Week #10 -- The Grand Finale

OMG, here I am -- at the end of week 10, with my shiny new MP3 player in the same building as myself. It's almost like Christmas, but without having to hide stuff and pretend that some other fat guy is going to break into the house to bestow gifts that my hard-earned dollars will continue to pay for well into the New Year, thanks to MasterCard and VISA. I'm so excited!

Okay, first I want to take offense at the calling of names that this week's lesson started off with. I thought an oxymoron was that guy on TV trying to sell me OxyClean. To be succinct, there is really such a thing as a video podcast, though it is only useful on-the-go to those of us who are graced to own the 5G iPod. You can, of course, sit around and watch video podcasts in iTunes (I am subscribed to VH1's Best Week Ever video podcast), but of course that doesn't make it any different than YouTube, except for that RSS auto-downloading bit. But disparage not the video podcast! It is the wave of the future, once you guys trade up out of your Shuffles and get an iPod with a screen. There's no reason to call it any sort of a moron.

I downloaded the audiobook UltraMetabolism: The Simple Plan for Automatic Weight Loss. I hope to have a chance to read it one day. Obviously, I hope to lose weight automatically one day, too, without any changes to my eating habits. Food and I just enjoy each other's company so much. Well, okay, I really enjoy food and generally it's been cooked enough that it doesn't complain about my company.


Right now, I am subscribed to the following podcasts: Computerworld TechCast, (to "Feed the Geek"); NPR: All Songs Considered, in continuous search of new music that doesn't totally suck; NPR: Car Talk, because if my brother and I ever spoke to each other we could do a show like this, and VH1's Best Week Ever, just to see what the quality of "professional" video podcasts is like. I think that all college courses should be available to the students (and possibly the public) as video podcasts. It's part of my whole belief that information should be free. As such, I can prove that I haven't trapped too much of it within my own head.

Well, what can I say about Learn 2.0. In the words of the Grateful Dead, What a long, strange trip it's been! We were exposed to some new and exciting sites, all building on the easy availability of data in our brave new, interconnected world.

Just remember, if you can think of a way to tie available information together and share it with others, you can create the next Google, the next YouTube, the next Flickr, etc. Tell the public what they want and then give it to them, like Steve Jobs does, and maybe people will one day be waiting anxiously for your new smartphone to start rolling into stores.

I will continue to blog for some time on this site, as there is much in our present society with which I would like to raise some protestations. Weeks 11-13 are "ketchup" weeks, so I will be exploring on my own. One of the things I want to examine closer (and pass along to others) is Web 2.0 Mobile. Okay, you have all this great stuff out there, but how much of it can you access away from your desk. Despite the hype, what can you (should you) be able to connect to on your phone or PDA. Does anyone with the tendency to own a PDA still have one that is separate from their phone? Inquiring minds want to know.