ALES 204 - A comparison from the beginning until now...And Beyond!

Twitter Clip Art

At the beginning of the semester, I was really dreading having to create a Twitter account. I felt that Twitter was only really used by celebrities posting about their up coming movie premieres, or pictures of their extravagant meals. I never thought Twitter would be so useful until this class! By learning how to use Twitter for academic reasons, one can search via hash tags or aliases to follow individuals who are contributing scientifically to a relatable area of study.  Although I did follow a few celebrities, I found following the CBC news to provide a relevant source of communication and up to the minute tweets of adverse weather conditions or local events.

When it came for the class to look in to the reliability of information of Wikipedia, I was blown away by the results of my research. Previously, I had taken everything seen on Wiki's to be true fact. It wasn't until our ALES lecture that I began to realize that we, as individuals are authors. And as authors, we can make a lot of inaccurate statements. For this assignment we were asked to locate a stub on Wikipedia, being a wiki that either has little to no information or citations on the topic. In my blog post about Wiki's I mentioned that I had troubles even locating a topic to improve upon. And since that assignment, I find myself obsessed with checking Wikipedia to see if the higher authorities have removed my published revisions. As of today, so far so good. To view my still intact stub, simply click here.

The face behind "Knitwit Abner"
my cat Abner

For my optional blog post, I discussed how I used a professional Facebook page to promote my side hobby of knitting. In lab, we created professional Facebook pages for employers to view. I took this idea one step further and created a page to upload pictures of completed knitting projects, as well as post an order form. Since opening Knitwit Abner to the world of Facebook, I have been quite successful in networking with people who are interested in purchasing items. Before ALES, I wouldn't have known how to portray myself online in a business sense. Keeping pictures professional and "clean" has improved my sales significantly. Using Facebook to promote Knitwit Abner, rather than a different source allows me to control who gets accepted on my mailing list, and separates e-mail pertaining to the page from my university e-mail.


Overall, I have greatly improved my knowledge on how communication affects business, first impressions, and presentations. After ALES is over, I might keep Twitter since I now see it as more of a resource than a "celebrity app". I will keep Knitwit Abner up and running on Facebook in hopes to create a small empire in the knitting world. And I might even keep this blog going, unless I get accepted to WCVM this fall of course!

Xinru Ye also summarized the work done in both lab and lecture well in her Ales 204 blog

Comments on Blogs:
1. Sara Hughes Wikipedia Post
2. Susan Enielse Introductory Post
3. Loana Valdez Optional Post on Viagra Use
4. Sara Hughes Facebook Post
5. Xinru Ye Reflective Post