Socially Optimized Research into Virtual Worlds (part 1)

Check out my model for socially optimized research on Prezi

I want to model to my students how I go about doing socially optimized research while I explore another important topic in digital culture: virtual worlds.

I've been revising my "Socially Optimized Research" presentation as I've been trying to follow it. The new graphic tries to keep the focus on connecting with people while pursuing inquiry.

Step One: TELL PEOPLE
We are so conditioned to print-paradigm ways of knowing that even with all these ways of reaching other people, there is a strong tendency to use isolated modes of inquiry (such as looking up something in a library catalogue, or doing a basic Google search. Believe me, this is a hard habit to break. But the more I try it, the more convinced I am of its benefits.

Taking my own advice, before I began this blog post I posted to Twitter and to Google+ the following: "Virtual worlds: serious educational / social uses, or techno-utopian time suck?" That was 18 minutes ago and I've already started conversing with two different people from my social graph: Quinn Warnick and Laura Gibbs. These are both academic colleagues. Take a look: