We all have to create and remember passwords and the temptation is to use the same one repeatedly, even though we know this isn’t a good idea!
An interesting solution is provided by PasswordCard, a free application that allows you to create and remember complex passwords. How does it work? Well…
Enter PasswordCard
A PasswordCard is a credit card-sized card you keep in your wallet, which lets you pick very secure passwords for all your websites, without having to remember them! You just keep them with you, and even if your wallet does get stolen, the thief will still not know your actual passwords.
How does it work?
Your PasswordCard has a unique grid of random letters and digits on it. The rows have different colors, and the columns different symbols. All you do is remember a combination of a symbol and a color, and then read the letters and digits from there. It couldn’t be simpler!
Make sure to read the precautions and frequently asked questions for further details on how to keep your passwords safe.
Young adults, far from being indifferent about their digital footprints, are the most active online reputation managers in several dimensions. For example, more than two-thirds (71%) of social networking users ages 18-29 have changed the privacy settings on their profile to limit what they share with others online….
“Search engines and social media sites now play a central role in building one’s identity online,” said Mary Madden, Senior Research Specialist and lead author of the report, “Many users are learning and refining their approach as they go–changing privacy settings on profiles, customizing who can see certain updates and deleting unwanted information about them that appears online.”
When compared with older users, young adults are more likely to restrict what they share and whom they share it with. “Contrary to the popular perception that younger users embrace a laissez-faire attitude about their online reputations, young adults are often more vigilant than older adults when it comes to managing their online identities,” said Madden.
If you are interested in examining the issue in more depth, specifically focusing on how teens manage online identity, I’d suggest reading the recent literature review Youth, Privacy and Reputation by Alice Marwick, Diego Murgia-Diaz, and John G. Palfrey.
Considering the recent privacyissues with Facebook and the increasing use of online screening as a formal requirement of the job hiring process, it may be worthwhile giving some thought to how librarians can educate ourselves and our users on this particular issue.
I have been fascinated by the work of Jane McGonigal for some time and was very impressed by her talk at this years TED conference.
“Instead of providing gamers with better and more immersive alternatives to reality, I want all of us to be become responsible for providing the world with a better and more immersive reality.” Jane McGonigal
Creator Allen Hahn developed Secret City in order to have a “mash-up of story, expanded theater, and technology facilitated work” in an involving way to see amazing buildings. Players get text messages and voicemails with clues, puzzles and riddles telling them where to go within the huge library. When the puzzle is completed, gamers get a new clue and a new piece of the story.
There are discoveries strewn all along the way: dark hallways, windy corridors and the endless tomes in the expansive building. Wandering around the library conjures images as you pass by books on your search for the next clue. (from PopCity Media)
The considerations for a social media governance model are numerous: brand identity/voice/tone, internal resources, staffing and stakeholders, work-flow adjustments, escalation policies, appropriate topics of conversation and language, identity/social equity “ownership” (who does brand social equity belong to? The employee Tweeting on behalf of a brand or the brand?), legal issues and rammifciations, industry regulations, content posting policies….well you get the point. While this may seem a bit of an arduous task, creating these governance modelslay a crucial foundation, and are vital to any social media–ahem, digital– strategy and long term success (and they’re actually fun to create too, believe it or not).
Explaining to someone unfamiliar with social media how to deal with and distinguish between trolls and legitimate complaints and appropriate levels of response is difficult, as the internet is a realm with a sociology of its own distinct from our everyday experience. Alisa’s example of the Rules of Engagement visual for the US Air Force provides any librarian working on social media strategy a clear and succinct means to do this.
Since the launch of Google Wave, there seems to be confusion about how best to use it. However, The Chronicle of Higher Education looks at attempts by colleges to engage with the technology in light of earlier predictions that it could replace course management software.
Ray Schroeder gave it a try last semester at the University of Illinois at Springfield, one of the first colleges to use Wave for online teaching since the preview version came out in September. For about two weeks in December, he joined his “Internet in American Life” course with a class on energy studies at the Institute of Technology at Sligo, in Ireland. They created a “wave” to discuss the impact of the Internet on energy sustainability.
But what if you merged a biology class and a philosophy class? You could have them evaluate a bioethics case study, suggests Mr. Schroeder, director of the university’s Center for Online Learning, Research, and Service. Or what about a class on Asian history? You could use Wave’s translation tool and hook up with a group of Chinese students.
What about libraries? Well, over at the UKOLN’s Cultural Heritage blog there is an analysis of how Google Wave has been received by librarians in the United Kingdom, where it seems that, like the rest of us, they intend to “wait and see”.
Overall, whilst interest in Wave was high, there was a degree of scepticism regarding how useful it is to librarians. Tellingly, some respondents felt that there are not enough extensions for Wave to make it useful to librarians yet and that nobody has actually found a valuable practical use for Wave in libraries at this point. One respondent went as far as to state that Wave has yet to be used for anything beyond time wasting. On the whole, respondents seemed happy to let Wave develop and let other people find uses for it before they approach it with any seriousness.
