CHANGING MY ONLINE FOCUS

REPOSTED FROM MY THOUGHTS (hshawjr@blogspot.com/haroldshawjr.com)

Making the choice has helped! I have given myself permission to move on and I actually went into my Twitter , Google Reader, Facebook account last weekend and deleted all but a select few educators or blogs from those social media accounts. It was actually a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. Many of these educators I had many conversations with on Twitter, and read or commented on many informative posts on their blogs.
It was a hard door to mostly shut, but I kept a few that I have had the pleasure to meet: Rich, Dan, Mark, Jeff and although I have never met him personally Clay B. and Alfredtwo on Twitter. All of them had a great impact on my online presence and how I use social media.

This week I have begun adding non profit leaders/organizations, AmeriCorpsprograms, Volunteer Managers/organizations and other social change organizations. It feels a lot like when I first started researching online and finding all those educational experts and leaders, except now I am looking for leaders/organizations in social change. Lots of new people’s names and organizations to learn and a whole lot more information to read and digest.

It does help that I know a bit more about social media and have a more focused view of what I want to use and how to use them to my best effect.

• Twitter is my instant news feed…
• Google Reader my RSS feed reader, so I can keep caught up on what is going on.
• Podcasts for when I am exercising or vegging out to learn more about my field.
• Blogging – getting my opinion out there and reading other’s blogs to learn more
• Facebook – I know that many are using it professionally, but I prefer to keep it more as a place for my family and closer friends place
• LinkedIn – My place to meet other like minded professionals, if you want to include me as a contact there, please do.

The journey is moving onward and it is rather interesting to see that as I have gotten older, I am becoming much more “socially aware” than I used to be. It is interesting to look where I have come from to where I am now.

Those are my thoughts, what are your’s

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