• Embed Doc
  • Copy Link
  • Readcast
  • Collections
  • CommentGo Back
Download
 
Posterous-Tumblr004.doc - 1 - Page 1 of 4
Posterous/Tumblr
an eBOOK CHAPTER in Learning Telecollaboratively(http://clifmims.wetpaint.com/page/Modules
 
)
prepublication version 004:
July 19, 2009 
By Jerry Bates
Introduction (an overview)
Posterous and Tumblr are two web 2.0 ready-to-go blog posting tools that keep you from having to getinto ‘messy’ coding business. It’s “micro-blogging,” in the words Sachin Agarwal, a cofounder ofPosterous. Both tools make blogging effortless, embedding your additional content (media, documents)automatically. Submit to Posterous page by simple email (mailto:post@yourposterousname.posterous.com). You can even create your Posterous “account” by emailingyour first post. In Tumblr, you _______________________.Educators need to remember the nature of blogging…. Stream of consciousness is its literary cousin. Infact, Daniel Honigman and Michael Quigley call blogging “lifestreaming.” [See also Wikipedia(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifestreaming) and Wordspy(http://www.wordspy.com/words/lifestreaming.asp )]
Examples in K-12 SettingsPopular Services
Posterous 
Want to blog fast? Posterous (http://posterous.com/ ) lets you do it simply with your emailaccount, even if you don’t already have a blog. In that case, Posterous automatically createsyour blog for you. Sounds a bit “pre-posterous,” but it isn’t.Just email your starter post to Posterous. Posterous sets up your blog immediately and postsyour message. Or, you can set up an account (took me less than 2 minutes), confirm yourposting email address. You’re in. Your Posterous micro-blog can be public, private, orcollaborative (group sites for classes). Basic service with 1 gig of space is free. The subject lineof your email message becomes the title, the body of your message becomes the text, and yourattachments are embedded in a media-appropriate window that appears above the postedmessage and below the title.Posterous accepts text, video, audio, still photos. Send a batch of photos at once, and Posterousassembles them into a gallery for you. Word processing documents are embedded in a viewer(Scribd) so readers scan scroll through them (or download to their own computer).Once you’re in Posterous, you’ll want to subscribe to others’ posterousings, so you can check inon what they’re saying/doing from your Posterous page.
 
Posterous-Tumblr004.doc - 2 - Page 2 of 4
Tumblr 
Tumblr is another quick-start blogging station, as documented in Wikipedia(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tumblr). People who use Tumblr are “tumbleloggers”. (Why“tumble”? Does the product just tumble out of you? ). Like Posterous, no need to master anycoding, since Tumblr detects and presents your objects automatically based on document type….the way they should be (photos in a photo gallery, for instance). Post and go.Special features: no comment feedback boxes; instead: “like,” and “reblog” lets readers leavetheir mark.A good question: what’s the difference between the two?
Getting Started
Posterous 
•
All you need to start with Posterous is an email account. If you don’t already have a blog,Posterous will set one up for you the first time you email a post to them. Email your message topost@posterous.com. Attach the documents you want embedded.
•
Let Daniel Honigman and Michael Quigley walk you through the process:http://www.oldmedianewtricks.com/how-to-use-posterous/  
•
Use Tom Larkin’s job aid: http://www.larkin.net.au/resources/posterous.pdf
•
With Posterous, you can simultaneously autopost your Posterous postings to other services youuse. How to? Seehttp://posterous.com/autopost 
•
 
Tumblr 
How to use in K12 Educational Settings
•
Teachers could….Posterous: Create a private group blog for your class.For teachers in a flat world, use Posterous as a central distribution center for learning materials for yourclass. Not the best tool, but it can work that way.
•
Students could…..Capture science lab experiment stages in photographs, to post with a brief statement of results.
Additional resources
Origins….
Posterous (http://posterous.com/about): Sachin Agarwal and Garry Tan launched the company in June2008, with seed capital from Y Combinator.
•
Chris Ullrich interviews Sachin Agarwal about the origin of the species(http://www.downloadsquad.com/tag/Posterous/ ). Sachin says, “
Posterous is the dead simple
 
Posterous-Tumblr004.doc - 3 - Page 3 of 4
way to publish online. You simply create an email message and attach photos, video,audio, or documents. We'll take it all in, host it, convert it to the most web friendlyformat, and publish it online in seconds.).” Part of the motivation for building the toolwas the desire to have a really easy way to ship photographs to the web and have themcome out in an organized album. Agarwal also uses the term “micro-blogging”….soseems that’s a good descriptor for this family of tools.
 
•
 Tumblr: Created by David Karp (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tumblr) in 2007. Some of its current venturecapitalists also fund Twitter.See also
•
Sketch of Karp’s creation of Tumblr:http://www.observer.com/2008/would-you-take-tumblr-man 
•
As Chris Dannen says, “In one sentence, Tumblr is a blogging platform that makes it easier topost video, audio, words, social bookmarks, photos, and even other people's blog posts into yourblog, and share it with other people. Instead of having to upload things to YouTube, Delicious orFlickr, or create your own WordPress database before posting things, you can put your mediadirectly into Tumblr from your computer or mobile phone. It's blogging, the way blogging wasmeant to be.”http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/chris-dannen/techwatch/what-hell-tumblr-and-other-worthwhile-questions 1. This discussion notes that traditional (!) blogs follow a title-paragraph-paragraphsequence. While reading a sea of grey may be boring, the presence of media enrichesthe tumblelogger’s online presence. Dannen observes that following someone’s Tumblris like following the person’s tweets.2. Dannen also notes that Tumblr does not use comment boxes to elicit feedback fromreaders; you can “like” the site; “reblog” it (place a link to it in your own blog). Dannenmarks this feature as part of the “virality” of the Internet (fast spreading).
•
Paul Boutin, in the New York Times (March 13, 2009) comments on the “blissful” simplicity of theproduct (http://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/13/tumblr-makes-blogging-blissfully-easy/ )
•
 
Appropriateness in K12
Posterous: Supposedly appropriate for children aged 13 and up (according to a review in CommonSense Media).http://www.commonsensemedia.org/website-reviews/posterous.
Something to think about….
•
Instantaneous effortless publication merits extra care before you hit your post button!
•
In the K12 environment: privacy and student protection features
Extended Learning about….
Deng, L., & Yuen, A. H. K. (2009). Blogs in higher education: implementation and issues.
TechTrends,(53)
, 3, 95-98.(self-note: want to cull some of the issues mentioned here, for they apply as “things to thinkabout” for the k12 environment too.)
References (Acknowledgments)
Daniel Honigman and Michael Quigley’s How to use Posterous: Retrieved July 18, 2009, fromhttp://www.oldmedianewtricks.com/how-to-use-posterous/  Wikipedia. Lifestreaming. Retrieved July 18, 2009, fromhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifestreaming Posterous’ own Frequently Asked Questions:http://posterous.com/faq 
of 00

Leave a Comment

You must be to leave a comment.
Submit
Characters: ...
You must be to leave a comment.
Submit
Characters: ...