Couchsurfing

Joined up.  Started a profile.  As this is the default state of our couch and the room that it sits in, and since my in-laws prefer a hotel to the cramped shoebox that is our ranch house, I don't think I'm going to be offering the couch at this time.  I do think the site is very interesting, and would definitely think about hosting in the future!

I don't know how to share a link to my profile - but my user name is jennyhbunn.

Final Project: Individual Project

I used Pixton to create a series of three comic strips that (in a very tiny nutshell) describe my experience in the class. I'm not a comic strip aficionado, but I thought this platform was a lot of fun and could be used in many different ways in the classroom and beyond. I also wanted to put all the comic strips together with a very short tutorial (longer one can be found in the group tutorial project) in an interesting way, so I used Prezi.

Hope you enjoy it!

Not REALLY a "Weekly Video," but -

Some of you guys have seen this from the other class, but I really like it, so I thought I'd post it here!

Project Planning

Fun Group Project: G+ Dogs
What happens when dogs use social media, specifically Google+ hangouts?

• Write script on Google Docs that is easily editable by classmates
• Set dates and times to rehearse and record
• Think through and acquire any costuming pieces
• Jason to record, Jenny records backup

Serious Group Project: Web 2.0 Tutorials

After examining many different platforms, I have chosen to do a tutorial on Timetoast.

• Brainstorm topic for timeline - To Kill a Mockingbird related? 
• Research events for timeline
• Create timeline and record tutorial
• Share tutorial on Youtube and send to Jason for class blog that will include tutorials from all classmates

Individual Project: CI5530 Comics

Using Pixton, I will create comics based on this class, as well as a tutorial showing how to use the program.

• Comic 1: use Pixton's basic model (includes everything but the text) for beginning of class - just getting started, learning the ropes, etc.
• Comic 2: use a set of three blank squares for middle of class - starting to feel more comfortable
• Comic 3: use a double line of blank squares for ending the class - feeling more confident and creative
• Film tutorial at some point along the way - maybe while creating Comic 2?  Maybe bits and pieces from all three?

The "Isn't This Cool?" Files: Flipsnack

I just thought this was super cool (and super easy), so I'm posting it!  I created a pdf study guide for an upcoming performance of To Kill a Mockingbird at Asheville Community Theatre and then put it into Flipsnack to get this:

Which License -

While poking around at the freemusicarchive.org, I found this track by Johnny Ripper:  



I like that he described it as "audio content for visualizing scenes in your head."  The only restriction on its use is a request from the creator that if the song is used in a video, to please contact him first.  It is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License, and conveniently, if you use this somewhere, you can just copy and paste the code on the page in order to attribute.  Like this:

"at the sea by johnny_ripper is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License"

I imagine that the artist made this track (and all the others on the album) available for free in the hope that the music might inspire someone else to create a visual accompaniment.  Or that by listening to Johnny Ripper's music, a filmmaker might understand his own images more clearly, or be able to edit and arrange them in a new way.

I think that if I were to create something - an image, a piece of music, a video - I would use the same license as Johnny Ripper. In a nutshell, it is described as one that "lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms." That seems to open the door to encourage creativity without allowing anyone to make any money off the creation.

Wikimedia -

I reviewed Wikiquote and Wikimedia Commons.  I chose these two because I have used or have needed them the most out of all the Wikimedia projects.

With Wikiquote, I like that you can search for quotes in a variety of ways.  Hopefully, however, you know a little about the quote for which you're searching - Wikiquote is easier to use if you're looking for a quote from a specific person, or from a specific television show or movie (Arrested Development is especially well indexed) than if you're just searching for a general quote about baseball or women's history (no subcategory exists for either of these - so while you can scroll through a variety of quotes about college football under the category "sports" or the Great Lakes Storm of 1913 under the category "history," you cannot do the same with baseball or women's history).

With Wikimedia Commons, I find the opposite to be true in searching.  It is easier for me to find and view many images on a general subject, even with a chosen parameter (ie: "coal miner black and white") than to find images from a certain source (ie: LIFE Magazine).  With Wikimedia Commons, it's very easy to end up in a place you never expected.  Like this.

SLED Event -

Okay y'all.  I went to the St. Patrick's Day party on Eduisland 9 for about 30 minutes tonight.  I left when I tried to stop dancing (you were supposed to click on a spinning shamrock to have your avatar animated by another avatar who had created 6 different dance moves - I thought this was pretty cool - but when I was ready to stop, I kept trying to click that damn shamrock but instead somehow ran/danced past the food table and into a giant hedge).  Also, Jason hit me in the face with a hot dog.

The other people at the party (there were three other people besides Jason and me) were super friendly.  We did not talk about education, but instead made party small talk, which consisted mostly of someone "singing along" with Steve Winwood and insisting that we "crank it up" and various other comments about how awesome the music was.  Strangely, the first song I heard was "Out of Touch" by Hall and Oates (am I showing my age yet?) and I do concur that that could be a song that some might find awesome.  But it felt very outdated to be gyrating around to, I kid you not, "The Living Years."  The song about the conflicted relationship the guy had with his dad and then the dad died.  Erin Go Bragh!

We were dancing on a floor that had been designed with green celtic symbols and had a giant rotating "Happy Saint Patrick's Day" logo in the middle of it.  Someone had gone to a lot of work to design this party!  Off in the distance there were bonfires (and actually, when I first arrived, Jason was somehow sitting on a bonfire dancing.  I don't know how he did that).  Somehow I acquired a giant green bottle, which I suggested to everyone could be Jameson's.  And after the Steve Winwood song ended - it was "Higher Love" for those keeping a checklist of the adult contemporary tunes - I tried to go look around a little more, but ended up in the hedge.

So, all in all, I actually did enjoy myself.  Mainly because it was so crazy and it gave me the opportunity to write phrases like "hit in the face with a hot dog."  Cheers!

Embedding: A Progression -

So, first there's this:



Then this:
http://soundcloud.com/jbunn/apalachicola

Then this:


Hmmmm - why is it cutting off my first slide?

Here's the first slide:

Photos are from my Picasa/Google+ photos site, but I didn't know how to create or embed a slideshow from that platform, so I put them in Quicktime Pro (good thing I'm taking this class at the same time as CI5200).

Now that I'm done with everything, I don't think that the words are a great match with those images, as the poem is all about the arrival and the images are obviously after we've been there for awhile.  Kind of confusing.  But, for my first stab at this sort of thing, I feel okay about it!  Onwards and upwards, right?

YouTube -

YouTube - I've only posted a few things - though I've obviously watched quite a bit.  I'm very much a viewer and am interested in creating other content for YouTube - but I don't really need anyone else to see my vlogs (present classmates excluded, of course).

SoundCloud -

SoundCloud is all new to me - and I LOVE IT. Love the "time comments" - that's a really cool feature! I've also found the podcasts of a friend from college that are killing me (Glitter in the Garbage - Drew Droege - kind of foul, FYI).

We do a monthly storytelling show at the theatre called Listen to This.  All original work.  We should record it and put it up on SoundCloud.  Yay social media class!

Picasa -

For my niece's birthday, I made her a personalized coloring book out of photos from our family vacation. Pretty neat!

I did not edit the photos in Picasa to turn them into line drawings - just sharing them through Picasa.  Very easy to use, especially if you already have a Google account.  Picasa organizes your photos and images for you - sometimes this can be a little frustrating as it doesn't always use the same folder organization as your harddrive - but to share these, I simply clicked "Blog This" and it sent the images directly to a new post on my blog.  (By the way, I used Paint.NET to change the photos to line drawings.)

 

 

The Halfway Point -

The halfway point.  Yes, it does feel like we're here!  This is slightly stream-of-consciousness, but here we go!

Since the beginning of this class, I have created accounts in Google+, Twitter, Diigo, Feedly, Soundcloud, Second Life, Classroom 2.0, and Wikipedia.  While I have found all of these platforms to be interesting in some way, I must admit that joining them all over the period of a few weeks has been slightly overwhelming.  Is there an app to keep track of all your apps? I also haven't been able to go back and spend more time really investigating these platforms in order to feel like I have any sort of mastery over them.  But maybe that's the point of this class? To at least jump off the diving board into the social media pool and start feeling comfortable in the water?

I wish there were another way to participate with this class rather than going to the forum for each specific assignment, clicking to see who's done what, and then commenting (or, as the case may more often be, not commenting) within that forum.  Is there a way to show a feed of most recent activity across all forums?  A "trending now" gadget?  I don't know enough (read: I don't know anything) about Moodle, so I don't know if that's possible.  But I would be a big supporter!

I would also love more critiques of various platforms - what are the pros and cons of using this platform? What educational uses could this platform have?  A few times along the way this has happened - for instance, I thought Neil's introduction of Tagxedo, and Curtis' post about Livebinders were specifically helpful.

I'm not really making the jump to connecting with strangers via social media.  Isn't that strange?  I wonder if it's because I started my social media experience with Facebook, where I don't friend or accept friend requests from people I don't know.  However, on Twitter, I do (but I only have 24 followers, and I know 93% of them) - so I guess I should say I would connect with a stranger on Twitter, if they met some sort of criteria - followed other people I did, lived in Asheville, etc.  I'm following people I don't know - mostly they're celebrities - on both Twitter and SoundCloud.

Here are some other things I don't understand that I would like to:

• How do channels and tagging work on YouTube?  If I ask 40 people to make a short video about a topic, would all those videos appear on my channel if they tag me?
• Is there an ad-free photo sharing site where you can create your own e-cards?
• What about that Google+ hangout?  Are we doing that?  

Module 4 OUT.

 

Understanding Wikipedia -

Well, after reading through the tutorial and a handful of the links (biting the newbie was especially enlightening!), I don't know that I'll ever reaally understand Wikipedia.

It honestly never occurred to me that I could be an editor on Wikipedia.  I understood that it was open-source  and that anyone could be a contributor, but it just didn't cross my mind that anyone also meant me.  I have actively wondered why Asheville Community Theatre didn't have a page (it's the oldest continually operating theatre in Asheville, the third oldest community theatre in North Carolina, and has had its share of notable participants - ie: Charlton Heston was the second artistic director) and yet never thought about writing it myself.  However, it's encouraged for a user to not create a page about themselves or their employer - harder to keep the NPOV.  Hmmmmm - can I throw it out for discussion?  Would it be appropriate for me to create that page?

Wikiversity: Web 2.0 Course -

First of all, here's my change: http://en.wikiversity.org/w/index.php?title=Web_2.0&diff=prev&oldid=882595

It seemed really odd to me that the name of the creator of the wiki was listed incorrectly and also that the meaning of the word "wiki" was wrong.

As for the class, the activities section was very similar to what we're doing in this class.  I think the Michael Wesch videos that we were pointed towards have been very inspirational and thought-provoking, and they might be a nice addition to any Web 2.0 class.  It has been helpful going through the different platforms with classmates - especially knowing the audience for your blog right off the bat.  Otherwise, I think the Wikiversity Web 2.0 class is a good "do-it-yourself" class that can push people to try new programs and see which ones they like to use the most.

Diigo (+Feedly, +Pinterest) -

I created an account in Diigo.  As with any of the social bookmarking sites, I think Diigo will only be helpful if I'm consistent with using it.

I like seeing photos more than just links - and maybe there's a way to do that in Diigo - so I also opened an account with Feedly (I'm not sure how to share my page).  Feedly is just a reader site that basically takes all of your RSS feeds and puts them onto one page.  Very helpful!  I would much rather use my Feedly page than my Google Reader page.

I also have an account on Pinterest, that again, I don't use as often as I should.

Second Life - from random discussion board -

Thought you all would get a kick out of this -

From the comments section on a review of "John Carter" from the AV Club -

Are we "out of touch academics"?

Weekly Video #3 (Michael Wesch Video Reflections) -

I combined my weekly video with my reflections on the Michael Wesch video.

I am continuing to experiment. This video was taken with my webcam which is embedded in my laptop. I like being able to use my hands when I talk - but I don't like the camera angle. I don't believe I'll ever shoot from below the chin ever again!

Second Life -

I have to say that I agree with pretty much everything that Neil and Jason had to say about our meeting in Second Life. I found the experience to be mostly confusing and distracting and only slightly fun.

I randomly clicked on the forum thread about the meeting (Wednesday at 8:30 pm) at about 8:27 pm on Wednesday night. Since I had already set up my account and free avatar, and walked through the initial orientation, I thought I would jump right in and do my best to find Catamount Island and join the meeting. When I opened Second Life, I was told that the program couldn't locate my last location, so I was being dropped into a new place. I don't know what this new place was (I was expecting the area in the welcome pavilion) - it was very grey and had a very unfestive air to it. I was surrounded by pretty spooky avatars - at least one was some sort of prowling grey catbeast. Very weird. I was surprised by my reaction - I felt very awkward and nervous and was relieved when I figured out how to teleport.

Catamount Island was pleasant and deserted. I wandered toward a red beam of light. I didn't know how to tell if anyone else was there, so I typed "Hello?" in the chat box. Of course nothing happened. I rounded a corner and there was Neil. As he said, neither of us could figure out the voice chat, so everything was typed. Jason joined in later and was able to provide some background information about the Island.

I explored some houses built by Western students - tried to open a refrigerator, read a note in Spanish left on a kitchen table, and wondered about the purpose of the cemetery on Catamount Island.

My main issues were:
1) Understanding movement, including walking, was difficult for me. I fell off a bridge into a lake twice (once on the way into a classroom, once I figured out how to get out of the lake, and into the class, a film had already begun playing, so I missed the intro). I also continued to somehow enter an invisible portal that took me to the top of a giant tower. So, really, mid-chat with Jason and Neil, I would suddenly be in a completely different place, have to fly back down to where they were and try to pick up again. Frustrating.

2) Second Life has completely crashed my computer twice. Once was during our meeting, so between shutting down completely and restarting, then trying to find Neil and Jason again, I missed about 10 minutes of conversation.

3) I know there are ways to change this kind of stuff, but I wasn't really happy with how the guys had normal looking avatars, but the women were all Boobs McGee. I chose a fairly conservative looking gal, with regular/casual type clothing, but when I changed my camera angle and saw her from the front, I was pretty heavy handed with the bra size. I don't care about this at all if you're using Second Life for social reasons, but if you're using Second Life for educational or professional reasons, I think it stinks that women could potentially spend a lot of time toning down the sex.

All that said, I did find chatting in Second Life to be more interesting than over email or Facebook or even Skype. For me, there was an aura of a mystery to be solved, which I found exciting. And again, I continue to be surprised at the immediacy of my emotional reactions - laughing out loud when I fall into a lake; feeling anxious in the grey, creepy world; or cursing when I ended up in the tower for the third time.

So I'm there if we meet again, but I'd also support the idea of the Google+ hangout. When's that?

My Logo -

I used onlinelogomaker.com for mine. There were plenty of options for symbols and you could upload your own image. I wasn't crazy about the font choices - they seemed ideal if I were opening up a skateboarding shoe company, though.