Social network + online store = Sandbox

Don't know about you but after I've joined tons of Social Network Sites in the last 6 years, I realize that I go through the cycle of technology adoption from trigger to peak of inflated expectations all the way to plateau of productivity. In between, I also tend to sink into some sort of SNS fatigue. So when a new site turns up -- usually every six months, I routinely create an account, based on each one's relative novelty.

Most usually come within my online attention radar. This time, I came across Sandbox via a huge billboard among a bunch of others along the stretch of Highway 54 in Makati, EDSA to the younger generation.

Ok so I ask myself what else is new? You've seen one with a lot of videos. And another with a lot of pictures, and yet another one with loads of music. What else could be different with Sandbox? Perhaps, the following?

To the younger set it could be a provider of services like friendster but with online store.

To the more mature and sophisticated netizens, it could very well be a source of services like facebook but with online store.

Then again, probably the best thing that makes Sandbox different from other websites, is:

It's an online store that allows you to download music, games and movie-themed content to your mobile.

Hold on, give me time to create a new account and go through the cycle again. And good thing there are open APIs. You don't have to really abandon your other SNS so long as the accounts could cross-connect.

[Edit] - After creating an account and doing the usual validation steps, (Note: They are rather particularly stringent about the usrn@me + p@ssword specs.), I was taken to the site. One thing that caught my attention, the right-hand side application icons that move like those of the Mac during Mouse hover. Will give myself more time to explore its digisoria section. Looks interesting.

2D2C in DLS-C

aka how do students in De La Salle-Canlubang discover, disclose, connect and co-create learning?



Figure 1: people@dlscanlubang.org

Discover

Figure 2 below demonstrates how the technology more commonly known as Real Simple Syndication (RSS) gives the user the ability to be on top things of interest thereby offering the latest updates in a personalized fashion.

Figure 2: Feed Reader

Disclose

Now by filling in suitable fields in a user’s profile, the owner indicates which attributes best describe him or her to the rest of the community. Some systems give to the user the flexibility of disclosing as much or as little, depending on the suitable level of comfort.

Figure 3: Profile

Connect

Connecting is something that Friendster, one of the pioneers of Social Network Sites in the early decade of the century, has widely popularized. The ability to invite friends online and get invitations confirmed in a two-way friendship loop gave rise to the practice of “Friending”.

Figure 4: Friends

Co-create

Through what is commonly called tagging, Social Network Sites confer to the users the ability to put some loose categorization of learning objects. The image below shows what is called a tag cloud. It’s an aggregation of ‘popular’ labels used on learning artifacts and the system works to highlight the ‘relative importance’ of the items according to font size.

Figure 5: Tags and Folksonomies

The implication of all these resonates with David Warlick (2007): "students stop being mirrors, and instead become amplifiers. Their job is not merely to reflect what they encounter, but to add value to it. Content and skills are no longer the end product, but they become raw materials, with which students learn to work and play and share. Information is captured by the learner, processed, added to, remixed, and then shared back, to be captured by another learner/teacher and reprocessed."

Networking or Not-working?


[Image via Hatem]

Nic Paton explores the perils and promises of Social Network Sites for employers especially HR managers. More here.

The sense I'm getting is that there seems to be scope to set up SNS in-house. Could be useful for Knowledge Management, particularly in the domain of creativity and innovation.

Share the Science ...

Christian Crumlish highlights Google OpenSocial's prescriptions for a successful Social Web Design:

• Enable self expression via personalization
• Show what friends are doing
• Let people explore friends and friends of friends
• Provide commenting features
• Expose multiple areas of similarity
• Solve real world problems through social connections

Longer list by Joshua Porter is here.

I'm tempted to summarize that as: Smart. Simple. Social.

Specialist Social Networking Sites

Ross Dawson discusses the role of specialist SNS to professionals (or Communities of Practice) and draws up a list from physicians to women-only executives here.

Indeed, Friendster, Myspace, Bebo et al. have set the categories. Now it's time for niche SNS.

[via Matt Moore]