0 Sample Collaboration Agreement for Group Research Projects

Image from wlibrary

I like to assign a significant, primary-research-based, multi-media, group research project in my classes. I suppose my attachment to primary research and group work stems from my personal experiences.

My own commitment to primary source research as a compelling learning tool stems from an experience I had when I was eight years old. It involved a librarian and a 135 year-old map showing my family's new home. My mother sent to the local library me on a fool's errand to find out whether the house my family had moved into was originally part of the church or the horse farm it was sandwiched between. The kind and forward-thinking librarian on duty that day took my inquiries with the utmost seriousness and led my into the basement where historic town plats were housed. There we read the maps and formulated an interpretation of my house and neighborhood. The librarian captured my historical imagination in a way that would drive my academic studies for the rest of my life.

My pledge to group work is rooted in less sentimental. As a history student, I found little opportunity work in team, yet the career-track museum jobs I landed both out of college and out of grad school routinely required collaboration with other organizations and close team work with colleagues. Very little in school prepared me for such work after school. Therefore, I made a personal commitment to my students to introduce to them to--and hopefully prepare them for--working in teams in the workplace.

The following assignment is the first step in that process:

View Sample Collaboration Agreement Directions

1 Free Music on the Internet

I've started doing video interviews on my other blog and am getting ready to podcast. I recently find myself on the hunt for background music to use.

I pretty much have the CC and fair-use thing under control. By and large, as a blogger, I can comment on or remix images to create something original--an original idea, a unique combination of images, or what have you. Basically, as long as I cite my source and link back to them, I am good. I also have a disclaimer stating that if I have used something inappropriately, I will take it down if they email me.

But music is a different beast. A few sites I have found a few sites, such as Jamendo and Owl through CreativeCommons.org, but Owl is confusing to use. I'm never sure what is free and what is not. On Jamendo, I find the pickin's oft times slim. Or rather, I just don't have time to wade through the garbage. So I am routinely doing Google searches for "free music."

I have recently found two new music sites that look promising PublicDomain2ten, and LastFM.com.

The new model seems to mix free with pay. I'm totally ok with that; I think provides a sustainable business model that keeps sites operational.

Caveat Emptor, however. Let the buyer beware! Free is great. Free gives artists exposure, and allows blokes like me to push out fairly polished products for little money. However, it is the users responsibility to search out and read the fine print. May sure you know what the limits of use are before you use someone else's work. And to CYA, make sure you have some sort of disclaimer stating that you will immediately take down any work if you get a "cease and desist order" from an artist.

By way of example, here is a video clip I did for the other blog using CC work I found on Jamendo .


Southern Cakes Explained from Hindsight Bride on Vimeo.

2 Boo Hiss Google Maps

A Big Boo Hiss To Google Maps! 
I have been trying to create a "wish tour" on Google Maps for days. While I finally figured out how to add the points of interest I want, and delete those mistakenly added points, I cannot for the life of me wrangle the "draw a line" feature in to submission.

The idea is great. As soon as I watched the intro video for creating tours, I decided to create a tour of my dog's travels across country.




The video made it look easy enough. But then the trouble started. It took me forever to figure out how to fix and delete points. In hindsight it seems easy enough: simply type in a location you want to find; click on it; choose "save to" and select the map you want to save it to. Simple.

But I was trying to manually enter points at first. I also ran into trouble with some points being inaccurate, as in my Well Traveled Dog Map. I wanted to tear out my hair trying to figure out how to place the points in some sort of chronological order, hence the word "tour."

Below is the first map I attempted. I found it exceedingly difficult to place lines along roads. It took several hours to get the this exceedingly inaccurate map to look as it does.





View The Well Travelled Dog in a larger map


I decided that perhaps the problem lay in the cross-country distances with the dog map. So I set out to create a tour of my favorite consignment shops in western North Carolina. Google's how-to video used a walking tour in San Francisco as an example. I figured if I stayed in a smaller area, I would have better luck. Nope, it was worse. Part of the problem is that mine is a driving tour. The walking tour example used straight lines on relatively straight street blocks, and a relatively short distance.

Mine is a driving tour, and the feature that sets a line along roads would be ideal if it worked. The platform seems buggy.  The directions say, "click to start drawing a line along the roads." But that only works some of the time. If there is a point of interest in the way, the tool will toggle from "draw" to "grab."

The few times that I got the line to start, I couldn't get it to stop, even though I followed the "double click to set and end point" instructions.




View Consignment Shop Tour in a larger map

I have poured hours into these two inaccurate and incomplete maps and have drawn the following lessons from them. 1) They are not easy enough for me to enjoy using them for individual projects 2) I was initially excited about the prospect of chambers of commerce or historical societies being able to create tours in and easy-to-use WYSIWYG environment. Wrong! If I were a business with my heart set on creating a tour, I would be in and even bigger rage than I am right now.

4 Geo-tagging and The Collective

Flickr's geo-tagging feature is fairly straight forward to use. It's drag-and-drop design allows a user to simply drag an image to the map and Flickr will automatically enter the associated coordinates.

This is fun, and interesting. After geo-tagging my own images from my "Saturday morning with D." I had a fine time telling our morning story with maps and well as images. When I did a quick search for fellow classmates' ASUweb20 tag, I found that my images did not show up even though I tagged them. I have been spinning my wheels for the better part of two hours trying to figure this out. Exhausted, I needed to destress, so I searched for what I now consider home, Mammoth Lakes. It seems that Mammoth's pro photogs have really availed themselves of the power of Flickr.

So there is is. A bit of ho-hum for you. Flickr geo-tagging is nice.

But wait! There's more. And it comes from...drum roll...Ted of course!

So geo-tagging is actually not just about marketing your photography services or creating your own little vanity pageant online. It is a way to tap into a collective knowledge base. A "metaverse" of information.

Of note,  is the demonstration of a 3-D rendering of the Notre Dame Cathedral using Photosynth. Basically, one can take a detailed, user navigated 3-D tour, in ridiculous detail. Developer Blaise Aguera y Arcas spoke it best when he said, the punch line behind the Photosynth technology... is [the] reconstruction of Notre Dame Cathedral was done entirely--computationally-- from images scraped from Flickr."

The implications for museums and the humanities is extraordinary. We digital humanists are increasingly able to aggregate and present ever greater amounts of data. We can know more for less and less money and resources. Think of it. How many grant dollars would it take to send a team to Notre Dame Cathedral to take pictures of every nook and cranny for a history or museum tour online?

Now we can just "scrape images from Flickr!?" Amaaaaazing!

1 Not so SURL-iously

OK, not a huge fan of Second Life. Full stop.

I was reminded of this while attending a Second Life Educators (SLED) meet-and-greet this evening. It wasn't much of an event. While the four other attendees promised that they typically dance, chat, and drink, and drink (yep, I said "and drink" twice because they said "and drink" twice. Apparently virtual drinking is a big deal. Seriously?) there wasn't much going on last night.

OK, clearly I went to the wrong event (for me). I figured it would be a good way to get my feet wet. But perhaps I should have attended one of the science-oriented, or research-oriented functions. I'm an all-business kind of girl in SL. I want a lecture, or presentation, or conference. Something focused. No dancing or drinking. More chatting and sharing ideas.

So there it is. My big gripe. And part of the problem was I picked the wrong event--a social event.

I am no stranger to SL. The few events I have attended in the past have largely been on my home University's Catamount Island. I have helped Neil (who largely built the Island) to demonstrate basic functionality and telecommuting. I have watched instructors teach, and have toured classrooms and educational facilities on Catamount Island.

But I am really not a huge fan. When I arrived at the SLED meet and greet, the vibe was akin to a pack of dogs pissing on posts and sniffing each others assholes. The group of four ladies clearly knew each other and had a code (or shorthand if you will) for their largely text-based conversation. Lots of "slash glare" comments were exchanged between these ladies. I don't know what that means. I assumed it meant, "hey noob, we are a part of a clique--lol."

I introduced myself, and after the requisite "hellos" and "welcomes," it was pointed out that I'm "two years old, and no profile information." Then, one SLED lady started making weird, sort of provokative gestures. Another started dancing and then flying around the room like she was Trinity from the freaking Matrix. It was bizarre--not in a good and wholesome way. So do people do that in their business meetings, or is that behavior simply a function of the more casual atmosphere of the meet-and-greet. What ever it is, it made my feel itchy inside. Perhaps if the conversation weren;t so inane... 

So there it is. I am part of this problem. In the two years I have been a sometimes SL citizen, I have not bothered to change my clothes, update my profile information, or leave Catamount Island if I can help it. It just doesn't capture my imagination.

That doesn't mean that SL os not a game changer for education. It simply means it is not a game-changer for my digital life. I will likely go back to skulking about Catamount Island on occasion, leaving the SLED meet-and-greeters to their dancing, chatting, and drinking, and drinking.

4 From Virtual Life to Real Life with Twitter

I recently won flowers on Twitter!

I won a beautiful $50 professionally arranged vase of flowers.  I did not know the florist before hand, but had been following her on Twitter for a few weeks.

I have thought long and hard about whether or not this "counts" for the assignment. The arrangement was concluded via email, and the assignment rules specifically state "Don't cheat by just using email or phone call- this should use one or more of the tools you've got." However,  I think that it is important to point out that this was a wholly organic bridge between virtual and real worlds.

Let me explain...

As a part of my blogging strategy I follow numerous people on twitter, both local and national people. Generally, the only relationship I have with fellow bloggers is through Twitter and blog comments. Nonetheless, the relationships I have developed through these two channels has become rich in many instances, and has resulted in email exchanges. As a matter of fact, if I do ever email someone in my blogging industry, it is generally after establishing a solid relationship through Twitter, online discussion forums, and commenting on blogs. I never email someone out of the blue. It just seems weird, like cold calling on the phone.

Anyway, I started following @EnchantedFlorst and re-tweeting her tweets. She followed me back. Here's how it went down the day I made real life contact...

I was in the midst of bantering with the Yellow Pages marketing folks and @EnchantedFlorst via Twitter about old media verses new media marketing.

I stepped away from my desk, and when I came back I saw that @enchantedflorst was giving away flowers again. I had seen this before and had re-tweeted it. This time, I decided to participate.

From @Enchantedflorst:

As per her instructions, I emailed her seventeen minutes after her tweet asking if I was too late. I then
re-tweeted her free flower offer so my own followers would be exposed to her.

And then...I WON! Woohoo!

From @Enchantedflorst:

And then...I re-tweeted once again to thank @enchantedflorst and give her additional exposure.

From Me (hindsighbride):

Furthermore, there were some emailing SNAFUs that Twitter helped remedy. A few emails didn't get through to my email box. Janet from @enchantedflorst direct messaged me on Twitter instead.

While Janet offered to deliver them that evening, I asked if I could drive out to Asheville and interview her for my blog. She suggested we meet at Lady Luck Flower Farm.

I ended up writing a blog post as well as interviewing both Janet from Enchanted Florist and Katie from Lady Luck Flower Farm. Both interviews will be published on my blog in the next few weeks.

So in some ways I "cheated" by emailing. I did not blog about this immediately because of the email clause. However, the more I looked for opportunities to "get the assignment done," the more those opportunities seemed false.

I had a real, organic web 2.0 experience that connected the virtual and real worlds. Janet was using Twitter and her free flowers to gain exposure. I am using Twitter to gain exposure and meet people to interview. We both met our goals through Twitter and have developed a good working relationship since then. Janet comments on my blog and I re-tweet a lot of her tweets. It is a mutually beneficial relationship that started on Twitter, not through email or phone--though we have used both since.

I have also recently made contact with the organizers for a major blogging conference through Twitter. I believe they found me because I was #hashtagging their name and commenting about this year's conference. This is super exciting because some of the bloggers I admire the most are involved with this.

 Incidentally, I also found a number of posts about the "underground blogosphere" and email. It seems that email is a great complement to web 2.0, especially as relationships mature.


However, the point is, Twitter is a great way to foster and strengthen community among bloggers and businesses. How else could I possibly meet these people? 

0 Reaching New Markets with Web 2.0

Lately, I have heard more than a few people talk about the "marketing power" of web 2.0. I have become increasingly offended by this and similar statements about gaining "market share"through Twitter, or developing "product awareness" using FaceBook.

What!? Or in the parlance of Internet cussing WTF!?

Now don't get me wrong, I believe that the Internet can be a powerful tool for businesses and professionals. However, I think that the old-school marketing strategies of finding your "target audience" and pitching your product to them doesn't work. People are primarily looking for two things on the Internet: information and community.

If you are a business looking to FAIL at social media, treat your social media platforms like press-release forums. Only Tweet and FaceBook about your products and events. Only blog about your products. Never comment on another person's blog, tweet, or FaceBook comment. In short, be self-centered and only allow information to travel one way--out from you.

If you want to SUCCEED at social media, treat it for what it is: a vehicle for exchanging information and ideas. I am a blogger so I will discuss this in terms of blogging (not this, but another blog that I run).

I of course want my blog to succeed. I want lots of readers, and eventually, I would like to offer limited advertising of businesses I trust and whose service I think would appeal to my readers. So yes, being able to write for money is a goal of mine. However, it is not the be-all-end-all for my blogging life.

The real reason I started blogging is I have something I think is important to say. Note that I did not start blogging because everyone else was doing it, or I thought I could make money doing it. Rather, I feel I have experiences and expertise that will benefit my readers. I want people to benefit from my ideas and suggestions. I am also well aware that a blogger needs other people and ideas to survive. I need a larger community of people that I both tap into and contribute to to keep my ideas fresh. In addition to blogging, I have a personal relationship with local businesses that I blog about. I tweet about other blogs, useful links, as well as more personal things. I participate fully in several large discussion and networking forums in my field, and I comment on other peoples blogs.

In short, I am an active member of my chosen niche community. I do not constantly push links to my blog in emails, comments or discussion forums. I am not constantly referring to myself, my blog, or my product. Rather I participate in online conversations in a similar way that I would in person. After all, you wouldn't think of going to a professional event and constantly try to sell a product would you?

The Internet is the same nowadays. The days of hard sell e-commerce are a gone, or at least largely ineffective. Today the internet is about conversations, communitiy, and sharing ideas.

Don't believe me? Just look at the ubiquity of comments in blogs, online stores, and everywhere you turn. People no longer want to be on the recieving end of a hard-sell marketing campaign. Rather, they want to be part of a conversation.

That does not mean that "marketing" is dead. Lord knows that I am constantly trying to up my Google ranking, attract more readers, and generally raise awareness about my own blog. I even have business cards I hand out. However, I also know that I am a part of a larger conversation, and I embrace my role as an active a contributing member of a larger online community.