I've been reading chapter 5 of my textbook, Meaningful Learning with Technology by Howland, Jonassen & Marra, which discusses communicating with technologies, and my mind kept wandering back to my brother's wedding.
Stewart and Lena got married this summer. It was a wonderful event and I love the new branch on our family tree, but that's not why I kept thinking of it. Stewart and Lena live in Japan, the wedding was to be in Maryland, and the Bride's Maids/Groom's Men came from New England, California, New Orleans, North Carolina, and Maryland. Stewart and Lena were only to arrive back in the US 1-2 weeks before the big day, so all the planning had to be done across all those time zones. Thank God for the Internet! (Think of the phone bills, otherwise!)
Much of our planning was done via Facebook's messages program, where we maintained at least 3 conversation threads. We discussed decorations, shared pictures of things we either already had or could rent, and eventually got approval from the bridal pair. Jobs were delegated through these discussions, and almost everything was planned here. Sometimes the discussions would be real-time, when more than one person happened to be online at once, but other times we'd leave a message, go to bed, and find the response in the morning -- all because Japan's timezone is 11 hours off of Maryland. We even managed to organize pot-luck refreshments for the reception!
Lena also used Pinterest to share pictures of things she and Stewart liked - allowing the rest of us to do the local footwork. My daughter was the flower girl, and conversations on Facebook combined with Pinterest pictures combined to help me alter a dress to suit Lena's idea of what she wanted. Sending pictures and questions back and forth meant that I could sew with confidence - they'd see the dress even before they arrived.
One of the people helping organize the wedding has chosen not to be on Facebook - which actually caused some problems as Facebook users had to parrot information back and forth for the non-Facebook users. That's when Skype came in. Stewart and Lena were able to hold real time discussions with them, working out the details. Based upon these conversations, we were able to arrange for the various rentals.
During the wedding itself, the music was piped in via a computer's playlist, which had been carefully selected in advance, and many people were running around taking pictures with their digital cameras. After the wedding, hundreds of these pictures were posted online - on picture sharing websites or shared on Facebook. I can now say, with confidence, that I have more pictures of my brother's wedding than I do of my own. And I love every one.
In the end, we were able to arrange, hold, and recover from an awesome wedding by international committee. They said it couldn't be done - but thanks to internet based communications technology, it went very well. Cue the music from "It's a Small World" - because it truly is.
I didn't mention this above, because it was a little off topic, but the next time you use Skype (or FaceTime on the Mac), think about the view-screens in Star Trek. Yup - my brother first got to know his nephew via a view screen with bad reception. Face to Face from around the world - wow.
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