StudyAbroad.com Launches World’s First Online Interactive Reality Show
Here we go. It’s billed as a mixture of Amazing Race and blogging – 3 college students are actually studying abroad, but they are given tasks to complete and they blog about their experiences. The blogging software is Mindsay.com‘s, which as it happens I’ve used off and on. Currently, half of the Gus Overshaw whale-killing journal crew have blogs there, since it’s a little more fun and interactive than Tripod, Gus’ main provider. Also, you have to log in to read Mindsay blogs, and you can set your posts to be read by all, read by a list of people you specify, or by no one.
One drawback to Mindsay beyond the “login required” factor is that if you visit someone’s page, you leave a link. It can be interesting to track people from blog to blog, but if you stumble across somebody really weird, they can see your ID and visit your page. There’s no anonymous lurking – which in some cases is okay, and in other cases can contribute to disputes on the order of junior-high-level catfights between former friends.
It’s an odd idea, but potentially interesting, but with a built in limitation on the size of the audience unless Mindsay customizes it for completely open publication (as opposed to the “walled garden” model they use now).
Great post!!
Actually, MindSay allows you to open up your blog to the public, thus allowing infinite anonymous visitors!!!!
If you’d like more info or linkback opportunities, please give us a buzz, we’d love to hear your feedback!
Well, you’re right – I was so used to reading blogs there that were set to limited-readership, I had forgotten all about the public option.
It’ll be interesting to see how the Study Abroad project plays out. Thanks for stopping by.