Evaluation of Social Media Sources

geralt. "Youtube" 1/15 via pixabay.
Public domain dedication license

In the blog post below, I will be analyzing two sources pertaining to my conflict I have been researching for precious blog posts. These sources, however, were found of social media sights through the use of Storify. They will be analyzed in a similar manner of the scholarly sources (credibility, author, where the source was found, etc.). However, these sources will be analyzed as social media sources involved with my issue and will be analyzed as such.

The first source I accessed through social media is the youtube video of Ken Robinson's "Changing the Education Paradigm" (if you don't have time to watch the video, here is a transcript) animated by RSA animate. The speaker of the actual video is a credible educationalist and author of multiple education books, making the content of the source reliable. The publisher of the video, RSA animate, is a credible societal and phycological youtube channel and company dedicated to exposing the world to "life-changing new idea" in an understandable and entertaining manner. Robinson recorded the speech specifically for RSA animate without an audience. The company that posted this video to youtube is directly related to its production.

There is, unfortunately, no way to tell who subscribes to the RSA channel there is, however, related channels that add credibility to the video which include the TED talks and School life channel. The channel itself is 9 years old. These validate the video's reliability as an insightful source. The RSA channel overall frequently posts about education and societal analysis. It is not reserved specifically for education, but that doesn't mean there aren't plenty of videos on education as a whole. The video is not reserved specifically for youtube, as it can be found on the TED talk video archive and its actual performance and transcript can be found in the RSA archive.

"Twitter" 8/15/13 via. CBCnews.
cbc.ca 

The second source I found was a TED talk linked from the twitter account of Victoria Cane. The source is a speech by Geoffrey Canada, an education advocate and reformist, in regards to the faults of our education system, including underprivileged children and the fault in the application of standardized testing data. The video link provided by Ms. Cane leads to the TED talk channel. Much like the RSA channel, the TED channel is a reliable source for educational and societal issues. The twitter of Ms. Cane speaks well to her credibility as well. Her tweets are typically linked articles about general livelihood and news, showing that, though she may not be a professional in the field, she is still dedicated to information.

Cane was not present at the speech itself and is not indicated to be related to the field of education, however, her caption to the video indicates that she is passionate about the topic and her other tweets indicate an interest in news and public wellness (topics such as health, education, and economics). The post was made by Cane on August 25, and the video itself May 8, 2013. Both of these are good indicators to the fact that the source and its provider are reliable in terms of up to date information
. The video can be found directly on the TED talks website, as well as its transcript. The TED channel was established in 2006 and regularly updates reliable videos.