I like the look of your site, but wow! so many places to visit it’s almost overwhelming. How do you juggle them all?

luv

I would so like to have been able to learn like this back in 7th grade! This seems like a good approach to learning things! Wish I was 13 again, of course knowing what I know now!!

I hate it when she’s right. So now I need to figure out if you can edit slides once they are up on the VoiceThread site, or do I need to start over again?

This is an important discussion but it goes around in circles: it’s the age-old question whether humans are inherently good, bad, or just plain mundane. It also raises the question whether open access to information is truly “open” to all in every class and culture or whether an intellectual elite misguidedly convinces itself that access to information is shared by everyone. Then there is the question whether values, morals, and cultural perspectives across diverse groups can truly “mashup” into a common plane of understanding.

Your optimistic view is my personal drug of choice: I want to believe that social media, web2.0, and other emerging technologies will have a progressive effect on the human race overall because they allow the fluid exchange of ideas. I call this perspective the Wiki View. It asserts that people essentially *complete* each other. What you don’t know, I might know, and vice versa, and if neither of us knows, then an expert will correct our mistakes and share the real answer.

In order for this idealistic Wiki View to become reality, however, several challenging conditions must be met. First, everyone in the world would need equal access to Web2.0 tools and platforms, along with equal ability (and willingness) to navigate and use them – and that certainly isn’t the case currently. The Digital Divide may be narrowing, but it’s not closed by any means. Just consider how people look at you when you ask, “Do you blog? Do you Twitter? Do you Plurk?” And that’s here in America! Many have never heard the phrase “Web 2.0” and many have never bookmarked a single website, much less created a del.icio.us site. Let’s face it; ‘Puter Nerds are in the minority.

The second condition is that everyone in the world would need at least a basic education in order to read, write, analyze, and synthesize the ideas exchanged through these social networks – again, not happening in the current age. We are in an elite group, unfortunately, compared to much of the world, privileged to have advanced public education and literacy. We have the luxury of participating in discourse and debate. For much of the world’s population, though, basic survival is the priority of the day. Food, electricity and running water are scarce in much of the world – never mind ISP providers and iBooks.

Thirdly, everyone in the world would need to agree to and follow some sort of common moral compass that guides the overarching goals of society. Too many conflicting views would lead to stalemate instead of progress. Imagine all the taboos in all the religious sects throughout the world being lifted; that unlikely event would be necessary to truly Wikify the masses.

Speaking of the masses, when the American Founding Fathers created the Electoral College, they did it because they feared the masses. They worried about the potential for mob mentality and herd behavior (and/or manipulative politicians) to lead an uneducated and gullible electorate to make a destructive choice in an election. They asserted that large groups are basically… well, stupid. The law of averages, you see – when you filter down to the average in a group, the lowest rise in rank and the highest fall down in rank. You get the middle of the road, a reduction.

All of that said, and I’m sure you need to get on with your life right about now, I do believe that Web2.0 and social networking are valuable, enriching venues in which professionals can exchange ideas, refine techniques, and connect. The resources and possibilities are endless! But on the other hand, Web2.0 and SN are also media for playful, mindless entertainment. Your blog is focused on education, but consider a blog like “The Triumph of Bullshit” (which is one of my favorites) – its only mission is to harvest tacky and silly website images and posts. No life-changing potential there!

Bottom line, I don’t think, realistically, that Web2.0 will change the world, but I think it has an immense capacity for touching one nerd at a time and pockets of like-minded nerds. We can use it as a tool to connect, but we shouldn’t view it as much more than that yet. Maybe in the future…