Random Fun // Wikipedia

 Today on LinkedIn I saw someone post (brag, really) about their new Wikipedia entry. I thought "hmmmm" and checked it out. I was surprised to see that they had a Wikipedia entry. I know enough about Wikipedia to know that you can't create your own entry, but you can suggest it to Wikipedia editors and see if you can get them to undertake it. I also know that you need to have a certain level of accomplishment in your field. (My father-in-law has a Wikipedia entry)

Somehow that got me to wondering what my Wikipedia entry might look like if I had one. I asked ChatGPT to create one for me. It's not entirely correct, but it's nice to see that ChatGPT thinks I have enough notoriety as a scholar to warrant a Wikipedia entry. 

If you want to see it, look below the fold.

I earned a badge, should I share it?

 Badges are all around once you start looking for them. 

Some of us don’t notice, or don’t care. Often that’s me. I know what I accomplished and I’ve no idea what I’ll do with the badge. Sometimes I get in a MOOD and want to be silly with such things, like the time I saved up paper “certificates of attendance” from a number of conferences and hung them up in my office. I thought that was funny (I have received them at international conferences, and it seems to be important to some attendees as proof to their institution that they were there).

I’m flying home from a conference today, a conference where I gave a talk. I noted that I received a digital badge through the conference platform (Whova … and that’s a whole post I could write)

Here it is! Should I share it elsewhere? Should I post it to my LinkedIn and see what happens? I mean, the platform provided tools to share it to socials — that’s the whole point, right?

 I typically present a at 5-7 conferences a year, so at this point it doesn’t feel like a big deal to me. I list it on my CV, and move onward. It’s just another requirement of my job. I might have found it special the first time or tow.

But I actually have a bigger question for y’all. Please feel free to weigh in here.

This time last year I embarked on a journey to become a leadership and performance coach. There are many whys for doing so, and I’m happy to share, but most importantly let me state that I am not leaving my job at FSU and switching careers.

I worked hard for my Level 1 certification, which I earned in March. I’m now working toward ACC level certification (need to get about 25 more coaching hours for that — I can coach students as part of my job at FSU and count the hours, so feel free to HMU if you want to try it).

Anyway, I got a badge and digital certificate when I completed my Level 1. I’m also really proud of my accomplishment. To me, this is much more meaningful than celebrating another conference talk.

When I finished Level 1 and got the badge, it was a super hectic time. I told myself I would update my web site for coaching and then share the badge on LinkedIn. I’ve not done that yet. Is it too late? Is it silly of me to even think about sharing this? Or should I go ahead and do it? 

Who knows, I may be in this dilemma again in a few months, after I get my hours, take my test, and get ACC certified.

And yeah, the badge is from Brown University, which amuses me because my husband did his undergrad there. I like to joke that now we’re a Brown family. :)

Social Media Fiction Challenge (I did it, too!)

 I read a YA book for the social media fiction challenge. 

Should I award myself a badge?

I chose The Future of Us by Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler [on Goodreads]

This book was about a teenage girl who had just received a computer .. and her friend next door, who brought over an AOL CD-ROM. Yup, it’s set in the early 1990s, and the main characters use dialup to log in to AOL. How does this relate to social media? Well, through AOL they find a secret portal to a ‘website” called Facebook that shows them the future. Like, 15 years into the future. And they are confused (is it a scam? A virus? Is someone pranking them?). Over the course of a week they check in on their future selves, gleaning details of their adult lives through posts, relationship status, friend lists, etc. And when they don’t like what they see, they start to realize that they can make small changes in the present that affect what they see of the future on Facebook. They know they shouldn’t, but they can’t help themselves. I’ll stop short of giving spoilers, and just say that it’s an interesting view of how we provide information on Facebook.

Great fiction it isn’t. But it’s an easy and charming read.

Tech struggles are REAL

One of your classmates noted in a participation log that tech struggles are real.

I am here to confirm to you all: Yes, yes they are!

If I may break through the fourth wall (or maybe better in this case to say “pull back the curtain”) and share some of my process in this class … well, the tech struggles are REAL.

I’d like to think that I’m good with tech. I was using computers in the late 1980s, creating art, programming HyperCard stacks, etc. I was on email in 1991. I remember using FTP services to upload/download attachments, with fussy file naming conventions. I hand coded websites in html. All of that.

Still, the reality of my every day is that I’m not on Pinterest/Instagram/LinkedIn/X/every-other-platform daily, and even when I’m on the platforms I’m consuming more than anything else. New features come and go, the platforms themselves evolve quickly and are often unstable, and then each summer I get to this class and I have to set everything up again and figure it all out.

Folks: Tech struggles are REAL.

If by some miracle I’ve made it look easy, well … can I get a badge for that? Because each week I’m setting up tools again, fussing with features that allow people to join groups, clearing out old posts, setting up demos. And the tools are always changing, sometimes dying, sometimes being born. I miss Twitter’s good ol’ days, and I posted updates there a lot. It was a great hub! But no one wants to be there since the algorithms changes and a lot of the content took a turn for the more toxic. LinkedIn has really upped its game, but it’s a real-name professional platform, so we don’t want to use it in that way. Instagram just doesn’t work in that same way, even though it offers hashtags. Each week it’s a mess of setting up, testing out, copying over, etc. And I struggle.

That’s all. I just wanted to validate the struggle for everyone. If you’ve had moments of “why won’t this embed/upload/link/whatever” … we’ve al been there.

The Ultimate Challenge - Week 2!

Alas, we are in Week 2 of THE ULTIMATE CHALLENGE!

This week, we have a new set of challenges going on. Do as many or as few as you like. You don't have to do Challenge 1 on Day 1 -- it's entirely up to you how (or if) you approach the challenges. 

Here's a list of challenges for the week. Full details below the fold.

1. Digital detox
2. Exquisite corpse story [Easter egg]
3. Create your own story
4. License yourself 
5. Hashtag Ethnography 
6. Collaborative concept map [Team challenge]
7. Blog makeover

Virtual Vacation Challenge

 

Ultimate Challenge Days 5-7

It's the weekend, so it's a good time for the virtual vacation challenge.

Take yourself on a virtual vacation this weekend. Find a lovely spot (real or fictional) and imagine how you would spend a day there. Look up photos online and write a blog post about your day with the photos integrated.

This may not feel like much of a challenge, but here's the challenge part that relates to our class:

Include at least 4 photos that you've found online that include Creative Commons licenses that would allow you to share on your blog, and share them with proper attribution. 

How do you find these photos?  Flickr. Wikimedia Commons. Lots of places!

There's no absolute perfect way to give attribution, but here are photos I took this week and then shared on Flickr:

"Helsinki" by vpd6414
is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA

"Conference Badge - ISLS" by vpd6414
is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA

I used the Flickr embed feature to grab the embed code (I had the header/footer included), dropped it into the blog post in HTML view, and then added a caption underneath to provide complete attribution.

Refind Roulette Challenge

 

Ultimate Challenge Day 5

One of our tools this week was Refind. Why Refind? Well, it's a tool that engages in automatic content curation. Y'all have been writing original content here, but some people mine the web for content and reshare it. Alternatively, you might just be searching for inspiration. Either way, Refind could help.

The challenge:

1. Sign up for Refind

2. See what it finds for you!

3. Grab it, blog it, and tell us what you think.

I did my own Refind finding and I got this article on grounding. Apparently it's a TikTok trend. My life will improve if I connect with the earth. I have no plans to go out barefoot tomorrow.

Dig in to the Diigo Challenge

Ultimate Challenge Day 4

Diigo was a tool from last week, but we didn't really have traction there. It's understandable because:

1. I didn't get notifications when a few of you signed up, so you were stuck in a moderation queue (sorry -- I've cleared it now)

2. It's not really a sexy tool.

However, I promise to check daily for moderation now and I think it's still worth checking out. So how about a challenge to get some of us over there?

There's no better way to learn how to use Diigo -- a social bookmarking tool -- than by jumping in and adding, tagging, and annotating resources. So don't be shy! Hop on over there and give it a try! Info in last week's Canvas module tool page. Again, I may need to moderate/approve what you post the first time you post there, so just be patient while I make my way over there to approve posts. I will check daily.

For the challenge, you should:

1. Join the class group

2. Add a resource with tags and annotation

3. Comment on 2 resources that others have added (may be from the wayback -- we use this as a class legacy space)

4. Peruse what's been posted in the past. See how times have changed across the years this site has been used.

5. Write a post about your experience (and let us know what you shared and commented on)

Flickr Gallery Challenge

 

Ultimate Challenge Day 3

Tools like Flickr are surprisingly versatile.

One of the Flickr features is the gallery. You can create a gallery (collection) of photos that others have shared on the site, and then you can share that gallery.

This feature could be quite useful to teachers, who can capitalize on the photos of others.

Your challenge, should you wish to engage:

Identify a topic you might teach (or some other reason for creating a gallery).

Search for relevant images on Flickr and create a gallery.

Write a blog post about the teaching idea (or other purpose) and share the gallery by embedding it and linking to it on your post.

Help files from Flickr:

Gallery Overview

Creating and Sharing Galleries

Recreate Art Challenge

 

Ultimate Challenge Day 2

We're going to have some fun repeating what's known as the Getty Art Challenge and posting our results to Cluster (an image/video sharing tool -- the link to our class space is in Canvas, Week 5 Tools and on the home page).

I can't wait to see what you come up with! Learn more and gather inspiration here.

A GoodReads Challenge

 

Ultimate Challenge Day 1

I love to read. Who doesn't? And readers help each other out by offering reviews and recommending books, right?

Join our group on Goodreads (link on Week 5 Tools page) and:

1. Add a book to one of the internet bookshelves (fiction, non-fiction)

2. Add a book to one of the leisure reads bookshelves (fiction, non-fiction)

3. Comment on the genre discussion or start a new discussion

The Ultimate Challenge

   

Weeks 5-7 of this course are particularly good ones for challenges. We're not exhausted yet. We're not fixated on final projects yet. We're still exploring spaces, tools, and concepts. But we have a sense of each other by now, and that helps unite us. Yep. Perfect time for challenges.

With that in mind, I offer you (drum roll, please) THE ULTIMATE CHALLENGE.

What is it? Just a collection of smaller challenges.

What makes it ultimate? Umm, that it's multiple challenges?

Why should I care? Well, you can ignore it if you like. Or you can be a bystander. Or you can be a competitor.

Competitor? What's that about? Do the most challenges, get a reward. 

What's the reward? It's a secret (which probably makes it sound better than it is, but still there is something). I'll mail the reward to the top 3-4 finishers (supposing your are comfortable with me doing so). I'll also send a digital reward in the form of a badge. Imagine the bragging rights!

How will I know about the challenges? They'll be posted here (but there may be some easter eggs hidden along the way, too). They'll be posted on Instagram. We'll keep a running list on the home page of the class in Canvas, too.

Do it for the glory. Do it for the learning. Do it for the badges.

Who's in?

My love affair with Bloglines

 It was the summer of 2004. I was bored. I was lonely. I was sorting out a lot of change. 

I can’t really remember how it all started, which is the chicken and which is the egg, but long story short: I found blogs. I started a blog. Other bloggers found me. I wrote. I commented. I made friends.

By the end of summer, I was reading and commenting on a lot of blogs, and I needed help managing it all.

I met Bloglines. Bloglines was an RSS program.

'\

It had a clean design and was easy to use. I woke up in the morning and hit Bloglines to see what had been posted overnight. During the day, I checked in a few times. OK, sometimes more than a few times. Bloglines made it easy for me to know who had posted and where I could go interact. 

Although my fellow bloggers and I lamented that the RSS readers cut down on people actually visiting our blogs, and seeing our fine blog designers, we also recognized their necessity when maintaining a lot of relationships across blogs. We still visited each other’s blogs to comment. We still saw each other’s banners and sidebars, infused with style and personality. Heck, I could picture a blog’s design when reading in RSS after a while. It was just a matter of efficiency. 

At some point Bloglines was discontinued. We found others, never quite as good, but the blogosphere was changing, too. There were other platforms to play on, other places to write, and more people hanging around the watercooler. Conversations moved offline, people’s lives changed and they had less time to blog.

Bloglines was an era. Fond memories … 

What are your fond early internet/social media era memories?

Where do you get your news?

 I'm curious! 

How do you encounter news (newpaper? tv? web sites? social media?), and what is the originating source of your news? 

How do you know if your news is accurate?

Do you care?

In a recent poll by YouGov.com (a market research company), it's clear that Americans don't trust a lot of news sources, and also access a lot of news on social media: https://today.yougov.com/politics/articles/52272-trust-in-media-2025-which-news-sources-americans-use-and-trust

As far as news sources go, The Weather Channel is by far considered the most trustworthy. And least is The National Enquirer.

And for platforms, most is YouTube followed by LinkedIn. 

There's a ton of data in their report, and if you're a news wonk or a data wonk, I think you'll find it interesting.

Pinterest Vision Board Challenge

 

Pinterest Vision Board Challenge

Make your own vision board on Pinterest. Here are some theme ideas to get you going:

• Your ideal home office space
• Your ideal classroom (physical or virtual) space
• Your career vision
• A dream class you might design and teach
• A vision for pedagogy
• A vision for technology integration in education / the workplace

Have fun with it, and when you're done blog about it (with a link) so we can find it and give you a badge.

Create a Pin Challenge

 

What to do:

Create an original pin on Pinterest and share it on the legacy class pin board!

Look for the big "+" at the bottom of the screen and click on it to create a pin.

Your pin content? A post on your blog -- so think about what you might want to share via a pin. Maybe it's a post you've already written. Maybe it's a new post that you write just for this challenge. A lot of people do "how to" blog posts and then create pins, but think more broadly. Imagine having a pinboard for a class to explore that is linked to various compelling web pages/stories? 

You'll need a post (so you have a link), a visual to associate with it, and a Pinterest account.

Show us the receipts by posting it to your blog as an embed on a post (my example is below):

I made a pin about this challenge: https://pin.it/7FfIntlbP  

It links back to this post.

And here it is as an embed: