"Mo Michael" reflection

I believe I wrote this post Thursday, 11 June. I just found it in my "edit" blogs in the Web 2.o blog...sent the first one to be posted, but don't see it. So I'm posting again!



Welcome! This is my first significant blog, long enough that I’ll coin the term BLOnG for what I’m posting here. Colors will segment the topics within. The entries on the page as a whole are connected by the thread of Web 2.0 and the journey I’ve made in this Web 2.0 class over the past three weeks.

My suggested introduction for this Web 2.0 class at Appalachian State University:


Web 2.0 combines a variety of interactive media available on the web that invites, encourages, and facilitates communication and connecting among people. Whether that’s interpersonal communication, collaboration within a group, co-creating art, video, or music; or intercontinental planning, it’s all about connecting. Because our brains are wired differently, each of us has preferred modes of creating and communicating. Web 2.0 supports them all. Whether we’re photographers, musicians, architects, writers, artists, city-planners, or environmentalists, there’s a tool, an application, a community, a blog, or some other Web 2.0 phenomenon that supports us as we journey through life.
In this course, you will begin to explore the vast world of Web 2.0 to understand how it fits into our complex lives, cultures, and world. Cultural inversion says we express 1) individualism while valuing community; 2) independence while valuing relationships; and 3) commercialization while valuing authenticity. Through “participant observation” we have and are crafting a world that allows us to study ourselves and others, to know ourselves, and to connect with ourselves and others in ways powerful and significant.
While outsiders may see “the web” as an entity that promotes anonymity and isolation, others argue that the web empowers everyone with internet access to reflect, create, re-create, and connect with all of humanity in ways heretofore unavailable. Because the tools for connecting are in the hands of the common man, the growth of Web 2.0 postings is exponential, whether we’re blogging, vlogging (insert link), or uploading vignettes to YouTube (insert link).
Prepare to immerse yourself in Web 2.0 – to learn and experience the vocabulary, tools, and applications (insert links). I invited you to consider this: it’s all about connecting with yourself and with others, about experiencing life to the fullest, finding joy and wisdom in the midst of sorrow and chaos, finding your strength in the midst of moments of weakness. It’s about us; it’s about humanity. We are the Web; the Web is us.



I am the Tube...the Tube is Us – my reflections on the “Mo Michael” video assignment

I wasn’t prepared to be moved by a Michael Welsch video (insert link) at six a.m. this morning, yet I was – moved to reflection, moved to tears. Part sociologist, mostly human... connecting, unexpectedly, to strangers on the internet. In those moments, I was not alone in this journey we call life. Reminded of the commonality of the human race, I found comfort in that. Instead of being isolated in my one-room apartment, I shared space with men and women around the world. My weariness left me and I looked forward to some introspective time today as I had final exams to proctor in the public high school where I teach.

In 2005, ABC could not envision the power of YouTube to connect people around the globe. But we’re connecting, and will continue to do so. When we place ourselves in front of our web cams, we’re inviting ourselves and others to connect with us. We share our persona (insert link to my first video for YouTube) of the moment, dare to open ourselves to others, and reflect on who we are, where we’ve been, and where we are going (insert link for second video). It’s pretty powerful stuff.

The power of connecting can propel one forward, facilitates creating and re-creating, and supports endeavors not possible in isolation. It also allows duplicity, so viewers must decide how to interpret, appreciate, and respond to postings. It’s free speech at its best, while offering the possibility for the antithesis of that, as well.

The morphing of YouTube since its inception in 2005 is an anthropologist’s dream. I appreciate Welsch’s insight into what’s going on and d.i.’s wisdom in including that in this course. Through a variety of exercises, videos, and postings, we return again and again to common themes, applications, and tools. I would have been wise to have penciled in times beside specific references in my notes so that I could review those clips again. Delicious, technorati, and dig.com were all mentioned. I’m still seeing Gary Brolsma dancing around and that well-known tune is playing in my head seven hours later! It connotes a joyful moment, so I’m not minding that at all!

At times I’ve been overwhelmed with assignments in this class. Yesterday I continued to edit my CMSimple account have yet to post more photos into my Flickr account, haven’t tweeted, haven’t Skyped, and am waiting to be elluminated! Just when I was getting used to blogging on our moodle account, we were asked to move our conversations to an outside source. I was initially frustrated with that request, but know I’ll be pleased in the future because this blog and the blogs of others will allow me to chronicle our journeys and access the shared wisdom of my classmates long after the class is over.

My initial confusion has morphed into intermittent confusion, which, by and large, is a more preferred state of mind any day. Instead of searching for information about the class through e-mails as I did through Tuesday the , I’ve learned to log in on our moodle page and to navigate the forums there. I don’t know that I’ll venture frequently into Second Life, but do expect to learn enough to speak and sit when invited to do so!