Review of "Russia in News" -blog

The first page created nice and calm atmosphere, the appearance was in harmony.

But the first but came quite soon: what is the subject? D-Ladies is the highest heading but I know that it is the name of the group. Next heading which bounces up is General Information. But about what? Based on the front page, I thought the subject is "How smart you are?" since it is the only link which has actual name, others are just some typical links like Articles and History.

Next thing that confuses me is that the left navigation bar contains a bit different links than the table of contents which is placed on the right side of the front page. As I looked closer, it was only a matter of different order, otherwise the links are same. Then there is also Menu at the upper right corner.. It contains only two links, both find on the other navigation elements too. Where to start?

I decided to start on the History-link, I thought it would be about the subject´s history and maybe it would also enlighten what the actual subject is. The last mentioned did get some enlightenment: the subject has something to do with news about Russia. The history-page was about the history of the group work. Since I´m a nitpicker I have to say that the outline of the text was a bit indistinct, some clear paragraphs would have been nice. But I am what I am ;)

Then I continued with the left navigation, since the table of contents seemed to be only on the front page.

Sources-page was nice and clear. Though there was a slight misunderstanding because of language.. With "English news Channels" you think about news channels from England. But in this case it was about news channels in English since the mentioned channels were all from USA (Washington Post, The New York Times, USA Today). Russian news channels in English were Itar-Tass, Prime-Tass, RIA Novosti and Russia Today. Estonian online newspapers were Postimees, Eesti Päevaleht, Äripäev, Eesti Ekspress, Õhtuleht and Rahvusringhääling. French-ones were Le Monde and Libération.

The Articles-page was really full of articles! Shame that I understood only those in English. But the categories were well picked and the listing was easy to read. It would have been nice if the news were in time order, then the listing would also have been a time line.

The actual fruit of the work is in the Analysis-page. It was interesting to read that Estonian articles didn´t have analysis on them, they were more like neutral story and the reader gets to decide what is his/hers opinion. Compared to English articles which were more analyzed and gathered a whole from different points of view. One of the group members had lived in the USA for a while and was surprised how much more she got information and Estonian media lost its reliability in her eyes. It was nice that the group also found a possible reason for this style of Estonian media: people are busy and want to read their news as short, compact fact.

While telling about internal things in Russia, it also pointed out that the group had followed the news about Russia for ten days. One of the biggest issues was the Russian presidential term extension in Russian Duma. In Estonian media this was seen a lot. Also English (USA on my opinion..) and French new agencies brought this issue up. The two last mentioned kept the subject in fact of what is happening -level while Estonian media mentioned also who are against the new constitution.

Also United Russia -party got attention in media. English portals mentioned Putin at the same context. Half of the articles were quite identical. Other issues were Russian army reform (it was mentioned in Estonian, Russian and English media), Kasparov (Estonian media doesn´t give that much attention, RIA Novosti and Reuters do), Politkovskaja (a lot of attention all around), Russian economy (gets quite well attention), Ukraine (only Russian media brings it up), Estonian and Russian relationships (Estonian media had several articles about the issue, others didn´t mention Estonia), Georgia (all selected channels talked about it, English media had the most details) and Russia and international relationships.

This last mentioned is a big issue in Russia, there seems to be a lot to say about other countries. Estonian media talks about NATO quite a lot, Russia almost not at all, English some. The new president of USA was a popular subject in every media. Estonian media also brought up Czech’s prime minister thoughts about European Union and the tariff rise of wood. Russian and English media had some articles about the American missiles in Poland. English media brought up also AIDS-issue.

The Interviews-page was about some interviews made to Russians who live in Estonia. The group got two answers which are shown at the blog (anonymous).

Ideas-page was a kind of brainstorm the group had in the beginning of the group work.

The last link of the left navigation is How smart you are? It goes to an almost blank page, is this a promotion of some project? I remember we talked about something like this in one of our Skype-chats (of this course); I managed to forget to answer to the questionnaire.. Maybe I´ll do it now :) EDIT: *buahhahhaa* Seems like I´m not that smart :D
I´m too impatient ;D

All in all, interesting subject! And the analysis-page was really very well done, though the analyzing could have gone more deep. I would very much like to read more this kind of follow ups about news considering a certain country! Good idea to do a study like this.

The blog

Chapter XX: Copying Restrictions

On my opinion copying shouldn´t be allowed without mentioning the source properly. No matter what the thing under copying is. Really, when you think of copying, what actually is the difference between copying a book or a piece of music? Or a painting? Text seems to be so easily copied, music or art enjoy more respect or how to say - copying them usually makes the copier feel at least a bit guilt. Just that an author has most definitely seen a lot of effort in writing the book, and to be able to write a book actually requires some talent too. Of course it is different than more artistic talent needed for making music or to paint. And writing source code, it also requires certain kind of talent.

So, is copying good or bad? As I said above, it is not bad if you respect the actual source. And to be precise, that is only quoting. When thinking of copying a whole product then it gets a bit tricky. Since if thinking of a musician his/hers income comes from the music, is it correct to copy his/hers work without paying? Of course not.

When lining the copying to source code the GNU GPL is just excellent. This kind of voluntary sharing works very nice since everybody knows the situation. And why not in other industries also, it just has to be clearly stated to everybody participating.

Chapter XVIII: Open Access

For example Irish Research Council for Science, Engineering and Technology (IRCSET) has ruled open access to all research papers which are published under its funding. There is also a time frame: all the papers must be available within six months of first publication. The papers should be put in an open access repository. IRCSET includes this open access to its terms and conditions of offering and providing funding. And it is not a little sum which IRCSET funds: in 2008 it will allocate approximetely 26 million euros.

This choice of the IRCSET lines with international practice which aims to enhance access to publicly-funded research.

Also some Irish universities are providing open access repositories of their own. Even a national open access repository system is developing, it will connect the universities´s and other participating institutions´s repositories.

Open Access Repository system does include the usual copyright and fair practice. And publication on it doesn´t stop from publicating also in a research journal or commercial publication.

What does this gain? As it is said in the source: “The intellectual effectiveness and progress of the widespread research community can be continually enhanced where there is recourse to as wide a range of shared knowledge and findings as possible.” So this kind of Open Access repositories enhance intellectual effectiveness, more people can access the materials and perhaps benefit from it in order to make research of their own.

This is an excellent opportunity to reduce Digital Divide. It makes things available, enables access to those who can´t afford to buy. Maybe this even better ensures the advancement of scientific research and innovation, as also said in the source, with this openness duplication of research effort is deducted.

And to this can also be quoted what Steven Levy has written in his book: "If you don´t have access to the information you need to improve things, how can you fix them?".

Source

After writing this I heard from the news that Life-magazine publish photos for free, it was also something to do with Google. But as you can read from the magazine´s pages, it is free to use their photos. This really is such a nice service! Of course you can copy whatever picture you want from the Internet, but still I feel this is nice, copying is done with permission.

Chapter XVII: GNU GPL

"The GNU General Public License is a free, copyleft license for software and other kinds of works."

GNU GPL is there to use, change and share. Only thing "restraining" is that the version you make from it has to be free also and that those who receive your version know that it is under the GPL and they can also do some modifications and so on.

Strengths
Freedom; since everybody can have the product and modify it if they want to. Sharing; since that is a way of getting diversity to products and lots of talent fixed to develop things.

Weaknesses
??

Opportunities
As pointed out in the strengths, this kind of sharing and freedom draws certain people who has abilities and expertise; the product will be diverse and continuously developing.

Threats
In a way, certain directions might try to make it hard to distribute the product. And maybe in the future some copyright laws might create some problems, the freedom could get attacked.


GNU GPL

Chapter XV: Different Schools of IP

There are two schools of intellectual property (IP), the Anglo-American and Continental European. What they have in common is their historical origin, copyright stem from feudal law licensing printers to publish books. Censorship and prior restraints were the crux of it. Nowadays publication is legitimate, but information freedom can be seen relatively new concept. When national law systems and legal codifications emerged it meant the end of medieval feudal law and it also points the moment when different national regimes of IP law became more clear and diverge.

One of the commonalities between the two schools is the idea/expression dichotomy: IP protects expressions of ideas, not ideas as such. Both schools also protect inventions (patent), writings (copyright), trademarks, trade secrets, design and models.

But what is the divergence? The Anglo-American school of IP is utilitarian and economic while Continental European focuses to the author´s moral rights, to integrity of the person. Anglo-American contains only limited rights of authors to the integrity of their person as expressed in the work. So there is a common ground but in the Anglo-American school is the economic right of an author highlighted in the expense of their right of personality.

Actually this purely economic perspective has been condemned (also in the US) since it questions freedom of speech. There have been examples of limiting radical satirical critiques of American society. Also state claims hardly at all power over information and enables the private sector to control it. This is not so evident in Europe, there is less contradiction between public and private. The US regime IP is contradictory because it forbids state action which imposes prior restraint on speech and limits restraints on it after publication but at the same time copyright law operates prior restraint on speech.

What is Intellectual Property?

IP Australia: What is Intellectual Property?

Eric Engle: When is Fair Use Fair?

Chapter XIII: Beginning Legal Issues - Starting with IP

Brian Martin starts his third chapter (of Information Liberation) by presenting some basics of copyrights and intellectual property (IP). He describes how the situation is corrupted through government´s power to grant monopolies, how intellectual property has kind of got out of hands with some big owners. He uses a good metaphor to enlighten the IP: shoes. One pair of shoes can be used only by one person at a time. Instead a poem can be copied a thousand times but the creator, the one who has the original, has still the full use of it. Patents exist in order to give the inventor the right to make, use and sell the invention. But there are also some cases where patents have been blocking the improvement, even used to suppress innovation. Martin gives the examples of radio and fluorescent lights, how certain companies collected the patents for years.

One interesting example is how nowadays even biological information can be claimed as IP. As long as some artificial means are used, things from nature can be patented; so some companies have patented genetic codes.. And to go further, for example soybeans have been patented; this has caused inhibition to research (by non-patent holders), and Third World is exploited by transnational corporations. Rich countries could really do as Martin suggests: give the Third World countries permission to provide ideas of rich countries free.

Another problem of IP is that even though the financial returns is said to inspire individual, they are quite seldom benefited; especially in companies since the inventor doesn´t get the patent, it´s the company who gets it. The deeper problem of the IP behind the above mentioned symptoms (privatization of government information, suppression of patents, ownership of genetic information and information not owned by the true creator) is that "Intellectual property is a form of private sovereignty over a primary good -- information." as quoted in Martin´s text.

There are good examples of the problems in Martin´s text, including how a Scottish newspaper went to court to stop an online news service from making a hypertext link to its web site. How crazy is that?

Martin presents also some critique to standard justifications of IP made by Edwin C. Hettinger. The obvious argument is that even if you share intellectual objects you can still use it. And the common justification is that people are entitled to things they have done. But as the text points out: how about the people behind this certain guy/girl? There are always quite a bunch of people supporting the actual work - teachers, parents, other writers/inventors and so on. Every intellectual work is always done based on something that already exists. And why to prevent others from using it? Also the market value of a piece of intellectual work is not a reasonable indicator of the contribution.

Another argument is that people deserve the rights since they have worked to get it done. But what really people deserve? This is tough question even to philosophers. According to the text it´s usually said that the reward should be in balance with the effort, risks and moral. There is just the but of the fact that intellectual work is also about natural talent and luck - people doing things according to their talent or pure luck don´t deserve anything? And on the other side of the coin: being natural talent doesn´t give the rights to own everything in the field of the talent or developing a product doesn´t give the rights to own everything related to that.

Response to third argument - private property stands for privacy and personal autonomy - is that privacy can´t be protected by owning it, you just need to keep it to yourself, not to reveal it, if you want to keep it private.

IP is justified because its needed to promote the creativity, to have more ideas. So IP gives financial help. With this fourth argument Martin and Hettinger see that it is the only one which has some reason. There is still some controversy because in order to promote creation and development of ideas you need more freedom, not restrictions of use. It should also be noted that innovation really is a collective process, best way to support it would be open collaboration or tacit cooperation.

Martin also talks about the marketplace of ideas, which means that ideas compete for acceptance in a market; good ideas will win since people will recognize their value. This of course demands fair competition. The text asks a good question: why would the ideas be owned? And on the other hand, marketplace of ideas is quite vulnerable, it doesn´t work all in all, since some groups just don´t commonly get their viewpoints presented and some directions rule over others. So the biggest reason for the failure is inequality. Economic inequality can´t be solved even with intervene of governments.

And the point of all this is that intellectual products shouldn´t be owned. As isn´t language and almost all scientific research. But what would happen then? Plagiarism is quite feared since copyright law isn´t that good protection against it even now. Royalties are a way to get some more money but hardly no one gets them enough to make living; and to those few could be paid salary, grant or bursary instead. So what would be a good incentive to create? Well, quite many are making their inner real, they don´t do it because of money and fame. Without IP there could be greater equality in economic and politics. Freedom and diversity.

How to get to that point? To start the change in thinking, the term should be changed to monopoly privilege. Doesn´t sound that good anymore does it? After this Martin points out that IP should also be discussed not in terms of property and trade rather than in terms of speech. Things shouldn´t be taken off their context. The frames of a product makes big difference in how to relate to it. Next step would be revealing all the costs around IP. These figures would most likely shock the fountains of it.

Martin also plays with the thought of piracy, if you want to use such a biased term. People already do it everyday, it is so easy. Just that it isn´t that effective as is ever any sort of theft. But a better way is to refuse to cooperate with IP; to boycott for example. Third parties can be won over by this open action, civil disobedience is strong especially when masses are behind the cause. In India it is said to be happening a mass discontent, maybe it would start a snowball effect?

A kind of continuum to this is promoting non-owned information, from which freeware is an excellent example. The Free Software Foundation is really taking this thinking out, as the text quotes: "-- is dedicated to eliminating restrictions on people's right to use, copy, modify and redistribute computer programs". They also highlight the so called copyleft which requires those who pass on a program also to include the rights to use, modify, and redistribute the code.

Also what to do according to Martin is to develop principles to deal with credit for intellectual work, including guidelines how to respect other´s work. In this it is important again to underline the fact that intellectual work can´t be done totally independent, it is always collective. This is why IP can be seen as theft.

Brian Martin: Information Liberation, Chapter 3 "Against Intellectual Property"

Chapter XII: Social Engineering

An example of social engineering
One story of social engineering happened a couple of years ago. ".. group of strangers walked into a large shipping firm and walked out with access to the firm’s entire corporate network". And how easily was that done! They managed to obtain small amounts of access, one bit here, other there, from different employees. They used some detective work to find out things about the firm; a call to the HR (Human Resources) and they had the names of the employees which were important for their cause.

They got in from the front door by pretending they´ve lost the key and to the security area they got in again by pretending, this time to have lost their identity badges. In both places a employee opened the door for them. The strangers planned their attack so that the CFO was out of town so they entered his office and since his computer was unlocked they got financial data off it. They also dug through the trashes and found different useful documents. The friendly janitor gave them a garbage pail - it was easy to carry all this material out of the building in it.

These strangers also knew how to imitate the voice of the CFO and got his network password by phone, pretending to be in a hurry (from the ADP-support I guess). And after this they just used some hacking tools and managed to get super-user access into the system.

Sounds really way too easy! Well, there were some obvious mistakes from the firm´s behalf, for example you should never let a stranger inside the firm.. Always ask something you can double-check from some other. And hey, who leaves his/her computer unlocked?

Source

How to fight against social engineering
As I wrote before, never let strangers inside the firm. There should be a certain protocol for the employees what to do if they have lost their key; some direction has to be around to let them in, someone who can make sure who they are. And that double-checking is also effective, to ask who he/she comes to meet, maybe even offer to show the way.. At least to call to this mentioed person and ask if the guest has arrived.

Yes, people want to believe that others have good intentions and feel themselves intruders if they need to ask something from a stranger. A janitor is good in this case, all the strangers trying into the building should go to him/her, introduce themselves, fill a form of some information themselves and the cause of the visit, and so on. This happens in some companies and it´s effective.

Doors to employees rooms should always be locked and so should their computers be also. And no notes on the table considering the password..

And of course the systems needs to be as secure as possible, at least passwords and different levels of access to information.

What is social engineering? Wikipedia´s definition

Chapter XI: Hacktivism

Wikipedia says that hacktivism is "the nonviolent use of illegal or legally ambiguous digital tools in pursuit of political ends. These tools include web site defacements, redirects, denial-of-service attacks, information theft, web site parodies, virtual sit-ins, virtual sabotage, and software development."
Source

In that same Wikipedia article are some interesting examples of hacktivism. Bronc Buster got my attention the most since I feel a country shouldn´t restrict the use of Internet from the people. And it seemed funny that this incident happened almost precicely ten years ago.

On Wikipedia it was told that Bronc Buster disabled some firewalls so that Chinese people got uncensored access to Internet. When I put his name on Google to search for Finnish pages about him, I got only a page that told he is a cracker who managed to change the web pages of government of China concerning human rights to a page which judged strongly the Chinese government and got links to pages which critisize the Chinese human rights politics. The page Bronc Buster made is in here.

Bronc Buster made his attack almost immediately the service got opened (26.10.1998) and mocked also the security of the pages: he said that it took only two minutes to break into the service.

Bronc Buster is said to be a member of Legions of the Underground, at least in this page it is said so. And in this page is it said that he is a member of Hacktivismo.

Here is also an interesting article about this occasion.

Master Thesis: Outline

New

• Title
Development of Self-Direction Through Self-Reflection in a Webcourse

• Introduction
The work to create this Master´s Thesis began when I was asked to do my study about an eLearning-course which has took place in spring 2008. I was asked to collect material written by the students in their weekly reflections.

After I collected the reflections from the students´ blogs to excel-files I started to look different relations between the answers. I´ve got interested about the students self-direction when participating courses myself and I feel that it is quite essential for the success of the student in online learning. I wanted to find out how and also how teachers could support it. This is why I focused to different elements of self-direction also with the materials of this precise course.

Studying the self-direction also brought up the usage of tools, so I studied the relation between them. The more familiar the student is with the tool/tools he/she uses the easier it is to be self-directed. But the usage of the tools is just one part. In this process I noticed that the essence what I would want to find is how to help teachers/tutors to keep the students in the courses and studying actively. Self-direction is a big part of it.

• -existing work
!!!
• -research question
Does self-direction develop in time? Is it so that who is self-directed stays so, who not does not develop? What is the identification of self-direction in self-reflections?
• -hypothesis
Self-direction can develop in time. Most students self-direction doesn´t develop. Self-direction can be seen in self-reflections through choices of student, developing of ideas and use of schedules.
• -goal
The goal is to find out how self-direction might develop in time and how self-direction is identified from self-reflections.

• Main part
• -method
Quantitative datacollecting, qualitative analyzing, focus groups
• -description of media project
!!!
• -synthesis and analysis of material/data
!!!

• Conclusions
!!!
• -outcomes
!!!
• -evaluation of the outcomes against the hypothesis
!!!
• -evaluation of the outcomes against the goal
!!!
• -implications
!!!

Literature & other:

Brockett, R. G. and Hiemstra, R. (1991) Self-Direction in Adult Learning. Perspectives on theory, research and practice, London: Routledge.

Brookfield, S. (ed.) (1985) Self-Directed Learning. From theory to practice, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Candy, P. C. (1991) Self-direction for Lifelong Learning. A comprehensive guide to theory and practice, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Hayes, C. (1998) Beyond the American Dream. Lifelong learning and the search for meaning in a postmodern world, Wasilla: Autodidactic Press.

Jarvis, P. (1992) Paradoxes of Learning. On becoming an individual in society, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Knowles, M. (1975) Self-Directed Learning. A guide for learners and teachers, Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall/Cambridge.

http://www.tash.org/mdnewdirections/selfdirection.htm
http://www.infed.org/biblio/b-selfdr.htm
http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/students/learning/lr200.htm

Chapter X: Minorities

All the different minority groups can experience how to be treated as "normal" in Internet. This is because of a simple fact: in Internet all you (must) give is text. Just if you want to you can show a picture of yourself, but an avatar can also be for example a cartoon character. It´s quite easy to "hide" behind text, it´s up to you what you want to reveal about yourself.

One interesting group is blind people. In real life they are spotted immediately and other people behave in a certain pattern when communicating with a blind person. You try to give the blind person space and not to stare him/her and maybe you treat him/her a bit like he/she wouldn´t understand so easily what you say..

But online a blind person can surf around almost like any other. With a editor which reads texts and pictures (so everybody who makes webpages: remember the alt tags in the pictures!) he/she can browse easily and with a certain keyboard a blind person can write just like that. Nobody notices that he/she is blind.

Chapter IX: Hackers

Bagbiter
I had some hilarious moments with the alphabets if the Jargon File. There were many phrases that caught my attention, for example "Airplane Rule", "Alice and Bob", "Banana Problem", "Control-C", "Easter Egg", "Gang Bang"...

But Bagbiter kind of suited nicely to my situation - fighting with my laptop. This really is such a bagbiter, working extremely clumsy! This term is funny, I would have never guessed or figured out such; how does biting and bag even get together :D Thinking of somebody biting a bag is quite a weird image when taking it literally, really funny that these words have come together and got a definition like this. Well, the roots of this term are at the sixties and seventies and refer most likely also to scrotum, so..

Bagbiter is not only an annoying computer, but also a person like loser. Hmm.. I have to remember that next time I feel the need to use the word loser, bagbiter would get more attention ;)

The Jargon File

Hacker Ethic
By Steven Levy there are seven features:

Access to computers should be unlimited and total
Well, in today´s world we are getting close to this - as long as we think of like Europe, USA.. In poor countries this isn´t happening so fast than in others. Thirst for knowledge is real and can be seen everywhere, but the positive attitude is a bit of a question mark since people tend to be so busy and lazy nowadays ;) But I think that the world really is full of fascinating problems to be solved. And pragmatic altruism is really worth of seeking! "No problem should ever have to be solved twice". Amen to that. Freedom? Well, it is shouted at every street corner nowadays.

Always yield to Hands-On Imperative
The point is clear: hands on. Do it, don´t just plan and analyze. If something can be done, do it. This would be so lovely to see more in action! I just hate the heavy wheels of decision making in companies.. You need to fill this paper to get that and the other paper to get that.. Do this plan and that analyzis.. Think of it for a month, are you really sure you want to do it?.. Blaah.

All information should be free
Well, everybody can have access to quite many kind of information, but this feature isn´t really happening in today´s world, especially when you connect it to the previous feature: you should also be allowed to improve and add things.

Mistrust authority - promote decentralization
Bureaucracy is a swear word if you ask me. I´ve worked in too many projects including different layers of bureaucracy.. But it seems to be like this today. And not all authority is a bad thing, as it is pointed out in this feature too. Just not to fall under authorities. And the end part of this feature complements the first half. Decentralization really is a central feature of the Internet and is one of trends in today´s world.

Hackers should be judged by their hacking
Equality is almost something worth gaining for, maybe someday it really works in world. Why would for example gender has anything to do with your skills? Or paycheck..

You can create art and beauty on a computer
This is obvious today. Today you even don´t have to be so good with fancy image editing tools, it´s quite simple to create things with your computer. Coding isn´t anymore the only thing considered art with computers :)

Computers can change your life for the better
Really they can. They can spare time for you to do something nice. For example you don´t have to go to a bank and line up for ages to get a bill paid, you can pay it from your eBank. You can meet new and interesting people in Internet. You can create things.

These are the classical features of hacker ethic.

Pekka Himanen has also made his own list:

Passion
Doing something from your heart. How important is that? Extremely. It´s a shame that so many has to work just to get money. How wonderful it would be to work through your passion!

Freedom
Really, the best results come from necessity and creativity. In some companies this is noticed, others still rely on strict schedules and boundaries.

(Hacker) work ethic
Irregular lifestyle is also flexible, but maybe it doesn´t work in every places :)

(Hacker) money ethic
It definitely sounds wise to spend some time to gather around the needed resources. And concentrating to ensure the broadest possible audience while choosing smaller immediate profits - how good example is Linux?! There is no need to explain.

(Hacker) network ethic
Freedom of word and thought is something which should be self-evident. And in a way Internet supports it: everybody has the chance of saying their opinion public. Resisting censorship is also quite wide-spread nowadays.

Caring
Humanity, caring of those who are not so fortunate. How self-evident should that be to everybody? Really, why would you want to have a lot of money? How about settling for enough and giving the rest to others who really need it for survival?

Creativity
And in the ground lies creativity. Use your own abilities in an imaginative way. Let the creativity run through you. Don´t hold back. Maybe this way you actually can give the world something valuable.

Looking these lists of seven´s you just wonder: why won´t we all become hackers?

Steven Levy: Hackers - Heroes of the Computer Revolution
+ our course materials

Chapter VIII: Ubiquitous Computing

Actually this chapter didn´t have any "ToDo" :)

But our group is doing a study of this subject, it is developing in here.

Chapter VII: Digital Divide

Digital Divide in Finland
Well, in Finland we haven´t got in media any cases about digital divide, at least I haven´t noticed. Maybe the situation in general is so good? Of course there are people in Finland too who are poor and can´t afford buying computers and so on or live in a place where Internet connection is hard to get (even impossible?) or just not interested in media and that´s why they don´t have the needed equipments.

But mostly it is their own choice, since even if you are poor (or otherwise don´t have your own equipments or connections) there are always the public computers and accesses to Internet, for example in libraries or some Internet Cafes.

So I´d say that digital divide in Finland is a choice.

And seems like it´s not only my opinion:
"As in other countries with high ICT penetration, closing the digital divide in Finland now seems to depend increasingly on citizens’ own choices. In addition to improved access and cost, computer and Internet use will depend on citizens’ perceptions of the value-added of online services, thereby further raising the stakes for improving e-government."
Source

Internet availability in Finland
Internet availability is very good in Finland - as long as you live in Southern Finland. It is so easy just to think this busy Southern Finland and forget that in the North there is a lot of wilderness.

I´d say that in North you do get to Internet if you want to, for example in a library. But connections at home might be more rare.

Even we had some difficulties having Internet connection. Or to get it wasn´t hard, but there was only one provider and the price was quite salty.. And we live only 60km North from Helsinki! But yes, we live in the country side.

Some statistics
Population: 5 244 749
Country Area: 388 145 sq km
Internet Users (Mar/2008): 3 600 000
Penetration per ITU: 68,6%
Broadband subscribers (June/2007): 1 518 900, per OECD, 29%
Source

Chapter VI: Internet Scams

A typical Internet scam
The most typical Internet scam is an auction-type; something is ordered from the web, it´s paid but not delivered. But maybe more common are the so called Nigerian Letters, which promise you lots of money if you just pay a liiiiittle payment.. Yeah, right.

There are also other kinds of letters, and more sophisticated (well, not always..). Most likely there is at least one in your email box right now. Or at least I seem to get one every day. What then? An email where you are either a "The Lucky Winner!!!" or are offered something, like "Loan offer to you!!!". With these emails the sender (using of course fake name and email) tries to get your private information (for example bank account information and codes) or get you to donate money.

About a year ago there was a big scam in Finland. Some direction sent emails in the name of Nordea bank. I got the email also, it was about some transaction and therefore my bank account codes were needed. Even though the email was quite inarticulate some fell for it. Afterward the Nordea bank clearly stated in media that it never ever asks for clients´ bank codes. Especially not via email. This scam went on also in other Northern countries as I know of.

Fighting the scammers
When reading the "whatsthebloodypoint.com" first thing I felt was why not. If there is a way to fight against the scammers then it should be used. Why not to fool them around and this way maybe save other peoples´money? And after all, this is quite nice way to fool the scammers, only their time is wasted.

Well, maybe my ethics are a bit rough, but I tend to get angry when innocent people are harassed.

whatsthebloodypoint.com

Chapter V: Echelon

Wondering what Echelon is? It´s a system which intercepts and process international communications passing via communications satellites, it extracts information and intelligence illicitly from millions of messages every day. It´s used by NSA. Echelon is a part of a global surveillance system which is quite old, over 50 years. Still, it is seen useful and some countries have recently built Echelon-like stations.

The UKUSA Agreement is about breaking codes of signals, it was established in 1947 and it brought together the British and American systems, and later on Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Also Norway, Denmark, Germany and Turkey joined the UKUSA network. This network is engineered under the same principles as Internet and it can be accessed from NSA´s system, Platform. The funny names continue, as some parts of the system are called Embroidery, Tideway, Oceanfront, Newsdealer, Gigster and Preppy and Droopy. You can draw your own conclusions from those.

What is interesting is that the first global WAN (wide area network) wasn´t the Internet, it was the international network connecting sigint (signals intelligence system) stations and processing centers. Funnily, it looks and feels like using Internet, standard browsers can be used to look at the output of NSA´s Operations Department, of course only with appropriate permissions. This so called Interlink connects 13 US intelligence agencies and some allied agencies and it is run from Fort Meade HQ. The aim is to provide instant access to all types of intelligence information.

The information Echelon and other parts of the global surveillance system provides is used by the US and its allies. Commonly the information is used for diplomatic, military and commercial purposes. Even it is denied, commercial and economic intelligence is a major target. The goal is to recognize topics of phone calls, since word spotting is not so effective. This feature is about to come. Also ever more extensive use of encryption by direct interference is hoped to overcome.

It is important to realize that your emails really are open to the eyes of intruders. Systems like Echelon are needed until encryption and secret codes become much more effective and ubiquitous - and most likely also after that..

Influence to global community? Well, at least it is a surveillance system, so beware of what you write ;)

Duncan Campbell: Inside Echelon

Chapter IV: Testing Net Nanny

I chose Net Nanny for quite obvious reason: I have a little girl. I thought it would be nice to know something about this very popular blocking software. Net Nanny is a so called child lock, it´s simple and rough - it blocks everything coming from certain address automatically. Works great on private PC´s but maybe too much to public machines. It is said that the major problem is that Internet changes much quicker than vendors cope to follow. And of course there is the threat of vendor´s hidden agenda.

Installing Net Nanny was simple. There were some dialog boxes which might confuse a user who isn´t that used to installing but nothing severe.

When I started web browsing for the first time after the installation it took a year for Firefox to start.. Well, it might have been also something to do with one of Firefox´s updates.

Feminism wasn´t bad on Net Nanny´s opinion. I got to browse without getting blocked. Also disabilities weren´t blocked. I also tried for example "Jehova´s Witnesses", "Republican" - no blocking

But porn was of course totally blocked. When I wrote "porn" to Google, I got a message saying "You are being blocked for viewing: www.google.fi/search For content of the following type(s): Pornography. For overriding it you need a password. But the override actually made just a blank page. Clicking the back-button gave me a page which said that there are no results for the word "porn". The reason was told below Google´s search bar: Word "porn" is filtered because you are using Google SafeSearch. Quite impressive I think. (NB: I use Finnish setup, so I transferred that last sentence - that´s why you might get a totally different one).

Also when I searched for "violence" I got the same kind of dialog as with "porn".

I would use this Net Nanny for sure, it seems to be effective. I might even need to use it after a couple of years when Karoliina grows ;) Or not. I´m not sure if there really is a need for blocking things, it´s one thing what has to be thought - maybe it´s enough to create a trusting environment to our home? It remains to be seen.

Heh, I had to uninstall Net Nanny soon after testing it - it blocked Facebook! :D And the reason it was blocked? "For the content of the following type(s): Gambling"

So, bye bye Net Nanny!

Chapter III: There is Always Room for a Good Product

At first I have to say that economics is not my strongest areas.. Quite often I have to struggle to stay awake while reading about it.. A non-market production? And in my field of activities..

Well, just to give you some mind-flow: Internet actually is a place where nonmarket productions can live. If you think you create something by yourself, meaning not that much people is needed to do the work, the costs of the product are not that huge. The first but is of course how to make your product visible. If you just put it so some server (there are some even free or almost free places) and don´t do anything to make it found, then you can say that you have just wasted your time.

Nowadays communities and networking with people and communities is "the thing", meaning blogs, wikis, galleries, Facebook, SecondLife and so on. So, your marketing plan contains a nice list of different places where to make your own profile and put your product in (or a link to it). Then you just have to be active, active and active. Make your friends, relatives and aquaintances test your product and write reviews about it until they beg you to stop. Spread the word. If your product is good and you have managed to find the right target group then the rest is history. Your product will spread through Internet like a wildfire.

Just are you good enough to create a new IRC-Gallery, MySpace or Wikipedia?

I think there is always a order for an innovative, smart and simple-to-use tool. For example to work collectively (enhance wikis) or study online (enhance for example Moodle). Or why not to just bring yourself up and known (enhance blogs).

Chapter II: Examples and Analysis

Robert Theobald: "Mind-Quake"

A Mind-Quake is a concept which means a certain point in the process of change where the old model and old understanding lose their meaning and a new one must be obtained or constructed. It means the skill to cut and divide the major quakes into smaller ones which are easier to handle.

At first when you think of Theobald´s theory you might think of the different theories of education. Well, behaviorism isn´t all gone, but when combining it to constructivism the idea is totally different. Learning just isn´t a stimulus-reaction, there is always some relation to old information. And in constructivism you actually puzzle up your knowledge.

But where this theory of Theobald works more precise.. If you think of the large scale, some basics has changed in the society as a whole. Today´s world is fully colored with one word: hurry. And everything has to be efficient. It hasn´t always been like this. Just ask your parents. Also in olden times you always got service, today the trend is more to self-service. This means a total change in thinking. For example when you check-in to a flight: you have to use a machine alone, no more smiling receptionist taking your papers (OK this is optional still, which must be a relief to older people).

And this change of society works even in childcare: some things which were seen as good things a few decades ago are nowadays seen almost dangerous. This is easily seen when you ask your mom or grandmother to watch your child a few hours.. The collision is guaranteed..

And even when thinking of the ways of correspondence, there has been a long road from homing pigeons to emails, SMS and instant messages like Messenger. The model has changed quite hugely in every step. The latest change has recently become common and usual -but there are still some people who don´t want (or can or like) to use emails or SMS (for example my mother). But what a thrill it is to receive a letter or a postcard nowadays! When I was basic school it was quite common to have many pen pals, I wonder does the children of today have any? And when have you received a letter last time? I think I got one about a year ago.. And before that I can´t even remember. It´s a shame in a way that this is so rare, maybe letters and postcards come back in fashion some day.

Charles Handy: The Paradox of Time

The application of modem technology means less time is needed to make and do things. People should have more spare time. But time has become a competitive weapon and getting things done quickly is imperative. As a result, many of those who work have less time that ever before.

Well, I think quite many people can see this happening. It is so easy to get a certain picture or phrase or what ever from the other side of the world. You can quickly collect for example logos of the company´s in IT-business, create a birthday-card or send greetings to your aunt. Without going to a store and buying a magazine and cutting the logos from it, without buying and writing your card and handing it to the receiver or without the effort of writing with a pencil and then taking it to a post. Where goes all this spare time since you don´t have to leave your home? You do another task since it is done so quickly. You send greetings to ten people instead of one. It is so quick and easy.

This applies perfectly in technical support in companies. Well at least to the one in our company. Without modems their work was more related to client´s phone calls and doing some logs of what was done. With modem technology they can take remote control the client´s computer and solve almost any kind of problem without leaving their desk. Sounds like the job is done about ten times faster than before? Probably yes. There must be a lot of spare time? Noup. And this goes closely to the paradox of productivity. Since one client is helped so quickly there is no need to have so many support personnel. And even if there were the same amount of workers than before, seems like the client´s contact more easily and also with just minor problems and instantly, without even trying themselves before.

So, all the time is always spent. Spare time? People tend to think that the certain amount of time is needed to use in precise tasks, it feels weird to have more time to do nothing than before.

Manuel Castells: Changes in Work and Employment

Emergence of flexi-workers (working without fixed time, place, or regulations); new methods allow more flexible approaches, but also produce more stress and discontent; the share of temporary and telework increases.

In my latest workplace there has never been precise times when to go to work and in certain frame you can choose how long you work in each day, just the hours per month have to be enough. We have a slide in the morning, from 7-10am when it´s recommended to show up. Usually most of people manage to apply this but it´s not rare that some people show up around eleven. I think this is quite common in Finland, especially in IT-sector.

The direction really has been away from office working towards flexibility; this kind of flexibility belongs to this time of ours, everything is more or less in electronic form, so no time is needed to "move the papers around".

My employer has offered me the possibility to work from home some days a week when I return from my maternity leave. I can manage and tutor some web courses. How great is that! Really flexible, all thanks to Internet connection. The stress this creates is how to really find and maintain a reasonable schedule. To really do the reasonable amount of hours a day, not to do all the week´s work at once.. To know when to stop, how much to do to get the work done needed in that precise week or month. And of course it feels more important to prove my employer what I do. That they can rely on me, I do what is wanted. (And a bit more.. Since I´m a perfectionist..)

Discontent? Maybe those who don´t have this opportunity of flexibility feel left out, when thinking of a work community. But when thinking of a worker, the discontent comes from the temporary and short periods of employment. The amount of temporary workers has been increasing a long time, I don´t think it´s straight related to flexi-work.

Chapter I: Challenges to the Global Information Society

Some basic of the situation of information society, according to Himanen´s article, is that the new technology isn´t the issue, it is a new way of doing things. Also the development of the technology won´t help if it isn´t combined to the changes in structure. These deep structures are the ones which need the change.

The article of Himanen comes to a conclusion that development of the deep-set structures of society is the most critical aspect to the development of information society - these structures need our attention. In the article it is pointed out that information society is not same as an information network or Internet program.

Himanen presents ten major trends which are already in progress. First one has to do with increasing international tax competition, which means that countries reduce tax rates in order to compete for investments and skilled labor. The second trend is about the new global division of labour, meaning that cheaper countries like China, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Russia and Brazil get the routine production. The more developed countries need to specialize to more creative work. Third trend is the aging of the population which is happening especially in Europe. Fourth trend is about increasing pressures on the welfare society, the first three trends cause this to happen. Fifth is second phase of the information society which means that the technical development (which started the first phase) continues focusing to social matters.

The sixth trend is the rise of cultural industries, meaning how information economy expands to the field of culture. Seventh trend is the rise of bio-industries. The eighth is about regional concentration which means how expertise concentrates to certain regions. Ninth trend is the deepening global divide which means the rise of inequality and marginalization. The tenth and last trend is the spread of a “culture of emergency”. It is about the acceleration of development which increases the volatility of economies.

Himanen also presents some development scenarios. From a geographical perspective USA, Europe and Asia are leading, USA has kind of a upper hand for example since one third of the world’s economy is in there. Still thinking geographically, there are also three different models: The Silicon Valley model, The Singapore model and The Finnish model. The first model refers to the neoliberalist scenario of “leaving the weak behind”, the second is based on tax competition, i.e. “a race to the bottom” and the third one is the current European combination of the information society and the welfare state. Due to the article, it really is possible to combine the welfare state and the information society, it just needs courage to revise this last mentioned model. There is a need to change from a reactive to a proactive policy, react beforehand and lead the way.

In the article there are also listed some values which are underlying the original European welfare state and innovative entrepreneurship. The values are caring, confidence, communality, encouragement, freedom, creativity, courage, visionariness, balance and meaningfulness. These are the values which make life worth living so they are important to any society.

But to meet the global competition with the scenario and values, it is important to notice also these concepts: A creative economy, a creative welfare society, humanly meaningful development and a global culture.

So, what is about creative economy? It is important to rely on creativity (and expertise) under these pressures of international tax competition and the new global division of labor. Creativity is the key when aims are in increasing the added value and to improve the efficiency of production. A creative welfare society on the other hand is about the goal of people having equal opportunities to realize their potential and are protected against the random misfortunes of life.

Humanly meaningful development has the core in the human sustainability, all the time rapidly crowing global development really is an important question in the information society. The global culture is about the fact that in global development the progress should be towards joint development that is sustainable on a world scale. Open mindedness is a key to that.

Pekka Himanen: CHALLENGES OF THE GLOBAL INFORMATION SOCIETY

EMIM / E-Learning / Assignment 10

What was your personal impression of participating such a course?
I enjoyed the course very much :)
I think the materials were very good and carefully chosen. Also this way of working, doing an actual course with a group is excellent choice. BUT to activate students and keep them working and most importantly together is VERY hard. To create the feeling that things are happening all the time is one key, but to show it.. Somehow it should be more clear to the students where is the actual "home" and from there you should have clear links to EVERY source needed and "see" others too (for example the feeds from blogs). Just ONE place where to go every day and check the current situation and do what is to be done.

I indeed learned also something new about collaboration. I´ve always been the hyperactive member of all the groups I´ve participated. I´ve done the tasks even alone if others didn´t do anything. It was quite a surprise to have another kind of role, more normal one I think ;) But I did feel I wasn´t doing enough and felt quite frustrated for not being able to do more - it was too difficult to jump in. Some of my tryings were even deleted which of course didn´t give much a courage.. But this was an important lesson. As was also this thing with being visible; how important it would be to have a certain place where all the group members / students can see that something IS actually happening all the time, the course is still going on.

I am used to taking responsibility for my own learning. It suits me, but I do need the contact with fellow students also. The discussions in the forums (or commenting and receiving comments like in this course) are very important. I need to reflect with others, get some support and see that I´m not alone doing stuff.

This really was a good experience. Maybe I´ll do my Master´s thesis about how to activate web students..

EMIM / E-Learning / Assignment 9

How well could I fulfill my goals?
Well, I was sure I would do more; create, write and "fuzzaround" making the group members to work.. But I ended up only commenting. Heh, I did try to do an actual evaluation plan but it was deleted (twice). So there was no plan done, just some questions. There were two hyperactive guys in our group who did almost everything - and deleted things they didn´t like. Good point was that they really did things and we others commented but I believe all of us would have enjoyed also the actual doing. They started out with force when I was still wondering the life of a mother, so I didn´t manage to jump in to their pace.

Besides commenting I also did comment other group member´s blogs, used a whole lot of not-so-familiar tools (Google Groups, Doodle Polls, Zoho...), put some links to the del.isio.us -account, wrote something about wikis as learning environments, did a lot of evaluation on other groups´courses and wrote a lot to this blog.

So I can say that I achieved quite much but would have done more also. Luckily I´ve studied quite a lot of eLearning (e.g. Mediapedagogy in university level for 25 ECTS points) so I don´t feel so left out. I do know that mostly it was up to me; I could have been more active but I know also that I would have done more if there wasn´t these guys who did almost everything. But it was good for the group that there were these active guys since I had my baby back then when it would have been time to be more active. It just happened that my baby got first :) She is little only once and she really needed me. And I enjoyed being with her so much. I still am with her all the time, now I just am more used to this situation and have more energy to study also. So I just have to settle for this what happened with this course, even tough I´m used to always do 110%.

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 14 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
It´s been very quiet week.. With our group. Last week I evaluated the group 5, this week the groups 2, 3, 4, 6 & 9. Others (7, 8, 10) were not ready or didn´t have any place to evaluate.

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
It was very interesting to see what other groups had made :) The courses and the evaluation polls.

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
Reflecting about other´s experiences.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle and our wiki. For evaluating others: their wikis, Google Groups and polls.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
I commented some of the team member´s blogs and the "global" blogs of this course. And did a lot of different polls, using wikis, blogs, getFAST.ca and GoogleDocs polls.

(This is here just to keep these in mind :)
Group works
Group1 course design
Group1 evaluation page
Group2 course design
Group2 evaluation page
Group3 course design
Group3 evaluation page
Group4 course design
Group4 evaluation page
Group5 course design
Group5 evaluation page
Group6 course design
Group6 evaluation page
Group7 course design
Group7 evaluation page
Group8 course design
Group8 evaluation page
Group9 course design
Group9 evaluation page
Group10 course design
Group10 evaluation page

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 13 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
There were some interesting ways to collect evaluation, nice to learn about polls.

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
Evaluation of other groups.

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
Lot´s of reflecting about other´s experiences.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle and our wiki. For evaluating others: their wikis, Google Groups and polls.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In our wiki with the participants (it was very quiet week), I also commented some of the team member´s blogs and the "global" blogs of this course.

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 12 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
Evaluation planning..

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
Evaluation planning.

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
Lot´s of reflecting about other´s experiences.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle and our wiki.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In our wiki with the participants, I also commented some of the team member´s blogs.

EMIM / E-Learning / Assignment 8

How to formatively evaluate e-learning course designs?
I was starting to make a plan; who to ask, how many different people, what.. I know that the people who are going to answer / evaluate are our "classmates" but still it would have been nice to make such a plan. It´s close to (usability) testing which is one of my favorite subjects.

But seems like in our team we just make some questions, maybe to Doodle as a poll. Now I´m trying to be a part even to that. Seems like I´ve missed all the other action, just made some comments.

BUT to this subject. Evaluation should be planned well; who is going to evaluate, what kind questions to make (open / selective / both), what are the actual questions and so on.

A Doodle poll is of course OK, at least it´s easy to realize.

I´ve made some evaluations of other team´s courses and it was interesting to use different polls; with wikis and Google Groups.

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 11 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
What a process this really have been!

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
Our wiki really is an excellent place :)

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
Lot´s of reflecting about other´s experiences.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle and our wiki. And now we got even a Zoho-account!

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In our wiki with the participants, I also commented some of the team member´s blogs.

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 10 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
I enjoyed the conversations about people´s experiences - again II ;)

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
Our group is really active in our wiki I´m proud :)

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
Lot´s of reflecting about other´s experiences.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle, our wiki and del.icio.us account.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In our wiki with the participants, some emailing also.

EMIM / E-Learning / Personal Contract II

My objectives: Why I wish to learn/do something, what is meaningful for me/for my group as part of the assignment I am responsible of?

I want to deepen my knowledge, eLearning is familiar to me, but there is always something to learn more. Meaningful is my experience, maybe the courses I have done give something to this team too. Especially the wiki courses I´ve made.

What I would like to add is the pedagogical aspect: that is what I need to learn the most! Different technologies to set up a course are quite familiar and I think the management side is easy to me :)

What resources will I need: What software tools and resources I am going to use? Resources can be people, different artifacts, materials.

I most definitely need my team! I have already done one group work almost alone in the autumn ;) I will need my laptop, Internet connection, Firefox, Word, Excel, Photoshop..

Peer evaluation and discussions are to be important.

What is also needed: blogs, wikis, Skype, email, Doodle (a new thing for me, making polls).

How will I do it: What is my strategy to achieve my objectives? What is the order of my actions? How will I use different resources in my actions?

I believe some planning is to be done with Word and Excel, but maybe we also will use wiki or something (LATER EDIT: Google Groups). Laptop is the artifact to work with and I need Internet connection and Firefox to keep contact, deliver material and so on. With Photoshop I most likely do some pictures or something.

I will read the course materials, join the discussions with my team, do all the weekly assignments and with the help of these join the design of our team´s own course.

Evaluation criteria: How do I know that I was successful? Develop measurable criteria to evaluate your activities in respect of your objectives.

Well, the team will give feedback. And I´m quite harsh to myself as usual ;) I will rely on straight feedback, I will give myself points or something.

The peer evaluation will hopefully be lively :) And I believe the facilitator will guide me.

Self-reflection: Did I achieve my objectives? Use the criteria what you developed to assess how well did you work. Reflect, what worked and what did not?

For now we have been doing some planning. Of course I suspected a bit more activity, but as it has been seen so many times it´s so damn difficult. Maybe I should really study how to activate people to do group works via Internet / webcourses. Finding some successful ways would really help many!

The current situation is better, I´ve managed to get a babysitter on daytime :) These first months with a baby have shown me that there is no planning anymore.. Just have to do things when it´s possible. Evenings seem to be the hardest (the baby is in her most demanding), at daytime I have time to study since the baby usually sleeps a long nap. I would have enjoyed doing more, but I just have to settle with this I´ve got. The guys have been so hyperactive that I have troubles following them and that is really new to me!

Google groups didn´t work that well, somehow it was very plastic or something. Wiki has worked out much better even though they are not that much different. Little things count :) Doodle´s polls are easy, del.icio.us got me confused at first, Skype has worked well as usually. We´ve really used a lot of different softwares and services!

-----

Based on the comments

At the beginning of the course I felt I´d do a lot as usual, be the one who does things when others don´t have time or loose interest or something.. The surprise was quite big when I noticed that I don´t have the time to be the one anymore. Luckily in this group there are two very active fellows :) And I ended up kind of being late and fell back, I lost the sense of "what is the current situation". After that I´ve been more or less confused, trying to catch up. Still am.

My objective to the group was to participate a lot, be in the middle of the actual thing. I ended up commenting to GoogleGroup/wiki/blogs, adding some links to del.icio.us, collecting something about wikis.. Those (wikis) are kind of what I was planning to give to this group and I actually did write something about my experiences, but so much more could have done.. But I will rise again! There are still weeks left so now my objective is to give as much as possible to this next task, evaluating.

EDIT:
Well, you can see that I tried, check the history of Formative evaluation page in the wiki.. All deleted what I tried to put in there. Well, at least I created one page to there.

So I´ll stay as a commentator, try to suggest things to every part of the course. Discuss. And try to find some useful materials and so on.
I just have to settle for the grade I get.

EDIT II:
Well, now I´m trying to make our course visible and be part of the gang to produce the evaluation poll / questions.

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 9 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
I enjoyed the conversations about people´s experiences - again ;)

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
Our group is really active in our wiki :)

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
Lot´s of reflecting about other´s experiences.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle, our team´s Google group (mainly just reading since we´ve moved to a wiki), wiki and now we have also a del.icio.us account.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In wiki with the participants, email.

EMIM / E-Learning / Assignment 7

From the perspective of my tasks in our workgroup, what did I learn from theoretical materials, how to make/use the course materials/activities/assessment/tools?
Well, have to say that we are still in process so much that I have to get back to this subject later..

Later:
My tasks ended up to be more of a commentator, link collector, wiki-specialist.. I thought I would have been maybe the pedagogical "expert" or something but.. Maybe I should have been more offensive.. But that is not my style. Well, luckily I have studied eLearning quite a lot, 25ECTS points in university level + around 10 in lower level, so I don´t feel that I missed now something important.

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 8 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
I enjoyed the conversations about people´s experiences.

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
It was very nice to chat with the group! And also to see that in our Google group we have some discussion all the time.

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
This week we discussed a lot of the group work itself, about the use of blogs and wikis and so on.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle, our team´s Google group and Skype. Now we also have a wiki

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In Google group with the participants. We also had a Skype-chat on Sunday 20.4. :)

EMIM / E-Learning / Assignment 6

Explain, which type of learning environment is best suitable for your e-learning course?
Our group/team decided to use wikis and blogs. Wiki would be the "home", where are all the materials and so on and the students will have personal reflection in blogs. The topic of our course is blogs and how to use them, that is why the students also need to actually use a blog. So the course is about basic concrete skills in setting up and using blogs and also skills to use these technologies in a pedagogically correct manner.

We will use behavioristic way of learning in the beginning since we want everybody to be at the same level with knowledge and skills. Then we will also use the constructivistic approach since part of the course is about letting people to learn through experience.

From our team´s Skype-chat:
"I think what we could say about the latter iterations would be that we'd give the learners some basis which they could found their learning process to obtaining these skills and also try them out to find out the ways that suite them"

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 7 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
Selecting a suitable learning environment. We already have chosen to use blogs, but in general.

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
Different learning environments though Moodle, WebCT and some others are already familiar to me.

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
Blogs and wikis can also be used as learning environments. In a way. You just need to have some other ways to for example measure the activity and give rates and so on.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle and our team´s Google group.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In Google group with the participants.

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 6 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
How to use Google´s groups ;)

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
Finally our team really starts to work!

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
I told about my experience with wikis to my team. Now we are going to test blogs as a way of learning.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle and Skype and Google group.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
Via Skype with Ani i Lyubo and one thought with Kai Pata ;-) And in Google group with the participants (discussion, editing materials).

EMIM / E-Learning / Assignment 5

What are the best ways of finding a social network of your interests?
At least it´s a big job to do ;) You could start with Google, search for for example articles and blogs about the subject. Through this you get at least some idea of the situation. From one blog you most likely find links to some others and soon you have a kind of social network; at least you know who writes about the subject. Then just get familiar with them. Maybe even Facebook could be helpful?

From this week´s materials:

"Online learning is at the cusp of a transformation that ought as well to inform social networking: the transition from a centralized, institution-based system depending on a top-down structure and rigid standards to a decentralized, grassroots system of creation and sharing based on informal and ad hoc standards."
Source

Sounds good, let´s do that! :) ;)

Social networking websites
Web2.0 tools
(Thank you Kai!)

EMIM / E-Learning / Personal Contract

• My objectives: Why I wish to learn/do something, what is meaningful for me/for my group as part of the assignment I am responsible of?
• I want to deepen my knowledge, eLearning is familiar to me, but there is always something to learn more. Meaningful is my experience, maybe the courses I have done give something to this team too. Especially the wiki courses I´ve made.
  
• What resources will I need: What software tools and resources I am going to use? Resources can be people, different artifacts, materials.
• I most definitely need my team! I have already done one group work almost alone in the autumn ;) I will need my laptop, Internet connection, Firefox, Word, Excel, Photoshop..
  
• How will I do it: What is my strategy to achieve my objectives? What is the order of my actions? How will I use different resources in my actions?
• I believe some planning is to be done with Word and Excel, but maybe we also will use wiki or something (LATER EDIT: Google Groups). Laptop is the artifact to work with and I need Internet connection and Firefox to keep contact, deliver material and so on. With Photoshop I most likely do some pictures or something.
  
• Evaluation criteria: How do I know that I was successful? Develop measurable criteria to evaluate your activities in respect of your objectives.
• Well, the team will give feedback. And I´m quite harsh to myself as usual ;) I will rely on straight feedback, I will give myself points or something.
  
• Self-reflection: Did I achieve my objectives? Use the criteria what you developed to assess how well did you work. Reflect, what worked and what did not?
• For now we have been doing some planning. Of course I suspected a bit more activity, but as it has been seen so many times it´s so damn difficult. Maybe I should really study how to inactivate people to do group works via Internet / webcourses. Finding some successful ways would really help many!
  

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 5 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
About personal contracts, I´ve never done one before :)

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
To read about other´s personal contracts.

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
I have to use these contacts more often! They should especially be used with group works..

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
Well, this week was quite quiet ;) This blog and Moodle were the tools to work alone and keep up to date.

EMIM / E-Learning / Assignment 4

How can a conversational personal contract improve self-directed learning?
Very shallow, but it makes you more committed :) Somehow you have promised these things for real, you have it "on paper", you need to have good reasons to slip. Well, at least this is how I feel it.

Web 2.0 has provided us some social spaces which include self-manageable tools, learning at personal spaces, continuous invasion to new spaces, distributing one’s personality between spaces, community as an identity and publishing artifacts to define communities and ourselves. Because of these we need self-direction and self-management.

A personal contract is a tool to this, with it you can make decisions and manage yourself. A conversational contract means that you update the contract, especially according to facilitators comments. It helps to sustain self-conversation with oneself about learning, it also externalizes learning conversation for the learner, passes the control back to the learner.

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 4 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
Well it´s always good to read about course design :)

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
Nothing in the course.

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
I liked the course design form in the "How to make a training course (roster example)", page 2 and also the other schemes too. Schemes are always nice, they give something new every time.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In this week I got very very angry with the still ongoing problems with my internet connection / browser. Well, today I installed new Firefox and booted my wireless box. Now everything works..

EMIM / E-Learning / Week 3 Reflection

1. What was the most important thing you learned this week?
I learned some new ways of designing a course.

2. What was particularly interesting/boring in this week?
The importance of design is always interesting.

3. Was there something you didn't quite understand and want to know more about it?
Noup.

4. What kind of questions/ideas/experiences this week's activities raised for you?
Actually my week was filled with frustration to my internet connection or browser problems. I´m not sure what was it in the end, now everything seems to work.

5. Which tools did you use this week, explain what was the purpose of using these tools (e.g. social talk, to regulate my team activities, to work on documents)?
This blog & Moodle.

6. With whom did you communicate during this week, how many times, with which tools, and for what purposes?
In this week I checked the blogs of my team mates, didn´t leave comments though, it was so tough even to browse..