As you may or may not have noticed, I've been somewhat negligent in my representation of the "social networking" portion of this blog. I'll blame a large part of that on the recent surge in the Educational Gaming Commons, which has turned my already game obsessed mind into ... you know... something even more game obsessed. But I've also calmed my own Facebook addiction a touch in the past few months, which has no doubt contributed to my reduction in social networking related posts. I'm not burned out on Facebook, dont get me wrong (calming the addiction still means I'll do a mandatory login every other day or so). But I've been spending a lot less time there than I was a few months ago.
But in doing a bit of RSS catchup yesterday, I came across a very interesting new application for Facebook that might have re-energized my enthusiasm. The application, known as BlogIt was designed by the friendly folks over at Six Apart (the same people who designed the software that powers this blog and the Blogs@Penn State project). So what does BlogIt do? Movie time!
But in doing a bit of RSS catchup yesterday, I came across a very interesting new application for Facebook that might have re-energized my enthusiasm. The application, known as BlogIt was designed by the friendly folks over at Six Apart (the same people who designed the software that powers this blog and the Blogs@Penn State project). So what does BlogIt do? Movie time!
In case you suffer from some strange movie phobia, basically BlogIt lets you post to a slew of external blogging or microblogging platforms all from within Facebook. And by that I don't mean crappy applications you've never heard of - real deal stuff that people actually use, like (cough) MovableType, WordPress, Twitter, Blogger, etc. BlogIt also makes it easy to cross post to multiple blogs or services with a single click.
So why is this awesome? In three words, consolidation, centralization, and exposure. And while other tools have attempted to bring together Web 2.0 in a nice neat package, this is by far the most impressive and complete that I've seen to date.
Obviously its not perfect. The lack of a WYSIWYG editor makes the experience uncomfortable, and BlogIt doesnt allow you to take advantage of certain blog features like tagging. And I'm sure there are probably some privacy concerns somewhere in all of this too.
But I like the opportunities that this app creates - not only for social networking in general, but also for Universities like ours where half the battle is making it easy for people to find their voice (nevermind ways to get them excited about doing it).
A lot to think about on this one.
Video taken from typepad.com/features/blogit
The one I am really excited about is the native iPhone application from SixApart ... that will be great. When you look at the demo you'll notice how easy it is to take pictures and drop them into blog posts. Very sweet little app for mobile blogging!
BTW, I couldn't get the Blog IT to update my PSU blog even though it seems like it should. I'll keep banging on it.
Not bad. I tend to have a problem in that I use twitter, facebook status updates, and my blog for totally different types of content.
For me, twitter is less and less about status and more a conversation within a smallish community.