Topic 4: Question 2 & 3

Q2)
a) Three ways of providing users with more control:
1) Customization of their online identity within the community can help them build a confidence of self and individuality. This in turn contributes to the identity of the community at large.
2) Strong participants can be given moderator or leader positions on the proviso that they adhere to some guidelines. Giving control to respected community members can help bolster a networks confidence. Conversely appointing the wrong person can damage the interactions of a community. Much like appointing wrong people to managerial positions, something I've become all too familiar with lately... (Yes, I'll take shots at them in whatever medium to whoever will listen)
3) Allow user created content and modules to be integrated. Facebook are a shining example of this one. All manner of applications and games from quizzes to glorified RSS feeds; all user created.

b)
Big stand out point here for me was the information regarding hosts. I noticed in a lot of the sessions we had I often found myself falling into something of a host role. I'm not a domineering person, or not intentionally if anyone gets that vibe, but I often found myself assisting with the direction of the discussions or helping other users to work whatever program we were using at the time. We all deferred to Ken seeing as he's our lecturer but I got the feeling he wanted someone to sit in the hosts chair.
I know we were never in any one environment long enough for real hosting to occur. The kind of practices a long term host would need to develop though are more centered around mediating the moral code of the users: making sure that a pleasant environment is maintained.
The key to that is reinforcing civil exchanges and encouraging users to interact, usually by giving them purpose to interact. In our sessions everyone was polite and civil. I think it helps though that we are studying these environments from a meta level. Perhaps we would run into conflicts if we were immersed in a stronger, more long term community.
I'm sure there's three points mingled in there.

c)
The reasons one needs to develop a set of rules of engagement in these environments is primarily because so much power is automatically awarded to your average user. As we saw when we used LC-MOO there are a variety of different ways the content in the right pane could be manipulated so all other users were seeing something they didn't choose. It is also possible to create objects and leave them lying around which can be manipulated to a degree by others. All of this is possible at an entry level too. With this much power, when coming together to work on large scale open source projects, as I envisage might be a good use for these types of environments, it is integral that users know exactly how to behave so as they don't disrupt or destroy the work of another. Given how these environments can also be populated with varying numbers of people it is important to know the correct way to get someones attention and feedback and also how to respond in that environment.
In my mind I see these tools as sort of software construction sites, and on a construction site you need safety equipment and rules and protocols with how you conduct yourself on site. I feel this analogy translates well here.
The need for these rules, in the context of document sharing systems, is somewhat lessened, not so much in necessity but in contents. Less power equals less policy and procedure. An individual user can't be as potentially dangerous to a community when it's only documents being shared (true the contents of the documents is important).

Q3)
a)
I tried, I really tried to organise the list of sites into educational and non-educational. But I just can't do it in good conscience. They all have the potential to afford educational opportunities. True, some more than others. So for the sake of having a list:
More Educational: Yahoo!, YouTube, Ning, LinkedIn, Delicious, Teachertube, RevYu, Digg, bubbl.us & reddit.
These sites all offer immediate educational yield.

Of these, the ones that offer the most potential for an educational environment are:
Ning, Teachertube & bubbl.us
They appear to have the richest potential.

While still arugably possessing educational value these are the bottom runners that one could argue are better time wasters than educational tools. Having said that it does not necessarily diminish their value as social networking tools:
Bebo, Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, Flickr.

For professional development I'm going to stick with: Ning, Teachertube & bubbl.us
All of the other options feel a little too undisciplined to be truly effective in the workplace.