Over the past year or so I have been doing what I can only term as "collecting" social software accounts. I am not really sure what to think of most of them but I will post some thoughts here. Gene Smith has put together a summary of the building blocks of social software as well as what he terms a "social software honeycomb" It is a great tool for evaluating how various social software programs will work.
Of the sites that he mentions I have used a couple: Flickr, Twitter, Slideshare and LinkedIn. In addition I spend way too much time on Facebook.
I never really thought of Flickr as a social site--but I guess people are using its interactive features more than I realized. I plan on exploring this angle of it some more. Maybe it will be a good tool to distribute pictures to students. I am not sure yet if I see it as more than a way to share my vacation and party pictures...
Twitter, ah yes Twitter... I have an account. I got if for a conference that I attended. I dutifuly loaded it onto my Crackberry and spent way too much time figuring why I needed or wanted to write tiny little messages to post for everyone to read. I really don't think that I am that interesting...but then again I have a friend who can't get through her day without hearing from Ashton Kutcher. Even my tech friends mock me for having an account. I really don't get it. Teaching with Twitter? Really? Do my students want my little comments all the time? Maybe I am selling myself short...
I have only used SlideShare as a user and enjoyed it, but didn't feel very "social" with it. I noticed that the feature presentation is about Michael Jackson--I am not sure that is a big selling point for the site.
LinkedIn is intriguing to me...seems like Facebook for people who grew up -- boring -- maybe if I wore a tie to work it would seem like a good thing to me--I work at a university so not so much.
Which brings me to Facebook. I have been a regular user (sounds like a drug habit) of the site for a while. I feel like I actually use a fair amount of the social tools there...but then I listen to my students talk and realized I use a small portion (but then again, I actually TALK to people). I have tried to cross the divide and use FaceBook for teaching but I have not had much success--I feel like my students (mostly college freshmen) think I am playing behind enemy lines. They may be correct. I really don't want to see their party pictures or read their status updates. I don't want their weekend behavior to influence my opinion of them in the classroom. I would like to think that would not happen, but I think it is human instinct. I plan on trying again...we shall see.
I need to clean up my social software accounts...if I actually used them all, I would never look up from a keyboard.
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I am not a really social software user. I have a facebook account that I use to share pics with my family since we are so far apart and make comments to friends here and there. I have continuously been invited to the other sites but just don't have the time and am not willing to dedicate anymore time to the computer than I do as it is.
ReplyDeleteI find it very interesting when I hear the comments such as the one you have made about spending way to much time in these social networks.
It is very interesting how different our society is when it comes to the internet and computer use.