Musings: Web2.0 includes???? (May#7)

So what prompted these musings? There is a school I work with in Sydney, St John Bosco College, that runs a wonderful day for their Year 11 students and I came across something in their booklet that make me think.

 First, I run a study skills session with the group. Then they break into smaller groups for the school’s GROW program (Glossary  Research Organised Writing) where they work on writing styles, identifying key terms, marking criteria, supporting evidence, using scaffolds for writing, and advanced research skills. It is a really impressive program and takes into account the sort of navigation literacy skills that students need.

While waiting Year 11 to arrive, I was flicking through their booklet and came across a section ‘How Web 2.0 Savvy are you’. I quickly jotted down a few points to see whether I was savvy as the Year 11 students:

  • Am I comfortable using the Internet. Yes.
  • Do I have a web page. Yes.
  • Do I read blogs. Yes.
  • Do I write a blog. Yes.
  • Do I have a Myspace etc page. No. Doh!
  • Do I use YouTube. Yes.
  • Do I use podcasts/vodcasts. Yes.
  • Do I subscribe to RSS Feeds. Yes.
  • Do I use Flickr or similar. Yes.
  • Do I read/write wikis. Yes.

So I felt pretty good about how I would compare to a web savvy student. Mind you, 6 months ago prior to this subject for uni I would have only been able to answer yes to 3 of these!

But I started thinking – what else should be on this list? What else do we expect a Web 2.0 afficiado to be comfortable with? Continue reading

Musings: Who owns the right to your content on Facebook? (April#1)

What prompted these musings? A recent discussion on ABC Sydney radio about the Australian swimmer whose party photos on a social networking site were suddenly brought into the spotlight by the media – highlighting the need for careful consideration of all information posted on the Net.

You probably think you own the rights to your Facebook content. Well read on, you might be surprised….

Social Networking sites are definitely here to stay. But do users really think about who might be looking at their information and what it could potentially be used for? If we want to use social networking sites in the e-learning process we need to be aware of potential issues.

  • We need to think about safety. Obviously one should never give away personal information (particularly home addresses) – students especially need to aware that the people they are interacting with may not necessarily be who they represent themselves to be.
  • We need to think about identity theft. This is a growing area of concern and too much publicly posted info makes it easier for the would be identity thieves among us. Reclaiming your identity can be a costly, time-consuming and frustrating process.
  • We need to think about the future. There have been examples in the US where candidates were not hired as interviewers have examined potential employees facebook pages and decided that their personal life did not fit in with the image the company wanted to portray. Things lurk on the net for a long long time. You think you may have deleted a file but it could easily have been held in cache by google and be around for a lot longer. The best way to think about it is never to post anything that you wouldn’t want anyone in the world to see from now until the rest of your life (and beyond!). Because those funny-at-the-time MySpace photos could come back to haunt you when you are trying for the job or career of a lifetime….

AND IF THAT WASN’T ENOUGH… THIS IS REALLY SCARY! Continue reading

Musings: ‘If you can’t beat ’em…..’ (March#7)

What prompted these musings? An article in the Sydney Morning Herald on Sunday 30th March 2008. http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/catholic-church-launches-virtual-parish-on-the-web/2008/03/29/1206207489791.html

Let me say upfront I come from a Catholic background. There are things I like about the Catholic church and things I don’t. One of the things I do not like is that the Catholic church seems so backward in things like the concept of women or married priests (in fact I sent the Pope a Christmas card this year, all the way to the Vatican, explaining that due to priest shortages my mother’s parish can only have mass every second week and asking if they could explain why we can’t have married and women priests – I just don’t get it. No reply yet but it is only 3 months, I am hopeful).

Anyway, this article astounded me. Despite being so behind the times in so many areas, the Catholic church has realised that if they can’t beat them, they have to join them.

So what has happened? Well a new social networking site for Catholics was launched yesterday: http://www.faithtrip.net/ Continue reading