http://flickr.com/photos/7447470@N06/1345266896/

INTRODUCTION TO SOCIAL NETWORKING

SITES, AND YOUTUBE (WEB 2.0)

The Internet – more than just a book

“The Read/Write Web”(Tim Berners Lee)

Original photo by Hummanna.

PERSONAL PUBLISHING/ PARTICIPATORY MEDIA TOOLS

• Blogs – writing (mostly)• Podcasts (audio)• Wikis – collaboration (mostly text)• Social Networking sites (MySpace, Facebook, Ning,

Bebo, etc)

MEDIA• Video repositories:

– YouTube, TeacherTube, Google Video, BlipTV• Flickr (photo sharing)• UStreamTV (video creation)

PARTICIPATORY MEDIA/CULTURESOCIAL MEDIA SOCIAL NETWORKINGSOCIAL SOFTWARE

YouTubeFlickrMySpaceFacebookNing, etc

WHAT HAS CHANGED?

• Decline of the Gatekeepers

• Publish then evaluate

• Content Creators; Content Rankers

• Everyone has access to everything

The World is Flat (Thomas Friedman)

• “People just don’t subscribe to magazines anymore; they also subscribe to people.”

Networked Learning

CONNECTIVISM: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age

(George Siemens, University of Manitoba, Canada)Principles of Connectivism:

• Nurturing and maintaining connections is needed to facilitate continual learning.

• Currency (accurate, up-to-date knowledge) is the intent of all connectivist learning activities.

• Choosing what to learn and the meaning of incoming information is seen through the lens of a shifting reality. While there is a right answer now, it may be wrong tomorrow due to alterations in the information climate affecting the decision.

• 9000 hrs of extra content each day

• In 6 months generates as much content as major broadcasters in US did in 60 years

• Superb video from Michael Wesch: An Anthropological Introduction to YouTube

www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPAO-lZ4_hU

A GLOBAL AUDIENCE:

YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjA5faZF1A8

• Performance by a 13 yr old Korean boy• Jan 31st: 34,770,497 million views; 142796 comments• That’s more than the populations of

Israel 5.7mDenmark 5.3mFinland 5.1mNew Zealand 3.6mIreland 3.6mHolland 16.4mAustralia 20.4m etc

WHAT’S ALL THE FUSS ABOUT?

• Is it real?• Who are these 34.7 million people?• Copyright implications? – I can reuse the content for my own purposes• Who is exercising editorial control?• Disintermediation – the decline of the gatekeepers of content• Should students have access to sites like this?

(see ‘YouTube – a Class Act’)• How do students like this feel at school?• Should we be encouraging our students

1. to create content2. to publish to these kinds of sites

• Empowerment and realisation of identity through personal publishing to social networking sites

Rewriting or Killing our Cultures?

THE CROWD:

Collective wisdom?

Stupidity of the masses?

Is our culture beingre-written?

Is the Internet killing ourCulture? (Andrew Keen:the cult of the amateur)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5jtiJPlv4Y

MySpace/FacebookSeptember 2nd, 2008

• POLICE are trawling social networking sites and tracking text messages to find the organisers of a wild party shut down by the riot squad in Sydney.

• About 1500 people crammed into a Camperdown warehouse in Sydney's inner west for the party which was publicised through Facebook and other online forums.

(http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,25642,24273455-5014108,00.html)

September 2nd, 2008

• A wild teenage party promoted on MySpace has been condemned by Geelong police who were pelted with glass bottles when they tried to close it down.

(http://www.theage.com.au/national/myspace-party-teens-pelt police-with-bottles-20080902-47hg.html)

fear

It’s a Wild World

http://youtube.com/watch?v=T-t8tUED9MI

“Just remember there’s a lot of bad and beware.”

Indian Initiative: babajob.com/babalife.com

NY Times, Oct 30th, 2007

Second Life

See Second Life in Education

Are we sociologically ready?

What are our ethical responsibilities as adults/educators:

• to our children/students?• to ourselves? (teacher sacked for posting photo on MySpace)

IN CONCLUSION:

Being a connected educator involves: • engaging with the world of participatory media• guiding students in this new disintermediated

world• modelling the use of technology for lifelong

learning• allowing time for ‘slow learning’ and reflection

• It’s all about connections……

Education by and large has not changed. Syllabus/curriculum is still rooted in a past paradigm of fixed knowledge. The world beyond classrooms has changed a great deal, and will continue to do so at an ever-increasing rate……

Photo courtesy of Sawrah, http://flickr.com/photos/sawrah/314474272/

• Accompanying URLs for this session available at http://socnetyoutubesl.wikispaces.com/

• This slideshow on the web at http://www.slideshare.net/michaelc

• Michael Coghlan can be contacted via NewLearning.com http://protopage.com/michaelc, or via email – michaelc@chariot.net.au