The Click Heard Round the World

Blogging Less, Falling More

Yesterday I formally shut-down my other website Betterverse.org. Betterverse has been a labor of love for the past three years, so I'm of mixed emotions about wrapping it up.

On the one hand, it's been wonderful having an outlet for spotlighting all the amazing work that nonprofits, charities, companies and governments have been doing using virtual world technology.  It seamlessly integrated into other work I was doing in virtual worlds for Global Kids, TechSoup and others.  And it was for the most part enjoyable and easy.

But over the past year, it started to feel like more of a slog just uncovering new stories and new angles on older topics.  I think partly it was because the shiny new-ness of the technology was starting to fade.  But also I think I my own interests have been drifting in other directions.

In the past couple of months, I felt like I was doing it just to keep doing it, which is a terrible motivation for doing anything.  

Typepad Adds Image Editing: Let the LOLwhatevers Begin

 

Just realized that Typepad, my blogging platform, recently added a photo editing feature, including adding text to images and little graphics.

Let the caption contests begin...

 

Compilation: Women Leading, Men Following in Lindy Hop

Check out this sweet compilation of videos of men following and women leading in lindy hop, put together by Sarah Carney.  Lots of familiar faces and great great dancing there! 

Sarah asks if anyone has any links to videos of a woman leading a man, either socially or in a performance?  I can't think of any.

[Link: Sarahcarneycreative.com]

I'm Syndicated on RabbitsandToasters.com

The nice folks at RabbitsandToasters.com informed me that they are syndicating my site, along with several other lindy hop-related blogs.  Here's what the the sponsors of the site say about it:

RabbitsAndToasters.com is a website dedicated to providing an easy way to find anything swing from the blogosphere. It has been out experience that trying to find relevant swing information on google is a bit tough. Wading through the immense amount of event postings, and outdated information can be a bit tiresome. We wanted to provide a website that had all the great current articles from around the web, in a location that was easy to find, and filtered out the rest of the crap online.

Sounds like a fine project, even if I don't really understand why it's called "Rabbits and Toasters." Yay for lindy bloggers!

Educator Workshop on Youth Media Creation Next Wednesday March 17 at Global Kids

I along with my colleague Amira will be facilitating a professional development training on "Transforming Youth From Social Media Consumers to Creators" on Wednesday, March 17. Here's the full description:

Global Kids has been a leader integrating social media tools within educational programs to develop 21st Century skills since 2000. With the emergence of online media from Youtube to Wikipedia, the new digital generation is presented with opportunities to broadcast their voice in unprecedented ways. In this training, educators will be engaged in hands on activities using social media tools that have educational applications, such as blogs, digital comics, maps and more, and hear about successful case studies from a variety of educational settings.

The workshop is open to anyone who is interested, although obviously most useful for those who work with young people in the teen/ tween age ranges. 

All Global Kids trainings are offered at $75 per person with a discounted rate of $50 each for two sessions or more. Trainings take place from 9:00 am to 3.00 pm on the day indicated, at Global Kids' Center for Global Leadership, located at 137 East 25th Street, 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10010.

For more information or to register, please call 212-226-0130 or e-mail pdtrainings@globalkids.org.

Christina on the sex appeal of librarians

I don't think I've mentioned my smart, lovely friend Christina's awesome new blog "Stacked."  She is chronicling her adventures as she works toward her goal of reading 100 books in a year.  She has a recent entry on the nerdy sexiness of librarians that's a great read:

Nothing like the conservative nerd-girl to get a smart man’s blood boiling and current hipster fashion is leaning towards the stereotyped library-chic these days.  I once had a guy tell me that each thing he found out about me made me that much sexier.  Think a mystery wrapped in an enigma…or an enigma wrapped in bacon - I hear they’re both a turn on. The fact that it was all hidden under knee length camel-hair skirts and turtlenecks made me that much more attractive. 

I agree with her that "smart women are the new hotness."

Rafi on differing social media strategies of the Israeli Government

My buddy Rafi posts on his new blog Empathetics a very insightful commentary on how different branches of the Israeli government are using social media during this latest Gaza conflagration.  In short, the Israeli military is employing the old "throw it against the wall and see what sticks" approach versus the Israeli diplomatic corps more nuanced and sophisticated tactics.  Who knew that wars were going to be fought both on the battlefield as well as on Twitter, YouTube and Facebook?

Check out Rafi's great post here.  I hope he analyzes Hamas's response next.

Life Lesson I learned through Second Life: Immersion Aversion

As part of the neat "Mix-and-Match" game that several Second Life bloggers are playing today, I was assigned the task of blogging about a "life lesson" I learned through Second Life (topic suggested by Joan Kremer).  I chose to write about what Second Life has taught me about how I am both attracted to and flee from community.  And how I have to stop observing and get in the game. This was surprisingly a hard topic to write about for me.

Thanks to Wildstar Beaumont for hosting my post on his neat blog "Wild Words."

Check out all of the other neat "Mix-and-match" blog posts here. 

My post on MacArthur Foundation Blog: Global Kids' Aha! Moments in 2008

The MacArthur Foundation "Spotlight" blog just published a post I wrote about some Global Kids "Aha!" moments we've had while conducting our virtual educational programs over 2008. Thanks to Barry Joseph for inspiring this post and suggesting the different lessons that I wrote about.

This post is also a plug for the "sneak preview" of MacArthur's new "Foundations" island in Second Life on Monday, November 17.  We're working with USC's Network Culture Project to put together several hours of interesting programming on how the virtual world is impacting the real world in various positive ways.

Check out my post here.

Second Life Bloggers Mix-and-Match Game: Let's Play!

Second Life bloggers Arminax and Vint Falken came up with this fun idea to get the various members of the SLogosphere to expand their horizons a bit and interact with each other.  The game, called "Mix-and-Match," randomly assigns bloggers to a particular topic and another blog to post their ideas on. 

I just got my assignment, which sounds pretty fun actually. I am to write on the Wild Words blog run by Wildstar Beaumont about "the biggest life lesson (first or second life) learned in Second Life." Interesting. I've got until November 12 to draft my post.

Meanwhile, a SL blogger named Merrick Thor is going to writing on this blog about "the larger significance of Philip Linden's hair." Ha!