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Re: VIDEO: The Simpsons Do a Send-Up of Social Media

mbogle — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 18:57:57 -0000

Likewise in Australia, for a supposed digital video success story I just don't see it. Literally and figuratively.

Re: Twitter Update Preservation Society

mbogle — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 15:40:11 -0000

Sure you could. In fact for a while I was subscribing to the feed for the search results for the term UNSW in Google Reader. Even though I've since unsubscribed from the feed I'm still able to locate tweets using the Google Reader Search. Good idea, I'd completely forgotten about that.

Re: Tweets in Perpetuity: An experiment in syndication

mbogle — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 23:52:49 -0000

Hi Ed,

I'm not so sure about releasing this widely as a service necessarily, however I am quite happy to add you to the list - in fact I've just begun to aggregate and syndicate your updates. I've added them to their own category here: http://p2.techticker.net/?cat=10

I think my preference would be to err on the side of caution in the short term, while I assess how well things are working. So limiting the number of feeds coming through (at least initially) seems like the safest plan.

That said I'm happy to assist/advise others on how they can set up similar systems if they desire and will continue to document the process I'm working through - including issues or pleasant surprises. It's not very difficult and yet lets you retain control over your data (whether you choose to release it under open licenses or not).

One of the main considerations at this stage is load and capacity. I have no idea what sort of strain syndication will exert on the system - or what thresholds may exist after which things start to have trouble. I seem to recall that one of my colleagues at UNSW ran into problems syndicating the feeds of many blogs, and which ultimately started bringing down the server. I don't expect it would happen in this instance - because he was pulling in several hundred blogs-worth of data - however it is a possibility to bear in mind.

I've also just discovered that the feeds from individual users are being handled differently from those of hashtags. @ references and weblinks are being made formatted as clickable links in the instance of hashtags, but not for individual users - and I have no idea why that's the case.

Realistically there's a fair amount of work and investigation I want to do to ensure the system is reliable and effective. So as long as you're happy for things to be occasionally unpredictable you're more than welcome aboard. :)

Re: Culture Shock and Disillusionment

mbogle — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 16:39:23 -0000

Some really valuable thoughts here, Lisa. Thanks very much for this! Quite literally in several places I thought "ooooooh that's deep."

For example, the thought had never occurred to me that this "...is the only place you *can* affect change." I was so caught up in melancholy navel-gazing about the fact "nobody agrees with me" (which isn't necessarily true anyway) that I overlooked the fact that if everyone did agree with me there would be no need for change - it would have already taken place. Great point :)

Secondly, and more importantly, your point about the positive impacts of our efforts not being immediately revealed. Quite true again. It's all too easy to take see the voices of criticism (or indeed those who agree with you) as being representative of an entire group - and yet that's not necessarily the case.

More than likely there is a range of opinion on the matter, with only a select few feeling compelled or confident enough to make their opinions known. Blogging is a lot like that too come to think of it.

The recurring theme I've seen in response to this is the notion that change takes time. People need space and opportunity to internalise new concepts and ideas, synthesize and make sense of them and determine how it might relate or assist in their local context.

You also can't expect to please everyone anyway, or expect that everyone will agree with you. That's just not realistic either.

Finally, me, a "teacher?" That is a truly frightening thought - for the world mind you, not so much me :)

Thanks for the comment - seeing things from your perspective has helped tremendously.

Re: Culture Shock and Disillusionment

mbogle — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 16:23:58 -0000

Thanks Lauren :) Your first sentence was one of the main reasons for sharing my train of thought. I find personally that witnessing or observing how people approach failure or adversity are as valuable an experience or example as how they handle successes - sometimes even more so.

And of course too, by discussing the areas where we're having trouble or confusion, we put ourselves in a position where others can begin to share their experiences or thoughts on the matter and add an additional layer of perspective that would have been absence otherwise.

The half-dozen @replies I saw on Twitter when I logged in this morning are testimony to that. The social power of social media is an amazing thing.

Re: Twitter: Mitigating the Noise with Seesmic & TweetDeck Groups

mbogle — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 01:30:04 -0000

Chris! How've you been? I notice a major shortage of posts on your blog as of late. Are you going to start writing again?

Yeah Seesmic is a nice app. Though admittedly I use TweetDeck more because it lets you sync your colums, groups and other configurations across machines by tying them together with an online account.

If I were only on one machine it would be a non-issue, but I use at least 5 different ones (between home, work, laptop and dual-booting machines), so the sync option comes in really handy.

I have to say that using the group option the last few days makes me wonder how I ever went without it. Follow people who rarely post, so it's good to be able to keep track of what they have to say.

Hope all is well! Talk to you later.

Re: Gmail Lets You Check Your Google Voice Messages

mbogle — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 15:38:45 -0000

Exactly. From down here in Australia it SOUNDS interesting, but all the innovation is of little use to us unless they release the service more widely. So for all the talk I've seen about Google and Skype being on a head-on course with one another, I fail to see how that will eventuate unless Google Voice is allowed to occupy the same international stage.

Re: POLL: Do You Still Use a Dictionary?

mbogle — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 20:12:27 -0000

Me too. Occasionally it's for spelling, but mainly I use them to ensure I'm using a word in the proper context.

Re: Distributed Models of Sharing

mbogle — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 18:03:33 -0000

I started responding to this as a comment but it quickly grew into something else so I've devoted a new post to it: "Use Case for the Distributed Model." Comments, skepticism and debate welcome :D

Re: Distributed Models of Sharing

mbogle — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 19:02:45 -0000

No, not necessarily a single language - it's far more folksonomic than that. Think of Diigo and Delicious, and the way a single link can be tagged, and re-tagged according to different criteria.

With a distributed model it would have to be folksonomic and flexible; not only because you'd be relying on the inputs/feeds of a web of people who each control what terminology is used, but also because it would rely on the context in which it was originally created.

This is part of where it has to be embedded in practice I think. Feed-based architectures are extremely flexible. They can be used as broadly as tag = education, for specific courses (tag = cck09) or even smaller, and everywhere in between. Part of the process then becomes the negotiation around practice, what tags are used, and in what context. (You know this already of course, I'm just saying this for the benefit of others who may stumble across this conversation).

Additionally, if you look at some of the stuff that people like Jim Groom are doing, and Mat Wall-Smith at New South Blogs here at UNSW (http://newsouthblogs.org), they're syndicating at a site-level as well as aggregating. They'll pull in feeds, re-filter them against a different set of criteria, and then re-syndicate them out again. So conceivably we could begin to see sites syndicating and aggregating with one another.

So really what's needed is not only the technical architectures that are able to support folksonomic organisation, but a culture that recognises the need to negotiate terms and co-operate in their implementation.

I want to expand this post to include an educational use case - perhaps my thoughts on this will be a bit more clear at that point. I'll try to get to this today :)

Re: Diversifying your software portfolio

mbogle — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 03:15:05 -0000

Agreed, that's one of the reasons why I have such an aversion to the phrases Human Resources or Human Capital. People are far more than more than inputs for production.

Re: Digress.it and Comment Press enable granual discussions

mbogle — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 10:01:28 -0000

Ah yes that's true. That's one of the aspects of Diigo I haven't really experimented much with yet to be honest - in fact I'd completely forgotten it exists. Thanks for reminding me!

The fact you can access the option merely by installing the toolbar plugin for Firefox rather than setting up a custom WordPress blog makes it much easier to set-up. Plus you can use it in conjunction with any website, can't you? Definitely an option worth considering - that's for sure.

Thanks for pointing that out - I'll be sure to take a closer look.

Re: Self-assessment of my presentation skills

mbogle — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 06:12:02 -0000

Hi Olivia, Please feel free to quote as much as you like. In fact everything I publish here is shared under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, so please make use of whatever you need.

Use of video as a reflective tool is a great idea. There's nothing quite like that point of view to shed light on your performance from another perspective. Personally I find it really valuable, but you're right - it does take some getting used to

I'll definitely take on board your suggestions about pausing to breathe too. I find it's really helpful to regroup your thoughts and get back on track as well.

Re: Self-assessment of my presentation skills

mbogle — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 06:06:50 -0000

Thanks for the vote of confidence, Belinda :) Honestly nervousness and stagefright is something I've been grappling with for as long as I can remember, so I'm sort of used to it.

Fortunately these days I don't get nervous about being nervous anymore and have learned to deal with it and take it in its stride. As I said, one of the motivating factors for me to keep presenting is a drive to get better at it and overcome the heebie jeebies :) In fact I've grown to quite like presenting and look forward to doing it again, so in that sense I've come a long way.

Now that you mentioned it I was definitely conscious of the time and rushing a bit, so that in a sense was an added pressure. In hindsight I think I was overly ambitious about what I was trying to fit into the 10 minutes I'd allocated myself - so that's an important lesson it itself really.

I am optimistic about ultimately overcoming the willies to be honest. The fact I'm starting to find my comfort zone and presentation style is very inspiring in itself. Just have to keep practicing.

Re: The challenge of educational change

mbogle — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 01:19:05 -0000

Oop, yes you're quite right about subversion being an internal force. Though surely external forces/pressure would exert at least some pressure on educational systems (or indeed structures of any kind). I guess the question would be the extent of the pressure and the degree to which it was sustained

Re: Self-assessment of my presentation skills

mbogle — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 20:24:24 -0000

Thanks Rhys. I was a bit wary about airing what I felt was my dirty laundry, but then realised that modeling practice is as much about documenting weaknesses and failures as it is about successes. Often times I learn as much from hearing about what didn't go well as I do about ideals and perfect execution.

Re: The challenge of educational change

mbogle — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 20:01:44 -0000

Thanks Gina.

Personally though I will continue to see value in open education and social media and will continue to operate in this paradigm even if there is no uptake at a local level whatsoever. I continue to push for change because I believe it is important and that it's what's best for education and for learning more generally. This doesn't necessarily mean it will happen, that it will be easy, or that it will ever be widely recognised as having inherent value as a new way of working.

It is disheartening sometimes to feel as though no one wants to listen, but really the more I talk about this stuff the more I'm reminded of how much it means to me. So that in itself keeps me going - I'm reminded of why I've chosen to live and work in the open.

I think too that continuing to carry on in spite of adversity and skepticism is important because in doing so we model practice and essentially become use cases on what openness is, how it works, and what the benefits are. Just because people aren't listening now doesn't necessarily mean they won't slowly begin to recognise what is happening over time.

It's like moving a mountain one spoonful of sand at a time - you just have to keep at it.

Re: The challenge of educational change

mbogle — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 18:52:13 -0000

Oops, yes you're quite right about subversion being an internal force. Though surely external forces/pressure would exert at least some pressure on educational systems (or indeed structures of any kind). I guess the question would be the extent of the pressure and the degree to which it was sustained.

That said, I'm trying to think of a relevant example of this and am having coming up with one. The example of market forces (in a business sense) wouldn't work because education isn't necessaily subject to them. Perhaps a political one - for example a historical event where activism or sustained protests eventually forced a change in policy?

Re: The challenge of educational change

mbogle — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 16:09:59 -0000

Good thoughts, thanks for that :) I must admit I was in a pretty pessimistic mood when I wrote this yesterday. To a fair degree I remain pretty skeptical about the possibilites of systemic change - there are too many chefs trying to control the recipe in the soup - however I hadn't considered the notion that all the infighting may actually be creating room for subversive pockets of innovation. That's a great thought really.

I'm curious too, could you expand on your distinction between rebellion and subversion within organisations as opposed to outside of it. Are there current examples of one versus the other - for example, would you consider the fact Jim Groom went outside local IT to host UMW blogs on an external server internal subversion? I suppose I would. What would be an example of subversion outside the system?

Re: Open Education versus Open Educational Resources

mbogle — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 02:13:16 -0000

Sorry about the login requirement - I was gettnghammered by spammers for a while and thought it might provide a deterrent.

I certainly don't want it driving away or otherwise obstructing discusson though so as soon as I get home I'll make login optional again.

Re: Help! Internet Connectivity Problems.

mbogle — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 01:07:10 -0000

That's interesting to hear. Were your ISP and phone company the same or different?

My wife noticed on two occasions that Skype calls between my daughter and her friend dropped out the second she answered the cordless phone. It may be a coincidence granted, but it's a very strange symptom nonetheless. Such a pain in the butt regardless! I normally am quite patient with troubleshooting technical problems, but this is getting old LOL.

Re: Help! Internet Connectivity Problems.

mbogle — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 20:25:36 -0000

Must be something in the air :) One thing that might be of use to you, I spoke with my ISP yesterday and they suggested I isolate the internet connection (e.g. unplug the phone line temporarily) and retest everything. Her implication was that sometimes the phone signal can interfere with the connection.

If after removing the phone from the equation the internet connection immediately improves it may be an issue with the phone line, in which case you could request a more detailed line test.

In my case she said it's worth running this test before they escalate the issue to the phone company, because if it turns out that the phone line is perfectly fine and the cause is related to something within the LAN we have to pay $100 for the request.

Haven't tried this test yet though, so I don't know what the results are. Watch this space - I'll post an update as soon as I can.

Good luck to us both!

Re: My CCK09 PLE

mbogle — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 15:54:40 -0000

I had much the same experiences as you when first experimenting with video. It's such an unnerving sensation to stare at yourself talking, and almost confronting in its ability to challenge the perspectives we have of ourselves. It does get easier as time goes by.

Michael Wesch has talked about this in a couple of his videos and has some very insightful thoughts on the matter. If I can manage to find the one I'm thinking of I'll be happy to post it in the comments here.

As far as SecondLife goes I've had similar experiences as well. It takes a fairly hefty system spec to use the software, and in fact at one stage none of the computers in our entire training room could use them. I think it comes down to the video card and amount of RAM you have mainly - but CPU speed and bandwidth almost certainly play a role as well.

To be honest I didn't use SL much during CCK08, largely because of the time zone factors I mentioned in the post. I was very interested in trying, but unfortunately most of the meetings fell during off-hours here.

I did manage to meet up with Lisa Lane at one stage and we had a chance to experiment, but that was really it. This is one thing I'm hoping to experiment a bit more with this time around, but that remains to be seen I guess.

For the moment at least why not join the Diigo group that Ed Webb created - http://groups.diigo.com/groups/cck0809. There's only 5 members at the moment but we're trying to drum up support. If we get enough people we may end up using it during the course - that ultimately depends on how much interest there is.

Re: My CCK09 PLE

mbogle — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 01:33:36 -0000

I saw your FB comment come through just a moment ago and was going to point you here - glad you've already found it!

As far as Diigo goes, one thing worth pointing out is they offer the option to replicate your bookmarks in Delicious, which is what I do. So anything you bookmark in Diigo is passed along to Delicious using the same tags. So you could conceivably use Diigo in the short-term during CCK09 and then switch back to Delicious afterwards without having lost any bookmarks.

If you have a Diigo account just go to https://secure.diigo.com/tools/save_to_others and you'll see three services included in the Save Elsewhere options - Delicious, Ma.gnolia, and Simpy.

To be honest I don't know much about Diigo groups, so I might have a play today or tomorrow to see what they can do. The platform doesn't matter so much to me as the people - I'm happy to go where ever you two are.

Given Ed's feeling towards Facebook, I think that pretty much rules out that option. I guess use of Diigo or not will depend on how many other people we can drum up support with.

If it's not enough are we assuming that we'll just head over to Moodle?

Re: My CCK09 PLE

mbogle — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:05:15 -0000

"Wonder if certain interesting contributors from cck08 will be back."

Oh lord I hope not - I'm not the rough and tumble debating type. I can't hold my own in arguments like that - I just crumble and clam up. Academic debates are one thing, some aspects of the CCK08 Moodle felt more like Jerry Springer to me LOL

Recruiting is a good idea. Though if it comes to it I'll go where the discussion is.

Great to hear you're taking the course.