March 22, 2004
Blogging in a Presentation
Paul Shabbajee asked is it rude to use technology to gain further info during or reflect on a presentation whilst in progress. As I am writing this Diana Laurillard is speaking and I feel desperately uncomfortable. Also I keep losing track of what she is saying - what skills or social mores do I need to acquire to make a success of this?
Insights into evolution - community learning and information sharing, David May
The technology underpinning the Internet and the Web will continue to evolve rapidly. An ever increasing range and quantity of mobile devices will be connected to each other and to an expanding infrastructure. This will lead to a more nomadic style of living and working and a very diverse range of digital content. We will become both authors and readers of multimedia - from images to movies to soundscapes - and participants in experiences which combine the physical and virtual worlds. The construction of the devices and their supporting infrastructure poses new challenges in technology and interface design - and in the organisation, management and use of huge quantities of information flowing between billions of devices. But the greatest challenges are in education and learning: how can we enable people to discover and exploit the full potential of these new technologies?
Insights into evolution - community learning and information sharing, Paul Shabajee
Ubiquitous wireless networked computing and 'convergence', are not only buzzwords, but are already dramatically redefining social and educational relationships in a deeply 'disruptive' manner. They are redefining our traditional educational processes, norms and roles. For example, is it rude and detrimental to learning, not to listen to a tutor when they are presenting, or to be checking what they are saying is 'true' on the Internet as they are speaking, or to be discussing it wirelessly with your peers live during the lecture or lesson? At a strikingly practical level these technologies are also challenging our traditional concepts of space and time and indeed our self image(s), and those we have of our social, educational and working communities.
This presentation explores these issues, illustrating, demonstrating and exploring some of the relevant technologies and their implications. One additional role of this presentation is to introduce the facilities at the conference for delegates to use and experiment with, during the conference. These include Internet-based instant communication (using IRC) and a live weblogging publishing system.