-
Of Course
George Siemens and I ran the Course to Discourse mini-conference the other week, to discuss the future of the course. The elluminate recordings are now up if you missed it. Here is the slideshare of my presentation: Digital Implications for Universities View more OpenOffice presentations from mweller. I opened the conference and so I was trying to set the tone for what was to come by considering the impact of digitisation on education. I employed a rather reductionist strategy by considering higher education as being comprised of a number of components. I used the analogy of newspapers to consider how each of their components had been weakened by digitisation. I…
-
What would ALT-REF look like?
So in the UK the Research Assessment Exercise is being replaced by the REF (Research Exercise Framework – see it's got a different name?). This will evaluate the research standing of individuals and departments and allocate money accordingly. Here's what they say: "The REF will consist of a single unified framework for the funding and assessment of research across all subjects. It will make greater use of quantitative indicators in the assessment of research quality than the RAE, while taking account of key differences between the different disciplines." In a twitter exchange with Joss Winn and Brian Kelly this morning I talked about creating an alternative to the REF: I…
-
The Four Assumptions of the Publishing Apocalypse
<Image Apocalypse by New Man http://www.flickr.com/photos/rnewpol/310013754/> I have pondered before that referencing in academic papers is an anachronistic practice in a digital age. This came home to me again recently, and my reaction was almost visceral this time. I wrote an article for a journal recently (I know! What was I thinking?), and it inevitably featured lots of online references. I thought I had conformed to the loathed APA referencing style, but was then asked for web pages to specify "(n.p.) when page number not known and (para 4) when the quote comes from a particular paragraph in an online article." Let's look at those requests: a) it's an online…
-
What I talk about when I talk about running
I read Murakami's reflection on running recently (he pinched the title from the first chapter of my VLE book – oh, okay, we both pinched it from Raymond Carver, but I got there first), and it caused me to consider why I run. I started running regularly about four years ago (it's my runiversary!). Before I launch into a meditation on running here are a few facts: I am patently not very good at it. There are people who discover running and a talent is unearthed, they are effortlessly clocking sub-3 hour marathons and a slow training run is faster than I can ever manage. I am not one of…
-
Bless my cotton socks I’m in the news
(yes, I have been waiting a long time to use that title) A couple of weeks ago, a journalist from The Guardian contacted me to talk about how a tweet from Stephen Fry had sent over 10,000 visitors to the OU's Devolve Me site. The angle was initially the power of new media, but quickly morphed into educational use of new twitter. I stressed the importance of one's personal network and new forms of digital scholarly activity. I didn't really have a single message though, and journalists like to have something to hang a report around, and it seemed clear that she wanted to go beyond the Fry story. So…
-
Can we talk of a blogging ‘industry’?
Cayusa – http://www.flickr.com/photos/cayusa/2941045084/> There was a piece in the Wall Street Journal recently which claimed that "In America today, there are almost as many people making their living as bloggers as there are lawyers. Already more Americans are making their primary income from posting their opinions than Americans working as computer programmers or firefighters." My reaction was similar to that of a lot of bloggers – 'Really? Are you sure?' I left it at that, but of course, some others did a bit of digging. Adam Gurri gives a good summary of the criticism, chief amongst them Clay Shirky who rather takes the piece apart arguing that: "their key figure…
-
Happy blogiversary to me
<Image – revised version of Evan's 3rd Birthday by D'Arcy Norman http://www.flickr.com/photos/dnorman/48439662/> I am three today. Yes, three years ago I started EdTechie, so here is another of those blogging about blogging posts. First up, some facts: In that time I have done 451 posts I have gathered 1196 comments The average number of comments per post therefore is 2.7 I have 1098 subscribers (although who knows how many are active) Most popular posts are: The VLE/LMS is dead A Twitter Love Song Social Networks will make us scared of kittens Ownership ain't what it used to be Future of content My first comment was by Juliette Culver (then White)…
