scribbles
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Notes on social networking in education
The aim of the Digital Youth Project was to provide an "ethnographical view of how children use social media to socialise, learn and relax" The MacArthur Foundation's education director, Connie Yowell, concluded that the work creates a new way to look at how young people are being taught. "Learning today is becoming increasingly peer-based and networked, and this is important to consider as we begin to re-imagine education in the 21st century," My bookmarks on social networking http://delicious.com/martinrichardking/socialnetwork
Pulled out from this list are a few of interest
IT skills of generation Y wasted at work http://management.silicon.com/careers/0,39024671,39170243,00.htm
Companies urged not to ban facebook http://management.silicon.com/itpro/0,39024675,39269235,00.htm
Facebook is educational http://networks.silicon.com/webwatch/0,39024667,39250348,00.htm
For research into social networking and education check out Danah Boyd If you can bear it there s a long video from Danah Boyd where she talks at length about new tech and social netwoking http://handheldlearning.blip.tv/file/1366079/ Pocket Philosophy
Warren Buffett says, "Be fearful when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are fearful." “launch early and iterate" - from Google engineering
"The power of example rather than the example of Power" - From the Obama campaign
"the most powreful technology is that which disappears" - from Intel
"life is lived forwards but only understod backwards" Cheap computing taking off
A major theme for 2008 looks like being cheap computing. Netbook - a term initially promoted by Intel to identify low-cost, low-performance, ultraportable laptopsT here is a review of current cheap Umpcs at http://crave.cnet.co.uk/laptops/0,39029450,49295979-1,00.htm
Recent UMPC announcements
The NC10 will have a non-gloss, 10.2-inch LED screen with a 1,024x600-pixel resolution. As it has a six-cell battery, Samsung claims the 1.33kg mini-laptop will be able to handle almost eight hours of usage on a single charge. Cost is expected to be £310 ex VAT - Too expensive in my view Dell Inspiron Mini 9
The Dell Inspiron Mini 9 has a 8.9-inch LED display (1,024x600) and weighs 1.035kg,
£299 with Microsoft Windows XP. £269 with Ubuntu 8.04.
LG Netbook X110 more like a small laptop though - 80Gb HDD 10in screen but still small
PC world Advent 411 £280
Windows XP only, 10.2-inch screen 1Gb RAM, built-in 1.3-megapixel webcam, Bluetooth, WIFI and 80GB hard drive. Manufactured by MSI (note the datawind device). I wouldn't class this as a netbook - just a cheap laptop but fits it with the theme.
Acer Aspire 1 8.9in screen £220 http://reviews.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/notebooks/0,1000000333,39438387,00.htm?r=1
HP HP 2133 Mini-Note PC http://hardware.silicon.com/desktops/0,39024645,39186069-1,00.htm
Elonex http://www.elonexone.co.uk/
As is to validate the maket Dell annouce their entry not expected for months though
OLPC created the context
the new OLPC is radical
Asus shook things up by applying the cheap concept to developed nations with the Eee PC. you can consider the Eee as disruptive technology. the time and condtions are just right for the Eee to make its impact. PC producers can see an opportunity here to "stack em high and sell em cheap" large quantities with a tiny margin. The "PC" market has never been so vibrant - just when you thought "gravity" was consolidating power to just a few mega brands like Dell up comes Asus to disrupt all that. However, Dell also have a cehaper model in the Vostro too. This has given an opportunity for the troubled PC manufacture turer Elonex to make a comback. Elonex have taken a bold gamble on the first sub £100 computer - the Elonex One at £99 - fairly low spec but the pre is amazing. It has 128mb Ram and a detechable keyboard see. Could be that the One is just too slow and underpowered but for £100 wow. Other manufacturers making umpcs are loking at factors rather than price - belinea have a £400 unit for example. For me the original Asus Eee seems to have got it just right and the drift down in price by Elonex is also right, inevitably though the pressure for higher margins will lead to feature creep and more power in the units but I think the cheap pc is now here to stay thanks to Asus More apreciation for the Asus Eee - http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/may/15/computing.linux -
clouds and power
more companies are relocating data centres close to electrical substations and other power sources. the cost and security of power supply in major conurbations is becoming a major problem and more companies are moving their data centres close to power sources. the analogy of cloud computing with the power grid develops. iceland is developing as an attractive data centre location due to it supply of geothermal energy - both abundant and "green" Gogle have located a major data centre next to a hydroelectic supply _ also abundant, clean energy Microsoft see a silver lining to every cloud
Recent comments from Micosoft see them attracted to the cloud as a way of combating piracy.
Pirated client software earns nothing for Microssoft whereas the cloud cannot be pirated - it can be subscription based or driven by ads.
The cloud is also a much better way to lock in people in
In a recent article Ballmer also recognises the changed consumer/web environment in statements such as
"The world will insist on 'click to run', not 'click to install' or 'click to configure'
Eee Linux Vs XP
Initial setup times
switch in, enter country; date/time; user info; connect to wifi network and configure wifi network then browse the net
Eee Linux 512Mb RAM 4Gb Flash drive = 3mins
Eee XP 1Gb RAM 8Gb flash drive = 7mins 30 seconds
Useability times
switch on to browse the net
Linux = 45 seconds
XP = 40 seconds
General impressions
Linux = more like a gadget and easier for the "normal" person to get on with - nice uncluttered screen
XP = traditional and for IT people - setup and operation feels more technical
Linux provides a nice clean interface with a good set of on-line desktop icons and usefful easy to use local aplications. I like the way the common icon are presented on the desktop.
The XP interface seems uninuitive - you need to know where things are (start, all programs, works). It seems difficult to locate and set up the wireless connection etc, This is strange given the amount of time and money Microsoft have spent on User Intreface research over the years - culminating in Vista......
I was surprised by the speed of XP - must surly be down to the solid state drive - the days of rotational media in user equipment are surey numbered.
Microsoft have managed to get some links to Microsoft Live on the menu - this is Microsoft waking up to the new world - head in the cloud but feet on the ground. I used live writer to create a blog entry on an existing live spaces area here - I really can't see the point of this approach
Microsoft - head in the cloud and feet on the ground
The perfect model is to go to a full on-line offer like Google sites and mash together diverse systems in as agnostic a way as possible - the new systems are evolving at a greater rate than any one supplier can keep up with.
Microsoft are offering a stepping stone to this new model by connecting what you already use and are familiar with to the cloud -presumeably the next step would be for Silverlight to then provide a full on-line option.
The Microsft model offers to link your existing Office installation to on-line hosted storage and to connet you company directory (e.g. Active Directory) to cloud.
Interesting.
Youtube annotationsWe can now add annotations to youtube videosThe Sensory Operating System (SOS) era
There were pre GUI systems like CP/M, MSDOS
There were GUI systems for the last 15 years or so like Mac and Windows
Vista seems more and more like the last eeking out of the GUI operating system - taking it as far as it could go.
For most of the GUI era software lagged behind hardware but for what might be regarded as the last microsoft product in the GUI era Microsoft seemed to overestimate the cost/power of hardware available for Vista
The mouse was a radical yet natural innovation for the human-computer interface and dominated the GUI era but recently many have regarded the mouse as a barrier to even better systems.
It seems as if we are now moving into the next phase of operating system and human-computer interaction. Systems in development are more "SENSORY" - they make use of other human senses and modes of interaction - speech,touch, gesture and movement.
Recent products have informed this move to the "sensory" operating system (SOS) - the success of the iPhone with its touch interface, the success of the Wii with it's motion interface.
This is good news for Microsoft as the GUI operating system is saturated and Microsoft is losing its dominance - teh GUI operating system is a commodity now and people are caring less about the operating system - as long as you can get onto the web.
Microsoft have an opportunty to set the scene for the next generation - if they are bold enough.
My Kid could code that
Todd Fast Sun Microsystems' chief architect of enterprise Java tools has provoked some interesting discussions from this presentation
Applications for the masses by the masses
Here are a few responses Hinchcliff’s reply at http://weblog.infoworld.com/daily/archives/2008/05/why_web_20_wont.html I am however encountering a surprising number of enterprise business users beginning to build mashups. They usually find some younger person who can do put something quick together using widgets, Yahoo Pipes, and some feeds. Also http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/05/12/Developers-role-shifting-from-apps-to-platforms_1.html
prime minister goes digital
Building Schools of the Future - putting the cart before the horse
BSF (Building Schools of the Future) is bold and radical and long term vision is what is needed.
At the risk of becoming too cyncical there are criticisms of the way it is implemented.
The IT element is the most controversial part of BSF - it is accused of allocating inadequate budgets and leaving schools at the mercy of centralised procurement to acheive economies of scale - creating mini-monoploies
The planned £4.5 bilion BSF program is a honeypot for private sector suppliers - the arguement is that long term innovation could suffer as strategic partners steer the money to supply what they already have. Here are some notes from The computing article from 17.4.08
and
Ian Lynch, spokeman for the Open Schools Alliance says:
"Innovation starts with teachers and pupils but under teh BSF teh schools IT strategy is taken out of its hands.
The massive rise in web 2.0 and social networking tells us that applications are moving to the web and tools provided free and supported by advertising - not licensing and subscription.
The further you remove control from users the more likely you are to entrenchthe status quo, whic many firms that would win BSF style contracts have an interest in maintaining.
Steve Molneux, an independent IT and e-learning expert comments
"The way young people use the web almost conflicts with the functionality of virtual learning environments, which were developed in the mid 1990's.
The fear is that large suppliers will deliver systems around what they already have - the future elemnt is beign left out.
The risk is in installing a managed service run by private sector companies more interesed in profit than education.
Some recent projects indicate that costs are rising - orignially indicated at £60 per student costs have risen to £150 per student.
Some of my comments
Why not adjust teaching, observe, get an idea of what might work and then change the environment more radically to match and encourage.
Think NAKED - take a lower impact approach - students own equipment, college allocated mobile equipment, adjust teaching in our existing spaces and then use this to inform more radical change.
We risk breaking things too much by just dropping people into a new environment too quickly.
It takes the premise of change the environemnt to change behaviour - this can have an effect but behaviour can influence environment. Web 2.0 is about small scale changes that diffiuse through organisations rather than big bang or bust approaches of the 20th century.
Voice - getting caught - the web resistance is futile
It sems like the web and the cloud will subsume everything.
there are interesting developmentswith video conferencing over the web and here are a few links to developments with Voice over the web
Overview of Voice Over Web - could this be called VOB
Ribbit - One of the leading companies in the VOB area
Jajah - another leading company in VOB - with web to standard handset options
Jaduka - company providing developer APIs so you can build your own VOB
GPS for ant-theft
GPS had been used as a tracking device for very expensive items in the past but as costs fall there are plans that Intel may integrate GPS into chipsets for "normal" location based services that are in demand but also for anti-theft tracking for items. So - your computer has been nicked and you know where it is but are you going to go there and get it back? MID WAD
MID = Mobile Internet Device WAD = Web Access Device Ihave been using the term WAD since most people just use the web. I think I wil use the term MID more from now on as it is more generic but allows the phrase MID life crisis Education - oportune period for change in teaching
The introduction of new diplomas and the delivery of GCSE's in more modular format provide an excellent opportunity to develop the new teaching styles we have been consiering - collaborative projects, more on-line material and delivery.
instrumentation of people
I read last week soemthing about installing sensors in peoples to monitor health and have the sensors report to a computer - possibly direct to a health system. interesting but could this be a bit too much. I need to read up more on this. the smartwatch
the smartphone is currently the focus for mobile - I still have to remember to take my phone though. A much more convenient mobile unit is the watch - far more convenient as it is worn and readily acessible on your wrist. I'm wondering if there will be a significant place for the good old watch in future mobile - especially when interfaces between units become better and technology shrinks further. maybe kinetic charging can help power our smartwatches. mobile displays are vital
vision is our dominant sense and caries by far the biggest information. Although dio is convenient for mobiles it wil be the introduction of revolutionary visual interfaces that will make a big difference to mobile. An important step will be to interface with external displays when they are avaiable. Another important step will be the development of new mobile displays - glasses with visual input, direct projection to the retina (scary), fold out or role out displays (soft screens) and projections - either onto a surface or eventually a sci fi style hologram forthcomming blogs
get naked about minimal technology use mind the gap about people between the lrading and trailing edges on new technology and methods planet mars about those on the leading edge - the ideas can sem so strange Asus Eee Vs Vista
cold times Asus Eee useable in 30seconds - you can open an application surfing in 50seconds shutdown in10 seconds Battery life = about 3 hours continuous use Vista useable in 110 seconds - you can open an application - but slow at this time as Vista is still running start up tasks -th eapplication actually runs about 60 seconds later surfing in 180 seconds shutdown in 50 seconds battery life = about 3 hours continuous use Asus - general impressions very portable - very useful as a notetaker keyboard encourages one finger typing - similar to smarrtphone (one thumb typing) but this is fine. I can see this being attractive in educatiion as an electronic notebook information handling thing. the smartphone still has it in terms of availabillity - you have to take your Umpc but you will probably have your smart phone. Conclusion The Asus Eee is a symbol of the age cheap, flash, internet, interoperability/standards - doesn't matter about the operating system or application sas long as you can get on the web and have some applications whoose files can be read by other applications (inc MS Office) and the web. EXPECT TO SEE ALL THE MAJORITY OF LAPTOPS BECOMING FLASH IN THE NEAR FUTURE zen and the infrmation age
past societies are investigated by their physical remains but the 21st century will be more difficult to 'unearth' with increasing amounts of what we do virtualised on computers - much of it not even stored. I wonder if there will be archaeology insecond life the history of the information age has other problems in addition to actualy finding soft records how can we verify them as soft records are by nature easily altered is this where history ends - we only exist in the present - the information age is a true zen experience the programable web
we certainly are seeing the rise of the read/write web but there are indications that programming is returning - from simple rss reader configurations and home page feeds and embeds to mashups and scripting. consumerism of IT
users have a budget to purchase and be responsible for their own IT. This is the model I am promoting for students now and it seems inevitable that this wil be the eventual model for staff IT as well. IT departments will need to focus on infrastructure and advice e.g. network, company data and access, company storage. e.g advising users on which tools and services - gogle docs or zoho or microsoft office or live etc the network is our computer
Clay Shirky's ideas are engaging.
I particularly like his comparison of something like email where we have "back and forth communication" comapred to web 2 style groups where a shared awareness can develop
Blogging
Gawker provides one application of blogging. Gawker provides a traditional UK newspaper style - if it wasn't for the name "blog" then it wold just look like a stadard "newspaper" except that you can comment and your comment can become part of the blog.
The guardian podcast here discusses the blogsite Gawker and the wider implications for jouranlism in the future and the idea of "writers" as brands.
In a sense a newspaper is a collection/community of journalists.
Most organsiations and companies are also collections/communities.
It will be interesting to see what develops from the notion of writers as brands and how this might develop in other proffessions.
Electrical power supply as analogy for IT developments
Nick Carr's "the big switch - from Edison to Google" seems to getting better and better as an analogy.
During the 1880's power was locally generated and DC - General Electric dominated
Through the 1880's the paradigm shifted to central generation and distribution over the power grid and Westinghouse became dominant
This analogy describes the current paradigm shift in IT and the main protagonists - Microsoft as General Electric (personal computing) and Google as Westinghouse (big central computing)
The main factor is the distribution grid - this all hangs on the broadband availability to users.
There are of course many possibilities - Fuel cells could turn the electrical paradigm back to personal for example. The Transparent world
IT and privacy - no such thing as a free lunch
There is great demand for Free service - paid for by ads.
To generate the revenues required and to reduce the inconvenience to the user the Ads required to finance the services are increasingly targeted and depend upon intelligence and profiling so that fewer but more effective ads are sent to the user.
This does mean that your behaviour is increasingly analysed by private companies.
It does seem as if the world is becomming increasingly transparent.
Not sure if I would go as far as the University of Washington where students vonuntarily where RFID tags and their location detected. A database updates their calendar and twitter and logs "encounter events"
Web 2 can be more secure
Using on-line documents like Google Docs can help avoid virus infections - you don't have to download and open a file onto your computer. Office documents are now a major way of spreadign virues again and you have to trust your anti-virus system and that of your collaborators to scan and disinfect documents but even then the anti-virus is one step behind the virus writers.
RSS feeds are also a safer way of viewingweb content - you arn't viewing the actual Web site and feeds are not currently spammable (you would unsubscribe to any feeds that got corrupted).
Computer literacy 2.0 (E-ducation)
The phrase computer literacy has been around for a good 20 years.
Wish I could think of a better term.
Here are some suggetions for current computer literacy - computer literacy 2.0
- Information management
Search techniques
Feed tchniques
Analysis and evaluaton of information (critical thinking)
- Information production
Tools
- standard tools such as Office
- new on-line tools
- collaboration e.g. groups,wiki's, shared docs, social networking
- On-line safety
awareness of what not to give away
threats such as phishing
- Interaction
Using appropriate technology from what's available
e.g. "etiquette" - not copyng in to many people
Edubuzz have some Guidlines on saftey at http://edubuzz.pbwiki.com/guidelines
The chemistry of Innovation
(hope my chemistry is ok here)
A mixture is just a collection - nothing new really - many attempts at innovation are really mixtures
A compound produces a new product with new properties
To produce a compound you need energy to break bonds (cross boundaries)
A catalyst can reduce the amount of energy needed
Lots of good analogies here
The stronger the boundaries the more energy is requitred to make innovation - you might just end up wth a mixture
The key must be to
- reduce boundaries
- introduce energy
- introduce catalysts
Analogies for innovation
Much of innovation is about bringing together and combining different things.
In Paradigm 2 I used the idea of "knitting" - multiple threads being woven together - problem with that analogy is that it seemed to happen by itself - I need to revisit that.
Cooking could be used - the idea of combining ingredients to creat a meal - looking around for new ingredients, adjusting proportions etc.
CHEMISTRY IS A VERY GOOD ANALOGY - mixtures Vs Compounds, catalysts, energy, reaction masses and boundaries.
Innovation
Innovation is about associations and connections.
Innovation develops with openess, opportunity and confidence
Innovation means development and change.
Innovation is similar to invention and although individuals can innovateand invent the problem is how to crerate the conditions for organistaions to innovate and invent.
To foster innovation organisations need to create the right environment - they need to
- Develop connections - encourage people to communicate across boudaries
- Be open and share
- Provide opportunities - resources for time, budgets, facilities and support
- Develop confidence - recognise that things go wrong - the importance of experimentation - 1 great idea might come from 10 failures
- Be able to change and deal with change in an apropriate way - you need to be flexible
A recent example is the "Terahertz" camera which used work from astronomers in detecting dying stars to detect hideen items in a security setting
musch of this is about taking a holistic approach
Towns and cities have been important sources of deveopment through History - one reason is the rich source of connections available to people.
Today the Internet provides the environment for innovation - a rich source of connections, opportunity and openess through web 2 - time is the problem.
To prevent innovation just reverse the conditions
Be secretive
Close connections - be hierachical, protective and restrict access
Close opportunity - keep people in their roles doing the same thing
develop insecurity through risk of failue and performance measurement
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remaining issues - how to direct innovation to appropriate targets - products that have a market or use? OpenID as "killer app
The management of user accounts, access and authentication takes increasing amounts of time on our own sytems. When people then have to connect across systems this becomes even worse.
Current localised accounts (seperate accounts on different systems) are time consuming and difficult for users but the major problem is that they restrict access and collaboration across systems.
Web 2 is about collaboration, sharing and openess but has been impeded by "web 1" user access methods - different accounts on differemt systems.
OpenID will be the key to really unleash the potential of Web 2. With most of the major systems now participating in OpenID I think we can look forward to a major step forward later in 2008.
The potential of OpenID is likely to be even more significant when combined with Opensocial
Also - in a sense OpenID is a further example of virtualisation - here it is the virtualisation of user accounts and authentication - systems no longer to maintan and mange their own user accounts - just manage access using OpenID - think SAS (software as service) think authentication as a service.
Technology as facilitator
I often have discussion about the role of technology in education - along the lines of - it's no use installing new techonology unless there is a use for it. There is an interaction though between technology and culture - they are intertwined and move along together.
Thinking about my videoblogs as an example of technology as facilitator but in a cultural context
The videoblogs I have been making are intended as an example of the interaction between technology and culture.
The new smartphone allows a new way of working:
- the built in videocamera lets me make a video anywhere/anytime - I;'ve usually got it with me
- the small unit is less intrusive than a bigger "proper" camcorder - people seem more willing to participate
- the "reverse" camera meant for videoconferencing is useful for video blogging - it helps to see yourself when you are talking into the camera - not sure why this is but it helps not to talk into the black hole of a camera lense.
Youtube allows a new way of publishing and everyone knows about youtube these days
Culture - people are aware of youtube and cameraphones - the barrier to acceptance and use is lowered as people are exposed to these technologies and for young people its quite natural.
Ideal Mobile
My ideal Mobile unit would be on that both has all its own functions AND allows them to be augmented by interaction.
I want my smartphone to have voice, video, camera, audio, GPS, radio, internet, local applications - everything accessible locally.
However, I realise that such little units have challenges in terms of battery life, processor speed, network connectivity, memory, screen size, keyboard size etc.
I want my smartphone to be able to use external systems to augment itself. Iwouldlike to be able to plug in additional power, processors, memory, keyboards, screens etc etc. Such developments are in the pipeline - Microsoft are talking about their Surface for example - place your phonme on their Surface and you can use the Surface screen and interfaces for example. I would like to be able to use an external camera to capture to the smartphone. I would like to be able to connect my smartphone into a "docking" station arrangement where it makes use of additional processor, memory and peripheral capabilities of the location.
One model am increasingly impressed with is that of remote application - Google docs, remote desktop. Take remote desktop - from my small, resource challenged device I can make use of the processor,memory and connectivity capacity of a much larger device. For example, from a device with a 1Ghz CPU, 1Gb RAM, 2Mbps network connection and 2Gb storage I could work on a spreadheet on a device offering say 8x 3Ghz cpu cores, 32Gb RAM, 2Tb storage and 10Gb ethernet access to the core of the Internet - I could off-load a huge financial calculation to this - make a cup of coffee and come back to find the results.
Sounds like terminal access to a manframe - IBM are quite aware of these developments
Virtualisation
We really are in the age of virtualition - Google to second life but on our own systems this is happening too.
We have run Virtual LANs on our network for about 8 years or more - we know have virtual routers too
We are using Virtual servers more and more - from none in August Inow have almost 30
We are using Virtual desktops more - we use them frequently in develpment and are about to use some to deploy on-line testing
In looking at Network Attached Storage and iSCSI we are in fact looking at yet anotehr form of virtualisation - the virtualisation of storage
user support
with user centric computing - users with their own equipment then there are possibilities for stgudents and other users to be involved with support. one of the problems we have with corporate equipment and computing is that we can't offer work experience due to security and data protection concerns but when corporate equipment isn't involved then we maybe able to use students in this support role user centric computing
in the near future when students and staff use their own equipment more and where we loan out equipment to students we wil need to expand support in this area - to operate the loan system, maintain and service the equipment and to support users with their use of IT. this is a sort of paratechnician function - a cross bewteen technician and learning resource asistant and the function would sit most comfortably in centralised learning centres. this seemms to go hand in hand with the decline in the use of boks and therise in the use of on line systems and materials in all aspects of life. information is freedom
20th century - information was more centralised, scarce, controlled and structured - information is power remember having to access books and libraries and where a teacher might have new information. now information is readily available and colaboration easy students are often better at teachers with working the net and using new technology to access unprecedented amounts of information.
what is the role of the teacher in this new world?
like the record industry adapting to a resource that is infitely copyable education must adapt to an age where its resource - information and knowledge is widely available how you know
with so much information coming available it will be more important to know how to find and use it rather than just know stuff rather like the use of calculators in maths - the mechan.ical skill is les important computer literacy 2 how to search how to develop feeds how to interact to develop ollaboration and conectios mobile zoho and google gears for off line acess impress on me how "earth moving" the on-line model will become - the next generation wil laugh at out quaint local aplications
will 2008 be the tipping point year when people just think web this is a dem for dude
web 2 environments
there are 3 options 1 institutional - think sharepoint 2 SAS hosted - think google sites 3 personal -think ning and separate applications like blogger, zoho etc the personal is easy and happening the problem is with institutional and hosted acess models are confused do we want only internal or only by account or public - what about parent access etc etc. I like the idea of gogle sites (hosted) but control is difficult and it is limited at the moment sharepoint probably fits the bill but takes a lot of effort to get going phases of IT
phase 1 mainframes their computing phase2 personal computing my computing phase 3 collaborative computing out computing this is a comment |