Social Media...What?

Virtual reality Immersive environments
Do you want a Second Life?
I spent about 90 minutes traveling the virtual worlds of Second Life. It was a struggle. I am not a gamer and I think that type of experience would have been a help to get a grip on the functionality of an avatar. Then maybe the Immersive experience would have been a bit more pleasant.

I spent most of my time in the educational worlds; looking at the stars and planets in a planetarium, listening to the most recent audio streams from the space station, visiting NASA.

Never met another avatar. Never saw another avatar. I don’t think science and education are big draws on a Saturday morning.

Overall I would have to grade my experience as a 5 on a scale of 1-10. My learning curve is steep not having any experience with virtual worlds. Once inside a world and tripping over my virtual feet trying to get to a desired location it was very relaxing. It is all right there in front of you. No effort to find information. There is so much of it.
Since I have the software downloaded I will probably visit again when I have more time.
Ha! that is a laugh.
I remember when I moved into a new neighborhood a few decades back, I meet a few members of the community who invited me to join in the community activities and I told them I would once I got settled. One wise woman responded with, “If you wait until your settled we’ll never see you…” They didn’t. The only people I interacted with were the neighbors right beside me. Interaction takes an effort no matter what “world” you are living in at the moment. At this moment I am working with the entropy of my own personal world. I need some down time.

As an information professional, I think immersive technologies have great promise. When I consider which group of people would benefit the most from the technology I think academic students (Education) is probably the big winner. virtual worlds offers an environment in which teaching finds its sweet spot. The affordances of virtual environments allows every potential student the chance to excel regardless of physical restrictions. That is, if there is enough capital investment to support sustained long term use of the technology. I think that is the crux of the problem.

I also believe that investment into the technology of virtual realities will widen the proverbial “digital divide”. The real world is not ready to share the resources needed for immersive environments to take the lead in education (in any society on the planet).

So, I think that commerce will utilize the technology to its great economic advantage. I am old enough that I don’t think I will ever see virtual wolds become a big part of my life, either professional or personal. I could be wrong. The question then becomes do I want to put the effort into a Second Life…

The sun is shining here today.There is a slight breeze. The blue sky is dotted with white puffy clouds. I think I’ll make the effort to take my canoe out on the McClosky Reservoir and spend a few hours drinking in my real world. Now that is time well spent.

Information resources for this post:
LIBR559M Module V Aggregation Ecclesiastes 1: 1-11 & 3:1-11

Mash-up of Beth
Daughter of Elizabeth
Matriarch of Overlook Boulevard

Sheer futility, Beth says. Sheer futility:
resistance is futile! What profit can we show for all our, social networking under the gaze of Internet.

A generation goes, a generation comes, yet
Internet stands firm forever.
Facebook rises, Facebook sets, then to its place
Facebook speeds and there it rests.

Southward goes Google+, then turns to the
North: Google+ turns and turns again back to
its “circle of friends” goes Google+.

Into the Aggregators go all the social networking tools,
and yet the Aggregators are never filled,
and still to Internet their goal the Aggregators go.

All bits and bytes are wearisome. No avatar can say that computers have had
enough virtual learning environments because…
What was augmented, will be tagged.
What has been linked will be accessed again.
and there is so much NEW under Internet.

There is an Aggregator for everything
and a time for every Aggregator under Internet.
A time for gathering,
A time for organizing,
A time for information professionals to take the lead.

A time for integration,
A time for a single view,
A time for a unified stream,
A time of affordance is the social media dream.

A time for Learning Management Systems,
A time for Moodle,
A time for Tapped In,
A time for Drupal a space as neat as a pin.

A time for Personal Learning Environments,
A time for Instapaper,
A time for a Second Life,
A time when it will b2evolution.

What do people gain from the efforts they make?
I contemplate the task to aggregate.

All that Internet does is appropriate for its time,
but although Internet has given us connectivity
we can grasps neither the beginning
nor the end of what Internet does…

This week I took the time to learn how to Glog using Glogster a social network that allows users to create free interactive posters, or glogs. A glog is a graphical blog created by interactive multimedia images. Directions are minimal, but it’s fairly intuitive and easy to manipulate. There are three functions that allow the user to collect the different forms of media that will be used on the glog; upload, link and grab. Once the image, video or audio pieces have been collected the user can stylize the media with a variety of graphics, text and wall paper to bring their ideas alive.

There was only one function that was a little confusing. You can “frame” an image or select a style of “player” for a video clip, but you have to do this before you put the media on the poster. I found this option by mistake. I wanted to add my image and hit the “frame” button. Ops! It added the image with a random frame. Really not a problem because the poster is auto-saved. All you do is click on the image and delete it!

It takes a bit of doing at first, but then it’s all fun. And so that’s what I did, I had some fun. I created a poster illustrating my favorite literary genre, Science Fiction/Fantasy.

What can a librarian do with Glogster?

The graphics give the end product a look that I think is visually appealing to children and young adults so I think that school librarians and public librarians would get the most use out of Glogster.
School Libraries:
Using the poster format as a collaboration tool to teach information literacy to young children would increase students digital literacy as well.
Public Libraries:
Marketing services, Advertising & enriching programs, Fundraising activities.
Academic Libraries:
On the library homepage as a directory of resources or a bulletin board promoting library activities.

I wonder if it would be possible to create a science conference poster presentation using Glogster…transmitting the poster from a laptop onto a very large video screen allowing interaction of the audience with the poster to view historical background information, experimental data and other relevant research…videos of the actual experiments. Nice!

Might it be useful in a virtual conference forum…?

Anyway, It was fun!

The topic of collaboration is an interesting one. Howard Rheingold, once again, gets my attention with his concept on an anatomy of a collaboration using the communication tools of the Internet. His comparison of the social dilemma of collective action to the “Prisoner’s dilemma” helped me realize why collective sharing is so difficult for western cultures. He noted that human collective action has been evolving along with the tools that helped produce knowledge like the alphabet and the printing press and now the computer. The one tool that hasn’t evolved much to get us past the Prisoner’s dilemma is the operating system of the human brain. Our western society is hardwired into a binary operating system. It runs on “either/or”. It’s called the ego and  has been referred to by some as the “egoic operating system”. Near the end of Rhiengold’s pitch for network collaboration he remarks that understanding cooperation does not necessarily make us better people. I say it can not. We have to abandon our present “grammar of perception”. We have to upgrade our operating system because it divides our field of understanding into “all or nothing”. Virtual collaboration using the present day communication tools of the Internet may be the KERNAL that moves the evolution of the human operating system into the place where true collaboration is possible.

So, why make the effort that Rheingold is so anxious for the world to begin?

Pros and Cons of Collaboration—from module III

What is the value of collaboration for libraries and library professionals: collaboration can exponentially increase the available resources when projects are collectively shared across institutions and organizations.

What projects are suited for collaboration: Projects that impact the quality of an individual’s, group’s, community’s day to day life.

Examples: Philadelphia model for museum and library collaboration http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/philadelphia-model-for-museumlibrary-collaborations-grows-by-leaps-and-bounds-125590563.html

ischool Inclusion Institute of Information Science at the University of Pittsburgh http://www.ischool-inclusion.org/contact.html

What are the characteristics of a successful collaboration: A mature ego (Nondual thinking), mutual respect and a multicultural awareness and sensitivity.

How do we develop the skills needed for successful collaboration: The skills are developed by entering into collaborative efforts over and over and over again. Sir Ken Robinson noted that creativity and innovation that results in an idea of value is a process not a singular event.

How is success measured in collaboration: Does the collaboration answer the original question or solve the initial problem? Does the solution resolve the issue? It is not about how much money was spent or saved so much as did the solution create the possibility of future growth? Did the outcome allow for future positive change? It can not be a static solution or it will stagnate.

What are the barriers to a successful collaboration: Lack of mutural respect for all involved and lack of full and open communication among participants. It could also be the unequal access to the technology that makes virtual collaboration possible or the unequal or ill-matched technical abilities of the participants.

An operating system based on dual thinking can never achieve successful collaboration. We need to work on an upgrade.

Jenkins’ paper on the challenges of participatory culture focused on a set of cultural competencies and social skills that the youth need to navigate the omnipresent media landscape. Beginning with and building on the traditional skills of literacy, research and critical analysis he proposed a list of additional attributes that must be cultivated; performance, simulation, approbation, multi-tasking, distributed cognition, judgment, collective intelligence, trans-media navigation, networking and negotiation. Jenkins approach to understanding the evolution of the three traditional skill is from an ecological view. that is, he suggests that we look at the digital technologies from an inter-relational perspective (technologies, communities and activities they support). Jenkins also stated (I think this is the crux of the issue) that to be a full participant of a society that avails itself to these communication technologies one must possess the above skills, possess the knowledge to use the skills, adopt an ethical framework for interaction and be self-confident.

This is all a bit overwhelming if librarians (new/experienced) continue to offer the keys of information to a society with the traditional resources of yesteryear. I’ll get back to this point in a bit…I recently witnessed how the use of machinima transformed a “boring and stupid” English assignment to “explore the meaning of parody” into an exquisite learning experience for four high school teens. Instead of writing a script for either a play or a movies to perform or film (both creative activities) the group decided to produce a machinima based on the movie I Am Legend. Their title, I Am Forgettable. The tools were XBOX, Halo Reach, Imovie, Final Cut Express, a microphone, TV screens (2) and a script created by the four based on their favorite scenes from the original movie. The level of collaboration needed to pull off the event in a successful and timely fashion was high and every one of Jenkins’ criteria for being a full participant in the community of four was in evidence. The activity was playful, engaging and transformative. And successful.

Now back to my point about libraries and resources. In the beginning of the 21st century museums began to look at their physical space differently. Instead of a static and stogy exhibition space that no one seemed to want to visit there was a move to create a common community space. Libraries are finally following suit trying to find their niche in the struggle to garner the attention of the public. The library’s resources have always been the key that opens the gate to information and knowledge which appeals to the society it serves. The resources were originally paper materials. Then it was computers and databases. Now, I think, it should include technology and the space that allows interaction akin to my above example. If media literacy is a set of competencies that every citizen is going to be expected to possess then libraries should adapt their “collections” to facilitate that societal need.

Jenkins said,”It matters what tools are available to a culture, but it matters more what that culture chooses to do with those tools.” I admit it. I love the smell of musty books, but I believe  libraries should be working to help shape what our cultures do with the tools of our contemporary society.

Mindful Infotention. That is a nice alternate label for Information Literacy. It covers a multitude of sins or in this case virtues. Rheingold’s “Crap Detection 101” is great because it’s full of useful tools to check the authority of a website such as easywhois.com and the suggestion of using the search term “link:http://…” to follow outside links. The post is full of suggested tools. the difficult part is in making yourself use the tools. Rheingold talked about exercising the “flabby think-for-yourself muscle”. It takes time to check sources, to critically ask questions about the authenticity of what you’re reading or watching and I think a great number of people don’t really want truth they want entertainment.

This weekend I’m giving my final presentation for the course, The Library’s Role in Teaching and Learning. I choose to create a lesson plan for adult learners around the consumer health information website MedLinePlus and part of the lesson includes a segment on healthy web surfing.   Rheingold’s blog post on Mindful Infotention reinforced my belief that as information specialists we are obligated to use our expertise to help our patrons, users, adult learner, students quite the “noise-death of the Internet”.

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