I thought this chapter would be interesting, since we’ve all kind of been making fun of how out-of-date this book is, and it’s about upcoming technologies. Wilber says some may already be out of date, and I don’t think that’s true of any of them (except Myspace, but I already ruled that out in an earlier post and in 2006); if anything, some still haven’t become as popular as may have been expected yet.
Of course, Facebook is still huge. A couple nights ago my boyfriend and I went out for a fancy dinner at The Olive Garden (big spenders!) and I overheard one girl (loudly) telling her boyfriend about something her friend wrote on her wall (while eating louder than I’ve ever heard anyone eat in my life, but I digress.) I just thought it was funny because a few years you ago you would be like, “She wrote on your wall? That’s so rude!” Now it’s just a commonplace phrase. Most people know what you’re talking about (except my grandparents.)
Wilber talks about Ning, and I had actually never heard of it until last semester in Dr. Rish’s class. He actually talked about it like we should have known what it was, and I’m not sure if I was the only person who had no clue what he was talking about or what. I didn’t totally understand what it was until I read this chapter. So I did learn something from this book!
Then you have Twitter. Twitter kind of annoys me, because I feel like most people use it incorrectly:
This does apply to Facebook statuses, but also to Twitter. Be witty or clever, but don’t tell me you’re eating dinner. No one cares. For examples of good Tweets (from celebrities, and sometimes are a little racy/vulgar/more adjectives to describe cussing), go here.
While reading the chapter, I was trying to think of how I can incorporate Twitter into the classroom. My main concern was that it would even be allowed: technically, I’m not following students, but they have the option of following me. Plus, I would only post scholastic-related things, but I’m not sure what that would be. I can be funny, I can’t be funny in English (har, har, there’s an example.)
Wilber also refers to Second Life, which I’ve heard of and know the general function of it, but I don’t know anyone who plays, and I never have. But I can insert another clip from The Office!
And then finally, there’s texting, which I’m pretty sure I’ve talked about in my blog already. In the one pedagogy class I took as an undergrad, I had a professor who said she was so appalled by the writing in her freshman English classes that she had to figure something else out, so she had them write papers in “text speak.” Last week, on the English Companion Ning (yes, I am now a proud member), a teacher sent out an email to a group I belong to asking for someone to translate the famous monologue from Romeo and Juliet into text speak. I took a look at it, but I type everything out in text messages, so I wasn’t going to be able to help her much.
hjstone 