Archive for Site News & Updates

american flagI know, I know. I sort of left the ending to the biggest thing on EiH twisting in the wind, and for that I apologize. It’s been a wicked crazy last couple of weeks, and 50 Years of 50 States was only supposed to take 5 days, and instead has taken 12. So, I wanted to let everybody know, that somebody did finally get the last trivia question correct. I asked you to tell me what the significance was of the order in which the states were posted. I got a lot of good guesses, but one person, nickschueller, got the answer right: “the order is the shortest tallest buildings in a state to the tallest tallest buildings in a state.” Congrats, Nick, you are the winner of a $50 gift card to Amazon!

I hope everybody enjoyed this challenge. I plan on publishing these posts in an ebook, so sign up for the newsletter, and you’ll be the first to know when it’s available, and I’ll give it to you for free.

Categories : Site News & Updates
Comments (2)
Map of Louisiana

Map of Louisiana

Early this morning, I asked, “Where is the United States’ tallest state Capitol building located?” The answer, Louisiana, at a height of 450 feet/34 floors. Congrats to anthonydurham, who won the drawing for a copy of Names on the Land: A Historical Account of Place-Naming in the United States by George R. Stewart. Due to time constraints, today’s trivia question will be postponed until tomorrow, and the Grand Finale will be pushed back to Sunday. There’s still 2 more prizes available, so subscribe to the RSS feed or follow EiH on Twitter for your chance at winning both!

Categories : Site News & Updates
Comments (1)

I hope you all are as excited as I am to kick off the first ever contest on Everything Is History. Before we get started, I advise you subscribe to the RSS feed, or follow EiH on Twitter so that you don’t miss out on any of the prizes. Here’s a quick rundown of how this is gonna work:

  • Ten states will be featured per day, Monday through Friday. At the end of the day, there will be a trivia question relating to the states from that day. Answer the question in the comments, and you have the opportunity to win a prize. The winner for the day will be selected at random from all of the correct answers.
  • So that everyone has a chance to win, you will only be able to win once, although you are more than welcome to participate for the entire week.
  • On Saturday, at the end of the series, there will be one final question in which everybody, including past winners can participate.

Here is the list of potential prizes:

USA License Plate Map Fine Art Poster

USA License Plate Map Fine Art Poster

So, subscribe to the RSS feed, or follow EiH on Twitter so that you can have an opportunity to win one of these awesome prizes!

Categories : Site News & Updates
Comments (0)
Aug
29

EiH: Now More Mobilier

Posted by: Tamahome Jenkins | Comments (0)

ipod touch iphone everything is history screenshotIt was only a matter of time before it happened, given my love of all things tech. Some of you might even be wondering what took so long. In preparation of the 50 Years of 50 States contest, I’ve made EiH easier for you to access from your mobile device. You don’t need to do anything, from now on, when you access Everything Is History from your mobile, it will automagically switch to the mobile format. As you can see from the screenshot, the site renders quite nicely on iPhone or iPod Touch. Supposedly, it works on the Android and a Blackberry as well. I tried it from my BB, but the default site still showed up (which may or may not be because T-Mobile sucks). What do you think, do you like the mobile version of EiH? If you have something other than an iPhone, does it work, or do you still see the default site?

UPDATE: I just received word that the site renders just as beautifully on an Android phone as it does on the iPhone. (Thanks, Nick!)

Categories : Site News & Updates
Comments (0)

Hear ye, hear ye! If you took high school history, then you could win one of 6 prizes that EiH is giving away next week. Starting 50 states map with mottosMonday 8/31, EiH will be running a series in celebration of 50 years of having 50 states in the Union. The rules are simple, each state will be featured in its own post, with 10 states featured per day. At the end of each day, I’ll post a trivia question related to the day’s posts and contestants will have until 11:59 PM Eastern time that night to answer the question in the comments section of the post. The winner for the day will then be chosen at random from the correct answers and will be announced the following morning. Prizes include the books State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of AmericaHow the States Got Their Shapes, among others. The grand prize, which will be awarded at the end of the week, is a surprise, so I suggest you subscribe to the RSS feed, or follow EiH on Twitter, lest you miss all the giveaway goodness.

UPDATE (8/25): I just realized I didn’t tell you *what* the grand prize is; it’s a $50 gift card to Amazon, so you definitely won’t want to miss this!

Categories : Site News & Updates
Comments (1)

Etymology – Originally with reference to the fact that if one owed a penny, one might as well owe a pound, as the penalties for non-payment were virtually identical in severity (wiktionary).

Courtesy of a.drian/Flickr

Courtesy of a.drian/Flickr

In case you haven’t noticed, EiH recently went through a drastic redesign. I had been toying with the idea for about a month now, and in my search for a template for another site I was working on, I stumbled across this one. Whereas the old EiH layout was more passive, like that of traditional media, this new layout lends itself to more interactivity. There are many more options for navigation above the fold, and perhaps my favorite is the ability to subscribe to EiH right at the top (notice the orange square next to the search box). Also, the right sidebar has been cleaned up, and feels less cluttered. In staying with the theme of more interactivity, there are also links to popular social sharing sites in the sidebar, as well as the new “Most Popular” section. That is perhaps my favorite thing of all, because you can find out just what other readers find the most interesting and are commenting on.

So what does that have to do with the title of the post? I worked on the transition all day yesterday from about 3 PM until the wee hours of the morning. After working on the new layout for about 4 hours, I decided to revert back to the old one temporarily so that I could actually use Sunday as a day of rest, but everything was borked. So, I had a choice, I could either fix the old layout, which would mean starting over when I decided to work on the new layout again. Or, I could soldier on with the new layout, which as you can see now, is the choice I made. I hope you enjoy it, and feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments.

Comments (2)

Courtesy of brtsergio on Flickr

Courtesy of brtsergio on Flickr


Hi all! You may have noticed the new link at the top for titled ‘forum’. I’m currently installing a forum and trying to iron out all the kinks to have it up and running by this weekend. I’ll give you more details once it is completed!

Ciao!

Categories : Site News & Updates
Comments (0)