Hey folks! Just a reminder. If you’re watching this page for updates and disappointed you might want to check out my new blog Ubernoggin where I write about technology, education, business and other smart stuff. Go check it out!
Mark Bell (www.storygeek.com) and I are currently writing Second Life for Dummies. At the end of the book we’ll be listing a few top ten lists. I’d really like these lists to reflect, not just what I find interesting and useful, but also what others find as well. So here it is, your turn to speak up and nominate your fav SL spots. Leave them as a comment with a SLURL attached. Feel free to nominate as many as you want and pass this link on to others so they can come by and nominate places. These should be “don’t miss” spots of any kind: best shopping, best build, mot creative space…anything and everything!
Hehe! Even after over a year of news coverage, the New York Times, USAToday and others I still get a thrill from being mentioned in the news.
I’m still reeling over how amazing this event was. Can’t wait for next week’s NMC conference.
I was a bit of a slacker with sources on my PowerPoint for last Friday’s Best Practice conference in SL so I’ve received a few requests for sources. I’ll give you one better. I’ll give you my whole research bib. I tend to maintain one big one in a spreadsheet that allows me to draw on all the sources I have indexed for various projects. This lets me compare sources and ideas that I might not have thought of as being connected. I’ve been working on this baby for years. It’s a bit sloppy and has some “intellagirl-ese” in it but you’ll find the sources I mentioned on Friday and maybe a bit more that you’ll find useful so have at it!
**Update: link to bib fixed
Hey folks! It’s finally summer break here. Phew! We made it through another academic year. Over the summer I’ll be focusing a bit more of my attention to my new blog UberNoggin. I hope you’ll all check it out, grab the feed, and tune in. There will still be lots of Second Life stuff there but a lot more too. Social networking, marketing in digital worlds and other fun mashup stuff that I think you’ll all enjoy. So, hop on over and check it out.
One of the toughest parts of playing with new ideas is finding a way to effectively present those ideas to other people. You wrestle with PowerPoint graphs, charts, doodles you make in Photoshop and finally stomp off in a frustrated huff. Well, no more! Ralph Lengler and Dr. Martin J. Eppler from visual-literacy.org have developed a fantastic chart that organizes tons of ways to present information in visual ways.
Not only is it super handy to hover over each of the methods and see examples, but the chart itself helps us to see connections between different approaches. The table itself is a brilliant example of how the right visual can not only present information but actually make knowledge by organizing material.
Go check it out and be inspired!
The term “web 2.0″ has become about as hackneyed as a Valley Girl’s “gag me with a spoon.” Everything from Youtube (which is actually an example of what web 2.0 is meant to describe) to a car’s company’s “build your own car” page (which is far from it) is being described as “web 2.0.” The term has come to mean very little but the idea behind it is still worth thinking about.
Why is it important to think about a potentially over used idea? Because, though it’s been abused it’s still useful. Understanding the larger trends in this new shift to user-centered web experiences can help us understand our own use of the web as well as serve as reminders of the kinds of web experiences we should be offering our students, customers, friends.
To best organize our thoughts about the concept, it’s useful to go back to Tim O’reilly’s original version of the term. O’reilly laid out four concepts to describe (not prescribe) aspects of new uses of the internet but I’m going to focus on the first two. To see more clink on the link.
Why this is important: In a few years we won’t remember what it was like to install new software with the exception of the latest fandangled browser. Our word processing, spread sheets, email and the like will all be online via a website. We’re already there in many ways thanks to Google’s docs, spreadsheets, and gmail. But I’m still writing this blog entry in Word 2007 which I installed off of a disk. Why is “the web as platform” a big deal? Access. Instead of investing in computers with gigs and gigs of hard drive space we can instead focus on a speedy connection and a bit of ram. More people will have access to the tools that we find common and we need not all have our own computer to be able to store documents and important information. In addition, being able to access your info from anywhere means no more lugging around laptops. Folks who can’t afford a computer won’t be so limited when they use a public access machine.
How this should change the way we think: Programs such as Photoshop are now online with cheap access. When we teach we can provide students access to software that would have been cost prohibitive in the past. Platforms like Second Life give us entrance to a world of human resources and concepts about 3D modeling (which we can also play with via Sketchup, another freebie from Google). More and more companies are learning that making their software available via a browser makes good business sense. We’re moving toward a model of openness that will benefit everyone (see #2 on this list), which makes us all potentially more productive, and builds great positive ethos for the companies which play along and let their guard down.
Why this is important: If you haven’t perused Pierre Levy’s book Collective Intelligence do it. The basic idea is that EVERYONE has knowledge that is valuable so SOMEONE. From the street cleaner to the CEO, we all have something to contribute. Wikipedia is the perfect example of the benefit of valuing collective knowledge. Everyone contributes and everyone benefits. Sites like Youtube and MySpace are close to this model in that they become “better” when more people contribute but there’s a line where too much is, well, too much and the site becomes burdensome to navigate. The real strength of harnessing the collective is that we all put in a little and get back a lot.
How this should change the way we think: In education we’ve got to start thinking about our students in a different way. They aren’t just receptacles to be filled with our knowledge. They’re knowledge makers and we can put them in the driver’s seat. They may be teenagers, returning adults, grandparents…whoever they are they have valuable experience and knowledge, unique perspectives and experiences. Making use of what they know and how they see the world can create a rich learning environment. Use a wiki, blog with comments, or any collaborative project that they design and execute and watch the ideas fly!
As businesses we should think of our customers the same way. They can teach us more about our product/service than we can teach them. As I’ve said before, a happy customer is a better marketing tool than any advertising campaign created by folks around a board room table. Smart companies allow their customers to become evangelists for their products.
In the end, the bottom line boils down to one concept: openness. Openness in business practices. Openness in classrooms. Openness in software and applications. The more we share, the more we benefit. Give away some power, some information and get so much more back.
For more great info about what web 2.0 is visit these links:
It’s official. In May I will begin a new position as the Director of Emerging Technologies (great title, huh?) at Media Sauce in Indianapolis.
Media Sauce is a fantastically hip multi-media marketing company. As Director of Emerging Technologies I will be responsible for researching and creating “the next big thing” in multi-media content delivery and creation. I’ll be focusing on participatory technologies that put the consumer/producer/audience in the driver’s seat.
In addition to research in new technologies I’ll also be focusing on innovative ways to apply existing methods. Second Life and other immersive spaces, social networking, and participatory media models. I’ll also be hitting the road to talk to folks about this new model of marketing and training and writing white papers about the research we conduct.
It’s my dream job and I’m ecstatic about it! I’ll still be cranking away at the dissertation and teaching a class here and there as well.
Stay tuned for news about research and other projects. Also *blatant plug here* if you’re in need of a well developed Second Life space or you’d like to discuss another project drop me a line at my new email address sarah dot robbins at mediasauce dot com. I’m excited to harness the creative energies at Media Sauce and aim them at Second Life. We’re going to be up to some super innovative stuff so keep an eye out for us.
For the past few months I’ve been working on a covert project for ANGEL Learning (www.angellearning.com). Together with their chief products officer, Ray Henderson, a few students, and with lots of input from SLED members, who were sworn to secrecy, we’ve developed Angel Learning Isle. The island is dedicated to providing space for SL educators new and experienced as well as easy-to-use tutorials for building and SL basics. The island features:
a friendly orientation garden with all the basics of getting around and communicating
a huge sandbox with a built in building tutorial
an educator’s tool gallery housing examples of free and inexpensive teaching tools such as white boards, slide shows, turn taking tools etc
classrooms on demand: simply type your name in a note card and drop it in the kiosk. the classroom pops up and announces who is using it. To remove the classroom just touch the kiosk again and “poof!” it’s gone.
dynamic seating area with arrangements for group work, small meetings, large groups, and media viewing
teleport gazebo with landmarks to other great education spots in SL (submit you landmark and screen shot to me to be added to the gazebo)
Angel Learning headquarters: here you can learn more about the Angel learning management system, meet up with other Angel users, or just hang out
We’re adding new info and items all the time so we hope you’ll come by and come back often.
To find the island just search for “Angel Learning Isle” on your region map. The island is open to both Angel users and non-Angel users.
Billy tunes out during discussion. Sally would rather pass notes about boys than read an assignment. As teachers, it’s our job to engage our students and to teach them to learn, to be excited and curious about the world around them. To feel that the subject matter in our classes is relevant and important to their lives. We serve as examples of what a life of intellectual curiosity can yield. In the end, we’re all salesmen. Selling a way of life, selling the thirst for information, selling our students on the benefits of knowledge.
Now, I know what some of you are thinking. You’re not in the business of entertaining your students. Kids who don’t want to learn don’t deserve your time. Your effort is better spent on the students in your class who actually want to learn. I understand where you’re coming from if you feel this way and I’ve certainly had these thoughts. However, if we think of ourselves as marketers in addition to being educators we get a whole new perspective on hesitant or resistant students.
Marketers focus in on a potential audience who they believe would benefit from purchasing their product just as we focus on tailoring our teaching for the students in our classes (or at least we should). Often a marketer creates different marketing schemes for different potential demographics just as adjust our teaching depending on where we teach, when we teach, and who our students are. Marketers don’t give up when their sales figures are disappointing. They don’t dismiss potential customers who don’t respond to advertising. They seek another way to reach those customers. Educators should do the same.
We should at least be as dedicated to reaching our customers students as the marketers who sell them their sneakers and their cell phones. Our product is much more important to their lives.
I certainly advocate evangelize for technology in the classroom. I’ve spoken to teachers all around the country in an effort to get them excited about using technology to teach and learn and it’s wonderful to see folks get excited about their teaching. To see the virtual “light bulbs” popping up around a group of teachers who have been beaten down by administration and standardized testing. But nothing beats seeing it happen in an actual classroom.
Last week I returned to my consulting work at a local high school after being away for a couple of weeks while I was on the “Intellatour.” While I was away the new Smart Boards were delivered and installed in the English department classrooms. Smart Boards are very simple touch screens that, with a LCD projector, create an interactive extension to a desktop machine. These simple devices completely changed the attitudes toward technology in the English hall. Skeptical teachers are now embracing new devices and best of all, they’re PLAYING with the technology.
The teacher who normally teaches theatre tech and acting and is now teaching more English classes than he’d like is using his Smart Board with Sketch-Up to draw theatre sets and plan blocking for the play he’s directing. Another teacher had students up at the board writing notes using the Smart Board pens, converting their writing to text, and making these the notes for the day’s discussion. Collaborative work has evolved where there was none. Teachers and students are invigorated about learning not just the technology but the course work as well.
This week I’ll be training all the teachers in the high school to use Moodle. I can only hope that this addition to the tools available to them will make an even greater impact in this little rural school system. Viva la technology!
I attended the American Education Researcher’s Association conference in Chicago. Dr. Sharon Tettegah organized a great invited panel for us. There were eight panelists with only seven minutes each and, beyond the technology problems we ran into, we made the best of our brief presentations. Ranging from Jeremy Kemp’s presentation about Sloodle to Vicki Suter’s talk about establishing a sense of “place” to my discussion of shifts in pedagogy in virtual environments…all wonderful talks. But even better than the panel, as is usually the case, was the informal idea sharing over pizza later. About twenty folks met up, shared yummy deep-dish pizza, and brainstormed about they way we use Second Life in education and business. Who says the folks on the coasts have all the fun?
Johnathon Richter at AERA
Mother’s day is coming soon. My mom (in her mid 50s) just registered her first domain and blogs every day. She amazes me at every turn. So here with Mom’s day approaching I’m trying to figure out what to get my newly-techy mother for a gift and I read her blog only to find out that she’s make ME a present.
Everyone who knows me well knows I have a serious infatuation with socks. My mom takes it to a new level by making me home made ones that out do even my craziest pairs.
She rocks!
Nancy Baym was nice enough to tag me on the latest blogger’s meme: the Simply Successful Secrets project. The idea is to list five things you do everyday that contribute to your success so that we can all learn from each other and be more “successful” together. Apparently I’m “on a roll” lately so perhaps someone out there will benefit from my crazy habits.
Well that’s my five plus one. Now who to tag next? Hmmm that’s tough. I know so many people I consider highly successful.
-My mother : she blogs now. I couldn’t be prouder of her. She’s a super mom!
-CC Chapman: a dedicated dad, super smart media guy, and endlessly genuine
-Chris Flook: he’s one tenacious dude and a fantastic friend. Watch him, folks. He’s gonna be BIG someday very soon.
-Dr. Samantha Blackmon: one of the most genuine, powerful women I’ve met in a long time. She pulls no punches.
-Mark Bell: the love of my life and one of the most inspiring people I know.
It’s still completely strange to me that folks are posting videos of the talks I give. Anyhow…if you weren’t able to listen in last Monday or you just wanna see my shiny face have a look here to see the video shot at UNC. Thanks to Larry Taylor for shooting this and posting it.
Here are some links I mentioned in my Project Parlor today at Educause. Please feel free to poke around and bring any questions you might have to tomorrow’s concurrent session.
The UNC talk went so well today. We had over 60 people in the room in RL and 80+ in SL. Audio was streamed in, Larry Taylor did a great job displaying my Powerpoint, while Mark “drove” my avatar so I could talk to the room. UNC will be posting video of the talk soon. I’ll add a link here when it’s up. Meanwhile, if you want to check out the PowerPoint, it’s loaded up here.
I don’t know why I’m so excited, but I am. Finally over 100 del.icio.us bookmarks for my site! Woot woot!
Chris Essex, of Indiana University, interviewed me about my Second Life class. You can listen here. It’s a fun listen and he asked great questions. Have a listen!
I’ve been working on lots of presentations lately but this one is the most fun. For CCCC I’ll be talking about the value of identity play in SL as a benefit to education. This picture is the first slide of the PowerPoint. A little provocative? Maybe. But very fun. The allusion to “What Not to Wear” (the BBC version) ought to get a few chuckles.
There’s a definite benefit to being a little shocking when giving a presentation. What fun is there in listening to some say things you already know and agree with?
The PowerPoint is now posted here.
Monday. It’s week two of Intellatour 2007! This week I’m off to New York City for CCCC and then off to Raliegh NC for a lecture at UNC and Educause Immersive Learning Environments focus session. Between the two stops I’m presenting SEVEN times! Yikes. Here’s the lowdown:
Pheww! My little pink suitcase is hitting the road in a big way this week. I’ll be twittering and posting Flickr pics as often as possible. I’m looking forward to meeting lots of interesting folks and maybe even converting a few people to the wonders of teaching in Second Life. Wish me luck!
You know Second Life has “arrived” when blocking it is a selling point for security software. According to Computer Active, security software company Sophos will soon release a patch to prevent corporate users to log in to SL. And I thought only high schools were control-freakish enough to clamp down on computer use with this kind of granularity. It seems to me that if enough people in your office are spending that much time in SL that perhaps you should consider making use of the that time in a way that could increase productivity (in-world meetings etc) rather than policing it with security software. If only we could see usage stats from some of these companies. Then again, services like Twitter and the eagerly anticipated my.secondlife.com will provide users other ways to interact with their SL contacts.
Over at The Atlantic, Michael Hirschorn is writing about whether or not the “Web 2.0 bubble” is about to burst. Hirschorn quotes Todd Dagres, co-founder of venture-capital firm Spark Capital, told The Wall StreetJournal. “[speaking of the current wave of web 2.0 sites]Lots of incomplete and underexperienced teams, business models based more on eyeballs than cash flow, and a rash of incremental and ‘me too’ deals.”
The article claims that today’s Facebook and MySpace (as the biggest social networking sites) are short lived in their interest and usefulness. Once you have a million friends what do you do?
I can understand Hirschorn’s point. I’ve got memberships on about fifty social spaces, jumping in as they come online just to see how they work (twitter.com being the newest craze of the week). I’ve been excited and then bored by so many great services that I can’t count them all. So, here, I can agree with the article.
What Hirschorn neglects, though, is what will replace the friends-race. We’ve all become too accustomed to being able to connect to just give it up because the sites become boring. We may continually migrate from one useful site to another but I can’t believe that once the novelty wears off that we’ll just go back to email and flat webpages.
What do you think? Is the bubble gonna burst?
I’ve just come back from a day of presentations at Columbia College in Chicago. In the afternoon I spoke in Patrick Lichty’s media theory class. Patrick had just begun to introduce MMO culture so I gave a little talk about identity construction in digital environments. Via communication mechanics is these digital spaces, we create versions of ourselves. I wanted the students to understand 1) how they create their online identity and 2) that these are real identities. I finished up by “proving” that Second Life if real.
See the PowerPoint here.
In the evening I gave a talk about education in Second Life to some faculty and community members.
That PowerPoint is here.
I also got to meet Bryan Campen (Cyrus Huffhines in SL)! He’s just as awesome in RL as he is in SL. Check out pics here.
I’ve been interested in participatory media for years and it just keeps getting more interesting. Last night on Heroes (best show on TV by the way) NBC announced a contest that allows viewers to submit their theories about the truth behind on the twists and intrigue in the show via videos. This is far from Youtube where anyone can upload any video they like. This is NBC asking for very specific videos, screening them, and posting the ones they like best to their website. It made me realize that there are far more than a few models of participatory media. O’reilly defined Web 2.0 for us two years ago. But a lot has changed since then. So I went in search of definitions that might help frame what we’re seeing happen in today’s media.
Pete Blackshaw’s CGM Glossary post helps quite a bit. Here are some summaries of his definitions:
I don’t think many folks would argue that Second Life is some form of participatory media but which of these categories would you put it in? In some ways residents of SL are co-creators with Linden, thus making SL a form of CSM. If we didn’t make the world interesting and they didn’t make it possible there’d be no Second Life.
However, the way that Linden insists on letting its residents take the limelight for their innovations makes it feel a bit like CFM.
Things get even more convoluted when you consider specific efforts inside the SL world. How many spaces actually include content contributed by the folks who visit them and how many are built like static showcases?
Still thinking this over. What do you all think? Do we need to add a category to Blackshaw’s list to accomodate SL?
AngryBeth Shortbread is a genius! If you haven’t been to The Port, then GO! Go now! Come back and read the rest of this later. If you have been there, well…go again! Why? Because AngryBeth does something that most great Metaverse creators just don’t seem the catch on to…she changes things up. The great bits of her place are always there but there is always something new too. For example, have you seen the caves under her place? If you haven’t, I say again, go now! Go ahead…I’ll wait.
Ok you’re back.
You’ve seen the caves. You’ve seen that AngryBeth is always building and developing new features in her SL space. But this post is about more than the fact that Ms. Shortbread is a genius. It’s about the importance of making an SL space dynamic. Most folks spend a good amount of time developing a space when they first buy land but whether you’re a big Multiverse Development Company or just a little guy with a 512 newbie spot, you’ve got to keep it moving if you want to maintain a certain level of traffic. It’s not enough to build something grandiose if it stays static. The best stores get in new merchandise all the time. The best games add dynamic content to keep folks coming back. The best SL spaces offer a consistent and yet ever-changing (even if it’s just a bit of the space that changes) experience. A static sim in SL is about as exciting as your grandma’s living room. If it’s looked exactly the same way since you were five how eager are you to go back? And SL spaces don’t even bake cookies!
There are two ways to keep a space dynamic: 1) new interactive content and 2) new people. It’s a cycle. If you build it they will come. If you rebuild it, they’ll come again and again. The more people who stop by and spend time and tell their friends…well the more people who will come by, spend time, and tell their friends. See the trend? What’s the point of a great space if no one sees it?
Hiro Pendgragon recently blogged about the way that Dell has integrated their SL presence into their overall market strategy. This is also smart. If your SL space is an extension of a larger project (a website, a company, a class) it can’t be treated as optional. It shouldn’t be presented in a wishy-washy way that makes it seem less than necessary. In addition, if you’ve developed the space correctly, the people who visit it will make it necessary as well through their participation in the space.
We have to remember that building an SL presence is only the beginning of a long process. It’s a relationship. You wouldn’t consider landing the first date with a girl the end of the relationship and this is no different.
For the last few weeks my students have been researching the rhetorical relationship between communities and the spaces they inhabit. The students have written several blog entries analyzing spaces they find interesting in real life to break down how communities create spaces and how these spaces serve to create emotional responses and prompt people to perform specific actions. Now it’s time to make our own.
Last week the students presented “pitches” for rhetorical spaces which included 
details about the intended audience, focus points, ways to measure the effectiveness of the space, and some kind of interactive component that would require visitors to take an action. They researched Second Life and real life places, synthesized what they learned and proposed a space to the class. We had eight presentations ranging from recreating the Coliseum to creating a micro version of Chicago. After all the presentations were finished the students voted on which space they’d like to spend the rest of the semester researching, constructing, and then using for more research to write up in a final paper.
The winning plan is for a “Celebrity After-Party.” The goal of the space is make visitors understand the pressures of being a celebrity and inform them about common downfalls of well known people. While exploring the mansion, visitors will learn about the tension associated with paparazzi, the pressures of being a public figure, and the vices that often end careers and lives.
Click here to see the student PowerPoint for the project. *posted with student permission*
As you can see, the two students who put together the plan thought it out very well but now it’s the class’s turn to take it apart, collaborate on the details and make it a reality. Our first step will be A LOT of research and writing…shh don’t tell them. Besides learning about how spaces can be communicative, they’ll also be learning research skills (both primary and secondary), collaborative writing skills, and learning about the sort of “cult of personality” that surrounds celebrity. Unlike a generic paper, the project will require them to complete the research in order to proceed to the next step. After all, how can we create that Jimmy Hendrix room if we haven’t learned all there is to know about him?
Stay tuned…The students will be blogging the project progress here over the next two months.
We’ve all made the jokes about the lack of reliability in Microsoft products and I’d normally be the last person to crow about the wonders of anything with so much spyware…HOWEVER…Office 2007 Word makes blogging to a Wordpress site so nice!
Since I updated to Firefox 2.0 I’ve had endless problems with the popup menus that allow you to insert images and links in Wordpress. They’d be cut off, non responsive, and generally just finicky. However, since I’m completely reliant on Zotero I didn’t want to go back to a previous version of Firefox. Then I got Office 2007 and the blogging function in Word was like the heavens opening and Bill Gates handing me a giant aspirin to fix all my blogging headaches.
I blog in Word, click publish, and my text, images, and links go straight to this Wordpress site with nice formatting that doesn’t mess up my template. Images are sized just how I wanted them and I don’t end up screaming at my machine. I can even add borders and make use of all the goofy clipart that comes with Word!
I’ve also found this great site with easy to follow instructions to get your publishing options all set up. If you use Wordpress you should try it out!
*steps off infomercial soap box*
This is pretty interesting. Take a look.
A recent study by professors at San Diego State finds that today’s college students are narcissist. Over 16,000 college students filled out a questionnaire to measure their NPI score (Narcissistic Personality Inventory). “The NPI test divides narcissism into seven components: superiority, exhibitionism, entitlement, vanity, authority, exploitiveness and self-sufficiency.” (Pinsky)
The study asserts that narcissists “are more likely to have romantic relationships that are short-lived, at risk for infidelity, lack emotional warmth, and to exhibit game-playing, dishonesty, and over-controlling and violent behaviors.”
“Current technology fuels the increase in narcissism,” Twenge said. “By its very name, MySpace encourages attention-seeking, as does YouTube.” From CNN
Our ability to create personal blogs and webpages, to post videos and photos of ourselves where others can see them, to create a position for ourselves (however small it may be) in the world of global media is a powerful thing. We no longer have to accept anonymity in the crowd. However, I’m not so sure that these kinds of participatory media necessarily make us narcissistic. Perhaps we feel a sense of agency, of ability to make ourselves heard, or even the power to affect change. Is that being full of ourselves? Certainly not in every case.
If feeling like I have important things to say that I want to share with others makes me narcissist then I’ll wear the label with pride and hope that others follow suit.
The NPI asks questions such as
While we should hope that we’re not raising a generation of folks hell-bent on world domination, I see nothing wrong with people feeling “special” or believing in their ability to shape their own lives. There seems to be a disconnect (from what I can find about the NPI…if you know more help me out here) between the narcissism that Pinsky talks about and the kind of self-esteem issues dealt with in the NPI found. Here are the NPI questions…see for yourself (from Raskin and Terry).
From what I’ve been able to find, the real difference between confidence and narcissism is an imbalance between how you see yourself and how you think others see you. It’s the difference between looking in the mirror at your slightly overweight body and saying “I’m fat and that’s perfect!” (narcissistic) and “I’m fat. I know I could be thinner but I’m happy with who I am” (self-esteem). If you’re in denial that others might see you differently than you see yourself, or if you see yourself in an idealized way that denies the facts you might be narcissist. So it boils down to a lack of ability to take others’ views of you into account. So now let’s think back to this idea that the internet breeds narcissists.
Argue with me on this if you disagree but it seems to me that the internet does just the opposite. Sites like Hot or Not, Facebook etc allow people to be brutally honest about you or to easily show their affection for the “you” that they see. You may think that video of you dancing in your bedroom is a real smash but the five hits you got on YouTube should tell you the opposite. Easy feedback systems like this, feedback made of quantitative clear information, should help combat an incompatibility between perception and reality.
Of course, if we let ourselves think about the constructed, and often fictional, identities and egos that some use in virtual worlds like Second Life…well that’s a blog for another day.
Thanks, Spin. How nice of you to say so.
Pheww! Take a deep breath. Don’t scream. Well not until after you watch this. Yes, Fox news has done a report on the John Edwards campaign (which it claims is officially endorsed by his office though I’ve read the contrary).
Seriously, after watching this “news” report I had to walk laps around my living room to prevent myself from SCREAMING! This is the most selective, biased, uninformed “journalistic” propaganda I’ve seen in a while and that’s saying something!
Apparently, Second Life is just filled to the brim with sexual deviants, rude Christians, and terrorist violence. There’s no mention of music, education, art, social discourse (which this reporter believes can only be accomplished through chat…what about the space itself? Hello!!!).
Wow…yeah…I have to calm down. I’ll go watch that German kid screaming again. He’s Zen compared to how I feel about this level of disgustingly sloppy reporting
In the podcast I recorded yesterday with Akela Talamaska we discussed the potential effects of the integration of voice in Second Life. As we discussed it I mentioned that voice might result in a “wave of honesty across the grid.” As is the case with many interesting ideas, the concept of honesty hadn’t occurred to me until right then when I said it and I’ve been mulling over it since.
There are about as many definitions of community as there are laptops in a Starbucks:
A community is a relatively self-sufficient population, residing in a limited geographic area, bound together by feelings of unity and interdependency.” Munon, 1968.
Communities are characterized by three things: common interests, frequent interaction, and identification.”
“Virtual communities are social aggregations that emerge from the Net when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships in cyberspace.” Howard Rheingold, The Virtual Community
“I define “community” as networks of interpersonal ties that provide sociability, support, information, a sense of belonging, and social identity. I do not limit my thinking about community to neighbourhoods and villages. This is good advice for any epoch and especially pertinent for the twenty-first century.” Wellman 2001
“An online community consists of people who interact socially as they strive to satisfy their own needs or perform special roles; a shared purpose that provides a reason for the community; policies that guide people’s interactions; and computer systems to support and mediate social interaction and facilitate a sense of togetherness.” Preece 2000
So we’re left with geography (whether physical or perceived by the boundaries of a form of communication), common interests, a sense of togetherness or attachment, and some form of frequent communication. I find it interesting that none of these definitions suggests that there must be honesty or self-exposure as a prerequisite for a community. Perhaps the “interdependency,” “identification,” and “sense of belonging” are implying that, in order to form relationships through communication, participants are honest and self-exposing at least enough to be accepted as being authentic members of the community.
The more I think about the role of honesty and openness in these kinds of communities, the more convinced I am that there is a critical and unstated element of honesty at play. At least, if not more, community members have an agreed upon (if unstated) level of honesty and self-exposure that they use as a standard. Even in groups founded on anonymity such as Alcoholics Anonymous, while members may be able to use a pseudonym in meetings, it’s expected that the stories and struggles they share will be authentic and not fabricated. In a group where everyone is open and exposed a single person who isn’t is perceived as an intruder and a violator.
So how does this apply to Second Life?I refer back to my “wave of honesty” revelation. With the integration of voice not only will folks who have been using an alternate identity in SL be given an opportunity to “out” themselves. But even for folks who don’t use an alternate identity, the opportunity to share more of themselves should increase trust relationships (or void relationships completely if there was deception involved) thus increasing community.
I’m still concerned whether this wave will be isolated in specific places thus creating increased cohesion in pockets rather than grid wide. I suppose we’ll have to wait and see.
Bryon Munon. Changing Community Dimensions. 1968. Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press, 1. Wellman, Barry. 1979. “The Community Question.” American Journal of Sociology 84: 1201-31.
Preece, J. (2000). Online Communities: designing usability, supporting sociability. Chichester: Wiley.
Rheingold, Howard. Virtual Community. 2000. Boston: MIT Press.
Here’s the latest Intellacast! After a long hiatus the podcast is back! This episode is an interview with Akela Talamasca (aka Keoni Chavez in RL), the lead blogger for the Second Life Insider. We had a chat about avatars, blogging about SL, and VOICE in SL! Have a listen!
Have a listen…oh and after you listen…the term that Akela was having so much trouble remembering is “Cognitive Dissonance” so play along and fill in the term when you hear him say “uhhhhhhh what’s that word!”The links mentioned are:
How it will work:
As I understand it, voice chat will be available for both proximal chat (out loud talking to people in a certain vicinity) as well as for group IM and one-on-one IM.
Island owners will be able to opt in our out of the function on their land but may have to increase their monthly maintenance (which might effect those of us with education land who pay a reduced maintenance fee?).
The announcement was not clear about multiple concurrent voice sessions (if you’re voice IMing with one person and proximal chatting with another) or whether individuals who don’t own land will have to change their accounts to make voice possible.
Obviously, there are still many questions to be answered.
The implications:
It would be tough to cover all the possible ramifications of integrated voice chat so I’m going to focus most on the educational implications. Please note that since so much of the mechanics of this new service are unknown that much of what I predict here may need to be revised as more information is known
Status: One of my biggest concerns is that voice chatting will somehow be perceived as more “valid” than text chat. What I mean is that once voice chat is widely available, those who choose to stick with text chat (for whatever reason) may be perceived as being dishonest or deceptive. Folks who stick to text may have very valid reasons for doing so (disabilities, lack of microphone etc.) but will that matter?
Cost: Though voice was a much-demanded feature of SL I can’t help but wonder if it’s a well-played ploy to get all land owners paying the new maintenance fee. Those of us who built islands before the increase are still paying the old maintenance price of $150 a month. New island owners pay $295 a month. A significant increase especially when many educators are working with funds from grants. Suddenly our money goes half as far and the maintenance budget we had for a year will only cover six months. this is a MAJOR issue for many. Of course, we can always decide not to enable voice on our islands and be safe from the increase but paying for functionality has never been part of the SL model and I think it goes directly against their philosophy. What’s next? A fee for each avatar over 40 hosted on an island? I don’t like unexpected increases in price and I don’t like systems which point out the “haves” and “have nots” in such a dramatic way.
Practicality and Social Implications: One of the huge benefits of text chat in class is that everyone can talk at once. Turn taking can go out the window in favor a discussion free-for-all. Not all groups can function this way but I’ve found it very beneficial for discussion in my classes. Voice simply isn’t practical when more than a handful of people are part of the conversation. It’s difficult to know who is speaking (which is important for teaching, after all where does that participation grade come from if we don’t know who’s talking?). Even more bizarre, imagine being in a public space with spatial voice enabled, a small group discussion, for example. You’re chatting away with those near enough to hear and suddenly a stranger comes in and disrupts the conversation. Can we mute just him? If we set him to ignore will we still hear him? See his text chat? Will that ignore work if we’re not the land owners?
In addition, one would think there would have to be a limit to how many people can be on the channel. A dance club with 40+ avatars whoopin’ it up would drown out any music being played. The subtle sounds of running water, chirping birds, or wind will be gone in favor of chitterchatter of folks around you. One can hope that we’ll be able to turn voice on and off so we can enjoy peace when we want.
I also wonder if there will be any visible sign that someone has voice enabled. Imagine being a “voice chatter” and walking up to a stranger: “Hello! Hello? HELLO!?” and not knowing that they can’t hear you.
Logging: Logging is a major concern for educators. We like to keep records of discussion, not just with students but with other educators, for our own benefit and for the benefit of others. Audio records, if they’re possible, are difficult to transcribe and can result in huge files. So much of the great discussion will be lost in time unless everyone agrees to use text chat.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not against voice chat in Second Life. For many things voice chat will be better. Presenters will be able to free their hands from typing and instead perform gestures as they speak. Giving new folks instruction via voice might be much easier. We can learn so much about someone from their voice, their accent (for better or worse) and this might increase the establishment of trust relationships. I could go on and on about the potential benefits but I think they’re much more self-evident than the potential hurdles that we’ll have to navigate to overcome potential problems.
How do you feel about voice chat in Second Life? Leave a comment. Let’s start a discussion.
Mike Bloxham, the Director of Insight and Researcher for the Center for Media Design here at Ball State, is the most amazing networker I’ve ever met. You need only talk to him for a minute to trust him and feel like you’ve known him for years. In his job at the CMD, Bloxham is responsible for instigating new contracts for research and development. So how does a center in Muncie, Indiana make contacts to conduct research on eye-tracking, interactive television, and convergent media? They get a man like Bloxham on the case. So I decided to interview Mike and get all the wisdom I could get out of him in an hour over a fancy cup of coffee. Here are some of the highlights of our conversation:
Question: So how about using a site like LinkedIn to build your business network? The importance of blogging?
Bloxham responded that he’s not convinced that such sites really work to increase contacts. He stated that, though he’s on LinkedIn, he doesn’t really use it. Rather, he said he’d rather build his contact face to face or through conversation about common interests.
“I have to say since I started writing the blog at the beginning of this year on Media Post’s tv boards which I do every week, that’s been really interesting because there are some people I have met at events since then who have commented that they read my tv board and then there are others who I already knew but none the less it’s another conversation point and it gives me a feel for the reach of something like that.”
Bloxham added, though, that he thinks blogging on a reputable site which already has an audience is far different from a personal blog. So rather than blogging on your own, why not try to be a blogger for a larger site? However, Mike also added that blogging on your own can still be a valuable way to prove to readers that you have something to say.
Bloxham uses Google Alerts to track down links back to his entries and to the CMD.
Mike and I then talked about writing effective blog posts. I asked him about his sense of humor and whether he had ever been misunderstood in his blogs:
“It’s a very critical stage because they’ll [visitors] come back sometimes having misread it, which is actually hilarious. I don’t actually indulge in correcting people; I just let people argue among themselves. You’ve got to be able to write well; you’ve got to be a good communicator and I think a lot of people look at digital forms and digital tools as a means of avoiding the more difficult forms of communication and I think those who view them in that way are going to fall foul because they’re lost, you’re just fooling yourself.” Though blogs are often written in less formal language, it’s important to be sure that your text accurately presents what you’re trying to say. You can have incredible things to say but if you write them poorly no one is going to get your message.
Bloxham also had interesting things to say about attracting an audience. Rather than writing what you think people will be interested in: “I think one way in creating an audience is being in tune with your audience, to kind of set the tone for the audience; they have to decide whether or not they want to be your audience.” Mike’s advice seems a little contrary but I think he’s right. Your message, your blog, will read as being more authentic, and therefore more engaging, if you think less about pleasing everyone and more about engaging the audience you’re most concerned with.
When planning conference presentations and blogs Bloxham says it’s important to have an opinion: “People aren’t drawn to boring material. One of the things I always say to people who ask me to present is that I’ll have opinions on things. You may not agree with the opinions but you’ve got something to disagree with there. Something people are interested in….. yeah like if everything is very mutual, very matter of fact and desperate not to offend anybody or come up with any original ideas, and then just give it up and get a good sleep under a duvet. Why bother getting out of bed? You simply just want to get paid. I want something to justify my time which is obviously more valuable then doing it just for cash.” Bloxham is all about stirring people up whether it’s through presenting unique research, using humor to get the audience involved (he once pretended to snort coke off of the podium during a presentation), or being controversial. His approach makes sense. What blog entries get passed around the mailing lists you’re on? The ones that agree with the majority or the ones that stir people up? “I don’t think you need to be desperate to please the audience all the time. If you’re polite about it you can very easily turn around and say, ‘you’re not going to want to hear this. You may fervently disagree with this’ and then we can have a striking argument with a nice beer together. I’m going to agree to disagree and that’s absolutely great because there may be the argument; we’ll have an original thought each and wouldn’t that be a valuable use of our time?”
Bloxham is a treasure trove of fantastic advice. From being controversial, to tips on remembering names, his perspective and attitude set a high bar for those of us who aspire to create mutually beneficial networks of like-minded people.
I was lucky to have been invited to run an in-world education workshop for the MIT Beyond Broadcast conference today. We had a great turnout of about 20 people. The discussion ranged from creating connections between the real and the virtual, simple simulation tools that anyone can make in SL, all the way to Sloodle and professional teaching avatars. Stay tuned for links to blogs about the event.
My students have been studying how to read a space as a text of the community to which it belongs. We’ve drawn maps of common places (our kitchens, the local food court, our classroom etc) and tracked the traffic to identify the focal points and shared artifacts in the space.
Last night we moved our studies to SL. We visited three places: AOL Pointe, the Regina Spektor space, and Sony’s Media island (thanks to all the great developers who built these spaces!). Using group IM, we discussed what we saw and how it effected us. We noted what caught our eye first, the interactivity of the spaces, who the intended audience was etc.
The students decided that all three spaces had the same audience, context, medium and purpose (to sell a product to 20ish folks in SL using an immersive space). However, they quickly pointed out that the voice and tone of each space was very different. AOL was described as “needy”, “in your face”, and “pushy.” The Spektor space was described as “warm”, “comfy”, and “subtle.” Sony’s space made us explore before we found videos, games, and other product promotion items. Students said that this was a “independent” voice that encouraged us to explore. They compared the Sony space to being in a record store (they still go to record stores?!!) where the sales people aren’t pushy and just let you look.
At the end of class we talked about how they can apply what they learned to the proposals they’re writing. Most agreed that they wanted to think about different “voices” their spaces could have and more subtle ways to get visitors to participate in the space.
Have you ever wandered into one of the SL welcome areas and been asked “So now what do I do?” or “Where can I go to fight?” If you have, you’ve run into an MMORPG player. The most common response I hear from gamer friends who try SL (because they want me to shut up about how great it is) is “So I logged in, walked around and stuff, then I got bored and quit. I don’t know what you see in this place.”
Well, today we get a treat. A look inside the brain of a gamer who tried SL. Drew, from “Toothpaste for Dinner” has written a hilarious blog post about trying out SL. Read it and laugh…..
Last night in my class one of my students, sitting at a table in the back of the room, kept smiling at his laptop screen. He wasn’t clicking much, not typing at all, and seemed a bit engaged in the discussion though not as engaged as others. Midway through the discussion I asked what was funny on the screen. Later in class, when I noticed him smiling at his screen again, I joked that I must not be as funny as usual because whatever was on the screen was more interesting. When class was over I spoke to the student one on one. I didn’t tell him not to bring his laptop to class. I didn’t even threaten that he’d lose participation points. I told him that if his laptop was distracting to him in another class period I would increase the level of ridicule until he was adequately embarrassed. The conversation was light but I know he got the point.
Those of us who advocate technology in the classroom have to be ready to deal with the issues that come about as students acclimate to using these tools in the most effective ways. Banning laptops from the classroom is not the right decision. A government professor at Scaramento prohibits laptops and “outlines it in his course syllabus that states, “NO LAPTOPS - a clever way to look attentive while e-mailing your friends or surfing the Internet.” Shoch requires his students to take notes the old-fashioned way” (The State Hornet). According to the Harvard Crimson one professor “responded to the issue by having a teaching fellow (TF) deduct participation points from students caught checking their e-mail in lecture” though the same professor admits that she believes computers are good in class but email is bad.
Compare these reactions to a statement made by John Chambers, CEO of the computer networking giant Cisco Systems:
“Do you ever watch your children doing their homework?” he asked. “They’re listening to music, instant messaging, and chatting on the phone at the same time. These aren’t distractions you’re seeing, but new forms of collaboration. You may not like it. You may say, ‘That’s not for me.’ But believe me, that’ll be you in five years. You will change your form of collaboration, in your business and in your personal interactions….Collaboration is the next frontier. It will be enabled by different concepts and different devices, but it will be about the power of the human network in ways we are just beginning to understand.”
From THE Journal
Where is the disconnect between the 9-18 year old kids who Chambers refers to, the18-22 year olds who are in our higher ed classrooms, and we, as educators? How are we using technology so differently that we don’t understand how one another makes the best use? How do we teach students to maintain their intellectual curiosity, use their laptops to engage rather than disengage? How do we teach ourselves to trust our students to manage their own learning and be as responsible as we believe ourselves to be when we pop open our own laptops in a conference presentation or during a meeting?
I suggest the best way to do this is to model the kind of technology use we think is best for our classrooms. When a student raises a question we should run to our machines, look up an answer and share it with the class. We shouldn’t be afraid to say “I don’t know, let’s look it up.” We should charge our students with finding information to share with the class. We should discuss the ways they use technology, the ways they study, the media they consume and help them take best advantage of the technology they have access to.
Paul Madsen, Conor Cahill, Richard Piccarreto and I all participated in Aldo Castaneda’s Digital Identity podcast last week. Have a listen! We discussed everything from OpenID to how digital identities are formed. It was a blast and I learned a bunch from these great guys. Have a listen and I’m sure you’ll learn a thing or two as well.
From YouTube to blogs to Doritos commercials in the Super Bowl and the new Bare Naked Ladies video, User Generated Content (UGC) is everywhere. It’s fabulous that the average Joe (or Josephine) can become a creator instead of just a passive consumer. And though the term UGC is certainly under contention and most folks agree that the quality of UGC isn’t always the best . But just as many are ready to defend, perhaps not the quality, but the relevance of UGC . The seven ideas Jenkins suggests in this blog entry are useful as we begin to examine one of the largest communities of dedicated content creators, Second Life. Jenkins offers more but here is a quick summary:
1. Participatory culture is more about the process than the quality of the products.
2. All creators must start somewhere. Their first efforts may not be that good.
3. The presence of bad art lowers the risk for experimentation.
4. Bad art inspires criticism and therefore growth.
5. Perceptions of quality are subjective.
6. Standards of quality are still evolving.
7. There’s no evidence that UGC actually takes away from the efforts of established creators.
Most folks talk about YouTube etc when they discuss participatory culture, however, if we apply Jenkins’ ideas to Second Life we can begin to see just how relevant what’s going on there could be. Everything in SL is resident-created. It’s truly a participatory culture. Though the world and its mechanics are made by Linden, the rest of SL, what makes it interesting and useful, is made by users.
This brings us to item 1. Second Life isn’t about the quality of these objects. It’s not about whether or not that new race car your avatar is driving really functions like a race car. It’s about the fact that a resident made it, marketed it, and made a little profit from his/her contribution to the space. The SL space facilitates this kind of content creation and encourages the population at large to consume it (or not). It functions as an open market place where everyone can create and participate not just the privileged few.
Item 2: At some point, everyone in SL is a newb. We’ve all worn boxes on our heads. We’ve all built plywood cubes and smiled with pride at our first creation no matter how crude. With practice and experimentation you get better. The system allows for this learning rather than leaving it, again, to a few who already know how to do it.
Item 3: I’ve seen some pretty awful clothing, houses, scripts etc for sale right next to some amazingly skilled products. When I see the t-shirt Joe Whoever made and notice that it’s flawed I can begin to think about how I would do it better even if only for myself. By being exposed to “art” that isn’t quite up to par I’m encouraged to try my own hand. If all the products I encountered were perfect then why would I be motivated to make my own?
Item 4: Jenkins mentions criticism but in SL this criticism can take the form of market forces. Creators who make something new and innovative will sell their products. Those who make mediocre items or overprice their efforts won’t make a single L$. The market serves to critique and cull the less-than-commendable efforts and either drives out the producers who don’t improve or fuels their efforts to make better products.
Item 5: M
