UW Bothell's YouTube channel!

University of Washington Bothell has its own YouTube channel! It's still young, but check it out!

Here's one video featured on the channel:

Mapping and tracking web 2.0 tool usage

I heard of WikipediaVision (beta) from a snippet in the Feb 2008 edition of College & Research Libraries News, and while that tool has potential, it led me to even more 2.0 tool/Google maps mashup applications that I found to be more impressive (mainly just because they're further into their development).

Check them out to see in (almost) real-time the usage and content people are contributing:

• FlickrVision 3D
  
• TwitterVision - also in 3D version and can be set up to pull from Facebook "twitter" messages.
  
• SpinVisionTV - pulls from YouTube postings

Caveats: Only certain user's activities will be reflected in these tools, depending on user information made public and other functions of the selected tools.

Wikipedia's Top 50 - Visualized

For those of you fascinated by the visual display of info as I am, this graphic nicely visualizes the top 50 wikipedia searches from 8/06-5/07. Edward Tufte would be proud of the creator.

It's interesting to see what topics were popular in concordance w/ what was going on in the news of politics and entertainment at the time. It's also kinda funny how one of the top things searched on were 'wiki' and/or 'wikipedia.'

Wikipedia’s Top 50 Visualizations Link

via English Education Professor by Todd Finley on 1/27/08

A Professor's Tips for Using Twitter in the Classroom

Here is an interesting way one professor used Twitter in class and for assignments:

A Professor's Tips for Using Twitter in the Classroom

via The Chronicle: Wired Campus Blog on 1/28/08

Twitter at first seemed like a bad idea to David Parry, an assistant professor of Emerging Media and Communications at the University of Texas at Dallas. For those not in the know, Twitter is a service that lets you micro-blog your life by dashing out very short notes (140 characters max) to a select group of friends or other subscribers, who can receive them as text messages on their cell phones. Mr. Parry’s first instinct was that Twittering would just encourage students to speak in sound bites and self-obsess.

But then he gave it a try, and he now sees Twitter as a useful classroom-communication tool.

How is that? He outlines several “Ways to use Twitter in Academia” on a post on the blog AcademHack.

Last semester he required the 20 students in his “Introduction to Computer-Mediated Communication” course to sign up for Twitter and to send a few messages with the service each week as part of a writing assignment. He also invited his students to follow his own Twitter feed, in which he sometimes writes several short thoughts each day. Yesterday morning, for instance, he sent out a message that read: “Reading, prepping for grad class, putting off running until it warms up a bit.” Last week, one of his messages included a link to a Web site he wanted his students to check out.

The posts from students also mixed the mundane with the useful. One student twittered that she just bought a pet rabbit. Another noted that a topic from the class was being discussed on a TV-news report.

The immediacy of the messages helped the students feel like more of a community, Mr. Parry said in an interview Monday. “It was the single thing that changed the classroom dynamics more than anything I’ve ever done teaching,” he said.

One downside: Some students have to pay a small fee for each text message they receive, and that means all this Twittering can add up to real money. Students can avoid such charges by setting their Twitter account so that they receive e-mail messages instead of text messages, but that eliminates much of the point of the service.

Should more professors use Twitter? Have you tried it in your classroom? —Jeffrey R. Young

Digital Toy Chest

Digital Toy Chest for Online or Downloadable Tools

via Machina Memorialis by John on 1/15/08

From Alan Liu, via Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 21, No. 465:

“Toy Chest” collects online or downloadable software tools/thinking toys that humanities students and others without programming skills (but with basic computer and Internet literacy) can use to create interesting projects. Most of the tools gathered here are free or relatively inexpensive (exceptions: items that are expensive but can be used productively on a free trial basis). Also on this page are “paradigms”–books, essays, digital projects, etc.–that illustrate the kinds of humanities projects that software thinking tools/toys might help create.” Each entry includes a descriptive annotation, screenshot, and link. Included at present are tools for diagramming, game creation, mapping, mashup creation, simulation & modeling, text analysis, visualization/pattern-discovery, and machinima.

Command Lines: Aesthetics and Technique in Interactive Fiction and New Media

A newly completed Ph.D. dissertation by Jeremy Douglass:

Abstract:

The Interactive Fiction (IF) genre describes text-based narrative experiences in which a person interacts with a computer simulation by typing text phrases (usually commands in the imperative mood) and reading software-generated text responses (usually statements in the second person present tense). Re-examining historical and contemporary IF illuminates the larger fields of electronic literature and game studies. Intertwined aesthetic and technical developments in IF from 1977 to the present are analyzed in terms of language (person, tense, and mood), narrative theory (Iser’s gaps, the fabula / sjuzet distinction), game studies / ludology (player apprehension of rules, evaluation of strategic advancement), and filmic representation (subjective POV, time-loops). Two general methodological concepts for digital humanities analyses are developed in relation to IF: implied code, which facilitates studying the interactor’s mental model of an interactive work; and frustration aesthetics, which facilitates analysis of the constraints that structure interactive experiences. IF works interpreted in extended “close interactions” include Plotkin’s Shade (1999), Barlow’s Aisle (2000), Pontious’s Rematch (2000), Foster and Ravipinto’s Slouching Towards Bedlam (2003), and others. Experiences of these works are mediated by implications, frustrations, and the limiting figures of their protagonists.

Visionary Landscapes: Electronic Literature Organization 2008 Conference

Currently seeking proposals, but also held next spring in our own backyard of Vancouver, WA.

"A plenary event including Howard Rheingold, Yochai Benkler, John Seely Brown, Joi Ito, and Lawrence Lessig on the Future of DIY Media."

Here are the details of the event:

24/7: A DIY VIDEO SUMMIT
February 8-10, 2008 School of Cinematic Arts, University of Southern California

Conference web site: http://www.video24-7.org
Blog: http://diy.video24-7.org/

Spaces are limited for attendance at the academic panels and the workshops. The video
screenings are free and open to the public.

24/7: A DIY Video Summit will bring together the many communities that have evolved
around do-it-yourself (DIY) video:artists, audiences, technology providers, academics,
policy makers and industry executives. The aim is to discover common ground, and to
chart the path to a future in which grassroots and mainstream, amateur and professional,
artist and audience can all benefit as the medium continues to evolve.

This three-day summit features:

SCREENINGS OF DIY VIDEO

On February 8 and 9, there will be screenings of DIY video that are
open to the public. These will feature curated programs on design video, activist
documentary, youth media, machinima, music video, political remix and video blogging.
The video program will culminate in an evening program and reception on February 9 that
will draw from all of these video genres.

ACADEMIC PROGRAM
Registered attendees will have access to the academic program on February 8 and 9 that
features panels on The State of Research, The State of the Art, DIY Media: The
Intellectual Property Dilemma andDIY Tools and Platforms.

WORKSHOPS AND BIRDS-OF-A-FEATHER MEETINGS

On February 10, the day will be devoted to practical and hands- onworkshops for
registered attendees on topics such as intellectual property, media creation,
distribution and new-media design tools.

Attendees will also have the option of organizing their own birds-of- a-feather meetings
to connect with other attendees.