Beautiful Boundless Articles
by Ted Slater on 06/23/2008 at 1:11 PM
I just stumbled upon a very cool, though ultimately not very meaningful, little application that creates "beautiful word clouds" from collections of words.
Curious, I wanted to see what our article "Biblical Dating: An Introduction" would look like. Here it is (click on the image to see it full size):
And here's what "Brother, You're Like a Six" looks like:
Who knew that such doctrinally engaging articles on relationship could look so cool?
1. Dr. Ransom said the following at 2:47 PM on Jun 23:
Drat and botheration! -- as of 4:45 pm EDT on Monday, June 23, the site seems to be down. Ted, because of the webzine's popularity as well as that of you personally, it seems you have crashed the server! Methinks hearty congratulations are in order.
This is one of those little facets that makes the Boundless Line so much fun: a healthful balance between the incredibly doctrine-depth-minded, and the purely frivolous such as this. ;-)
2. Leann said the following at 2:55 PM on Jun 23:
I just found this today as well! I think Tim Challies may have mentioned it in his daily links. You're the second person today I've noticed (besides Challies) who has played around with this application. I love it!
3. Jo said the following at 4:08 PM on Jun 23:
So pretty!!! I wonder what the Bible would look like...
4. Colette said the following at 4:48 PM on Jun 23:
Wow, that's cool! All I could think was "what great t-shirt designs!!!"
5. Jaime said the following at 6:24 PM on Jun 23:
Here's the book of Philippians (NASB)
6. Bethany M said the following at 7:21 PM on Jun 23:
Wow, this is really really cool!!
7. Tami said the following at 7:21 PM on Jun 23:
Jaime (5), that's pretty cool.
I'm surprised the word "rejoice" wasn't bigger, however! :)
8. Gene said the following at 7:31 PM on Jun 23:
In the beginning.
9. Claire said the following at 8:14 PM on Jun 23:
I am now obsessed with this thing!
And as for being "not very meaningful," Ted, I would say that I have to respectfully disagree (having a BA in English, and all). =)
I think the website has awesome applications. For example, the mere repetition of a word would suggest that it is a more central idea and the most important thing that is being written in that particular context. The Philippians example (Jamie #5) is a great one. Someone else made one about the Nicene Creed:
http://wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/25853/Nicene_Creed
Also, think of how many awesome presentations could be made in churches, youth groups, etc.
Thanks for sharing this random website, I love it!
P.S. Can someone tell me how to post websites on here so they turn into a link? I may be a word nerd, but I am computer illiterate.
10. Jenelle said the following at 8:49 PM on Jun 23:
WOW! i love it!
#4 Colette: Definitely great for T-shirts!
11. K.L. said the following at 10:37 PM on Jun 23:
Oooh...this is cool! I'm gonna have to mess around with this some more later.
12. Florence said the following at 4:27 AM on Jun 24:
It's realy nice to know that there are site on biblical courtships and relationships.
I intend to go into youth counselling and I will pls. need articles from you very often. If it can possibly be sent to my mail box, I will be very gratefull.
May God continually increase your horizon
13. yipeng said the following at 7:40 AM on Jun 24:
I've wordled each book of the New Testament :)
Check it out here: www.markedbyfaith.blogspot.com
14. Rock said the following at 8:58 AM on Jun 24:
The top one should be the boundless T-shirt design.
15. Ted Slater said the following at 9:21 AM on Jun 24:
Yipeng -- very cool! Thanks for doing that.
16. Ted Slater said the following at 9:38 AM on Jun 24:
You can see the entire New Testament here.
17. Claire said the following at 9:41 AM on Jun 24:
I realize now that the website I listed makes itself into a link when my post went through. I didn't know it would do that. So yeah, I look brilliant. =D
18. Tami said the following at 10:21 AM on Jun 24:
Since someone beat me to the Nicene Creed, here's Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God (I figured the "Heat" palette was appropriate ;):
19. Ted Slater said the following at 10:49 AM on Jun 24:
Claire et al., I'm actually going in and editing your HTML to make the links show up correctly. It's the Web editor in me.... :-)
20. Tom Neven said the following at 10:54 AM on Jun 24:
No need to get too serious about all this.
21. Samuel PG said the following at 2:10 PM on Jun 24:
Thanks for telling us about this. I made the entire Old and New Testaments from the KJV. http://wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/28120/KJV_Old_Testament
http://wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/28140/KJV_New_Testament
22. Priscilla said the following at 2:36 AM on Jun 25:
This is very, very cool! Thanks much, Ted.
Here's another idea that I just tried out: Ever written anything about yourself, an essay, a resume or just an informal introduction. Paste it into the Wordle box and check out the result. (Don't cheat and write something specially for the application now!)
I'm thrilled that the biggest word from mine was "Christian" and that "people" and "books" were also prominent. That about describes me.
23. yipeng said the following at 6:18 AM on Jun 25:
Thanks Ted! I think so too :)
I'm thinking of a new wordle project... stay tuned :P
24. Rachel S said the following at 2:46 PM on Jun 25:
I took Pricilla's (#22) advice and used my statement of purpose from my grad school applications. How happy was I that "Christianity" is one of the most prominent words. And I got into a program at a secular school!
http://wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/31613/SOP
25. Ted Slater said the following at 3:30 PM on Jun 25:
Here's my master's thesis." Can you guess what the topic was? ;-)