Learning- in Theory and in Practice Response Blog

Discussion Question: What is the difference between the explicit and implicit dimensions of knowledge?

This chapter made me really think about the difference between knowledge and imformation. It is important for people to actually experience things in order for them to gain knowledge. Anyone can go on the internet or read a newspaper to get information, but knowledge is more personal and varies among every individual. I thought it was interesting to read about the project of the computer engineer that demonstrated the "community of practice". He told of a group of about 15 or so people, who all knew what was going on with what they were doing and they all were on a level working-field. The group was successful and had very few arguments. I can relate to this because it reminds me of the place that I work. I work at a used bookstore called Bookholders. There are only about 6 people working at a time and we all know how to do almost everything within the store. Even if someone does need help, all they have to do is ask and they can be shown. We are a very small group with very little structure and we all mesh as employees really well. There are few arguments and a lot gets done around the store. I think it is true that you need specific experience in order to gain specific knowledge about a specific topic. People who have a lot of experience doing what they are doing, have more job security or chance of getting a new job, than someone who simply has done a lot of reading about how to do a particular job. I also found it very interesting to learn that simply through the practice of speaking and listening, children learn about 13 words a day over 16 years. I never thought to compare how a child would learn to speak if they had to learn strictly from the dictionary. Because the practice isn't there, the learning method is extremely less effective.

Limits to Information Response Blog

Discussion Question: Could it be true that eventually, this overload of information technology will lead to the end of television, universities, cities, and nation states?

I think that it is crazy to think that just because we have so much information, this means that all of the things that hold our societies together now, will eventually become diminished. To have all of these things end, what would the world come to? I worry that the world will come to be very impersonal and all technological. It is still necessary for children to go outside and play, instead of sitting inside playing video games. Even adults should go outside more. The internet is not only used for important information, so people waste their time for hours on the internet instead of hanging out with people or even leaving their seat. I think that all of the information technlology that we have is extremely important and I don't think that people should be complaining about the amount of information. There is nothing wrong with being able to find the answer to almost any question on the internet. It is extremely convenient and it has become almost necessary to use the internet to acquire information. Books are still useful, but now there is even technology to replace books. The Kindle is a peice of software that allows you to download and read books through a small, mp3-like device. I hope that the rise of technology does not bring about change that sseriously affects our society or makes it completely impersonal. I like talking to my friends and hanging out with them, I don't want to Skype with my friends from the same university as me and never hang out with them face to face. This technology allows you to see and talk to poeple as if they were right next to you. It is effective when people are far away from each other, but the better the technology gets, the more I worry about things like technology taking over almost every aspect of life. I think that the theory that the telegraph was the start of the information technology is somewhat true. Although people have been making smoke messages and such for centuries, I think that the telegraph is the first example of communication travelling fast from one person to another, through technology.

Tip for Using Powerpoint!

Because a powerpoint presentation is meant to be a simple presentation of the main ideas you wish to convey, there is a useful tool on the powerpoint software to help you while doing your presentation. If you click on the "view" tab in Powerpoint 2007, there is a tool called "Notes Page." If you choose this tool you will be able to type your own notes underneath of the slide, and these notes are only visible to you when you print out your presentation. This way you can better direct your attention to your audience, instead of following and reading directly off of the powerpoint, as this is not what it is meant for. You can have more in depth discussion of the meain ideas in your own notes to help you remember what you need to talk about, without including all of the information on the slides. I hope this helps!

Copyright Reading Response

What would the creative world be like if it weren't for the copyright laws the James Madison set into place so many years ago? Without the copyright laws, would we have to cite our sources like we do today? What is the concept of DMCA and why is it so dangerous?

These copyright articles were very informative on the different aspects of copyright, from the beginning of the laws up until the current details on it. I think it is very interesting to think about what the world would be like without a copyright law. In the Vaidhyanathan article it was interesting when the point was brought up that without copyright, people could reproduce and resell an authors original work and sell it for their own profit, even though it has nothing to do with them. I like the idea that people have the right to claim their "intellectual property" as their own, that way no one gets to take the creativity of another, or claim it as their own. I did not know that something has a copyright immediately as you write it, as long as it is original, even if it is just on a napkin. I did not understand the concept of the 1998 Digital Millenium Copyright Act. I found this part of the article to be very hard to understand and it even repeats one part in a kind of redundant way. I don't understand how not allowing people to break through electronic gates to the work would cause people to copy and abuse someone's work.

Wikipedia Comic Activity Review

1. Megan did the work on her computer but we both brought an equal amount of input into the project. Megan came up with the idea of the comic which was essentially that anyone can edit articles on wikipedia. She put together the comic while I searched for pictures and information to use as a part of the comic, such as the yankees players.

2. The process of working together went well because without Megan it would have taken me much longer to complete the project and even to come up with an idea of what to focus on. I like working with other people because two heads is better than one.

3. I learned how to make a comic on pikistrips.com, although I don't anticipate using the software again as I am not a very creative person.

The Wiki Story - Response #3

Question: I don't really know if this serves as the question you're looking for but I could not understand the statement "...but today those objections have taken on the flavor of the apocryphal farmer beholding his first giraffe and exclaiming,'Ain't no such animal!" (pg 117).

I found this reading very interesting in the fact that the success of the Wikipedia trumped the more legitimate Nupedia. Because the creation of Nupedia was so in depth and needed a full force of effort behind it, it had trouble surviving. As soon as Sanger and Wales tested the wiki project, it was immediately receiving more feedback than the Nupedia ever had. The fact that the public found it more accessible, and were actually interested in helping to build the amount of entries in Wikipedia reminds me of the previous reading involving "amateurization" versus professionalism. Does this situation with the wiki being more successful play into the fact that more and more amateurs seem to be participating in actions that used to be left to the professionals? I also question why the public wouldn't prefer to rely on a more reliable source such as Nupedia, as opposed to a website with user-generated content. I thought it was interesting to read about the reasons why people would even be interested in putting their own personal knowledge about something into a page online, for others to learn from. I liked to read that one of the reasons that people take the time to make entries is based on their desire to do a good thing. I think that the part in the book that describes the Ultimatum game. It is odd to think that it is human nature to "have a willingness to punish those who are treating us unfairly" (Shirky 134). It is interesting to think about choosing between getting nothing or getting a little and having to deal with the other person getting more than you. In the article about collective intelligence, I find it interesting that it notes on how higher education institutions push students to use more scholarly sources. The article focuses on the importance of collective intelligence and being open to "that there are diverse forms of expertise and that we learn more if we draw on as many different minds as possible rather than placing our trust in singular minds" (Jenkins, "Sharing Notes about Collective Intelligence"). I wonder if schools will ever make the shift from scholarly input to a more collective source of intelligence.

Everyone Is a Media Outlet & Publish, Then Filter

Discussion Questions: How long will it take for the newspapers to become totally depleted? Even though Lott was the majority leader for the Republican Party in Congress, is it fair for him to be penalized for something that he said around friends in a casual setting? How can you distinguish between broadcast media and communication media in a user generated situation such as Facebook?

Firstly, I think that the internet is a huge threat to printed newspapers. On the multiple news websites, a reader can find all of the articles that are found in the newspapers, plus hundreds more. On top of the news websites, a reader can get information of almost any kind on the internet. I believe that within the next 50 years the newspaper will no longer be an institution and the professionals will work to post stories on the online news. Next, I think that it is a shame that media takes people’s privacy away from them. Although I obviously do not agree with the seemingly racist statement made by Lott, I also don’t think that a person should always have to watch what they say for fear of it being presented to the public. Lastly, I think that all of the blogging and user generated content that you find on the web today is really too much. There is very useful information online, but there is also a lot of pointless information on different blogging sites and all of the other sites that have mostly user generated content. But at the same time, the internet now provides everyone with the ability to express their thoughts, ideas, feelings, etc. online with their friends, peers, and the world wide web, if they so choose. I am a Facebook user myself and I sometimes get annoyed with how much information is presented on it. Especially in high school people would get into fights through Facebook and it’s so silly and pointless. It takes the realness out of things and does not force people to have face to face confrontations but instead makes them wireless. People say what they are doing every hour, and how they are feeling about their boyfriends, and the “cool” stuff that they did last night. It almost seems too personal. But, hey, it’s a free country.

Here Comes Everybody Reading Response #1

After reading this part of the book, "Here Comes Everybody", I am left wondering what they would have done if our technology today was not so advanced as to allow a person to start a personal webpage with links and dicussion boards. Because Ivanna was able to find out what the girls e-mail address was, I wonder if it would have been smarter for her to go directly to the police and deal with the situation that way. Ivanna is lucky that she has a friend as great as Evan that he would invest so much time and money into a project such as this. After reading, I was intrigued by the story and decided to actually look into the "StolenSidekick" webpage. The page was so full of updates and he accepts donations to make up for the money he spent keeping the webpage running. Because Ivanna already purchased a new Sidekick, they decided to auction off the cell phone on eBay and it sold for something like $2000 dollars which they divided and sent a portion of to charity. They also had a segment on 20/20 following the whole incident. It is amazing how in our society word can spread so fast regarding a simple lost cell phone. Without the technology that is present, nothing ever would have happened about the lost cell phone and Ivanna probably would have just had to move on with her life and accept the fact that an undeserving girl was running around with her Sidekick. Because Evan worked so hard to get the word out there and to get people involved, his plan to get the cell phone back, simply for the sake of gaining justice, was extremely successful. Thanks to the internet and the many people using it, Evan and Ivanna were able to convince the police to change the claim from a "lost" to a "stolen" property. Sasha was arrested for stealing the phone but Ivanna did not press charges because she felt that she had gotten exactly what she was looking for and everyone had already been through enough stress from the situation. Maybe their story will make someone think twice about stealing a phone that they found in a taxi.

Information Society

To me, the term information society means living in a society where information is ever present, be it through technology or simply through a conversation with your peers. The term information is defined as knowledge communicated or recieved concerning a particular fact or circumstance. Society is defined as an organized group of persons associated together for religious, benevolent, cultural, scientific, political, patriotic, or other purposes. From these definitions I gain that an information society can be described as a group of people that is knowledgable about a certain or many different facts. Because we live in a society where the center of most of our day to day lives includes cell phones, computers, television, radio, and many other technologies, we are always being presented with new information. At any point in time we are able to access any kind of information that we may want to know. Simply by accessing Google, we can learn the answer to any questiont that we may have (besides maybe what secrets is the government holding). I would say that this is definitely an information society that we live in and with each day that passes it becomes more and more so.