Today's 10 Things Discussion

I wanted to pass along another 10 Things experience that's less bibliocentric but still worth sharing.  

After I joined Facebook and added a number of current ILC student staff as friends, their networks included recently graduated ILC student staff who ended up "friending" me, and then their networks included more former ILC students who had graduated in the past, and they "friended" me, and before long, my group extended to students who had left more 6-8 years ago.  One who had graduated about 5 years ago used the connection to ask me for a letter of reference.  

I thought this was pretty cool.  I've had phone requests from former students in the past on rare occasion, but I can't help thinking this one wouldn't have happened if not for Facebook.   

Second, during the meeting, I mentioned that there are often options for some of these technologies and I used the example of iGoogle v Flock.  Both allow you to aggregate social networking sites into one window.  Carol asked about the difference between them, and, since I haven't compared them seriously, I said, "I don't know."  I can say, however, point out a few obvious differences (I'm really good at pointing out the obvious).  

Flock, a browser, is tied to the computer you're using.  If you move to another computer and want to use Flock, you will have to reconfigure it and possibly even install it if that's possible.  With iGoogle, a web site, you can connect and use it from almost any computer with an Internet connection.  Bob Johnson was able to jump up and show his iGoogle page on the computer in the room today, but he wouldn't have been able to show you his Flock configuration since it's not his computer (plus, it doesn't have Flock installed in the first place).

Also, there is one big difference between the two in security.  With Flock, you are logging into each social networking site yourself (or via locally-stored cookies) and any cross-site data transfer (like, dropping a photo from Flickr into a friend's Facebook) whereas with iGoogle, you are handing all your account access info to Google, and all your inter-site transfers go through Google.  

If I learn of more differences, I'll post them.