The usefulness of blogs

Since setting up and registering my blog, I have been busy checking out the blogs of other people, especially people that I know and work with, or have worked with in the past. It has been really interesting to see the choices that people have made for their layouts, and the things that they actually post. As well as being able to see what other people are hoping to achieve by doing 23 Things and how they are finding the programme, it has also served to help me reconnect a little with people that otherwise would not be interacting in this way because they are not keen on things like Facebook, which I often use.
I have been very excited to see that 2 people have commented on my blog so far! My aims for next week are to put up a picture and become a follower on some of the blogs that I am enjoying reading.

Compulsive clicking

The customising of my start page was fun as there were a whole range of applications to add, some useful and some quite random. The instructions were again really clear and easy to follow and in the end I got a little carried away with adding applications! It reminded me of when I first got my facebook account and I was adding pretty much anything, so I decided to restrain myself a little. The applications were good and setting the time etc was simple, although customising the weather application was bit difficult as it didn't seem to like Oxford. I think start pages are a really good idea as they enable you to have access to all of the information that you select on the same page so that you aren't constantly navigating between different sites, making information more easily accessible and saving time.

Getting started

Last week I began the 23 Things programme and set up my start page. I found the instructions really easy, although I had forgotten about the existence of my old Google account! The 'taking things further' point was good, as I had no idea what the difference was between http and https and probably would not have bothered looking if I hadn't been prompted, as I am a bit of a technophobe and don't really ponder such things. So far, so good...

My 23 Things experience so far

I am participating in the 23 Things programme because I want to gain more practical experience of using web 2.0 in my day to day life. I am hoping that I will gain a better working knowledge of web 2.0 and be able to apply this knowledge in my working life. I already know a bit about web 2.0 from various applications that I use in my personal life for social networking and from courses that I have attended, but I would like to learn more about the applications that I don't use, and see how they benefit me professionally and socially.