Updated August 29 2008. About a week or so after my return from abroad, all traces of my summer vacation had disappeared from the embedded FriendFeed post which I had set up … the remains of which appear below. I removed the feed because it kept updating, keeping pace with the social networks and posts
Continue reading ...Now Cinco de Mayo is huge elsewhere, but it kind of passes us by down here in Australia, a bit the way Australia Day would in Mexico. There you go! However what does unite us globally on a daily … seemingly hourly basis what with television, Twitter, Facebook et al … are words and images,
Continue reading ...It’s been a while between drinks here on Spinning … . I’ve been engaged in a blogging and life-activity sense elsewhere. Not that I haven’t been busy in the world of e-learning, but it’s been the Clayton’s blogging (blogging you do when not blogging) i.e., tweeting, instant messaging and so on which has been occupying me. The whole Twitter universe seems to have expanded incredibly in the past week; I am being followed by hordes of people suddenly (hmm … another spammy manifestation which makes me feel as though I am being ‘collected’ randomly). Quite a few of my colleagues are suddenly ‘getting’ the point of Twitter. Me, still not sure, though good for a quick notification, help me out here, late night roundups of activity sort of thing.
Continue reading ...You know how the old saying about mothers goes …. they’re sociologists, counsellors, tutors, managers, chauffeurs (add your own personal favourite). So it is these days that I find my role as a university lecturer diversifying in the oddest ways. Now this has probably got more to do with the nature of the discipline field … theatre, and preparing young artists for a professional role in the entertainment industry. Most of my classes are involved with training students for careers as actors. Yes, I teach and direct, but also and for nearly 10 years now as the industry has changed its face, I’ve been training them to think about themselves and their work in a business-like way. Empowering them to engage in what the economists like to call disintermediation, and which in the arts industry means extracting yourself from the middle man and the control they can have over your work (aka agents of all kinds). The jury’s out on whether or not it’s a good thing to cut the painter entirely, and let’s face it, actors wouldn’t be actors if they didn’t have an agent to blame for most things.
Continue reading ...Yesterday was the first anniversary of my niece’s wedding. I’d been feeling guilty about the dozens of digital images I had lurking in iPhoto and my tardiness in getting them out there for sharing as I’d promised. Truth is, I was looking for an app that would make putting a slideshow together quick and easy.
Continue reading ...I teach Generation Y on a daily basis. These are the so-called ‘digital natives.’ I see this latter term popping up all the time round the web, and I wanted to test how comfortable these Gen Y-ers are with the digital world. I have written earlier about my concerns regarding student digiphobia:My Adventure Continues or
Continue reading ...They are not called social media for nothing. There are dozens, maybe even hundreds of these sites designed to bring people together for fun, profit, procrastination, support, catchups, and now I discover, to drive your blog traffic! Aha. I felt overwhelmed when I saw Problogger’s list of possible sites to explore as Task 30: Explore
Continue reading ...I am sure this is a terrible title for the post but as it’s a staging-post post on a journey, it works for me. The journey is the one that this blog is charting … my adventures in online teaching and learning. For a while now, and through various courses I’ve taught, I’ve been concerned
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Day 26: Bring on the Media
Back to the daily Comment Challenge tasks and I’m hunting down some A-V apps to diversify commenting and make it more dynamic. I’ve had a few words to say over the past week or so on my commenting using Seesmic, so I won’t bang the drum again. If you haven’t read them, just type ‘Seesmic’
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