I’m sitting in my favorite seat (far back right corner — so that I can see, hear, and reach the power supply) in Auditorium B for the Science Blogging Ethics, moderated by Janet D. Stemwedel. My plan is to be taking notes on this blog article and then post it every fifteen minutes or so — or not.
The main thing on my mind right now is the forecast for snow that we’re facing here in Raleigh. I’m flying to Minneapolis tomorrow, so Brenda has reserved me a room at the airport so I’ll be close in the morning. I’d hate to not get to Minnesota because it snowed in Raleigh 😉
I’ll be italicizing my 2¢ worth.
Ethics is a matter of responsibilities? to whom am I responsible? and what options let me best balance those responsibilities? So what are the responsibilities of blogging? Is there any one definition, vision, expectations about blogging? I think that some readers do have expectations based on a number of criteria/factors, and sometimes those expectations do not, sometimes, coinside with why the blogger blogs.
What can I say on my blog? Some information is public and some is proprietary. It’s worth noting that much of the theme of this conference is open science. Ah! Should there be a blogging code of ethics?
Ah, a great question has risen from the audience. When is information public (you can post that quote or that pictures) and when is it private? Is there a resource with the answers to these questions? The answer from the moderator is, “No!”
The talk is going on about assuring that what’s written and published on a blog, newspaper, etc. is reliable, and I agree. This is a valuable direction to be going in. But I don’t think that there is a single managable answer. I think that part of the responsibility should rest with the reader. Part of being a reader, today, is asking questions about the answers that you find.
A great conversation going on. Too much to keep up wither here. No answers. One man said that people need to be learning critical thinking skills. Then he said, “A man just said that kids are reinventing education. ” Bingo!
Hmmm! Suggestion now is that rather than trying to establish a code of ethics for blogger, instead, more of a best practices agreement. There is talk of setting up a blogging ethics wiki.
Next is a conversation about teaching science and blogging. I’m moderating that one, so there’ll not be any notes here. But I’m hoping to podcast it, so hopfully, more to come.
The session on teaching science with bloging (wikis, podcasting, etc.) went well. Majority of the folks are university level. I was surprised not to have seen more K-12 folks. The most interesting thing that came out of it for me, was a science and religion professor who used blogs to generate outside-the-classroom conversations. His story was very compelling. But it was especially interesting that he used the blog conversations to reflect on the course, giving him ideas about adapting the class in real time, and also redesigns for the next semester.
The next breakout that I am attending is How to Build Interactivity into Your Blog, with Dave Munger. So what is interactivity really? He didn’t really answer that question, but he said that interactivity will bring visitors.
He’s using Bad Astronomy as an example of an interactive blog. The blog
- has a long history
- populare topcis
- stays on topic, and
- has a friendly tone (short sentences),
- six posts per day,
- links to other blogs,
- but not too many links,
- image /video rich,
- it’s personal,
- but not too personal.
Dave’s Tips
- Be regular,
- Be yourself,
- Self-promote effectively (most bloggers under-promote themselves)
- Anti Self-promotion (be careful of DIGG and DIGG like services)
- Don’t be for comments,
- Images,
- Movies,
- Polls
- How to make polls (blogflux.com & quimble.com),
- Make good polls,
This session was not exactly what I expected, but the conversations that ensued was very interesting. Of course, all of the items above have their exceptions, and many of them came out in the dicsussion.
At the end of this session, a woman got up to demo crossref.org. It’s a plugin for WordPress that, using a DOI number, can callup a citation and plug it into the blog. A DOI is a Digital Object Identifier. If any of you know more about DOI’s please share.
We are trying like mad to bring technology into the classroom for use by students into instruction. Blogging and Wikis have not official policy governing their use, therefore I can use them. How do you suggest making the best use of a blog for educational purposes?
Thank you so much for coming. It was a great session.
One answer: college profs were either from the Triangle or flying in from afar. The K-12 teachers were mostly from the Triad, Charlotte and Western North Carolina areas and most of them decided not to risk driving in the snow, so they called and canceled at the last moment.
Hope to see you soon at one of the blogger meetups!