The text reads:

You are invited to test a new Apple iPad! Because of the big hype around the iPad, several companies are giving away iPads for review purposes as soon as they are available.

Yes, you really can get a new iPad, but only for a limited time, so be sure to enter right now!

It’s quick and easy, just follow these 3 simple steps :

Step 1: Become a Fan. Click the button below and Step 2 will be revealed.

Out of curiosity, I clicked on “Become a Fan” and steps 2 and 3 were shown:

IN ORDER TO COMPLETE THE REGISTRATION, the new fan is asked to invite all his/her friends to become fans and to copy a piece of javascript code when doing so. Being skeptical, I refused to disturb my friends and possibly expose them to a scam.

Instead, I simply clicked on the “3″ button and a new window opens:

“Sorry, this offer is unavailable in your country. You are now being redirected to a similar offer that is available in your country.”

In a second or two, I was brought to a site with lots of smiley icons. Before the page could fully load, I closed it.

HOW GULLIBLE CAN PEOPLE GET? As of now, there are over 6,000 fans on that page - an increase of a few hundreds since I first viewed the page. One of its earlier variants iPad Research Center – Test & Keep It had over 240,000 fans. By the way, the “comments”/”testimonies” on the promo page were not real. That’s just an inserted image. And I’ve of course removed myself from being a fan of the page.

Other variations:

• Apple iPad Market Research Testing: Test and keep and iPad today
• Testers Wanted: Test New iPad, Keep It
• iPad Research Program – Test It and Keep It!
• iPad Research Center – Test & Keep It

Beware too of scams galore on Facebook that promise freebies and may end up making you pay (literally) instead. For example, “Walmartstores.com: Gift Card Sponsor Offer Scam“.

As the blogger at blog.thequonk.com put it:

Be discerning. A marketing firm that is truly offering 10,000 free iPads should have enough money in their budget to put together an attractive, well-designed, correctly-functioning website and not rely just on Facebook as a marketing tool. I admit, Facebook is a pretty good place to start but it’s not the only place to go. Why do they not have an external website? Or the more obvious, why is there no company information? Founded in 2010? I don’t know what information it’s asking you for in the ‘Become a Tester’ application but you might want to change your Privacy Settings for future ‘deals’. iPad is the new toy and phishers know that. Read between the lines before you sign your life away for a free iPad. Make sure it is legit then you can sign your life away. =D

• A man saw a photo of himself posted on the city Police Department’s Facebook fan site in connection with a robbery he didn’t commit. He went to the police station to correct the problem, and the information he gave police led to the arrest of a 30-year-old man police said they believe is the real robber. — HomeTownAnnapolis.com, 18 October 2009
• A 26-year-old fugitive was caught in Cancun, Mexico after he told his Facebook friends, including a former Justice Department official, that he was living in paradise there. — The Guardian, 14 October 2009
• A 33-year-old clubber who attacked a man with a bottle has been jailed Portsmouth, UK, after his victim tracked him down using the Facebook social networking site. — BBC News, 08 October 2009
• A 26-year-old burglar was caught in Rome, Italy because he logged onto Facebook during the break-in. — Telegraph, 03 October 2009
• A 19-year-old Pennsylvania man was arraigned on a charge of daytime robbery in Berkeley County, USA because he used the victim’s computer to check his Facebook status during the robbery. — The Journal, 16 September 2009
• [Feb 2010 update]:  The Singapore Police Force has a Police Appeal photo album entitled “Police Appeal: Do you know these people?” on Facebook. The photos were apparently added about nine months ago!

What about other social media?

“Boston police using Twitter and Facebook to track down bike thieves” — Mashable, 20th July 2009

“The next time you think about breaking and entering, you might want to consider that police departments are now savvy to social media and will use the power and reach of the web to catch you… the Los Angeles Police Department has just released surveillance video from a break-in that took place at Lindsay Lohan’s Hollywood Hills home on Sunday morning. Their method of conveyance— YouTube.” — Mashable, 26th August 2009

Recognize anyone in the video below?

See Also:

• Use of social networks in investigations on Wikipedia
  

CAUTION:

• Facebook scammers latest trend in cyber thievery — Sunday Gazette Mail, 18th October 2009
• Careless Facebook use can get you robbed too. — Mashable, 27th August 2009

THE WORD “SOCIAL” in social media says it all. When one participates in SOCIAL media, you’re supposed to be “social” — be sociable or at the very least, ”human”. Being human means having a face, a proper name (or nickname), and not a generic product/service name.

I’m continually amazed by the number of comments posted here that have silly inhuman usernames such as “car dvds”, “security”, “printing”, “jokes”, “teacher”, “attorney”, “liability law”, etc. Many of these commenters also write very inane stuff such as, “nice article thank you for sharing” – which can be posted on any blog and basically says nothing. Haha, very smart and very stupid at the same time. Because this means that you are making zero or even negative impact here, on the blog owner as well as on the other blog visitors. Your so-called “social interaction” or “social presence” neither appeals to the mind nor the heart.

So, HELLO! Please get real and be human here. Otherwise, SHHHHOOOOOO! Go away and good riddance! Inhuman interactions are not welcome here.

See Also: Common Social Media Mistakes

David Armano observed in his blog at Harvard Business Today “a fundamental truth to social media that many organizations underestimate — being social means having real live people who actively participate in your initiatives.  It’s difficult to automate and a challenge to scale, but it can also help move your business forward in ways that produce leveraged outcomes such as new/better products or services.”

He also noted that seeding, feeding, and weeding all take place after any social initiative has been launched:

• Seeding. Investing to grow your effort into a healthy ecosystem that can produce data, insights or even new ideas. People will be required in order to do this.
• Feeding. Feeding the media with a steady stream of content. Some of this can be automated… but there has to be some editorial judgment made for every piece of content and functionality. People are required for that.
• Weeding. A productive social business design will require efforts to prune and weed out material that can inhibit its growth (just like a garden). In some cases, automated moderation services can do this–but in others people will be required to ensure that interactions are productive..

1. You didn’t use your real name. Facebook will find you and spit you out.
2. You joined too many groups. (The maximum limit is 200 groups per user.)
3. You posted too many messages on a wall or in a group. E.g. Guy Kawasaki had his account disabled–in his case for “excessive evangelism.”
4. You posted in too many groups, too many user’s walls. (That’s what spammers do, silly.)
5. You friended too many people. (Not so long ago this was a prime cause of disabled accounts, but Facebook has instituted a maximum of 5000 friends that should protect you from yourself.)
6. Your school/organization affiliation is doubtful.
7. You’re poking too many people. (Beware the odd FB app that pokes on your behalf.)
8. You advertised your app on wall posts.
9. You used duplicate text in multiple messages.
10. You are a cow, dog, or library.
11. You are under 18 years old and not part of a High School group.
12. You wrote offensive content.
13. You scraped information off Facebook. E.g. Facebook bots disabled Robert Scoble’s account.

ACCORDING TO MARI SMITH, here are more possible reasons your account may be deactivated:

1. You send “too many” friend requests in one day/session.
2. You make “too many” wall posts in one day/session – especially with verbatim content and with links.
3. You copy and paste the same friend request message “too many” times.
4. You send too many identical emails to individual friends and/or friend lists*.
5. You message your Group members “too many” times.
6. You message your Event invitees “too many” times.

.
Recommended action steps:

1. Take your time to build up a strategic network of friends on Facebook. Focus on quality, not quantity.
2. Send no more than approximately 20 new friend requests at any one time. Also, be sure to mix up the friend request messages.
3. Use your own opt-in email system.
4. Build out your Facebook Page.
5. Include Facebook in your overall marketing strategy. Don’t put all your social networking “eggs” in one basket. Build up a following on Twitter, FriendFeed, Plaxo, LinkedIn, etc.
6. Remember there was life before Facebook.

.
SEE ALSO:

• Facebook’s official Statement of Rights and Responsibilities.
• Account Disabled discussion on Faceboook.

In the February 2009 post, Rubel commented:

“Yet many, particularly in PR, still treat ordinary citizens, traditional journalism and branded content as distinct islands of media. Going forward, it’s best to see them as a contiguous archipelago.

“Consider that in 2008 some 58 percent of newspapers featured some form of user-generated content on their sites, according to the Bivings Group. This is up from just 24 percent in 2007. The mix includes: user-generated photos (58 percent), homegrown video (18 percent) and articles (15 percent). Meanwhile, the number of newspaper sites that are allowing readers to comment on articles has more than doubled to 75 percent.

“On the other side of the coin, we’ve seen time and again that social networks like Facebook, Friendfeed and Twitter are now essential sources of news and information for millions.”

This brings us to the social media ethics question. In the October 2008 post, Rubel wrote:

“First, all things social are media and all things media are now social – so I am not sure what “social media” is any more.

“More importantly, social media marketing also implies that social networks, blogs and other like channels are advertising venues. They’re not. They’re public spaces just like our great National Parks. We must respect them as such. Otherwise we’re going to pollute the environment and make them less enjoyable for everyone - especially the citizens who thrive there, just like the amazing ecosystem that thrives in places like Yellowstone…

“Social media marketing works best when it’s integrated into the experience and takes a “win-win” approach.”

As quoted by William Taylor in Fast Company:

The biggest problem with mass-market advertising, Godin says, is that it fights for people’s attention by interrupting them. A 30-second spot interrupts a “Seinfeld” episode. A telemarketing call interrupts a family dinner. A print ad interrupts this article. “The interruption model is extremely effective when there’s not an overflow of interruptions,” Godin says. “But there’s too much going on in our lives for us to enjoy being interrupted anymore.”

The new model, he argues, is built around permission. The challenge for marketers is to persuade consumers to volunteer attention – to “raise their hands” (one of Godin’s favorite phrases) – to agree to learn more about a company and its products. “Permission marketing turns strangers into friends and friends into loyal customers,” he says. “It’s not just about entertainment – it’s about education.”

Finally, as Seth Godin put it in his blog:

Permission marketing is the privilege (not the right) of delivering anticipated, personal and relevant messages to people who actually want to get them… Permission is like dating. You don’t start by asking for the sale at first impression. You earn the right, over time, bit by bit…

In order to get permission, you make a promise. You say, “I will do x, y and z, I hope you will give me permission by listening.” And then, this is the hard part, that’s all you do. You don’t assume you can do more. You don’t sell the list or rent the list or demand more attention. You can promise a newsletter and talk to me for years, you can promise a daily RSS feed and talk to me every three minutes, you can promise a sales pitch every day (the way Woot does). But the promise is the promise until both sides agree to change it. You don’t assume that just because you’re running for President or coming to the end of the quarter or launching a new product that you have the right to break the deal. You don’t.

HOW DID INSTITUTIONS DESIGNED FOR LEARNING become so widely hated by people who love learning? It’s been almost two years (spring 2007) since Dr Michael Wesch of Kansas State University invited the 200 students in his “Introduction to Cultural Anthropology” class to tell the world what they think of their education by helping him script a video for YouTube.

The result was the disheartening portrayal of disengagement below (viewed almost 3 million times worldwide as of today):

LAST OCTOBER, Dr Wesch wrote, “Despite my role in the production of the video, and the thousands of comments supporting it, I recently came to view the video with a sense of uneasiness and even incredulity. Surely it can’t be as bad as the video seems to suggest, I thought… But when I walked into my classroom for the first day of school two weeks ago I was immediately reminded of the real problem now facing education. The problem is not just ‘written on the walls’. It’s built into them.”

The problem

“The video seemed to represent what so many were already feeling, and it became the focal point for many theories… Most blamed technology, though for very different reasons… luddites imagine students to be distracted and superficial while techno-optimists see a new generation of hyper-thinkers bored with old school ways…

“Texting, web-surfing, and iPods are just new versions of passing notes in class, reading novels under the desk, and surreptitiously listening to Walkmans… despite appearances, our classrooms have been fundamentally changed. There is literally something in the air, and it is nothing less than the digital artifacts of over one billion people and computers networked together collectively producing over 2,000 gigabytes of new information per second… Classrooms built to re-enforce the top-down authoritative knowledge of the teacher are now enveloped by a cloud of ubiquitous digital information where knowledge is made, not found, and authority is continuously negotiated through discussion and participation. In short, they tell us that our walls no longer mark the boundaries of our classrooms.

“…The walls have become so prominent that they are even reflected in our language, so that today there is something called “the real world” which is foreign and set apart from our schools. When somebody asks a question that seems irrelevant to this real world, we say that it is “merely academic.” Not surprisingly, our students struggle to find meaning and significance inside these walls. They tune out of class, and log on to Facebook.”

The solution

“Fortunately, the solution is simple. We don’t have to tear the walls down. We just have to stop pretending that the walls separate us from the world, and begin working with students in the pursuit of answers to real and relevant questions…

“We can acknowledge that most of our students have powerful devices on them that give them instant and constant access to this cloud (including almost any answer to almost any multiple choice question you can imagine). We can welcome laptops, cell phones, and iPods into our classrooms, not as distractions, but as powerful learning technologies. We can use them in ways that empower and engage students in real world problems and activities, leveraging the enormous potentials of the digital media environment that now surrounds us. In the process, we allow students to develop much-needed skills in navigating and harnessing this new media environment, including the wisdom to know when to turn it off. When students are engaged in projects that are meaningful and important to them, and that make them feel meaningful and important, they will enthusiastically turn off their cellphones and laptops to grapple with the most difficult texts and take on the most rigorous tasks.”

Do you know that you can turn some (if not all) the notifications off? And that you can also change your privacy settings?

THERE ARE SEVEN THINGS that users like you and I can turn off (or on again) in Facebook:

1. Privacy > Profile: Control who can see your profile and personal information.
2. Privacy > Search: Control who can search for you, and how you can be contacted.
3. Privacy > News Feed and Wall: Control what stories about you get published to your profile and to your friends’ News Feeds.
4. Privacy > Block People: Block specific people (e.g. stalkers) from being able to find you ina Facebook search, see your profile, or interact with you through Facebook channels.
5. Privacy > General Settings for Applications: Control what information is available to applications you use on Facebook.
   
6. Wall Settings for an Application (e.g. Groups): Allow or disallow an app to publish stories automatically on your wall.
7. Profile Settings for an Application (e.g. Groups): Allow only certain people to view specific groups you join on your profile.
   

Which ones do you turn on/off? What do you think are the pros and cons of turning on/off these settings?

(See also: Mari Smith’s “10 Ways to Stay Safe on Facebook“.)

“When we talk about globalisation, we are talking about the way in which we bring different complex operating systems together. It is like the internet. The internet was an ARPA discovery. That by each operating system accepting a certain protocol, TCP/IP, different systems could interconnect even though they have different legacies and different deep programmes. Built upon this, through hyperlinks, we could communicate as if we belonged to a common system….

“The recent financial crisis is a crisis of that hyperlink, or an aspect of that hyperlink. The global imbalance – so much has been written about it, this is not the subject which I am going to talk about tonight. Except that the financial crisis is a problem of the higher system which links us all together….

“If we look at globalisation today, it is really an American construct, the hyperlink – the HTML language, the XML language – is basically an American language. It is expressed in accounting rules, financial rules, the way armies are organised, industrial standards, financial standards and so on. The problem is when the US becomes excessive in this missionary zeal. Political scientists like Kissinger talk about the dual strain in American foreign policy. There is the national interest which defines the foreign policy of all countries, but there is in American foreign policy always an additional strain, a call to an American ideal, a desire to spread the word, to democratise the world. To a point, that is very attractive and to an extent it enables the world to be globalised. But beyond a point, when you start intruding into the deep operating system of particular countries or tribes, it creates problems.

“When America goes into Iraq and tries to democratise Iraqi society as if it has no legacy…

“Coming back to the issue of global governance – America has to lead, but America has to lead in a way which acknowledges the diversity of the human family…

“If we are all the same, something is very wrong. Countries are different, tribes are different, cultures are different, and in global governance, the basic building block must acknowledge that diversity and that difference. But that which binds us all together, that hyperlink, that for a long time will be American in its essence.”

Note: If you’re on Facebook, see his Facebook note and read the comments there.

The other groups measured in the study were the Central Asians (Indians), East Asians (Chinese and Japanese), the Southeast Asians, Arabic (north Africa and Middle East) and Amerindian-Mestizo (Mexican and Central America). All these groups will experience a population growth.

Question: Why is global white population declining and not the other groups? Does this have anything to do with the legal recognition of same-sex couples worldwide among predominantly white nations in modern history, besides general reluctance to have babies (see Causes of “Sub-fertility replacement” on Wikipedia)?

The media giant is the owner of the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun, Orlando Sentinel, Hartford Courant and several other papers. It also operates 23 television stations.

“…factors beyond our control have created a perfect storm — a precipitous decline in revenue and a tough economy coupled with a credit crisis that makes it extremely difficult to support our debt.”

“Like many US newspapers, the Tribune has been grappling with declining circulation, a loss of readership to online media, and a steep drop in print advertising revenue.

“The New York Times reported last week that another debt-ridden major US newspaper chain, the McClatchy Co., is seeking to sell one of its flagship newspapers, The Miami Herald.

“And the New York Times itself has not been immune to the crisis gripping the newspaper industry. The paper reported Monday that the New York Times Co. plans to borrow up to 225 million dollars against its mid-Manhattan headquarters building to ease a potential cash flow squeeze.”

September Update: See also “Dow Jones shutting down FEER” and “Journalists Losing Jobs at Three Times Rate of Average Workers“.

The group exists as a platform for discussion, advocacy and action to uplift, improve, and perhaps solve Singapore Malay issues using New Media.

For more details on Millennials (a.k.a Generation “We”), check out this thought-provoking American video:

It’s interesting to see how problems (in this case, various crises in the USA such as the 9/11 incident, Hurricane Katrina and the recent subprime financial crisis) can be effective triggers for deeper learning and a firmer resolve to unite and to collaborate among the young. It would be even more interesting to see if a Generation “We” New Media group could be set up across race and religions in Asia, and NOT just for Malays in Singapore. Hey, Hazman, would you be game to do this?

An extract from Sarah Burris’ blog:

GenWe was Greenberg’s project to help the Millennial Generation empower itself against much scrutiny. The book also makes the case that Millennials are:

• Dedicated to improving the common good over individual gain, a sentiment that crosses all racial, ideological and partisan lines.
• Reject fundamental principles of modern conservatism – primary focus on individual rights and trickle down economics.
• Welcome innovation and are eager to establish a new paradigm.

• Privacy & Reputation: The digital reputation of people, especially those who have not opted in to that discussion (or “Conversation”). (Vijay Goel, M.D.)
• Truth & honesty: Firms who misrepresent themselves online, pretending to be a “user” (1) Gaming the SEO system to gain rank, (2) underhanded manipulation of product reviews and comments, (3) the accumulation of friends (and social groups) with the intention of monetizing them OR for promotion of business, political or personal agenda. (Albert Maruggi, SeLiNa and wayzgoose)
• Truth & honesty: Blurring of lines between “edit” and “advertising. (tmarklein)
• Security: Identity theft. (LewisG)
• Safety: Protecting children who widely use social media in ways many parents don’t know how to protect. (runnerkik)
• Spammers! (NancyMarmolejo)
  

Chris Heuer asked a good question: “How do we give bad actors in the ecosystem (exploitative, manipulative, dishonest, rude, etc…) a bad reputation that is more visible for others to know who to take seriously and who to ignore?”

Still, how indeed? Could such a penalty system (if developed and available) backfire and end up penalising the powerless and inept instead?

FRANKLY, I DON’T KNOW what to make out of the Tibetan protests. I’ve not spent significant time researching on the issues involved. However, from what I know and remember of Chinese history, I feel quite strongly that Chris Nebe (as a foreigner with insider knowledge and experience of China) is speaking the truth about Tibet in the video here:


Nebe’s post in YouTube:
The West is trying to demonize China. Why? To ensure an upper-handed position economically, politically, and socially.

Too many harbor strong opinions about Tibet, yet know nothing more than the few slogans offered by the mass-media outlets.

The media screams:
“They killed innocent monks!” – but those “innocent” monks and other young hooligans killed innocent Chinese before a single shot was fired on them.
“The Chinese are oppressive” – do you consider freeing over 95% of Tibetans from slavery, building a state of the art infrastructure, and a new economy oppressive?
“The Chinese suppress Tibetan Buddhism” – then why have the Chinese spent a fortune restoring ancient monasteries and places of religious significance?

China doesn’t SPIN NEWS like we do. Their silence is too often mistaken as admission of guilt. Don’t be another uninformed drone. Do everyone a favor and learn truths before forming opinions.

Here’s to Peace & Harmony! The 2008 Beijing Olympics deserve support!

Reminds me of “Star Wars: Return of the Jedi”, where Emperor Palpatine said to Luke Skywalker: “The alliance… will die. As will your friends. Good, I can feel your anger. I am defenseless. Take your weapon. Strike me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!”

Last month (March 25), in a report entitled My Biggest Mistake, TodayOnline reported that Malaysia’s Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi admitted making the biggest mistake in thinking that the Internet was not important. The PM’s ruling coalition suffered its worst results ever in March 8 polls that left five states and a third of parliamentary seats in opposition hands.

Among them was 67-year-old opposition Democratic Action Party chairman Lim Kit Siang who won a parliamentary seat in Ipoh Timor. He ran three blogs, which were meticulously updated with multiple posts every day. Long-time blogger Jeff Ooi, 52, also won as a DAP candidate in Penang. Like many other opposition leaders, they were able to reach out to young urban and educated people, many who were voting for the first time. Mr Ooi added that Web users are not limited by age. “We attract many citizens above 45 years old and these are the people who are more interested in politics and the oppositions’ viewpoint.”

In March last year, PR, market & biz dev coordinator Jonathan Dunn reported:

YouTube has launched a channel that will broadcast videos submitted by ‘08 U.S. Presidential nominees. The goal is for the channel to act as an information hub for the hopefuls and, one supposes, offer a way to counter unauthorized, potentially damaging, videos that may be posted by other users….

So far Rudy Giuliani, Barak Obama, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, John McCain, Dennis Kucinich, Bill Richardson, Mitt Romney and Joe Biden are on board. The videos seem to be a mix of carefully scripted campaign stops and the usual ‘on the trail/vote for me’ rhetoric. A click on the candidate’s videos on the channel home page (or on the candidate’s names above) takes you to a profile page for each candidate where other videos and info are hosted.

A few months later, in June, CBC News Today host Nancy Wilson interviewed broadcaster, researcher, and Internet evangelist Jesse Hirsh regarding the role and influence of social media on the 2008 US Presidential Election, e.g. “Why would candidates want to figure prominently on Facebook?”, intimacy on social media, dirty campaign tricks, blogging vs mainstream media, level playing field, etc.

By now, only three presidential candidates are featured on YouChoose 08: Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for the Democrats and John McCain for the Republicans.

Will the US Elections voting patterns correlate closely with the subscription, viewership and interaction patterns on YouChoose 08 (on YouTube) and other social media such as Facebook?

Related Articles:

• YouTube: US “presidents”, UK queen & now Jap PM

THESE DAYS, THE WORDS “Love is stronger than Death” keep coming to mind. Four reasons: (1) Two very moving movies recently, (2) Our bible group is currently studying the Acts of the Apostles, (3) Four days of prayers and meditations during Holy Week retreat (March 19-23), and (4) Today is the third death aniversary of Pope John Paul II (also known as Karol Wojtyla before he became pope).

One of the two movies is famous: “The Passion of Christ”. The other is not well-known but its message is just as touching and powerful. It is “Karol, a man who became Pope”, showing in many concrete ways how love can conquer hatred, violence and even death. Here’re two 10-minute video clips and the English transcripts (click the “Read the rest of this entry” link below) for some of its most moving moments:

Karol, a man who became pope – Part 1 of 5

Karol, a man who became pope – Part 2 of 5

All, have a happy and blessed Easter! JPII, unum corde et anima una!

PARTIAL TRANSCRIPT for Part 1 of 5:

Note: The original dialog is in Polish. The subtitles are in badly translated English. I’ve edited them a little. Words in brackets are the replaced subtitles.

@6:45 – 8:06 min of video
Karol: Why don’t I know how to answer her? Why do men force other men (similar) to live in absolute pain and without hope? How can we answer that? How many million of monsters inhabit this earth, Tomasz? Why are the innocent the ones who pay? How many people have to be born only to fall into an abyss (”be boundless”)?
Fr Tomasz Zaleski: I can only tell you that I have looked at that Nazi in the eyes. The evil I saw was so absolute, so incomprehensibile, obscene, that I’ve felt the desire to kill him. And I am a priest! I’ve felt deeply guilty. We don’t need to hate as they do. Love… only love can prevent men from falling in the abyss.

@9:06 min of video
Girl 1: You are late.
Karol: I’m sorry.
Girl 2: We have decided to enlist in the armed groups. Everyone.
Man 1: Not I. You fight with weapons, I want to fight with the word. We have the theater and the theater has to continue.
Girl 1: And where? For which spectators?
Man 1: It will keep on living in secret (clandestine) in our houses, in the cellars. We needs to save the word.
Girl 2: Poland is prey of terror and chaos, and you talk about the theater? How do you manage not to be ashamed?
Girl 3: There is no alternative. We need to take up fire-arms.
Another voice: Correct!
Man 1: The word is stronger than bullets!
Man 2: Show it with a gun aimed at the head!
Girl 1: What do you think, Karol?
Men: We have decided! Armed resistence!
Girl 1: Karol!
Karol: Stop, wait! I understand and respect those who want to take up [aim] arms. The Nazis are exterminating our people. They also want to exterminate the culture, to cancel the Polish language. The only way to have still a future is to save our past. He who wants to choose the way of the arms, I think, it’s correct that he does it. But he [Man 1] is right, we need to keep our culture alive. We will make theater too, and we will do it secretly (clandestine). Remember: the theater is the conscience of life.
Man 3: You’ll have your theater and we’ll have our arms.
Karol: Ok, let’s fight the same battle… same hope and same enemy. [Embraces man 3]
Man 3: Let’s go!
[All embraces one another, saying] Unum corde et anima una!

FULL TRANSCRIPT for Part 2 of 5:

[Scene: Gunshot rings out. Woman screams. A man pulls Karol into a room.]
Man: Where do you think you’re going? Where do you run? Do you want to be killed like a dog in the middle of the road?
Karol: Who are you?
Man: Ian Tiranoski and who are you?
Karol: Ian, you will burn your fingers…
Ian: A match is ignited and it’s extinguished. It’s not the flame of a match that burns inside me. [Lights a candle.] You have not told me yet what your name is.
Karol: Karol. I have to go. I am looking for a friend, a priest, for a mass.
Ian: A corpse mass?
Karol: Yes.
Ian: We’ll win with love, not with fire.
Karol: Can you say that with the Nazis just outside your door?
Ian: Nazism will end, evil will devour itself, but…
Karol: But… if love doesn’t triumph, Nazism will return even with another name. Do you mean that?
Ian: Exactly! [Gives Karol a book] St John of the Cross, you’ll be surprised by it. It’ll become your preferred reading. Pick it up.
Karol: Thanks.

[New Scene: Karol talking to a priest in a church.]
Karol: I want to look for the same reasons that you have, of hope and of faith, I want to close myself up in a monastery…
Fr Tomasz: Karol, in such times the people need to have priests nearby and not confined in a monastery.
Karol: I have thought a lot about what I want to leave, and I keep thinking about the importance of the choice that I am about to make. I wonder if it’s because I want to hide myself, or because I feel me in a guilt for all the pain that I see, or if there is something deeper… God is calling me.
Fr Tomasz: John has written in his Gospel that Jesus said: “You have not chosen me but I have chosen you”. The door is open, Karol. Now it depends only on you.

[New Scene: Fr Tomasz and Karol get out of a car.]
Fr Tomasz: Let’s go. [The two enter a building and meets a Cardinal.]
Karol: I have seen all the horror around us, and I have been drawn with strength toward a good, the priesthood. In the name of every human being, of his dignity… to know myself through the knowledge of God, to live God in the depths, I want to become priest…
Cardinal: In the darkness of this evil, we have to give testimony that the divine sense of life is more important than life itself.
Karol: I am here for this.
Cardinal: The Nazis have closed our seminary, you are risking your life. Therefore your mother must not even know that you study here. You’ll lead your usual life, but you’ll study and meditate secretly with us every time it’s possible for you.

[New Scene: Soldiers marching forward.]
Commander: Arm! [ Soldiers ready rifles to shoot. Fr Tomasz standing near the wall, talking to a German captain who has earlier saved Karol's life against the wishes of a Nazi leader.] Come back, father! Come back, father!
German captain: Thanks, Father, to have helped me to die. I’m safe now. I can’t see the Germany of my childhood, those white houses along the river…
Commander: Father, come back!
German captain: Go away, father. He has ordered you to walk away from me.
Fr Tomasz: Brother!
German captain: Go away, I beg you. Don’t get yourself killed.
Fr Tomasz: A new day will come when your children will see on the river those same white houses.
Commander: Aim! [ Soldiers raised rifles.]
Fr Tomasz: [Embraces the captain] God bless you.
[Nazi leader gets out of car and waves to commander.]
Commander: Fire!
[German captain dies. Nazi leader points gun at Fr Tomasz.]
Nazi leader: Who has killed him? You or me? You have killed him, Polish priest. And now, I’m going to kill you.
Fr Tomasz: [Controlling anger and grief] May God forgive you!
Nazi leader: According to my god, the world must be governed by honor.
Fr Tomasz: The world must be governed by love!
Nazi leader: [Walks away and tells commander] Kill him.
Commander: Aim! [Fr Tomasz pulls his priestly stole down from his neck and kisses it.]
Commander: Fire! [Fr Tomasz dies.]

[New Scene: Karol walking along a road, turns sharply around and sees the name of Fr Tomasz on a list of executed people. Weeps bitterly.]

[New Scene: Student priests studying in church. An explosion.]
A student [running and shouting]: They have exploded the bridge of Demlikj! the Russians are near! The Germans are going away, Poland is free! Thanks be to God. [The students embraced one another happily.] Poland is free! [Karol smiles and prays with relief.]

[New Scene: Ordination of Karol Wojtyla as priest. In a church, Karol (face flat) lying on the floor. Cardinal in front of him. Choir singing and praying.]
Karol: Come, Creative Spirit, I’ll be on the floor where others walk to arrive where you drive their footsteps.

[New Scene: Grim-looking man walking towards Russian leader.]
Russian leader: Welcome. Julian Cordec, correct? They have told me of you a thing that I judge impossible for a Polish.
Julian Cordec: That I don’t hate the Russians? My best years have been at the university of Moscow.
Russian leader: They say that you are not Catholic. What is it, a joke? An excuse (expedient) to have a career with us?
Julian Cordec: The joke for the socialist revolution would be to let the Catholics act unmolested, don’t you think?
Russian leader: Is there a reason why this should become your desk?
Julian Cordec: [Hands a file to the leader.] The list of the Polish clergy. The Nazis have eliminated one third of the priests, but they are still many, too many. I won’t let them act, think, or breathe. One day, they won’t even have the time to dream about their God.
[Russian leader raises cup and toasts Julian Cordec.]

[INTRO SCENE for the next part of the movie: In a church. Karol turns around and camera zooms in to show a closeup of his face.]
[Voiceover] I am a young face carved on the rocks of the Tatrs. May a grain field grow from my youth, mature in the hopes and the pain so that our joy may glorify You… great mystery.

HERE ARE SOME PRACTICAL TIPS from a very interesting girl called June (a.k.a. princessgx on YouTube):

I’m continually amazed by how low (or high) spiritually one can get! However, this shall be as far as I would go… lest the vitriol in me get brewed into hatred and I end up joining the Dark Side (just as Luke Skywalker almost got seduced by his Darth Vader father in Star Wars).

As Eleanor Roosevelt put it: “It’s far better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.”

Here’s a summary of a post with a similar title by Dion Hinchcliffe:

1. OpenSocial offers the lowest common denominator, not the full richness of each platform. Like Java, write once, test everywhere is the name of the game for OpenSocial. Using the OpenSocial model, developers can create apps to run on dozens of different social networking sites, but can’t leverage the full capabilities of the site it runs on. To create a competitive product with the full richness of the underlying platform, custom coding is needed.
2. OpenSocial is largely based on open standards. OpenSocial uses the essential browser open standards of XML, HTML, Javascript, and the data formats are all ATOM and RESTful/WOA. It also supports Flash content and functionality and most of the really popular development platforms, including Ruby on Rails. OpenSocial documentation and sample code all uses the Creative Commons licensing and Apache 2.0, and everything will be open sourced at some point.
3. OpenSocial is a doorway to data portability AND potential security holes. A site that supports OpenSocial applications provides that application with all the people data in that user’s account. Their own info as well as their friends. Users can import/export their social data to/from sites and 3rd party app developers can knit together a person’s social data across other social sites that support OpenSocial. Michael Arrington has reported that the first OpenSocial app has been hacked.
4. OpenSocial is simple but also capable of full-blown, rich Internet applications. And without server-side infrastructure. Developers can innovate with a few bits of markup and procedural code and drop it into the OpenSocial ecosystem and leverage the massive audiences and scalable infrastructure of OpenSocial compliant sites. OpenSocial even supports powerful interactive Web user interface models like Ajax explicitly. Amongst a few real gems, mountains and mountains of relatively useless, uninteresting apps will also be created.
5. OpenSocial is from Google. OpenSocial will ultimately be very good for Google, if not outright bad for a few others (probably Facebook). The outcomes may not always be to the benefit of everyone playing under the OpenSocial umbrella. User beware.
6. A new era in competency in social software is being ushered. Building successful social applications is a lot different prospect from building traditional business and consumer applications. Understanding people is the key to building effective social networking applications, and that is often the hardest thing for an industry obsessed with connecting with each other via 1s and 0s.

“…have you bothered to read Facebook’s Terms of Service (”TOS”) or Privacy Policy? What legal relationship have you agreed to? Who has access to your data and personal details? I waded through their terms and policies. Here are some things I found.

1. The terms can change any time…. you’re deemed to accept those changes by continuing to use the site. Even if you didn’t know of the change.
2. Personal use only. LinkedIn is all about jobs and business. MySpace is full of profiles for companies and products. But Facebook is supposedly only for personal use.
3. A single, individual user account…. you can’t have two accounts on Facebook.
4. You’re giving up a HUGE license… did you know that posting content gives Facebook a license to do whatever they want with your content?
5. Applications are NOT guaranteed safe… “installer beware.” A malicious application developer could break through Facebook’s security protocols and expose your info… but Facebook wouldn’t have to take the blame.
6. Disputes are arbitrated under Delaware law. You’ve agreed to “final and binding arbitration” for resolving most disputes with Facebook.
7. You surrender all submissions. If you send it to them, it becomes their property.
8. Privacy is NOT guaranteed. Besides, Facebook’s own third-party contractors might misuse your information.

.

Afternote 11 Aug 2007: See also: Terms of Use and Privacy Policy on NETCoachAsia.com. Most terms in these statements have stipulated and approved by TrustSg.

Another fun Simpson video:

• After this video ends, choose the fourth video from the left: “World of Warcraft in the Simpsons”.

• I cannot simply enter “Rochester Park”. I must enter a block number. So, I plucked a number from the air: “9″.
• After x seconds of inactivity, map.gov.sg would show a timeout message and then a timeout screen (!) as follows:
  
• As TedFox noted, “[map.gov.sg does] not provide any bus/mrt directions (which can be taken from the sbs website though)”. It also does not provide other useful information such as “Satellite Image”, “What’s nearby”, “Analyse Loc”, “Related Editorials” at the top of the StreetDirectory.com page:
  
• Nor does it provide this useful titbit of information at the bottom of the page:
  

  “Streetdirectory.com Rochester Park is located in Dover, Singapore. The Dover district is a small one filled with schools and tertiary institutions. Private schools such as Anglo Chinese School (Independent), or ACSI, and Anglo Chinese Junior College are located here, as well as public schools such as Fairfield Methodist Secondary School. Many locals study in ITE Dover to obtain technical certificates or go for a diploma education at Singapore Polytechnic. Many expatriates sent their children to United World College Southeast Asia (UWCSEA), one of Singapore’s international schools. These expatriates also enjoy going for a drink at Rochester Park, a popular cluster of restaurants and wine bars in Dover.”

• Finally, the location map itself look like this on Map.gov.sg:
  and the location map on StreetDirectory.com looks like this:
  

Disclaimer: I have no vested interest in either Map.gov.sg or StreetDirectory.com. Neither am I aware of having any friend (or foe) in these two organizations.

Related Articles:

• Is this the end of StreetDirectory.com?

“A district court yesterday ruled that Virtual Map (Singapore)’s online maps on StreetDirectory.com had breached the Singapore Land Authority’s (SLA) copyright. The judge also ordered the company to destroy or deliver up all infringing material.”

I’ve been referring to the maps and related services (e.g. Bus/MRT directions) on StreetDirectory.com for years and found them very useful in helping me find my way around Singapore. Yes, we are living in a very small island (only 699.0 sq km). But this island also has a population of more than four million people and God knows how many streets and buildings. I’m sure at least thousands (or even hundreds of thousands) of other users find the site very useful too.

What a dreadful piece of news to read on the eve of our national day! Does this court case mean the end of a free and very useful reference site for Singaporeans and visitors? Or (still hopeful…) will SLA start providing this service instead?

Related Articles:

• Can Map.gov.sg Replace StreetDirectory.com?

“And that’s the reason we do it, that’s why everybody who’s involved in the project is involved with it. And the belief is very simple. That is that you can eliminate poverty with education, and no matter what solutions you have in this world for big problems like peace or the environment, they all involve education. In some cases, it could be just with education and in no case is it ever without education. And we particularly focus on primary education.”

Dr Robert Kozma, emeritus director of the Center for Technology in Learning in SRI International and a consultant on technology in developing countries, begged to differ in a recent article in OLPC News. He wrote:

“…a key to the success of the center is having a manager who is not only technologically skilled but familiar with the informational needs of the villagers and is capable of searching the vast resources of the internet to meet these needs…. it is important to start with an understanding of what people need and their context rather than what the technology can be made to do. Taking this perspective, it is not clear that the widespread distribution of computers to children is the way to eliminate poverty in Africa.

“Rather than spending hundreds of millions of dollars on XO machines, wouldn’t it be better and cheaper for national governments to support rural villages in their efforts to set up and staff internet-connected community telecenters where villagers have access to the information they need to improve their livelihoods and their lives.”

What do you think?

A quick check on the IP address (70.86.138.114) suggests that this hacker is located in Texas, Dallas (USA) — more specifically, along McKinney Ave:

Can someone catch this guy/gal and tell him/her to buzz off?

There were 10 speakers: Brett McFall, Tom Hua, Jay Abraham, Mark Joyner, Armand Morin, David Cavanagh, Ewen Chia, Stephen Peirce, Mike Filsaime, and John Childers. Each internet marketing guru on the stage spoke persuasively of having a simple easy-to-follow system which guaranteed success. Some qualified by adding, “lots of hard work over a period of time”. Somehow though, with the possible exception of Jay Abraham and Mark Joyner, their systems all looked and sounded the same:

Basically, each guru suggested offering a freebie to lure prospects to a site and into giving their email addresses. Then the hardsell process begins in earnest: A one-time irresistible offer is made online and the specially designed website starts to sell in almost all possible ways (upsell, downsell, cross-sell, etc.) until the prospect yields to temptation and pays up.

AT THE END OF EACH GURU’S TALK during the WIMS 2007 seminar was invariably a sales pitch, whereby the guru would show what looked like an endless list of over-priced products/services. Then he would slash the prices to about a tenth or more, and tell the audience to buy NOW. Many people actually did as told.

I did a quick estimation. Some of the speakers charge each attendee $5,000++ for attending his program which includes one day of training, two days of coaching and monthly meetings for one year. If 100 people sign up for the program, he’d have made $500,000 (half a million!) per program.

I also ran some checks on the PageRanks (using the multiple PageRank checker) and the estimated traffic (using AttentionMeter.com) on the speakers’ websites and found the following:

Fig. 1: Google PageRanks for the 10 speakers.

Fig. 2: Google PageRank for some of the speakers’ sites

Fig. 3: Compete.com Graph for ArmandMorin.com, BizSuccessOnline.com, BrettMcFall.com & StephenLive.com

Fig. 4: Compete.com Graph for Abraham.com, Aesop.com, EwenChia.com, MarkJoyner.name, MikeFilsaime.com

Fig. 5: Compete.com Graph for Aesop.com, ArticleCity.com, AutoPilotProfits.com, eBookWholesaler.net, Simpleology.com

Notes:

• AutoPilotProfits.com belongs to Ewen Chia, Aesop.com and Simple-ology.com belongs to Mark Joyner, ebookwholesaler.net belongs to Tom Hua.
• With rampant link exchanges on the Net, PageRanks are increasingly being manipulated.
• Traffick, a search engine blog, wrote (”On Alexa, Compete.com, Quantcast, et al.”, February 06, 2007):

“People who don’t know too much about web stats love to quote Alexa ranks way too much… that’s seen as a silly thing to do by those “in the know”. But still, darned tempting. You can buy better data, but Alexa is free.

“More recently, upstarts that don’t seem too dissimilar to Alexa have come along: Compete.com, Quantcast, etc…. Based on the evidence I’ve sifted through, there’s not a shred to suggest that Compete.com is better at this stage, and some to suggest it’s actually worse.”

I remember from experience that hardsell also happens in face-to-face sessions. And how I hate being subject to it! These guys are shrewd marketers. These techniques probably really work well. Perhaps consumers need to beware! How many times have we bought things that we don’t need but thought we need at that moment of buying? Still, what are the right things to do when one really needs to make a living and so sell well on the Net (or elsewhere)? And just who (if any) have achieved real successes?

Related Posts:

• Scam? Ewen Chia, Adam Wong, Both or Neither?
• Insight#4: Of Alexa, Dmoz & Technorati

• January: Xunlei, a Chinese P2P file-sharing network that allows users to download music and videos. Similar to BitTorrent?
• February: Adscape (video game advertising) — offers advertising with plot and storyline integration, demographic and geographic targeting, and a reporting interface for marketers.”
• March: Trendalyzer — software which converts statistics into interactive animations.
• April:
  Tonic Systems — presentation and document management products expected to be a strong fit with Google Docs & Spreadsheets.
  Marratech (video conferencing software) — “e-meeting and web conferencing for effective collaboration tele-working with remote staff, customers and clients.”
  DoubleClick (online advertising) — “enables agencies, marketers and publishers to work together and profit from their digital marketing investments.”
• May: GreenBorder Technologies (desktop enterprise security)
• June:
  Panoramio (geospatial photo-sharing service) — “Map your photos”
  FeedBurner (online RSS feed and blog-to-email) — an extensive feed and blog advertising network where publishers can promote, deliver and monetize their Web-based content, and end-users can access and manage feed-based content.

I TRULY LOOK FORWARD TO MORE FREEBIES soon, in particular, Web conferencing and PowerPoint-equivalent on Google Docs & Spreadsheets. Perhaps Google is looking forward too to more revenues from AdSense and AdWords? As Josh Catone wrote on ReadWriteWeb:

This is a great deal for both Feedburner and Google. For Google it gives them access to over 720,000 feeds including, 111,000 podcast or videocast feeds, many of which can now be added into the Adsense network. It also gives Google access to a wealth of data and information about how people consume blogs and information across the greater blogosphere.

For Feedburner, which has raised around $10 million from Mobius Venture Capital, Portage Venture Partners, Sutter Hill Ventures, Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Union Square Ventures, it gives them access to Google’s muscle and resources (not to mention a nice exit).

The price itself seems like a steal to me. Feedburner’s 422,000 publishers may not seem like a lot for a $100 million investment, but that 422,000 publishers actually translates into access to many millions of readers that Google can push advertising to.

Is this where “community service” and “commercial profitability” could intersect? Is this really possible, feasible, desirable, etc.?

For the information of those who are compiling or reading these D-Lists: I’m currently using the LinkLove plugin and have set “$allpassion_comment_count” to a value of “10″. Yes, “10″. Therefore, you need to post a minimum of 10 moderated (read “meaningful”) comments before there’ll be a link to your blog.

Thank you truly for your links. I mean this — it does feel good to see the Authority number rising. However, I also feel phoney to see the same number rising. Therefore, I very much prefer that you link to my blog or posts because you like or appreciate something I write here and NOT because of a plugin I use or that you think you can get a link in return. Much thanks in advance.

Chinese version （中文版）:

English version （英文版）:

“Did You Know? Shift Happens – Globalization & the Information Age”
《你知道吗？环球与资讯的转变》
Created by: Karl Fisch (apparently a high school teacher/admin in the USA)
Modified by: Scott McLeod; Content remixed from: David Warlick, Thomas Friedman (”The World is Flat”), Ian Jukes, Ray Kurzweil (dubbed “the best person to predict the future of AI” by Bill Gates) and others; Music: “The Last of the Mohicans” (1992)

Thanks, Lucifer Chu. (谢谢你,朱學恆。)

The message was as follows:

From: DMOZ Editor <xxx.dmoz@gmail.com>
Date: Apr 28, 2007 9:05 AM
Subject: DMOZ – Requesting test username/password.

Site:http://www.netcoachasia.com/
Site submitted: January 17, 2007
——————————————————

Hello,

I am an editor at dmoz.org (DMOZ or ODP) and would like to see if it’s possible to have a sample/test username and password + access code? The courses seem very interesting, but for some sites we must be able to see some of their descriptions and what they offer before we can list them.

Rest assured, this username/password + access code will be kept purely confidential, and you can delete it at anytime.

http://dmoz.org/guidelines/site-specific.html#password -Explains how dmoz editors keep usernames confidential and why we sometimes need them.

Thanks,

Anonymous dmoz editor

A GOOGLE SEARCH ON “DMOZ editors” yields quite worrying results. The first four are as follows:

Corrupt DMOZ Editor

WebProWorld :: View topic – DMOZ editor wants $300 to list my site

Psssst — GIVING away DMOZ Editor Accounts! – Jim Boykin’s Internet …

The Resource Zone – Open Directory Project Public Forum

Discussion board sponsored and managed by members of the ODP Community, for discussion of dmoz-related issues.
www.resource-zone.com/ – 3k

Note: This editor asks for a password to a course. I gave him/her access to one. After a day or two, s/he asks for another course to see. I don’t understand. I’m just listing an elearning site. Why does a Dmoz editor need to view multiple courses on my site?

At first impressions, besides the minimalist search (搜藏) interface, Baidu seems to offer many services similar to those offered in Google: e.g. news (新闻), images (图片), maps (地图), video (视频), Blogger-equivalent (空间), BlogSearch (博客搜索) and toolbar (超级搜霸). However, one key difference seems to be in the extent of integration. Unlike Google, the many services in Baidu feel like subfeatures of ONE service and not many separate services. I only need to log in once.

What do you think? Have you used Baidu and Google? Which do you prefer, and why?

See also discussion on the Asia Social Media 2.0 Forum.

This is a new design challenge in this age of information anxiety and abundance of meaning. More and more people, myself included, are doing many things at the same time. However, decades of research (and common sense) have indicated that the quality of one’s output and depth of thought deteriorate as one attends to ever more tasks. For example:

• “We are under the impression that we have this brain that can do more than it often can,” says René Marois, neuroscientist and director of the Human Information Processing Laboratory at Vanderbilt University, quoted in a recent NYTimes piece about how multi-taskers max out their brains, creating neural network bottlenecks and causing confusion and mistakes (thanks, Susan Mernit).
• When people try to perform two or more related tasks either at the same time or alternating rapidly between them, errors go way up, and it takes far longer–often double the time or more–to get the jobs done than if they were done sequentially, says David E. Meyer, director of the Brain, Cognition and Action Laboratory at the University of Michigan: “The toll in terms of slowdown is extremely large–amazingly so.” (thanks, DeedsDoing 2006)
• “Kids that are instant messaging while doing homework, playing games online and watching TV, I predict, aren’t going to do well in the long run,” says Jordan Grafman, chief of the cognitive neuroscience section at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, quoted in a CNN report last year.

IN MY EXPERIENCE FOR EXAMPLE: During Nexus 2007 last Saturday, I found myself switching among three screens on my laptop most of the time. We were using Twitter.com for message sending, Campfirenow for chatting, and Nexus Live/Interactive to view Twitter messages from everyone. I could barely pay attention to the speakers/panel on the stage. Probably listened to only half the words. One possible way to reduce distraction could be better to replace Campfirenow with a shoutbox hooked onto Twitter via its API, the way Uzyn managed to hook Ping.sg shouts into pingsg_shouts on Twitter. Open Tweetbar on the sidebar and everyone would have two less screens to distract their attention — in other words, Let everyone look at just ONE screen.

Recently, Bjorn Lee twittered: “i have ADD, maybe i shld enrol in that china camp where they reform internet addicts.. oops, thats called NS in spore.” (ADD stands for Attention Deficit Disorder here, I think.)

What other solutions are there? Listen to former Microsoft VP Linda Stone perhaps (thanks, Mike Rohde):

“Continous Partial Attention (CPA) is different than multi-tasking, where the motivation is productivity: giving equal attention to many activities. CPA’s motivation is being a live node on the network, gaining meaning from the network, being ready for new opportunities at any moment…”

“But this always on, anytime, anywhere, anyplace era has has created an artificial sense of constant crisis. The adrenalized fight or flight mechanism kicks in. It’s great when we’re being chased by tigers. How many of those 500 emails a day is a tiger? Or are they mostly mice? Is everything really such an emergency? Our way of using the current set of technologies would have us believe it is.”

And learn from Jakob Nielsen (thanks, Beth):

1. Don’t check your email all the time. Set aside special breaks between bigger projects to handle email. Don’t let email interrupt your projects, and don’t let the computer dictate your priorities.
2. Don’t use “reply to all” when responding to email. Abide by the good old “need to know” principle… send follow-up messages only to those people who will actually benefit from the reply.
3. Write informative subject lines for your email messages. Assume that the recipient is too busy to open messages with lame titles like “hi.”
4. Create a special email address for personal messages and newsletters. Only check this account once per day.
5. Write short.
6. Avoid IM (instant messaging) unless real-time interaction will truly add value to the communication. A one-minute interruption of your colleagues will cost them ten minutes of productivity as they reestablish their mental context and get back into “flow.” Only the most important messages are worth 1,000 percent in overhead costs.
7. Answer common customer questions on your website using clear and concise language. This will save your customers a lot of time — thus making you popular — and will keep them from pestering you with time-consuming phone calls and emails.
8. User test your intranet. Clean it up so that employees can find stuff faster, and make the intranet homepage their entry point for keeping up on company news and events.
9. Don’t circulate internal email to all employees; instead put the information on the intranet where people can find it when they need it. (This obviously assumes that you’ve fixed the intranet’s usability.)
10. Establish a company culture in which it’s okay not to respond to email immediately. This frees employees from the pressure of incessantly checking email and lets them get more work done.

Finally, run 5 miles or do a spin class like Beth does. She explained:

“For some reason, vigorous cardio exercise helps clear out the information anxiety Maybe it is the just the stepping away from the reflected light dancing across my eyes coming from the monitor.”

Related Posts:

• Web of Mass Distraction I

“I do think we need some code of conduct around what is acceptable behaviour, I would hope that it doesn’t come through any kind of [legal/government] regulation it would come through self-regulation.”

While condemning the bloggers who issued the threats, Mr O’Reilly was keen that the whole blogosphere should not be tarred with the same brush.

“…The fact that there’s all these really messed-up people on the internet is not a statement about the internet.”

O’Reilly’s call came shortly after high-profile blogger Kathy Sierra reported feeling threatened and at risk online. Coincidentally, the Media Development Authority of Singapore has just opened some guidelines entitled Internet Code of Practice for public consultation a few days ago.

More details on BBC Technology News page, Susan Mernit’s post, Doc Searles’ post on this (based on a letter from Alan Herrell, apparently one of those who threatened Kathy on MeanKids) and a ChannelNewsAsia report.

Update 30-03-2007: See also Bjorn Lee’s Death Threats on the Blogosphere.

Update 09-04-2007: See also Blogger’s Code of Conduct at Wikia, BlogHer’s Community Guidelines and A Call for Manners in the World of Nasty Blogs at NYT.

Who’s that? Why did s/he do that? How did s/he do that? How to stop her/him from doing the same thing again?

(Found this on CESBloggers.com who in turn references SlashDot.)

“… I get about twice the pageviews of mattcutts.com, but his Alexa pageview ranking is about 25 times more than mine (I got this by looking at the 1 year, most highly smoothed graph, and then squinting to guess at the mean).

“What that means is that people with the Alexa toolbar installed are 25 times more likely to view a page on Matt’s site versus mine, but overall, all users view twice as many pages on my site.

“That’s a 50 to 1 difference introduced by the selection bias of Alexa. Presumably this is because Matt’s site is really appealing to a core group of SEO enthusiasts, many of whom also like the Alexa toolbar.”

IN A SIMILAR VEIN, John Chow wrote:

“Alexa is a tool that many webmasters and advertisers used to gauge the size of a website. The Alexa ranking is based on a three month running average. The number shown is where a site ranks on the internet… The main problem with Alexa is its rankings are based on users who have installed the Alexa toolbar onto their browser. If you do not have the toolbar running, you do not affect the rankings of the sites you visit. The next big problem with Alexa is it is very easy to cheat the system. Just get a few friends to install the toolbar and have them surf your site everyday. It does not take many people to break into the top 100,000. You can even do it all by yourself by refreshing your site over and over again. Get a dozen friends to do it and you’re break into top 20,000 easily.”

Alexa, by the way, works only on Internet Explorer. Now, perhaps all these explain why this blog’s Alexa ranking is 6,588,931? However, why two particularly trivial links which have nothing to do with this blog are listed in Alexa — they are totally different from the many links recognized by Technorati and 10,500 found via a Google search? Also, how is it that an empty blog such as one that’s created by default in an Elgg community blog and my Elgg profile could be ranked 64,954? Hmmm… just because both are on Elgg.net (also ranked 64,954)? Sheeeshh… no wonder! My test blog at Blogger.com has a rank of 15, just like Blogger itself!

When I scrolled to the bottom of an Alexa page, I found this statement, “Alexa’s directory listings are provided by Open Directory and enhanced by Alexa”. At the Open Directory (a.k.a. Dmoz) site, I read that it apparently has 75,151 editors and 4,830,584 sites listed in over 590,000 categories. According to one of its Help pages, “Depending on the activity level of the editors in your area, it may take up to 2 weeks or more for your site to be reviewed.”

However, I’ve tried for months and my blog is still not listed on this Open Directory. The oft-repeated reason given on support forum had been along this line: There has been a huge backlog and the editors couldn’t find enough time to clear that yet.

Likewise, I’ve tried for months to claim my blog on Technorati, but to no avail. The reason (given by Admin) looks familiar: My blog (along with many others) apparently could have been flagged for review, the support staff are facing a huge backlog and couldn’t find enough time to clear that yet.

I wonder. When I cannot claim my blog on Technorati, is my blog considered non-existent to Technorati? A search among the blog posts in Technorati yields 11 links, but a search in the blog directory yields this error message:

“Huh?

There are blogs, and then there’s whatever you just typed in. If it’s a blog, we don’t know about it. Maybe you made a typo. Or maybe it’s a blog that doesn’t exist. Maybe you don’t exist. (In which case, please ignore this.)”

While I truly appreciate the invaluable services that Alexa, Dmoz and Technorati provide, I also truly don’t understand what is meant by “flagged for review”. Who flags a bona-fide blog for review by Technorati and thereby stop it from being claimed even by its legitimate owner? In any case, is there a way to open up this listing of blogs that have been flagged for review, Digg-style perhaps, so that more people can comment on them and thus help the editors/admin guys speed up and clear this site-listing backlog?

Afternote on 2007-03-16: Please HELP ME claim my blog on Technorati. Add me as a Fave on Technortiat by clicking this -» and then feel free to delete it later.

“OH NO! NOT ANOTHER SOCIAL NETWORK!” Don’t you get this feeling nowadays? Social networks seem to be sprouting like wild grass every week. Perhaps you even get tired looking at the numerous icons in the GoToWeb20 website (screenshot below), or simply reading the news? Are you like me, wishing that these legions of social networks (almost like towers of Babel) would simply consolidate into a few major players? OR at the very least, open up and make it possible for users to sign-in, post to, and maintain profiles easily from just one (or if desired, just a few) source?

“HOW DO WE KEEP UP?” is a question that has been bugging me over the past few years ever since I got hooked onto the fantastic potential of Web 2.0. So, this morning, was truly gratified to read Robert Scoble’s post (also entitled How do we keep up?):

“I got up early to read feeds and do email. I started at 5:45 a.m. and it’s now 7:26 a.m. and I still didn’t get through all my feeds. But, worse, is what I did find: dozens of new products, new companies, new phones… how do we keep up with this flow that is coming through the blogs? It’s much easier to build a company now than it was in the 1990s, plus access to capital is there again, so that leads to tons of new companies and a LOT of news. What does this lead to? Risk for new companies because the chances that a new company will be able to get adoption/build audience and community is very small. There’s simply too much out there to pay attention to.”

Following Scoble’s “flow”, I found that at Slashdot (in the “Typing it all again” category), kdawson wrote:

“mrspin offers the opinion of ZDNet blogger Steve O’Hear that users may soon tire of social networks — if they don’t open up and embrace standards allowing greater interoperability among the different networks. O’Hear writes: “Unless the time required to sign-in, post to, and maintain profiles across each network is reduced, it will be impossible for most users to participate in multiple sites for very long. In an earlier post he went into more detail on the same subject, with extensive opinions from four creators of social networks.”

Following O’Hear’s “flow”, I found some weariness amidst the exciting 2007 Web predictions on the Read/Write Web blog:

“While social networks dominated 2006, we wonder if the amount of time an average user spends online will start to negatively impact on their social lives in 2007 and lead to a downturn. Could social networks prove to be anti-social? At the same time, social networks will probably also become more open – and data portability will start to occur, although MySpace will hold out…”

This is the beauty (and “ugliness”) of social networks: One article leads to another, yet another and another. After an hour or so, I believe I’ve done a quick survey, especially after doing a Google search on “fatigue, social networks, tired”. Even found a comic at Blaugh entitled “I Hate Social Networks”! I can safely infer that there IS indeed widespread social network fatigue.

Data portability had been on my mind. So, I couldn’t agree with O’Hear more. However, I wonder: Couldn’t ZDNet and the four social network leaders interviewed have set the ball rolling and start leading by example? You see, just to cast a vote and to add my opinion at ZDNet, I had to sign up and create yet another profile. Likewise, whenever I’m invited to join a new social network. As a result, I feel less and less inclined to join new social networks nowadays.

If only someone would create an easy-to-use standard-based app or widget that would enable users to keep their profiles and content on a single-source (say, on their desktop or website)! And if only all social networks would have a simple linking feature that works according to that standard!

For example, at Elgg.net, I can reap all the benefits of being in a social network while maintaining my current blog here. Reason: I can publish publish the same posts in Elgg through a feed. I can also have different levels of access restrictions for postings within Elgg. Although Elgg has/had some teething issues (e.g. duplicate/triplicate posts and disappearing media just because I tried to edit a published post), I’m sure they could be resolved eventually.

Truly looking forward to the day when I could join as many as social networks as I want with minimal effort: owning and maintaining all my profile(s) and content in one space, and merely linking them to various networks. Of course, my comments on different networks could be different…

Speaking of this, wouldn’t it be great if one could get wiki-like overviews of original information and the associated “enrichments” (Dion Hinchcliffe’s term for tags, ranks, reviews, comments, revisions, etc.) all on the same page?

Then, we the readers wouldn’t be wasting time reading Babel babble (rehashes, duplicates, triplicates, etcetera). And we the “publishers” wouldn’t be wasting time building towers of Babel — trying in vain to make a name for each of “us” separately. (Indeed, the proliferation of social networks has collectively and literally made us anti-social!)

Hopefully, by then, we’d be truly socializing and collaborating on a Valentine Day, and every other day!

(See also Google Drive: Cure for Social Network Fatigue.)

FOR A LONG TIME, I’ve believed in the free culture espoused by Lawrence Lessig and the open sharing of ideas, theories, studies, research advocated by Terry Vessels (above). I’ve therefore downloaded and consumed (installed, used, read, watched, listened…) lots of free software, ebooks, video, podcasts, news reports, in-depth analyses, research studies, etc. on the Internet over the past few years.

Recently, however, I’m beginning to ask myself, “Do I really believe in free culture and free exchange of ideas? Have I’ve been more the taker than the giver?” Granted that I’m normally a frank and open person. Yes, my work has been almost invariably very demanding. And yes, I’ve been blogging from time to time, sharing new things that I’ve learnt. Still, there were times when I’ve hesitated and held back. For example, I’ve kept my research study (begun in 2005) under wraps on the Net until a few days ago. Another example, I’ve been adding lots of useful information to a wiki on a sub-domain for almost two years now. Yet so far, I have chosen not to link them from my blog.

PERHAPS MISTRUST FIRST set in when a Masters program classmate asked quite pertinently some time ago, “But how could we share our research ideas, especially in a public domain? What if someone else were to steal our ideas and claim them as his/her own?”

Our eminent Trade Minister George Yeo probably spoke for many among us when he said on BlogTV (Episode 12: Big Boys Blogging) a few days ago:

“If they expect me to say things which I’d only say very privately, then they will be very disappointed because the blogosphere is not private space… There are things which you will say to your wife which you would not say to your friends, there are things that you would confide in your teacher which you would not confide even in your classmates. That’s part of life, we all have circles of trust…”

The minister was answering young blogger Gayle Goh’s very frank comments that (1) people who read blogs want fresh new perspectives and a strong, personal voice; and (2) people might find it very difficult to trust what politicians have to say especially when they won’t deviate from the party line at all.

Gayle’s response? She looked quite skeptical, even a little disapproving.

At first, I smiled at her youthful audacity and seeming naivete. Upon reflection however, I think Gayle raised an excellent point. Yes, indeed. Just who, in their leisure, would be interested to read a party manifesto? Even though it comes in blog postings?

Jeremy Wright, in his book Blog Marketing, wrote (paraphrased initially, words in brackets below are mine):

“Most blogs are expected to have these qualities — an authentic voice, honesty, and authority… this holds true even more so for the corporate blog…. This presents unique challenges for business leaders who want to understand blogging (connect with readers), as the concepts of transparency and authencity are not often associated with corporate communications practices….

“Blogging is really about three things:

• Information: Telling your customers what you’re doing and finding out what they are thinking.
• Relationships: Building a solid base of positive experiences with your customers that changes them from plain-old consumers to evangelists for your company and products.
• Knowledge management: Having the vast stores of knowledge within your company available to the right people at the right time.

“Without blogs, company messages can get so filtered by public relations or the media that CEOs and other senior management have decided to talk directly with customers — whether it be in the company’s stores, on the company’s airplanes, or at special events set up specifically for communicating with customers. The value of direct customer feedback is obvious, and blogs provide that [one-to-one and daily] on a global scale.”

In “Chapter 3: The Power of Blogs for Business”, Wright wrote:

Be Real: The Scoble Story

“…sometimes the most important person to be blogging in your company may not be an executive. For Microsoft… the most important blogger is arguably Robert Scoble… Scober started blogging before he joined Microsoft — his existing blog was actually a major force in landing him the job. In his role as a technical evangelist, Scoble has to be both authoritative and honest.

“One of Scoble’s rules is to tell the truth, even if it means admitting that a competitor’s product is better or if it means Microsoft is doing something wrong. This can be scary for an executive to do — though Sun’s Schwartz does it quite successfully (another story in the book). For Scoble, this comes naturally, and the net effect is that he has become one of the most influential people in a company with more than 55,000 employees. The external effect is that Microsoft now has a trusted voice who will give the straight and passionate answer to even the hardest questions.”

Finally, BG Yeo himself had observed in the first part of the BlogTV show:

“It’s strange. The emotion connected with blogging is very different from that connected with say, giving a speech or addressing an audience. For some reason, there’s an intimacy associated with going into the blogosphere which you don’t associate with a public meeting.”

Hmmm…. Can BG Yeo really maintain a public, party-line stance and yet achieve that “intimacy” with young people in Singapore? What do you think?

Today, I’m publishing online two wiki research proposals which I’d written for a Masters in Instructional Design program at the National Institute of Education, Singapore:

• “The UTAUT and Electronic Brainstorming in a Wiki”: This proposal was written in April 2005 for “Implications of Social Psychology Theories & Research for Educators”, a module taught by Dr Angeline Khoo and Dr Lim Kam Ming. Could have worked on this as a project if not for the circumstances (long story). So, imagine my surprise upon finding a very similar project (Global Warming Student Speakout) on the Google for Educators site last October! Not sure though what the specific research questions were.
• “Mediating PBL in a Wiki environment” (1): This proposal was written in April 2005 for “MID809: Designing, Conducting, and Reporting Investigations”, a module taught by Dr Chee Kit Looi and Dr Myint Swe Khine. A revised experiment was conducted in November among two classes in a polytechnic. The results were mixed. However, due to more pressing concerns at work, the writeup for the results of this project has been placed on the backburner till now.

Looking forward to your comments, suggestions, queries, etc.

Was a little amused to read this post by founder James Farmer:

As for blogs on May 23rd the 10,000th edublogs.org blog was created. Which was great. But as of this moment today (August 14th) there are 17,869 blogs. Yikes.

Splogs… the plague of our times! :-p Still, looking forward to seeing the new site (already integrated with wikispaces) — expected to incorporate Flickr, YouTube, and other widgets.

ACTUALLY, none of us got the right answer, although I did come quite close (the answer is in the Dutton & Aron link above, just scroll to the middle of the page). The Capilano story was one of many concrete examples (and experiments) which Professor Henck Schmidt used during a talk at Republic Polytechnic yesterday, to illustrate six key principles of learning and teaching, namely:

• Learning is basically construction of meaning, e.g. coherent theories about the world.
• Activation of prior knowledge facilitates the subsequent processing of new information.
• Elaboration of knowledge at the time of learning enhances subsequent retrieval. E.g. use of paired assocation.
• Organization of Knowledge: E.g. “Do you remember where you were and what you were doing when news on 911 broke out?” (Note: Actually, I kinda puzzled by this illustration. Didn’t get to clarify my doubts though.
• Contextual Dependence: Matching context facilitates recall.
• Intrinsic Interest: External rewards does not steer the learning, in fact it may reduce intrinsic interest and make the subject matter studied less interesting.

We (the audience), including many instructional designers from various IHLs in Singapore, were asked many interesting questions in order to trigger more questions and activate critical thinking. Truly gratified to have attended a talk by a man who models what he teaches. And to leave with an adrenaline rush…

The hottest concepts in American politics are not liberalism or conservatism, preventive war or globalisation. Rather, the concept which exercises professional politicians and their handlers most is framing.

According to Hatchet Jobs and Hardball: The Oxford Dictionary of American Political Slang, framing is “the attempt to define the debate so everyone knows what everyone else is going on about…” Known as framing, as in ‘framing the debate’, this sometimes occurs as a storm of criticism intended to kneecap adversaries rhetorically, to force them into inflexible political stances, or to goad them into reputation-damaging statements”.

A recent article in The New York Times Magazine gave the following example of framing from the last presidential election: The Bush campaign’s successful effort to portray Senator John Kerry as “flip-flopper”, “forever bouncing erratically from one position to another”.

President George W. Bush and his campaign “made sure that virtually every comment they uttered about Kerry during the campaign reminded voters, subtly or not, of this one central theme”.

Mr Kerry helped considerably in the effort by saying, of a Bill to fund US troops in Iraq, “I actually did vote for the US$87 billion before I voted against it.”

The Bush campaign hit the jackpot again when Mr Kerry allowed himself to be filmed wind-surfing, tacking left and right to catch the wind. The Republicans used the footage in an advertisement — “the smartest ad of the campaign”, said the Times.

“Democrates, on the other hand, presented a litany of different complaints about Bush, depending on the day and the backdrop; he was a liar, a corporate stooge, a spoiled rich kid, a reckless warmonger. But they never managed to tie them all into a single, unifying image that voters could associate with the President. As a result, none of them stuck. Bush was attacked. Kerry was framed.”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Microsoft Corp. Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates on Wednesday mocked a $100 laptop computer for developing countries being developed with the backing of rival Google Inc. at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The $100 laptop project seeks to provide inexpensive computers to people in developing countries. The computers lack many features found on a typical personal computer, such as a hard disk and software.

“The last thing you want to do for a shared use computer is have it be something without a disk … and with a tiny little screen,” Gates said at the Microsoft Government Leaders Forum in suburban Washington.

Reminds me of one of those famous last words (negative predictions on ultimately successful technologies). As one of the list members, Yisahy Mor, put it, “Thinking of technologies Gates went to the trouble of playing down. Some examples that come to mind: Mac, Linux, Internet standards…”

1. No Author Biographies (trust: add a descriptive ‘About’ page)
2. No Author Photo (credibility, recognition)
3. Nondescript Posting Titles (time: create microcontent)
4. Links Don’t Say Where They Go (anticipation: use link titles)
5. Classic Hits are Buried (time: add highlights)
6. The Calendar is the Only Navigation (time: use categories)
7. Irregular Publishing Frequency (anticipation)
8. Mixing Topics (recognition: carve niche)
9. Forgetting That You Write for Your Future Boss (future value)
10. Having a Domain Name Owned by a Weblog Service (future value: readership, links, search engine ranking)

Looks like i’d better do something about points 1., 2. and 5.

“[W]hat sets wildneress apart in the modern day is not that it’s dangerous (it’s almost certainly safer than any town or road) or that it’s solitary (you can, so they say, be alone in a crowded room) or full of exotic animals (there are more at the zoo). It’s that five miles out in the woods you can’t buy anything. There’s no way to drive someplace and spend some money…”

I’m more inclined to think that “wilderness” in the Information Age looks like this: “It’s that five miles out in the woods you can’t sms, blog, “Del.icio.us”, “Furl”, “Flickr” or “Avantgo” anything. There’s no way to go some place and kill some time in cyberspace…”

“Well, in our country,” said Alice, still panting a little, “you’d generally get to somewhere else–if you ran very fast for a long time, as we’ve been doing.”

“A slow sort of country!” said the Queen. “Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!”

WAS REMINDED of this story while scanning through thousands of lines in my Bloglines account. Most were recent blog entries on topics related to my work — education, instructional design, psychology, technology, and so on. This is a treasure trove or bottomless pit of … — depending on how one looks at it.

It’s amazing how a story written about 140 years ago could ring so uncannily true of life in a really fast world. The “Red Queen” could be some people or certain situations. For example, as John Seely Brown had observed at an SMU seminar in March earlier, people working in the information technology industry today have to “keep running faster and faster” just to keep up-to-date. New and much more advanced hardware and software technologies keep emerging at such a fantastic rate — with more promising features and more new-fangled ways of doing things.

At work, we have been introducing so many new tools to the academic staff in our institution that i’ve wondered several times, “How many of these tools are really necessary? If tech-savvy people like us are only playing catch-up while working on these full-time, how do non-tech-savvy people feel having to learn all these part-time while working on other things full-time? When will we stop running, take stock of what’s happening and stop letting technology (or expediency or some mob) lead pedagogy (or the rest of us rank-and-file) by the nose?”

(See also Will R.’s Happy Overload Day post and David Weinberger’s “No, I’m Not Keeping Up With Your Blog” post.)

“This is a wonderful explanation for why we prefer some items over others. This can have some learning design implications. The finding: We prefer items that we ‘remember’, rather than that we ‘know’. So, what’s the difference between ‘remembering’ and ‘knowing’?

“When we ‘know’ something, we’re completely aware of its existence, but we don’t recall the specific instance when we learned of it. When we ‘remember,’ we’re recalling a particular occasion.”

“To put it simply, if we have story to tell about the item, we are inclined to prefer it. Not a bad marketing mantra if you think about it.”

Strange. Wouldn’t it be the other way round? When we like something, we are impressed by it and so we remember it? Could the researchers be inverting the symptom (remembering) and the cause (preference)?

GETTING lazy. Just quoting some interesting posts of others and then commenting on them. Originally wanted to post my comment on Elearningpost, but comments are not allowed for its news items.

From what i’ve learnt last semester, there is a concept in social psychology which suggests that the probability of liking someone or something increases with familiarity. This does not always happen, but it can happen quite often. Sometimes, “familiarity breeds contempt”. Remember this proverb?

But “we prefer something because we remember it”? This could become a convenient excuse for marketing folks to persuade advertisers to put in more money into their ads. But remember how we can get so very irritated by songs or products that are advertised incessantly? Maybe there’s an optimal balance in exposure somewhere.

In any case, i can think of songs which i ::like:: very much and whose lyrics/title i can’t remember. The reverse is true for me too — i can also think of songs which i ::dislike:: very much and whose lyrics/melody i can remember.

(Note: i read Elearningpost regularly because i’ve found the information there very interesting and useful most of the time.)

DBR subscribes to the sociotechnical systems theory and the activity theory. It studies learning in context, taking into account the impact of contextual factors on the measured outcomes of specific interventions (which in turn are based on certain theories, hypotheses or methodologies). It integrates design practices and academic research, so as to make the outcomes both relevant and rigorous for all stakeholders — teachers, students, researchers, designers and policy makers. Somewhat like Action Research (Lewin, 1946) with a contextual and design focus, as well as a longitudinal and multi-party view.

“The conjunction of problematic and determinate characters in nature renders every existence, as well as every idea and human act, an experiment in fact (reality), even though not in design (intention). To be intelligently experimental is but to be conscious of this intersection of natural conditions so as to profit by it instead of being at its mercy.” — John Dewey

REVISITED the tensions between ‘Industry’ and ‘Academia’, this time with more sophisticated (or distinguished) vocabulary.

For example, ‘Research-Based Design (RBD)’ vs. ‘Design-Based Research (DBR)’, ‘practice’ vs. ‘research’, ‘relevance’ vs. ‘rigor’, ’short/quick vs. long/slow’, ‘high/low theory vs. high/low applicability (Stokes, 1997, see diagram on the right), ‘awful reputation of ed research (Kaestle, 1993), ‘methodology and the research practice gap’ (Robinson), ‘problems and possibilities’ (Shulman, 1999), ‘usable knowledge’ (Lagemann) and finally, ‘Aristotle’s three types of knowledge: episteme, techne and phronesis’ (Flyvbjerg, 2001).

And like design methods, DBR is purposeful, creative, open-ended, iterative (continuous, on-going), robust (incomplete predictability, e.g. see-move-see [Schon], participatory co-construction of meaning [Ehn]), inherently empirical in epistemology, and involves local science/wisdom (diSessa).

Will the gap between ‘Industry’ and ‘Academia’ be closed with DBR? After 100 years of educational research, have research findings been of great relevance to teaching practices yet? Perhaps we need another 15 years more, A/P H. said.

Milgram (1974) summed up the experiment in the article “The Perils of Obedience”, writing:

“The legal and philosophic aspects of obedience are of enormous import, but they say very little about how most people behave in concrete situations. I set up a simple experiment at Yale University to test how much pain an ordinary citizen would inflict on another person simply because he was ordered to by an experimental scientist. Stark authority was pitted against the subjects’ [participants'] strongest moral imperatives against hurting others, and, with the subjects’ [participants'] ears ringing with the screams of the victims, authority won more often than not. The extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths on the command of an authority constitutes the chief finding of the study and the fact most urgently demanding explanation.”

LEARNT about Milgram’s work during social psychology class last semester. Was quite shocked and intrigued at the same time.

As Dr. K. pointed out, what we believe and how we actually behave can be miles apart. We never know whether we might do something that we would end up feeling ashamed about. It was a stark reminder that we shouldn’t judge others. On the other hand, the fact that 35-odd percent of people chose not to obey cruel commands is encouraging — a testimony to the human spirit, and perhaps the need to follow our “true north” rather than the “authority at hand”.

And a question: Are certain MBTI personality types more likely to obey authority than others? Conversely, are certain types very much less likely to do so?

(See also Milgram Experiment in Wikipedia and The Man Who Shocked the World by Thomas Blass in Psychology Today, Mar/Apr 2002.)

This software which i’ve been using over the two years seems highly ‘protectionist’. It’s like “Hotel California”: “You can check out any time you like, but you can [almost] never leave.” The pM folks don’t provide any export function. WP has import scripts for many software but not pM. Out on the Web, only a problematic pM 2.3 to WP 1.2 converter is available although WP is already at 1.5.

For the sake of convenience, almost paid up and upgraded to Expression Engine (EE). But wasn’t particularly impressed by the two-week trial. There are features in EE which i don’t need. There are also things that i could easily do in pM Pro (e.g. switch an entry from one weblog to another) or want to do (e.g. multi-user annotations on a graphic via the Fotonoter plugin) but couldn’t do in EE.

Plus: Had been so busy with both work and study assignments that the promotion period was over before i realised it. Really couldn’t see why i should fork out over S$200 for a commercial blogging software (which may levy more charges and cut-offs later) when a good one like Wordpress is available free of charge.

“IN THE EASTERN RELIGION, Zen Buddhism, the goal is to achieve enlightenment. The Zen master attempts to bring about enlightenment in his pupil in various ways. One of the things he does is to hold a stick over the pupil’s head and say fiercely, ‘If you say this stick is real, I will strike you with it. If you say this stick is not real, I will strike you with it. If you don’t say anything, I will strike you with it.’ ” (Bateson 1972, p.208).

“This is a clear double bind situation because all the proposed solutions are ruled out, yet it can be solved without schizophrenia or flight, if the pupil manages to take the stick from the master and thus transcend the constituent conditions of the situation.”

“ONE SPECIAL and very demanding type of learning may be termed as transformation or transformative learning. This type of learning occurs in crisis-like situations that can only be solved by transcending the premises of a problem or situation. It may take place through long and often painful adaptation or through shorter, intense processes. In both cases very strong motivation and the ability to raise considerable psychological resources is required.

“Structurally, transformative learning involves the simultaneous restructuring of several cognitive as well as emotional schemes. Functionally, it changes the learner’s self and thereby provides the learner with qualitatively new understandings and patterns of action.

“…Time and time again well-known American humanistic psychologist Carl R. Rogers points out that ‘…any significant learning involves a certain amount of pain, either pain connected with the learning itself or distress connected with giving up certain previous learning’ – ‘learning which involves a change in self organization – in the perception of oneself – is threatening and tends to be resisted’ – ‘all significant learning is to some degree painful and involves turbulence, within the individual and within the system.’ (Rogers 1969, p.157-9, 339).

“…Engestrom sums it up thus: “In [this type of learning], the subject becomes conscious and gains an imaginative and thus potentially also a practical mastery of whole systems of activity in terms of the past, the present and hte future. Individual manifestations of [this type of leanring] are commonly called ‘personal crises’, ‘breaking away’, ‘turning points’ or ‘moments of revelation’.” (Engestrom 1987, p.153).”

(See also Neither Death Nor Life.)

(Extracted from a paper by Yusra L Visser (2002), Effects of Problem-Based and Lecture-Based Instructional Strategies on Problem Solving Performance and Learner Attitudes…)

“LEARNING SPECIALISTS generally agree that problem solving, together with several other core competencies (e.g., comprehending and composing, critical and creative thinking, and metacognition) is among the most important dimensions of thinking and learning (Jonassen, 1994). Nickerson (1994) has pointed to several of the reasons why the ability to engage in effective and purposeful problem solving is critical to the development of individuals and their communities.

“… Despite the acknowledgement of the importance of developing problem solving skills, relatively little research has been conducted on this theme in the field of instructional design (Jonassen, 1994). Moreover, within the existing research base, even fewer contributions have been made to the development of instructional design approaches for ill-structured or complex problem instruction. The majority of the instructional design literature in the area of problem solving instruction points to the use of particular instructional strategies to support the acquisition of problem solving skills (e.g., cognitive apprenticeships and microworlds). However, these strategies have rarely been researched with sufficient rigor to ascertain their effectiveness in achieving the desired outcomes.”

“If we knew what we were doing, it wouldn’t be called research, would it?” — Albert Einstein

THE PAST TWO WEEKS had been rather anxious ones because a once-promising thesis seemed in danger of becoming an impractical one. Perhaps this thesis is ahead of its time right now.

The idea came from an interesting discussion with a professor. What would motivate students to want to solve a problem? The initial answers seemed straightforward enough. Something that Maish Nichani mentioned at a Knowledge Management seminar months ago came to mind: a story problem needs ‘PHAT’ — ‘P’ for Passion, ‘H’ for Hero, ‘A’ for Antagonism and ‘T’ for Transformation. In other words, Identification (PHAT) and Tension (PHAT) factors. A great thesis can written based on this, the professor had said.

With mounting pressure from my pre-dissertation module instructors, for lack of a better idea, I was intrepid enough to try to tackle this for my Masters thesis. I saw that I would need plenty of problems to conduct the study. So, my ideal subject was: two classes in a Republic Polytechnic (RP) since they solve a problem a day — that would give me 14-16 problems a semester!

Was told that I had excellent research questions: (1) How to write engaging story problems that polytechnic students can identify with and want to solve with all their hearts and minds? (2) What types/levels of engagement are desirable? (3) What types/levels of Identification (PHAT) would engage polytechnic students appropriately? (4) What types/levels of Tension (PHAT) would engage polytechnic students appropriately? (5) Do the students’ problem-solving performances improves with greater engagement?

Spent lots of time over the past month: reading up papers (such as Bangert-Drowns & Pike’s taxonomy of engagement modes, Ahmad Ibrahim Etheris’ Computer-supported collaborative problem solving and anchored instruction…), contacting the RP CED director, discussing with my research partners, observing a PBL class in progress, mulling over appropriate research methodologies, and so on. Finally realized what a mammoth task this is. Yes, this can be a lifetime’s work, as the professor had added then. But I didn’t register that then.

A problem with this PBL thesis is: How does one define the Tension and Identification factors, now that most problems written in RP are not really story/scenario problems (and i thus cannot simply use “PHAT”)? Another problem: The existing process logs, such as reflection journals, self and peer evaluations (often known to be a “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” kind of thing), facilitator’s assessment and observations, seem too sketchy and unreliable for drawing conclusions.

So, how does one track the students’ problem solving processes in enough detail to gauge the levels of engagement among some 20-odd learners for 14-16 problems over a semester in a polytechnic where i don’t work? Interviews and observations would not be enough.

Video recording? We would need to aim four cameras at four groups of students over 14-16 days in a term since they tackle one problem a day. If we have two classess, the resources would need to be multiplied by two! Knowledge forums? Why would the students discuss online when (1) they can simply talk to one another at once, (2) they need to move from one stage to the next within one or two hours, and (3) these are not very motivated learners in the first place? Concept mapping? “Maybe, but only one pre-test and one post-test are feasible,” my research partner asserted. “We don’t want our students to get ‘research fatigue’.” We are still looking at the outcomes and not the processes.

Furthermore, RP is simply not ready to start using new IT tools at the moment. They have one major new tool to introduce the next semester, Axon Idea Processor. And it is complicated.

i could almost see all my annual leave evaporate in the midst of frequent visits to RP.

While racking my mind for a new angle to the thesis or even an alternative one, i was suddenly struck by the fact that right here under my nose (in this polytechnic where i work), is a groupware experiment that i had conducted with a lecturer recently and it has been progressing quite smoothly!

Talk about opportunities in a crisis (危机)! Now i have a better and more stable thesis to work on! No need to take leave. And finally, there’s a technology component!

“FOR THE MOST PART, IMUO (In My Uninformed Opinion) the big monolithical enterprise solutions for elearning serve mostly to reinforce the learning via lecture paradigm (”record your lectures to stream via the internet!”) that leave the new generation…. well yawning in ennui.

“After all these years of “course management systems” (and is learning really about “managing courses”?), they still are completely structured wrong in that the main organizational scheme for them is the course (which is ephemeral) rather than the learner (who hopefully will stick around). When the course expires or is archived or deleted after the semester, there goes all the student’s work. During the brief existence of the “course” all of their work is filed away in different iron shoeboxes labeled “Chemistry” “Composition”, “Sociology” with no affordance to connect between the boxes, no integration across disciplines, no record saved of achievement and progress. The semester ends, grades transmitted to the registrar, and flusssssshhhhhhhh goes all the work that took place. “

“VISIONS ARE EXTREME HALLUCINATORY daydreaming, too-good-to-be-true ideals with high impact but no measurable probability — because they can’t happen. They’re fantasy. No one believes in them. Not even you. They’re fiction…

“If you have ever heard a truly compelling vision of what the world could be “if only…” from anyone else in your life, this is the place to finally write it down. Anonymity is best since you may hold back if others know your name. A good vision would contain fantasy elements from all utopias you ever believed in, and several that you laughed at, and riduculed other people for.

“If you are describing something that you consider a reasonable goal, that you believe can ever actually happen to any substantial degree, or has a measurable probability, it is a best case and not a “vision”. Be very careful with this distinction — best cases are something we allocate real w:human capital and (indirectly) w:natural resources to get done… a single good vision, however, would break us, were we even to really attempt it.”

WAS A VICTIM OF “extreme hallucinatory daydreaming” while working on a be-all do-all elearning project at a MNC a few years ago.

Our target audience included teaching staff, students and business partners across all educational sectors (K-12, tertiary, adult and corporate) in Asia Pacific countries. The super-duper system was touted to have all the features available in existing competitor systems (which were each targetting only specific sectors) and much more. For example, courseware of many subjects across all levels; on-the-fly personalizable learning, assessment and tracking; on-the-fly booking of virtual classrooms with audio and video streaming; on-the-fly XML data exchange with all types of e-services that might be provided by industry partners such as e-libraries, e-printers, e-publishers, e-translation, online payment gateways…

Surely, with such fantastic features, marketing should be a breeze, sales would boom, customers would be happy and everyone would have cause to smile?

However, we had just half a year and a very lean team to achieve all these from scratch. Still, the business folks thought of themselves as great visionaries and assumed that so long as some programmers and analysts got onboard, anything technical or editorial (a “black box” to them) could be produced (almost like magic!). This was supposed to be the easy part.

The reality was: there were too many dreams, promises and requirements; yet too little time (left from the endless meetings), manpower and resources. Plus XML was a new technology and elearning standards were not quite there yet (not even today). The dreams soon turned into nightmares. Eventually, the super-duper project joined the ranks of hundreds (or was it thousands?) of other dot.coms (or dot.cons) and went bust.

ATTENDED A TWO-DAY CONFERENCE on educational technology (ET) at Suntec City last Thursday and Friday. So much hard work, so many speakers and so many participants from so many countries. Somehow though, it ended on a note of disillusion at the closing forum.

One participant stood up and observed, “Elearning has not yet delivered its promise of a teaching and learning utopia. Instead, what we have seems to be a Web of mass distraction.” Everyone laughed.

Another guy said, “In our search for gold, let us not be discouraged or disturbed by the dirt we find.” The chairperson quickly responded, “Ok, let us thank….” and ended the conference.

conference n. An electronic meeting place dedicated to a particular subject where users come to participate in discussions or group projects… An electronic conference provides a many-to-many communication medium, as opposed to the person-to-person nature of e-mail. — EE Link’s Glossary of Computing Terms

DURING the conference, other than a few enlightening sessions (such as two good keynote addresses and some HoD presentations on the use of online scaffolding to facilitate meaningful discussions among three primary schools), the usual thing happened. Most sessions turned out to be quite bland. While exhorting all to facilitate learning constructivistly, most presenters transmitted their knowledge (or findings) one-way while making lots of “motherhood” statements (obvious well-accepted cliches) about the need for constructivist teaching, benefits, and so on. Not walking their talk! The slides also left much to be desired — the words were often too small, too many; the graphics have too much details or are plain distracting.

IF i could organize the next ET conference (and have enough supporting resources — this is crucial because having organized much smaller conferences, i have some idea of how much work a conference can entail), i’ll make use of educational technology to enable speakers and participants to ‘conference’ with one another in a truly constructivist manner. Among other things, i would do the following:

1. Timing. Half the number of sessions and double the duration of each session to at least forty minutes.

2. Motherhood statements. Set aside a few introductory sessions on technology and pedagogy for those who are unfamiliar with educational technology. This shall be the only sessions where presenters are allowed to make “motherhood” statements.

3. Visual checklists. All presenters must go through checklists like Dr Bernie Dodge’s checklist for overall visual appeal.

4. Recordings. Pre-record all presentations (narrated PowerPoint, video unnecessary) or at least put all the PowerPoint slides online so that participants can preview and select sessions that meet their needs BEFORE the conference. Room sizes shall be allocated accordingly and not based on guesswork.

5. Real discussions. Actual conference sessions shall be used for topic-based discussions, and not for one-way transmissions, possibly using the “Progression” format (where based on a theme, several speakers host separate tables that each seats up to 10; participants join a table with a preferred topic, discuss with the speaker for about 20 minutes or so, and then move on to the next table with another topic).

6. Video conferencing. Include a video conferencing segment with one or more special overseas speakers.

7. Internet access. Put a few PCs with Internet access near registration booths and make them available for use by conference participants at a nominal fee.

8. Networking opportunities. Make it easier for participants to network with others who have similar experiences and/or interests, possibly through activities such as networking lunches or gaming, as well as online matching, discussion or polling.

“A BLOG, OR WEB LOG, is like a paper diary except that you compose your entries on a computer and send them up to a website. You can make a blog completely private or limit access to friends. But if you really don’t mind having your innermost thoughts read by utter strangers, then you can write a public blog that anyone can go to by typing in the correct Web addresses.

“What suprises me is that lots of bloggers (or bloggettes?) actually relish opening a window to their lives this way…. Even more unexpected is that these bloggers really let things hang out when recording their personal dramas for general consumption… So, if you know a blogger — or a journalist — be careful of what you say or do to him. Otherwise one day you may find your dirty linen washed in public without you realising it, until it is too late. Then you will know what the view is like from the other side of the window.”

READ THE ABOVE COLUMN incidentally while scouring the local papers for interesting infographic snippets. Having attended a lunchtime talk by Maish Nichani on the same subject only yesterday, i couldn’t help but be struck by the immense gulf (a chasm!) that separates those who “know and do technology” from those who don’t.

If i had known nothing about blogs and read this column, i would have remained in my small world, brushing off new technologies as mere gimmicky avenues for baser instincts.

Fortunately, i have experimented with blogs and do know a little about what blogs can do. So, was quite surprised by the simplistic argument. To consider blogs as mere “personal dramas” flicks or “show-and-tell” gossip just because there are such blogs is as good as panning the usefulness of all publications just because there are gossipy printed material, writing off all TV programmes just because there are sensational shows, or scoffing at all websites just because there are porn sites.

Am reminded of people who don’t quite understand something, wouldn’t do the serious work needed for real understanding, and yet want to pronounce a negative judgement. Perhaps i’m guilty of this sometimes. Nevertheless, it’s attitudes like this that could block the rollout and adoption of useful initiatives in elearning (or other important field) today.

As Maish pointed out, according to Wikipedia, “A weblog, or simply a blog, is a website which contains periodic, reverse chronologically ordered posts on a common webpage. Such a web site would typically be accessible to any Internet user…. Individual posts (which taken together are the blog or weblog) either share a particular theme, or a single or small group of authors.”

There are many types of blogs: personal, collaborative, political, and so on. As Maish had explained and demonstrated during the talk, the ubiquity and uses of blogs today are mind-boggling. They have been used with great success worldwide in various fields: to enable reflective learning or teaching, to enable collaborative work and project management, to enable capture and sharing of tacit knowledge, as e-portfolios….

Listening to Maish, i see a world of possibilities and how i’ve been using my blog in quite a limited way. Baring my soul in a public website had never been my intention. Just thought that weekly blogging is a neat way of compiling assorted essays on my reflections on faith, work, learning, and etcetera. Was quite thankful recently to receive a compliment via email from a priest, “I enjoyed (… and am enriched) reading your reflections!”.

Still, how about summarizing what i learn through a daily News section? How about analyzing and synthesizing what i’ve learnt through a weekly or monthly Features section? How about learning from the experts in my field on a regular basis through an RSS aggregator that pulls insights from their blogs? How about adding an interaction box to maintain persistent and relevant conversations? How about encouraging my students to express themselves and collaborate with one another through blogs? …

The usefulness of blogs is limited only by our openness and imagination. The question is: How many of us would actually choose to “cross the road”?

(Extracted from tomorrow’s reading in Our Daily Bread

“The end of all things is at hand; therefore be serious and watchful in your prayers.” — 1 Peter 4:7

“THERE IS A WEB SITE that claims to predict when you will die. After you answer a series of questions, your projected date of death appears along with a digital clock counting down the number of seconds you have left to live.

“It’s all based on current life-expectancy charts, but seeing it on a computer screen makes it more vivid. As the site says, it’s “the Internet’s friendly reminder that life is slipping away.” ”

A HOLIDAY HAS JUST PASSED and i’ve got next to nothing done. Not much prayer, no marking, no teaching preparation, no gym exercise, no chit-chatting, and not a blog entry yet.

Spent almost the whole day on my new website (nope, not revealing here), experimenting with Fantastico and free php-based CMSs such as Xoops, Mambo and phpNuke. Yes, many insights gained. Yes, closer now to that ‘Web haven’ where one only has to fill up forms to update content. However, before more could be achieved in less time, so much more time has to be spent making the whole thing work first in the desired flow. And one problem followed another. Kept seeing “Internal Server” errors. Not so fantastico afterall.

At the end of the day, seemed to have just returned from a black hole which has sucked up all things and yielded very little in return. Another case of “more is less”.

Deja vu huh? What’s new after four years of working on the Net? For all the grandiose promises held out by cyberspace (a.k.a. elearning, web portals, open-source code), there are also many more ‘black holes’ into which time, money, information, dreams, credibility, and etcetera, have vanished.

Meanwhile, life is slipping away.

“Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 – 1827) was a famous composer. He started going deaf in 1800. He had to use his ‘inner ear’ – his memory of sounds – to compose his great music. His Ninth Symphony is the longest symphony ever written. It closes with a choir singing the Ode to Joy. He took 10 years to compose it. Here was Beethovan, deaf, but demanding that the choir sing about joy! When the Symphony was first played on 7 May 1824, in Vienna, the audience loved it. However, he could not hear them. A singer had to turn him around so he could see them cheering.

“BUT MANY music critics made bad remarks about the Symphony. It was music completely new at that time. To include a choir was innovative. In fact it was shocking. It was the first time in history such a thing had ever been done – because it involved singing, it was only part symphony. It was a mixture the critics were not comfortable with. One conductor called the piece tasteless. A composer called the grand finale badly set.

“The critics were even more upset because Beethoven had not followed the normal form of a symphony. This means that the first movement should be fast, the second movement slow, the third movement dance and the fourth movement fast. Beethoven broke the rules with his Ninth Symphony.

“Today, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony is accepted all over the world as one of the greatest pieces of music ever composed…. If your idea is good, you should not worry about all the bad remarks. With time, people will see how good your idea is. So keep thinking… keep trying… keep doing… keep making your own music!”

Today, the Internet provides different stories on why the CD has a normal playing lenth of 74 minutes. They all revolve around the effort to record all of the Ninth Symphony, one of the longest classical compositions, on a single audio CD.

According to one story, the world-famous conductor Herbert von Karajan, whose concert recording appeared at that time on the PolyGram label, demanded that Philips introduce a CD with a sufficient playing time for his favorite piece. Another version says that the wife of the then-Chairman and founder of Sony Akio Morita urged her husband to exercise his influence and pay homage to Beethoven with the extended playing time.

(Imported from a forum.)

Looking back now, if i’m the instructor, i might re-design the course. M. and i put up a similar idea via simultaneous typing in a virtual chat last Wed. For an instant, we ’smiled’ in cyberspace at the meeting of our minds as M. wrote, “i think we are talking the same language”.

FOR SHE HAD written, “A lot depends on the motivation and preferences of the individual. Some individuals have the time/motivation to feel the commitment to work on group assignments. others might think — I would really like to work on this assignment collaboratively, but I’m worried that I won’t be able to devote the time, and don’t want to let anyone down. So, it might be good to make collaborative activities, small bites.”

And i had written, “For people unfamiliar with or not ready for academic studies, it would be good to start with one key paper and an e-tivity. More papers can be read along the way to achieve one or more goals in the activity.”

Another thing that struck me during the course was: the three assignments (concept matrix, strategies & tactics, and reflective journal) have been very useful in helping us develop understanding and insights; but they are still very theoretical. i could have added a practical component to the assignments in the course towards the end of Module 2. For example, if there are 39 participants, they could be divided into teams of threes or fours. Each team is supposed to design an e-tivity (as in Dr Gilly Salmon’s e-Moderating course) and to facilitate online discussions on a chosen topic (say, based on a paper) for two weeks. The team that generates the most interesting and insightful discussion then gets more points added to their individual grades.

This would take care of the need for course participants to “practise collaboration and teamwork” and for the course facilitator to actively facilitate “collaboration, interaction, communication and dialogue that improve learning”. Doing this could be more practical and manageable than having to actively ‘force’ or ‘entice’ course participants to be active in all discussions.

(imported from Blogger.com; see also ‘Industry’ vs. ‘Academia’ I and ‘Industry’ vs. ‘Academia’ III.)

“ASSIGNMENT 2 is going to be a ‘piece of cake’!” i had thought last week, upon finding a high-level pedagogical report submitted in May 2001. However, confusion quickly set in as i tried to re-organise its contents in accordance with Steeples’ Pedagogical Framework.

Now, am i going to write from the perspective of an acad staff (which i am not) or from that of a facilitating ID centre (which i am part of)? Just which parts belong to (1) Philosophy, (2) High Level Pedagogy (HLP), (3) Strategies and (4) Tactics? Some parts, such as Constructivism and Problem-Based Learning, fit into (2) and (3) respectively like a glove. Certain parts seem to belong more to tactics than strategies.

OTHERS, SUCH AS Flexible Learning and “Technology-enabled”, seem to be in one another’s places. From the report, it seemed that “Technology-enabled” was the HLP that prompted the introduction of a Flexible Learning strategy. The directive from the top could have gone something along this line, “Others have started doing this. So, get on the e-learning bandwagon quick, in case we fall behind the pack.”

This is probably why when i first joined the institution two years ago, a frequent refrain of management personnel was, “We’ve forced thousands of students to buy notebook PCs. The value of their purchases is in millions. Now, we have to ensure that the academic staff make good use of technology in their teaching in order to justify these massive expenses.”

Academic staff, in turn, are often unconvinced that using technology would really enhance the quality of their teaching. Even if they are convinced, finding suitable uses of technology is often not easy. But then, i probably shouldn’t be complaining. If things were not so, i could be out of job!

Nevertheless, upon reflection, this top-down approach (instead of a bottoms-up approach) to managing teaching and technology is fairly common among companies and educational institutions. The problems created are similar to one that J. mentioned in an online discussion, “Our director is a firm believer that if you put a course online then why not have 500 students instead of 25 in each class?” Certainly rings a bell when i think of a past experience with an MNC. As B. put it in his reply, “You know it, I know it…why aren’t WE making the decisions?”

Truly interesting what a simple application of Steeples’ pedagogical framework reveals.

(Imported from Blogger.com.)

This is getting clearer and clearer, especially after the video conferencing session that we had with G., S., et al, on one side (in Australia) and with our in-house Instructional Design (ID) program participants on our side (in Singapore) yesterday morning.

THERE WAS a certain unexpressed angst in the air. The Australian team knew that they have put together a great ID program, but somehow participation level in the online program was quite low, especially in the online forum. We the Singaporean team knew that we have made available to our academic staff one of the best programs (if not the best) in Australia and we have tried our best to be good co-facilitators — but the question remained.

Our academic staff participants knew that they wanted to learn. But somehow they couldn’t bring themselves to plough through the excellent papers and then post their insights or comments in the forum. They cannot yet see how the theory or insights gleened from the papers would help them design good online learning courses in practice. And they cannot understand why they were not taught ID in a jiffy.

This evening, after a virtual chat with B. and M., it gets even clearer. It’s a problem of ‘Industry’ vs. ‘Academia’ — ‘practice’ vs. ‘theory’. It’s through no conscious fault of any party. Yes, good ‘practice’ flows from sound ‘theory’. However, like the proverbial East and West, ‘practice’ and ‘theory’ are still having difficulties trying to ‘meet’ — even with much vaunted constructivist approaches.

More about this later. Gotta run for Bible study group now.

(imported from Blogger.com, see also ‘Industry’ vs. ‘Academia’ II)

Each evening, in accordance with the Ignatian spiritual exercise, my spiritual director (SD) would give me four recommended passages to pray over four hours the next day. The thought came on the third day when my SD was listening very attentively to what i was telling him about my prayer experience — the thoughts and feelings that came to mind while meditating or contemplating over the scripture passages. As usual, he has asked a few strategic questions in the beginning and was about to recommend readings for the next day at the end.

SUDDENLY REALISED that in listening non-judgmentally and questioning/recommending strategically, my SD was using constructivist tactics to help me learn experientially from the scripture, my prayers and my past experiences. Only problem is: i had trouble ‘getting into the scene’ through the Ignatian contemplative prayer, where i’m supposed to imagine and feel myself present in the scene described in a scripture passage.

i saw that if i managed to do so, i would be able to learn affectively; then my future actions would proceed naturally from my heart, and not just my head. God knows that though i’m a basically Thinking type person, my feelings can sometimes and quite easily take control over me.

One thought led to another, and got linked to recent insights over these two years — how i’ve conjectured that God has been teaching us mortals through a Problem-Based Learning and Experience-Based Learning approach all our lives. Now, it looks like through divine inspiration, saints like St Ignatius had came up with a constructivist method of helping one another growing spiritually hundreds of years ago. And prayer, as John Craghan put it in his book Psalms for All Seasons, “forces us to interiorize and reflect… allows us to think the thoughts of God, not of humans… [and] acknowledge that things can be otherwise and that we do make a difference.”

It was truly amazing! God the Divine Teacher had been mediating our learning using constructivst methods for eons before academic study uncovered it only a few decades ago!

(imported from Blogger.com)

“1. Prior Commitment.
I have work-related matters and eh, a week-long holiday to attend to. [Then, it was SARS-related quarrantine for almost 2 weeks. Later, a week for spiritual renewal.]

2. A ‘Push’ Factor. I feel a certain revulsion, or to put more mildly, plain inertia. Just one week away from the DF and “My Goodness! How the messages have multipled!” The thought of having to plough through all these messages (now seen as “readings”, as Iris called them during last wed’s virtual chat) is enough to put me off. In other words, the volume and the textual nature of the discussion makes learning rather unattractive.

3. Weak ‘Pull’ Factors (especially ‘emotionally’). Sure, my motivation is high – i take up this course to gain knowledge and to get a qualification. i also think discussion with my tutors and peers is necessary to gain deeper insight. However, if i compare my rate of participation in this learning forum with that in another forum (which is not related to work or study) which i feel emotionally tuned in, reasons (1) and (2) are not enough to stop me from making time to take part in the latter forum. In a way, members of a community need to ‘buy in’ emotionally to the idea of belonging to this community before they will become active and contributing partipants.”

After the post, E. very sensibly pointed out the flipside to relying on emotional commitment as motivation, “…if someone is very emotionally involved in something else that is happening in their life (or, more generally, in the world), it is difficult to stay as focused on one’s work or study. There are some periods in my life when some major concern I have seems to use up all my emotional energy and ‘drains’ me so that I can’t focus as well on other things that are also important. No amount of telling oneself to ‘pull yourself together’ seems to help sometimes.”

i think in a very true sense, this probably sums up another key reason why my usual drive to study flew out of the window these few months. i had been emotionally distracted by a relationship issue, and E. said it all. So, this is how some (or is it many?) of our students feel like! And the heavy textual nature and the required rigor of authoritative references in an academic program like this one doesn’t help.

(imported from Blogger.com)

In a twist of fate, yours truly (normally highly motivated and studious) is now behaving like a proverbial unmotivated lazy student in our institution.

First, went on a long-awaited six-day holiday (this is for family bonding) in Hongkong and Bangkok in mid March. Came back in the midst of a Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) scare. Was confined to work at 56kbps at home (and up to 10 hours per month) instead of 100Mbps at office (unlimited!) for six days in Week 4 (bcos i just returned from a SARS-inffected country) and Week 5 (bcos a student was down with SARS).

LOST SOME momentum there, but managed to squeeze out Assignment 1 with a one-week extension after the official deadline. Then, went on a long-overdue four-day retreat (this is for spiritual renewal) at the local Ignatian centre in Week 12. Felt wonderful upon my return, but for a week or two was most reluctant to get into study mode.

Quite an experience! i’m beginning to understand how an unmotivated lazy student might feel as untouched learning material accumulates with the rapid passage of time while other activities beckon so enticingly. Almost wanted to give up! :-p

And quite an irony! Just a few months ago, i had put the finishing touches to a Blackboard course entitled Top e-Learners’ Study Strategies — specifically designed for students in our polytechnic. Got great reviews from boss, colleagues and varsity tutors earlier. Now, i can’t even apply them myself — these strategies have become Strategies That Don’t Work.

But wait! i chose to take this course, i wanted to learn to set effective online teaching strategies and tactics, and this skill is useful in my work. So, okay, grit my teeth and hang on!

And inspired by blogs shared by an online classmate Adam L. and ex-classmate A.O., i hereby start mine….

(imported from Blogger.com)