On the Nature of Dialogues, Ideas, and Video Games

Here is another one of my test posts from FWD:Everyone - Dialogue On Art & Video Games. As you can probably tell if you read this post and the last one I am not using this platform in the way it was intended. The idea of FWD - as it was presented to me - was that people are having amazing conversations through email that are lost to the world because email is private (relatively speaking). The man I was talking to then compared this to historic letters that have gotten published.

I understand the logic here ... but I rarely see email used in this way. In my social and work circles email is a very utilitarian method of communication. It is to share information or files that are pertinent to a particular class/job/etc. Alternatively, when I have something of interest I want to discuss I may use email to arrange a coffee or beer over which I can discuss issues of importance. I do, however, often have fascinating conversations of varies real-time communication platforms - as you can see from the 2 posts I made over at FWD. This behavioral pattern suggests a couple of observations about personal communication and idea generation.

Beta Testing and Preparing for your Thesis/Dissertation Defense

The connection between the title topics is tenuous.

I have been talked into trying out a new blog-like platform that turns emails into blog posts. I don't really email all that much, but I like blogs, so I agreed. So far I think this has huge potential for teachers, but I have not yet had the opportunity to try it with a class. I just created my account today and made one post. Since I kind of like the post, I thought I would share it here.

The post is a brief conversation I had with a master student about preparing for their thesis defense, and you can find it at FWD:Everyone, under the title FB Convo on Defense. The tl;dr version: you are not alone, anxiety is normal, you'll be fine, and everyone feels like this. This is then followed by a general idea of what to expect the day of and what to do the day before.

Although I will be testing out FWD, it will not be replacing this blog. When certain topics overlap, however (like the linked conversation above) I may link posts from there to here.

Now its time to get back over to NerdCultures and get those posts graded.

Thank-You Facebook - Taiwan's Tragedy and A Traveler's Piece of Mind

Before dawn on February 6th of this year a 6.4 magnitude earthquake hit southern Taiwan. Reports of deaths started coming almost immediately, albeit slowly at first. Then I heard that an apartment building had collapsed. Later, the death toll would come to 117. I was in shock. Here in Wisconsin it was late afternoon. Less than 2 hours after the earthquake hit my phone started blowing up. My friends, thankfully, were checking in.

Catching Up, Rites of Passage Rituals, Identity, and Cosplay

Scrolling back through this blog it looks like I haven't written a post since September. I'm not sorry. I have entertained you with videos of my escapades with TPN and I managed to double the length of my dissertation in one semester - directly leading to my graduation. That's right, I am now officially Dr. Krista-Lee Malone. 

Apparently this surprised a few people. Examples of responses upon my announcement:

"Wow, I wasn't sure you were going to finish."

"It's about time!"

"Really?"

But it's ok, because I can now say this:

And then the next question: "How does it feel?"