MySpace

A couple lists that I belong to have been blowing up with messages regarding MySpace.com. It is a very popular social networking website that offers social networking, photos sharing, websites, and blogs (and I'm sure much more). It may be different from Friendster, but I don't see the differences yet (though it might be a little more customizable).

I decided to go in and take a look for myself. I set up an account and they gave me this link (Find me on MySpace and be my friend! -- cheesy, isn't it?).

Now back to the discussion. Many on the list were complaining about their students setting up accounts in MySpace. They argue that it is not a healthy space for children (under 18) do to the explicit nature of the advertisements, member spaces, and the fact that this space is rife with sexual preditors. I can only guess that the last assertion is correct. The first two assertions are absolutely true. There is no way that this site (yes, the entire site) is appropriate for children.

If you click on the link above, it takes you to my space on MySpace (http://www.myspace.com/linguavita). This is probably the safest place on this network. However, the banner ads can get somewhat explicit. This place is only "safe" if users don't click on anything else on the page. I couldn't seem to keep in my space. I was always getting bounced out to the general MySpace pages, which all show a liberal amount of cleavage and women in suggestive poses.

I can see the point of those who say, "But children see worse than this on afternoon TV." That's true too. However, I think that this dialogue began in response to a suggestion that it be used with students. I really wouldn't even be comfortable using this with my adult students.

I think that it's apparent that I do not recommend that this be used with students, however I do not agree with those calling for MySpace to be boycotted, petitioned, sued, etc... That is just ridiculous. While the advertisements are explicit, they are not pornographic. The user spaces might be, but how can you control this? It's impossible. Put on parental controls and block the myspace domain.

There really seems to be a healthy, adult (mostly early 20's) community forming in this space. While I don't hold it up as an example of a child-friendly application, it is an exemplary social networking application. I only have a couple complaints in this regard. The sheer size and number of advertisements get in the way. Also, most of the spaces cannot be limited to "friends." Some content can be, but access to your space is public (including your pictures). Also, it would be a better application if you could limit discussion forums to your friends (or even 2nd or 3rd order friends). A public forum gets too unwieldy. Nothing is going to form in there but chaos.

SuprGlu

I feel like I may be the last person in the world to blog on SuprGlu. It is an interesting product and I'm just beginning to realize it's benefits.

I started a site at http://danielcraig.suprglu.com. What this service does is work with your various RSS feeds and organizes them based on your specifications. The SuprGlu staff has indicated that they don't see (or want) SuprGlu used as an aggregator (essentially repurposing other people's content). They state that it is for personal use, which I think means your personal feeds. Right now they limit you to 10 feeds, so this wouldn't go very far with a sizable blogroll.

SuprGlu integrates well with Flickr and del.icio.us. It also looks like they will be doing a lot of work on it in the near future. I think this service is an up and comer. I look forward to future developments.

Problems so far:

1. There are keywords, but no search. Keywords are great, but they are nearly worthless unless you can string keywords together to focus your search.
2. I haven't figured out how to search other Suprglu sites using my keywords or a search. There has to be a way, but I'm blanking so far.
3. While I understand their reasoning for 10 feeds, If I want to feed my blogs (personal and educational), del.icio.us, Flickr, discussion forums (i.e., Moodle), and other sources I track/develop for my classes, the 10 feed limit could be restrictive.

Talkr Update

It's strange, but Talkr has been down for at least a few days now. Being down this long makes me think that they might be out of business. I emailed support and haven't heard anything yet, but, of course, if their network is down they wouldn't receive my email either.

I'll keep it up on this site for a few more days. I think that it's a useful service and I hope that they haven't folded. It's like books on tape (or iPod).

Plus, it took me a few hours to figure it out. I hope all that work wasn't in vain.

Getting Spiffy

Great Clips - only the best for Dan's balding head :-)

I was starting to look a little shaggy and I've got a presentation tomorrow. It's always good, even if it's a departmental presentation.

More info on that later.

Talkr

Thanks to AJ at Effortless Language Acquisition for recommending Talkr. I think that this is a great idea. I have been wondering how we could use a page reader as a Podcast and Talkr seem to have done this.

I'm still working out the bugs (getting summaries only), but I have added both the feed for the entire blog (button on the bottom, right-hand side of the page) and a link at the bottom of each post to the audio.

Now you may ask, what is this good for? The computer-generated voice is unnatural sounding, there are many pronunciation mistakes, etc.... Why not just add audio to the blog? All of these are good and valid criticisms. My only answer is, it is as good as it gets for someone without the time or will to do both a text entry and audio entry to their blog.

Even with the obvious drawbacks, this service is amazingly good. Computer readers have come a long way, with some very natural transitions (linking and merging) and it works on your existing RSS feed.

Happy 230th Birthday to the USMC

One of my domains is registered through GoDaddy.com. They sent me an email today with a link to their Birthday wishes to the USMC. Click on the link below to see it.

Happy 230th Birthday to the United States Marine Corps!

This is a Flash movie that takes a while to load.