Social Media – Page 2

Social Media for Students

Last week it was the value of social media for teachers, but this week, students. There’s lots of reasons to be on social media as a student. For one thing, pretty much all your friends are on it. There’s a social cost to not being on Facebook, because it makes you harder to invite to stuff. But that’s just Facebook. What about Twitter, Tumblr, Youtube, blogging, and all the other intriguing social networks floating around this series of tubes? that’s where things get fun. So today, here’s why social media is valuable to students.

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March 21, 2013

University College, Dublin

Social Media

The Merits of Social Media for Academia

Finally. The philosopher in me always wants to work up from first principles, so I felt like I had a lot of work to do before I could write this. I’ve written a bit about some ways to think about social media and online spaces, what engagement means to me, and what I look for in improving communication. Now, and only now (Thanks Kant, you big jerk), do I feel comfortable talking a bit about the value that social media has to higher education for teaching, research, outreach, and mentorship. This is just an overview, there’s a lot to say on the subject, and I hope to do more than scratch the surface, and share what I do every day, when I’m not creating pages, sitting in meetings, and taking care of assorted administrivia.

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March 14, 2013

Don't always listen to the Prince. What? Pictures of books are redundant.

Communication

What Do You Mean, Communicating Better?

I’ve spent a few months now talking about how to think about social media and communication, with a mind toward exploring how we can communicate better. But I’ve been remiss. I’ve been missing something important that I wasn’t ready to talk about yet, which is what “Better” actually means to me. Depending on your goals, it’s going to mean different things, but in communication, I think there are some things that are universally desirable, and opportunities that social media creates for everyone. These are some of them. (more…)

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March 7, 2013

Humans! Become passionate about education!

Social Media

Smashing Looms

This is one of those things that everyone in communications has to talk about at some point, preferably early on. I like to think of it as smashing your looms, after the fictional General Ned Ludd, but what it really means is that automation kills communication. Well, it wounds it gravely, and your messages will ultimately limp rather than leaping like they should.

Other things which are dead: this analogy.

Automation can be your greatest ally when communicating with large groups of people or when using a lot of different media, but it is an ally of the most insidious sort. It breeds a level of laziness which can poison your efforts in the long run. Today I will prove that this is the case. That is my mission.

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February 21, 2013

Social Media

Defining Engagement

It may be Valentine’s Day, but that’s not the kind of engagement I’m referring to. No, engagement is a really popular word right now. I thought about being a word snob and inventing my won hipster word for the same phenomenon, like “Ascultonation” (if you know the root of that, you might also be a word snob. Please feel free to use it), but engagement is exactly the right word for what you want. It describes the condition you’re trying to evoke down to a T. Engagement is more than talking at people, and it’s more than getting them to listen.

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February 14, 2013