Group items tagged

This paper explores the impact of communication media and the Internet on connectivity between people. Results from a series of social network studies of media use are used as background for exploration of these impacts. These studies explored the use of all available media among members of an academic research group and among distance learners. Asking about media use as well as about the strength of the tie between communicating pairs revealed that those more strongly tied used more media to communicate than weak ties, and that media use within groups conformed to a unidimensional scale, showing a configuration of different tiers of media use supporting social networks of different ties strengths. These results lead to a number of implications regarding media and Internet connectivity, including: how media use can be added to characteristics of social network ties; how introducing a medium can create latent tie connectivity among group members that provides the technical means for activating weak ties, and also how a change in a medium can disrupt existing weak tie networks; how the tiers of media use also suggest that certain media support different kinds of information flow; and the importance of organization-level decisions about what media to provide and promote. The paper concludes with a discussion of implications for Internet effects.

referred to in EdFuture.net webinar by Simon Buckingham Shum, Associate Director (Technology), Knowledge Media Institute, Open University, UK - uses student data generated from LMS (inc Bb and Moodle) discussion forums reinterpreted into a network diagram Can visually depict - disconnected (at risk) students - key information brokers within a class - potentially high and low performing students so to plan interventions before deadline for grading - before/after snapshots to indicate impact of intervention - student reflection/benchmarking in informal self-assessment

Dissects how a digital scholar might construct "a networked research cycle" (planning, collecting data, analyze, reflect); themes which will have increasing relevance "whether it is because they become accepted practice or because the research community reacts against them." Granularity (e.g., iTunes vs music industry's album) Pushback from outlets (e.g., open blog vs scholarly publication - shift from output to focus on ongoing activity, engagement and reputation - more difficult to measure and reward) Crowdsourcing (inc. layers of filter and publication) Light connections and nodes (sharing in "a frictionless manner") Rapid innovation "These emerging themes sit less comfortably alongside existing practices and can be seen as a more radical shift in research practice. A combination of the two is undoubtedly the best way to proceed, but the danger exists of a schism opening up between those who embrace new approaches and those who reject them, with a resultant entrenchment to extremes on both sides. This can be avoided in part by the acknowledgement and reward of new forms of scholarship..."

a wise and wonderful essay - especially important for those scholars who might buckle under the bullying and harassment so common in academia but more frightening when open and in the public domain. MOOCs should encourage public scholarship - and help to make it more valued... and of higher quality - but they will need to include in the design that the facilitators modeling advocacy and constructive kinds of alliances for the participants. That is, providing that "institutional commitment" for public scholarship that is thoughtful and intriguing (vs. public showboating).