I’m not going to lie: when we found out about this project I was less than thrilled. Basically because I assumed that our class would not be able to work together in any sort of cohesive way. And I didn’t much like the theme either… pop culture is more of a topic than a theme anyway. So I’m glad we were able to make that something more specific and focused. I’m actually pretty amazed that we were even able to get organized and finish a project. I think it probably could have been more varied—it seems like a lot of us ended up working on the reality show and quite a few of the original ideas fell by the wayside. But I think overall having the class focus on two major projects worked better than having a few people on many projects—it would have been much more difficult to finish them. So that’s my overall opinion on this project: I think it probably could have been better and gone farther, but was good all things considered (i.e. we are all second semester seniors and disinclined to get organized and work.)
So, my experience with using social media in this project. My experience here was largely just organizing the group on Facebook, so I suppose I learned a little about that. I thought more people would check Facebook than their school email, so it would be an effective means of communication, but I think people who don’t check their school email aren’t going to check a class page about a school project. But having it there was good—it did do its job in providing a central “location” for the group to meet/keep one another updated outside the classroom. But Facebook disappointed me a little in terms of its effectiveness as a community organizing tool—especially in regards to the reality show day. I think it’s because committing to something on Facebook seems less real than to committing to something in the “real world.” I think we still have this idea (as a society perhaps) that unless something is physically in front of you, it doesn’t entirely exist. Because of the somewhat ephemeral nature of Facebook (by which I mean that everything is always changing and moving and that there are no constants), do people feel they have less of a responsibility to commitments made via Facebook? The spirit day had 31 confirmed attendees and 25 maybes… but I think all of about 6 or 7 people dressed up total. I guess that goes for the real world too though… I’ve always heard that you should expect a quarter of the people who volunteered for something to show up. So the internet and life seem pretty similar in this sense. So Facebook worked well for the purpose of organizing our class, who knew to look for it, but not so much for the spirit day.
This project (or rather my side project that sort of sprang out of the larger group project) also allowed me to use Blogger, as site which, up until now, I had not been very familiar with. I’m reserving judgement here: I’ve always kind of felt like blogging is similar to confessional poetry: rather self-centered and telling more about people than I want to know. So for me, blogging was something new, and I didn’t particularly like it—I felt very pretentious, and am pretty sure that it will never be read, so I have to question the point of putting my ideas out there in the first place. If a blog is posted and nobody reads it, is it even still a blog? Because isn’t the purpose of blogs to be read? I need to stop getting philosophical about social media; I’ll just get frustrated.
So, my experience with using social media in this project. My experience here was largely just organizing the group on Facebook, so I suppose I learned a little about that. I thought more people would check Facebook than their school email, so it would be an effective means of communication, but I think people who don’t check their school email aren’t going to check a class page about a school project. But having it there was good—it did do its job in providing a central “location” for the group to meet/keep one another updated outside the classroom. But Facebook disappointed me a little in terms of its effectiveness as a community organizing tool—especially in regards to the reality show day. I think it’s because committing to something on Facebook seems less real than to committing to something in the “real world.” I think we still have this idea (as a society perhaps) that unless something is physically in front of you, it doesn’t entirely exist. Because of the somewhat ephemeral nature of Facebook (by which I mean that everything is always changing and moving and that there are no constants), do people feel they have less of a responsibility to commitments made via Facebook? The spirit day had 31 confirmed attendees and 25 maybes… but I think all of about 6 or 7 people dressed up total. I guess that goes for the real world too though… I’ve always heard that you should expect a quarter of the people who volunteered for something to show up. So the internet and life seem pretty similar in this sense. So Facebook worked well for the purpose of organizing our class, who knew to look for it, but not so much for the spirit day.
This project (or rather my side project that sort of sprang out of the larger group project) also allowed me to use Blogger, as site which, up until now, I had not been very familiar with. I’m reserving judgement here: I’ve always kind of felt like blogging is similar to confessional poetry: rather self-centered and telling more about people than I want to know. So for me, blogging was something new, and I didn’t particularly like it—I felt very pretentious, and am pretty sure that it will never be read, so I have to question the point of putting my ideas out there in the first place. If a blog is posted and nobody reads it, is it even still a blog? Because isn’t the purpose of blogs to be read? I need to stop getting philosophical about social media; I’ll just get frustrated.
No comments:
Post a Comment