I've been having an ongoing discussion with a colleague on "what has really changed". so much of what we do today has its roots in what was done "yesterday". For example, how are links on the web different from citations in journal articles? Or how is our manner of collaboration today different from collaboration in guilds in Europe? My argument against "it's just the same" is somewhat anemic still, but generally centers on: technology has enabled new affordances of interaction with others, the pace of information growth and flow, and the scope/scale of conversations. While we today may be learning in a similar manner to what was done even a generation ago, the point of departure will become greater as time goes on. The impact of Descartes and Luther, for example, was not felt in their own generation. They marked a departure, but the full implications still ripple today. Similarly, social technologies for creating and sharing information, making sense of our world, and creating small-scale global networks don't seem to be a significant departure from 20 years ago. But talk to me in a few decades :). Anyway, this post (via John Connell) provides an indication of the similarity of previous methods, but the point of departure already reveals a different tomorrow: Social media in the 90's
Posted by gsiemens at March 6, 2008 5:14 PM | TrackBackI agree speed/scale/scope/access have all increased in a wired world. But I'm still hung up on the new affordances and how they fundamentally change how we make sense of information and how we learn. What real value do the affordances of the new technologies add? What is different beyond speed/scale/scope/access? Was everybody dumber before the Internet? When I think back to my personal learning environment before the Internet, I remember feeling that even with a more limited, but still too plentiful, access to information, I couldn't keep up with what was happening in my discipline even then. I still felt that if only I had time to read more of x, to explore y, to experiment with z. I didn't have time for the speed/scale/scope/access I had to information before the Internet.
In a similar vein to social media in the 90's how about a list of how 'old' methods have been adapted/adopted by new technologies. To start:
Bibliographies (who I'm reading) --> Recommender systems
Filtered news from multiple sources - local, national and international - delivered to you daily (newspapers) --> aggregators
Posted by: Peter T at March 7, 2008 5:45 PM