[Oe List ...] Facebook & other virtual mediums

Fri Apr 30 18:45:13 CDT 2010

Another concern about Facebook for the Archives Project is that many of us can not access facebook during working hours.  For example, I work for Houston ISD and therefore have powerful privacy blocks- for obvious reasons!  I check email & some news sites etc at lunch or around 4:30 when officially off duty but still waiting for my son's bus to arrive.

With everything going on in life as a parent, various meetings during week, I often don't get on computer at home or wait til 9p after "homework time" w/ our kids or on the weekends. This means I often don't check facebook except for maybe 5-6 times a month. 

I understand the need for a common virtual meeting area that is somewhat conversational &  informal (like Facebook) where Archives (or any future OE/ICA endeavors) can post comments, pictures, links etc. I wonder what other options exist? Are there user friendly issues w/ using a "wiki" like the repository- eg hard to post photos & have running dialogue?

Facebook has nice feature of  limiting visual posts (you can select "more" if really want to read entire post or scan by if not).  It's great for sharing photos and feeling connected without spending lots of time! Also posts aren't  repeated like on this list serve, where have to keep scrolling down to next comment w/ repeat of the first post for each additonal comment.

Since "In Diaspora", I  have varied relationships to things like this listserve, Archives project,  supporting Internat'l ICA's,  Springboard, sharing/musing about Order wisdom & its distillation, sharing concern and actions for the future of the planet. I'm glad Archives Project is exploring mediums to share, dialogue, interact. I appreciate everyone who will be working on the Project this May.  
Debra Harris
________________________________

From: "oe-request at wedgeblade.net" <oe-request at wedgeblade.net>
To: oe at wedgeblade.net
Sent: Fri, April 30, 2010 5:03:03 PM
Subject: OE Digest, Vol 72, Issue 54

My "MobileMe" gallery with the same photos, available to download
http://gallery.me.com/dmansel/100078

Message: 2
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 2010 16:31:18 -0500
From: David Dunn <dmdunn1 at gmail.com>
To: OECommunity Community <oe at wedgeblade.net>,    Dialogue' Listserv
    <dialogue at wedgeblade.net>,    Springboard Listserv
    <springboard at wedgeblade.net>
Subject: [Oe List ...] Facebook pros and cons ? and help sorting it
    out
Message-ID: <1AF2D574-D718-4E5E-B7E2-52A475535B1B at gmail.com>
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Hello colleagues.

I'm duly settled in Chicago: I know where to sleep, where to eat, where to brush my teeth and where to go to get online. Life is good. Pam and Marge are hustling to prepare for the first wave of colleagues. I put my weight to the wheel finally this afternoon. You'll see stuff start to flow tomorrow.

I'm still wrestling with Facebook. For all of the hoopla, I think it's a mixed bag and not at all intuitive. So here is my short list of pros and cons, plus a couple of sentences about what I think it's good for. 

Pros
? Facebook is popular and has lots of members who can access peoples,' organizations' and groups' pages
? Facebook is free
? Facebook has some clever ways to facilitate networking and spreading the word about something of interest
? Facebook has a simple way to keep friends up to date on what you're up to.
? Facebook has the ability to handle discussions, communications and audio-video-photo media
? Facebook is especially attractive to younger generations
? [what would you add?]

Cons
? Facebook has powerful privacy controls, but they're not that easy to figure out
? Facebook has a learning curve re how to actually use it
? Facebook has a complex user interface that takes some getting used to
? Facebook tempts us to share more of our personal information that it's prudent to share online
? [what would you add?]

On balance: what's Facebook good for?
? Facebook is good for scanning a lot of information on what Friends are doing and thinking: it's a "news stream or 'feed' "
? Facebook is also good for easily sharing information with the people you want to share information with. Why wait until Christmas?
? Facebook is especially good in making connections and spreading the word about things you value.

?and not good for?
? In my opinion, Facebook is not a replacement for 
    a "wiki" like our Repository, 
    the ICA USA website (ica-usa.org) or 
    a face-to-face virtual meeting platform (like GoTo Meeting, etc.)

Bottom line
I think I'll personally stick to using Facebook as a sort of public face and portal to things that I'm interested in. For the Archives Project, we'll post photos and brief updates to the Facebook page, add photos to my Gallery and Flickr, and add my own and colleagues' blog entries to Spiritjourneys.org.

See the two attachments for help getting on top of Facebook. The first is visual-spacial, the second is rational-verbal.

To be continued.

David

David Dunn
dmdunn1 at gmail.com

Creative direction and spiritual companioning

My Facebook page with International Conference Center photos
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2056389&id=1021391491&l=cfb42f03a1
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