Looking for an Advent exercise recognizing the transient nature of our existence? May I recommend cleaning out the bookmarks on your Internet browser?
I don't know the last time I've used the bookmark tab on my Chrome browser. I use a dashboard program called Symbaloo for all of the sites I visit regularly, and Delicious.com to save and share groups of topic related sites (quick unrelated note, when I give a link to Delicious.com to groups of teachers, we often find it blocked at school sites…why ever could that be?). My bookmark tab has long since grown past the bottom of the screen and past all usefulness. It was faster to type in an entire address than find it on the list.
So it was a bit of an accident when I clicked the tab last week. Since it was a quiet afternoon, rather than move on, I decided to tidy up, and in doing this, I discovered truths about myself and my world.
The first thing that was apparent was the total lack of any organizational structure. The bookmark tab allows the user to move entries up and down and to group them into folders…none of which I have ever done. My bookmark stack read like a stream of consciousness phone book, with pages, documents, and apps in desoltory disarray.
As I went through the entries one by one, I clicked through many of the unrecognized links. I found articles that had formed much of my thoughts about technology in education. Many of them were out of date, referring to devices and directions that didn't pan out. Some were truly prescient, anticipating models yet to be realized. More sobering were the links that no longer went anywhere. Something that was important to me no longer exists…a file removed, a blog no longer maintained (I did discover that I can purchase some of these sites from GoDaddy.com).
Same with programs and applications…the word processor I saw as the answer to Microsoft Word, the podcasting software for my 15 episode series from 2010, the animation program I used to make cartoons, all of which I haven't used in years. Wasn't Wolfram Alpha going to change everything? And then there are programs that don't exist any more, and that I don't remember…what WAS that one?
As I finished cleaning out the menu, I saw so many old ideas and directions disappear. I'm certain that things I am as devoted to today (and even I) will be erased by time.
…but they won't be under the bookmark tab
Look at your bookmark tab and share the stories you find there…and, as always, I invite your comments.
Image. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e8/Office-pink-erasers.jpg
Posted with Blogsy
“Horrible it was told to us; the slaughter, burning, pillaging, the torture of men. It is true, many things we have heard, all filled with bellowing, weeping, and hardly were we comforted, nor can I deny, no, I cannot deny we have heard many, many things were committed in that city.
Okay I just looked at mine and it is scary. I just found my weekend project. Another I see with teachers is their desktop-they have EVERYTHING saved to their desktop and it’s full. I could never function that way. I would be interested in hearing your thoughts on that!
That actually inspired me to clean up my favorites! About a quarter of them no longer existed but I couldn’t tell what they had been since I had not labeled them well. Now, everything is much more logically organized. Thanks!