Adam Kapler

The design evolution of adamkapler.com:

Below are a few examples of the many websites I have made for myself. This has been a hobby of mine for nearly a decade now, hard to believe. (I still remember when the internet was “new.”) Most of my sites have been lost to antiquity, but I have managed to find the following…

__________________________________________________________

2000: Simple beginnings and ugliness at Geocities.

The simple beginnings: I have lots of nicknames that I’ve  used as webpage titles (Kaps, AdKaps, Hey Kappy, Kapatiller, Kapillary… as well as my real name) but I don’t know what I was thinking when I chose to spell “kapi” as I did. I was a freshman in high school, give me a break. Me and a couple friends made websites and then competed to see who could rack up the most visits. I think Andy won, due to cheap shot at Brendo. Good times. It is clear what was important to me: the Saint Edmond Gaels and my 1987 Camaro (I had a school permit). Remember when websites had guestbooks? Funny. The guestbook still works: most of it is spam (one even pushing Viagra) but there is one enticing message from a girl named “Foxy Flame” who saw me in her yearbook and thinks I look like Haley Joel Osmont. Sick. High school was wierd.

__________________________________________________________________________

2001-2006: The lost years

No records. Darn. It’s a pretty safe bet that I was still posting Camaro stuff.

___________________________________________________________________________

2006: Phi Chapter needed a new home on the web

The house’s website needed an overhaul, so I did this over a break. It doubled as a Photoshop tutorial for me. I knew I wouldn’t be there to update it forever, so I later set up a blog that anyone can update. Plug: alphasigs.info

________________________________________________________

2006: Trying a home-made blog

I tried to make a blog from scratch. Because it was such a pain to update, it was rarely updated. Fail. I think it was kinda pretty, though. Props to me for incorporating my own handwriting. Looks like this is when I was finally enjoying chemistry (see background of banner). This was also during my Cyclone Alley days, so no surprise to see a picture of Curtis Stinson and the name of Will Blalock. Cyclone basketball hasn’t been the same since.

___________________________________________________________________

2007: Another home-made blog attempt

My sister had an operation that left her in the hospital a week, and with little else to do and no internet connection, I threw this together. Much easier to update than my previous attempt, but still too difficult to make it feasible.

______________________________________________________________________

2008: WordPress and the navigation bar at the top

I made the switch to WordPress and got rid of my personal webspace. AdamKapler.com solely redirects you to my WordPress blog now. For a while, I had a navigation bar at the top of my site (see pic below) but I never had enough content to truly warrant its use. I had to give up creative freedom (I can’t customize everything) with WordPress, but it also makes life much easier. Coding and all that jazz has become too complicated for amateurs like me.

_______________________________________________________________________

2008: Almost branching out…

I wanted to start a website that would report on cool scientific findings from the web. Think: Digg. But that was just the problem: there are too many websites that already do this far better than I ever could. I wanted to call it The Scientific Method, a sarcastic and satirical take on the complexities of the scientific process. I also thought the freedom of posting things anonymously would be nice. Hmm… maybe I already have an anonymous blog you just don’t know about.

_______________________________________________________________________

2008-2009: Less about me, more about science/religion/politics

This isn’t one of those emo journal blogs. I don’t tell you how I’m feeling, but maybe you can infer that by what I post and how I post it. In the past couple of years I have come to realize how rampant misconceptions are in regards to science, how religion is revered and respected though it often ought not to be, and how what happens in politics truly matters. In turn, my postings have become – how should I put this? – spicier.

I like WordPress a lot (it’s easy, updateable from anywhere, the bookmarklet makes posting simple, it’s secure, I trust them, search engines find me…), but you can’t customize much without paying for it. I want to (but can’t) change the font, the typeface colors, and the backgrounds. Because of this, I tend to channel my design creativity into the banner, which explains why it changes so much.

_________________________________________________________________________

The future: Medical school

I really want to write about my experiences in med school to keep my family and friends updated… but I really can’t guarantee that I will have the time.