Address the Digital Divide

“William Gibson, the name who invented the term ‘cyberspace’, has said, ‘The future arrived. It just wasn’t equally distributed” (Soloway, n.d.). As a leader in educational technology, my response to this quote is to help make emerging technologies valuable to others by keeping a global perspective in mind and trying to understand different cultures well enough to help people incorporate new ideas about technological access into their culture (Thornburg, 2009). Having only ever lived in the United State of America, I have an enormous learning curve to begin understanding different cultures in other areas of the world. However, I am aware of the inequities and digital divide right here in the United States among different geographic areas of the country, as well as dramatic differences within a single town. I want to understand what technologies are appropriate and realistic in a particular culture while maintaining gender, cultural, and socioeconomic sensitivity.

The first and most important step in addressing these differences in technological access is financial support and education. According to Dr. Soloway, (n.d) the way to address the issue of leveling the playing field and eliminating the digital divide is to put a cell phone with Internet access in the entire community’s hands for everyone to communicate with each other and to create a climate of acceptance in which people not only have dreams but can actually experience these dreams as reality in their lifetime. I completely agree that the cell phone is the future emerging technology globally and it is the single technology device that can close the digital divide in a way no other technology can.

Reference:
Soloway, E. (n.d.) The digital divide: leveling the playing field [Podcast]. Retrieve from http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/courses/14936/CRS-WUEDUC8812-3730077/EDUC_8848_PK_Transcript.pdf

Thornburg, D. (2009). Diversity and Globalism. Laureate Education, Inc. Retrieved from
http:/sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn?CourseID=4199715&Survey=1&47=5828341&ClientNodeID=984645&coursenav=1&bhcp=1

Red Queens and Increasing Returns

When I decided to use the movie Total Recall for Module 4 assignment, I didn’t have to go far to it. Total Recall, based on Phillip K. Dick‘s book, is a part of my home collection of videos and one that I have watch many times.

The current competition between DVDs and video on demand is a example of increasing returns as describe, by Dr. Thornburg where “two innovations hit the market at about the same time and by chance, one technology gets locked in and drives the other to extinction, in a nonlinear process” (Thornburg, 2009). According to Chris Anders from Wired Magazine, Reed Hastings the founder of Netflix saw an “inflection point” at the moment when home theater units started becoming popular with the DVD hitting critical mass and saw an amazing opportunity (Anderson, 2004). At this point in time, neither the DVD nor video on demand has locked in, so let the game continue!

Last summer I visited Navada, and I learned to appreciate “the art of playing the tables in the Casino of Technology…and above all, the rewards go to the player who are first to make sense of the new games looming out of the technological fog and make adaptations to what is coming” (Arthur, 1996). Therefore, as I think about the four criteria of McLuhan’ tetrad, DVDs and video on demand are currently on the “Enhances” quadrant, because both of these technologies have enhanced the quality of life for many families to allow more time spent together at home, and I am not sure what will replace them yet as predicted in the “Reverse” quadrant (McLuhan, 1988).

References:
Anderson, C. (2004). Tech’s long tail [Video]. Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/chris_anderson_of_wired_on_tech_s_long_tail.html

Arthur, W.B. (1996). Increasing returns and the new world of business. Harvard Business Review, 74 (4), 100-109.

McLuhan, M., & McLuhan, E. (1988). Laws of media: The new science. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Red Queens Image. Retrieve from http://www.proteusadvisor.com/uploaded_images/Red-Queen-733517.jpg.

Thornburg, D. D. (2009). Increasing returns and red queens. Laureate Education, Inc. Retrieved from http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn? CourseID=4199715&Survey=1&7=5797856&ClientNodeID=984645&coursenav=1&bhcp=1

Disruptive Power of Second Life

Does Second Life have the power to be a disruptive technology by creating a virtual world that allows us to reinvent ourselves and be anyone or anything we want to be? We are social creatures and the experience of creating; consuming and exploring information in the virtual world is inherently a social behavior that many people want to experience (Rosedale, 2008). Second Life allows you to be creative; you can test ideas before implementing them in real life.

As an elementary media specialist I do not see Second Life as a disruptive technology yet, mostly because it is prohibited from student use, not to say that it could be allowed someday soon. One research article I found only explored using Second Life in a secondary school setting enacting role playing while simulating negotiation skills based on globalization issues (Ho, 2010). Elementary age student could benefit from virtual role playing as well; but they are not commonly use in school settings. Virtual worlds outside of school like Tootsville appear to be more widely used for younger students.

Second Life has many social benefits for Second Life and other virtual worlds allowing experiences that are rarely possible or impossible in every facet of life. The social implications of virtual worlds in education provide opportunities for field trips that would never be possible for students to visit in reality and also in the medical field opportunities for people with physical disabilities to participate in activities they never thought they would experience (Krueger, 2008).

References

Ho, C.M.L. (2010). What’s in a question? The case of students’ enactment in the second life virtual world. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 4(2), 151-176.

Krueger, A. (2008). Innovation in Second Life [Video]. http://www.thehealthcareblog.com/the_health_care_blog/2008/10/second-life.html

Rosedale, P. (2008). Second Life. [Video] Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/the_inspiration_of_second_life.html

Second Life Image: Retrived from http://www.freebase.com/view/en/second_life

Module 3- Rhymes of History

Interactive white boards are an example of a technology that represents a rhyme of history. SMART Boards rekindle from the past the need to display information for an entire classroom of students to see at one time, rather than the teacher having to write something on each individual students' slates or chalkboards, capturing lost teaching time, as did the inventor of the first chalkboard, James Pillans, a school headmaster in Scotland in the mid-1800’s (http://www.ehow.com/). How ironic is it that today, the teacher still only has to write something once on the SMART Board, but with other emerging technologies such as the interactive response system (clickers), iPods and iPads, it can also be shared individually with each student on a personal technology device just as the original student slates or chalkboards were used. I would also like to emphasize as Dr. Thornburg pointed out in his vodcast, “It’s not the technology, but the affect of the technology, that is rekindled," possibly coming full-circle.


References:
http://www.ehow.com/about_6458935_slate-chalkboards.html

http://www.smarttech.com/

http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn?CourseID=4199715&Survey=1&47=5486705&ClientNodeID=984645&coursenav=1&bhcp=1

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/kevin_kelly_on_the_next_5_days_of_the_web.html