Managing technology and life

I have now become fully aware of my immersion in the online community. In an exercise for the Emerging technologies course I am taking we created aPersonal Learning Environment concept mapI found that I was lacking in the social aspects of the networked environment so I set up a Twitter account and Facebook account.  I had a e-blogger from Google that I had from when John Finch gave a web 2.0 in service for teachers here in Brandon a year of so ago. Add to this a De.li.ci.ous and Stumble upon and Digg accounts, as well a numerous accounts (Chapters and Amazon.ca and the like) and these email address Gmail,Yahoo, Hotmail, FirstClass ( internal Brandon School Division) MTS email and my email at my domain name .You can see how the flood of administration  might become overwhelming. Also maintenance is needed for my site on the Neelin Web and the updating of the students work in Communications Media and the Video classes. Add to this the upcoming projects: I am contemplating making of making a  site at RationalBob@rationalbob.com (which I can’t seem to get around to) and a video tribute project of my Dad and my wife’s Mom who have passed away. I am going to have to consolidate all just the passwords and usernames soon and save it in keepass just so I can keep the access data straight. A lot of work to stay in touch and keep on top of the latest educational trends. TIME!

Also being a student, a teacher, father and husband and maintaining  real-time f2f friendships in the offline world, doesn’t seem to leave a lot of time for reflection and thought , but I make time. That is  the reason I took the emerging technologies course………..to force me to think more about that which is truly important and to be skeptical, especially of technological advancements that purport to make our life easier and less complicated.

That being said, I can see why Facebook, Twitter and a host of other social networking applications are so popular.  These web 2.0 tools have taken the web to a meta-level the same as Windows did for computing and the cell phone for voice communication. They are ubiquitous, free (well not MTS or Telus……….jes! activation fees indeed) and seemless to the user so there is no wonder they are  adopted en masse.

I have noticed however a feeling of  remorse and vindictiveness when I disallow people as being a friend in Facebook. It’s as though you are slighting them as someone as inferior for communication.Even though these persons may have been only a brief aquantaince in your childhood  memories now they come begging for inclusion into your already busy life. Several I have accepted and then promptly ignored. A few I deleted as friends as we did not share anything in common.I hope they don’t get a Facebook notification saying “Robert thinks your not worthy of his time’ . That would be too much pressure to conform.