My Goodreads

I was invited by a friend to join Goodreads (username: hickstr@gmail.com) a few years ago so we could share books we enjoyed and recommend others. I think I logged in twice. Luckily, I still had my membership confirmation email that gave me my username. I like the idea of these book sharing sites but due to the low priority I put on reading I rarely move through books fast enough to warrant an online sharing service. I do, however, keep a list of books I would like to read in Google tasks. As I mentioned one sentence prior, this list seems to grow much faster than I can check books off of it.

I do like the ability to see what others are reading and how what I have read can create other suggestions. In an educational setting, the one part that I really like is how suggestions are aggregated and given by the site instead of an instructor or mentor. I think this allows for a little more exploration and self-directed learning. Multiple reviews also help readers find out if certain books have the content they desire and what sections are/n't worth reading.

How To Tell People They Sound Racist

I chose this video because it has a profound impact on me when I saw it the first time. The ability of the author to clearly and meaningfully articulate the difference between what people say/do and who they are is rare to see. His passion shows and it's fun to watch people with passion.

I have used online videos in my work with students. When I worked with the leadership program at Coe many of our sessions were supplemented by online videos about the FISH! Philosophy and Ben Zander. The ability to find a vast array of videos quickly to demonstrate different ideas is simply amazing. Now that tv networks are posting clips of shows it's very easy to be current and use new material on a weekly basis.

I have uploaded a few videos for different reasons. One is of my wife's family cottage in order to share it with my family (and for posterity) and another was a video I made with students for Pres Ball a few years ago (it's still on youtube). With both videos, I was able to reach the intended audience quickly and easily.

This is Delicious!

I am using my Yahoo! account to login to Delicious and my username is THicks24.

I've wondered about Delicious in the past but never made the jump into using it. I have used StumbleUpon and ended up exploring more than anything. I recently lost all my bookmarks on my browser and wish I would have saved them in "the cloud". I usually discover new websites through other social media (Facebook, face-to-face conversations) so I'm excited to see what I find through Delicious.

Lastly, I like a minimal browser interface/toolbar and I'm still getting used to having the add-on taking up space. It's much easier to use than adding sites manually though so I may end up keeping it around...

@TomRHicks

is how to reach me on Twitter. I'm following a couple of breweries, Mo Rocca from CBS Sunday Morning and Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, CoeBRAI, Lonnie Zingula, and Lance Armstrong. Lance is very active on Twitter and it's neat to see his comments during the Tour De France, which just finished it's third stage today.

I've only ever wanted to us Twitter to follow others and be entertained. I stayed away from it for a while before I finally jumped in last summer. I rarely check it but will spend some more time on it during the Tour. I know it has been used to track trends and news and those are the only two ways I can think of it being used in an educational setting. It's purely social to me so I struggle to see how much educational value it has. I do think it would be interesting to analyze the type and frequency of individuals' comments though.

I've recently stated that I think Twitter will be dead or irrelevant in two years due to its meteoric rise, supersaturation in our culture, and lack of purpose (outside of being social). I still believe this but also think that some other Web 2.0 tool will capture our imagination before that two years is up and Twitter will be relegated to a niche product again.