#PFR network: blog & #socialmedia directions

…because a) I want your ideas t & b) writing about mine helps crystallize them, especially the most stubbornly inchoate.

First though, comes a brief social media re-cap with a reminder (here it comes) that questions and calls for clarification are always welcome. Post them wherever -- as comments here, on the blog, or on a social media iteration (Facebook or G+ as Twitter seems a tad minimalist for the purpose). Here you can be as anonymous or psuedonomynous as you wish or suits your needs.

PS: #PFR = Precarious Faculty Rising; "network" because it is.

Already I'm blogging more. Not blogging was a sure sign of my discontent. Facebook-busy was just an excuse, albeit not a bad or entirely invalid one. 84 posts in 2013, 202 in 2012. Even bloggers living in a houseboat on the Nile can't deny that message. There are 4-5 posts in draft, reblogs that I need to add copy to and several more in my inbox.

Other recap: numbers are back up on A new faculty majority and more followers too, not as many posting comments but I'm OK with that as long as they are still reading. I'm not as diligent as Ana Mª Fores (Adjunct Justice) is about replying to every comment.  We've been informally tracking our personal post and content tendencies for patterns and natural preferences. Overall, they are distinct (as are our individual voices) but overlapping and each complementing the other.

In general, we both post more about issues outside higher ed than many contingent faculty or higher ed labor pages and share interest in both K-12 and international education. Ana is particularly committed to immigration issues and the Dreamer movement. Expect to see that reflected in her editorial choices. My pages and blogs will cover more ed-tech and online ed—and have already started. The issues and trends are too important to ignore or dismiss out of hand. Eventually, we'll probably write something about our editorial bent...I would not go so far as to call them policies.

Casualties: I deleted the moderately popular (on Twitter streams) Paper.li's (HigherEd Daily, Notes from an Adjunct Underground , Welcome to the Precariat and Precarious Faculty Daily) for "branding" (ugh, how I hate that expression!) and name reasons. No amount of editing or renaming would change the URL. I intend to re-issue several from scratch under the @precariousfac and @VCVaile handles. All were overdue for makeovers anyway. Accounts are Twitter based, as are aggregation algorithms.

Tumblrs have been on semi-hiatus but are not casualties, although some may remain on hiatus or reduced schedules. On the other hand, Tales of a Trota Campos, formerly on near hiatus, has been busier than usual — but is in desperate need of a design and layout makeover. Both HE related WordPress blogs, MOOC Madness and As the Adjunctiverse Turns, continue as usual, primarily re-blogging WP. The blogging string is rather a jumble I'm not sure I could explain even to myself. Along with Scoop.it and Pinterest, it remains more personal than academented and distributed across multiple networks.

An addition to the string network: that would be my G+ page, http://gplus.to/vanessa.vaile — 100% public and being used like a blog, blog post aggregator, not limited to PFR Network post. This is where PFR meets and greets my other networks — separated only by hashtag. I'm experimenting with +Laura Gibbs' model, which I have admired since my first visit. Good Blogger/G+ integration helps. YouTube — same family — should integrate well too.

Storify, the static web page, Mountainair Online (domain of my own), social bookmarking sites/services, NetVibes the super-sized, all purpose, public/private aggregator, and — last but never least — the ubiquitous rss reader underpinning and feeding them all fit in here somewhere too, perhaps together as hubs — overarching organizers — despite differences.

I never did get to this projects, focus areas, upcoming events/topics, mission, etc — another post, another time — but soon. So much for my resolution to write shorter posts. The short version: here it is — now what to do with it?