About six years ago, I wrote the essay below for my BA in Internet Communications. It is about how Facebook can actually be beneficial for one of the major disabilities in Australia: depression. I think the ideas in the essay can be applied to children.

The identification and support of individuals on Facebook with depression is enhanced by the anonymity, privacy and bridging ability of their personal community’s weak network ties. 

This paper argues that the weak ties, like workmates or service providers, of an individual’s personal community can be very useful in supporting that individual. Weak ties are especially useful when strong ties, like close friends and family, fail to adequately offer support. This paper begins by explaining Mark Granovetter’s (1973) network theory and its strong and weak ties and examines each ties’ advantages and disadvantages. It then shows how strong and weak ties operate online and some differences between their online and offline use. College student-based studies and a case study of an individual’s Facebook page are then used to show how strong and weak ties are useful in identifying and supporting individuals with depression. These studies show the anonymity, privacy and bridging ability of a personal community’s weak ties make up for some of the potential shortcomings of strong ties when tackling health concerns such as depression.

Our connections with people come in many forms and intensities that can be broadly categorised as strong or weak ties. These terms originated from network theory developed by Mark Granovetter in his seminal work The Strength of Weak Ties (Granovetter, 1973). Granovetter argues that all individuals have a network of people they know and interact with, which are their ties. Strong ties come in the form of family and friends and are people likely to engage with one another, while weak ties are more acquaintances, like neighbours, classmates and workmates, who are less likely to engage with other members of the individual’s network. Strong ties tend to have similar demographics, like class, race and religion, to the individual at the centre of the network (Wright & Bell, 2003). Whereas weak ties can be more dispersed in their demographics. Weak ties usually develop around a specific interest, like a hobby or work. (Donath & boyd, 2004). A network with many strong ties is considered high density, while a network with many weak ties is low density (Granovetter, 1983).  As Wellham and Wortley (1990) point out, most people have a mixture of strong and weak ties in their own personal community.

Network theory is at the heart of social media. Without people connecting and creating strong and weak ties social media would not exist. Social media sites encourage this connecting or networking through the act of friending or liking someone or an organisation on a site like Facebook or following someone on a site like Twitter. Boyd and Ellison (2008) claim our strong and weak ties online are usually strong and weak ties offline. That means that people are using social media to connect to ties like friends, family and workmates who they know offline. But Wright and Bell (2003) argue that people engage with a more diverse range of people online than is possible offline. This diversity occurs because they frequently engage with people online based on one common interest, such as having depression, but they can be completely different in other aspects of life. A person’s online and offline ties may be similar, but there is the potential for more weak ties online.

As network theory is at the heart of social media, it is also central to the construction of online communities. An individual using social media, like Facebook, can create their own personal online community by friending and accepting friend requests from other Facebook users. Wellham and Gulia (1999) argue that online communities have many of the characteristics of offline communities and that online communities can offer support and information like offline communities do. They argue a community can use the web to maintain its strong ties. Therefore, an individual can use social media to maintain their own personal community of strong ties. Like Wright and Bell (2003), Wellham and Gulia (1999) also hypothesise that the net can increase the number of weak ties a community has as people connect more due to shared interests than shared demographics. Network theory’s strong and weak ties are central to both social media and online personal communities.

Each type of tie has its advantages and disadvantages. Strong ties, in the form of family and close friends, offer companionship, emotional support, and a sense of belonging. A person with a personal community network of strong ties is likely to receive a great deal of support from family and friends (Donath & boyd, 2004). Family and friends can feel obligated to listen and offer advice, but this support may become judgemental (Wright & Bell, 2003). Granovotter (1983) argues that each of the ties in an individual’s network has their own network of ties, and weak ties can act as bridges between networks. Granovotter (1983) goes on to say that strong ties such as family and friends are likely to have similar socio-economic characteristics and life experiences to each other and the individual at the centre of the network. Conversely, weak ties, such as a person’s dentist or gardener, are more likely to have ties with people who have no connection to the individual’s network. Therefore, an individual with many weak ties in their personal community has many potential bridges to other personal communities to which they are not directly tied. Those weak ties are likely to have different socio-economic characteristics from the individual at the centre of the community. These weak tie bridges can, therefore, give them access to a wider range of information and life experiences. Conversely, an individual with a dense network of strong ties may find themselves isolated from other groups in society (Granovetter, 1983; Wright & Bell, 2003; Donath & boyd, 2004). An individual with a personal community dominated by strong ties is likely to get a lot of support but have less access to the diverse information and opinions of weak ties.

Online and offline personal communities have differences. One of the major differences occurs because the text-based nature of social media makes it possible for users to choose when and how much information to reveal about themselves. They can choose what information to include on their profile for a social media site like Facebook or Twitter. They may exaggerate or lie on their profile or make up a completely fake profile. In doing this, a person can hide a significant amount of personal and socio-economic information which could quickly unravel in the offline world if they were to meet one of their online ties or even speak to them on the phone. This means that social media can offer a greater deal of anonymity when a person is interacting with weak ties who know very little about them. This anonymity can change the dynamics of an individual’s personal community. For instance, it can help avoid the stigmatisation of belonging to groups negatively associated with particular medical conditions (Wright & Bell, 2003).  For example, diabetes is frequently negatively associated with being poor, overweight and lazy. This anonymity means that people might be more open when interacting with weak ties on social media, and more likely to explore new ideas or ask what may be deemed stupid questions (Wright & Bell, 2003). Social media’s anonymity means people might be more open online, especially with their weak ties.

The solitude of viewing the online world also changes how people give help and support. Wellham and Gulia (1999) argue that people are more likely to provide information, support and companionship to their online rather than offline weak ties. They argue this may be due to the phenomenon of people being more likely to intervene when they think there is no one else to offer help and support to an individual. Because most people interact with social media in the privacy of their own space, they may consider themself the only reader of a post requesting help or an anguished status update and, therefore, feel the need to respond and offer assistance. Wellham and Gulia (1999) go on to claim that online group members often trust total strangers. This solitude, trust and support of weak ties might be why many people are prepared to open up about health concerns, like depression, to their social media network.

A large amount of the population suffers from undiagnosed and untreated depression. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (2015) says around 8.9% of Australians reported having depression or feelings of depression in 2014-15. Of those with depression, many are not identified (Whitehill, Brockman & Moreno, 2013; Moreno et al., 2011) or do not receive treatment for their depression (Whitehill, Brockman & Moreno, 2013). One of the reasons they do not seek treatment is the stigma associated with mental health issues (Wright & Bell, 2003; Moreno et al., 2011). Lack of knowledge about depression and privacy concerns are also a reason (Moreno et al., 2011). This lack of identification and treatment of depression in the community needs to be rectified.

A supportive Facebook community can be used to identify depression. Early identification of depression on Facebook might prevent serious mental illnesses from developing or even suicide (Egan, Koff, & Moreno, 2013). Several research projects have been conducted into how US college students who use Facebook react to mental health issues within their individual communities (Egan, Koff, & Moreno, 2013; Whitehill, Brockman & Moreno, 2013; Moreno, et al. 2011). These studies found a high prevalence of depression among college students with 25 percent reporting depression or feelings of depression. The students studied by Egan, Koff, and Moreno (2013) thought that people were more likely to talk online about depression because they used Facebook as a diary and due to its anonymity. As noted previously in this paper, anonymity is more likely to be a factor with weak ties. Therefore, a person with a personal community dominated by weak ties is more likely to inform their community that they are depressed. Other researchers have found that emotionally unstable people are more likely to write Facebook status updates about their emotions (Berger & Buechel, 2012; Beshara, 2013). They may do this because they feel safe disclosing on social media while in the privacy of their home or room (Park et al., 2015), and people feel less judged with the lack of non-verbal cues online (Wright & Bell, 2003). Online disclosures of mental illness can also be less threatening than face-to-face disclosures (Berger & Buechel, 2012). Facebook also offers the opportunity for status updates to be hidden from certain members of an individual’s community, so if a person is worried about how their strong ties, like a judgemental sister, might react to a post about depression, they can exclude her from seeing the post. The willingness of individuals to disclose their depression to their online community due to privacy and perceptions of anonymity created by weak ties, means that they can be more easily identified and then offered support by that community.

Support for those with depression on Facebook can depend on the strength of the tie. Park et al. (2016) say that people with depression claim to get more support from Facebook than offline. Park et al. say this might be because it is easier to give support online than having to meet someone face-to-face. Wright and Bell (2003) suggest that if depression is uncommon or its discussion stigmatised amongst an individual’s strong ties, Facebook offers the opportunity for a depressed person to connect with weak ties who may have knowledge and similar experiences of depression. The US college students involved in the research projects had their own ideas on how Facebook users should respond to depression posts. Most said they would confront a close friend or strong tie face-to-face (Whitehill, Brockman & Moreno, 2013; Egan, Koff, & Moreno, 2013). But they would not do the same for acquaintances or weak ties, as they felt it would be an invasion of the weak ties’ privacy. The students also felt they may not know weak ties well enough to understand the context of their depression post. The students said they might mention the depression post to a friend with a closer tie to the depression poster, or they might report the post to an appropriate authority like a student councillor (Egan, Koff, & Moreno, 2013). It appears that a community of weak ties may make it more likely that an individual posts about their depression. If their strong ties fail to offer initial support, weak ties may prompt their strong ties into action or contact councillors to help them. Weak ties also potentially offer a more diverse range of information and experiences of depression.

A case study of an individual’s Facebook page (I have made them anonymous) is an example of how the weak ties of a personal community can offer support to a person with depression. The individual is a prolific poster on Facebook. In the past year, more of their posts have been about their depression and their anxieties as their medical practitioners alter their medications. The individual appears to be using their posts as a diary. Egan, Koff, and Moreno (2013) suggest some people with depression do this to record and share with their community what they are experiencing. The individual’s posts about their depression are among those that receive the most likes and comments and, as such, are more likely to appear in other members of the individual’s community’s Facebook feeds. There are few, if any, negative comments on the depression posts; just about all the comments are supportive or attempts to help. Many of the comments on their depression posts come from friends involved in the same industry, some of whom the individual meets offline. Therefore, the individual does not appear to enjoy anonymity from their strong offline ties on the web when discussing depression. Interestingly, their partner seems to be the only one in the individual’s family who comments on those posts, which may mean the individual has some anonymity from strong family ties when posting about their depression. Many of the comments appear to be from weak ties who live in other parts of Australia and lack familiarity with the individual. Their main connection with the individual appears to be that they engage in the products of the individual’s industry. Some of the individual’s weak ties discuss the individual’s treatment and offer information about their personal experiences. For example, when the individual posted about their anxieties around food, a commenter said they had to change what they ate due to illness and suggested our case study individual ask their psychologist to speak to a nutritionist. The individual also shared mental health information to and from their weak ties. The individual shared an explanation of anxiety from a weak tie. They thanked the weak tie for the share and stressed how important it was that more people knew what anxiety entails.  The individual’s weak ties offered them the opportunity to receive information and share information with other individuals and their communities, as well as receive support from a wider range of individuals with differing experiences of depression and its various elements.

This paper has shown that weak ties can make up for some of the shortcomings of strong ties in personal communities when it comes to identifying and supporting depression on social media like Facebook. The paper shows how the anonymity of weak ties on Facebook can make it more likely for someone to open up to their community and post about health concerns like depression. That anonymity can help people avoid the stigma and judgement around health concerns that can come with strong ties. It also shows how the private and solitary nature of social media makes posting about health concerns feel safer than mentioning them offline and makes it more likely that a weak tie will offer support. This paper has shown that people with many weak ties in their community have potential access to more diverse information and people with similar experiences than those available from their strong ties. If there is limited experience of a health concern or it is stigmatised within an individual’s close friends and family, a person with a diverse personal community containing many weak ties may be better supported and have access to more information to help them. Personal communities can be made stronger if they have plenty of weak ties that provide support and also act as bridges that spread and bring in information.

References:

Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2015). National health survey: First results, 2014-15. Retrieved from http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/by%20Subject/4364.0.55.001~2014-5~Main%20Features~Mental%20and%20behavioural%20conditions~32

Berger, J. A., & Buechel, E. (2012). Facebook therapy? Why do people share self-relevant content online? http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2013148

Beshara, R. (2013). Facebook friends as mental health amateurs: A case study on the new age subculture. Journal of Transpersonal Research, 5(2), 77-85. Retrieved from http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/probing-the-boundaries/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Besharawebsite-paper.pdf

Boyd, D, & Ellison, N. B. (2008). Social network sites: Definition, history, and scholarship. Journal of Computer‐Mediated Communication, 13(1), 210-230. http://dx,doi.org/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2007.00393.x

Donath, J., & Boyd, D. (2004). Public displays of connection. bt technology Journal, 22(4), 71-82. http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/B:BTTJ.0000047585.06264.cc

Egan, K. G., Koff, R. N., & Moreno, M. A. (2013). College students’ responses to mental health status updates on Facebook. Issues in mental health nursing, 34(1), 46-51. http://dx.doi.org.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/10.3109/01612840.2012.718044

Granovetter, M. S. (1973). The strength of weak ties. American journal of sociology, 78(6), 1360-1380. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/2776392

Granovetter, M. (1983). The strength of weak ties: A network theory revisited. Sociological theory, 201-233. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/202051

Greenwood Yoga Academy. (2017). In Facebook, Retrieved on April 22, 2017,  from https://www.facebook.com/Northofperth/posts/1645418478805176

Moreno, M. A., Jelenchick, L. A., Egan, K. G., Cox, E., Young, H., Gannon, K. E., & Becker, T. (2011). Feeling bad on Facebook: depression disclosures by college students on a social networking site. Depression and anxiety, 28(6), 447-455. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/da.20805

Park, J., Lee, D. S., Shablack, H., Verduyn, P., Deldin, P., Ybarra, O., & Kross, (2016). When perceptions defy reality: the relationships between depression and actual and perceived Facebook social support.Journal of affective disorders, 200, 37-44. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2016.01.048

Rutter, N. (2017). In Facebook. Retrieved April 20, 2107, from https://www.facebook.com/adrian.bedford/posts/10154416314578016

Wellman, B., & Gulia, M. (1999). Net surfers don’t ride alone: Virtual communities as communities. Networks in the global village, 331-366. Retrieved from http://groups.chass.utoronto.ca/netlab/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Net-Surfers-Dont-Ride-Alone-Virtual-Community-as-Community.pdf

Wellman, B., & Wortley, S. (1990). Different strokes from different folks: Community ties and social support. American journal of Sociology, 96(3), 558-588. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/2781064

Whitehill, J. M., Brockman, L. N., & Moreno, M. A. (2013). “Just talk to me”: communicating with college students about depression disclosures on Facebook. Journal of Adolescent Health, 52(1), 122-127. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2012.09.015

Wright, K. B., Bell, S. B. (2003). Health-related support groups on the Internet: Linking empirical findings to social support and computer-mediated communication theory. Journal of Health Psychology, 8(1), 39-54. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359105303008001429

This is a copy of a speech I wrote for a writing subject in my BA in Internet Communications.

Whatever happened to the technology singularity?

I am here tonight to ask what happened to the technology singularity. We don’t seem to be getting any closer to being dragged into its event horizon. I desperately want to experience the singularity’s supercharged revolution of society. Rather than just writing about it, I want to live it.

I can remember my excitement when I first read Eric Drexler’s Engines of Creation, in which he described the wonders of nanotechnology. He told us of a future where nanobots—nanoscale robots—can manufacture everything, molecule by molecule. Star Trek fans would have immediately imagined replicators would soon be churning out all the burgers and beer they could ever consume for free.

My excitement about the future I would live in super nova-ed when I read Damien Broderick’s The Spike. He wrote of a convergence of technologies that would create a spike in human development, a period of massive change, where a combination of artificial intelligence, genetic engineering and nanotechnology would turn us into super-humans. We were destined to become technological gods.

While impatiently waiting to become a god, I read Ray Kurzweil’s The Singularity is Near. He speculated that artificial intelligence, genetic engineering, and nanotechnology would lead to humans, like you and me, creating our own starship Enterprise and leaving the planet. You and I were going to the stars. And humanity would eventually saturate the universe.

But here’s the reality for those of us dreaming of the technological singularity. Engines of Creation was written three decades ago, while The Spike hit the bookstores nearly two decades ago. And The Singularity is Near came out over a decade ago.

So how near is near?

Will we ever live lives of leisure and creativity while AIs run everything for us? Will we ever genetically engineer our bodies so we can live for millennia? Will we ever use swarms of nanobots to strip carbon atoms from carbon dioxide molecules in the atmosphere and stop global warming?

What have scientists been doing to ensure the singularity even occurs?

At the molecular level, a few of them got together and used a scanning tunnelling microscope to move 35 atoms around so they spelled IBM, thus creating the world’s smallest logo in 1990. While scientists at Cornell University busied themselves constructing a molecular scale nano-guitar, which has strings that can be strummed, but we can’t hear it. However, other scientists seem more intent on creating something useful. Nature magazine says scientists have created many nano-scale motors and propellers. But these very simple machines are a long way from the complexity needed to make Drexler’s engines of creation.

But then 3D printers suddenly materialised, like the Tardis, out of nowhere. We suddenly had a very primitive Star Trek replicator. Many of you would’ve seen stories about 3D printers, like their ability to print guns, single shot pistols that tend to explode. Just as well 3D printers can also print replacement artificial hands.

One or two of you might already have spent the few hundred dollars for a 3D printer.  I envisage that in a few years, every household will have one, using them to print replacement screens for dropped mobile phones or to make a missing Lego block needed to finish a model of Han Solo’s Millennium Falcon.

Think about what you could print if you had an industrial-scale 3D printer, like the ones used to print houses in China. NASA has also used them to print 75 per cent of the parts for a working rocket engine. In the future, you might be able to print a full-scale Millennium Falcon that actually flies.

What about genetic engineering? Seemingly endless trials continue to reaffirm the safety of genetically modified foods. The US Food and Drug Administration says diabetics have been using genetically engineered insulin for decades. Many animals have been cloned, including cows, sheep, horses, dogs, and cats. But no one has successfully cloned a human, at least not officially.

One form of genetic engineering that seems to always be in the news is stem cell research. Harvard University scientists have used stem cells to regenerate human heart tissue. They hope a fully functioning human heart will be created using stem cells in several years. There are also many reports of stem cells healing paraplegics. The University of California reported using them to help a car crash victim regain the use of his hands and legs. While in Japan, the RIKEN Laboratory for Retinal Regeneration used stem cells to stop the macular degeneration of an 80-year-old’s eyesight.

What have the computer scientists been up to? We’re still yet to see an operating system become self-aware like Samantha in the movie Her, but machine learning is taking off. As many of you know, machine learning is where a computer learns to do things using algorithms rather than being programmed to do those things. Such algorithms allow driverless cars, like Google’s, to react to all the new situations the car encounters on roads. Data scientist Jeremy Howard runs a company involved in machine learning, and he says deep-learning algorithms have enabled a computer to be better than humans at recognising the content of images. Not only that, the deep-learning algorithms enabled the computer to write accurate descriptions of the images. Howard claims that machine learning will allow computers to soon do most service jobs that involve writing, reading, listening and data analysis. And they will do these tasks much faster than humans.

Kurzweil says artificial intelligence is the key to the singularity. Once computers get smarter than you and me, they will not only design smarter computers, but they will also be able to speed up the development of nanotechnology, 3D printing, and genetic engineering. For those of us counting on fully experiencing the singularity, we can hope that an algorithm is currently being written that will make computers more intelligent than humans. We can hope such an algorithm will be announced next week, seemingly materialise from nowhere, like 3D printers did.

If a full-on artificial intelligence enabling algorithm is created soon, many of us here tonight could experience the wonders of the technological singularity and a post-human universe—a universe where the only limitation to our massively extended lives is our imaginations.

References:                        

Aldrich, M. (2016). Paralyzed man regains use of arms and hands after experimental stem cell therapy at Keck Hospital of USC. Retrieved from https://stemcell.usc.edu/2016/09/07/paralyzed-man-regains-use-of-arms-and-hands-after-experimental-stem-cell-therapy-at-keck-hospital-of-usc/

BBC. (2014). 3D Printed guns of ‘no use to anyone’. Retrieved form http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-27634626

Bernard, L. (1997). Smallest guitar, about the size of a human blood cell, illustrates new technology for nano-sized electromechanical devices. Retrieved from http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/1997/07/worlds-smallest-silicon-mechanical-devices-are-made-cornell

Broderick, D. (1997). The spike: Accelerating into the unimaginable future. Kew, Aust: Reed.

Browne, M.W. (1990). 2 Researchers spell ‘I.B.M.,’ atom by atom. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/1990/04/05/us/2-researchers-spell-ibm-atom-by-atom.html?pagewanted=print

Coghlan, A. (2017). Vision saved by first induced pluripotent stem cell treatment. Retrieved from

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2124820-vision-saved-by-first-induced-pluripotent-stem-cell-treatment/

Drexler, K. E. (1986). Engines of creation: challenges and choices of the last technological revolution. Retrieved from http://xaonon.dyndns.org/misc/engines_of_creation.pdf

Junod, S.W. (2009). Celebrating a milestone: FDA’s approval of first genetically-engineered product. Retrieved from

https://www.fda.gov/aboutfda/whatwedo/history/productregulation/selectionsfromfdliupdateseriesonfdahistory/ucm081964.htm

Kurzweil, R. (2005). The singularity is near: When humans transcend biology. New York: Penguin.

Massachusetts General Hospital. (2016). Functional heart muscle regenerated in decellurized human hearts. Retrieved from http://www.massgeneral.org/News/pressrelease.aspx?id=1910

NASA. (2015). Piece by piece: NASA team moves closer to building a 3-D printed rocket engine. Retrieved from https://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/news/news/releases/2015/piece-by-piece-nasa-team-moves-closer-to-building-a-3-d-printed-rocket-engine.html

Peplow, M. (2015). March of the machines. Nature, 525(7567), 18. Retrieved from http://www.nature.com/news/the-tiniest-lego-a-tale-of-nanoscale-motors-rotors-switches-and-pumps-1.18262

TedxBrussels. (2014). Jeremy Howard: The wonderful and terrifying implications of  computers that can learn [Video file] Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/jeremy_howard_the_wonderful_and_terrifying_implications_of_computers_that_can_learn

Walmsley, H. (2015). World-first 3D-printed hand prosthesis inspired by 1845 design kept in online archive. Retrieved from

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-12-17/world-first-3d-printed-hand-prosthesis-inspired-by-1845-design/7032736

Zhou, C. (2015). 3D-printed house built in just three hours in China’s Xi’an. Retrieved from

https://www.domain.com.au/news/3dprinted-house-built-in-just-three-hours-in-chinas-xian-20150729-gim4e9/

This video is a remediation of Advance Australia Fair made for my BA in Internet Communications. The remediation uses the anthem to critique Australian society. 

Once again, it’s been a long time between posts. Two months at least. My BA in Internet Communications is really eating up my time. I am now in the third period doing my fifth and sixth subjects. One of those subjects is an introductory subject to studying at Uni that everyone who studies at Curtin, at least everyone doing a humanities degree, has to do. It focuses on how to write essays, reflective or critical thinking, working in groups, and we have to give an oral presentation. I am having a bit of trouble figuring out how to do reflective writing, although my tutor said my second practice attempt was excellent. I have always found it challenging to get my voice heard in groups – hey, that is one reason why the independent life of writing appealed. I don’t like giving speeches either. So, the subject is going to have its challenges.

The other subject is New Media, focusing on participatory culture and remediations. A remediation is changing one media object into another, e.g., turning a book into a film. We have to create our own simple remediation. I plan to remediate the national anthem by making a slide show of its words that critiques Australia.

I recently got the results for my second-period subjects, a distinction for The Internet and Everyday Life, which I loathed, as much of the time, I felt clueless about what I was doing. For that, my major assignment was an essay on how the internet enables people with disabilities to advocate effectively. For Interactive Web Design (a second-year subject), I scrapped in with a high distinction. I built a website on disability-friendly housing that had a slideshow, interactive tabs (accordions), a menu that moved down the page as a user scrolled down it and tooltips or hotspots where when the cursor moves over an object on the page, information comes up.  

I went to the Melbourne Writers Festival, which luckily started on the weekend between the second and third study periods. My primary interest was to see Justin Cronin, author of the superb and critically acclaimed Passage trilogy. He considers the trilogy science fiction – not horror. I saw him in two sessions. The second was him with the creator of the excellent horror/fantasy/sci-fi series Glitch, made for the ABC. I am very glad to hear that they are making a second series of Glitch, as it had a huge hanging ending. Interestingly, they both mentioned liking the American series Leftovers, which has as its premise 5% of the Earth’s population suddenly vanishing. It is a very different series, based on novels, and the novels have the characters moving to Australia in the third series, so it is going to be or already is filming in Australia.

Another memorable session at the writer’s festival was with Geoff Dyer. He is a writer who has written many diverse books, from nonfiction books on yoga and tennis to biographies to novels. Just about every book he has written has been with a different publisher and editor. He said he hates the writing process.  

Due to the course, I have been doing very little writing—just a few minutes a day as I redraft a novel. I have not finished reading a novel this year. I started reading and enjoyed the third novel in the Passage series on the train back from the writers festival.

Well – it is time to get back to study.

I’ve been extremely busy with my course since I started it. I reckon I am averaging 50 hours a week on it. I have developed a nasty habit of persisting on a problem until I have solved it, e.g., staying up until 2 a.m. or waking up in the middle of the night with possible solutions to problems and turning on the computer to try them out—e.g., at midnight one night, and I kept going until 4 a.m.

I am doing well considering the challenge, but not surprisingly considering the work I put into the course. My three graded assignments so far have been a distinction and two high distinctions. In the web design subject, I now only have to get 0.1 marks for the final assignment to pass as I have 49.9 marks out of 60. In the other subject I am sitting on 13 out of 15. 

So I do not have much time to write. The most I have done recently occurred when I put an old story on the website I am building. I wrote it about 15 years ago. It hasn’t dated because it is about time travel (haha). It is one of the few attempts I’ve made at writing humour, and I really enjoyed it (yeah, laughing at my own jokes), but I was fixing up things as I formatted it for my website.

Otherwise, my writing is going so slow only a time-lapse camera would show some movement. Every day, I spend a few minutes redrafting my novel just so I can feel like I am still a writer. I am currently about a fifth of the way through the redraft.  

One of the huge ironies of this course, with its emphasis on the web and social media, is that I now have very little time to play with social media and check out what my friends are up to. So please don’t feel neglected. I am neglecting everyone and everything not course-related, except for my exercise program. 

Hopefully when I get into a routine and get an idea of what is wanted is required to do well at this course, I will have more time to spend writing and engaging with others online.