Sugden’s posterous

THIS IS A COPY OF MY POST AT http://eduvel.wordpress.com  (http://eduvel.wordpress.com/2009/06/05/is-twitter-innovative/).
I don't intend to make a habit of posting in two places - but am doing it this time to re-publicise my new MAIN BLOG at http://eduvel.wordpress.com
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On Sunday last, I was invited to follow #spymaster (http://playspymaster.com/) on Twitter. Given that my invite came from a respected friend, and the fact that that friend is one who pushes the boundaries of learning technology (and the further - final fact that it was Sunday and not really a work day - although ....) I succumbed. You never know unless you try!

The game - and this does not really matter for the purposes of my post - puts you in the position of a James Bond, Ilya Kuryakin sort of spy. You have to earn money by doing simple tasks, buy 'stuff' to make you more powerful and assassinate people. That's about it. I saw pretty early on that it was something that, if you became committed to it, would suck the time out of your life. It is/was like everything I hate about Face Book - pointless and silly. However, for the occasional 10 minutes I played with it on the day it was a harmless pastime. The main problem with it, is the viral nature of its invitation policy - unless you're careful everyone you've ever written to or heard from on your email programme will be invited. The designers have clearly set out to rule the world.

Nevertheless, my agreeing to use the game was my choice.

It was a surprise therefore to read several Twitter posts which implied that the game was 'not an innovative use of Twitter'. Because I thought it was. Had it been the sort of thing I actually liked, or if I could have found an educational use for the game - it might have been an innovative use of Twitter. Because Twitter itself no longer innovates. Twitter for many, is just another bandwagon and it's shine will fade (see James Clay's excellent:Ten reasons why Twitter will eventually wither and die… - he cites this game as an example of #9 ). Others have posted that they will un-follow(!!) Twitterers that post to #followfriday. Another form of creeping death.

So what is innovation? Is it anything that doesn't have a bandwagon following it? Surely innovation is the taking of 'something' and putting it to another - useful - use? Perhaps that's the real question - what do we as individuals deem to be useful?

Needless to say, I've now done what I can to disable my #spymaster account. I didn't like it, I couldn't see how it could be adapted for educational purposes and I can't be bothered with it - but as I said before: you never know unless you try!

Also read: Ten things people say about using Twitter, but really they shouldn’t (James Clay).

Cheers

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I've become something of a Twitterer in recent months. My previously preferred micro-blog - Jaiku - has suffered a serious decline in its health and looks (to coin a nautical phrase) 'dead in the water'. I've discussed this before:

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Not sure what this means but here goes:

Apparently this CHANNEL is a good thing. If I like the way it looks and works, I'll try to fit it into my new Village e-Learning blog: http://eduval.wordpress.com

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Hopefully (fingers crossed), we've managed to cure my laptop of its Internet failings.

For a few weeks now (since upgrading Zone Alarm we now believe) my Vista Laptop has intermittently dropped it's connection to the Internet. The XP laptop has been fine (as has Sharon's v.old XP laptop). I'd never thought to press too deeply and ask why she wasn't using her newish Vista laptop to do MSc work but it turned out to have been experiencing the same problem. Actually - the same TWO problems: both occurring since the Zone Alarm upgrade.

I'd been using my XP machine more and more as the Vista laptop was apparently suffering from something terminal, but yesterday, Betony's dad came along to install a new ink system for my printer (don't ask - apparently its cheaper and lasts longer) and he offered to investigate the problem for me. He came across lots of references to FireFox v Zone Alarm problems - the people at FireFox quite viciously saying "it's a Z A problem - they should fix it". But the clincher for us was this post:

http://forums.techguy.org/web-email/782499-solved-firefox-ie7-stop-working-2.html

It fitted my problem exactly (both IE7 and FF suffered the problem) so we took the necessary action and uninstalled Zone Alarm and installed instead another free Firewall - Comodo - http://www.comodo.com/ (fingers crossed - Problem solved)

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http://www.ipadio.com/phlog.asp?section=39&phlogid=289&phlogcastId=1299

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Today’s Sunday Times http://is.gd/yuvc has two topics for discussion. The first concerns revolting students [http://is.gd/yuKy] and the second is discussed two times this week: the seemingly new (sic) phenomena known as Twitter.

[http://is.gd/yttY] (The Truman Show has arrived) and [http://is.gd/yakp] (The men who made Twitter Tweet)

The students are up in arms because teaching standards at their University have not risen in line with the implementation of tuition fees. Apparently: “The prospectus suggested lectures would be given to groups of about 100 students. In reality, they contain up to 380, although 150-200 is more typical.”

All the article serves to do is reinforce in the minds of readers a Blott-on-the-landscape style of university education. What is right about lectures being given to groups of 100 students? Never mind to a typical 150-200! I suspect (and apocryphally know) that many Professors didn’t come into the University to “teach” – but... I ask you... what can be gained by perpetuating this medieval teaching style. The students have every right to demand education rather than lecturing.

And what does the University in question say in its defence? [The University] described as “not true” the idea that increased tuition fees were intended to lead directly to improved teaching. Instead, it says they are aimed at strengthening the finances of universities

Oh really? And when the University finances have strengthened – what then? Are learners and learning still at the heart of their raison d'être? I wish the students luck. It’s about time someone cared about how education post 16 is delivered.

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The amount of interest over Twitter continues to amaze me. How many column inches must this provision attract before it becomes a useless parody of itself? I now have [I am dsugden] 99 followers! I know less than half of these people. I follow just one celebrity, purely because I find the things he does and the language he uses interesting. Everyone else is a work colleague of one kind or another.

In my previous defence of micro-blogging [http://dsugden.posterous.com/micro-blogging-0] I was reacting to another Sunday Times article (don’t they ever read their back numbers?) and I’d then suggested that I and friends used micro-blogging “as a means of mutual self-support and development”. I’ve had no reason to change this opinion, despite the long drawn out illness of Jaiku (another micro-blogging site). www.jaiku.com

Today’s articles are a little less pointed and both authors seem to take the stance that it’s safer to site on the fence and only mildly ridicule the site as so many readers subscribe.

People who see the point of sites such as Twitter (and Facebook – which to me is already a hateful parody of itself!) should be allowed to continue communicating in this way without having to have the constant SPAM of new users hitting the follow-everyone button (if there is one: there must be?)

I heard one lady (my sort of age) talking to a shop assistant in Somerfield’s the other day. “Are you sure Facebook is safe?” – “yes perfectly safe – you just join and invite those you know” – “so it really is safe, really?” – “yes” – “it’s just that I heard it wasn’t safe”. “No it’s perfectly safe, as long as you just invite those you know, I’ve never had a problem.” – “So you’re sure it’s safe?” – and so on ... Just an example of media watchers and readers following like sheep I suspect but what is ‘safe’? what does it mean?

Hey ho.

David

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Frieda replied to my post thus:

Thanks for your post David. I agree with you that there is no plan B and that if we decide to use such tools we are throwing the die and playing with our luck ('alea jacta est'). However, what I wouldn't like to see is 'fashion' in web 2.0.
Twitter and Facebook for example seem to be in vogue now, even with all the issues Facebook has around 'privacy of data'. Does it mean that we can only rely (or partially rely) on web 2.0 fashionable?

Is the Web dying? - Sugden's posterous (7 May 2009)

http://dsugden.posterous.com/is-the-web-dying

http://snipurl.com/hjaek

[The clip above is courtesy of Hyperwords - I chose to 'copy with link']

[I decided to reply this way because the replies to Comments on Posterous is not the best way of opening up a discussion. I'd still like to see a wider discussion of the principles of this debate]

.. and I agree that parts of the web can be 'fashionable', which is why we must not lose site of our pedagogical principles.

As I said previously, we should use the web as a convenience and as an aid but we should base this convenience on basic tenets of teaching and learning. Research and evaluation can still be done in a library - it is not just a feature of online web engines; storage of media can still be done in other ways; when one web facility fails, there is always another to take its place (fingers crossed). If Flickr ever dies, because I still keep tabs on another couple of sites, I know that they could easily replace that particular convenience.

As Frieda suggests - beware of 'fashion' but exploit the underpinning principles offered.

David

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 Following my friend Frieda's recent Posterous post [http://frieda.posterous.com/can-we-trust-it] I thought I'd put a few thoughts together by way of support and to perhaps extend the argument.

Frieda’s question was that now e-Tribes had ceased to be (fallen off its perch; gone to meet its maker ...) “How do we solve the issue of web 2.0 reliability without falling into the hands of VLEs? Can it be solved?

What's the plan B ??? ”

1)   – First of all: There is no plan B! I'm afraid that the answer is as bleak as that.

2)   – Next: I don’t think we can solve the problem of Web 2.0 – it is what it is ...

We’ve always known (I think we have always known) that the web is flaky and that we should only trust it as far as it can be convenient. E-Tribes and similar document hosting web sites (I’m thinking of e-Snips here) have always had the convenient tag for me. I’ve always kept a back-up of any materials posted and simply used the convenience offered by world-wide and round the clock access to host materials for use by or to be shared with others. I lost patience with e-Snips a long time ago as it sought to ‘groovy-up’ the stuff I’d posted and to fix me up with some girl or chap somewhere else on the internet who was gagging for it!!!

Flickr (http://www.flickr.com) and to a lesser extent YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/) are exceptions to this rule for me. Although I keep the majority of images posted to Flickr and most of the video clips on YouTube as files on one of my computers – these are not as ordered or easy to access as those online. Should Flickr fall by the wayside I would have a serious case of depression, which I suspect is what Frieda feels now, as she has invested the same amount of time and effort into e-Tribes as I have into the photo hosting site. The difference between the sites for me is that Flickr has always had a ‘Pro’ level, for which you pay a minimal amount. It’s also backed by Yahoo! I suspect that if Yahoo! went belly-up – it would be the time to worry.

So – does partnership with a world renowned web presence (Google, Yahoo, AOL etc.) mean that a loved Web 2.0 facility will survive? Not really. Jaiku [http://davidsugden.jaiku.com/overview] became part of the Google juggernaut a while ago and is now slowly dying from a lack of real support. Unlike Twitter [http://twitter.com/dsugden], another micro-blogging site, it provide (used to provide) the opportunity to import RSS feeds and to be updated from a phone. This gave huge educational potential, which colleagues and I had begun to explore. It has the ability to ‘group’ discussions in such a way that all contributors could follow the thread – not just those who were being ‘followed’ by the contributor. On Twitter this leads to confusion as only a fraction of any wide reaching discussion can be followed. AND Twitter is now Spam-ridden.

Gabcast [www.gabcast.com] started charging for their provision in March – which caused many of us to back off. It’s still worth paying for the service, if the service fits your needs but (finally a positive point) others have leaped to fill Gabcast’s place. See www.ipadio.com

See http://dsugden.posterous.com/gabcast 
and http://dsugden.posterous.com/gabcast-replacements

3)   – Finally: “without falling into the hands of VLEs” Nice one Frieda – much more discussion there I think! :-)

David

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At last - a real Gabcast replacment (at least for the way I used to use Gabcast)



I've just made the above recording on www.ipadio.com and as you see, they provide an embed code (the URL can be taken from the address bar). But - and here's the real bonus for me: by registering with the site and logging in - I was able to download the file I'd recorded as an MP3.

Many thanks to the guys at iPadio - Mark Smith and I have been exchanging emails all week and he has been able (with much burning of the midnight oil) to make this work as we in Education might like it to work.

The way it works, is you register a phone number (that's a change from Gabcast, but for those of us used to Spinvox and Jaiku, that's not a problem) and they send you a code and two telephone numbers. An 0845 number for local calls from a land line and an 020 number which (fingers crossed - just like with Gabcast) can count as part of a phone call bundle on mobiles (020 is a london number).

So there you go - let us know what you think.

David

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Thanks to James Clay - we have a Gabcast replacement (well almost and well not entriely due to James Clay - but thanks to him for bringing it to my attention).

http://audioboo.fm/boos/7557-i-ve-posted-a-phoneboo

James has blogged about it here: http://elearningstuff.wordpress.com/2009/04/10/audioboofm/

So - is there a downside? - Well, compared to Gabcast there are a few, yes - but it's still early days.

The biggest problem for me is that it is designed for the iPhone (and iTouch) although James has said he used a Nokia to make a recording too. I haven't tried this yet but used my home phone to dial 0203 393 6430 and then followed instructions. With Gabcast, you then went to your area and 'claimed' your recording but with Audioboo (at this time) you have to go straight to the home page and search for it amongst the others. But this wasn't an arduous task for me and the URL and Embed cod are provided for you to use. However - there is no option to donwload, which was a major feature of Gabcast.

It's worth following http://twitter.com/markrock to keep up to date with what's happening but for now, i'm going to investigate www.ipadio.com

I saw this site mentioned in one of the responses to James' post.

It says:

Right now ipadio is free for consumers. 

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