Author: Daniel Hocutt

Methods of big data analysis have helped enterprises better understand their users and the market, and to make timely business decisions. Analytical systems collect, collate, and report critical business data, enabling businesses to look at users’ characteristics more closely. Google Analytics (GA) is one of the most popular data analysis tools for web platforms. According to W3Techs, GA is used by 52.9 percent of all websites on the internet. GA provides descriptive, prescriptive, and predictive approaches to analyze data (Iyamu, 2018) that technical communicators can use to measure user characteristics, engagement, and usability. However, they fall short in identifying subjectivities…

The focus of Session E9 was to have been technologies with presentations on both the design of a tech-heavy writing course and the use of learning management systems. However, Michael McLeod and Dawn Opel, co-presenters of the panel titled Keeping Wonder in Check: Balancing the How of Digital Tools with the Why When Designing Technology-Heavy Writing Courses, had the session to themselves upon learning the other panelist would not be available to present on LMS. While McLeod and Opel opened their presentation with the expectation to take only part of the session’s time — thus enabling participants to attend the…

The Graduate Research Network is composed of two primary components: facilitated roundtable discussions of works in progress and a professionalization presentation and workshop focused on academic and alt-ac job markets. This was the third consecutive time I’ve participated in the GRN, and I’ve found each iteration increasingly useful. While the absence of Dickie and Cindy Selfe from the professionalization roundtables was palpable, a host of mentors and roundtable facilitators (along with our fearless leaders, Janice Walker and Angela Haas) effectively led conversations and sessions with wisdom and encouragement. If you’ve never attended a GRN, whether you’re a graduate student or…

Presenters Kris Purzycki, UW-Milwaukee Peter Brooks, UW-Milwaukee Review Digital games and Old Dominion University were underlying themes of my #cwcon16 experience. This resulted in attending panel E1, “Approaches to Teaching Cultivated Community Spaces Surrounding Games,” which included two presentations, one by Kris Purzycki (an ODU graduate) and the other by Peter Brooks, both from UW-Milwaukee. Purzycki intended to present with a partner, but his co-presenter was attending his own graduation that day and could be in only one place at a time. I drove from Richmond, Virginia, to Rochester for C&W with two ODU colleagues, both of whom engage in game scholarship. I had just finished…