Disorganized in Web 2.0 Life

Created by Theresa Rowe (Oakland University) on August 6, 2007

I started playing around in the Web 2.0 world after personal contacts and conference presentations led me to explore. I wanted to see what this new world looked like. My explorations started with my son Andrew sending me pictures on Flickr. About the same time, I tired of virus-control-and-cleanup on my home PC, and I bought a new Mac with a year of .Mac membership and I uploaded a photo album of my new puppy there. I had SBC-Yahoo as my DSL provider with a Yahoo login.

Educause announced the Connect web site, and I’ve written a little in this blog.

A flurry of e-mail on the CIO list introduced me to Second Life, which I’ve explored as my avatar Theresa Hawks. I have to say that I haven't had the fun with Second Life that seemed to be the promise. It is kind of strange watching several avatar heads look down and the little hands all moving at once while we all try to type out messages. Maybe I'll hold out for real-life conversation from the avatars. We have started creating an Oakland University island in Second Life. We have ideas; we'll need time and effort to shape them.

I wanted to see what all the hype was on Facebook (www.facebook.com) and MySpace, and I created pages there. I uploaded more pictures to Facebook for family contacts. I saw the first pictures of my son’s girlfriend in Flickr and MySpace, and I haven’t met her yet. I never really connected to MySpace.

I was interested in del.icio.us (http://del.icio.us/) for creating a list of resources I’m using to support a couple projects. I created a login in there and started working on a list. Then I learned I could integrate that list with my Facebook page and have done that. I can also show my del.icio.us list on the Educause Connect site and have done that. My favorites are at http://del.icio.us/theresamrowe.

Netvibes came along as a way for me to create a personal portal (www.netvibes.com). I’ve got my personal portal set-up with RSS feeds from my favorite sites. I like the tabs feature that allows me to separate interesting news from technology resources.

Along the way we switched our ISP providers to our cable company. Flickr and Yahoo merged, so I have two Flickr/Yahoo accounts and I’ve been totally unsuccessful in merging these accounts in my limited amount of play time.

I have photos on both Flickraccounts, on Facebook, on the .Mac account, and on a TribalPages site where I have posted historical family photos (http://www.tribalpages.com). I have also entered my Flickr identity on the New Media Consortium member site, but I haven’t figured out what to do with it yet, since I have that mess with two Flickr identities I have to fix. I let the .Mac account lapse because I couldn’t find a way to integrate it into my online life. Before this balloons out of control, I need to think about where my photos will have a home base.

I can go to a number of individual sites, or I can go to Netvibes for the RSS feeds I’ve set up for different sites.

I can share my thoughts by blogging at Educause or by posting at Facebook or meeting with people on Second Life.

One strategy I’m considering is separating my professional life from my work life in online communities, but that is really difficult. My friends aren’t interested in information technology security or e-learning initiatives. My professional contacts aren’t interested in my family sailing adventures, the new puppy or my son’s frequent escapes from New York City life. But I am sure interested in creating an online world that I can manage.

I’ve tried very hard to have a method and madness to my personal identity management. Each of these sites has a login identity methodology, and sometimes it is different enough that I cannot reuse an identity. I’ve tried managing a pattern to passwords, but I find that I am constantly resetting passwords. Any site that doesn’t have an easy method for password resets will probably not be visited twice.

What is that online world that I am creating? It seems to have varying aspects:

Sharing and organizing personal details about my life with family and friends.
Organizing IT management and e-learning tools and resources.
Communicating with so many different people – peers, professional contacts, friends, family and the community of the unknown.

What are the problems?

Mergers can create a nightmare of merging accounts and reconfiguring your environment.
I'm not sure anyone has time or interest to read all this stuff we are posting about ourselves.
Identity, access and password management issues are compounded by the number of different logins and rules.
Some of this starts getting circular. If I want photos shared, which site is “home base” and then spread to the other sites? Same for a blog or whatever you are working with. Home for my photos and home for my blog may be different sites.
How much time am I willing to spend, and what level of return for that time investment do I expect?

So I wanted to share these thoughts; now I'm back to trying to decide how I will use all this for the class I will teach this fall. Is Wikipedia an acceptable resource for the students in the class? Should I post my personal details for students to see in Facebook? Can I use del.icio.us to replace links on the syllabus? What about my professional job - how will I use this? Can we redo our help documentation into a Wiki? What controls will we need to make sure we end up with something of value? Are there copyright issues with having a university blogging server, or should we just encourage bloggers to use any of the existing blogging sites? Hmmmmmm; there's are lot to think about.

web2.0 technology CIO e-learning

Theresa's blog
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3882 reads

OpenID & Appalachian

Submitted by Matt Pasiewicz (EDUCAUSE) on August 8, 2007 - 10:35am.

I'm very interested in the role of OpenID in this respect. Should it become meaningful and pervasive, browser add-ons like Appalachian might prove interesting.

		Disorganized in Web 2.0 Life Created by Theresa Rowe (Oakland University) on August 6, 2007 I started playing around in the Web 2.0 world after personal contacts and conference presentations led me to explore. I wanted to see what this new world looked like. My explorations started with my son Andrew sending me pictures on Flickr. About the same time, I tired of virus-control-and-cleanup on my home PC, and I bought a new Mac with a year of .Mac membership and I uploaded a photo album of my new puppy there. I had SBC-Yahoo as my DSL provider with a Yahoo login. Educause announced the Connect web site, and I’ve written a little in this blog. A flurry of e-mail on the CIO list introduced me to Second Life, which I’ve explored as my avatar Theresa Hawks. I have to say that I haven't had the fun with Second Life that seemed to be the promise. It is kind of strange watching several avatar heads look down and the little hands all moving at once while we all try to type out messages. Maybe I'll hold out for real-life conversation from the avatars. We have started creating an Oakland University island in Second Life. We have ideas; we'll need time and effort to shape them. I wanted to see what all the hype was on Facebook (www.facebook.com) and MySpace, and I created pages there. I uploaded more pictures to Facebook for family contacts. I saw the first pictures of my son’s girlfriend in Flickr and MySpace, and I haven’t met her yet. I never really connected to MySpace. I was interested in del.icio.us (http://del.icio.us/) for creating a list of resources I’m using to support a couple projects. I created a login in there and started working on a list. Then I learned I could integrate that list with my Facebook page and have done that. I can also show my del.icio.us list on the Educause Connect site and have done that. My favorites are at http://del.icio.us/theresamrowe. Netvibes came along as a way for me to create a personal portal (www.netvibes.com). I’ve got my personal portal set-up with RSS feeds from my favorite sites. I like the tabs feature that allows me to separate interesting news from technology resources. Along the way we switched our ISP providers to our cable company. Flickr and Yahoo merged, so I have two Flickr/Yahoo accounts and I’ve been totally unsuccessful in merging these accounts in my limited amount of play time. I have photos on both Flickraccounts, on Facebook, on the .Mac account, and on a TribalPages site where I have posted historical family photos (http://www.tribalpages.com). I have also entered my Flickr identity on the New Media Consortium member site, but I haven’t figured out what to do with it yet, since I have that mess with two Flickr identities I have to fix. I let the .Mac account lapse because I couldn’t find a way to integrate it into my online life. Before this balloons out of control, I need to think about where my photos will have a home base. I can go to a number of individual sites, or I can go to Netvibes for the RSS feeds I’ve set up for different sites. I can share my thoughts by blogging at Educause or by posting at Facebook or meeting with people on Second Life. One strategy I’m considering is separating my professional life from my work life in online communities, but that is really difficult. My friends aren’t interested in information technology security or e-learning initiatives. My professional contacts aren’t interested in my family sailing adventures, the new puppy or my son’s frequent escapes from New York City life. But I am sure interested in creating an online world that I can manage. I’ve tried very hard to have a method and madness to my personal identity management. Each of these sites has a login identity methodology, and sometimes it is different enough that I cannot reuse an identity. I’ve tried managing a pattern to passwords, but I find that I am constantly resetting passwords. Any site that doesn’t have an easy method for password resets will probably not be visited twice. What is that online world that I am creating? It seems to have varying aspects: Sharing and organizing personal details about my life with family and friends. Organizing IT management and e-learning tools and resources. Communicating with so many different people – peers, professional contacts, friends, family and the community of the unknown. What are the problems? Mergers can create a nightmare of merging accounts and reconfiguring your environment. I'm not sure anyone has time or interest to read all this stuff we are posting about ourselves. Identity, access and password management issues are compounded by the number of different logins and rules. Some of this starts getting circular. If I want photos shared, which site is “home base” and then spread to the other sites? Same for a blog or whatever you are working with. Home for my photos and home for my blog may be different sites. How much time am I willing to spend, and what level of return for that time investment do I expect? So I wanted to share these thoughts; now I'm back to trying to decide how I will use all this for the class I will teach this fall. Is Wikipedia an acceptable resource for the students in the class? Should I post my personal details for students to see in Facebook? Can I use del.icio.us to replace links on the syllabus? What about my professional job - how will I use this? Can we redo our help documentation into a Wiki? What controls will we need to make sure we end up with something of value? Are there copyright issues with having a university blogging server, or should we just encourage bloggers to use any of the existing blogging sites? Hmmmmmm; there's are lot to think about. web2.0 technology CIO e-learning Theresa's blog Login or register to post comments 3882 reads OpenID & Appalachian Submitted by Matt Pasiewicz (EDUCAUSE) on August 8, 2007 - 10:35am. I'm very interested in the role of OpenID in this respect. Should it become meaningful and pervasive, browser add-ons like Appalachian might prove interesting. Login or register to post comments
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