I believe that there are lots of benefits of using Blog.
First is the ease of use. Blog is very easy to use and importantly it is free of charge. If anyone wants to post blog to tell stories about their personal interest, they can do that easily. Whether it is in the classroom or at work, blog can be used in several ways, namely, educating, entertaining, and communicating.
Second is the aspect of opinion sharing. People are allowed to comment on blog which makes e-learning become more powerful.
Third is the linkage of blog to other social tools, such as youtube, facebook, twitter, msn messenger, and photo album make blog a powerful medium of communication on certain knowledge once it links with other social tools, such as my blogs I created before coming to Pepperdine University.
http://mitocwclubthailand.blogspot.com/
http://thaikindle.blogspot.com/
Some companies use blog as a marketing strategy. For example, Marriott uses blog as a marketing tool.
http://www.blogs.marriott.com/
Whether it is for commercial or education purpose, blog is very useful.
Even for a small business which does not have money to pay for web hosting, blog can be used as a website to communicate to audience.
However, in reality blog is not as complicated as website. Website can be used more once you have lot of data to put on website. Blog does not have some limitations on link with some computer languages.
In order to create multimedia on blog with lot of information linked with database, blog can not be used.
Looking at other perspectives, blog can consist of junk information because it is free.
If it is free, one person can have so many blogs to write about anything, whether the information is right or wrong. One time I saw in my country that a citizen wrote information on politics on blog and release it by using email. I saw that blog in the email. Blog condemned Former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinnawat.
I believe that we all do not know if that blog contains real information, facts or wrong data.
Many people believed that blog and forwarded mail on that blog. I saw so many comments on that blog.
The power of viral marketing using blog and email is so powerful that blog can be dangerous tool, especially when it is free.
With blog sitting there in the world of Internet, junk blog can pile up every day.
Can we imagine what will happen when the world is full of information in blog?
In summary, blog can be a powerful e-learning tool for class and for corporations at the same time blog can be social marketing tool to manipulate information in the case when Internet marketers use blog to put a lot of information to create links so that google can rank page as priority.
Good insights about the benefits and potential risks of blogs. How might blogs be leveraged in learning environments?
ReplyDeleteBlogs can be leveraged by using it with other tools.
ReplyDeleteBlogs need to be used with chat room , google docs, and youtube. If there is a chat room in real time, people can chat and comment on blog and help each other write blog. Google docs can be used to edit reports and share via blog. For instance, I can edit report with friends on real time and if that works, every friend approves, then we can document on blog together.
In reality, if we can edit youtube while collaborating with google docs and after team approves we can post it on blog.
ReplyDeleteWeakness of blog is that it is not collaborative tool. It is for documenting the finished part.
ReplyDeleteThat makes blog different from PBworks.
good learning environment needs
ReplyDelete1) immediate feedback
2) on-line community
Blog can not give immediate feedback. Compared to facebook, blog is more static with no chat room.
Blog is not robust due to lacking of chat room /on-line real time chat.