i’m sorry, i just don’t know

I attended several sessions about wikis and gaming in education so far at ICLS.  I’ve noticed a couple of themes… First, I’m finally starting to see researchers using existing tools to support learning (second life, wiki software, etc).  Perhaps the tools are finally in a stable enough state for the kinds of projects researchers are trying to conduct.  Or, perhaps researchers decided to put their resources to better use and instead of building systems from scratch, modifying existing systems to fit their needs.  Several of the wiki projects I’ve heard about did just that… they like the idea of wikis, but needed to modify existing software before it was useful.

Vanessa Peters from the University of Toronto used wikis to facilitate collaborative knowledge building among high school students.  Two things were of most interest to me.

1)Students who participated in the wiki knowledge creation project scored significantly higher on assessments than students who did not - It’s nice to see an actual finding that supports what we’ve all believed since wikis came about.

2)On average there were 50 revisions before students got to the actual content creation on any given page.  Things like changing the title, formatting, etc… before any content was added.  This actually mirrors what it takes to get me working on any piece of formal writing.  I will spend an hour getting the font right, choosing just the right words for the title, setting up my page numbers, etc.  I’ve long since accepted this as an odd quirk I have, but maybe it’s not just me.  Perhaps there is some value in that time spent “setting things up” that I’ve overlooked or taken for granted.  Maybe I’m setting up the second stimulus that Yrjö Engeström talked about on Wednesday.

So today it happened.  My engagement with Facebook apps turned from academic interest to obsessive futzing around (my term for what people do when they get caught up in the social presence features of an online community).  And the winner was…. Owned!  Buy and sell your friends.  As of right now, I own about 6 people, almost all of whom I actually know.  I am currently owned by some 49 year old man.  There was a bidding war between him and some guy from Sheffield, England which stopped abruptly when I filled out my profile and said I was married.  Funny how that happens, eh?  Before the fun stopped, the bidding went up to $15,316, so apparently that’s what I’m worth.

All the cool Facebook apps that Justin Ball wrote… it was this one that got me distracted from work and inviting friends to join up with me.  But hey, it looks like I can give Trey to Anne if I want.

Treasuremytext.com will archive and share your text messages. Sign-up is a bit confusing, but for the person who enjoys being the object of voyeurism, this is the app for you. I’ve signed up, but have yet to successfully get my text feed working. And because I know how spectacularly interesting my life is, you’re all welcome to subscribe to my text feed. I’ll be a little puzzled, frankly, if anyone really does.

So, beyond all of that, I’d love to get my hands on this data and do a little discourse analysis. There is so much reactionary stuff out there where people are worried that texting is making our youth stupid. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that all of these people are over 30 and have no particular use or experience with the wonders of texting. In my humble opinion, this assumption is just that… an assumption. In my humble opinion, texting, like I/M is just another literacy. I heard about a study where they tried to see if texting is an addiction. For heaven’s sake. What is it that caused the older folk to freak out whenever a new, pervasive technology comes along? Is it really that threatening?

(4 hours later…)
Revised Review: In order to use this service, it looks like I have to actually go through the step of forwarding my text messages. Boo. Hiss. I’m not going to ever do that. No one would. Give me apps that fit in nicely with what I already do or don’t give them to me at all.

via Dion Hinchcliffe…

Clay Shirky talks about what motivates people to participate in social media creation.

from blip.tv posted with vodpod

A new study found that there are more harmful bacteria on many computer keyboards than there are on toilet seats.  Please, wash your hands.  Video Report Link

A recent report by G. Oliver Young from Forrester Research shows an increasing trend in organizations purchasing and using Web 2.0 tools (Blogs, wikis, widgets, podcasting software, etc.).

It is interesting that there seems to be a direct correlation between the size of the organization and whether or not they are actually buying Web2.0 apps. The larger the organization, the more likely it is to be buying or considering Web 2.0 applications.

via WebGuild

I’m not a programmer.  I’m a novice mash-upper.  I needed to figure out how to gather, aggregate, and publish the blog posts of community members to my existing website.  My constraints:  I couldn’t just set up a wordpress blog to do it.  I had to display this aggregation in our existing community website.  And, my current site did not support any additional forms.  So here’s how I did it…

1. We have a Society website up built on Wild Apricot that lets me set up members only pages.  I set up a “Submit your Blog” page there.
2. Since Wild Apricot has no API (boo!) into their data, I had to find an external form service, enter:  Wufoo.  The free account lets us build up to three forms.  They store the data (which I’m not concerned about because it is publicly available blogs) which we can access via an online API.
3. I manually (here’s the clunky part) add the feeds to Yahoo Pipes which publishes them out as one aggregated RSS feed.
4. This feed gets turned into a widget by me and Widgetbox.
5. I copy the code for the widget into my community site, and everything is right in the world.

Why a community site is good for an Association…  We want to be clear that we support collaborative engagement around issues relevant to our industry.  Only our MEMBERS can contribute to the conversation.  People are motivated to do this because it builds their online reputation- a powerful motivator as can be seen by the popularity of Web 2.0 apps that support online identity development and social presence (think Facebook- a multi-billion dollar company).

Intel has new technology that boosts the signal reach of WiFi using radio signals.  It’s cheap, it stretches for tens of miles further than anything else, and it will mean good things for rural environments (and that’s not just Cache Valley, where I live with the cows… Think India, South America, Africa, Asia…).  One step at a time and we’ll get everyone to join our club (you know… Google, Starbucks, MySpace, and eCommerce).  And, of course, this is good news for anyone interested in things like breaking down barriers to entry, allowing for participatory dialogue between individuals in developing areas, and opening up access to education.

via Kate Green

Adobe Photoshop Express is a streamlined, browser-based photo editing and sharing site that currently gives you 2GB of storage just for signing up. You can browse through other people’s galleries already. The editing capabilities are pretty good for the average human. Of course, there’s no comparison to the actual Photoshop, but who uses all of those features anyway? (Other than my lovely designer friends.) Here’s what it can do…