http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym Tony's blog for the MSc in E-learning (University of Edinburgh) Mon, 14 Dec 2009 14:22:05 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en The final post: a reflection and a farewell ... [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWw8OUkdvO8[/youtube] The end of the module and time to reflect on the lifestream. I’ve already made some summarising comments in an earlier post in which I describe the course as an example of ‘loosely coupled teaching’ and, to a lesser degree in an even earlier ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/12/14/500-word-end-of-lifestream-summary/ The deadline for the submission of our lifestreams approaches - just 90 minutes left as I write - and I realise how important the blog has been to my lifestream with other technologies in walk-on roles (Twitter to advertise blog posts, YouTube, Slideshare and Flickr to host the media I ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/12/14/block-1-week-by-week-summary-retrospective-2/ Block 2: Virtual communities and online identities is another really exciting course chunk. As with Block 1, we've an artefact to produce: a study - in whatever format we choose - of a virtual community. As with Block 1, there are some terrific energies being released here. week 5: 19 October Twitter ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/12/14/block-2-week-by-week-summary-retrospective/ I think it may be fair to say that, like many, I found Block 3: Cyborg learners – critical perspectives on digital culture to be the toughest of all the blocks and the one I least enjoyed. I think I find the whole idea of cyborgs and the posthuman to ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/12/14/block-3-week-by-week-summary-retrospective/ The end - as Sian and Jen's lovely found Flickr image reminds us - is indeed near and it's time to do those end-of-week summaries I never got round to doing during the course proper. Gulp, that's my social life gone until Xmas. Here's my end-of week summary for this week ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/12/05/reflections-on-the-course/ J'aime les nuages ... les nuages qui passent ... là-bas ... là-bas ... les merveilleux nuages! C. Baudelaire: L’étranger Bill posted about a cool site that creates a word cloud ('word clouds' and 'tag clouds' are different beasts) for your tweets. I have no idea what to make of mine, based on 100 ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/11/30/tweet-cloud/ I was intrigued by a reference to Boon and Sinclair (2009) in Sian's paper so went off and read it. This bit caught my eye: Facebook user profiles are obvious constructs: there is truth in them, but invariably artifice as well. Thus, to some, these digital selves become fractured, confused reflections of ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/11/27/on-boon-sinclair-on-facebook/ A really exciting and thought-provoking paper from Sian. A manifesto for this course? Maybe, though I'd say  it was more philosophical blueprint (the spectre of Sian's argument haunting the dispersed spaces of our own reflections?). In the Skype chat session Sian asked if we thought it was over-theorised. For me I ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/11/26/a-canny-paper-on-the-uncanny/ Given this course's boundary-busting characteristics, I'm going to carry on in a similar mode and discuss my assessment 2 ideas in public. Sian - hope that's ok? I think I'm only really going to finish the course if I produce something that connected to my current professional practice. For IDEL a ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/11/26/thinking-about-the-assessment/ I printed Haraway off to read later but couldn't resist a quick peek. Got hooked though and had to blog. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say I really loved Haraway's Cyborg  Manifesto. Why haven't I read it before? Actually, I know why - I thought it ... http://digitalculture-ed.net/tonym/2009/11/20/haraway-seeds-yes-she-does/