But having said all that, it is still getting harder and harder to get excited about new Google services.

Its not that they are boring or pointless. It really just has to do with not wanting to invest in a new tool to only have it canceled in less than a few years.  Many people point to the untimely death of Google Wave as the main cause for their lukewarm response to Google+, but those of us that have been following Google for a while know that there were many other disappointing closures before Wave.

But if it can make it, Google Plus has some great ideas that could be very useful in Education. Or at least I think. Very few of my friends are on it yet, despite me sending out invitations… so it is hard to get a good feel for truly how well it works. But here are some initial thoughts:

• As many have said, the ability to only share certain information with certain groups of friends is a great idea. It was a great idea when ELGG and Facebook first came up with it, of course – but Facebook kind of never really bought into the idea once they added it (and the average online user has never heard of ELGG). After all, they were trying to monetize your connections, so why make it easy to reduce the number of connections and interactions you can make?
• The killer app to many people seems to be the free group video chat. I haven’t had a chance to use it yet because of my limited circle of friends that are in Google Plus, but the early feedback sounds positive. But I know that this is a feature and price point that many educators have been looking for.
• Am I supposed to say G+, Google+, or Google Plus? What is the official spelling?
• Programmers are already writing browser plug-ins. Sure, Facebook has apps, but not until years after FB was created, and none of them seem to be able to change the core functionality of how Facebook looks and operates.  Maybe there are some out there and I don’t know it. The Facebook + Google Plus integration was pretty nice, even if it was a little basic (there were concerns over it being malware, so I uninstalled it). It added a button on your G+ page that let you open your Facebook stream right there in G+.
• The true measure of whether G+ will be successful or not depends on how well the people in charge understand networks. George Siemens wrote a recent post examining the importance of this.  Siemens also comes to the conclusion that Google just doesn’t get it. That may be so, but I would also say it may be too early to really tell. The user base for Facebook is so huge while the base for G+ is incredibly small. Facebook will probably seem to work better just due to its size, while G+ may appear to fall short due to how new it is.  I think it also depends on what you look at. Siemens looks at Facebook friends suggestions, something I usually ignore completely. Unlike Siemens, over half of the friend suggestions I get on Facebook are the “way out there” kind.  So I have to admit that I have been ignoring that feature in G+ because I also ignore it in Facebook. Besides – I don’t need and algorithm figuring out for me who I need to connect with. I prefer to do some research on my own and find my own connections. Maybe Siemens is right about Google recommending only “power users” to him, or maybe he doesn’t realize that he probably qualifies as a power user himself (much more than myself or most people I know) and the possibility is that since Google sees him in the same category as these people that it is also recommending them to him. So, ultimately, the success of G+ will probably be more in the eye of the user, based primarily on how well they do the specific things each user is interested in.
• It is probably a given that most Google services will integrate with G+ at some point, but how long will it take for the ones that haven’t already been connected? I can’t seem to find a way to share anything from Google Reader with my circles – other than the old school way of copying and pasting a link. But I could already do that in Facebook. In order for me to switch from Facebook, I am going to need to see integration with the things I already use.
• Google also says that Plus pages for companies (like Facebook fan pages) are coming. In reality, they are already there in the form of Google Sites, Google Groups, and even Blogspot. Once all of that is brought together into a page for companies or classes or whatever in Google Plus, that will be pretty cool. Cooler even than Facebook Fan Pages… if there are enough users on G+ to take advantage of it.
• I like the idea of Sparks, but I am wondering how to make them more useful. For instance, I like music. But not all music. But there are a large number of bands I follow. Do I have to start a hundred Sparks to follow them all? Sounds daunting. OR will it be possible to start a Spark on a broader topic and then go in and specify what parts of the broader topic you want to see?

Overall, an interesting new product that could go many different ways. Something for everyone to keep their eyes on.

If you can create your own “Circles” as they call them, and then share what you want with them and even do video chats – you pretty much have the beginnings of a Learning Management System.  If they integrate Circles with other services (like Blogspot) – that would make it even more interesting. You could make a blog private and then with one click allow access to one circle (course).

Like Google Wave, invitations are limited (and will probably be highly sought after for a while). But will the failure of Google Wave make people too cautious to try this? And when was the last time Google had a big hit idea on their hands? Who will want to start using this and then have it canceled in a year or two?

Okay… I do want to give it a shot. And you probably do to. But Google Wave (and Lively and…) all showed us that major interest from the educational world is not enough to keep a Google project going. Which is one reason why I tend to doubt we will ever see a Google LMS.

Hopefully in the near future, we will see more classes that have a guide like this for a huge chunk of the syllabus. Maybe there will be a few required items, blogs, etc to add to each student’s PLN, but a large part of it will be left up to them to find their own.  Class discussions and assignments could then be based on dynamic content online rather every student trying to figure out how to re-write the same information over and over again without plagiarizing what has been said a million times already.

Someday we may even see entire departments or schools that would have a PLN guide like this for their orientation.  Just like we now make all new students go through and set-up a school email account, some day they might also set-up a PLN.  Each course they enroll in would then have a set of resources to add as a folder to their PLN (or maybe it will be added for them).

The missing link that I see is the software – there needs to be something that makes it easy for instructors to share relevant parts of their PLN with students, as well as students to share good resources with each other. Well, something a bit more advanced than emailing links to everyone. Maybe Google Reader already does this and I need to explore it more?

I have signed up for many Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) recently – and never completed a single one.  That is my biggest confession. Most colleagues get pretty shocked to hear that – after all, Mr. EduGeek himself would seem to be the best person to figure out a MOOC and get the most out of it.  Maybe even become a rock star in one.

But the problem is, I just don’t have time to figure out how to use one.  Yes, I will spend forever trying to figure out how to customize a WordPress app, but I won’t take the time to figure out how to participate in a MOOC.

At first, I though it was just me.  But then I found out that the people teaching the courses I never touched had to create a four minute long video explaining how to have success in a MOOC.  That is probably the first bad sign right there.  If you have to take a mini-course on how to take your course, you are probably having to focus too much on the structure and not the learning.  Even in Blackborg, the focus on figuring out the course is knowing what links to click, not what to do with the links after you know what to click.

Dave Cormier (how created the video linked to above) gives five steps on how to have success in a MOOC.  Each one of the steps needs explanation, because they don’t necessarily make sense without the explanations.  See how complex this is getting?

Of course, I was also one of those people that avoided the massive “lecture hall” courses in college.  It was just too easy to get lost in the crowd, even if you tried not to.  Being a male educator in a room full of predominately females, I saw first hand how easy it is for the minority to get lost in the mix, even if they tried not to.  Online, it is usually the minority opinion that gets lost… which is what usually happens to me in MOOCs.  You see, just because you follow and comment on other people’s work, there is no guarantee that they will follow and comment on you, ESPECIALLY if they disagree with you.  They will possibly even get mad that you aren’t stroking their ego and just ignore you (just being brutally honest here – the web is a magnet of narcissism).

My biggest confession is that I don’t see the point of a MOOC if I already have a Personal Learning Network.  I honestly don’t see the need for any type of open course once you have a PLN and have figured out Google.  But that probably also has to do me starting to question the whole concept of “open.”  It seems that “open” is now becoming synonymous with “lack of accountability.”  But that is a topic for another blog post.

To me, the advantage of taking a course is that you get to interact with the instructor or some other type of subject matter expert – and they are the ones that help you focus on what you need to be learning.  The MOOC removes this value but leaves the time lines and due dates.  So in other words, you remove the actual value of being in a course but leave the annoying part.

I know, I know – you are supposed to network with other students and they will give you the feedback and information you need.  That is all great – if you connect with a good group of people.  There is no guarantee you will connect.  And even if you do – what if they just rubber stamp whatever you say because they fear conflict? What if they really have no idea what they are talking about but think they are an expert?  You could end the class with a bunch of new knowledge that is actually worthless because you hooked up with the wrong group.  I know that in some subjects there are no wrong answers so that is not always the case – but it is a danger.  One that is less likely to exist in a traditional course.

Obviously I am focusing on worst case scenarios.  I think that the fact that I am an instructional designer by trade now I know that it is possible to design a “traditional” course that dumps the bad parts typically associated with the “sage on the stage” mentality while still incorporating the good parts of a MOOC (all while also avoiding the pitfalls of a MOOC).  In other words, a course that connects with existing PLNs instead of creating news ones.  You only have so much time after all (another confession of mine – I don’t have time to keep up with the new PLNs formed in MOOCs). The only problem is that a course like this can really only exist in a traditional college course format and not in a MOOC format.  But a lot of that has to do with the “Massive” part.

I think I also just see the MOOC as the technology-driven, socially-networked version of the cattle-herd lecture hall courses so prevalent on college campuses today.   Herding 500 students in a course is still herding 500 students in a course, even if try to put a modern technology spin on it.  Some people think that is fine.  Personally, I like things smaller and more intimate.

Eszter Hargittai, associate professor of communication studies and sociology at Northwestern, suggests that the benefits of social-networking sites may cancel out the distractions they pose.

Here is a newsflash people: the benefits of reading can also cancel out the distractions it poses. Do you really think spending hours each day devouring the National Enquirer improves academic performance? Nope.  Spending time on a social network is about as broad a category as reading now – with good and bad examples of both existing out there.

Someday… just maybe academics will figure out it is not the tool itself that matters but how it is used.  Until then we will have to continue performing studies that tell us the obvious.

But I fully recommend that you bookmark the study – it will save you time and energy the next time you have to respond to “I heard that students are failing because of Facebook” for the millionth time.

When we started this site, the goal was to keep an eye on emerging stuff that could be used in education.  In recent years, there have been very few new sites to rave about, and thus many contributors have run out of ideas for posts.  Now it is just me (although I am open to others joining me if they wish). And I am running out of new sites and ideas to post about.

The problem is that everyone is trying to be the next Facebook.  You used to have all of these sites trying new ideas and angles on many things, and then Facebook took off so fact that everyone just decided they wanted to be the next Facebook.  And I don’t mean the next interactive social site that brings people together in a new way… I mean the next Facebook clone.

So, in many ways, Facebook seems to have killed innovation online.  Of course, that happens in most industries – people see one company make it big, so they decide to follow blindly.

But this whole privacy thing is another issue.  People are really up in arms about it, and I can’t say I blame them.  At one time we were all looking for the next site to integrate Facebook so we could share music likes, restaurant discoveries, new yoga poses, whatever.  Then everyone realized that Facebook had quietly turned in to a big corporation over night and they were using all of this stuff we were sharing to make money off of us.

Educators are starting to notice this also, and wondering if they are crossing ethical lines by attaching student information to advertising dollars.

Less than a year ago, I thought the people leaving Facebook were just alarmists who probably also stocked up for Y2K.  Now I am seriously considering joining their ranks.  Without the impenetrable underground bunker, of course.

What if people stop sharing stuff online because they are tired of being exploited by big business?  That would pretty much kill Web 2.0, open education, Open Learning Networks, Personal learning Networks… you name it.  I have already noticed a slight decline in the amount of info I can glean from my PLN.  Is that a slight temporary dip, or a sign of what is to come?

Or, could this be a chance for something better to come about? Maybe less centralized social networks, more personalized, more secure?  Take note of these New York University students that are creating a new social network with a focus on privacy.  Interesting development…

In other words, forecasting the weather is starting to incorporate crowd sourcing.

We have seen a giant push to get websites to work intuitively… and to even start thinking for us.  So on one hand – the Internet is starting to look more like the real world.  But I think even more often we are starting to see the world around us looking more and more like the Internet.  The powers that be are starting to see that there is power in crowd sourcing and social networking.  I wonder what real-life social networks we will see spring up next?

The real question for us is – can we use these ideas in education?  What if we took this weather stations ideas and applied them to a class? What if, instead of one large class, we broke that class down into smaller units based on geographic location.  Each smaller group forms a study group of sorts that watches issues related to the class subject in their area.  The small groups are loosely tied to one another in a way to share what they are learning about the subject.  The small groups would study local events or places. In this situation, the LMS would become more like the newscast – aggregating all of the input in one spot for everyone to benefit.

What if time and location became irrelevant for synchronous classes? What if you were grouped with a small group of people that lived near you when you sign up for a class, and then that group decided what day and time to meet for class?  The instructor would then send out assignments each week or maybe record a video for the group to work through. Maybe the instructor even met with each group.  then the groups send in their work to the class and the instructor aggregates all of the information coming in from each group and summarizes them for the entire class (which would essentially include all small groups no matter where they meet in the world).

Potentially, you could ave hundreds of students all meeting in a synchronous fashion, but all still in a way that fits their schedule.  This is, of course, another area where there is technology to do this… but we need one that is more specifically geared for educators.

So, for a little reality break here… a little shocker for people out there.  Are you ready for this one?  People have been leaving FaceBook since the day after it started.  No… really.  Same is true for AOL, MySpace, Google, Twitter…. you name it.  People try a site, don’t like, don’t get it, or whatever… and so they leave.

Fast forward a few years to a time when FaceBook has seen amazing growth.  Record numbers of people are trying it out.  Guess what that also means.  Yep – that also means a greater number of people are leaving it.  Simple math, really: as the number of people trying a site out increases, so would the number of people quitting.  Amazing!

Of course, take an obvious fact and construct enough smokescreens around it… and people will think you have an actual story!  Sad, but true.

What FaceBook really does (and Twitter for that matter) is expose the misanthropic nature of many people.  Take some of the more prominent gripes about FaceBook:

• I don’t care what you had for dinner!
• Why would I want to play all these silly trivia games?
• I don’t care what Goonies character you would have been! (or insert whatever other current quiz is going around).
• Why would I want to join some cause I have never heard of?

Basically, it is just a bunch of people saying that they just don’t care about other people.   The last time I ran into a friend in a store, they told me many random trivia thing… including what they were having for dinner.  That is what people naturally do. I also get together with friends and show them pictures, and play board games that basically amount to nothing but trivia.  Pretty much everything I could ever do on FaceBook, I also do in real life in some form or fashion.

These anti-FaceBook statements show how sadly misanthropic we have become as a society. You had better share a funny, witty, life changing story every time you open your mouth, or it is a waste of my time. I remember as a kid how we would sit around on chairs outside and talk about dinner and movies and politics and a hundred other simple and complex topics… because we actually liked the people we called friends. Now people delete you from their friend list on whatever site just because you didn’t change the world with every post.

What ever happened to caring about the little things in the lives of people that we call friends or family?  You don’t have to like FaceBook, or Twitter, or Google or whatever if you don’t want to… but can we all stop trying to place guilt trips on the people that do like the things we don’t?

(unless, of course, you want to put guilt trips on people that like Blackboard.  That is totally understandable :)

EDIT: Yes, I know that just like any other site (AOL, MySpace, etc) – FaceBook will someday start to die off and be replaced by something else.  Let’s just wait until we have an actual study or data to back up that event, rather than just a bunch of “my buddy so-and-so left, and so did some others.. so it must be true!”

Why, no other than some kind of weird explanation for Google’s scattered and confusing social networking plan – of course.  The master plan for where they are going…. because there has just got to be some kind of rhyme to all the random pieces they seem to just be throwing to the wind every few weeks or so.

Will Google Wave be the final piece that pulls it all together?  I hope so.  But whatever it is, they need to get their social plan fully out there before social networking goes the way of Web 1.0.

I think the reason I want to figure out this master plan so much is because I like what I see so far.  I have iGoogle all set-up with the widgets I like, and now I can share information from some widgets with other friends.  Well, assuming I can ever coax any friends in to trying them with me.  Updates from those social gadgets show up in a FaceBook-like friend stream.  Or, at least… mine do. Until I get that first friend to join me in playing with these… I won’t know what their stuff looks like.

I also have a Google profile that now follows me as I use Google Friend Connect gadgets on different sites.  I can share things in Google Reader.  Then there is that Google Latitude thing that no one wants to touch, because, well… it is kind of creepy.   And probably a few other things I am missing.  Like Gtalk, Google Voice, etc, etc.

Oh… and then there is that social network that Google already has…. called…. ummm… Orkut?  Something like that.  Does that fit in there?

Probably does, but until the master plan is revealed to us someday, we’ll just have to keep waiting patiently for our invite to the next piece.  Which reminds me that I still need to kick myself for waiting so late to get on the list for Google Voice….

Posterous is a service that allows you to update all of your social sites through an email.  It is designed to be intuitive – so if you attach pictures, they will get posted in your Flickr account.  Videos can go into YouTube.  But, a text post won’t end up in some weird corner of either one.  You can also update blogs like WordPress and your attached images and video go into the post, too.

The two features I am digging the most are site-specific emails and groups.  Usually, one email will go to all the sites that you set-up for autopost.  Don’t want your short Twitter update to post to your Drupal blog?  Just send an email to twitter@posterous.com.  Your little tweet only posts to twitter.  You can also combine emails, like twitter+jaiku@posterous.com.

The group feature is really nice.  Just invite other contributors and have them send emails to a bit more specific email address that identifies your group.   Any one’s email can then go out to a whole slew of social sites (great for organizations, school news, or conferences) in a matter of seconds.  Or, make your group private and host a class that way (you don’t have to autopost anywhere if you don’t want).  Every post goes out to all contributors by email, and you can comment by just replying to the email.  Any pictures or videos added are intuitively inserted into the post.

It will even update your FaceBook status, or load pics/videos into FaceBook.

As you can guess, this is a great all-in-one tool for mobile blogging.  Posterous itself can act as your blog, or it can push your posts out to most major blogging platforms.

Now I wish we could see Posterous pluck SocialThing away from AOL before it is totally killed and become a one stop place to post and follow all of your networks.  They would need some kind of comment tracking system for that, because I would hate to have to keep up with comments on all the sites the support.  Or maybe that can be an idea for future features – a way to sync comments from all the sites they support.