It is important to note that the focus of #DigPINS is not meant to merely build technical skills – This is not a “click here” kind of experience. We aim to look at technology through a critical lens but you will need technical skills to participate – it is an online learning community.
Because some participants have more technical experience than others we are providing a detailed list of some technologies we are planning to use. Some of us may need to build different technical skills than others but everyone is encouraged to use the time in #DigPINS to push themselves in learning and evaluating new skills and technologies.
The facilitators are here to help and ideally the community will work together to help one another to empathize and learn together in these areas.
To get ready for participation in the community one of the things that you can do is just make sure that you have access to the following tools and if you have questions about access to reach out to Damien.
Range of public
#DigPINS has participants work in both public online spaces as well as spaces that are more closed and only available to those in the cohort. We do this as an exploration of digital context and its impacts on digital identity.
The tools listed below allow interactions on a range of publics and we note where they fall in how public they are.
Slack –
Slack is a text based chat program that works like a messenger service. We will be using Slack as our main form of communication and backchannel.
Only those in the USM cohort are invited to this space. You will need an account and you can also download the app and turn on notifications.
Range of public: Slack is open only to our USM cohort. Slack will be our main communications tool for #DigPINS. Use of Slack is bound by the Slack terms of service.
Access – To access Slack you need to sign up or be invited. You can use your maine.edu email address to sign yourself up. Or let Damien know if you would prefer an invite.
Using Slack – Here is a video about how to use slack if you are new to Slack you may find it useful.
Blogs –
As part of developing a digital identity members will blog publicly on this site. If participants have their own blog they would like to use we will ask that they cross post here.
You are encouraged to post at least once on each of our major topics (digital: pedagogy, identity, networks, and scholarship).
Range of public: Blogs by nature are very public to view. The URL of this site is publicly available and could be indexed by search engines like Google. usm.digpins.org runs on WordPress and is a subdomain of digpins.org which is owned by Sundi Richard.
Access – Damien will create accounts for each registered participant who will receive email invites with a changeable password. Anyone visiting the site can see the blog.
Sync Video Calls
Sync video calls will likely be led using Zoom but we are still finalizing this.
Range of public: Some calls may be open only to cohort members while others may be live streamed and recorded. An announcement about how public the call is will be made when planning for the schedule.
Access: Facilitators will send you a link and you may need to download software.
Before we begin you may want to set up a Twitter account if you do not have one already, however, you may also want to wait till after the week on digital identity if you are unsure. We have an established twitter hashtag of #DigPINS.
Range of public: Twitter is very public by nature though you can choose to protect your account this will limit the ability of who can see your tweets.
Access – You can sign up at https://twitter.com/ and there are instructions on signing up at https://help.twitter.com/en/create-twitter-account. Use of Twitter is bound by the Twitter terms of service.
Other Tech
Note that this is not a comprehensive list of technology that we will use for the community but a minimum list. We are still refining the content and activities and a last minute technology or service could be added. Technologies used will always be free of cost for the cohort participants