MyThoughts on MySpace

MySpace is one of those things that no one can seem to explain. It just doesn't make sense. They have over 66 Million users. What is it? It's a blog site... But here's the catch... It's horrible! The user interface is so bad-looking, I don't know why anyone would want to spend time looking at it. But alas, they are still attracting lots of new people every day.

Lately, MySpace has been getting a lot of bad press. There have been several reports of child molesters stalking and hunting down unsuspecting kids. The bad thing about this, is the vast majority of kids are actually using this as just a form of common communication. The problem is that most of the kids aren't educated enough to know how to go about setting up a safer environment. They do have an option to only allow members of their buddy list view their page... But most teens are just too lazy to go through the extra steps. Is this MySpace's fault? I do think that they could make a better effort to educate teens on setting up a "safer" account. However, I believe it is the responsibility of the user to look out for him/herself. Know what you are getting into. It is also the parent's responsibility to get involved and educated about this before it's too late.

O.K., I've rambled on long enough about this... Your turn. Let me know what you think. Click the comment button below.

Here's a link to an article to get you started. Seems like they are starting to make an effort to clean things up.

Reflection on Podcasts and Blogs

I'd like to thank all of you that participated in Tech Tuesday the past two weeks. We had a great turnout. For those of you who haven't experienced Tech Tuesday first-hand, we hope to see you soon.

Now that you've had training on Podcasts and Blogs for teacher use, I'd like to hear some ideas on how you plan to use this information. Let's share our ideas! Click on the comments button below and leave a comment. If you already have an account, you can use your screen name, otherwise, just leave an anonymous message. Thanks for participating!

Do you have Autisim?

Ever wonder? Now you can take the test. In order to be classified, you have to score above 32... I scored 24, not sure what that means, but I scored a 24.

Click here to try it out.

Quick Tip: Command + [ or ]

This is a quick tip for Microsoft Word:

Ever try to make text squeeze in a specific spot? Do you play with the font size numbers 10 or more times trying to make it work? Try the font-size shortcut keys.

1. Highlight the text
2. For Apple Hold down the Command (Apple) key and [ or ] to increase or decrease the text size.
3. For a Windows Computer, hold down Cntl and [ or ] to increase or decrease the text size.

Enjoy.

A Choice in Soda

O.K., I found this link today.. if you like soda, or even if you don't, you have to see this! A real treat for those people who can never make up their minds on what they want.

Click here to read about it.

iLife '06 Review

After much anticipation, I finally got my hands on a copy of iLife '06. As soon as I got it, stumbled through the packaging, drooling all the way, and plopped it into my iBook. I got a chance to play around with each of the programs and here are the results:

GarageBand: The biggest addition is the ability to create podcasts easily within Garage Band. I plan to use this feature later to do tech demos on various hardware and software. A great addition!

iPhoto: iPhoto is MUCH better! You can now edit in Full-screen mode and compare to other photos side-by-side. It made getting red-eye out a lot easier, and man does it make the photos look good!

iMovie and iDVD: This is the part that impressed me the most! There are now some really professional looking themes in both iMovie and iDVD. I put together a home movie for my daughter, Bethany, and wound up with a very impressive DVD. The menus are improved greatly from the '05 version. My only complaint would be that it still takes a really long time to burn a DVD (it's one of those things you let the computer just run over-night on).

iWeb: This is Apple's newest addition to the family. I was really looking forward to using this, and I have to say, I was very disappointed. The program is great - if you have a .Mac account. If you don't have a .Mac account, you won't be able to do 60% of the functions in any given web page. $99 a year, I feel is still a high price to pay. Unless of course the county would like to buy me a subscription....hint hint, wink wink, nudge nudge!

All-in-all, for $50, this is a steal! Run, don't walk to your nearest Apple store and snatch it up!

Podcasts in the Classroom

I was first introduced to Podcasts through my daily trips to iTunes. Since then, I have been a faithful subscriber to several Video and Audio Podcasts. Some of my favorites are TWIT (stands for This Week in Technology), DLTV (Digital Life TV), and MacBreak (self explanatory).

I believe certain podcasts could be very effective in the classroom. The advantage that they all have is that they are current. These are great for history classes looking to get a dose of daily news. ABC News has a podcast called ABC News Now. No commercials to fast forward through, and no need to set up a VCR the night before. You can download it while you are taking roll!

For more ideas and information about Podcasts, I'll be talking about them next Tuesday in the Teacher's lounge at Kecoughtan. Hope to see you all there!

Combining Music and Math

As a musician, I am well aware of the correlation between music and math. I found this site on Digg.com and thought it was pretty interesting. Could be useful in either a music or math class. Check it out by clicking here.

Technology at its Worst!

Well, I checked this link out on Diggnation and now I'm depressed. Want to know how long you are expected to live? Check out the Life Expectancy Calculator . I'm looking at 76, and my wife is looking at 102. Guess I gotta start exercising or something!

Diggnation

Have you ever visited Diggnation? Diggnation is a user-based Technology News Site. Users pick the most important news by giving a story a "digg." The stories with the most "diggs" get put on the Front Page. You can see what stories I have dugg by going to my user link here. Or you can see the main page by clicking here.

Apple Come-back?

I thought I would address this issue, since I feel so strongly about it.

I was a PC user for my entire life before I came to work here in an Apple dominated school district. My initial reaction when given an iBook was, "well, I like the iPod and all, but come-on... a Mac-in-trash!" Boy was I wrong! This notebook has changed my entire computer experience - in a good way. I no longer have to fight with drivers / hardware conflicts / and viruses. Also, I am just in awe of how great the iLife suite works together. Apple has done such a great job with their products, I just don't understand why anyone puts up with Windows anymore.

I honestly believe that if everyone were handed a mac to play with for a week or two, no one would ever go back to Windows again. I think that with the iPod being such a big hit, Apple will once again work its way back into the computer domination that it once was... I just hope I'm still alive to see it happen!

Server Problems

Well, it appears my blog has suffered some server glitches today. Technology - great when it works, and a pain when it doesn't. Anyway, don't let flaky servers deter you from coming back. It looks like whatever problem they've been having is now resolved.

Tech Tuesday Change

Tech Tuesdays will no longer be held after school. They will be held in the Teacher's Lounge throughout the day. If you'd like to attend, just bring yourself, your laptop, and a friend to the Teacher's lounge anytime during the school day on Tuesday!

This Tuesday's topic will be blogging. Hope to see you there!

Blogging

Ironically, I thought that my first blog should be about blogging. How can teachers use a blog? Some thoughts come to mind:

• Homework assignments
• Overviews
• Links to webpages to help with class projects
• Thoughts of the day

Please attach a comment if you have any other ideas how teachers can use blogs.

Here's a link to Goochland's website containing serveral teacher Blogs.