I posted my thoughts on the OpenEd 09 conference over at my personal blog. It is long, but I tried to capture the energy and passion I witnessed ... If you are interested, please jump over and read it. The event was mind bending on so many levels, it is hard to put into words.
2009 Faculty Academy at University of Mary Washington
Twitter tag search results.
Keynote James Boyle
Excellent speaker --> No slides and exceptionally engaging
Previous Chair of Creative Commons
Hypothetical Situation #1
If you were asked to design two different systems:
Imagine 1992 --> Terminal --> Designed to restrict access to the network --> You are a consumer, consuming from a predefined list of functions (print, send)
Imagine 1992 --> WWW --> The network will carry anything --> The Internet treats blocking as a malfunction and routes the user around it --> Recipients can also be producers (they can put stuff up that we've not attached a value to it)
Thoughts --> Network #2 will be a disaster --> Porn, SPAM, Idiots, Ranting, Stupid Rumors will be spread, and Piracy --> No one will do commerce on a public network --> It will be a disaster --> Let's go with a nice safe network where control lives
Who would have imagined that 17 years ago?
Hypothetical Situation #2
If you were asked to design two different encyclopedias:
Imagine 1992 --> "I want you to design the world's greatest encyclopedia" --> Build a large corporation who can execute top down control --> It is going to cost a lot (writers, review, editors, etc) --> Trademark and Copyright would be critical
Imagine 1992 --> "I want you to design the world's greatest encyclopedia" --> We would just put up a website and let people do it themselves --> We'd have that is crazy
Hypothetical Situation #3
If you were asked to design two different methods for creating software:
Imagine 1992 --> Closed source license --> Built around tight control with a model for generating revisions and updates --> Money
Imagine 1992 --> Open Source Software --> Open, free access --> Changes move back into the commons
Which would flourish? Both.
IBM makes twice as much on OSS as they do from patent enforcement. IBM is the world's largest patent holder.
"if you want a secure system it has to be open"
Each of these choices is between open and closed. At the time most (if not all) would have chosen closed.
Open is not always better, but we have a cultural bias against openness.
Teaching should be about open --> How do we learn to teach? --> We take others peoples work and remix it --> Raises a set of really interesting observations --> Surely textbooks have been crowd sourced, open educational resources, and other ideas have not come into focus.
It is not just the freedom to copy, it is the freedom to remix.
We have a flourishing global encyclopedia and OSS movements, but not an active approach to openness in education.
Search engines are failing us not b/c of their algorithms, but b/c of the closed nature of our information -- the Science web is trapped in 1993 search results --> terms, not context and value --> Content is too closed
Right now we are being more cautious with our content than Viacomm --> That is pathetic
Everyone is an edge case in someone else's discipline
Conclusion:
The norm should be open --> Common sense must win --> SSN --> No --> Course materials, Scholarly Presses, Technical Systems --> Yes
Mock Debate: Is the CMS Dead?
Jim Groom and John St. Clair
This was perhaps the most fun I've had at a conference. Jim went first and claimed that it wasn't that the CMS was simply dead, that it is undead -- like a zombie. It cannot be killed. He clearly has a negative impression of the notion of the CMS as a Institutionally driven, top down system. I think one of the best assertions is that too many people think the CMS/LMS itself is that it isn't about teaching and learning, it is about managing course rosters, uploads, etc.
The real wonderful thing that happened occurred when John St. Clair (Distance and Blended Education) started by saying Jim misunderstood the challenge -- that he wanted to debate if the "Conventional Midsize Car" was dead. All I can say is that it was brilliant on so many levels.
Something I failed to mention in my reflection post was the release of the 2009 NMC Horizon Report. Each year NMC and ELI team up to publish an annual look into the crystal ball of emerging teaching and learning trends ... I always look forward to the release of this publication and it typically has several items in it that we are looking at or that are on our radar ... it also does a great job of giving us new directions for where we are headed in the future.
The big difference this year is that I was invited to be a member of the advisory board and let me say it was an honor working with so many smart and talented people in our field. You can read the finished report on your own, so I won't get too far into it ... but the section on the Personal Web was a place I lobbied hard to make sure it appeared.
What I found fascinating was the process the NMC took to gather the items for the report. We were given wiki space, a collection of tags, and some heavy duty deadlines to make sure we contributed. Each step of the process was well regulated and kept us all pushing each other to not only dream, but to provide evidence that our dreams could come true. If you are interested in a well formed collaborative process for publication take a look at the Horizon wiki.
While at ELI, they formally released the report to the community in a session. It should be required reading for all of us! Grab a copy and take a look.
I wanted to share out some notes I've taken while at the Berkman@10 Conference. It has been an exhausting two and a half days. Probably the most intellectually stimulating event I have attended ... a real stretch opportunity for me for a ton of reasons. I wanted to attend to see how a law school looked at the issues I try and pay attention to ... I was not disappointed.
I wasn't able to capture all of it, but what I did grab I posted to two places:
