Activity 7: Twitter

This week we’re exploring Twitter. This assignment is due on Tuesday, November 2.

• View the video “Twitter in Plain English” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddO9idmax0o&NR=1) and the video “Twitter Search in Plain English” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGbLWQYJ6iM&feature=video_response)
  
  
• Read the following short articles on real-life applications for Twitter:
• “Amazon Learns a Painful Lesson about the Twitter Hashtag” (http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2009/04/amazon_learns_a_painful_lesson.html)
• “Twitter Craze is Rapidly Changing the Face of Sports” (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/the_bonus/06/05/twitter.sports/index.html)
• “Now 4 Restaurant 2.0” (http://www.newsweek.com/id/187008)
• “A Twitter Timeline of the Iran Election” (http://www.newsweek.com/id/203953)

• Sign up for a free account at Twitter (http://twitter.com/). Your name and username will be visible to Twitter users, but you can choose to keep your updates (tweets) private or put them on the public time line. Only approved friends will be able to see tweets for protected or private accounts.
  
  For more details on how Twitter works and your Twitter page, as well as a brief overview to using Twitter, you can also read this beginner's guide: (http://www.webjunction.org/social-software/articles/content/449889)
  
  
• Then, find some people to follow and try a few tweets!

Post in your blog:

1. Label this post Activity 7: Twitter.
2. Talk about your experience with Twitter, either previously or after completing the activities in this assignment. What do you think of micro-blogging, in general?
3. What potential does a Twitter-like tool have for creating social change? Describe an example from your readings or think of a new one.
4. Based on the ideas in your readings, how might you imagine using Twitter in your future career? Is there potential for such a tool?

Activity 6: RSS

This week we’re focusing on RSS. This post will give you a brief overview of the technology and explain the activities for the week. This assignment is due on Tuesday, October 26.

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and is a file format for delivering regularly updated information over the Web.

1. Read the articles “It Really Is Really Simple: RSS for Educators” and “News á la Carte,” and watch the RSS in Plain English video.
2. Set up an aggregator account with Google Reader.
3. View the Google Reader in Plain English video and add at least three (3) news feeds, blogs, or Web page updates to your account. The video demonstrates several ways to locate and add RSS feeds. You might also use one of these:
• When visiting your favorite Web sites, look for the orange RSS icon. Often a feed icon like this will be displayed somewhere in the navigation of the site.
• Do a blog search in Google. This search limits results only to blog postings.
• Look at the list of RSS feeds available for CNN.
• Do a search in Technorati. Technorati is a popular blog finding tool that lets you search for blogs.
4. Subscribe to the feed for this Learning 2.0 @ SCSU blog. Go to http://learning2scsu2010.blogspot.com/. To subscribe to this blog, look for the section “Subscribe To... Posts” located on the right side of the blog. Click on the pull down menu and select "Add to Google" from the list of aggregators/readers. Now, each time we post a new assignment, the link will be listed in your Google Reader account.
   

Post in your blog:

1. Label this post, Activity 6: RSS
2. What is convenient about RSS and newsreaders? Include some examples from the readings and/or videos.
   
3. Do you think you might be able to use this technology in your school or personal life? If yes, how and if no, why not?
4. Which tool for finding feeds was easiest to use?

Activity 5: Social Networking

This week we will look closely at Social Networking. This assignment is due Tuesday, October 19.

• Read "How to Avoid Facebook and Twitter Disasters"
• Read "'Flocking' Behavior Lands Online"
• Read "Does Social Networking Breed Social Divison?"
• Watch the Common Craft video, "What is LinkedIn?"
  
  

Post in your blog:

• How concerned are you with privacy issues in social networking sites? If you have a Facebook profile or Twitter feed, what do you do to ensure your own privacy? Having read the first article above, is there a tip or technique that you will incorporate in your own use of social networking sites? What do you think about the etiquette described in the article?
  
• From the readings above and your own experience, do you think social networking sites bring people together or keep people separate? Please explain.
• The "'Flocking' Behavior..." article describes many different studies that examine the effects of social networking on human relationships. In your experience, which one seems to be the most accurate and why?
• How is LinkedIn different from Facebook? Name one advantage and one disadvantage of the LinkedIn social network.

Activity 4: Social Bookmarking

This week we’re focusing on Social Bookmarking. This assignment is due on Tuesday, October 12.

1. Watch the Social Bookmarking in Plain English video. Read “The Brave New World of Social Bookmarking: Everything You Always Wanted to Know But Were Too Afraid to Ask” and “7 Things You Should Know About Social Bookmarking."
   
   
2. Do some tagging in your own blog. You can tag (Blogger calls them labels) your earlier Blogger posts with keywords or phrases. From the Blogger Dashboard, go to Manage Posts and choose the post you want to add tags to. Enter the words in the Labels for this post box in the lower right. Type in your tags (commas in between each word or phrase). Click Publish Post to re-publish the post with its labels (tags) to your blog.
   
   
3. Login to the class Delicious account (username=IM204, password=b00kmarks (0=zero)). Next, go to Google and find at least one Web site related to Web 2.0 or social software and its connection to your intended future profession (i.e. nursing, journalism, management, etc.) and tag it. Make note of the tags already used in this account and if possible, use one of them as well.
   
   To tag a Web site in Delicious: Explore the site options and try clicking on a bookmark that has also been bookmarked by other users. Can you see the tags they used to categorize this site?
• Login to our class Delicious account
• In the upper right, click on "Save a new bookmark"
• Type or paste in the url of the Web site you want to add, then click Next
• Type in some tags to describe the site -- separate each tag with a space and use an underscore (_) to create multiple word tags, then click Save
  
  You may also want to create a Delicious account for yourself and discover how this useful bookmarking tool can replace your traditional browser bookmark list. Add a few websites and add your own tags to each of your links.
  
  If you like Delicious and want to easily add bookmarks to your account, you can put buttons on your browser toolbar. Instructions are available for Internet Explorer and Firefox. For more information, view this 8-minute Delicious tutorial to get a good overview of its features.
  

Post in your blog:

• Label this post Activity 4: Social Bookmarking.
  
  
• Can you see the potential of this tool for your own research or for your personal interests? What about for research within groups or work within your future profession? Please describe why or why not.
  
• Which site(s) did you bookmark and add to the class Delicious account? What tags did you choose?
  
  
• What are some potential benefits of the social (sharing) aspect of social bookmarking?