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Blogging Conclusion

  This summer, I have dabbled in blogging. I’ve always thought about how easy it would be to be a content creator, and thought that people who do this as a full time job have it so easy. Boy, was I wrong. Coming up with ideas for posts that would be somewhat engaging was way more difficult than I had previously imagined. I definitely have a new found respect for those who blog or create content of any kind… without any prompt.   So, what’s next for this blog? Honestly, not sure. Truthfully, it will probably fall by the wayside and become another abandoned blog in the interwebs. Ideally, I might occasionally update it and treat is a reflection for my own education and professional experiences. What should I do though? That’s a completely different question. The right move for my blog is to take the skills (and the slight confidence) I learned through blogging and work on creating content on other sites with more foot traffic. I think my first step though, will be to take a step back fro
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Future of Web 2.0

  After spending this summer learning about and interacting with Web 2.0 tools, I was curious about the future of Web 2.0 and how it might evolve in the future. I came across this NPR article by Bobby Allyn discussing Web 2.0’s impact on news sites. The headline is what drew me in: “Hard times are here for news sites and social media. Is this the end of Web 2.0?” I was thoroughly caught off guard and surprised by the headline.   The end of Web 2.0? After I spent the last twelve weeks learning about it? Impossible!  The highlight of the article was different news programs closing: Vice News Tonight, Buzzfeed News, Gawker, and Vox laying off part of its staff. Further, Allyn postulates that the rickety standing of these top sites leads people to believe that Web 2.0 as we know it is coming to an end. But then the question is raised, what comes next?   I don’t know. And neither does Allyn. The way people communicate via the internet shifts. People continuously develop smaller communities
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Top Web 2.0 Tools

  Now, this by no means an exhaustive list of Web 2.0 tools. This is just a list of the ones I liked and a little bit about it.   LinkedIn – This tool is great for professional networking and learning about different topics in industry. I added more people to my network, and interacted with people’s posts, sending them to people and commenting when I could.   Reddit – I have played with this tool before, but it has really grown in popularity for me the last few months. I like being about to sort content by a topic (subreddit) and interact with posts in a specific community without being inundated with a huge variety of posts  Pinterest – Picture and graphic sharing platform. I like this for the gallery style images and organization of ‘pinning’ items to different boards.   Blogging – This one doesn’t have a specific tool tied to it, but I used blogger. I grew to enjoy blogging and used it as a reflective activity and organizing thoughts based on different readings, interactions, and oc
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The Work From Home Debate

 When I started my job, I was told I could work a hybrid schedule. Unfortunately, that wasn't written into my contract. A decision has since been made where all employees within a 60 mile radius must be in office 5 days a week, and it has put a strain on me. Driving a 2 hour round-trip commute daily is a lot, and yesterday was my manager's last day over the decision.  It kind of puts us in a tough spot. Our initial launch for our project is in October, and having this kind of turnover this close definitely isn't ideal. But, it has me reflecting in the context of Web 2.0 tools. So many Web 2.0 tools emphasize connectedness and collaboration... and they don't need people to be in the same room, or even the same time zone to utilize them. Social media keeps people connected across places. What is the difference between this and the workplace? When so many schools and programs are offering virtual and remote options, what necessitates people being in the same building 5 day
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Threads and X

 The big news I've seen as of late has been about Instagram launching Threads, and Twitter rebranding to "X".  I listened to a podcast from The Daily this week titled "Will Threads Kill Twitter?" Tinfoil hat time: Do you think the Threads launch influenced the Twitter rebrand? Back to the podcast, there was a line that struck me: "I think humans do have some desire to connect with one another, and it's a real love-hate relationship with how the internet fundamentally works." For me, this hit home. Humans are social and desire connection. I think this is why social media feels so important to us, it allows for connection. However, there's that love-hate relationship. The podcast also mentioned that Threads hopes the norms of the site will evolve organically. That's where the love-hate relationship lies, Twitter has often been associated with negativity and 'doom scrolling', but maybe the new option of Threads will combat that narrati
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More Alike than Different?

 I recently read an article that I found to be one of the most interesting articles I've read in a while. It explored the differences between the different users of technology, the internet, and smartphones. Written in 2018, the article is titled "Social Media Use Continues to Rise in Developing Countries but Plateaus Across Developed Ones" by Poushter and Bishop.  Throughout my read, a few things came to mind for me. First, this was written in 2018 - 5 years ago. How outdated it this information already? Based on some of the trends and graphs, it seems that some of their statistics might already be changed at this point. I don't blame this critique on them - simply an observation.  However, as I read, the title kept coming back to my mind, specifically "But Plateaus Across Developed Ones". Looking at the percentage of internet usage for developed countries, its difficult to get much higher than the number they already have. US has 89%, Canada 91%, Australia
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Pessimism in Reddit

 I find myself careful to read some of the stuff in r/Instructional Design on Reddit. It seems like many people there are annoyed with shifts caused by the pandemic and by teachers being told this profession is an easy switch. Honestly, it kind of sucks. I am a former teacher who worked hard and left the field and am happy with where I ended up. I feel like I see a few kinds of posts: Hating the field for some reason, recommendations on how to enter, and actual conversations on how to improve whatever they are working on.  It gets exhausting reading discourse about how much people hate what is currently happening. It also makes me curious about the larger conversation around why teachers are leaving the classroom (that is a huge conversation). It just feels so wrong to gatekeep the information simply because someone chose to enter this career first instead of transitioning later in life. Anyone else have thoughts on this?
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