SxSW ’09 – Gruber & Mann – HOWTO: 149 Surprising Ways to Turbocharge Your Blog With Credibility! (audio mp3, free on iTunes)
Linked to above, is a talk by Merlin Mann (of 43 Folders and You Look Nice Today fame) and John Gruber (of Daring Fireball) from South by Southwest entitled “HOWTO: 149 Surprising Ways to Turbocharge Your Blog With Credibility!”
You may not blog or write, but I think that’s there a still some hidden gems in there for you no matter what you create. Mann and Gruber’s thesis—in my opinion—is “Be yourself, and do it awesomely.” I think there is a lot to be said for that.
The talk is an interesting treatise on how to do this whole social media thing with integrity instead of chasing after the fast cash and employing techniques that may or may not be considered douchey. As Merlin puts it, “Find what you’re obsessed with and do the shit out of it.” Highly recommended listening.
You’ve got something that you care a lot about, and you’re obsessed about — it’s almost like an intellectual fetish. Then you’ve got something that’s your angle on that. - Merlin Mann (via Glenn Wosley)
I’m going to try not to regurgitate what’s been said better by others. Instead, I’m going to give you a chance to sit down (or load it onto your iPod and take your dog for a walk like I did) and give it a chance. Tony Steward has a great outline of the talk as a reference later on. Roo Reynolds has one too.
From the South by Southwest Website:
John Gruber (DaringFireball.net) and Merlin Mann (43Folders.com) discuss the current state of blogging as a medium for creative expression, weighing the opportunities and challenges of building a thoughtful online presence in a world where everybody owns a printing press. They’ll consider the ascendance of Digg-friendly “problogs” and debate the subtler pleasures of careful writing that reaches smaller, but potentially less “profitable” audiences.
During the South By Southwest (SXSW) conference, Guy Kawasaki (can you tell I’m on a kick lately?) moderated a panel titled “True Stories from Social Media.” During the discussion, Aaron Mentele (partner at one of my favorite web development houses, Electric Pulp), noticed the shift in shift in social media from “Moderate, moderate, moderate” to site owners letting go of the reigns a bit and letting the community take control. The other panelists concurred that a big part of their sites’ success has been in encouraging open and free communication.
I teach in a middle school. Middle school students are not known for their eloquence when it comes to discussing the virtues and pitfalls of their teachers as evident by the writing in the bathroom – I’ve never been the topic of conversation on the bathroom walls, which may either be a good or bad thing.
During the final days of the school year, my co-teacher and I invited students to whip out a piece of paper and tell us what they think of us. We told them not to include their names, but they chose to anyway (or weren’t listening to the instructions – not uncommon). It wasn’t my idea and I was prepared for the worst, but I was blown away by the response. Our students responded with thoughtful and reflective responses, some of which may have been their best prose to date. They were open and honest in their appreciation for the work we had done and respectful in their criticism.
There was a lot that I glossed over in the introduction to this post. The moral of Aaron’s story was that controversy causes spikes in site in traffic – this isn’t the goal for most educators. My moral is slightly different. If we let go of the reigns and stop moderating with an iron fist, we may be surprised with the result. Integrating social media into the classroom is scary and requires a giant leap of faith (or reckless abandon, in my case) but it just might be worth it in the long run.
When students write for social media. They write for audience that isn’t just the teacher. As a result, they need to be more thoughtful in their writing. At the same time, in my experience, they tend to also be more thoughtful in the way they respond to each other’s work.
The result of the student surveys? I’m a caring, dedicated teacher who needs to lighten up on the sarcasm.
By the way, this post was inspired by a post over at Creating Knowledge with Technology as well as Guy Kawasaki, Aaron Mentele, and friends.
