Have you seen the new template that Facebook offers?
I can’t say whether i like it or not yet. What i know is that it looks more professional and easier to handle. Sure, this change doesn’t make it easier to get used to the new facebook. For the first time i switched by chance to the new template i was very surprised and i was scared because i thought i couldn’t switch to the old and loving facebook template.
The new one is separated into four tabs: the wall, info, photos and boxes. One can move from one tab to another according to his/her preferences. This makes it easier to find similar info in certain areas without having to read the whole page. For example, on the info tab you can find the ‘facebooker’s’ personal data or in the photo tab you can find all the photos from the albums, and so goes on. I haven’t found other important changes yet since i haven’t got used to the new template and to be fair i prefer the old one, although it might be a little bit slow or confusing at times.
So, this is how the new page looks like
I think that in this way all similar information can be found in certain areas making it easier for the inexperienced user to find the information he/she is interested about. Moreover, the page is non-linear as the user can select different paths in order to ‘jump’ from one page to another. In my opinion, this new page has been created in order to enhance the user’s movements in order to easily navigate on the panel.
Lately I signed in my Hi5 account. I was curious to see whether I had any new notifications. Surprisingly I did have many, regarding friend requests. I had about 10 requests from totally unknown people asking from me to become friends so as we can get to know a little bit more with each other. This is quite natural these days since lots of people with the rise of internet seek to socialise through social networks such as Hi5. However the strange part was that the requests had been made from children aged from 12 to 16 years old. Honestly, tell me, what kind of relation or friendship can be developed from people who belong to such different generations? What kind of discussions can we have?
In an attempt to understand their logic of asking me to become their friend I visited their pages. There I discovered lots of colours, amazing pictures, numerous applications and hundreds of posts written by their friends and from themselves. So, trying to see how they reached me and whether we had any common friends I saw their friends. But I quickly discovered that they had made hundreds of friends from all over the world and from any age rank.
I guess that this is a new tendency between friends, to make as many friends as possible. The one with the greater number of friends is the coolest and the greatest, the ‘leader’. So, I feel that although Internet has brought people together, is also bringing them apart. In the seek of making friends and searching people we forget our true friends and neglect them. The term friendship, as I have known it till today, is going to be distorted. We are going to hang out around with unknown people, through the screen of our computers, and we are going to feel happy and satisfied with this, because lots of people today find it difficult to spend their time the way they used to in making friends.
This blog was firstly created to serve the purpose of maintaining a blog for my MA media class. It was about a month ago that i posted my first entry fully enthusiastic that i would begin something by myself and other people would comment on it. As I read from the article “Why we blog” there are several motivations for blogging. I can say that my main motivation has been to provide comments and opinions; and maybe articulate ideas through writing about social networking.
I have to admit that this is not my first blog. I had begun another one last year where I was documenting my life and expressing ideas and opinions, but I deactivated my account after a while. The reason was that I did not feel motivated enough to continue writing. I was writing things about my life but what was the point? I did not have a great audience, the more passionate ones where my two closest friends, but no one else seemed to be interested about my blog. I was feeling too unimportant and that I was spending too much time for something that was worthless. I hope it will not happen the same with this blog too!
What reasons would you give for *not* carrying on with a blog?
As I already wrote, the main reason for not carrying on with a blog would be the lack of audience. As far as I see that other people are visiting my blog I will feel confident enough to continue blogging. I don’t think that I would stop my blog if I had nothing to say. There are so many things around us that affect our lives and we can have an opinion to express on them.
Who would you blog for? What sense of audience have you got when you are blogging? What evidence have you got for your blog being used by others?
For the moment, i believe that my main audience is my classmates from the media course. We are all trying to maintain our blogs and we expect from each other to read the blogs and comment on them. From the dashboard I have some indicators that other bloggers too have read my blog. They have reached it through certain tags which I have used in order to categorize my entries. Moreover, I have used a tool called blog stats which shows the total number of people who have visited the blog and which fortunately everyday seems to increase. After I finish the course my main target will be my friends and anyone else who is interested about social networking.
What are the benefits of blogging for (i) yourself and (ii) others?
In order to maintain the blog I have to be informed about social networks. I have to develop my own opinion and express it objectively in my blog. So, I have to be an “expert” about what I am writing about or at least have some knowledge about it. So, I read and search for articles, and I use the internet in order to stay informed. As a result, I broaden my knowledge too. Consequently, as the blog will be informative and will be sticking to facts, anyone else who will be reading it, will stay informed too. They might even understand what I will be writing about in more depth because my goal is to use plain English.
I have read that some people use blogs in order to earn money through using advertisements. I would never do such a thing and my opinion is that it is not right to exploit the readers in such unethical ways.
What have been the ‘unintended consequences’ of blogging?
Sometimes, i feel that I am disappointing my audience if I haven’t written something for a week. I feel guilty because I think that they visit my blog in order to read something new and they feel disappointed when they find that I haven’t included a new entry. There is no one to apologize to because it is my own blog but I keep thinking that I should have an entry at least once a week so as they remain satisfied.
Has anything surprised you about keeping a blog?
Well, it is quite difficult to keep a blog. You have to spend quite a lot of time in order to maintain it and write new stuff every week. I thought that it would be easy to express my opinion and exciting to receive comments by anyone who would read it. The truth is that I don’t feel free to express my opinion, I am not totally excited that I will have an online journal; I have to watch out for everything I write about. I should be very careful in order not to insult or hurt someone. I should be very well informed because anyone can proof what I am talking about might be wrong. And sometimes I feel that I don’t want to share anything with anyone. I would prefer to keep it for myself or at least for my friends. Why should I spend so much time and effort for somebody else who might not even appreciate what I am writing about?
Have you suddenly made lots of new online friends?
No, I haven’t made new online friends through my blog …
Has your social life take a turn for the worse?
Of course not …
Is it all a lot more boring and mundane than you expected?
Yes it is, but no one has ever managed to become good at something without spending lots of time and effort (unless he is a true talent of course) …
I tried Second Life (SL) two months ago but my computer’s graphics did not allow me to experience this social network the way I would like. From the smallest movement everything on my screen seemed to collapse and even if I didn’t move my avatar wasn’t stable at all. But first of all let me introduce what SL is according to my experience.
Well first of all you create an account with a username and a password. You can choose your first name but not your last name. There are a number of choices and someone can choose the one it best suits him/her. After that you can install the SL on your computer and after entering your username and password a totally new world is just for you.
In the beginning there is a tutorial base where you learn the basics such as walking, watching around, flying, dressing and changing your avatar, and talking to other people in there. This is a funny and easy part as it seems that you can do anything you dreamt of in real life (RL).
If you have very good graphics you can make the slightest changes on your avatar, even from changing the shape of your eyes. This is really good; you can look like you would love to in RL.
Well after this, you can visit different areas of SL and see so many things. There is a place just for educational purposes the Education UK Island whose address is
There you can find a great number of other universities and stuff for educational purposes.
Also, there is a research project at the London Knowledge Lab, Institute of Education, University of London, for Learning From Online Worlds; Teaching In Second Life whose page is:
From there you can have a better idea of what SL can offer as learning is concerned.
But there are so many groups and events you can learn about if you learn how to handle SL. You can join these groups and become a member of many societies. You can even learn about popular place, events and groups without losing lots of time.
Moreover, there are places in SL where you can find stuff for free. These include clothes, jewellery, money, games and quite many things.
But SL has its disadvantages too. There are places for adults only and there is a great risk for a child to visit them. What is more, lots of people in SL can so easily pretend to be anything they like so you can never trust the one you are speaking with. You must really be careful what you are saying and to whom.
In the beginning it was MySpace. Then totally unexpectedly Hi5 came up in my life, and now I have settled in my most favourite social network, Facebook.
And the most reasonable questions are then arisen: Why did you join both three networks, Why do you prefer Facebook more than the others and finally but not least, what do you do in such networks?
It was around the beginning of 2006 when I first obtained an internet connection at home. The reason was simple.I had to study through the Internet and keep track of my tutor’s demands as an undergraduate student of a technological department. You might think how it is possible not to already have an internet connection in my home just like everybody else, but keep in mind that my home is in Greece and the internet penetration was quite low at that time and it did cost a lot to have a broadband line.
So, through trial and error I was making my first steps in the “magical” world of internet. I was so happy and excited to discover so many things through a simple click on my computer. To watch any video and picture I wanted; to download anything useful for my school work and even communicate with my friends!
As you might have guessed I discovered MySpace. I immediately became a member and I spent quite many hours for settling up my profile, decorating my page and adding my musical preferences. MySpace as you might know is a social network in which music is its central theme. Many bands advertise their music in there. So, except for my friends I also added for friends some musical groups. I visited their pages and listened to their music. Sometimes, these groups even invite me for events, where they play music in different venues in Athens. But I quickly got bored and I abandoned my page as a friend suggested me to try Hi5.
I found Hi5 much more interesting and easier to use for communicating with my friends. It is quite simpler and more convenient to handle than MySpace. Someone can choose a background profile, add personal details and interests and is ready to make friends from all over the world. Another difference between MySpace and Hi5 is the privacy level. What I mean is that in Hi5 only your friends can see your profile since you can set it to be a private profile. Moreover, you can upload photos, comment on them, give and take fives which describe you and write journals.
However, I did not have enough time to spend on Hi5 and I abandoned it for quite a lot time. It was not until this year that I signed in again where I noticed quite many changes in there. Many new applications are added and there are lots of things that one can do. But I noticed that the people in there had changed too. When I firstly joined Hi5 I could find people from all age ranks but now it was not the same. Children aged from 14 to 17 were asking my friendship and after becoming their friend I discovered that they had made Hi5 a meeting point where they tried to make the best profile with as many applications as possible and showing off through the photos they had uploaded. Moreover, there is a relentless chatting between them through the profile comments, where they even discuss other friends in Hi5 and the story so goes on …
Finally I joined Facebook when I was here in London around the February of 2008 as a friend did talk about it all the time. She was so excited finding old friends and communicating with them even after ten years of losing touch. I was so curious. What a magical network is this that can even reunite you with friends that you haven’t seen for years.
So, I became a member …
In contrary to the other two networks I had to post my real name and I soon was faced with privacy matters. How safe is it to post my real data, exposed to anyone who might want to become a friend? What if I do not post my real data? But then how my old friends will track me? I was in a great dilemma. Then I made a choice. “I will post my real name but I will set privacy rules in my profile. Only my friends and the network I belong will see my profile. My pictures will be visible only to friends and as a result I will make friends whom I already know”. So, I managed to overcome privacy problems and create my own account.
I have found some old friends, I added friends from Greece with whom I “talk” a lot after being in London for 5 months and I would have missed them a lot if we did not speak at all. I even joined some groups where I made friends with whom we have the same interests and finally I have added a variety of applications which are so funny. I can send requests to my friends to use them too and it is a kind of interaction through which we have a nice time. We compare our answers and send many more requests for much more applications to use. Moreover, one can upload an unlimited number of photos, create albums and tag the people on them. As a result, when someone is tagged this photo appears to his photos too!
Finally, someone can create a journal through the message box where he can let a number of certain people to read and comment on it. So, keeping in touch even being miles away from them is much easier.
The question now is what is next? Which network am I going to join after I get bored from Facebook too? Is it going to be Bebo, Twitter or Second Life?
Well, at least for the moment, my answer is that I totally love Facebook and I will never abandon it. I don’t need any other network as long as I feel satisfied with this one…
Of course there is the other side of Facebook, just watch the video
I recently became a member of Diigo society. Diigo is a useful tool with emphasis on research and socializing. One can parallelize it with Del.icio.us but i think that they are not quite the same. They share common things such as bookmarking and researching but i find Diigo a better tool since it offers many facilities. Just watch the video and you will find that it is quite interesting. I just became a member and i hope what the video promises are true and easy to do. I will certainly talk about Diigo after a while, for the moment i am experimenting and i need some more time to objectively criticize it.
After Kate’s questionnaire in her blog Hurstktsblog’s Weblog i decided to give my answers according to her questions whether we do social network. I think that everyday a new person becomes a networker. All have this feeling or need to be members of a team or a society even if this team/society is digital. We want to belong somewhere and have common things with lots of others. Since time and space are precious, more and more people turn to societies made on the Internet. Internet has become an important part of our everyday lives.
Which social networks do you belong to?
I have to admit that i belong to many social networks. In the beginning i became a member just out of curiosity and because some of my friends had already been members and suggested that i should too because its cool for communicating between us and meet people from all over the world. So I have accounts in Hi5, MySpace, YouTube and Facebook (in which i spend lots of hours).
How often do you access these accounts?
I access them daily searching for new material.
Who do you talk to?
I talk to my friends from real life and to friends i made through the social network.
Do you have a blog?
Except for the one i am writing to i don’t have another blog
What do you use your blog for?
The blog was created for my MA course in IOE. My main purpose is to show the tools we can use today for learning purposes.
I think that in this way all similar information can be found in certain areas making it easier for the inexperienced user to find the information he/she is interested about. Moreover, the page is non-linear as the user can select different paths in order to ‘jump’ from one page to another. In my opinion, this new page has been created in order to enhance the user’s movements in order to easily navigate on the panel.
