My experiences with virtual communities has been very limited. I do not have a Facebook or other related account and the first blog I have set up has been for this class. But having an 18 year old girl who is fascinated with Facebook & 16 year old boy who loves the MMORPG communities of Gielinor and Lumbridge in Runescape and World of Warcraft (WoW), I have witnessed these communities through my kids. While many criticize the addictiveness of these on-line games, I was impressed with the amount of research/reading that is involved to achieve success in the quests these games present. And, the interactive piece involves chatting and competitive or cooperative mini-games with other players. There are strict guidelines about behavior and you can be booted off the game for inappropriate behavior. My son had to do a comparision of these games for a media literacy class at his high school and he chose a couple of YouTube casts as examples for his presentation. South Park recreates a satirical look at how the virtual gaming community takes over youth and adult lives. I am not a South Park fan, but you can go to YouTube and search South Park and WoW.
For an example of Runescape vs. World of Warcraft visit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c15GbvUupMY
It is great to sit next to my kids when they’re online. They are very open with me about the communities that they are experiencing. My son hooks up the microphone when he & his buddies are going on a real challenging quest and the cheering on and support they give is an example of collaborative teamwork and they are having a blast! Fun and learning lifelong skills such as team-playing — go figure!
As for facebook, when managed tactfully, I feel it is a great option for people to network and build community. But, employers, college admissions & high school deans have access to those accounts so we,(as parents & information literacy educators), have to take responsibility for teaching this generation of digital natives the cautions that need to be taken. You can tell which parents do not monitor what their child is putting on facebook by the content that is presented.
For a different LIS class, I subscribed to a listserv for a couple of weeks and found it very overwhelming with so many hits each day. When reading some of the links for this topic, I was surprised to find so much negative comment on embracing blogs as a useful technology for libraries. But, I can understand the rationale behind their hesitancy — these were tech savvy librarians, but they were saying that the blog is only going to be replaced by the next version of online networking and they were having a hard time justifying the time spent to get it implemented only to have it replaced by something newer.
I have been hesitant to jump onboard full scale, because, like them, I do not have the time. Working fulltime, taking master’s classes, being a single parent pretty much takes up the clock. I can read for my class while watching my son’s football game, but the online piece is not a great option on the football sidelines.
And, I just wonder, how much blogging is being done that is taking away worktime on the job? Our school district is monitoring how much time educators are spending surfing the net and how much of their emails are spent on personal business vs. professional.
I already have 3 email accounts (school, work, home) that need monitoring. I can see a lot of applications in my personal life and in libraries for Second Life technology, but many like myself will choose to test the waters at a slower pace. As Trish mentioned in her blog about finding the time to “play” in Flickr — I can relate. Sometimes the choice comes down to “play” in Flickr, or go to bed and get a good night’s sleep. So, in essence, I think the underlying theme with this post is: ‘how do people have the time’.
When people my age now are the ones who are the HR managers and college deans, I have a hard time imagining that this current frenzy about disqualifying people based on their Facebook frenzy will continue. I would never object to someone posing with a pitcher of beer or whatever, and I don’t know anyone who would. It’s just a part of our lives now, and it’s really just horribly uncool to be judged for it.
Having said that, I am rather proud of my small search engine footprint. On the other hand, given some of the job listings Michael showed us in class, perhaps I need to get a bigger one to be more attractive to people seeking Internet-savvy applicants!
[...] post by Readingrocks [...]
Linda, you have hit the nail on the head! I am not a parent but do work full time in addition to my classes. I just can’t muster much energy to check a blog, social network site, etc after I have spent most of my day on the computer. My company does not allow access to many of the social network sites, and frankly, I can’t blame them. I image there are thousands of hours lost each day/week etc. that people are accessing, exploring and blogging that is on company time. I am certain there are many people out there not taking away from employers time but what about time for people around you when not at work?
I heart this:
” I was impressed with the amount of research/reading that is involved to achieve success in the quests these games present. ”
Good stuff.
It interests me that the librarians discussing blogs were worried about time spent when an newer social tool might come along. One thought: would one of those librarians refuse to put in a phone system in the library because in a couple of years, newer phones will be available?
Many of these tools create skillsetsthat will carry over to the next tool. A Wordpress blog might lead to Drupal, etc..
Good post!