The following quotation is the rules for the RPG forum on The Northlands.  They were posted (and are implemented) but our moderator, Red.  To see the rules in their environment click here.

We all have to have rules. I like to think of them as guidelines, to be used with your good judgement. Please adhere to them and it will remain fun for all

1. Please, no godmodding – every character should have weaknesses, just as they have strengths. They should also be defeatable – there’s no fun, otherwise.

2. Don’t force other characters – you can aim the hit, but it is up to the other player if it lands or not. Work these sort of things out prior to the event via the OOC thread (exactly what it’s created for) or via PM. In some circumstances, players will allow someone else to control their character, if they happen to be away for a long period of time, so as not to hold up the play of the game. However, don’t assume you can control someone else’s character without getting their permission first.

3. Before entering an RPG, speak to the GM (Game Master) first, and make your intentions clear, through the OOC thread (again, that’s what they’re there for) or by PM.

4. Try not to double-post as a character. Wait for another player to chip in. Don’t forget about timezones and that real life takes precedence over RPGs.

5. Keep conversation about the game to the OOC threads. That’s another use for them! Only character posts should be put into the actual game thread. Everything else gets confined to the OOC thread.

6. If conflicts arise and can’t be resolved amiably, seek the help of the moderator (me ) or one of our admin staff. That is what we are there for

7. The Admin and Moderators’ word is final – so don’t argue.

As I think of rules, I’ll add them, but for now – happy gaming

I have neglected my blog and lifestream a bit because I have been immersed in visual artifact creation.

[Interesting aside: the work of artifact didn't naturally flow into my lifestream because once 'in deep' I didn't think to digg or reference my sources and wanderings. One of two things need to happen for lifestreaming to be a real record of my learning journey - either I get better at placing my learning into a archive-able form (like tumblr or delicious) or lifestreams have the functionality of working with your browser history.  The former is unappealing as it would seem artifical and break the flow, but the latter would be pretty cool as long as I could filter it of course.]

Anyway I thought I would make a quick post about Twitter before I forget what my main breakthroughs were.  When I started this course I was a bit anti Twitter, but eager to give it a go as so many people had bought into it.  My original reservations we that all the tweets I received were boring.  Not individually, but as a stream.  I like Facebook status updates as they are part of something bigger – like the chorus in a Greek tragedy.  But Twitter is just… all chorus.  As much as I tried, I couldn’t find a place for it in my online life – it didn’t add value.

Now I understand it a little better.  I ‘get’ how hashtags work, and why we might retweet, reply to, and direct message.  However my improved understanding has simply given me more confidence to eliminate it as a contender in the ‘must have’ social networking compendium that our lives are undoubtedly gravitating towards.

Why?

Twitter only really works if you don’t have anything to say.  Once you have something meaningful to share 140 keystrokes just doesn’t cut it.  Yes you can attempt to be succinct, but 140 keystrokes requires you to do this to the point of glibness.  Valid and interesting points loose their clarity and relevence.  They even loose their appeal, and for me appeal is an important point of sharing anything on the net, where messages must be appealing in order to get (and retain) an audience.  Yes I can follow bloggers who will kindly tell me about their new post thanks to the shortened url and phrase combo, but by the time they have tweeted their update  (and I have read their tweet) I already know they have posted because my Google Reader / Feedly combo has told me.

Also, in the context of our #ededc experiment I live on the other side of the world from my fellow tweeters.  Therefore when I am chirping away they are sleeping and vice versa.  At times I felt like a budgie talking to my mirror (and if I want to talk to myself I can do that at length in my blog).  Twitter seems to straddle synchronous and asynchronous communication.  Tweeting to me felt like getting up in the morning, reading a really interesting Skype convo that some friends had had last night and then trying to join in.  Yes I got responses to my tweets but they often got buried so what could have turned into an interesting discussion on a forum, became a bit of a “look at what we could have talked about” anti-climax.  I would also find a very interesting response to a previous tweet and rummage through the past several days looking for what it was responding to because we didn’t always use the ‘reply to’ function or our replies were complex and related to several tweets, or an emerging theme. If you could slide tweets into past, more pertinent, points in the convo it would be helpful.  Google Wave will, I believe, offer this kind of structuring.

So although I enjoyed this part of our Digital Cultures course Twitter isn’t for me.  But this is a valuable lesson. I get it now, and I still don’t want it.

This ability to eliminate is an important skill, and one we can all aim to teach our students.  As citizens of this brave new new digital lifeworld we are being bombarded by more and more tools that offer new ways of connecting and communicating.  Selecting the ‘right’ ones sometimes feels as scary as choosing the right stocks for your portfolio, yet we can’t use them all so the ability to test, evaluate and reject (without anxiety) is going to be valuable.

This little budgie is ready to hang up her mirror.

I was just reading Hand (2008) and pondering how:

Power in digital culture indexes an increasing tendency toward the total surveillance and administration of society, now conducted through globally gathered and sorted digital information. The results of this will paradoxically be greater insecurity, an intense amplification of existing social divisions, and the consumerization of democratic citizenship. (Hand 2008, p39)

Hands comments that:

But such regulatory machines may be user-generated in wikis, or subject to top-down political intervention (as in China). Indeed, Poster (2006) observes that the territoriality of the subject is minimized in digital culture, but it is not eradicated. (Hand 2008, p38)

This reminded me of a colleague had posted on his Facebook status updates (not sure how) that he “cant see anything thats going on in Facebook as he is stuck behind the Great Firewall of China!” and I thought I would share it with my #ededc colleagues:

lahirondelle #ededc a friend of mine can’t view FB as he is “stuck behind the great firewall of china”; Thai gov blocked U-Tube for months – thoughts?

This was posted at 16.08 and at 16.37 I recieved the following tweet from 12vpn:

@lahirondelle We can help your friend access FB in China, also U-Tube in Thai, https://12vpn.com

That is just plain spooky.  Feeling a bit insecure now.

I thought I would snag that quote first. It is one of the first thing that came to mind when I looked at my newly flowing lifestream.  Actually the real quote  (by Heraclitus 540 BC – 480BC) is:

“You could not step twice into the same river; for other waters are ever flowing on to you.”

Except of course with a lifestream, you can, which makes me feel like we are going against nature.  Tweets and Facebook status updates are, surely, ephemera.  I feel like the process of lifestreaming is (possibly – after all I have only been doing it for one day) clinging to something that shouldn’t be clung to.

I should insert here that I am seriously into Eastern belief systems so, as far as I am concerned, living in the moment and letting go of the past is where it is at.

I don’t like stockpiling stuff, that is my husband’s department (both of them now I think about it – my first husband saved the cinema tickets from every film we went to see).  Once I decided I didn’t want to be one of life’s hoarders I threw away a suitcase of letters (remember those? they were cool… came in envelopes with stamps and postmarks and everything).  I had years’ worth of letters from friends,  love letters from… well that is none of your business who from, plus every letter my dad sent me while I was at university.  Even now dad is gone I don’t have a moment’s regret for letting them go.  Although I don’t remember what was said those letter filled moments made me, they are me – I am, in pranic form, every letter that has ever been sent to me.  I don’t need the little paper corpses shrouded in envelopes to tell me who I am.

So if letting go is good and clinging is bad, lifestreaming can’t possibly be healthy as an end in itself.  So why do it?

Well, I am willing to keep an open mind, and I am sure we will all come up with a ton of reasons  (other than to prove to our tutors that we aren’t just sitting around browsing Lolcats) and I admit I am really excited to be at the beginning of a new e-learning journey, as long as I am able to let it all go at the end of it.