Baliwood star in cool vid

Thursday, November 27, 2008

man is god

so much is happening; those of us that are students of social media and transcendent web technologies cannot scan the transformation without each other. We are each others' filters, as increasingly the web becomes the source of knowing. We must count on each other; collaboration must be cherished, the new sacrament. see the film to the right. pass it on, hehehe.

Friday, October 10, 2008

Mac madness

OMG, new university job has brought so many changes. From 10 years of corporate fire-fighting to a more deliberate pace. From reactionary to proactive, from anxious to calm. And an interesting Mac flood. The uni does not want me using my personal MacBook Pro, for a variety of reasons. And i had to turn in my moto to my prior employer after the university supported iPhone came in. Then in an Apple training on running multiple platforms, I win the raffle..So in 48 hours, I get a new MacBook Pro, a new iPhone 3, and an iPod touch. "Finding my footing" is what I'm telling people when they ask me about the new job. Inside, I think I'm experiencing PTSD :)

Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Web 2.0 goes squared

and overwhelms me! I'll have to admit, I'm a higher ed admin and student affairs guy, who has enjoyed chewing on the margins of emerging technologies for a few years, but I've never TOTALLY understood any of it enough to say I am more than peripherally aware of these tools. Love'm, and know little about them. I'm way to old to be a real geek, and I say that as I wish I could. And now I've been declared as "uniquely qualified" for a student affairs position that includes integrating emerging technologies into student services delivery. It's a new position, so I'm winging it. And hoping that someone comes to my rescue to point me to best practices. But..may never happen, and I'm ok with that, but frightened all the same.

Friday, August 1, 2008

and the last of Michael's project summary

I’m told by the veterans that an institution interested in using SL should take time, get everyone imaginable involved, and of course look at the best examples. We are advised by the instructional technologists to start with the desired learning experience, and build the world that is the best environment for those objectives, and by the seasoned skeptics and evangelists to get the institution decision makers in-world and be patient and prepared for lots of conversation and data collection. Island owners advise that we attend to legal issues as well, insure that we develop the faculty, and contemplate how teaching and learning are integrated into our institutional culture. We must understand in very profound terms how this very large idea might resonate with our long-term plans and missions, our vision for the future.
Residents of SL that use the world for teaching and learning agree that it is an evolutionary step and a cultural experience that may set the standards, if not for educating in virtual worlds, then for an understanding of the cultural complexities that are necessary for creating such a richness of experience. Virtual Worlds and Learning Management Systems will evolve together to create virtual worlds that are designed for specific experiences for specific disciplines. SL represents what educating can be in 3D for the short term, but new virtual platforms will make educating using the 3D web something completely different. The larger metaverse will be one in which people driving avatars will populate a variety of worlds, making and keeping connections that are real relationships, across a myriad of virtual existences. The metaverse of the near future will be one in which open source technology will prompt institutions from around the RL globe to link their own virtual learning environments to form an amazing tapestry of learning environments, one shared by hundreds of millions of teachers and learners with direct and personal access to each other and their resources.