Schoolblogs RIP?
Posted by Peter Ford in UncategorizedFeb 16th, 2006 | 16 responsesThe SchoolBlogs server has been around for years – well since 2001 then. In edublogging terms that is a fair while. It has seen many thousands of weblog sites created – perhaps getting on for ten thousand. Few made the light of day at the chalkface because the server creaked and groaned almost from the beginning and it was deemed too slow and unreliable for classroom life.
For me though it was the foundation of most of my early blogging work with students and my tentative steps to forge communication and collaboration with like-minded webloggers. The term edublogger was as yet uncoined. Along with SchoolBlogs.com, it was home to my early class weblogs and to my ten year old students’ attempts at managing their own fully-functional blogs. People said they wouldn’t be able to do it but SchoolBlogs and I proved the doubters wrong. Our school soon began exploring blogs for every class and parents created blogs and contributed to their children’s blogs. Although we later moved to a sharper server – all the pioneering work of my own experiences happened on the SchoolBlogs server. It was a totally free service and I took it at face value, knowing I would get what I paid for 
I often wonder why I didn’t back up all my sites as I made them. The ‘download a site’ function was easy to use but I never got round to it. When the SchoolBlogs server went down hard I always knew it would reappear. This time it looks as though it might be the end. The company that physically hosts the server in the Netherlands is going bust and although there is some talk of shipping it to a retirement data-farm in the US, this option seems increasingly unlikely.
It was Ewan’s experience of accidentally deleting his blog and the accompanying embuggerance that brought me to the realisation that my stuff was probably lost. Unlike him though, I cannot bear the thought of trawling through the years to try and reconstruct a portfolio. I’ll just have to put up with the link rot.
I did however, use the Wayback Machine to find some key memories. Along the way I found some interesting ones – like my commentary and advice to Will Richardson back in 2002 before he was the Will Richardson that we all know and love today.
I’m the eternal optimist though. Deus ex machina – Ewan and I will wake up tomorrow and everything will be as it was
16 Responses to “Schoolblogs RIP?”
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About Me
I am Peter Ford and this was my personal blog.
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Waking up this morning most of the world is as it was. The comments are a little messy but the conversations are there. I can relax knowing that I still know why and how I know what I know about blogging, podcasting and the universe as we know it. That’s a lot of knowledge, innit? Hopefully some wisdom restored, too.
So Peter, when did you become “the” Peter Ford!!!;)
15th June 1969
Talk about a time warp. Thanks for the mention, Peter. I’m sorry to hear about the demise of schoolblogs. It was a pioneering site, and it did much to get me hooked on blogs. I have no doubt that by the time we’re all through with this, all of us will face these types of moments, where much of what we’ve created will just go away into the ether. Maybe Ewan is right about the book…
Best, Will
Hey Will – thanks for dropping by and your kind words. I’m sure you are right about the transient nature of stuff we create. I’m finding though that it is my memory that is the most transient – I am constantly amazed how much I forget even when it is beautifully archived in a blog somewhere.
Cheers!
Hi Peter;
Thanks for being a pioneering enthusiast. I just presented Blogchat this evening to a group of developers and they were hard pressed to tell it was a 4-yr-old application. You guys saw its value early on and helped us to make it easy to use.
– Brent -
Hi Brent,
Likewise
I remember the larks with BlogChat well. It is just perfect as a platform for collaboration in the school environment. That gives me another idea… I’ll post over at your place…
hello peter
… somehow your name and schoolblogs were synonymous so when couldn’t connect to ‘my first blog experiment’ searched for you
… thanks for the explanation … a huge shame & like you was able to recover some writing via Wayback machine (thanks) …
the experimenting never ends … may get lost though … take care
Hi Peter,
I’m a technology teacher working with 11 and 12 year old students in New Zealand. I went to a conference yesterday and they raved about blogging. I thought I’d like to introduce my students to it and had a quick search for sites that may be suitable for hosting childrens blogs. So far I haven’t had much luck. Do you know of any websites that I might be able to try?
Thanks for your help.
Hi Andre,
For a starting point – Try http://www.edublogs for a free teacher blog and http://www.learnerblogs for free student blogs.
Thanks,
Will check them out today. One thing though…I’m assuming you have had students blogging. How responsible should I feel for what students post? Not all my kids are sensible or trustworthy sadly. Over the course of the year I may well have introduced over 700 children to blogging. Should they post things which may well be derogatory about our school or other students could I in some sense be held accountable? Should I worry? Your views?
Andre,
Given that you are going to have so many pupils blogging then I would look for a multi-user solution that allows you to have overall control of created blogs and their content. You will obviously have guidelines for acceptable blogging behaviour for your students and encourage them to take responsibility etc. However, with that many blogs then you also need the ability to deactivate, edit or delete a blog at the push of a button. I currently use WordPress Multi-user when I set up schools because it allows a school or teacher overall control and thus peace-of-mind that any ‘nightmare scenario’ can be effectively dealt with. It is based on the edu-blogs sites I recommended yesterday. Let me know if you require any further information.
[...] A quick ‘google’ suggests that no edu-blogger has yet published a blook (but I might be wrong), although Cool Cat Teacher (Vicki Davis) is planning to do so in the summer. Her main reason is the transient nature of electronic data, and experienced edu-bloggers have also pondered on the potential loss of their early work. It’s an irony to note that in order to leave one’s thoughts to future generations, even if the readership might be only our own family, we still have to resort to traditional means. Vicki points to another ‘blooker’ who gives an excellent explanation of their experience of blooking. [...]
I want my school to get into blogs!
Can someone help me
Graeme,
I’ll help you. Want do you want to know?
hi peter its jake of your silverstone kids thingy bob i was in kings sutton schools one well i forgot what was the link to the kids site silvverstone