The final word - My experience with this class
I have such an appreciation for the online world and find a lot of the content that was delivered in this class really interesting. Some of the content I feel i already knew but I don't see this as a disadvantage because I was able to concentrate on the aspects I was a bit foreign with.
The idea of video blogging really interested me, I guess I was a bit scared to ever attempt it but the fact that it was intertwined in our assessment really allowed me to finally take that step. I found the process frustrating because on every output of my video I came across a problem! On video 1 i had entered the wrong video codec, Video 2 i had exported the video with the wrong audio codec and then Video 3 for some reason failed to convert when uploaded.
What this taught me was that with online technology, most of the things you learn are through trial and error and there is no finite way to teach how something is done.
Something which really stuck with me in the class was the idea that "When you upload something, the way you view it completely changes because you become aware of the audience" I thought this was really profound because a lot of the time when you upload something on the internet you really have to evaluate the piece because you never know who could come across it, whether it's suitable or appropriate and whether it's worth uploading.
I really enjoyed the discussions we had in class and enjoyed the class size as I think it was just the right number.
Overall, it pretty much fulfilled everything I had expected coming into the class. I've learnt a fair bit given it only ran for 3 days and am still learning as I continue with some of the blogging in my own time.
Monday, April 26, 2010
Second Life - My Experiences
It's hard not to come into Second Life without thinking that you are just playing an online version of the Sims.
Whilst i am excited by the idea of an online world which features Avatars the appeal of Second Life somehow fell short. A large part of it was an initial confusion as to what I was meant to do or where I was meant to go. I explored for about 1 hour around the world only to find myself just as confused as when I started.
From what I could see - anything you wanted to do required Linden money, which is actually real money. I initially questioned this tactic as when currency becomes involved you automatically question whether something is worth investing money in. In this case, I would have to say no.
The fact of the matter is Second Life now just seems like a fad that raged in the Noughties. Whether it was too early for it's time might be a consideration but from my network of friends no one is dying to join the network. It would be interesting to see whether the lure would be different if Linden money did not require an actual transaction to take place.
Half of the fun in games is that you are entering a different world, so when money becomes involved you lose that aspect of fantasy as to continue doing anything you need to step back into reality and reach into your wallet.
However, this does not disregard the potential of Second Life which I think is huge. If the success of James Cameron's Avatar is anything to go by, our society is increasingly interested in the idea of avatar's and differentiating between reality and a 'second realm' If they jumped on the success of the film, Second Life could take off - really, as it is essentially doing everything the other social networks are but in an incredibly rich graphical format.
I think where second life really gains its advantage is the graphical nature of it's world, as opposed to staying as flat web pages you have a 3 dimensional world that can be created and customized to your taste. Here the potential is huge already with individuals 'performing' re-enactments of famous artworks in the digital realm.
Ultimately, as a tool Second Life is very powerful but the real problem is who is on it? Until they can find a way to lure more users onto the site it really doesn't fulfill much of a purpose for new users. But I do hope in time, the internet's interface becomes much more graphical and that we completely change our perception of a web page being flat .. maybe exploring the web in the future will be more like Second life? Where websites are actually structures in a world? and Social Networking sites are the recreational parks of this world.
It's hard not to come into Second Life without thinking that you are just playing an online version of the Sims.
Whilst i am excited by the idea of an online world which features Avatars the appeal of Second Life somehow fell short. A large part of it was an initial confusion as to what I was meant to do or where I was meant to go. I explored for about 1 hour around the world only to find myself just as confused as when I started.
From what I could see - anything you wanted to do required Linden money, which is actually real money. I initially questioned this tactic as when currency becomes involved you automatically question whether something is worth investing money in. In this case, I would have to say no.
The fact of the matter is Second Life now just seems like a fad that raged in the Noughties. Whether it was too early for it's time might be a consideration but from my network of friends no one is dying to join the network. It would be interesting to see whether the lure would be different if Linden money did not require an actual transaction to take place.
Half of the fun in games is that you are entering a different world, so when money becomes involved you lose that aspect of fantasy as to continue doing anything you need to step back into reality and reach into your wallet.
However, this does not disregard the potential of Second Life which I think is huge. If the success of James Cameron's Avatar is anything to go by, our society is increasingly interested in the idea of avatar's and differentiating between reality and a 'second realm' If they jumped on the success of the film, Second Life could take off - really, as it is essentially doing everything the other social networks are but in an incredibly rich graphical format.
I think where second life really gains its advantage is the graphical nature of it's world, as opposed to staying as flat web pages you have a 3 dimensional world that can be created and customized to your taste. Here the potential is huge already with individuals 'performing' re-enactments of famous artworks in the digital realm.
Ultimately, as a tool Second Life is very powerful but the real problem is who is on it? Until they can find a way to lure more users onto the site it really doesn't fulfill much of a purpose for new users. But I do hope in time, the internet's interface becomes much more graphical and that we completely change our perception of a web page being flat .. maybe exploring the web in the future will be more like Second life? Where websites are actually structures in a world? and Social Networking sites are the recreational parks of this world.
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Facebook - Do we like or become a fan?
Facebook have unveiled their newest alteration to the social networking site, abolishing the 'Become a Fan' feature in favour for 'Like.' For those that have Facebook, this proves troublesome as there are now two different 'Like' options - One to 'Like' a Page, and one to "Like" an activity of a user.
Typical to Facebook, there was of course uproar to the change (just like every single change Facebook has ever done) What is interesting is that despite the uproar, Facebook doesn't look like it's slowing down in popularity.
When Myspace unveiled it's new layout back in 2007, a lot of their users abandoned the social networking site because they were unhappy with the changes and did not want to learn all the new features. However, for some reason Facebook seem to manage to get by all their modifications without much damage at all.
If one actually analyses the changes Facebook have implemented this time around, you can see the genius in their features as they move closer to trying to 'rule' the internet. Some of the new features involve making the profile information more interactive, changing the pages into a more Wiki-style website as well as opening up static text to become links for users to continue to navigate through.
I wanted to know what your opinions of the new changes are? Do you like them? Did you even notice them?
Facebook have unveiled their newest alteration to the social networking site, abolishing the 'Become a Fan' feature in favour for 'Like.' For those that have Facebook, this proves troublesome as there are now two different 'Like' options - One to 'Like' a Page, and one to "Like" an activity of a user.
Typical to Facebook, there was of course uproar to the change (just like every single change Facebook has ever done) What is interesting is that despite the uproar, Facebook doesn't look like it's slowing down in popularity.
When Myspace unveiled it's new layout back in 2007, a lot of their users abandoned the social networking site because they were unhappy with the changes and did not want to learn all the new features. However, for some reason Facebook seem to manage to get by all their modifications without much damage at all.
If one actually analyses the changes Facebook have implemented this time around, you can see the genius in their features as they move closer to trying to 'rule' the internet. Some of the new features involve making the profile information more interactive, changing the pages into a more Wiki-style website as well as opening up static text to become links for users to continue to navigate through.
I wanted to know what your opinions of the new changes are? Do you like them? Did you even notice them?
The potential of social networks for businesses?
I'm really interested to see the potential of social networks for businesses. Initially, the benefit for businesses to hold an online social media presence is that they are able to interact with an incredibly large, established community. Furthermore, businesses are able to tap into the networks based on what benefits their business.
For example, a business dealing with the music industry would be more likely to join Myspace as opposed to joining Couchsurfing.
So the question is when does a business know which social network to join?
There are hundreds upon thousands of social networks out there, each holding a community as different as each other. While the major social network Facebook is now firm at the top of the hierachy, there has been a lot of buzz about the growing trend of Twitter.
The latest research seems to show that though Twitter's membership has skyrocketed in the past year, the actual usage of Twitter per day does not even come close to that of an average Facebook user. Additionally, geographically the majority of Twitter's users come from the USA.
So what benefit can business gain from Twitter? Recently, Twitter announced that it would allow business to advertise on Twitter signalling a strategy for the company to earn some revenue from it's social platform. The power for businesses is that Twitter already categorises Tweets based on the hash-tag technology.
If a company that sells clothes online searches for tweets with the phrase 'online shopping' they are able to directly communicate with users via Direct Messages, advertising their product in a way which they would usually have to pay thousands of dollars for.
Whilst the social network marketing phenomena still seems young, there is a lot of confusion for businesses to really understand the value of the time investment. What i think is required is an understanding of your audience as well as adding a human touch to the marketing effort on social networks, rather than sticking with the corporate direct sell you would otherwise try to employ.
I work for a company called UbiqueApps - definitey worth checking out.
http://www.ubiqueapps.com/
I'm really interested to see the potential of social networks for businesses. Initially, the benefit for businesses to hold an online social media presence is that they are able to interact with an incredibly large, established community. Furthermore, businesses are able to tap into the networks based on what benefits their business.
For example, a business dealing with the music industry would be more likely to join Myspace as opposed to joining Couchsurfing.
So the question is when does a business know which social network to join?
There are hundreds upon thousands of social networks out there, each holding a community as different as each other. While the major social network Facebook is now firm at the top of the hierachy, there has been a lot of buzz about the growing trend of Twitter.
The latest research seems to show that though Twitter's membership has skyrocketed in the past year, the actual usage of Twitter per day does not even come close to that of an average Facebook user. Additionally, geographically the majority of Twitter's users come from the USA.
So what benefit can business gain from Twitter? Recently, Twitter announced that it would allow business to advertise on Twitter signalling a strategy for the company to earn some revenue from it's social platform. The power for businesses is that Twitter already categorises Tweets based on the hash-tag technology.
If a company that sells clothes online searches for tweets with the phrase 'online shopping' they are able to directly communicate with users via Direct Messages, advertising their product in a way which they would usually have to pay thousands of dollars for.
Whilst the social network marketing phenomena still seems young, there is a lot of confusion for businesses to really understand the value of the time investment. What i think is required is an understanding of your audience as well as adding a human touch to the marketing effort on social networks, rather than sticking with the corporate direct sell you would otherwise try to employ.
I work for a company called UbiqueApps - definitey worth checking out.
http://www.ubiqueapps.com/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
