Looking back to look ahead…
August 16th, 2010 • LIBR559M • No comments
As LIBR 559M comes to an end, I cannot believe how much social media I tried for the first time. It’s funny because every time I hear about web 2.0 and library sciences, I panic. I think “Oh man, I’m not gonna know how to do that. I’ll get a job and not know what I’m doing”. But being able to try all this stuff has made me way more confident. All of this social media, even the second life stuff, is really user friendly, so I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to keep up and figure it out.
Before this class I didn’t consider the potential of using social media for education. I could see its use for getting the word out about events going on, but I really liked hearing other people’s ideas about how to use it in the classroom (or the library). The more mediums we can use to learn the better!
I’m really glad I took this class and I hope that my fear of social media is gone for good. I was surprised by how encouraging everyone in the class was – I was worried coming into the class that I’d be waaaay behind, but everyone was super helpful and openly shared what they knew (a special thank you to my chawsome study buddy Shawna and our rad group partners Sara and Maggie –thanks gals!!!)
I’m still not sure what I think about second life. It still freaks me out a little. I had someone once tell me that she didn’t have any friends, family, or boyfriend, but it was okay because she had her online community. For myself, I much prefer face to face contact, even to talking on the phone. And I worry that people may like their online avatar better than themselves, especially with the crazy body types that you can choose for yourself. I do think it could be fun to have a virtual world that’s totally magical where you have no limits and make it up as you go, but I’m pretty sure it couldn’t work to have hundreds of people adding to a world constantly – it’d probably be chaos! For now, my imagination will have to do.
I also really loved the critical thinking questions Dean gave us. Being able to think about social media in the context of real life society made me engaged and interested in the materials – so much food for thought I’ll be digesting for a while to come!
From telephones to television to facebook – new mediums, old fears
August 10th, 2010 • LIBR559M • 1 comment
“Does the concentration of power or wealth in social media, ie Facebook or Google, worry you? Why?”
My main worry with the use of social media has always been that people won’t ever talk to each other face to face anymore; we’ll just facebook or text each other. But as I work my way through this class, I’ve started to think that these fears of mine are just that, fears, and I’m sure that people had the exact same worries about the telephone. But with new technologies come new social norms. So for example, it’s possible to have a meaningful conversation on the phone. New technologies give us more and new ways to communicate with each other – I don’t know that I really need to be comparing them to a face to face interaction like I’ve been doing; they’re just different ways of communicating. And really, when I think back to all the time I wasted as a kid and teen sitting watching tv, I think that social media is much better because the user is involved. At least with social media you’re thinking and engaging versus tv where I just lay on the couch and turned off my brain.
I found the Michael Wesch video super interesting. I hated! Elementary and high school and I didn’t do well at all. I think that if I had had social media as a learning tool, I would’ve done much better and probably enjoyed the learning process a lot more. Social media provides different ways of learning, students can pick a social media that they enjoy and use that as a facilitator to the learning process. Because I had such a hard time with my school work and graduated high school by the skin of my teeth and feeling stupid, I’m all for any new ways of teaching so that as many learning styles and possibilities get incorporated as possible. I want learning to be fun and I want everyone to believe that they are capable of learning (and teaching) because we are all on some level.
Now onto facebook…I do find it creepy that they customize their ads to me based on my profile. A friend of mine told me a couple of years ago that he had just sent a facebook message that had the words “New York” in it, and seconds later, ads for New York started coming up. He loved it and said it was convenient. I’d rather facebook mind its own business, but I guess since I’m using its services for free, that’s the deal. Part of the problem I can see with customizing ads like this is that maybe, just maybe, some of us want to see and try new things and we don’t want to be kept inside a little bubble or be put in a box and left there.
Collaboration Rules!
July 27th, 2010 • LIBR559M • 8 comments
After doing module 3 “Collaboration”, I’ve been thinking about one of the questions posed: Are we all equally skilled at working together in collaboration? I think not! We all come from very different backgrounds; we have different degrees, different work experiences, and different life experiences. At my last job, collaboration was essential to getting anything done, although we worked most of the time independently. I for sure learnt how to collaborate, I don’t think it’s a skill or even a concept that is valued in our society, especially under capitalism with its idea of competition and ‘only the strong will survive’. And when thinking about collaboration with social media, we are definitely not all equally skilled in collaboration. People have different skill levels and even different comfort levels while using social media. But this presents yet another opportunity to collaborate. Any group projects I’ve done in the SLAIS program, including our latest Wiki assignment, were not only collaborative in terms of the subject matter, but also in sharing information about how to use the social media tool we had decided on or been assigned to use.
With this Wiki project, my teammates taught me how to use the chat rooms in our e-learning site and how to add links on the Wiki itself. Just last semester in another group project, my teammates introduced me to, and taught me how to use, GoogleWave. Although I came into this program knowing very very little about the social media out there (let alone how and when to use them), I have learnt so much thanks to the collaborative learning that’s come out of collaborative group work. And I’m still learning – I can’t believe the number of social tools for collaborative work that we looked at in module 3!
I agree that a sense of community is most important for successful and real collaboration. This sense of community can help take away the competiveness we’re used to – we compete with others we could be collaborating with for grades, raises at work, even in sports where we’re playing to beat someone else. But in the information profession, collaboration is most important, as I’ve learnt. It allows us to keep up to date with new social media and with what is going on in the world around us. We all bring some new and different knowledge to the table with us, which is wonderful because no one has enough time to learn and research about all the new social media coming out, but we’re able to keep on top of it in part thanks to the sharing with each other about cool new social media we’re using or we’ve heard of.
I do think that for collaboration to work it is essential that the members of the group have some sort of affinity with each other. It could be that members know each other well enough that they can take and receive constructive criticism, or that the members of the group are so excited about and believe in the project so much that they are honest and open in their communication with each other. As Edwin Land said, “Politeness is the poison of collaboration”. So then maybe we can say that honest and respectful communication is the food of collaboration!
A brief thought about performing with social media
July 20th, 2010 • LIBR559M • 2 comments
I think that performance is everything in social networks. Especially since people can’t read your body language or tone. I have very limited experience with performance in social networks, but certainly have observed others performing, even if only on facebook. I think that people’s online persona’s are usually either pure imagination or they are the best parts of a person, because there’s no need to represent anything other than the best parts of you self online, which is kinda nice. I do wonder what happens when someone behaves badly online and then has to deal in real life with people who witnessed such behavior. I think you’ll be judged in real life by your actions in social networks and vice versa, so unless once doesn’t have any cross over between real life friends and friends in social networks or is completely anonymous, one is still limited in their actions.
Thoughts on the article “Confronting the challenges of participatory culture”
July 20th, 2010 • LIBR559M • 3 comments
I found the article “Confronting the challenges of participatory culture” by Henry Jenkins super interesting. I don’t know that the teens used as examples here would have been able to contribute to such an extent without the social media they are using. To read about what they have accomplished really made a strong impact on me. I tend to worry that social media will bring people further apart, but there is clear and strong evidence that it’s doing quite the opposite. I was also surprised by the stats that say half of all teens have created media content (way more productive than what I was doing as a teenager which was sitting in front of the tv for hours on end) and that girls ages 15-17 are more likely than boys their age to be involved with social media. I do think I had the stereotype in my head that it is young white dudes sitting in front of their computers who are the users of social media.
I also found Jenkins argument compelling about the skills and knowledge that teens are learning through using social media versus what they’re learning at school. I don’t know that the school system as it’s set up now can keep up with social media in any real way. Both my parents are teachers, and they’re busy enough preparing lessons, let alone trying on top of that to learn about social media so they can teach it. Besides, it seems to me part of the beauty that’s going on with social media and teens is that they’re self taught. They’re learning out of pure interest, not out of any kind of obligation, and maybe that’s why they’re loving it so much. Teaching it in school might take the joy out of it, especially if it’s being taught by someone who doesn’t have the same passion for social media as the kids do. It’s almost as if the involvement teens are having with social media is coming from an organic place – it seems to be very natural. They’re doing it because they like it. And they are learning a new and alternative way to run a society. Instead of having an authoritative power structure in place that we all are forced to follow or get thrown in jail, they have affinity spaces in which they are encouraged and encouraging of others to share and teach their skills and interests – everyone can be an expert and at the same time be learning from their peers. On paper, this sounds like utopia to me!
Second Life versus Real Life
July 14th, 2010 • LIBR559M • 5 comments
I rarely use the internet for any kind of social interaction. I use my email and facebook account to talk to friends, but these are friends who I see and hang out with on a regular basis. After doing Module 1 and reading through the introduction to the course, I’m already thinking about what my problem is with this interactive media. Mostly I’m easily overwhelmed with all the possible information that will come to me now that I have a brand new twitter, delicious and blogline account. But I’m also uncomfortable with the absence of face to face contact that’s possible. One can truly “live” online.
I saw a CBC documentary on The Fifth Estate a little while ago called “Strangers in Paradise” (it aired Jan 28, 2009) and it scared me! It’s all about people who live in second life to the point where they are having virtual sexual relationships with other avatars. One woman who was married with 4 kids even flew to England to meet her online lover. Another man who was interviewed said he didn’t understand why his wife was angry when she saw that he was having online sex with another avatar. In the end, several couples who met in a virtual world met in real life and hit it off and decided to be together, both on screen and off, so who am I to judge.
I just worry that people will lose their social skills altogether because we’ll never have to actually see or speak to anyone if we don’t want to. I realize this is irrational, but I also know of people who have broken up over facebook. As Dean quoted on the introduction page, “We shape our tools…and then our tools shape us” ~ Marshall McLuhan, 1965. I do genuinely love change, but I hesitate to fully embrace all the changes that are happening in the ways we communicate with each other.
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