This is just what I needed - clarification on Facebook pages, groups, and profiles. Thanks to Eliza Sherman, for this straightforward explanation. Profile = Individuals connect with friends and see (and share or tag) their status updates in a News Feed. You can be removed under Facebook’s terms of service, something I wrote about before in Avatarcide, when a friend who is an avatar in SecondLife was booted from Facebook. It’s complex. Page = A fan base for individuals, products, companies, organizations, and campaigns. People become FANS of pages. This is good for promotion and are fully viewable to the public (even when not logged in). Administrators are not visible. Group = For building a community. Administrators are listed. You can send a message to the entire group (something you can’t do on a page). Additional details are on her post along with a nice reference table (below). THANKS!

I write an analyst blog and contribute to a group blog for my employer, Brandon Hall Research. The blogs are on the company’s URL. I also have this blog on my own URL here. So it was interesting to read of Forrester Research’s directive to analysts using their own personally branded research blogs: take them down or re-direct them to the Forrester site. Ugh. Forrester’s reasoning: to increase value to clients by aggregating all of the content in one space. Jacob Morgan wrote about the downside of their decision: "No analyst with a shred of talent or ambition will likely ever choose to work for Forrester, assuming this policy is enforced." He thinks the move will "kill the spark of innovation and curiosity that most research analyst have in their DNA…" I disagree with that part. Read my analyst blog and you’ll know I am curious, innovative, and ambitious. Talent, you have to be the judge of but I do know I drive traffic to the main site. Some of the other downsides Morgan lists I DO agree with: SEO value for the company, feelings around ownership, and brand visibility. That middle one - feelings around ownership- is the tough one. I’ve spilled my guts on my analyst blog. I’ve dug deep and worked through some research questions publicly. I’ve thrown half-baked ideas around. If the company suddenly deleted me, I’d have four years of learning undocumented. Nothing to refer back to…"I wrote about that once…" would be no more. And, I’d have lost hundreds of hours of (additional) "work" I was not paid for. After all, I can’t be paid for 8 hours of work a day just for blogging. But if it takes me three hours to write something, I eat that cost. I find reward in the process of writing, thinking, reading what others think, etc. It’s difficult because I get paid to write about work on the blogs but a lot of what I write drifts from that. I feel that’s mine. I did that on my own time. Too bad so sad, huh? Dawn Foster wrote about it. Given the current economic situation, I agree that this decision is unlikely to have much short-term impact on Forrester, but the long-term effects could be devastating. I suspect that several of their analysts will leave over this decision, although they may wait until the economy starts to improve before making the jump. I also think that they will have a hard time recruiting top talent. Very few people who have built active blogs in their areas of expertise will be willing to give them up. I know that I would never consider working for Forrester under these restrictions. She points to one analysts feelings on the issue. Am I thrilled at the prospect of giving up Experience: The Blog, my personal/professional blog? Well no—it’s become part of my digital identity and represents thousands of hours of time and effort. But I also understand Forrester’s reasons for the changes. There are obvious benefits to the company of aggregating intellectual property on Forrester.com, including Search Engine relevance and creating a marketing platform that demonstrates the breadth and depth of analysts’ brainpower and coverage. Dennis Howlett also wrote about it. He refers to SageCircle’s assessment of Forrester’s reasoning: Forrester CEO George Colony is well aware of that savvy analysts can build their personal brands via their positions as Forrester analysts amplified by social media (see the post on "Altimeter Envy"). As a consequence, a Forrester policy that tries to restrict analysts’ personally-branded research blogs works to reduce the possibility that the analysts will build a valuable personal brand leading to their departure. In addition, forcing analysts to only blog on Forrester-branded blogs concentrates intellectual property onto Forrester properties increasing the value of the Forrester brand. Forrester’s Corporate Communications posted this response to Sage Circle’s post: Regarding Forrester analyst blogs: We believe we can best serve our clients in their professional roles by aggregating our intellectual property in one place - at Forrester.com. Make no mistake: Forrester is committed to social media, and the number of our analyst bloggers is increasing, not decreasing. Analysts will still have the ability to blog outside of Forrester on topics not related to their coverage areas. Dennis Howlett calls the decision an epic 2.0 fail. …both Jeremiah and Ray (former Forrester analysts) were generating huge interest in Forrester thinking. Not bad for a distant second placed player in the analyst community. Crucially and largely as a result of their solo efforts, Forrester was getting a LOT of new, incoming revenue. But equally crucially, neither Jeremiah nor Ray were rewarded for their efforts, often on top of 80+ hour working weeks. He goes on… Enterprise 2.0 mavens consistently argue that bottom up adoption of Enterprise 2.0 will make business better. That’s fine except in one crucial regard: pre-existing success history dictating future policy. There is plenty of evidence for that. Forrester’s belated but still knee jerk reaction confirms. Worse still. Rather than behaving as the doyen of what it preaches regarding social media, Forrester is showing itself as hypocritical in the worst possible way. Josh Bernoff, Forrester, tells it like it is: Forrester is an intellectual property company, and the opinions of our analysts are our products. Blogging is an extension of the work… I hope I don’t have to deal with having my company blog deleted. But it is always a possibility and that said, if I had a choice, I’d put it on my own site.

I wrote this about analysts and blogging and said… if I had a choice, I’d put it [my blog] on my own site. Brandon Hall Research is cool with that so I’ve moved all my content to my own URL.  If you’re reading this in a feed reader or email, I’ve done it right. If you’ve just stumbled across this website, you can subscribe via an RSS  feed or email subscription. Here are the addresses. RSS feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/janetclarey/mZXF Email feed: http://feedburner.google.com/fb/a/mailverify?uri=janetclarey/mZXF

I read some of the traits (or eccentricities) of the highly creative, as identified by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, in the post Tortoise-brain vs hare-brain: creativity at work. It was one of those head nodding reads. I have a propensity toward creative work. At least I think I do. I say that after repurposing content for most of the day and wishing I was doing anything but that. However, the work must get done. Every day isn’t about rainbows and unicorns. At first I thought there was a correlation between that propensity toward creative work and my desire to change my work frequently. After reading the post though, perhaps my need for change comes from my dislike of too much structure. There’s a quote from Peter Cook in the post about that…"too much creativity without structure and nothing ever gets finished." So, yes there must be SOME structure. I know how hard it can be to manage the highly creative. They can be a real pain in the ass. But you need them because creativity is an essential component of success. Organizations that are highly structured probably won’t/don’t retain the highly creative. Who do you work with that has some of these characteristics of the highly creative? Is this you? Fond of asking dumb questions, despite their intelligence Arrogant when they know they know something, humble when they know they don’t Highly self-critical Often markedly introverted, but sometimes quite the opposite Very honest about their own shortcomings or knowledge/skills gaps Tend to see situations and issues in more complex terms than their colleagues.

Sorry for the vulgarity in the title but I read a whopper of a quote from my always thought-provoking colleague, Gary Woodill, and what ensued in my mind was nothing more than a clusterfuck. (My definition of clusterfuck is complicated confusion and chaos.) Anyway, here’s the quote: "learning through the use of social media is a set of implicit assumptions that if people are using something called "social media", then "social learning" must be taking place. This is a confusion of the means with the ends." Think about it. I did. When you Google "social learning" you’ll notice that "social learning theory" is returned first. The "social learning" hits that follow are primarily bloggers. Bloggers like me. And then there are theorists like Etienne Wenger talking about social learning and social learning systems in the  context of communities or practice and stewarding technology for communities. I love that stuff. You can see that "social learning," as a term, appeared enough to make Google’s trend chart in 2006 and has gone up-and-down since. From the end of 2008 and on, it really grew some legs. A trend term. Vogue. Maybe rogue. Definitely ill-defined. Often misused. Tossed around without much serious inquiry into its meaning. In fact, it’s a  clusterfuck of meaning. As much so as ‘learning’ itself is. Ponies and unicorns. I guess what I’m saying here is that there’s not enough push-back on the term. Is it harmful? Effective? What’s the theory behind it? Were Bandura and Vygotsky full of shit? Lave and Wenger? What do we need to be thinking about? I think, when it comes to the new social learning crowd, we’ve got us a case of groupthink. I’ll be the first to say I’ve been part of the problem. However, I think we’ve got to slow down before we flood search engines with models that are not models and definitions grounded in little more than what someone else said.

After spending so much time investigating the positive aspects of learning through social media, I wanted to start looking at the possible negative aspects. Here’s one that’s possibly problematic: Our ability to show admiration and compassion may be declining due to our fast-paced digital culture. Neural correlates of admiration and compassion is a study that explores the social emotions that define humanity - admiration and compassion. Brain scans show it takes longer to respond to admiration and compassion than to respond to signs of something like physical pain. There is greater cognitive processing involved in feeling compassion. Does our fast-paced media culture (fueled by social media) mean we are becoming indifferent to the emotions of human suffering? Is it redefining our humanity? For instance, we flock to YouTube over and over again to view the death of a luger at the Olympics and say OMG! and then share that on Twitter so someone else can ‘re-tweet it’ and say OMG! and repeat it to the point that it spreads like a cancer. Or it ‘trends’. But are we ‘there’ long enough - in the moment - to display compassion? Do we allow enough time? In the study, the researchers say: The rapidity and parallel processing of attention requiring information, which hallmark the digital age, might reduce the frequency of full experience of such emotions, with potentially negative consequences. This made me think of a highly emotional e-learning course about palliative care. (You can see a marketing demo of this course if you register.) The course elicits strong emotions. In the demo you get an idea of it but I actually ran through the  course and it made me cry. E-learning that made me cry (for the right reasons). Feeling emotions was something I previously would have said "no, that’s probably not good for self-paced e-learning." I think this course allows time to process feelings. The course guides the learner to assess situations on their own using various resources like charts, glossaries, video, etc. Learners don’t just pull out a mobile device and watch a video or YouTube clip of a suffering patient  and then go into the room to provide care (and there’s a process to that care). So I guess what I’m saying here is that content that needs to tap compassion may need to be designed without rapid digital exchanges common to social media. I’m not stating fact. I’m putting it out there for consideration based on this one study. Our ability to show admiration and compassion may be declining when it comes to rapid digital exchanges. Don’t rule out e-learning for emotional content. Perhaps we just need to consider the time we’re allowing for a learners response.

I was tweaking my LinkedIn profile and saw this…

Today’s different. Really different. Because instead of firing up my computer and working exclusively for a company, today I’m non-exclusive. (In Facebook relationship "non-exclusive" is like being "in an open relationship.") Today, instead of being an employee of Brandon Hall Research, I’m a Brandon Hall Research Associate meaning I will continue to do work for Brandon Hall but am free to explore anything else I want to. ANYTHING. This is a very, very good thing for me. As Hannah Montana would say, the best of both worlds. Here’s what really feels different about today. Throughout my professional career, I’ve always been an employee. So I feel this amazing sense of independence and also this pit in my stomach. My husband went through this transition over ten years ago and has been encouraging me ever since to do the same. The pit, of course, is a result of kids, mortgages, health insurance, vacations, and all that other shit that makes me wish I was this guy. Not seeing a weekly paycheck in the future is nerve racking and a difficult hurdle to cross when making the transition. I’m sure several of you have felt the same. I put the word out about my role change to a portion of my online network and YOWSA, what a response I got. I love love love my network. I’m serious. The best network EVER. This may not be the best economy for making a change, but I really needed it. I’ve got some new projects and look forward to what the future holds. So, if you need skillz that kill and are not afraid of someone who uses words like clusterfuck, I’m your dudette ; ) Meantime… My work at Brandon Hall Research will take me to the Marcus Evans CLO Summit April 11-13 in Braselton, Georgia. I’ll be presenting on cloud computing. Followed immediately by… AITD National Conference in Sydney, Australia April 20-22 where I’ll be speaking on the topic of "E-Learning 2010: Innovation & Implementation" and leading a pre-conference workshop on social media tools for trainer’s. Day 1…wish me luck.

I traveled to Buffalo, New York (yes, on purpose ; ) last Friday to speak at the ASTD Niagara Chapter meeting about learning in the workplace through the social web. There was a lot of energy and knowledge in the group. Instead of getting hung up on "what is Twitter?" type of  conversations (which I often get), we had conversations about bigger issues like control, privacy, standards, the role of L&D, knowing, and "why" (addressing what problem?). I came away with this: A business can not control the social web because employees are already using the very tools their employer wants to control. And, they’re using them to get work done, not to play Farmville. The social web is not private. Once you create any type of content - a rating on Amazon, a blog, a comment - you’re privacy ceases to exist. However, the amount of privacy you want is somewhat within your control. Fear (of loss of control and privacy) is best addressed by establishing standards for engagement and working with internal groups. Understanding new roles is critical. Where can you be the most effective? Is it helping people find the right person or the right content? Is it helping people to access and retrieve information more efficiently? Knowing is crucial…you don’t know what you don’t know. How is the work actually getting done? Being able to articulate why the social web is right for a specific problem will get you needed resources. Don’t say "social." Say collaborate, say communicate, say increase productivity, but don’t say social. ASTD Niagara, thanks for having me. And, I must give a hat tip to my virtual cube mate Dave Ferguson for sharing some slides and ideas the night before the event. The photo in this post is from Dave’s presentation. It’s by LuluP on Flickr and represents Dave’s way of explaining things - in this case tagging. Thanks Dave.)

When I was sitting on a research panel at DevLearn 09, Brent Schlenker - the moderator - asked each panelist what they’d invest in if they were venture capitalists. I said Augmented Reality (AR). I haven’t wrote about AR much and I haven’t done any serious research on it but I have had a Google alert going for "Augmented Reality" now for several months. (I get back an enormous amount of information so actually I should modify my alert so it limits hits to those related to learning and education.) I am, however, hesitant to do that because I probably wouldn’t see stuff like this from Blaise Aguera y Arcas demo’ing AR maps using Bing maps, Flickr, Worldwide Telescope, Video overlays and Photosynth. He tells the crowd at TED to think time travel, think telepresence, think crowd-sourced commerce to enhance decision-making. It makes me think of all sorts of possibilities for learning. Here’s to augmenting the visual representation of the world. (This video is a month old so you may have already viewed it but I wanted to share it because it blew my mind.) Via Eric Tsai’s Posterous (he has some other AR examples as well)