Current mood:

contemplative

Blogs, learning networks, and the wisdom of crowds
I have been rereading a provocative article by a leading intructional technology expert, where he calls for "Elearning 2.0". There is much to consider there, so I will note some starting points here.

First, Downes emphasizes networks over closed environments. Blog-allied technologies enable distributed learning, distributed conversations, discovery processes, and team-based composition.
This reminds me of open ecologies (perhaps linked to the information ecology concept?).
If this is correct, our academic pedagogies need to shift. Well, perhaps the humanities can learn from the sciences, where we have been working much more collaboratively for some time. i.e., co-authored articles are the norm, and lab work is not very individualistic.

Second, and speaking of sciences, what happens to peer review? I am not convinced that collective scrutiny and publication maintains the baseline of peer review's quality assurance. Wisdom can emerge from crowds, but if no crowd is summoned, the object remains unscrutinized, its quality isolated, a cipher.