OK, so we’re all trying to figure out what, if anything, social media is useful for — other than having fun and wasting time with friends and family.   The New Media Consortium has put together a site reviewing what they’ve been experimenting with.  We have a group here that is viewing a webinar on October 27 on Effective Use of Social Media for Student recruitment ( if you’re in New Haven and want to join us just let me know.)  I’ve had some success with Twitter in advancing business interests, but nothing I’m ready to wrap an official company strategy around.  I really like LinkedIn (especially for helping students/alumni with career networking), but it seems like Facebook gets all the attention.  And don’t forget blogs — not quite as sexy as Twitter or Facebook perhaps, but still finding a place in college communication efforts.  Talking with peers, experimenting, and exploring — that’s a type of progress, right?

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George Mason University’s Center for History and New Media has a new resource site on the use of mobile technologies in reaching museum visitors.  The site itself is well done, and a great starting place for any cultural organization.  As with many of the CHNM projects, their program examples are all open source, based on their wonderful Omeka project.  They stress the importance of cross-platform solutions, and the reuse of content in multiple delivery formats (traditional web, mobile, etc.).  And lest we forget the audiences, they stress the importance of meaningful engagement.  The site encourages museums to experiment with mobile, and provides resources to help them get started.

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If you missed it last fall GMU’s Zotero project was sued for possible copyright infringement.  Kudos to GMU for standing up for their rights, and nice to see that reason prevailed.  Strike up one for open source and the power of the commons.

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We all (at least if you are reading this) are empowered by today’s networks on the web.  Whether we are deciding on what book to read by the user reviews on Amazon, or telling our friends about bad service received during a hotel visit, the interactions are person-to-person.  And the messages are not necessarily coming from the sources or in the manner that the sellers of these goods and services have traditionally relied upon.

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The new Horizon Report is out, and mobile technologies are at the top of the ‘technologies to watch’ list.  Sure desktops/laptops still have their place, and will continue for years to come.  But for communication/collaboration technologies, where most of the real innovation is happening these days, mobile is the platform of choice.  Even now a student with an iPhone has little need to lug a laptop around with them — and in a couple of years that will become a given. 

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Facebook, Wikipedia, the photo sharing site Flickr and others are household names, crucial resources in people’s daily lives.  These web applications have vibrant development communities extending their core functionalities, building greater value and encouraging even wider adoption.  Application development in much of higher education has been slow to adopt the successful technologies and strategies used by these leading web companies.  But with the maturing of key technologies, rise in user expectations, and cost sensitivity brought on by the current economic crisis the time is now.  Corporate, or in the higher-ed world central IT units need to start learning from, and adopting these practices.

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