Josh Ferrara — josh-bob.com

Hello Svbtle

Josh Ferrara — Mon, 23 Sep 2013 00:00:00 +0000

I’m pretty excited and honored to have been invited to make my blog a part of the Svbtle blog network. If you aren’t familiar with it, this is Svbtle in it’s founder’s own words:

Svbtle is a new kind of magazine. We’re a network of great people mixed with a platform that takes the best things from traditional publishing and combines them with the best parts of the web. We want to make it easier for people to share and discover new ideas.

Put simply, Svbtle is equal parts blogging tool (for the writer) and online magazine (for the reader).

Dustin Curtis has created a writing platform that is a perfect fit for my blog to call home. From the very beginning when Svbtle was nothing more than a platform for his personal writing, Dustin’s concept for a clean blogging platform that was focused on writing and nothing else intrigued me. His original post was a major factor in me moving my blog away from the clutter of WordPress as a blogging system.

I’m consistently inspired by the content that comes out of the incredible writers involved, and I’m excited about being able to contribute to a great community of ideas.

My old posts can still be found in the archives, but all new posts will be a part of Svbtle.

Click the “Blog” icon above, or visit blog.josh-bob.com »

Setting Goals

Josh Ferrara — Sun, 28 Jul 2013 00:00:00 +0000

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Wild Cards

Josh Ferrara — Mon, 01 Jul 2013 00:00:00 +0000

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A New Season

Josh Ferrara — Fri, 15 Feb 2013 00:00:00 +0000

With every new year comes new opportunities. This year, we are pretty excited about the paths in front of us. Time is money, so let’s get right to the good stuff.

A New Focus

With each client we’ve taken on, we’ve seen our role shift more and more toward serving as creative consultants. We’ve helped build websites, design print pieces, and we’ll continue to offer those services as they are needed. Moving forward, we’ll also be focusing on being the entire creative solution for business and church teams that are looking to bring a fresh perspective to their creative process.

A New Name

Sort of. Names are funny things. As we’ve moved through the years as a company, we’ve always been pleased with our name. This year, as we shift into a new season, we’ve decided to adjust our name to better reflect all that our company has become. Starting today, Hivemind Labs is now Hivemind Creative.

As we’ve begun to work with clients on a broader scale to develop all facets of their work, it only seemed right to have a name that better reflects what our days look like.

A New Logo

Every new season deserves a new outfit, so with our newly polished name, we’ve decided to adjust our brand visuals as well. Starting today, you’ll start noticing our new look on lovely Hivemind projects around the web.

We asked our lovely designer, Gabrielle Ferrara, to craft a logo that put more emphasis on the core of our name (“Hivemind”), and we couldn’t be happier with what she’s put together.

A New Site

This has been in the works for for quite some time, and we’re excited to let you take it for a spin. As our company has evolved, we’ve added and subtracted from our available services. Today, we’re launching a new site that will give you a better picture of what Hivemind can do for you and your team.

In addition to the new design, we’ll also be switching to a new address to match our shiny new name: hivemind.co.

A New Partner

This is the one we’ve been dying to share with you! Starting today, Lance LeBlanc is joining the Hivemind family as CEO & Lead Strategist. He brings with him a wealth of experience, working most recently at Healing Place Church, where he served on the executive team as Creative Director and Executive Pastor.

Lance is joining the team at an exciting time, and we can’t wait to share some of the unique projects Lance will be working on in the coming weeks of this new venture.

Full Steam Ahead

We truly couldn’t be more excited about all that the new year holds for Hivemind, and we’re excited to continue working with you and your teams.

If you’ve got any questions or just want to say hi, feel free to send us a note:
josh@hivemind.co — jon@hivemind.co — lance@hivemind.co

Undefeated

Josh Ferrara — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 00:00:00 +0000

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The Bandwagon

Josh Ferrara — Sun, 06 Jan 2013 00:00:00 +0000

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The New Wayfarer

Josh Ferrara — Mon, 22 Oct 2012 00:00:00 +0000

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Identity & Motivation

Josh Ferrara — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 00:00:00 +0000

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I'm Good At The Internet

Josh Ferrara — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 00:00:00 +0000

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Persevere

Josh Ferrara — Sun, 26 Aug 2012 00:00:00 +0000

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It's like _____, but better

Josh Ferrara — Fri, 24 Aug 2012 00:00:00 +0000

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A Fresh Start

Josh Ferrara — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Welcome to the newest iteration of my corner of the web. I took some time (ok, a lot of time) to slow down and figure out what I really wanted out of this site, and I think I’ve come up with something that I really enjoy. I experimented with the photo-a-day blog, tried including a personal resumé, and even spent a large span of time sorting every post (almost 250) within tags & categories. It was an interesting journey, but I think I’ve finally discovered the some of the roadblocks to my personal blogging efforts.

Ultimately, it was too complicated. Sure, WordPress makes the actual publishing side of things seem easy. It’s all a facade. Think about it. Pick a topic. Write a post. Chose a category. Assign some tags. Publish. It’s not a lot, but it’s a roadblock.

The second, and arguably more subtle roadblock I found, had to do with my job. I spend my days split between code that I really enjoy, and WordPress for client sites. It’s great for their sites and needs, and it’s a powerful resource for the price, but it’s not code that I enjoy writing. When I have spare time, it’s much more enticing to sit down in code I enjoy than to open up the WordPress dashboard and pen a post. Again, subtle, but it’s a roadblock.

The solution

After hearing about Mark Otto and his foray into using Jekyll, I was intrigued. A blogging medium build around the code that I enjoy. Posts written in markdown, and published with a simple git push to GitHub Pages. No hosting to manage, no complicated system to publish. Just content.

It has it’s drawbacks. When I decided to take the leap, I figured a redesign made sense as well. I quickly learned that Jekyll is currently a little limited in its pagination functionality, but there is an active community behind that, so I don’t doubt that will be addressed soon. It also reduces your ability to blog from any location easily. You know, because being able to post from my phone kept be blogging consistently.

So I took the dive. I put together a new design and slimmed down the details until I was left with just the basics. The site you’re now reading is powered by Jekyll and hosted on GitHub (really, here’s the code), and, get this, I really enjoy working with it. Will this make me post more? It certainly won’t hurt.

Backward Compatibility

Josh Ferrara — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 00:00:00 +0000

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My Name Is Josh, I'm A Neophile

Josh Ferrara — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 00:00:00 +0000

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Legacy

Josh Ferrara — Sat, 11 Aug 2012 19:37:12 +0000

Today would be the 24th birthday of a great friend of mine, Jordan Gautreau. If you didn’t have the pleasure of knowing him, I assure you there haven’t been many men like Jordan.

It’s easy to talk about the ripple you’d hope to leave after you’re gone. It is, perhaps, easier still to declare how you will carry on the memory of a passing loved one.

However, I firmly believe the hardest — and most impactful — thing you can do with your life is to leave a legacy that challenges others, whether they like it or not.

Well done, Jordan.

Deciding Days

Josh Ferrara — Fri, 03 Aug 2012 19:32:00 +0000

“There is a time coming where we will be forced to choose between comfort and conviction. These will not be easy days, nor decisions made with ease; alas comfort sets the mind at ease, whilst conviction sets the soul — which will stand before the King — at ease.”

— Josh Boston

Rethinking

Josh Ferrara — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 00:00:00 +0000

You may blame it on Twitter, you may call it apathy, but the truth of the matter is that blogging hasn’t been a high priority in my life during this season.

I’m taking some time to rethink what I want out of this site, and what I want to share through it. I’m not sure if it’ll end up similar to what the site currently is, and I’m not even sure how long it’ll take. Either way, I want something less forced. I want a medium that fits well into my life. We’ll see.

A New Chapter

Josh Ferrara — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 14:53:09 +0000

So, last year, around this time I decided that since I spend my days crafting WordPress beauty for others, I would begin spending my nights crafting the WP creation that is my own blog. For about a month I argued with myself over design, slowly choosing elements I liked, features I wanted, service I wanted to include, etc. So much easier to work when the client isn’t yourself!

After a month I soft-launched the theme that you see now, with a few exceptions. At the beginning of 2010, the page included a link to a ‘photo of the day’ blog, as well as a Tumblr for what I thought would be a niche between WP and Twitter. Big Mistake! Too much content to was needed to keep the site looking alive! So after about a month, all 3 aspects of the blog were nearly lifeless. I’ll admit, part of it is because I just resented Tumblr for not being like WordPress. What do you mean I have to edit themes ONLINE? I can’t edit files in an editor? Needless to say, I have repented and turned back to what I’ve known all along with work, WordPress is the way.

So now, a new year is starting, and I’m making a new attempt to chronicle what happens in my life.To catch you up to speed, I thought I’d give you a one paragraph synopsis. I call it “2010: a josh odyssey”. Here goes:

I started the year taking 2 winter session classes at LSU so I could graduate before turning 21. In the spring semester I took 21 hours, again, to speed up the graduation process. It was the hardest semester of my life. Long nights, group projects, real work, and balancing it all with running my own company to make a living and pay for school. Graduated in May within 2 weeks of turning 21. Finished with a 3.8 GPA (doesn’t matter) and $0 of debt (matters a lot). A week later I took the girl of my dreams to New Orleans and got down on one knee; she said “yes!” 2 weeks later I started working at Gatorworks in addition to running Ferrara Creative (steady jobs impress chicks and their parents). In June we went to Cape Cod for 2 weeks on vacation. In October we went to New Orleans again, but this time we got married. After the wedding we decided to go to Europe for 2 weeks. That was fun. Then we came back home. Now we live in Prairieville with a happy condo of our own, more kitchen appliances than we know what to do with, and a jolly fish named KatieBob. The End.

Interesting thoughts

Josh Ferrara — Wed, 06 May 2009 02:25:50 +0000

Wrap your head around this one…

Get Involved!

Josh Ferrara — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 16:24:28 +0000

I’ve been really impacted the past few weeks by the incredible amount of generosity, but also the huge level of unity that I’ve seen in my life. I’ve seen people with lives, needs and situations of their own give of their time AND finances to help support a college student as he tries to make his way to Africa, and I’ve seen people raising money for mission trips of their own go out of their way to support others.

So here it is.

I challenge you to get involved in the incredible things going on around HPC and the globe. This isn’t your time to travel? Give. Maybe you are saving for a trip yourself? Give. We all have 10 bucks to spare, it can go a long way. We are all in this together. We must support one another!

Here are 6 incredible opportunities for you to get involved in something larger than yourself. PRAY & GIVE.

// Carole & Evangeline

Go for it.

These are people that, just like me and you, will not be able to go & do without support. Your support. So hunt them down, email them, call them, Twitter them, just contact them, pray for them, and help send them as tools of love.