Just do it … blog it
Another review of Warwick Blogs. Sone students are very positive
Helen Ryan, a second-year physics student, began blogging in October and is one of the more active users. “When I started I was simply using it to vent about things in my personal life.” Support came from other bloggers and Ryan became “part of a community, which I never expected”.
others, perhaps predictably, are less happy:
Max Hammond, a chemistry PhD student, says that blogs are a useful social tool, but that the service’s acceptable usage policy is draconian. “The blogs admin appears to suspend student blogs on some very shaky reasons.”
The admin comment that they’ve only removed posts that are libellous, though clearly the point between which a post is “having a moan” and “is libellous” can be a fine one.
Lawrence denies that freedom of speech is an issue. “Many controversial posts have been allowed to stand. The ones that have been censored have almost all involved abusive comments.”
Dale, the project manager did add
Dale argues that it is sensible to keep an open mind about blogs. “There are lots of other ways of supporting reflection and personal development, or community and collaboration. We did speculate about whether it would be cheaper and quicker to give every student an A5 diary.”
– though clearly the “writing for an audience” experience of using a blog, doesn’t happen if everyone has an A5 diary.