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Educators in VR

Info on all presentations: https://account.altvr.com/channels/1182698623012438188

Charlie Fink: Setting the Table for the Next Decade in XR

Translating Training Requirements into Immersive Experience

Virtual Reality Technologies for Learning Designers

Virtual Reality Technologies for Learning Designers Margherita Berti

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Technology Acceptance and Learning Process Victoria Bolotina part 1

Technology Acceptance and Learning Process Victoria Bolotina part 2

Assessment of Learning Activities in VR Evelien Ydo part 2

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VR: So Much More Than a Field Trip Shannon Putman, Graduate Assistant/PhD Student, University of Louisville SPED special education https://account.altvr.com/events/1406092840622096803

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VR and Health Professionals Rob Theriault

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Transform Your History Lessons with AR and VR Michael Fricano II

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Transform Your History Lessons with AR and VR Michael Fricano II, Technology Integration Specialist https://www.arvreduhub.com/transform-history

Qlone App for 3D scanning

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2020 Educators in VR International Summit

The 2020 Educators in VR International Summit is February 17-22. It features over 170 speakers in 150+ events across multiple social and educational platforms including AltspaceVRENGAGErumiiMozilla Hubs, and Somnium Space.

The event requires no registration, and is virtual only, free, and open to the public. Platform access is required, so please install one of the above platforms to attend the International Summit. You may attend in 2D on a desktop or laptop computer with a headphone and microphone (USB gaming headphone recommended), or with a virtual device such as the Oculus Go, Quest, and Rift, Vive, and other mobile and tethered devices. Please note the specifications and requirements of each platform.

The majority of our events are on AltspaceVR. AltspaceVR is available for Samsung GearSteam Store for HTC ViveWindows Mixed Reality, and the Oculus Store for RiftGo and Quest users. Download and install the 2D version for use on your Windows desktop computer.

Charlie Fink, author, columnist for Forbes magazine, and Adjunct Faculty member of Chapman University, will be presenting “Setting the Table for the Next Decade in XR,” discussing the future of this innovative and immersive technology, at the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit. He will be speaking in AltspaceVR on Tuesday, February 18 at 1:00 PM EST /

International Summit

Setting the Table for the Next Decade in XR 1PM, Tues, Feb 18 https://account.altvr.com/events/1406089727517393133

Finding a New Literacy for a New Reality 5PM, Tues, Feb 18

https://account.altvr.com/events/1406093036194103494 schedule for new literacy

Finding a New Literacy for a New Reality

Dr. Sarah Jones, Deputy Dean, De Montfort University

This workshop with Dr. Sarah Jones will focus on developing a relevant and new literacy for virtual reality, including the core competencies and skills needed to develop and understand how to become an engaged user of the technology in a meaningful way. The workshop will develop into research for a forthcoming book on Uncovering a Literacy for VR due to be published in 2020.

Sarah is listed as one of the top 15 global influencers within virtual reality. After nearly a decade in television news, Sarah began working in universities focusing on future media, future technology and future education. Sarah holds a PhD in Immersive Storytelling and has published extensively on virtual and augmented reality, whilst continuing to make and create immersive experiences. She has advised the UK Government on Immersive Technologies and delivers keynotes and speaks at conferences across the world on imagining future technology. Sarah is committed to diversifying the media and technology industries and regularly champions initiatives to support this agenda.

Inter-cognitive and Intra-cognitive Communication in Virtual Reality

Inter-cognitive and Intra-cognitive Communication in Virtual Reality

Michael Vallance, Professor, Future University Hakodate

Currently there are limited ways to connect 3D VR environments to physical objects in the real-world whilst simultaneously conducting communication and collaboration between remote users. Within the context of a solar power plant, the performance metrics of the site are invaluable for environmental engineers who are remotely located. Often two or more remotely located engineers need to communicate and collaborate on solving a problem. If a solar panel component is damaged, the repair often needs to be undertaken on-site thereby incurring additional expenses. This triage of communication is known as inter-cognitive communication and intra-cognitive communication: inter-cognitive communication where information transfer occurs between two cognitive entities with different cognitive capabilities (e.g., between a human and an artificially cognitive system); intra-cognitive communication where information transfer occurs between two cognitive entities with equivalent cognitive capabilities (e.g., between two humans) [Baranyi and Csapo, 2010]. Currently, non-VR solutions offer a comprehensive analysis of solar plant data. A regular PC with a monitor currently have advantages over 3D VR. For example, sensors can be monitored using dedicated software such as EPEVER or via a web browser; as exemplified by the comprehensive service provided by Elseta. But when multiple users are able to collaborate remotely within a three-dimensional virtual simulation, the opportunities for communication, training and academic education will be profound.

Michael Vallance Ed.D. is a researcher in the Department of Media Architecture, Future University Hakodate, Japan. He has been involved in educational technology design, implementation, research and consultancy for over twenty years, working closely with Higher Education Institutes, schools and media companies in UK, Singapore, Malaysia and Japan. His 3D virtual world design and tele-robotics research has been recognized and funded by the UK Prime Minister’s Initiative (PMI2) and the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST). He has been awarded by the United States Army for his research in collaborating the programming of robots in a 3D Virtual World.

Create Strategic Snapchat & Instagram AR Campaigns

Create Strategic Snapchat & Instagram AR Campaigns

Dominique Wu, CEO/Founder, Hummingbirdsday

Augmented Reality Lens is popular among young people thanks to Snapchat’s invention. Business is losing money without fully using of social media targeting young people (14-25). In my presentation, Dominique Wu will show how businesses can generate more leads through Spark AR (Facebook AR/Instagram AR) & Snapchat AR Lens, and how to create a strategic Snapchat & Instagram AR campaigns.

Domnique Wu is an XR social media strategist and expert in UX/UI design.She has her own YouTube and Apple Podcast show called “XReality: Digital Transformation,” covering the technology and techniques of incorporating XR and AR into social media, marketing, and integration into enterprise solutions.

Mixed Reality in Classrooms Near You

Mixed Reality in Classrooms Near You

Mark Christian, EVP, Strategy and Corporate Development, GIGXR

Mixed Reality devices like the HoloLens are transforming education now. Mark Christian will discuss how the technology is not about edge use cases or POCs, but real usable products that are at Universities transforming the way we teach and learn. Christian will talk about the products of GIGXR, the story of how they were developed and what the research is saying about their efficacy. It is time to move to adoption of XR technology in education. Learn how one team has made this a reality.

As CEO of forward-thinking virtual reality and software companies, Mark Christian employs asymmetric approaches to rapid, global market adoption, hiring, diversity and revenue. He prides himself on unconventional approaches to building technology companies.

Designing Educational Content in VR

Designing Educational Content in VR

Avinash Gyawali, VR Developer, Weaver Studio

Virtual Reality is an effective medium to impart education to the student only if it is done right.The way VR is considered gimmick or not is by the way the software application are designed/developed by the developers not the hardware limitation.I will be giving insight about the VR development for educational content specifically designed for students of lower secondary school.I will also provide insights about the development of game in unity3D game engine.

Game Developer and VR developer with over 3 years of experience in Game Development.Developer of Zombie Shooter, winner of various national awards in the gaming and entertainment category, Avinash Gyawali is the developer of EDVR, an immersive voice controlled VR experience specially designed for children of age 10-18 years.

8:00 AM PST Research Virtual Reality Technologies for Learning Designers Margherita Berti ASVR

Virtual Reality Technologies for Learning Designers

Margherita Berti

Virtual Reality (VR) is a computer-generated experience that simulates presence in real or imagined environments (Kerrebrock, Brengman, & Willems, 2017). VR promotes contextualized learning, authentic experiences, critical thinking, and problem-solving opportunities. Despite the great potential and popularity of this technology, the latest two installations of the Educause Horizon Report (2018, 2019) have argued that VR remains “elusive” in terms of mainstream adoption. The reasons are varied, including the expense and the lack of empirical evidence for its effectiveness in education. More importantly, examples of successful VR implementations for those instructors who lack technical skills are still scarce. Margherita Berti will discuss a range of easy-to-use educational VR tools and examples of VR-based activity examples and the learning theories and instructional design principles utilized for their development.

Margherita Berti is a doctoral candidate in Second Language Acquisition and Teaching (SLAT) and Educational Technology at the University of Arizona. Her research specialization resides at the intersection of virtual reality, the teaching of culture, and curriculum and content development for foreign language education.

Wed 11:00 AM PST Special Event Gamifying the Biblioverse with Metaverse Amanda Fox VR Design / Biblioverse / Training & Embodiment ASVR

Gamifying the Biblioverse with Metaverse

Amanda Fox, Creative Director of STEAMPunks/MetaInk Publishing, MetaInk Publishing

There is a barrier between an author and readers of his/her books. The author’s journey ends, and the reader’s begins. But what if as an author/trainer, you could use gamification and augmented reality(AR) to interact and coach your readers as part of their learning journey? Attend this session with Amanda Fox to learn how the book Teachingland leverages augmented reality tools such as Metaverse to connect with readers beyond the text.

Amanda Fox, Creative Director of STEAMPunksEdu, and author of Teachingland: A Teacher’s Survival Guide to the Classroom Apolcalypse and Zom-Be A Design Thinker. Check her out on the Virtual Reality Podcast, or connect with her on twitter @AmandaFoxSTEM.

Wed 10:00 AM PST Research Didactic Activity of the Use of VR and Virtual Worlds to Teach Design Fundamentals Christian Jonathan Angel Rueda VR Design / Biblioverse / Training & Embodiment ASVR

Didactic Activity of the Use of VR and Virtual Worlds to Teach Design Fundamentals

Christian Jonathan Angel Rueda, research professor, Autonomous University of Queretaro (Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro)

Christian Jonathan Angel Rueda specializaes in didactic activity of the use of virtual reality/virtual worlds to learn the fundamentals of design. He shares the development of a course including recreating in the three-dimensional environment using the fundamentals learned in class, a demonstration of all the works developed throughout the semester using the knowledge of design foundation to show them creatively, and a final project class scenario that connected with the scenes of the students who showed their work throughout the semester.

Christian Jonathan Angel Rueda is a research professor at the Autonomous University of Queretaro in Mexico. With a PhD in educational technology, Christian has published several papers on the intersection of education, pedagogy, and three-dimensional immersive digital environments. He is also an edtech, virtual reality, and social media consultant at Eco Onis.

Thu 11:00 AM PST vCoaching Closing the Gap Between eLearning and XR Richard Van Tilborg XR eLearning / Laughter Medicine ASVR

Closing the Gap Between eLearning and XR

Richard Van Tilborg, founder, CoVince

How we can bridge the gap between eLearning and XR. Richard Van Tilborg discusses combining brain insights enabled with new technologies. Training and education cases realised with the CoVince platform: journeys which start on you mobile and continue in VR. The possibilities to earn from your creations and have a central distribution place for learning and data.

Richard Van Tilborg works with the CoVince platform, a VR platform offering training and educational programs for central distribution of learning and data. He is an author and speaker focusing on computers and education in virtual reality-based tasks for delivering feedback.

 

Thu 12:00 PM PST Research Assessment of Learning Activities in VR Evelien Ydo Technology Acceptance / Learning Assessment / Vaping Prevention ASVR
Thu 6:00 PM PST Down to Basics Copyright and Plagiarism Protections in VR Jonathan Bailey ASVR

 

Thu 8:00 PM PST Diversity Cyberbullying in VR John Williams, Brennan Hatton, Lorelle VanFossen ASVR

Instagram AI and cyberbullying

https://www.npr.org/2019/10/03/766507832/instagram-now-lets-you-control-your-bullys-comments

Instagram announced a new anti-bullying feature called Restrict.

Fifty-nine percent of American teens have been bullied or harassed online, according to a 2018 survey by the Pew Research Center. Instagram is one of the most popular social media networks among teenagers and a likely place for teens to be bullied.

In a recent study, conducted by the investment bank Piper Jaffray, Instagram is the second most popular social media platform among teenagers. Thirty-five percent of teens surveyed said that Instagram is their favorite social media platform, compared with 41% who preferred Snapchat.

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more on cyberbullying in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=cyberbullying

Bitmojis, Gifs, and Snaps

Bitmojis, Gifs, and Snaps in the Classroom? Oh My!

Tierney King JULY 29TH, 2019

https://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/effective-classroom-management/bitmojis-gifs-and-snaps-in-the-classroom/

Bitmoji, an avatar in which you create yourself, respond to student emails with Bitmojis super-fast if it’s built into the Chrome browser

Although Snapchat can be used to create Bitmojis, Price also suggested using Snapchat to create “Snap stories” for students. “These take longer, and this method focuses on the creation of content,” she says.

break up Facebook

https://nyti.ms/2LzRzwq

Facebook’s board works more like an advisory committee than an overseer, because Mark controls around 60 percent of voting shares. Mark alone can decide how to configure Facebook’s algorithms to determine what people see in their News Feeds, what privacy settings they can use and even which messages get delivered. He sets the rules for how to distinguish violent and incendiary speech from the merely offensive, and he can choose to shut down a competitor by acquiring, blocking or copying it.

We are a nation with a tradition of reining in monopolies, no matter how well intentioned the leaders of these companies may be. Mark’s power is unprecedented and un-American.

It is time to break up Facebook.

America was built on the idea that power should not be concentrated in any one person, because we are all fallible. That’s why the founders created a system of checks and balances.

More legislation followed in the 20th century, creating legal and regulatory structures to promote competition and hold the biggest companies accountable.

Starting in the 1970s, a small but dedicated group of economists, lawyers and policymakers sowed the seeds of our cynicism. Over the next 40 years, they financed a network of think tanks, journals, social clubs, academic centers and media outlets to teach an emerging generation that private interests should take precedence over public ones. Their gospel was simple: “Free” markets are dynamic and productive, while government is bureaucratic and ineffective.

American industries, from airlines to pharmaceuticals, have experienced increased concentration, and the average size of public companies has tripled. The results are a decline in entrepreneurshipstalled productivity growth, and higher prices and fewer choices for consumers.

From our earliest days, Mark used the word “domination” to describe our ambitions, with no hint of irony or humility.

Facebook’s monopoly is also visible in its usage statistics. About 70 percent of American adults use social media, and a vast majority are on Facebook products. Over two-thirds use the core site, a third use Instagram, and a fifth use WhatsApp. By contrast, fewer than a third report using Pinterest, LinkedIn or Snapchat. What started out as lighthearted entertainment has become the primary way that people of all ages communicate online.

The F.T.C.’s biggest mistake was to allow Facebook to acquire Instagram and WhatsApp. In 2012, the newer platforms were nipping at Facebook’s heels because they had been built for the smartphone, where Facebook was still struggling to gain traction. Mark responded by buying them, and the F.T.C. approved.

The News Feed algorithm reportedly prioritized videos created through Facebook over videos from competitors, like YouTube and Vimeo. In 2012, Twitter introduced a video network called Vine that featured six-second videos. That same day, Facebook blocked Vine from hosting a tool that let its users search for their Facebook friends while on the new network. The decision hobbled Vine, which shut down four years later.

unlike Vine, Snapchat wasn’t interfacing with the Facebook ecosystem; there was no obvious way to handicap the company or shut it out. So Facebook simply copied it. (opyright law does not extend to the abstract concept itself.)

As markets become more concentrated, the number of new start-up businesses declines. This holds true in other high-tech areas dominated by single companies, like search (controlled by Google) and e-commerce (taken over by Amazon). Meanwhile, there has been plenty of innovation in areas where there is no monopolistic domination, such as in workplace productivity (Slack, Trello, Asana), urban transportation (Lyft, Uber, Lime, Bird) and cryptocurrency exchanges (Ripple, Coinbase, Circle).

The choice is mine, but it doesn’t feel like a choice. Facebook seeps into every corner of our lives to capture as much of our attention and data as possible and, without any alternative, we make the trade.

Just last month, Facebook seemingly tried to bury news that it had stored tens of millions of user passwords in plain text format, which thousands of Facebook employees could see. Competition alone wouldn’t necessarily spur privacy protection — regulation is required to ensure accountability — but Facebook’s lock on the market guarantees that users can’t protest by moving to alternative platforms.

Mark used to insist that Facebook was just a “social utility,” a neutral platform for people to communicate what they wished. Now he recognizes that Facebook is both a platform and a publisher and that it is inevitably making decisions about values. The company’s own lawyers have argued in court that Facebook is a publisher and thus entitled to First Amendment protection.

As if Facebook’s opaque algorithms weren’t enough, last year we learned that Facebook executives had permanently deleted their own messages from the platform, erasing them from the inboxes of recipients; the justification was corporate security concerns.

Mark may never have a boss, but he needs to have some check on his power. The American government needs to do two things: break up Facebook’s monopoly and regulate the company to make it more accountable to the American people.

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We Don’t Need Social Media

The push to regulate or break up Facebook ignores the fact that its services do more harm than good

Colin Horgan, May 13, 2019

https://onezero.medium.com/we-dont-need-social-media-53d5455f4f6b

Hughes joins a growing chorus of former Silicon Valley unicorn riders who’ve recently had second thoughts about the utility or benefit of the surveillance-attention economy their products and platforms have helped create. He is also not the first to suggest that government might need to step in to clean up the mess they made

Nick Srnicek, author of the book Platform Capitalism and a lecturer in digital economy at King’s College London, wrotelast month, “[I]t’s competition — not size — that demands more data, more attention, more engagement and more profits at all costs

 

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more on Facebook in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=facebook

Gen Z and social media

Under Employers’ Gaze, Gen Z Is Biting Its Tongue On Social Media

April 13, 20195:00 AM ET

https://www.npr.org/2019/04/13/702555175/under-employers-gaze-gen-z-is-biting-its-tongue-on-social-media

The oldest members of Generation Z are around 22 years old — now entering the workforce and adjusting their social media accordingly. They are holding back from posting political opinions and personal information in favor of posting about professional accomplishments.

only about 1 in 10 teenagers say they share personal, religious or political beliefs on social media, according to a recent survey from Pew Research Center.

70 percent of employers and recruiters say they check social media during the hiring process, according to a survey conducted by CareerBuilder

Generation Z, nicknamed “iGen,” is the post-millennial generation responsible for ‘killing’ Facebook and for the rise of TikTok.

Curricula like Common Sense Education’s digital citizenship program are working to educate the younger generation on how to use social media, something the older generations were never taught.

Some users are regularly cleaning up — “re-curating” — their online profiles. Cleanup apps, like TweetDelete,

Gen Zers also use social media in more ephemeral ways than older generations — Snapchat stories that disappear after 24 hours, or Instagram posts that they archive a couple of months later.

Gen Zers already use a multitude of strategies to make sure their online presence is visible only to who they want: They set their account to private, change their profile name or handle, even make completely separate “fake” accounts.

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more on social media in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=social+media

and privacy
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=privacy

The Post-LMS World

The Post-LMS World: Social, Simple, Modern, Mobile and Student-centric

 FROM AMBI

By Saad El Yamani     Apr 7, 2019

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2019-04-07-the-post-lms-world-social-simple-modern-mobile-and-student-centric

My note: the author repeats a LinkedIn post from 2017 https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2017/03/28/digital-learning/

Despite its name, the Learning Management System (LMS) is not about learning. The LMS was originally the CMS—Course Management System.

The LMS succeeds as a core productivity tool for educators because it allows institutions to extend their academic capacity and transcend the constraints of time and space. However, the Learning Management System was never able to deliver on the promise of its new name because it was created for a completely different purpose: course management. Learning doesn’t happen within the digital space of the LMS; it happens beyond its borders.

Today’s generation of students is deeply social and collaborative. They rely on real-time online interaction, collaboration and sharing to feel supported, confident and successful. Having grown up on iPhone, Snapchat and Instagram, this generation expects seamless experiences that are deeply social and collaborative.

In the post-LMS world, learning technology is student-centric in its design because today’s students are vocal, creative and eager to share their blue sky ideals and ideas.

The post-LMS world is also social by nature. in the post-LMS world, learning technology is simple, modern and mobile.

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more on learning environments in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2017/07/06/next-gen-digital-learning-environment/

https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2016/02/01/trends-tomorrows-teaching-and-learning-environments/

https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2017/03/28/digital-learning/

selfie dismorphia

Faking it: how selfie dysmorphia is driving people to seek surgery

Filters have never been more prevalent – and it’s leading some people to have fillers, Botox and other procedures. What’s behind the obsessive pursuit of a flawless look?

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/jan/23/faking-it-how-selfie-dysmorphia-is-driving-people-to-seek-surgery

The phenomenon of people requesting procedures to resemble their digital image has been referred to – sometimes flippantly, sometimes as a harbinger of end times – as “Snapchat dysmorphia”. The term was coined by the cosmetic doctor Tijion Esho, founder of the Esho clinics in London and Newcastle.

A recent report in the US medical journal JAMA Facial Plastic Surgery suggested that filtered images’ “blurring the line of reality and fantasy” could be triggering body dysmorphic disorder (BDD), a mental health condition where people become fixated on imagined defects in their appearance.

2017 study into “selfitis”, as the obsessive taking of selfies has been called, found a range of motivations, from seeking social status to shaking off depressive thoughts and – of course – capturing a memorable moment. Another study suggested that selfies served “a private and internal purpose”, with the majority never shared with anyone or posted anywhere – terabytes, even petabytes of photographs never to be seen by anyone other than their subject.

However, a 2017 study in the journal Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications found that people only recognised manipulated images 60%-65% of the time.

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more on social media in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=social+media

Fortnite is Instagram of gaming

The Most Important Video Game on the Planet

How Fortnite became the Instagram of gaming

https://medium.com/new-york-magazine/the-most-important-video-game-on-the-planet-c26988a8f497  Jan 11 2019,Brian Feldman

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/07/how-fortnite-became-the-most-popular-video-game-on-earth.html

Every number released in conjunction with Fortnite is staggering, even within the context of a $137 billion industry. On the same day as its Fortnite Pro-Am tournament at E3, the video-game industry’s largest convention, the game was released for the Nintendo Switch, and within 24 hours it had been downloaded more than 2 million times. Analysts estimate that Fortnite is currently raking in more than $300 million a month, and has made its maker, Epic Games, more than $1.2 billion since its battle royale mode launched in late September.

Fortnite is virtually identical on every platform, and players can move from their PlayStation to their phone and back without missing a beat. Milligan first heard about the game back in September. “It was the next new game, like when Minecraft came out, but way more popular.”

The cadence of a Fortnite game is that nothing is happening and then, very suddenly, everything is happening. The game has three main modes: solo (every player for themselves), duos (teams of two), and squads (teams of three or four), but there are consistently around 100 players in every session.

Even when kids aren’t playing Fortnite, they’re talking about Fortnite or finding ways to profit from it.

Video games pioneered the dopamine-rush cycle. Using bright graphics and sound effects to make players feel continual accomplishment, arcade games were honed to make players feel like they needed to feed in just one more quarter over and over again — slot machines that kept people entranced without ever having to pay out. The addictive core of video-gaming never went away, even as games became more complicated: Every win, every high score, every 100 percent completion, every secret and Easter egg was a chance for a little rush of accomplishment and satisfaction.

And then mobile products learned to do the same thing. Give people goals, reward them with flashes of color, and you could entrance them into something resembling addiction. This was called, tellingly and unsurprisingly, “gamification”: Treat every app and every activity as a video game, with scores, prizes, and leaderboards. Snapchat rewarded users who talked every day with “streaks”; the exercise app Strava allowed you to compete with other joggers and earn badges; Foursquare turned the entire world into a game of king of the hill.

The process has come full circle. Fortnite is a gamified video game.

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more on FortNite in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=fortnite

https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2018/03/31/ready-player-one/

WeChat and blog combining social media

Parallel running of two social media from different countries: WeChat and blog for international students

Our work with Chinese students from the Confucius Institute (CI) at St. Cloud State University (SCSU) shed light on an interesting development: in the last several years, the popular Chinese social media platform WeChat dominates the social life of Chinese people, Chinese students in particular.

WeChat, like WhatsApp in Europe, Vkontakte in Russia, Weibo in China, or before its 2014 Orkut in Brazil (https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2014/07/05/social-media-orkut-the-and-of-an-era/ seeks to create its own users’ momentum, and no differently from Facebook, expand that membership momentum from the host country to a global dominance (https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2017/08/06/psychology-of-social-networks/;  more citation comes here).

Based on the WeChat affinity of the Chinese students at the SCSU CI program, the program organizers faced difficulty applying other social media platforms, as part of the curricula of the host country. Namely, blog, as one of the widely used SM platform for creative writing (citation comes here), was contemplated as a SM platform for the Chinese students to journal their experience at the SCSU CI program. Since WeChat behaves rather like Facebook and Snapchat, the lack of opportunity to utilize widely available platform for rather lengthy narration (versus SMS/texting abilitis of Twitter and WeChat) convince the SCSU CI program organizers to seek the buy in by Chinese students into the blog initiative.

Pang (2018) builds a theory based on Ellison (2007) theory of “maintained social capital,” namely the ability of individuals to maintain values of social ties when geographically disconnected. Ping (2018) further narrows her research on Chinese students in Germany using Li and Chen (2014) findings about Ellison’s theory on students in a foreign environment and the necessity for these students to build a new circle of friends in the host country. According to Basilisco an Cha (2015), such environment was provided for Filipino students by using Facebook and Twitter.

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