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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Friday, 26 September 2008, 04:35 AM
  As Ken Anderson has pointed out here regarding Stephen Downes' presentation in San Jose, Stephen's already established theory is that the forums are "not free" because they are "dominated by only 3-4 loud voices" but that blogs are "more free" because they contain more thoughtful discussions, and because they are moderated, can presumably remove any "too loud voices" -- the operating theory is also that 'trolls' prefer to duke it out on the forums where they "hate each other" and won't bother to go to blogs of substance.

All of this is tripe, and I'm now working on refuting it.

Here's why:

1. The blogs are content-free; very low-content; or high-content for only a few exceptional cases; these cases happen to be *the very same people who post on the forums a lot, especially originating threads* (and some aren't dubbed "loud voices" because they are "liked voices" like Lisa).

2. There are 120 blogs listed now (there seem to be a few pages duplicated or down, but call it that), and the overwhelming majority of them are *not* high-content, nor high-engagement. The overwhelming majority (so far) consist of throat-clearing, a mere link, and not interesting conversations, unlike the forums, where practically every post contains an interesting nugget of thought and linking and conversation.

3. I've made a valuation system of "0" for blogs that have only very cursory posts like "Hi, I'm taking this Connectivism" course or merely links to course material; "1" if they made perhaps one thoughtful post and quit; "2" if they have had multiple posts over the three weeks with a sustained engagement with the course ideas; "3" if they had multiple posts, sustained engagement *and* conversations, i.e. 2-3 or more posters coming to comment on their blogs.

4. It's a chore to go through the whole list in this fashion, and I'll do that, and I invite others to make their own assessment scales and do the same thing, but I'm going to bet that they will not have very different results than me using my "content/engagement" scale here (different than the silly "power law" that merely counts noses, i.e. you post, you make a blog, you show up, you are "something" even if all you posted was "Hi, I'm taking this course now [link]". While some may disagree that such posts deserve not 0 or 1, they'd have to concede that they aren't 2 or 3.

5. I can read some French enough to evaluate, but I can't read any other languages except Russian of course, which isn't represented here. So I was going to award all non-English blogs a "2" just for that factor to weight it, but then I discovered that they were easily determined to be substantive or not by their length or presence of mere links.

CONTENT/ENGAGEMENT RATINGS


1. http://amusingspace.blogspot.com/ Rating: 1
Reiterates Downes' premise, "here's a depth in the blogs, a thoughtfulness that i am not experiencing in the threads (these feel like a tug of war played with spiders webs....)"

2. http://abalone.typepad.com/abalone/ Rating: 0 one post, short news about the course itself and introductory material

3. http://www.actionsfle.com/dotclear/index.php?feed/rss2 Rating: 0 -- news about the course, French

4.http://feeds.feedburner.com/AdventuresInCorporateEducation Rating: 1 only one post, good question: "Do people even think this far when they are making the community — why do you want one? Because you were told to make one? If that is the only motivation, the community will die because there is not a network feeding it, breathing life into it.The question remaining for me is: is a community a network? Or is the network the energizing force that powers a community?

5.http://www.reinventinglife.org/joomla/worklife/agblog.html Rating: 0 -- very personal, few posts, "what Connectivism means to me"

6.http://davidal.es/aldia/feed/ Spanish but very short Rating: 0

7.http://dietsociety.edublogs.org/feed/ Rating: 1 a few posts only, "how I feel about this" "Connectivism is like Anarcho-syndicalism in that the central authority rests with the individual."

8. http://connecteded.wordpress.com/feed/ thoughtful SL person but only a few posts and links to others Rating: 1

9.http://elearningthoughts.posterous.com/rss.xml Rating: 1 Just one post, personal, "I've finally found a good definition which resonates with my internal feelings of why I was successful at teaching in a blended course recently. Via the wikipedia entry for "experiential learning":

10.http://www.fininformatica.it/wp/category/cck08/feed Rating: 3
-- thoughtful engagement with material, though brief, attracted 1 comment

11.http://arieliondotcom.wordpress.com/feed/ Rating: 2 engaged, contentious, but not getting comments. "She said that she was therefore going to be the facilitator and “steer” us toward the course content whenever it strayed more towrd the mechanics. But I mentioned that seemed antithetical to the whole concept of Connectivity. To me, we were networking and the network (those in this particular network) were making their own knowledge. The participants were deciding, “democratizing”, personally empowering ourselves, to our needs for learning. THe other group may have another need. And no one person should be “steering” us toward anything."

12. http://beespace.net/feed tweets only Rating: 0 (no fair calling your tweet aggregator a "blog" as such).

13. http://blog.puntopanto.it/?feed=rss2 brief introductory post, no more Rating: 0

14. http://feeds.feedburner.com/classroomblogging/useP Rating: 1 post, "I'm overwhelmed"

15.http://bradleyshoebottom.wordpress.com/feed/ Rating: 3 -- engaging with ideas, making map, attracting 4 posts

16. http://brains.parslow.net/?q=taxonomy/term/40/0/feed Rating: 2, very dense engagement with course ideas but not attracting comments

17. http://www.google.com/reader/atom/user/05821365489330161490/state/com.google/reading-list permission denied Rating: 0

18. http://eduspaces.net/brucen/ very brief introduction, no content page Rating: 0

19. http://buthaina-connect08.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default Rating: 1 -- one post only, reiterating "what is connectivism" discussion

20. http://cckno8.wordpress.com/feed/ Rating: 0 links page to course material only

21. http://cck08.posterous.com/rss.xml Rating: 1 - just one post with graphics for "centrality" or "routing"

22. http://learnoscck08.wordpress.com/feed Rating: 3 -- dense engaging posts, with a convo with 2 participants at least in comments

23. http://elconnectivism.wordpress.com/feed Rating: 0 short 'I'm beginning this post" paragraph

24. http://feeds.feedburner.com/Understandings Rating: 3 engaging directly with concepts and readings, attracts 2 other commentators to the blog

Totals:
0 10
1 8
2 2
3 4

Thus, so far, 75 percent of the blogs are weak in content -- either essentially content-free or with one weak post only; 25 percent of the blogs have strong or even very strong content with engagement; of the 25 percent, only 16 percent have these more thoughtful, quieter conversations that Stephen imagines.

And -- wait for it! -- here's the big payoff in studying those 16-25 percent: THEY ARE ALL PEOPLE WHO INITIATE THREADS ON THE FORUMS OF PARTICIPATE IN OTHER THREADS; THE 4 PARTICIPATE AND STATE FREQUENTLY.

So, oops, there goes Stephen Downes Data Fable, concocted out of counting noses of "power laws" of only a tiny handful of people making the majority of the "157 posts" (a dynamically changing figure that hasn't been updated at all) who are "too loud" and therefore "necessitating" everyone flocking to blogs.

The reality is:

1. The blogs have mainly no substance.
2. What little substance there is peters out after one post or one week.
3. What substance there is doesn't always attract others.
4. The 16 percent who say something of substance and attract others are the same people who post on the forums.

So you'd think my work here is done, but of course, I'll push on to examine all the rest of the blogs, and I'll say in case someone is in literalist or fisking mode:

1. My ratings are not ratings of people, or even of blogs, which might be more substantive some other day; obviously, each and every person who connects to this course is a precious snowflake and maybe only melted because of the heat of contact; they are available in their full preciousness another day to perhaps be the Wise One of the Ages, No Connection is Ever Lost

2. My ratings are *ratings about the premise of Stephen that blogs are better than forums* so that the context is "forums or blogs, which is better? where are people having the context" NOT "this blog is good or bad".

3. My decision that one post saying "Hi, I'm here"= 0 could be debated and made into 1 or even 2, under the taxodermic approach that spawned the first data fable about the "power law," and that's fine, but the reality is, there is absolutely no way you can fudge this materia regarding engagement: either there are comments, or there aren't.

4. My expose here doesn't prove anything superior about the forums, it just a) makes the case for both; b) attempts to counterweight the professor's clear bias and amplification of a false point c) trumps the argument by pointing out the people who are interested in the blogs *also* post on the forums, were not "driven away" by "loud voices" even if they are not "the loud voices" themselves.


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Picture of Jayne Little
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Jayne Little - Friday, 26 September 2008, 09:10 AM
 

I do hope you continue the rankings.  Thanks for taking the time.

I am going to presume that if someone greatly disagrees with a ranking, they will enter a dialogue.  

 I will also do some cursory validations of the rankings.

Once I get a handle on how your rankings compare to mine, then I should be able to review the blogs faster.  Of course, you will be doing a point in time review, and people can improve their blogs, start later, etc.  It's too darn bad there isn't an overall universal rating tool.

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Picture of Pat Parslow
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Pat Parslow - Friday, 26 September 2008, 09:15 AM
  Cut it out, you are making me agree with you again wink
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Picture of Jayne Little
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Jayne Little - Friday, 26 September 2008, 09:26 AM
 

I'm unsure why Stephen gave that juicy quote in that presentation. I'm with you on this one, it was bad analysis and a poor reaction, albeit, it was likely an honest one and may be based in frustrations of goals versus reality

For me, the first week was chaotic just as one would expect. Individuals do their dance of learning the community. You have new people to topic, people who are arriving late to course, and people who have been anxiously awaiting its start up.  Communication in moodle went into a boring overload of introductions & chatter. Then, those who wanted to dialogue, were awaiting the startup, went into a standard challenge/response in the forums.

I do not remember any survey on one's previous experience in forums as part of this course. That would be an interesting analysis.

My guess is there are some, who are truly new to forums and like many newcomers would have been uncomfortable with some of the vitriolic posts. For some, it takes a while to learn how to dance in this area.

The second week's readings were a killer for me, and again, I am going to presume, which is always a risky venture, that they were for  others as well.  They were heavily into the theories of learnings.  Responses dried up in the 2nd week. I know I didn't feel worthy of being able to respond. 

This week, things got busy again. The topics were more user friendly, and you can see by the number of posters in the various threads. 

I am fairly sure that I don't fit in the top3or4, but, just as a note, in case I did...I never hate anyone for posts.  I may feel they are foolish, I may despise their policies, or I may just love to argue with them,...but to truly hate someone..well, gosh, that would be rather silly.

 

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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Friday, 26 September 2008, 02:36 PM
  1. It's not just some isolated quote in that one presentation. He made the presentation based on several forums post he had already made by them, plus his own "The Daily" editorial. Sorry I don't have time to fetch up the links but look at his "The Daily" pieces where he's made this point repeatedly.

2. There aren't any vitriolic posts. This is one of those myths that gets started because someone like me says, properly, someone normal and obvious, that people trying to shut up some posters are thin-skinned. It's a report; it is not vitriol. Find me a link to some actual vitriol, please, instead of perpetuating this silly forums myth.

3. Oh, the weeks and their readings, and the dynamic of the course, are all very important vectors to example as influencing pace, frequency, quality of blog posts. And surely they do, and surely we'll find after 12 weeks we have denser blogs with more comments, etc. and those that seemed like they petered out after week one may come back. But this isn't a valuation of *what blogs are*. It's a valuation *to refute Stephen's point* that blogs are "better than" forums. I'm showing that they are equal, or worse, and in fact in our case here, involve the same posters.
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Picture of roy williams
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by roy williams - Friday, 26 September 2008, 09:36 AM
  Just a thought - you dont do appreciative enquiry, do you?
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Picture of ailsa haxell
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by ailsa haxell - Friday, 26 September 2008, 10:35 AM
  A shallow analysis. I want a recount smile
I have substantive blogging and you have only considered the first line of one of these.
Your analysis seem easily swayed by what you want to see, expect to see and have not explored beyond this.
http://amusingspace.blogspot.com/


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Picture of Pat Parslow
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Pat Parslow - Friday, 26 September 2008, 10:47 AM
  I'd agree yours is more than a '1' by Catherine's scoring mechanism. It is at least a 2 and quite possibly a 3.

However, I suspect your criticism (that Catherine only sees what she wants to see) is equally true (in this instance, i.e. on the topic of dominant voices in the two channels) of Stephen Downes. Personally, in any blog I see one dominant voice, even though in some cases it is by multiple authors, because of the very nature of blogs.
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Stephen Downes portrait
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Stephen Downes - Friday, 26 September 2008, 11:48 AM
  I fail to see how this observation shows that I 'see only what I want to see'. What is there in any of my observations that is contradicted by the fact (never denied by me) that each blog has a single, or dominant, voice?

My assertion covers the set of blogs as a whole, just as my other assertions cover the discussion forum as a whole. Finding facts that contradict other statements, statements that I have not made, may be fun, but is hardly revealing.
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Picture of ailsa haxell
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by ailsa haxell - Friday, 26 September 2008, 02:12 PM
  hey Stephen, just clarifying, I was not referring to you.
To be very clear, my comment was on Catherine's analysis of blogs. ailsa.
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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Friday, 26 September 2008, 02:39 PM
  1. If you have substantive blogging, is it *about this course*? That's the question on the table, not whether your blog is interesting in general. I found several blogs that are regularly posting interesting and substantive material, but only had very short blurbs about this course. And that's what the valuation is about: this course.

2. Did you have more than one post? Did the one or two posts really grapple with any of the ideas? or did they merely cut and paste them back or link to others? Did anyone answer on the comments? Those were all my straight-forward criteria.

3. If you don't like your personal rating, make a case to change it based on the demonstrable criteria, but don't ask for a recount for the entire thing unless you have a better system or can come to different conclusions on all the material.

4. No, my analysis is based on curiosity, exploration, and paying attention, instead of merely believing what Stephen Downes is spewing. I suggest you exhibit the same curiosity and go do what I did.
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Picture of ailsa haxell
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by ailsa haxell - Friday, 26 September 2008, 10:20 PM
  Catherine , you are in error, you are guilty of doing exactly what you accuse others of.
You had set your own criteria, then you shift it coz it suits you.
Your attention to detail is seriously lacking.
At least you might have revisited and conceded an error.
For the record: 11/15 postings for the month of September were specific to the topic and substantive, including critical analysis and referenced. Evidence of networking is current with 10 posts made by others taking this course, including continued dialogue. Trackbacks also evidence of networked learning.
I was willing to hear a counter argument, after all anything worth believing in needs to stand up to the critique, however your credibility for critique has plummeted.
Seems you are intent on causing mischief rather than being credible.

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Picture of Ken Anderson
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Ken Anderson - Friday, 26 September 2008, 11:21 PM
  Hmmm.  One of Catherine's students got a low mark and is contesting it? Is this what is happening here?
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Picture of ailsa haxell
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by ailsa haxell - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 08:31 AM
  ouch. hmmm. no.
Just identifying creative accounting.
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Picture of Ken Anderson
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Ken Anderson - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 09:37 AM
 

I am running my own study at:

http://kenkat.wordpress.com/2008/09/27/duking-it-out-forum-style/#more-361

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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 11:35 AM
  <you dont do appreciative enquiry

Sounds like a buzz word, "appreciative enquiry," does this mean embarking on an investigation without an open mind, and not criticizing, but "appreciating" the topic you're researching?

Perhaps you could explain, and we could both learn something : )
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Picture of Pat Parslow
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Pat Parslow - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 11:48 AM
  It has been around a while - try here for a description
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Picture of George Siemens
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by George Siemens - Friday, 26 September 2008, 10:55 AM
Hi Catherine,

I haven't done a rating review of blogs. I will say, however, that I have spent more time commenting in forums than on blogs. Not sure if it's because the emails hit my inbox regularly or because there appears to be some continuity of some threads in Moodle. I was at a presentation a few years ago where Terry Anderson (from Athabasca) presented findings that support Stephen's assertions of different dialogue in a distributed manner through blogs (Terry's work didn't focus on relational or conflict issues in forums). But, I think in all cases, and with all research - especially in social sciences - context is important. What are the factors? What's happening in this course? What is the nature of the content? The experience of faculty? of learners? I find it difficult to generalize research in online learning because of the multiplicity of interacting factors.

I am interested to see how things will evolve with blog postings as we go forward. The first assignment of producing a short paper is due in early October. Will participants post those in moodle? or on their blog? or send to us via email? I guess that leads to the question of what role the forums and blogs play in relation to tasks. For example, when we are in "getting to know each other" mode, do we prefer a central space of dialogue? Or, when we are in "post extensive personal thoughts" mode, do we prefer our own space instead of this forum? We'll have to wait and see how interactions unfold as the course progresses.

Do some people prefer forums because they are more comfortable in this environment (i.e. have more experience)? Is it easier to contribute to a forum than to start a blog? What about motivations for contributions? Some of the most popular threads in this forum have been the controversial ones. Our blood pressure surges and we respond. And so on. Many factors may be contributing to what Stephen sees and to what Catherine sees.

We are still early in the course and from my perspetive, patterns of interaction are not yet fully set. I suspect we'll see things settling more as the course develops and we'll be better able to judge what is happening (and as educators, what we would like to happen).

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Picture of Sui Fai John Mak
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Sui Fai John Mak - Friday, 26 September 2008, 12:20 PM
 

Hi George,

When it comes to contribution, it is really a personal preference.  For me, I like to contribute to a forum, due mainly to its dynamic nature in conversation and sharing of thoughts, and my eagerness to learn from others spontaneously.  I think blogs could allow you to have more personal "space" in expressing your personal beliefs and experience.  Even if others don't agree with your views, the visitor can choose whether he/she should respond or not. Not sure if others agree on this?thoughtful  What's the preference of others?

I suppose lateral thinking is important in a forum setting, as it could complement vertical thinking.  At times, I found confusion when thinking about an issue, due mainly to my misunderstanding or misinterpretation of the different views, or reactions to strong opinions raised in a forum.  And I could only see new lights when I tried lateral thinking.  It seems to work for me.  "If there isn't any more oil by digging deeper into a hole over a spot, can we try somewhere else?"  How does it sound? 

I found deeply heated discussions are accompanied with strong emotions, of course they are personal!  May be that's the exciting part of being in a forum. 

No one needs to agree with everyone else.  That's democracy??  wink But we could all learn, that's common sense, but ........

Sit back and enjoy the discussion.  Or else, listen and involve, and learnapprove LOL

We are just human, and so would it be natural to become very emotional when it comes to certain views of others?  The Voice of the Crowd (VOC) is important to everyone.  It would be interesting to learn the views of others in an open space (forum) and a personal space (blog).  What do you think?blush

John

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Picture of Ken Anderson
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Ken Anderson - Friday, 26 September 2008, 12:56 PM
 

Hi John.  I like your questions, and I can't resist responding to them. Here's my opening thoughts on my participation in the two spaces:

Open space:  I hold back a bit on expressing my views for a few reasons:

1. I can't delete them after I have expressed them. A record exists that is out of my control (after 30 minutes)

2. I feel less ownership in a open space. I share it with others, and someone else has the control

3. I neither wish to embarass myself nor wound others excessively

Personal space:

1. I own it, so will do what I wish, understanding that if I wish others to attend, I must provide attraction

2. I have more control

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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Friday, 26 September 2008, 02:43 PM
  George, I think you are ducking several important issues here.

Re: "presented findings that support Stephen's assertions of different dialogue in a distributed manner through blogs."

Stephen is so obsessed for looking for and celebrating "distribution" and "networking" everywhere that he forgets about substance.

You can't claim that 75 percent of these blogs in the sample I gave you have substance. Get through the rest of the list -- it may even be worse or only slightly better from what I've eyeballed.

But the most important refutation I make is I illustrate that the people contributing this "distributed" or soi-disant "different dialogue" on blogs are...wait for it! -- the *same people* as in the forums. So my work there is done.

I, too, was hoping to find this quiet, intellectual reservation where all the men and women were above average and nary a discouraging word was heard, but I get out there on those blogs and I find...Parslow. The same bunch. So, please, look at the facts, not at what Stephen is trying to find as a superstructure in search of a base.

I don't merely "just see," or merely spout "power laws" based on superficial computations on charts. I *go look*. *Go look, George*.
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Picture of Bradley Shoebottom
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Bradley Shoebottom - Friday, 26 September 2008, 01:51 PM
 

Catherine,

An invigorating study and a promising start to an intersting subject. Thank you for the 3 smile. However, your rating system needs improvement in one major regard - it is not measuring the true indicator of the purpose dialog - communciation for the purpose of leanring. Your rating system,needs beefing up. What you need to do is a second part to your study, a survey mechanism to survey the course participants to see if those that did not participate as much felt they got as much as those that participated a lot. A link may not see very substanitive, but it can mean a heck of a lot to the person that requested it. So, as observers, we need to talk to the participants somehow, and not merely crunch a few numbers through passive observation. The really time consuming part of what I propose is that each post needs to be surveyed. Or here is an easier alternative from E-bay and Amazon...

Stephen and George, can you put a rating system in place for each posting in the Moodle? If I think the link is invaluable, I will give it a 5?

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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Friday, 26 September 2008, 02:52 PM
  Bradley, that's an interesting proposition, but I don't think it would be very easy to calculate.

I figure that if someone posts a substantive essay and gets 4 comments on it, and goes back and forth, all the people in the exchange "have learned something".

Of course, you could claim that someone merely finding a link to this course material on an edu blog they already followed in general is "learning something". So then that content-free utilitarian blog with the link suddenly earns, say, a "3" for its "learning capacity" and is on par suddenly with a substantive exchange that people came away feeling subjectively "they learned". That's what I mean by "data fables". Yes, there is data there, say, "3" and "3". But a fable is woven around the numbers to make it seem as if they "mean they are equal" and they aren't. Learning about the location of a course is a low-value, utilitarian learning. Learning about some bold new way to connect to your students that works is a high-value philosophical learning, lets' say, and I think any rating system at this level can't distinguish.

I also am not interesting in surveying people to find out why they didn't participate. They didn't participate because they didn't feel like it. They are auditors in a course with 2,200 people in it, a significant portion of whom are vying for attention, yieled at least 200-400 people that one has to pay attention to, plus all kinds of difficult readings, audio tapes, etc.

Again, I have a narrow task here: refuting Downsian fallacy of distributed learning. It's totally fake. The learning isn't distributed; it's the same people, in the same dynamics, and there is simply MORE activity and more exchange on the forums because they're easier and more accessible. His theory of the "loud voice" is especially bogus in a setting where educated adults with at least a DSL connection and a capable computer and dispoable time can be expected to post if they have something to say and we don't have to distribute "one laptop per child" to get them to post.

A journalistic or scholarly effort to survey participants is a great idea, but I'm just not interesting in that separate task for this purpose.

As for 'ratings' of posts, I have never seen that system work credibly. It's a popular contest, it is flash-mobbed, it is meaningless, and in its lower depths it is like KGB-style police informant systems, i.e. low-balling or abuse-reporting expression. That kind of rating of each post doesn't answer the Downsian fallacy, either, because he could fetch up a lot of flash-mobbed low-rated posts, or a lot of no-rated posts, and say, "See? The forums are crap". Whereas what I show is *engagement* -- how many times back and forth. You can measure that easily by looking at number of people responding in each post.
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Picture of Bradley Shoebottom
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Bradley Shoebottom - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 01:59 PM
 

Christine,

I missed the difference between forum and Blogs. The article on the hsitory of the social web made it a bit clearer. We are in a forum vs my blog or the course blog. My blog is an attempt at syntesizing my thoughts on a subject. I have critiqued a few of the readings in a negative fashion most recently week 3. Since I don't have a large readership, I participate in this forum to see what others are thinking in a summary fashion, or key questions bugging them. I have also posted a few questions that get at the heart of my blogs. Since I can count on a more lively debate due to the readership here, I get more out of the interaction than I do my blog. My blog may be a truer indication of my thoughts as Stephen theorizes, but the forums may be where I get more insight and unless I come back to my blog and revise my thoughts, no will know I ahve changed or modified my thoughts unless they also saw me interacting in the forums.

Yes this forum has been dominated by a few of us. I wonder if it is because we are taking the course for credit so we have a higher level of incentive.

Are you taking the course for credit or is it your incentive to just critique Connectivism? You initial introduction post is not clear. If it is for the latter, you have one heck of a "volunteer spirit".

George told me about a new book called Numerati that seems to take a conspiracy theory that the web is dominated by a few. I ahve not read yet but plan to get it. Have you read it?

Bradley Shoebottom

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Picture of Andreas Formiconi
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Andreas Formiconi - Friday, 26 September 2008, 06:14 PM
  Words should be used with much more parsimony.

Too much noise in this place.

Numbers should be used even more carefully.

Of a set of 120 objects you consider 24 of your choice and you draw conclusions on this subset. This is meaningless.

Are you planning to review all the blogs? Well, then do the work and declare the results when they are complete.

This would be the minimum for a correct behaviour.


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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 11:43 AM
  Andreas,

Just skim, or don't read, a long post, if it bothers you.

We're not here to dumb down our thinking to make your life easier, or puree and slice and dice for rapid digestion of other people's thoughts.

There's a terrible piece of propaganda being bruited around here, to the effect that "loud voices" drown others out, or make a public meeting impossible to participate in democratically.

It's hilariously false and a stellar example of retrograde thinking that comes from the vestiges of offline life being replicated online.

There isn't any "loudness" -- it's *text*. You can *chose to read it or not*. You can *skim*. You can skip around and find those you see as interesting. As I keep telling you and others making this false claim, go and count the number of threads; see how many of them there are; see the small percentage that I myself start or take part in, or other "loud voices".

There is no such thing as "loud voices" on a text forum, where people don't have to shout to be heard, or push and shove to get to the front of the room, they just *open another thread* or they just *skim* and they just *pick where they'd like to participate*. They can *ignore text*. Unlikes a real life meeting where a shouter might really drive everyone from the room.

As for my sample, it's hardly meaningless whatsoever, it's no more meaningless than on week one of the course, making some judgement about validity based on a mere 157 records with behaviour of a handful of subjects, when it will dynamically change over 12 weeks. And yet THAT piece of data fabling was allowed to stand. How do you account for that?!

If you don't think a sample of 24 is just as valid, wait until I finish this onerous task, and it turns out to be the same or worse, as anyone can see by just eyeballing the list of blogs and their posts.

No, I don't think any sort of "correctness" need apply here. If you have such high standards for "correctness," where were your demands to the original poster with the declaration of patterns in week one based on the records only at that point? Where's the demand to him to keep recording?!

And since it's an annoying and boring task, I put out the hypothesis for anyone who had the energy to complete if they wished before me, or suggest other criteria, or do their own criticism.

Furthermore, given that Stephen Downes is rapidly using his influencer status to disseminate the memes everywhere about how "blogs are better," I thought the news of how the blogs are "the same, or worse" and not the haven he imagines to be an urgent matter to get out, the minute a representative sample was done. And representative it indeed is.
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Bradley Shoebottom - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 01:03 PM
 

Andreas,

Concision, concision, concision.

Agreed.

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Andreas Formiconi - Friday, 26 September 2008, 06:20 PM
  Moreover, such long posts should be written in a blog.

Forum are more a kind of "public" place.

In public places, if you talk too much you are limiting others voices.

Its about respect for others.

Bye



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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Pat Parslow - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 12:52 AM
  Moreover, such long posts should be written in a blog.

Forum are more a kind of "public" place.

In public places, if you talk too much you are limiting others voices.

That is true in a synchronous environment, but not in an asynchronous one, and still true whether the place is public or private.
My reading of what you say here is that people should not take part in a discussion once they have used up some arbitrarily allotted number of posts or words. I would argue that such an environment discourages participation - when I have seen it used in assessment activities it leads to people leaving their comments until the last moment, and results in almost pure noise rather than any sort of dialogue.
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Andreas Formiconi - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 02:11 AM
  Nothing to do with an allotted number of posts or words.

Today pepole work a lot, read a lot, do a lot of things. Moreover the course is huge, there is lot to read: it is common sense to write short texts.

You can expose a concept in an unlimited number of ways. It makes good to your message if you choose a short way:

  • more people will read it
  • you will be undestood better by non english speaking people (this is an international course)
Conciseness is a virtue in communication.
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Pat Parslow - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 02:32 AM
  We shall have to disagree, I suspect.
Conciseness is a virtue if you value the miscommunications which then occur, in my view. If you want to convey your understanding and meaning, it is often necessary to describe in more detail than the headlines.
Also 'concise' is relative - many things require many words to describe them, and 'short' posts do not facilitate this - yet they may still be concise in that they do not use excessive words.

However, I do agree that long posts attract smaller audiences - but perhaps that is a good thing from both our perspectives?
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Andreas Formiconi - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 04:29 AM
  Yes, we disagree. Diversity is good smile

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 11:47 AM
  No, it is not common sense.

People writing short and very influential posts with certain memes that they privilege and disseminate and which create false impressions often generate a requirement to write back something longer, and more detailed, to argue against all the facets of their incorrect statement.

Such is the case with Stephen Downes, who has used the daily read by nearly everybody, his own blog looked at by many in the course, this forums, and even lectures in San Jose, to make a supposition which is false.

When you have that major a propaganda blast, you may have to take multiple posts, lengthy arguments, and repeated arguments to counteract the false picture.

Conciseness does not automatically confer virtual or legitimacy.

I am a person who has learned a second language (Russian) very fluently and read it all day on the Internet; and a third language enough to get some basic things (French). I would never dream of demanding people on the Russian Internet to shorten their texts from their Tolstoyan length, or demand that people on the French internet compensate for my lazyness in not learning their language fluently by dumbing down their essays and making them short.

Sorry, but that sort of guilt-tripping over the English language demands the sharpest possible rebuff.

Learn to skim, and stop whining.


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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Frances Bell - Tuesday, 30 September 2008, 01:20 AM
  I think you make a good point here about participants whose first language is not English. One of my doubts about the forums (this thread excepted) is about their inclusivity in terms of the social practices of participants. A couple of weeks ago I tried a little experiment with a 'twitter rules (posts <140 chars) thread. Maybe interesting lines of discussion could be pursued in parallel twitter rules threads.

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Frances Bell - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 01:09 AM
  I don't agree with you that people 'shouldn't' write long forum posts - though short posts can be very welcome!
There is an interesting issue about linking forum posts and blog posts - people could posts an idea an forum posts, linked to a blog posts where the idea is expanded. I don't know if people are doing that here. I have thought about trying this as it might be useful to find ideas expressed in a post after the asynchronous forum is finished.
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Pat Parslow - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 01:41 AM
  I had been thinking about linking to blog posts from the forum too. The main reason I haven't is that that mode of connection would seem to split comment on a post between forum and blog.
However, I noticed something which disturbs me slightly about the Forums this morning - the number of unread posts in Introductions fell, without me reading them. I am now wondering if this instantiation of Moodle is set to archive (or worse, delete) posts of a certain age or something (I hadn't read the ones I no longer have listed, of course, so it is hard to know!)
This lead me on to wondering whether the discussions here will be kept, or whether there is a de facto need to be blogging instead of discussing on the forums.
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by George Siemens - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 02:23 AM
Hi Pat - Moodle has not been set to archive or delete posts. This forum will be available in the future. We ran a conference ~1 1/2 years ago on connectivism and those forums are still available.

You do raise an interesting point about the longevity of blogs vs. forums. It's always best to have control of your own contributions. I prefer to blog on a site under my control rather than one that is kept and archived by an institution. You never know what can/will happen.

I'd like to see some manner of collecting and aggregating multiple contributions (different blogs, moodle forums). Co-comment tries to serve a function like this - i.e. centralize our decentralized comments.

The challenge, however, is the loss of context when we are replying to someone and we only retain our own contribution (say if we post in Moodle and we archive our comment but not the whole conversation).

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Pat Parslow - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 02:42 AM
  Hi George - interesting, I just lost 2 more off my unread count in the Introductions section!

I agree with your points about maintaining control of your material and the challenges in keeping the context, especially if you do not have the rights to copy other people's posts to maintain that context. Keeping material under your control helps maintain control over your Digital Identity, but possibly limits the exposure your material will achieve (which may or may not be a concern).

We are working on a product called MeAggregator(TM) which should do what I think you (and the rest of us!) are all looking for in terms of aggregation. The idea is that you keep a store of links to material you have written and which you have read and found useful, coupled with the tags that you apply to them. In itself, this is not exactly ground breaking, of course, but the idea is that the MeAggregator(TM) has modules to allow you to connect to many different data sources, and it also allows you to define permissions for other people to see parts of your 'data' and the tags that go with it. Consequently, the idea is that you build up a Folksonomical File System (yes, we know about the acronym) which is directly useful to you as an individual (hierarchical file systems become an adjunct to a tagged file system, for instance) and even more so once you can build trust relationships with others to be able to leverage their tag-data relationships.
We have a rudimentary trust system built in to this as well, allowing the user to specify the level of trust they have in a particular relationship (fine-grained so that I might trust you about Connectivism with a 0.99 value, for instance, but only 0.1 on your views about, say, my shoe size)
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 11:50 AM
  I don't like the concept of "trust" or "ratings" being welded into communications system. It closes societies rather than opens them, creating hierarchies and privileged groupings. People are branded with something like a "folksonomical" tag and "Google knows where to point" without right of reply. It's not due process. It's like the way people are smeared on Wikipedia and have to wage editing battles.

All you are doing with mechanics like this are replicating closed societies with favour-banking systems online, trying to replicate the complexities of how people interact with information.
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Pat Parslow - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 12:00 PM
  It is designed to support individual's assessments of which data sources they trust. By doing so, it makes them available to the individual user to contemplate and thus provide an extra level of both semantic and cognitive data for them to consider.
As for branding with a folksonomical tag - all a tagging system does it make it easier to find things by classifications produced by people. The same content is there, so any branding is already done, but if you are somehow the 'victim' of a tag, just as in society offline, at least with the label being used rather than various euphemisms for it you can see it has happened and take whatever action you feel necessary.
In the concept of MeAggregator(TM), however, tags would be used by people to define groups for whom the user wished to grant, or deny, access to the materials they have. It is precisely the same as other methods of creating groups, just with a common mechanism for classifying people and resources. Of course, as it is open source it is also inherently evil and you won't be using it.
I can not see how they close societies - perhaps you can explain further for me?
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Bradley Shoebottom - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 01:36 PM
 

Pat,

Read Write Web published an article about a new website that allows you the build a library of reference material that you find useful. It was posted sometime this past summer but I could not find. It was commented it would a useful service for those doing research because it would track which materials you had read and which you had not. Kinda like LibraryThing but for online materials. Not sure if that is the same idea you are developing software for. Sounds like yours feeds, but from the best of my memory, the other service I mention requires you to build your own reference library.

Bradley shoebottom

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Steve Tuffill - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 03:57 AM
  Did you mean the "alternative" to Google, which surfs the "Deep Web", Bradley? I looked at that last night and found many redeeming features about this heavyweight product, (which is not zero cost, BTW), Infovell which looks like a product aimed more at medical research.
However, I have used Copernic Agent Professional for a period of years now. And this again is not a free product, but it really has a great way of organizing research.
Pat's product sounds very interesting. It will be great to hear more about this. Personally, I have a great interest in learning about new tools on the Web and I have been watching all of this evolve. This Connectivism course has helped me learn more about which new tools people are using.
By the by, do you subscribe to Robin Good's Feedblitz? I saw a write up with George in there today, which talks about his "virtual" address in Second Spain on SL and there is also a reference to Mashable's List of Online Business Tools, many of which a few of the educators on this site would find useful.
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Jayne Little - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 06:39 AM
 

Heh Steve

I agree.  Found a few tools, including a couple of calendar / group tools that I am experimenting with from Mashable's list. 

(thanks for relinking it, as I had failed to bookmark it last night.)

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Bradley Shoebottom - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 02:35 PM
 

Frances,

I am moving towards giving a brief summary of my blog post in the Moodle Forum if I think it fits in with the discussion going on. Its like the news summaries you read online to see if you want to go deeper. Since I am pretty active in this forum, there is a good chance I will hyperlink to my Blog. Shamelss plug: See my critique of Week 4 Readings where I show how peeved I am at more readings getting added just 2 days before the week "starts".

I put my "musings" in the Moodle the first 2 weeks only to realize it was too long and hindered readability.

Bradley Shoebottom

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by George Siemens - Monday, 29 September 2008, 01:24 AM
Hi Bradley,

A quick note - as a learner, I am equally dismayed at times when last-minute readings are added. I would like to clarify two things:

1. Each week, both Stephen and I will add some sort of reading, writing, or presentation. As mentioned at the beginning of the course, Monday is when these short pieces or recordings are sent to the list.

2. I will do a review of the readings assigned outside of what Stephen and I will submit each week. If you can give me until Wed of this week, I will have all readings set in stone (so to speak) and will only add resources under optional categories.

As you are likely aware, the nature of discussions each week does give rise for opportunities to share additional resources. However, I recognize many participants are likely motivated to work ahead in order to fit course work into their daily lives...

George
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Bradley Shoebottom - Monday, 29 September 2008, 02:09 AM
 

Thanks for the clarification. Stephen said the same thing about how at the beginning of the course outline, that you would be adding material. It did not appear to have happened for the first 3 weeks so that is why I was so surprised.

I access the reading sna print them off double sided at work (to save paper) so I can read them while the kids are taking swimming lessons, having naps etc without the need to be online.

Thanks for letting me know that Wed is your internal cut off time. I am not that far ahead!

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Emanuela Zibordi - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 02:22 PM
  You know that I totally agree with you, Andreas wink
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Jayne Little - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 02:48 PM
 

Heh Catherine

In your first post, you said "4. It's a chore to go through the whole list in this fashion, and I'll do that"

Curious when you will do that.

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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Tuesday, 30 September 2008, 12:43 AM
  When I have time, dear. And I have no doubt that the material will track the findings already made. Go look at the lists, if you have some doubt about this.
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Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Lisa Lane - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 04:47 PM
  Damn. And here I was thinking I was loud. thoughtful
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Torre di Babele
by Andreas Formiconi - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 07:23 PM
  Ebbene, poiché qui si può dire tutto ed il contrario di tutto, valendo in sostanza di più l'arroganza e la prevaricazione piuttosto che l'attenzione per le ragioni dell'altro, anziché Learn to skim, and stop whining scrivo in italiano, che tutto sommato è la lingua nella quale si sono espressi Dante Alighieri, Michelangelo Buonarroti, Galileo Galilei e molti altri ai quali, sia detto per inciso, qui tutti sono molto debitori e che avevano in somma considerazione i valori della sintesi e della concisione messi al servizio della chiarezza del linguaggio, dell'armonia, del senso della misura.

Ed è proprio per tal senso della misura che cedo la parola ad un poeta italiano contemporaneo per esprimere il mio pensiero molto meglio di quanto potrei fare io.

CONSIDERO VALORE, Erri De Luca
Considero valore ogni forma di vita,
la neve,
la fragola,
la mosca.
Considero valore il regno minerale,
l'assemblea delle stelle.
Considero valore il vino finchè dura un pasto,
un sorriso involontario,
la stanchezza di chi non si è risparmiato,
due vecchi che si amano.
Considero valore quello che domani non varrà più niente e quello che oggi vale ancora poco.
Considero valore tutte le ferite.
Considero valore risparmiare acqua,
riparare un paio di scarpe,
tacere in tempo,
accorrere a un grido,
chiedere permesso prima di sedersi,
provare gratitudine senza ricordarsi di che.
Considero valore il viaggio di un vagabondo,
la clausura della monaca,
la pazienza del condannato, qualunque colpa sia.
Considero valore l'uso del verbo amare
e l'ipotesi che esista un creatore.
Molti di questi valori non ho conosciuto.


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Re: Torre di Babele
by Bye Has left the building - Saturday, 27 September 2008, 10:37 PM
  Hi Andreas,

Non riesco a parlare italiano. Devo usare Google Translate. Spero che questo ha un senso. Non è il pesce da Babel Hithchiker della guida per la galassia. Non riesco a leggere Dante Alighieri in lingua italiana. Questo è il mio peccato. I'll tenerlo a breve.
I blog sono un bene per monologhi. Forum sono buoni per i dialoghi. Lunghe discussioni sono necessarie per la difficile idee. Talvolta lungo forum posti sono inevitabili. Non tutti possono partecipare. Questo non è giusto. Questo è inevitabile per difficile le idee.
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Re: Torre di Babele
by Emanuela Zibordi - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 04:15 PM
  Great! wink
Google translation is terrible, but the sense of what you want to say is clear.
I am convinced that difficult ideas can be express in clear and short sentences. Then each of us have our own style. Certainly I neglect posts very complex, because I cannot understand them. thoughtful

Good week!
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Re: Torre di Babele
by Steve Tuffill - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 04:55 AM
 

 

There are some great thoughts in the poem Andreas! It is curious in a way that there should be an objection to long posts. A post has been written by the writer for others to read regardless of length or complexity. Just get on, and read and understand.

And you said: "they had considered in sum the values of summary and the brevity put at the service the clarity of language, harmony, the sense of proportion." How true!

I loved some of the lines in the poem you have quoted... "I see the value of a wine lasts until a meal" conjures up a vision of a long table set in a beautiful garden, with a view of the Adriatic or the Mediterranean Sea, and plentiful bottles of Primitivo set out there!

There are some delightful lines in this poem: "...the patience of the convicted, whoever is at fault" "I see value in the use of the verb to love and the hypothesis that there is a creator."

Your comment at right of the page, "I have known many of these values," echoes my thoughts.


Ci sono alcune grandi pensieri nella poesia Andreas! E 'curioso che non vi dovrebbe essere una obiezione a la lunghezza dei “posti.” Un post è stato scritto dallo scrittore per gli altri a leggere indipendentemente dalla lunghezza o complessità. Basta arrivare, e leggere e capire.

E lei ha detto: "e che avevano in somma considerazione i valori della sintesi e della concisione messi al servizio della chiarezza del linguaggio, dell'armonia, del senso della misura." Come è vero!

Ho amato alcune delle linee del poema che hai citato ... "Io vedo il valore di un vino dura fino a un pasto" evoca una visione di un lungo tavolo in un bellissimo giardino, con vista sul mare Adriatico e il Mar Mediterraneo, e abbondanti bottiglie di “Primitivo” di cui vi!

Ci sono alcune linee delizioso in questa poesia: "... la pazienza del condannato, chi è in colpa" "Vedo in valore l'uso del verbo amare e l'ipotesi che vi sia un creatore".

Il tuo commento a destra della pagina, "ho conosciuto molti di questi valori", fa eco il mio pensiero.

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Re: Torre di Babele
by Sui Fai John Mak - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 03:31 PM
 

Hi Steve and Andreas,

I came from a non-English/French speaking background.  Though I couldn't understand the writing of the poem, but I could read your passion in between.  And I love the poem that Steve has translated and interpreted.  Tell me more....wide eyes 

I like short and long messages.  I'm here to learn and share, not just about connectivism, but also the values and beliefs we all embraced.  That's equally important in networking, I suppose. What do you think?

Most people appreciates short and concise message, because they are easy to read, as mentioned by Andreas.

Is it true that the more we share, the more that we could understand each other, especially in this forum?  If we don't ask or tell others what we want, we could only assume.

Alternatively, we could meet in the blogs, or wikis, or facebook etc., for such valued conversation, privately, if the message is too long. How does it sound?

I am still building my blog (house), so I have to wait.....

More importantly, people will participate if they enjoy, and have fun.  Agree?? thoughtful 

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Re: Torre di Babele
by Andreas Formiconi - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 05:47 PM
  Of course, my remark on shortness is not absolute; you know, the dialetics of forums exacerbates positions. I understand that a message may require a lenght text, of course.

Nonetheless, I'm sure that very often we indulge in our own mastery of language by writing more, sometimes much more, with respct to what the message would need.
Yes, I'm totally convinced that people will participate if they enjoy, and have fun.
I will provide, or ask someone to, a translation of the poem smile
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Re: Torre di Babele
by Andreas Formiconi - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 05:34 PM
  And do you know where I learned of this poem, Steve? From my students.

One of the advantages of the blogroom is that I learn a lot from my students.

Even in a simple computer literacy course, when students use a blog as an exercise book, they put much more in it, for instance telling others that they found a nice poem.

I discovered that, thanks to the activities in the blogroom, the human relationships with students are amplified in a way I could not have imagined before.

I have so many students, roughly 700 per year. In the couple of initial lectures there may be more then 200 faces in front of me: no way to know them but very few.

In the blogroom I begin to know them and many of them very well. When we meet the first time, they are often shocked and very pleased because their teacher all of a sudden is able to take care of they problems and their needs.
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translation!
by Susan Burg - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 08:56 PM
 

I have just translated this poem by Erri De Luca....on behalf of Andreas Formiconi!

Yes, I agree with Andreas. I think we need to see our posts in the blog and in Moodle as a process toward gaining individual knowledge and understanding. How can you criticize someone's learning pace? Aren't you, Catherine, the one who is whining? Patience is an attribute of the teacher, right?

I See Value

by Erri De Luca

In every form of life I see value,

the snow,

a strawberry,

a fly,

I see value in the mineral kingdom,

the assembly of the stars,

I see value in wine as long as the meal lasts,

an inadvertant smile,

the weariness of he who has not been spared,

two old people who love each other,

I see value in what will not be worth anything tomorrow and today is still worth little,

I see value in all of the wounds

I see value in saving water,

repairing a pair of shoes,

to silence in time,

to rush to a scream,

to ask before sitting,

to be thankful without recalling for what,

I see value in the wanderer's voyage,

the nun's convent,

the prisoner's patience, whoever's the fault may be,

I see value in using the verb to love,

and the hypothesis that a creator exists.

I haven't known many of these values.

CONSIDERO VALORE, Erri De Luca
Considero valore ogni forma di vita,
la neve,
la fragola,
la mosca.
Considero valore il regno minerale,
l'assemblea delle stelle.
Considero valore il vino finchè dura un pasto,
un sorriso involontario,
la stanchezza di chi non si è risparmiato,
due vecchi che si amano.
Considero valore quello che domani non varrà più niente e quello che oggi vale ancora poco.
Considero valore tutte le ferite.
Considero valore risparmiare acqua,
riparare un paio di scarpe,
tacere in tempo,
accorrere a un grido,
chiedere permesso prima di sedersi,
provare gratitudine senza ricordarsi di che.
Considero valore il viaggio di un vagabondo,
la clausura della monaca,
la pazienza del condannato, qualunque colpa sia.
Considero valore l'uso del verbo amare
e l'ipotesi che esista un creatore.
Molti di questi valori non ho conosciuto.
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Re: translation!
by Sui Fai John Mak - Sunday, 28 September 2008, 10:30 PM
  What a lovely poem! I see value too.smile
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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: translation!
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Tuesday, 30 September 2008, 09:16 PM
  Of Mere Being

The palm at the end of the mind,
Beyond the last thought, rises
In the bronze distance.

A gold-feathered bird
Sings in the palm, without human meaning,
Without human feeling, a foreign song.

You know then that it is not the reason
That makes us happy or unhappy.
The bird sings. Its feathers shine.

The palm stands on the edge of space.
The wind moves slowly in the branches.
The bird's fire-fangled feathers dangle down.

-- Wallace Stevens, 1954
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Picture of Sui Fai John Mak
Re: translation!
by Sui Fai John Mak - Tuesday, 30 September 2008, 11:18 PM
 

Thanks Catherine,

A wonderful poem.

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Picture of Andreas Formiconi
Re: translation!
by Andreas Formiconi - Wednesday, 1 October 2008, 12:02 AM
  Yes, this is a warning I like, very much.

PS:
october
students are coming, many of them
probably forced to give up reading threads
perhaps will read just some, here and there, randomly

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Picture of Steve Tuffill
Re: translation!
by Steve Tuffill - Wednesday, 1 October 2008, 12:13 AM
  Well it was very nice meeting you, Andreas! Thank you for your input to our forum!

Arrivederci pronto!
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Picture of Andreas Formiconi
Re: translation!
by Andreas Formiconi - Wednesday, 1 October 2008, 12:59 AM
  Grazie a te!
Buon lavoro!
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Picture of Sui Fai John Mak
Re: translation!
by Sui Fai John Mak - Wednesday, 1 October 2008, 12:59 AM
  I like it too.
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Picture of Steve Tuffill
Re: translation!
by Steve Tuffill - Wednesday, 1 October 2008, 12:15 AM
  Wow, Catherine. I wonder what your take is on the famous blackbird poem. I really like Wallace Stevens. I think he had a lot to tell us about how people behave with each other...
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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: translation!
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Wednesday, 1 October 2008, 01:08 AM
  Stevens said there were 13 ways of looking at a blackbird. But then, he was an insurance adjuster...I imagine Stephen Downes would agree, given his lack of confidence in objective reality.

I think there's one way of looking at a blackbird, and at least 12 additional ways to write poetry about it.
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Picture of Jon Kruithof
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Jon Kruithof - Monday, 29 September 2008, 12:36 AM
  Even though I'm late to the party, just a few comments.

Several people have created blogs for the course, much like my own, and will be thin on content. I also subscribe to the theory that if you don't have anything to add, don't say anything and I've done that.

The blog is essentially for me (if anyone else comments that's a bonus), the forums are for discussion. I find discussion more engaging by definition.

I will say this about your study - the moodle forums are going to be used more, as George (or someone else) said in the first week this is the central repository. I know I'm more comfortable posting here, and get much more out of this than the feed of blogs. I don't think you're wrong, by any stretch of the means, but I do think that your data will be skewed. Perhaps in future iterations of the course, there will be no central posting area, and then there can be a real test of blogs vs. forums.
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Picture of George Siemens
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by George Siemens - Monday, 29 September 2008, 01:29 AM
Hi Jon,

It will be interesting to observe how interaction in blogs vs. forums will develop over the rest of the course. I have read many blogs that I found to be insightful. This will increase as participants begin to post their papers and CMAPs online.

Comparing the two modes of communication is difficult. Blogs are inherently personal. Forums are public spaces. Our participation in each will be different. Additionally, comparisons are complicated by the longer term view as well. Participation in the forums will likely end once this course is finished. Blogs - and connections established with other learners - will likely continue (in some capacity). For example, when we did our online connectivism conference in 2007, moodle forum posts dropped to zero after the course. But, many participants connected with each other from around the world and continued to share ideas through blogs, etc.
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Picture of Om Design
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Om Design - Monday, 29 September 2008, 11:57 PM
  Yeah,

and there are also those who can comfortably speak into a recorder. Some don't like to. It doesn't seem to matter all that much on the larger scope of things. The desire to refute Steven has sparked a lot of interesting thought regardless. None of which would have happened otherwise.

It is also quite possible that Steven is merely speaking from his own perspective and making some generalizations about who blogs. Bloggers 'could' and possibly 'should' post their longer works (is this in indicator of effort? caring?) and link to them from the forums.

What is the value of comparing them in the first place?
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Picture of Catherine Fitzpatrick
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Catherine Fitzpatrick - Tuesday, 30 September 2008, 10:31 PM
  Continuing on the journey here in a spirit of scientific inquiry and valid valuation, recalling the list of blogs here and moving on to the next 36:

25. http://elconnectivism.wordpress.com/
Rating: 0 placeholder post

26. http://bnleez.blogspot.com/ Repeated engagement with both videos and articles.
Rating: 2 Too bad there are no comments, as this looks interesting.

27. http://connecting-online.blogspot.com/
Rating: 3 Only 2 rather wan posts about CCK08, but because they do engage, and do have comments, have to give it a 3.

28. http://connectiveknowledge.wordpress.com/ just 2 posts, but thoughtful interaction, drawing of charts, citing of a story as example, and comments.
Rating: 3

29. http://halafawzi.monkiri.com/ Site down.
Rating: 0

30. http://cck08.wordpress.com/ Only 2 posts from a lurker, but sufficient interaction and many comments.
Rating: 3

31. http://www.crescendo.hu/ This is in Hungarian, but it clearly has posts on "Konnectivizmus", diagrams, citations, thoughts, and comments.
the Hungarian word for which is "hozzászólás". Love those cognates!
Rating: 3

32.http://danielst.wordpress.com/ Introductory only, no comments.
Rating: 1

33. Duplicate
Rating: 0

34http://teaching.nfshost.com/dantoday/
Rating: 0 No posts about Connectivism.

35. http://pairadimes.davidtruss.com/ Power edu tech type, only 1 post about Connectivism with 11 comments
Rating: 2 It's really a reflection about work and personal time allotment and priorities that he is trying to gin up as a Connectivism post on an edu blog.
Good example of how people really want to talk about connections, but not about connectivism.

36. http://designedtoinspire.com/drupal/taxonomy/term/149/0 Introduction by putting in a Mapquest.
Rating: 1

37. http://indirector.blogspot.com/ 2 posts on Connectivism from edu -- no comments
Rating: 2

38. http://ebites.wordpress.com/ only 2 posts, with comments. Introductory, and short response to 1st week -- I'm being generous here.
Rating: 3

39. http://edusnacks.edublogs.org/ just 1 post and 1 comment
Rating: 2

40. http://www.dreig.eu/caparazon/ Spanish language, but doesn't appear to have anything on Connectivism, although various tech topics like Twitter discussed. Anyone is welcome to come and correct.
Rating: 0

41.Duplicate

42. http://www.elieceracevedo.net/ Nothing on Connectivism
Rating: 0

43. http://sorden.wordpress.com/ Numerous posts, interactivity, tackling ideas, readings, forums, videos, numerous comments.
Rating: 3

44.http://fcarroll.wordpress.com/ Hello, world!
Rating: 0

45.http://www.flexilearn.com/ only 2 posts, not very dense, 1 comment.
Rating: 2

46http://mystictim.edublogs.org/ "I can't keep up". A few posts, a few comments. Very vague general statement also reposted on the forums, BTW, Why have the cognitive sciences spectacularly failed to bring about a technological revolution in the way we learn and act in the world? Again, being generous.
Rating: 3

47.http://grantcasey.wordpress.com/ A number of posts on networks, comments.
Rating: 3

48.http://blogs.salon.com/0002007/ "I've already written about all this and I live it anyway". Lunch in San Jose, etc. But it is sort of about connectivism, and has comments, so I'll be generous.
Rating: 3

49.http://linarmstrong.posterous.com/cck08-dyslexia-and-connectivis Looks promising, but link won't open.
Rating: 0

50. http://ignatiawebs.blogspot.com/ Multiple posts on CCK08, mainly cut and paste with superficial commentary, comments.
Rating: 3

51. http://ilearner.dk/cck08/ Very personal, "what I like or dislike about the flow," i.e. "chik [Catherine] does not send me high" [sic] -- loll Multiple posts, low in quality but has comments. Again, generous
Rating: 3

52. http://iamarf.wordpress.com/ Multiple posts on Connectivism, trashing "maximalist tirades of Catherine Fitzpatrick" lol, Comments.
Rating: 3

53. http://interstitial.wordpress.com/ only 1 introductory post
Rating: 1

54. http://intrepidteacher.edublogs.org/ only 1 introductory post
Rating: 1

55.http://ioncon.blogspot.com/ Blog removed.
Rating: 0

56. http://jcrom.wordpress.com/ A few posts, with a concept map. 1 comment. Weak content. Being generous.
Rating: 3

57. http://joaoptgarrido.wordpress.com/ Hello, world!
Rating: 1

58. http://katiepiatt.blogspot.com/ A few posts, a few comments. Compares Connectivism to the Phantom Tollboth.
Rating: 3

59. http://kenkat.wordpress.com/ Multiple posts and comments, humourous.
Rating: 3

60. http://itacanet.wordpress.com/ Only a few posts, but read the articles, made a concept map, had some concepts.
Rating: 3

16 -- 3
5 -- 2
5 -- 1
10 -- 0

53 percent substantive
16 percent barely there
50 percent non-content


Totals of entire sample of 60 to date:

0 20
1 13
2 7
3 20

33 percent non-content
22 percent barely there
12 percent weak
33 percent strong

So this week, as to be expected, we've doubled the strength of the blogs, going from 16 to 33 percent "3" or engaged, multiple posts, with comments. That leaves 67 percent non-content or weak content that doesn't go beyond an introductory post or one cut-and-paste sort of post.

Why expected? Because by week 3 of the course, people who bothered to make a blog have more to say.

Mind you, I've been terribly generous on some of these, awarding them a "3" merely because they breathed and had comments, using my rough system here -- I can't really in fairness depart from it. In fact, 2 out of these "generous" 3s were merely ranting about "Catherine's rants" LOL -- at least they found something to talk about in this confusing morass of material.

Some of the very strong blogs should have even been a 4, since they had lots of posts and lots of conversations and really grappled with the ideas. And a good chunk of these 33 percent "3" blogs were *also* posting on the forums. I'll need to go back and do that study later.

Is Stephen's claim that "the blogs are where it's at" merited? No, of course not, even if we've doubled the stronger blogs by now in a larger sample, in the 3rd week. Because if you really study these blogs, even those I've awarded a "3" are quite weak -- often not really on topic, or very personal, i.e. not really engaging with any ideas other than their own associative musings. And because of those very strong ones among the 3s that merit even more credit (though my system doesn't provide for it), they were *posting on the forums, too.*

Do blogs reveal a "different power law" than forums, with more participation? Well, I think it's apples and oranges. Should you get credit for posting on your own blog in a moderated setting where you can shield yourself from criticism? Well, not really. Is that what it takes to defend your precious-snowflake thoughts? I wonder.

I'm thinking about more ways to rate forums and blogs, and it's clear to me that there isn't anything so much more stellar about blogs to merit Stephen's repeated steerage and even driving on to the blogs. There is considerable overlap between blogs and posts.

Ultimately, you cannot tell 2,200 people: "Go to this one blog who is my pet student who really gets it and even makes neat charts" instead of letting them explore and discuss -- and yes, criticize and argue -- on the Moodle.

My take on the blog v. forums issue then is: both. And don't be deceived that there is such Rich Content on the blogs. There isn't. See for yourself.
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Picture of Barbara Dieu
Re: Refuting Stephen Downes' Theory of Networks Re: Blogs vs. Forums
by Barbara Dieu - Tuesday, 7 October 2008, 12:08 PM
  I am sorry for the tweets - you should not have got them had you subscribed to http://beespace.net/tag/CCK08/

Nothing there matters much, nor is it updated - just musings aloud, recording my thoughts and impressions as I go.

I find that the forum is a more focused and provides you with more immediate interaction while blogs are more distributed. A forum holds conversations inside the house, which converge to specific points whereas blogs are "outside" in an open environment - the movement is outwards, unlike a forum which goes inwards.
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