XplanaZine

Here’s our take on news that matters for Tuesday, January 3. Today’s theme is taking it personally and here are a few things from the technology world that are making a difference in our lives.

• Gaming — A couple of interesting items. First, this article from Sprawl magazine (a zine dedicated to suburban youth) on online roleplaying as the future of creative writing. Reported from a player’s point of view, this is definitely worth a read if you haven’t spent much time in online role playing games. And, if you want to know what the big online games were last year, check out this review.
• Blogging, Podcasting, and Vodcasting — An interesting new survey from Podtrac.
  Awareness of podcasting is the same or higher than reported by other surveys but the slant here is that most podcast listeners are men. Mediaweek reports that the research found roughly a third of the
  thousand Web users surveyed said they have heard of the term
  “podcasting.” Among that group, just 32 percent have actually listened to a podcast. Of those who have listened to podcasts, 78 percent were men, according to the study.
• Handhelds — Personal calling on wireless phones exceeded that on residential land lines even though 35 percent of the U.S. population doesn’t have wireless, according to the Yankee Group. And with CES a couple of days away, here’s a look at some of the handheld media player news coming our way:
  • It’s Distributed Media Galore at CES
  • href=”http://engadget.com/2006/01/02/nextlink-introduces-bluespoon-spider-bluetooth-headset/” target=”_blank”>Nextlink Introduces Bluespoon Spider Bluetooth Headset
  • Samsung YP-Z5 Flash MP3 Player with 1.8-inch Display
  • href=”http://engadget.com/2006/01/02/samsung-yp-t8n-flash-mp3-and-mpeg-4-player/” target=”_blank”>Samsung YP-T8N Flash MP3 and MPEG-4 Player
• Social Networks — How useful (really) are social networking sites when it come to doing important things (not to say that goofing off at work isn’t important but..)? Here’s an article from Xeni Jardin that takes a crack at answering that question. The preliminary answer? Like any tool, SNS is more useful for those who no how to use it and who have a concrete purpose for doing so.
• Finally, is anyone/everyone ready for Google PC? Is it Google + Walmart = Microsoft? It’s definitely going to be a strange year.

Now, here’s a recap of our favorite posts from the edublogging community from the past 48 hours.

• From Sol Gaitan : Post on the year in ideas.
• From Will Richardson : Post on stories of reinvention (personal and education) from edubloggers around the world.
• From Graham Wegner : Post on things he is looking forward to accomplishing as part of his job this year.
• From Stephen Downes: Post on the deficiencies of the publisher screening process.
• From Dave Cormier: Post on Wikibooks and the potential of funded projects.