viz.

Image Credit: Screenshot from Twitter

Inauguration officials estimate that about one million people crowded the National Mall this weekend to watch Barack Obama be sworn in as President. While this crowd was smaller than the 1.8 million who attended his first inauguration in 2008, a number of luminaries were present: Beyoncé, Stevie Wonder, and Invisible Obama. Apparently Invisible Obama had a busy day planning his inaugural ball outfit, surprising Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, and acting as a “seat filler.”

Screenshot "Full Body Twitter app" Johndan Johnson-Eilola

I experienced full body twitter this weekend.  Just by moving my body, I wrote a text and sent it into the twitter-sphere.  The experimental video installation "Bodies of Language" and conference panel with professors Anne Wysocki and Johndan Johnson-Eilola was really fun.  (You can see a snapshot of my interaction with the exhibit after the break.) The discussion also planted the disrupting thought that multi-media needs to get beyond the visual. What?  Get beyond the visual? 

"One Day Without Shoes 2011," TOMS via Youtube

Today TOMS shoes conducted its second annual One Day Without Shoes campaign in which anyone (wherever in the privileged world) was encouraged to go without sandals, boots, sneakers, etc. The intention behind the event is to "raise awareness" for what it's like for the millions in less developed countries who daily go without adequate protection for their feet and, as a result, are at risk for serious infections. At the risk of sounding like a cynical jerk, I'm going to raise some questions about how the campaign attracts an audience through compelling visual tools and ultimately how it benefits those for whom it claims to be raising awareness.

Image Credit:  Screenshot of viz. 

Elizabeth's post earlier this week on visual representations of Twitter reminded me of a blog entry from about a year ago by Emily Bloom, who often highlighted New Media pedagogy in her blog posts, and who contributed a wonderful New Media Pedagogy and Visual Rhetoric page.  You can see Emily's "Visual Tweets" entry reposted after the break, or you can link to the original Visual Tweets post and the comments from September 2009. 

Video Credit:  Twitter and World Simulation      

I’m always impressed (and, I have to say, sometimes a bit bewildered) when I hear of instructors who are especially successful in using online social networking in a classroom setting. For an example of what’s lately leaving me pedagogically awe-struck, take a look at the video, posted above. More, after the jump.