Why blog?

• Old ways vs. New ways
• Isolated vs. Connected
• Visible vs. Invisible or rather
• Silent or a presence or sphere of influence

____________________________________________________________

 What do you think?

• As an academic
• As an author (or wannabe writer)
• As a journalist or ‘citizen journalist’
• You have something to say
• You want to be heard
• It’s your job

_____________________________________________________________

You need the social media skills

• Reputation
• CV
• Google your name
• Interview on Skype

You want:

• To be heard
• To engage
• To influence
• To compete

_____________________________________________________________

Beware:

A)  the limitations of the metaphor
B)  imposing old constructs onto new such as:

• a website as a brochure
• a blog as a diary, journal or log

It is everything and anything online:

• A digital ocean

• A digital water-cycle

• An ecosystem

• Swim Lanes as a metaphor for learning design

• Overwhelming volumes of stuff

• It matters

____________________________________________________________

Distance Learning to Nearness Learning

No longer ‘broadcasting’ but ‘peer-to-peer’, ‘one-to-one’ or ‘group’ influencing

The value lies in the influence of the personal relationship

• rarely synchronous
• even more rare to be face to face
• but as a presence or voice,

• it is vital.

______________________________________________________________

Analogies make us think, express ideas and through simplification the clarify

• Ring of blogs (max, ma, min and micro)
• Ring of Social Media Activities (Linkedin, Facebook and Xing)
• Saturn’s rings and moons
  A metaphor for collection of webpages, a vibrant, dense, sharp, insightful blogs with a mix of Social Media Networking activity in Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter.
  INSERT RINGS SKETCH

The pattern that  matters to me is between people.

Which I tried to bring to life with a set of chess pieces. I need to work on this, perhaps lay the relationships out on the floor of a conference hall?

Activity systems illustrate how people solve problems are  innovation and generate influence through interaction

_________________________________________________________________________

Who reads, who comments who creates?

__________________________________________________________________________

Conversations between people, content fed in, discussed, shared, informing the website or informed by it.

BLOGGING

Individual or group/team enterprise

Author or contributor

(Guest writers)

Effort, patience, time …

• Listen
• Comment
• Create

WHAT TYPE OF BLOG?

‘Everything and anything goes. You cannot do it wrong. There are no mistakes. At any time you can change your point of view, your style, your book, the pen you write with, the direction you write on the pages, the language in which you write, the subjects you include, or the audience you write to. You can misspell, write ungrammatically, enter incorrect dates, exaggerate, curse, pray, write poetically, eloquently, angrily, lovingly. You can past in photographs, newspaper clippings, cancelled checks, letters, quotes, drawings, doodles, dried flowers, business cards, or labels. You can write on lined paper or blank paper, violet paper or yellow, expensive bond or newsprint.’

Tristine Rainer, ‘The New Diary’ 1976.

CREATE

______________________________________________________________________________

RECOMMEND

• Niche (person or team)
• Comprehensive (an extension of the website)

Also personal, unique even quirky … Has a point of view, voice.
N.b. Consistent … Pace can change, but at least like a fire that never goes out … Or it will.

Beating writer’s block – controlled stimulation to get you going

SOCIAL MEDIA as the ‘Water-Cooler’

Two words:

‘Be Sociable’

LEARNING ONLINE

Why the groundswell?

And why now?