a thaumaturgical compendium

Interesting brief article in Queue on IBM’s Dogear social bookmarking tool for the enterprise. It appears to be a system like del.icio.us, but with the ability to assign groups and to set up levels of privacy.

They skip over the most interesting and difficult part: How to get folks to use it! They casually mention that they built RSS right into the system, as if that was an immediate sell. I think it could be used to great effect in classes and in academic meetings, but it seems to have had a lukewarm reception in these venues.

In particular, the Association of Internet Researchers meeting encouraged tagging for the conference. First off: not sure that an academic conference encourages tagging. It seems to me to be something that has to happen over a long period of time. Second, they gave folks too many options: suggesting del.icio.us, Technorati, and Flickr tags, to an audience among whom (ironically, I think) tagging is not a common practice. In all, the effort fell flat. But it had the standard “let’s do it and see what happens” vibe. Nothing wrong with that vibe—it is very Web 2.0—but as I said, the value of tagging something for a fairly broad conference seems limited to me, especially (and this is key!) if it isn’t integrated into the whole.

I’ve also had my classes tagging this semester. Since the class “home page” is an aggregator (like this one) it’s easy to pull the RSS from del.icio.us and integrate it with the standard stream. Yet only those who already knew about tagging are tagging.

I’m now thinking about the Cyberporn and Society course for next semester (yes, it is a little late), and how to better integrate tagging into the course. I think an important step is to provide more of an overview of what tagging is all about and how to do it so that students have a better idea of what it is.

It is always a trade-off in a course: how much time do you spend talking about blogging/wikis/bookmarking/etc. and how much time do you spend with the actual substance of the course. In other words, what is the ROI (return on instruction) for focusing on the “ways of doing” rather than the “ways of knowing.” I have generally shied away from “teaching the tools.” Set up some expectations for product—I always thought—and students would teach themselves the tools.

Recently, I’ve been reconsidering this a bit. It’s a truism that we are never teaching, but hoping our students learn to learn. It strikes me that certain kinds of tools (how to use a library, for instance) have a very high long-term ROI. While my “don’t teach the tools” made sense when we were dealing with Flash or GoLive (v.1, yikes!), when it comes to social computing, it may be something worth really focusing time and resources on.

Sure, some of you may say “duh”! But that’s a bit of a new direction for me.

Tim Bray posted a link to Udell’s Google Maps walking tour of Keene, NH, in case anyone (like me), hadn’t seen it. This is really very cool: it’s what happens when you allow others to co-design your service.

I don’t know how many of the current MI students read my blog (I suspect very few), but if you do, this should trigger some ideas if you haven’t yet settled on a capstone. A lot of creative possibilities to combine GPS and Google Maps. I know a few of you are doing things with GPS and wireless (through Paul’s class or in other courses), and this would be a natural kind of extension. Also might allow for some interesting combinations when glued together: think Google Maps + Facebook or other services. Neat stuff.

MITIA students: just a reminder that Sunday, 12-12 at midnight is the last posting on your blogs I will consider (for the grade at least!).

Communication Theory students: roughly the same deal. I won’t consider changes to the notes wiki after Sunday night.

That is all.

Although I’ve used weblogs extensively in previous classes, this is the first time I used them largely instead of physical class meetings. In my own opinion, this is not the best way to use weblogs. I wish that it were otherwise, but I think weblogs are best used as a way of enhancing the classroom experience. When I compare what we covered this semester to earlier semesters—and much of this is definitely my own fault—I don’t think we did as much. On the other hand, it may be largely my own bias here. It may be that I feel like I covered more in previous, lecture-based versions, but the students didn’t come away with as much. It’s difficult for me to say.

Here are some of the things the students have had to say about the experience. And note, there may be a boatload of response bias here, given that we are still working in the class.

Admin for Best Blog:

I have come to the realization, from searching the blogosphere and from knowledge gained via this class, that blogs stand the chance of replacing screen names. In the years to come, more and more people will be launching their own blog, hosting their own topics, inviting fellow bloggers to have free reign on their blog, and thus creating their own neighborhood in the ever expanding global village. It is a concept that is exciting. And prior to this class I had no clue to what a blog was or what blogging entailed.

Jenn:

I like doing all the work through a blog system, merely for the fact that I have a ridiculously busy schedule this year, and I don’t mind doing the assignments late at night (rather than on Wednesday afternoons). I think that using blogs for a classroom setting is a great idea. It’s fast, up to date, and interesting to read. There really isn’t anything difficult regarding blogging, it’s all too easy. After the semester ends, I will keep up with blogging. I will most likely check out the blogs that I have come to really enjoy, rather than start up my own… again, I’m just a really busy girl.

jf44:

It definitely appears that Blogs can be used the way that we have been using them as well as many other ways, and furthermore has the potential to be a very effective networking tool. Although I do wish that we were meeting in person at least a few times throughout the semester, it also does appear that it is working for many people in the class to hold the class, strictly online. I just believe that it would be a little easier and keep people like my group members in line with the work that they have to do on a more regular basis. Other than that, the class and the material that we learn is interesting most of the time and occasionally borders on being fun.

The concept of blogging definitely has the potential to be much more than it is in the classroom as well. I would also recommend it to any teacher who is looking for a sort of networking tool for their class that looks to get more in depth than that of the widely used, but lame discussion boards via UBlearns.

I had originally thought that group blogs would make it easier for folks to come together on topics, etc. This is the first time I used that approach. Worked really well for some of the groups, and really poorly for others, as with all group work. I’ll have to figure out how to handle that better in the future, though it may not be worth the trouble.

Don:

It is sad how slow the education system is at catching up with technology. The fact that our fine institution is only at the UB Learns stage is discouraging. I don’t believe having a class that meets only virtually should be a radical concept. I dare say that you don’t need to have any face-to-face meetings. That’s what AIM and chatrooms are for. I admit that at times during the semester I have put this class at the back of my mind. This is partially due to my own laziness and irresponsibility. I also blame the way I’ve been programmed as a student. If I am not regularly attending a class, I am likely to forget about it. This psychological obstacle is one that I believe can be overcome; especially if more instructors like Dr. Halavais attempt to break the monotony of our education system.

A lot of people mentioned AIM chats as a possible way getting together. I am really new to the idea of using instant messaging as part of my teaching, but I’ve been very happy with it so far. I’ll definitely plan on integrating this more directly in later classes. I had planned on doing so in this one, but that was predicated on using Orkut to get profiles of the students, and that kind of fell apart.

unfabulosa:

I really didn’t mind the experiment at all. Perhaps, meeting in person more frequently would have forced me to be more involved with the class in general. But at the same time I’m fine with the distance factor, who want’s to go to class anyway? I’m online at least once a day so it’s no big deal. I will admit that if the subject matter of the weblog is of interest to me, then I most likely will enjoy the process of blogging. As far as the readings go, I thought they were very interesting and helpful to this class’ use of technology. If I had to give a teacher some advice, I would say that weblogs are a great idea because they require a lot of writting, understanding and exposure to the ever expanding world wide web. I personally believe that the internet will become the future of some media industries. If anything, would encourage for the teacher to allow students to decide if they wish to work alone or in groups.

unfabulosa brings up the motivation issue, as did Don, reegs, and several others. I have graded several times through the semester, hoping that grades would be a good enough reminder. I don’t think it’s that students don’t want to, or can’t, post regularly. It’s just that the pattern of classes helps act as a reminder for what needs to be done and when. I need to figure out a way to encourage more frequent posting. It may be a simple metric: post three times a week and then you are good. As it turned out, only a handful of people posted on a regular basis, despite such a requirement in the syllabus.

Adrienne:

My feelings about the experiment have been so-so. I do not like the fact that we are meeting physically in a class setting, after not having done so for a few months now. If there was a teacher wanting to use a blog in their classroom, I would not recommend it. The hardest part about blogging, is writing about things that are of interest to me, and making sure no one else has covered it already. My content has been okay. Not like other students, but I am not totally dissatisfied with my blogs either. If I could change the structure of the class, it would not have been working with groups, but at least having the option to do the blogs on your own in the beginning. Also, looking at more blogs and structures to get a better understanding about them the first 2 weeks we met in the beginning of the semester

One of the issues—and this is something I need to work on in my teaching anyway, but is especially important when you are asking students to try something new—is being more organized and explicit in my expectations. Many students are used to fairly structured environments for classes, and since I always hated such structures, I make the mistake of assuming others do to. When I originally planned the class, I expected getting folks up and blogging would be a relatively painless process. As it turned out, it has become the main effort of the class, leaving out some important content. As I noted above, I don’t consider that a failure, but it is not what I had planned or expected.

And, to end on a high note, protesterbee:

I think that the idea of holding class via blogs is pretty cool. It’s different, to be sure, but I think that it works. It requires a very high level of trust on the part of the Professor, and it also requires the class to police themselves more.

I think that so long as there are basic ground rules set, and that there is enough interesting material and that a blog is an adequate forum by which to give this information, then I don’t think there’s anything wrong with holding class like this.

Personally I like this class because I can do the work when I have the time to do it (meaning weekends, late at night), and it doesn’t really matter. I can post whenever I want to, which is super sweet.

In conclusion, rock on!

Some of the experiments in blogging in classes have been glorious failures: I learned a lot out of the process, but I’m not sure how successful they were at encouraging student learning. Others have been unqualified successes. I won’t know about this class until I see what direction the student blogs take over the next month, but I would put it more toward success than failure, even though the success was not what I had initially intended.

When I started my job three years ago, people (who shall remain nameless) suggested that blogs were an interesting diversion, but would never be a subject of serious academic study. “Why not study decision support systems?” And while it has been nice to see wide coverage in the press, this just served to support the opinion, for some, that it wasn’t a phenomenon worth studying. How nice to get the latest issue of the Communications of the ACM and see this cover.

Even nicer is to open it up and find some wonderful articles focusing on some serious descriptive work. I am particularly taken by Kumar et al’s (the Almaden folks, natch) article that looks at some of the structure of livejournal, and it’s not just because they cite the work Jia Lin and I have been doing. Along with the Nardi et al piece in here, I think I now have a couple of very good articles to hand to the increasing number of people who knock on my door and say “where’s a good entry point for the literature on weblogging”? And, at the same time, there is something oddly fetishistic about the trauma of going mainstream: at the same time the comfort of knowing that if studying blogs was a folly it is at least a folly that lots of people more respectable than I am have fallen into, and at the same time, the feeling that you may have been so into what was happening right around your own board, that you have failed to see the next incoming wave.

Time to start paddling.

Bunch of people have posted about Blogexplosion. It’s a way to randomly encounter new weblogs, and also to drive (random) traffic to your own site. I recently came into discussion with someone about the idea of “public weblogging,” that is weblogs that are kept for a fairly public audience.

My weblog is a public weblog. I entered into it in part because I thought that as a public employee and an educator I had a responsibility to speak publicly on matters in which I had some knowledge. Luckily, I didn’t stop there! But many weblogs are not really designed to attract a large or a public audience. Many people are happy to have a weblog for their friends and family, or a fairly close-knit group. These two types of blogging are interesting for different reasons.

Visiting random blogs through, for example, the random link at blo.gs feels very different from Blogexplosion in large part because those who have joined the latter are seeking out public audiences.

I know many of my more far-flung readers have, like me, been using Firefox for a very long time. When I saw the features list, I almost didn’t make the move to version 1.0, because everything was working so well. I’m glad I did. Maybe it’s my imagination, but it seems even faster. It still shocks me that people are using IE when there is such a good alternative out there. You might not think what browser you use matters much, but having recently tried to rescue a computer that had been pretty much rendered nonfunctional by Internet Explorer, the fix was easy enough: I installed Firefox on their machine and suggested that they forget IE ever existed. In other words, go download it.

Firefox, at its basic level, has a great set of features. I don’t know how I ever lived without tabbed browsing! But the extensions make it even more powerful. In my setup, I have the spellbound tool, which lets me spell check my forms (very helpful for blogging), and an Autofill extension that mimics IE’s utility. To help my language impairment, I have Translate Page, and I am eagerly awaiting an update to Moji so it will work with the new Firefox. I have a small extension that saves me keystrokes in using the Wayback machine. But the killer extension has to be Web Developer, which lets me edit CSS on the fly, on any web page, among other very useful things.

I am also using the excellent Mozilla Calendar, both at home and at work. They are linked using regular old ftp (no fancy webdav for me) to my web page, and I have a copy of PHP iCalendar displaying it to the public here. Except for an annoying bug that makes sharing my “to do” list a bit problematical, I have been very pleased with this set up. I only wish I could get my colleagues to both keep and share their calendars, but I doubt this will happen any time soon.