Social Networking Grows Up

From socializing, to learning, to studying.  What will the next generation of social networking be?

Arthur C. Clarke, quoted in Popular Science May 1970, predicted that satellites would one day “bring the accumulated knowledge of the world to our fingertips.”

He was right. Today there is no shortage of social networking sites on the Internet, where we can instantly share ideas, business opportunities, and even recipes with our friends. Instant information is literally at our fingertips.

When most people think of social networks, they think of Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, or similar sites.  But an increasingly web savvy and time constrained working population are turning to social networks for professional development through discussion, file sharing, and collaboration. CEET (for educators interested in teaching with technology) and the Literacy Forum (to advance literacy and learning) are good examples of social sites for learning, designing and sharing educational practice.  And now there is a new crop of social networks emerging, designed specifically for studying, sharing class notes and collaborating.  Here are a few:

Finals Club – Free site for sharing Harvard University course notes

OpenStudy – Links learners who want to study free online educational content like MIT’s OpenCourseWare

GradeGuru – A note-sharing site run by  textbook publisher, McGraw-Hill Education, that pays students small rewards—in cash or gift cards—based on the popularity of their notes.

Mixable – Lets students share notes and coursework as well as form study groups within Facebook, using a free application developed at Purdue University.

but honestly Monica

This past month I have been mesmerized by the creation of a collaborative digital story.  A multimodal networked storytelling extravaganza,  contributed to by thousands.

It is a tale of villianous Judith Griggs, editor of Cooks Source Magazine.  For those unfamiliar with the story, an article written by blogger Monica Gaudio was reprinted without permission in the October issue of Cooks Source magazine. Gaudio claims that she contacted the editor, Judith Griggs, requesting an apology and a $130 donation to be made to the Columbia School of Journalism. Gaudio, unsatisfied by the email response she received from Griggs, posted an excerpt of the email message on her LiveJournal blog entitled “Illadore’s House o Crack.” The post was picked up by Twitter and Facebook users. Eventually big names like Boing Boing, Salon.com, The New York Times, and The Guardian, to mention a few, picked up on it too.

Griggs fueled the story by refusing to apologize, berating Monica and by posting sarcastic comments on the magazines facebook page.

The Internet community reacted swiftly, with humor, but also aggressively, bombarding the Cooks Source Facebook page with insults and creating a series of mocking fake Twitter accounts for both the magazine and Griggs.  Videos appeared on YouTube and thousands of bloggers voiced their opinion.

The Internet Community turned a case of copyright theft into a multimodal networked collaborative digital story with humor, intrigue, scandal and tragedy. Villian became victim as Griggs faced unleashed cyberbullying. Recently she announced the closure of the cooking magazine and the www.cookssource.com URL now directs you to Intuit.com, a web hosting company.  The Facebook page has been closed.