directly at myvoice [at] parentpowerindex dot com, or on Twitter at Twitter.com/ParentPower.

ParentPower is broken down into two parts, the Desktop Application and the Index and Headlines. Here is a some information about each of them.

The Desktop Application and Reader

The ParentPower Desktop Application is designed to make your life easier and to help you find great content fast. In the ParentPower button you can find the index, blogger headlines, BlogHer Mommy and Family, Sk*rt Family and Parenting, and CNN Health/Parenting.

In the menu there are quick links to Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Flickr and Sk*rt. And we have put together a list of links that you might find useful such as movies, traffic, shopping and more.

On the left sidebar, the application includes games, parenting videos and podcasts - which you can find in the media feeds on the Menu. Plus, we are known for delivering the weather.

We have also included an RSS reader that you can customize. If you aren’t using an RSS reader, it is a powerful and simple tool. If you do have an RSS reader, you can use this one for specialized tasks and to cut down on clutter in your main reader.

The Index and Headlines

Rankings. Some people like them and some people don’t, but we have seen first-hand how they have enabled other communities to easily discover and enjoy bloggers. In fact, we have taken this a step further and put together a Headlines page, so that you can quickly get a snapshot of what is happening in the Parenting Blogosphere. We hope this brings great visibility for the bloggers in the index and for parents looking for parenting tips and other information. Plus, it means you don’t have to be a top-ranked blogger to get noticed. We have put together a primer on using ParentPower to promote your blog.

Index Methodology

The Index uses a percentile ranking system that uses Technorati inbound links and rank, Bloglines subscriptions, Alexa rank, Google PageRank, and Yahoo inbound links. All of these are averaged and each blog is given a percentile score. We adjusted the formula so that the blog defaults to its highest possible rank. As you will see, many blogs have identical positioning on the index. You can read more about the ParentPower methodology on the page we put together for that purpose.

Posted in Intro to ParentPower | No Comments »