Kairos: A Journal for Teachers of Writing in Webbed Environments.
Vol. 2 No. 2 Fall 1997
After four years of making its home on MediaMOO, the Netoric Project has decided to move to a new home. In a release from Netoric's Tari Fanderclai and Greg Siering, the announcement came this way:
MediaMOO has served us well, and we're grateful; in particular we acknowledge the assistance from Amy Bruckman, as well as the frequent publicity she's provided for our project.
But with more and more of the computers and writing community becoming interested, regular users of MOOs, we believe we can better serve this community where we have more freedom to make our own administrative decisions and to expand our facilities and the privileges of those who join in the project.
We'd like to be in a place where people can simply write to us to join the MOO or take care of other administrative issues.
We want to be able to guarantee that people who want to participate in the Netoric Project can get characters, rather than having to hope that the administration of the MOO will let them join.
We'd like to see Netoric members make places for themselves within Netoric's online space, and even join us in coordinating new kinds of Netoric events.
We'd like to be in a place that teachers can use for their classes, so that when they join us for events and become interested in the educational possibilities we discuss so often, we don't have to say, "First you have to find a MOO that will let you bring your class. . . ."
We'd like to have those classes sometimes be involved in Netoric events, whether by inviting us to visit their projects or by joining us to provide student perspectives on issues we discuss.
We'd like to see students and teachers all have the privileges they need to teach each other things like building and programming. And the list goes on.
And so we will begin our fifth year of the Netoric Project in the Netoric International Park on Connections.
Netoric International Park is a realm on Connections—a self-contained area within the MOO entirely devoted to the Netoric project. We chose the park theme in order to get away from the idea of four-walled meeting rooms and create instead a more creative and playful working environment. We've sketched out the topography of the park, leaving plenty of room for Netoric members to expand it if they want to, whether by adding their own homes or making useful or scenic or fun areas for all of us to share. And of course, you'll find the all-new Tuesday Cafe right there in the park, in the Netoric Lodge.
Connections is run by Tari, and Greg will also have the ability to help the Netoric crowd with the most common administrative issues—getting characters for themselves and signing up to build in Netoric International Park. Everyone on Connections gets a programmer bit and some quota when they get a character. Teachers interested in bringing classes to Connections need only explore the Connections home page to get familiar with the policies and procedures, and then contact Tari to get started.
We encourage those who already participate in the Netoric Project, and those who already know they want to start participating, to go ahead and write Tari or Greg to get a character. Our addresses are below, and your note should include this information:
We hope to get a lot of character requests this week, so please be patient for a couple of days while we set up your character. There are no admissions requirements beyond wanting to participate in Netoric. You'll get a character—it's just that we might need a short time.
- Say that you're requesting a character on Connections in order to participate in the Netoric Project.
- Give us your email address.
- Give us your first and second choices for your character's name.
Kairos: A Journal for Teachers of Writing in Webbed Environments.