This morning I nearly created a panic. I received a Retweet from a friend:
I did what I normally do. I clicked on the TechCrunch link to check it out, even going to the Google Apps page to see if it was true. It seemed to be, at first glance. And I retweeted it…and then– sent it out again without a RT! Geesh.
Ah, there’s the problem. I made an assumption. Seeing the word Docs in the first RT made me think: all Google Docs. In fact, Google is changing its policy for Google Apps customers–but not educational institutions or individuals.
The damage was done. Within minutes, the tweet had been retweeted at least 15 times with anxiety growing with each tweet!!
Thanks to @kjarrett and @irasocol, I was set straight fairly quickly. We talk about needing to teach our students to search with care, judge reliability and validity of web information, and then I do this:)
But this does remind me of the fiasco I had with Google Team Edition two years ago when I once again clicked too quickly. Don’t get me wrong. I love Google Apps. Use them all the time. So much, I joined Team Edition as soon as it was announced.
What I didn’t see when I joined was this:
If you have an existing Google Account with your school or work address, signing up for Team Edition with that account may disrupt your Google calendar and documents. If you send doc or calendar invites to co-workers with Google Accounts, they’ll be able to view the data as usual, but they won’t have collaboration or sharing options with your Google App group.
Arrghhhh. I discovered too late that two of our teachers were stuck in no-man’s land, trying to collaborate with their students who were in our Team Edition but unable to since they had pre-existing individual accounts. Two students lost all their documents when they migrated over. Sound confusing? It was!
And I could not get any help from Google. So we abandoned the Team Edition, and I’ve been a little nervous to try the Google Apps for education ever since.
Anyway, I am going to try to be more judicious in my retweeting and clicking. Information comes at us so quickly these days. We do a disservice to friends and colleagues if we don’t take time to evaluate before we pass it on.
Update: I just received this from my son–giving me a hard time, as usual:)
