Look Us Up
So I’ll apologize for my own embarrassment in taking some time to toot our own horn here at Stone Business. The object of my affection, though, isn’t the magazine in your hands – it’s online.
Everyone with a URL seems to tout their Website as the vanguard of the new information revolution, and pack it with widgets, gadgets and other electronic bric-a-brac. Next to some of these, www.stonebusiness.net – Stone Business Online – looks a bit dull and stodgy.
That’s until you take a second look and realize Stone Business Online offers something else – namely, a wealth of information that’s easy to find.
To be honest, Stone Business Online ran as kind of a me-too Webpage for awhile, as we poured more and more resources into producing the print magazine. We never really found the time to build an all-inclusive online portal that would do everything but darn your socks (and there’d be a link for getting that done somewhere).
I’m not one of those ink-for-blood print guys who takes a dim view of online publications. I frequently joke that I’ve been online so long that Web pioneer Tim Berners-Lee corrected my first HTML code, which also happens to be true. But, I also find many Websites either offer a lot of bandwidth-wasting razzle-dazzle, or give readers a home page with 150+ options and no clear focus to what’s important.
Earlier this year, I decided to go under the hood and start working on our site. I’m still tinkering, but I’d invite you to take a look. And, I think, look again. And again.
People in our trade don’t sit in front of a keyboard and monitor for a whole day. When they go online, they want to find information without wading through menus and pop-ups and talking heads. They want it fast and complete.
Stone Business Online doesn’t have all the gizmos and cutting-edge graphics. What it contains are first-page buttons with simple titles, such as “Articles” or “News” to get you where you want without any detours.
What you’ll find are the complete archives (with a few exceptions that can’t be reprinted) of Stone Business. Everything’s arranged by department topics, and there’s a quick-and-simple search function, so you don’t need to remember which month (or year) something appeared. And, at the end of most items, there’s a list of other articles on related topics.
However, it’s more than a exact duplicate of what’s been in the magazine. All of the items are from original uncut editorial-department files, so there’s occasionally more content – the details we cut because there wasn’t enough space to fit it all in the print edition.
You’ll also find there’s more in the News section, since we print items online immediately. You get the first look at developing stories and information about workshops and events. The front-page lineup changes constantly. If you want to be kept in the loop on new additions to the Website, we offer updates via Twitter and Facebook.
What’s happening at Stone Business Online is the ongoing development of a simple, easy-to-use source, and more’s coming. It’s not flashy or cutting-edge, but it gets you the news and information you need in a way that saves you a valuable resource: time.
Take a look sometime soon. I think you’ll like what you find.
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One thing you’ll find at Stone Business Online by clicking the “Downloads” button (yes, right there on the left in the Main Menu) is the PDF entry form for our annual Best of Home competition. That mid-October deadline is going to creep up faster than you’ll realize, so get the images of your work together and get those entries in to us. (You can also request a form from me directly at emerson@stonebusiness.net.)
We’ve kept the contest simple. The information we require is pretty basic, and you don’t have to be a member of anything or pay a fee. It’s our attempt to keep this as open as possible, and we encourage projects of all sorts and sizes.
And, yes, we don’t offer any prize money, either. We do give the opportunity to be recognized for exceptional work in front of thousands of stone professionals just like you. That’s a jury worth impressing.
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The end of summer brings back, for some of us, the memory of that clear, warm September day eight years ago when four airliners altered their flights and changed the course of our history. Again, it’s also time to lament the ponderous and erratic progress in memorializing this world tragedy.
Special recognition goes to all those involved with the Pentagon Memorial, dedicated last Sept. 11, with its simple, effective design. From any point, you can also see what’s perhaps the most-striking bit of natural stone at the site – the one limestone panel on the Pentagon’s rebuilt wall still blackened from the destruction, with the simple inscription of September 11, 2001.
Then there’s the Freedom Stone, the cornerstone for the Freedom Tower in New York that still sits at Innovative Stone in Hauppauge, N.Y., after being carted away unceremoniously a few years ago.
On Sept. 11, Innovative will rededicate the Freedom Stone at 8 a.m. for public viewing in a new memorial garden at its Hauppauge headquarters. The ceremony will include keynote speakers, special musical performances, a blessing of the stone and a release of Monarch butterflies and a white dove in gestures of remembrance and hope.
Hopefully, a reinstallation will occur soon, to keep alive the memory of something so unforgettable and yet somehow fading from our collective conscience.
Emerson Schwartzkopf can be reached at emerson@stonebusiness.net.
This article first appeared in the August 2009 print edition of Stone Business. ©2009 Western Business Media Inc.