Meeting (A) Redpod Group

Shortly after submitting the first assignment for this unit I decided to take the initiative and contact my fellow red group members to set up a meeting to discuss assignment 2.

I posted the idea onto the CSU forum and both Lesley and Liz replied. We decided to meet using Etherpad the following night. When the time came to meet I went to log into Etherpad but found for some reason I couldn't. Thus, I spent a frantic hour trying to work out why I couldn't access Etherpad as well as posting messages on the forum informing my fellow group members why I suggested the meeting and was a no show.

It turned out that the others in the group also had problems with Etherpad as well - so at least that made me feel a bit better. I guess no matter how reliable the person is, sometimes technology can be a tad unreliable.!!

Webex 30 September - 2009

I was very curious to try Webex as it sounded interesting and I hadn't experienced anything like it before.

I received my invitation to join early in the day but found that I was unable to accept the invitation until right before the meeting began. I found this a tad daunting - as my computer is not always the most reliable and I would of liked to of been prepared if anything should not go to plan. Luckily, everything did go to plan and I was able to accept the invitation without any problems.

I had my microphone and earphones set and ready to go, but found I could not hear properly nor could others hear me, thus my microphone and earphones were malfunctioning! This did not seem to be a huge problem as I could still hear without the earphones, but the only problem was I couldn't speak.

I liked how on Webex the person who is facillitating the meeting can "mute" other participants. I sometimes find dialogue during online discussions (particilarly when several people are participating) can run in many different directions and thus can be confusing. The "mute" function helps to overcome that. Similarly, I liked how participants could use the hands up function.

I can see Webex or a program similar to it being advantageous in a remote school similar to the one where I am currently working in. At out school we are often short of specialist teachers and I see (if it wasn't for the financial cost) that we could employ a specialist teacher to instruct classes via Webex, as the students can still see the instructor and vice versa. Of course, in terms of behaviour management there would have to be a teacher physically in the room with the students however, I think this could be something that isolated schools should probably think about considering.

Topic 10 Exercise 10.1

Social Networks Case Study

Social network analysis of our weekly meetings and blogs




Since we have a fine collection of artefacts from our own learning community in this subject, use the references to guide your directions AND figure 1 on mapping the social network as a set of nodes, follow these steps (HINT - don't pick too small or too big an extract)


What to do:


Who is following who? Examine the blogs in your POD and work out the map of followers/following relationship.


Assign each person a letter in the same order as they appear in the dialogue as a, b, c, etc.

1. For your chosen extract, draw the social network diagram and build the same matrix of 0 and 1's as per figure 1.


2. Describe any patterns of people's interactions that you discover. (I am forcing you to think here)


3. If you were to repeat this analysis on another set of blogs from another POD, would you find the same patterns?


4. Why or Why not (HINT - changes in context and process may be just some variables to consider)


5. Support your opinion with any of the reference provided or with others you find.

A= Mel

B= Liz

C = Lesley

D= Ben

E – Shin

The data that was used for the purpose of this question was taken from a Redpod group meeting. As is the case with all Redpod meetings the conversation flowed steadily – but it is not always on topic. Despite this, the group are very forthcoming with discussing their successes as well as challenges. Everyone seems to be happy to support others to overcome these challenges.

While I know that our meetings with the Redpod members are relatively fruitful and full of discussion I do not feel this is reflected in either of the above diagrams. While I guess it shows we all interacted with each other it does not indicate much about the tone of the conversation, nor does it detail the depth of the conversation. I think upon reflecting on the discussions I have had as part of this online journey I have discovered that I am pretty much a follower and a peacemaker.

I do not think that the results would be the same in another set of blogs from another POD because my the roles may differ in a different situation. As pointed out by Valdis Krebs “organization charts prescribes that work and information flow in a hierarchy, but network mapping reveals (they) actually flow through a vast web of informal channels.

Reference http://semanticstudios.com/publications/semantics/000006.php

Topic 9 Exercise 9.2

Research and Evaluation in Government 2.0

Ever since our state and federal politicialns began using tools like Twitter, Linkedin and Facebook, the 'mashup' of social networking with politics was inevitable. Now all over the world there are summits on Government 2.0 in Australia, The Gruen Report is due in late 2009. Here is an interesting audio to explain about Parpicipatory democracy, Web 2.0 and the Government 2.0 Taskforce

1. Summarise the use of

Wiki drafts of papers for public discussion and

Twitter in Government

2. Did you see yourself as a supporter of Government 2.0? If so how did you benefit? If not then explain why. Consider the Gov 2.0 taskforce site at http://gov2.net.au/ and the conference at http://www.gov2.com.au

Wikis are designed to be a collaborative tool used to gather information. Some businesses are beginning to use wikis as drafts of public discussion. Users are requested to review information and where they deem it appropriate add relevant information. The information gathered on the Wiki usually includes specific challenges, issues and innovations. Staff usually post the wikis for review, comment and to seek additional content. Staff will then usually incorporate edits, comments and additions as appropriate and develop a final draft which is then submitted to members. Similarly, Twitter is being used in Government - for example both members of the public and government officials can use twitter as a place for discussion

Reference: http://www.sacog.org/calendar/2008/11/03/grpa/pdf/09-RUCS%20Wiki.pdf

In all honesty, prior to this course I hadn’t even heard of Government 2.0 – so it is very difficult to contribute an opinion. I have heard of a task force and have seen some articles about this – but because of my limited knowledge would find it difficult to offer any sort of worthwhile opinion.

Topic 9 Exercise 9.1

Is Social Networking A Business Model?

Join the site called linkedin.com and set up your "business" profile. While many businesses use social networking sites of buy islands in virtual worlds, some argue that there use is not a model for doing business.

What are the arguments for and against social networking being classified as a business model?

As suggested I joined the LinkedIn website and was intrigued to find what it was all about. Although I find it hard to see the relevance a website like this would have with me in my current situation, I can see the benefits for others. In particular, being able to set up a slide show to be shown in another location would be ideal.

As pointed out by Wikipedia “social networks connect people at a low cost, this can be beneficial for entrepreneurs and small businesses looking to expand their contact bases” Companies also have the option of using social networks to advertise their businesses in the forms of banners and text ads.

A distinct disadvantage of using a site such as LinkedIn. Is that users can become so absorbed that they do not click on the banners and text ads for businesses. The other distinct disadvantage would be that it does not seem that advertisers can tell if their target group has been reached.

Topic 8 Exercise 8.4

Aggregation, syndication and the social engine

a) RSS is an XML application needed for aggregration and syndication, often called a Web "feed".

What is RSS and explain what aggregation and syndication are and how they have changed the nature of the Web. How do you subscribe to an RSS feed? Try some of these RSS enabled sites such as itunes.com and the notions of "swarm" and "stack" at digg.com

b) del.ico.us is a social bookmarking website. What does this mean and what are the advantages for workgroups? Discuss how del.ico.us uses the term "tag" in a different context to what Web publishers would be familiar.

c) How do you see services such as those provided at the GoToWeb20.net site as changing the way that YOU and your future networks operate?

d) Explain how the Elgg social engine works on a Web site where it is installed? Is this the type of application you want on your Web server in the workplace?

a) RSS or Really simple syndication can also be referred to as Rich site summary. RSS is a family of web feed format which is used to publish frequently updated works such as a blog or a video. An RSS document includes full or summarised text in addition to metadata such as publishing dates or authorship. Web Feeds (as RSS documents are commonly referred to) is advantageous to publishers as it allows them to syndicate content automatically. RSS feeds can be read using software called an RSS reader, feed reader or aggregator. An aggregator is client software or a web application which aggregates syndicated web content in a single location to make viewing easier. Syndication is when website material is made available to many other sites. More commonly, web syndication refers to making web feeds available so people can view most recent events that have occurred at the site.

b) Social bookmarking sites such as del.cio.us is a method for users of the internet to share, organise, search and manage bookmarks of web resources. Files themselves are not shared, merely the bookmarks that reference them.

The advantages for workgroups using bookmarking sites is that descriptions may be added to these bookmarks in the form of metadata, so that users can gain an understanding of the content without having to download it themselves, thus wasting time. According to Wikipedia “many social bookmarking services provide web feeds for their list of book marks, including lists organised by tags. This allows subscribers to become aware of new bookmarks as they are saved, shared or tagged by others.

Tags are one word descriptors that you can assign to your bookmark on Delicious to help you better organise and remember them. Similar to keywords, but the user chooses the most appropriate tag to help them remember and access the site with more ease. You have the freedom to assign as many tags as you wish to a bookmark and you have to option of renaming or deleting them at a later date. This makes tagging a lot easier and flexible than trying to fit information into preconceived categories or folders. Users of Delicious also have the freedom to add more than one tag to their bookmark…which is ideal when it falls into several categories.

c) The services provided at gotoweb.20 and similar websites provide access to many other websites from that one page. It would make it easier for workgroups to operate and certainly would be less time consuming that having to trudge through a multitude of other sites to find the relevant information.

d) Elgg is an open source social engine that began in 2004 and powers all kinds of social environments including education, business. Elgg comes with a set of default profile fields which may be extended or completely changed by the site adminstrator. By using Elgg’s powerful widget framework the user is able to choose a bank of available widgets to create full and rich profiles. The Elgg profile gives a good overview of a member of the site, compiling their activity with the site.

I guess this type of search engine would be beneficial in the workplace as it would help employers to keep a track of their employees activities at work, however, personally I wouldn’t like to have my movements tracked so closely.

Topic 8 Exeercise 8.3

Data portability, FOAF and the Semantic Web

1. Begin with the YouTube video at http://www.foaf-project.org/community
2. Like a chain letter, our data seems to move within and between tools like Facebook and Twitter. Is this a good thing?
3. According to http://foaf-project.org/about, the "Friend of a Friend" project or FOAF is described as:

FOAF is a simple technology that makes it easier to share and use information about people and their activities (eg. photos, calendars, weblogs), to transfer information between Web sites, and to automatically extend, merge and re-use it online. The Friend of a Friend (FOAF) project is creating a Web of machine-readable pages describing people, the links between them and they things they create and do.

How does the FOAF tag from part of the Semantic Web and Web Services via social networks?

Q1. I found the video at Youtube an interesting way to get the message across to an audience. The video reminds us about the mundane task of repeatedly filling in the same details about yourself each time you sign up to a social networking site. It would be so much easier if you did not have to go through that process each time. I, in particular found it very frustrating trying to sign up for Second life as for some reason the registration process was not that fond of me. Life would be so much simpler if there was a uniform procedure that just automatically filled out your details allowing the user to get on with the task of simply using the social networking site.

Q2. I think that users of networking sites should be able to take their data with them when they leave a site. I understand by being able to do this businesses cannot send products etc to entice the user back on board, but I think it would encourage networking sites to ensure that the services they provide are up to scratch so users will not want to leave.

Q3: The connection between Social Networking Sites and semantic community portals is strong. The friend of a friend (FOAF) ontology has been used by many social networking sites such as Tribe and it describes member profiles and their relationships. Using FOAF ontology is leading to interoperability between the different standalone social networking sites. This will increase the number of “happy chances” occurring between people who utilise these online worlds by bringing them all together in a universal social network. For this to happen though, according to Wikipedia “more social networking sites will be required to use FOAF, SIOC (Semantically Interlinked Online Communities) and other related ontologies making the data within them distributed and decentralized as opposed to being locked into proprietary sites or applications.