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The recordings from the fabulous Webstock 2008 conference in Wellington NZ are now online. I would highly recommend tuning in and learning from these. A few from my favourite list were:

-Kelly Goto: “Getting Unstuck” - This is far beyond techy webness (which is great in itself but you need to understand your audience!) and dabbles in the realm of organisational culture and health. This is a fantastic presentation and will give you a lot to think about around application to your own role and context.

-Amy Hoy: “Usability for Evil” - Again this was all about people. The presentation was focused on principles of human psychology; understanding how we actually function, process information and basic motivations before thinking about anything else, that including what is on a website and how it is designed.

I ended up missing Russell Brown’s presentation, so looking forward to listening to that one as very much in my sphere of interest. Will also be good to catch up on those missed when I had to make a tough choice at the break out sessions!

All Webstock 2008 presentations are available online here

The last few posts I have written have been about teaching yourself something, as it is necessary to with digital media if you are to stay up to date with the overnight, hourly, constant developments in the space. It would be impossible to develop course materials on such a topic as they would have expired by the times the course notes were printed.

Something I have got into recently is iTunesU, where Universities publish full courses in audio and print format online. Read about it here. You can download podcasts and listen at your own hours and in your own realms of interest.
MIT announced an online initiative in 2001 called Open-CourseWare, to “advance knowledge and educate students . . . to best serve the world.” OCW shares free lecture notes, exams, and other resources from more than 1800 courses spanning MIT’s entire curriculum. Have a look at MIT offerings here

I think these resources are brilliant. They hold such potential to reach the masses that can not afford the money or time for lectures, and really break down the barriers to entry for those who are willing to knuckle down and do this on their own time with only initiative to keep you on task.

The fundamental question in many minds though is what about the missing piece of paper? How does an online course sit on a CV without grades, attendance records, assignment marks or the piece of paper at the end? Well, we are going for the paperless office, so why not a shift to paperless degrees?

Employers may at this early stage of online education’s existence question the validity of these courses. In my opinion, if you have completed a course and you are confident in your learnings and the value this brings to your role and workplace then make sure you communicate this, then deliver on it.

It is a new concept, but one I think that will gain momentum, particularly for those that have completed university are in the workplace and want to continue to upskill and expand knowledge into new areas that you may not have had access to through formal education.

I found a great resource today called “More than 100 Free Places to learn online and counting” - it includes

• Online tutorial and How-to sites
• Big Idea and Debate sites
• Higher Education and Open Education initiatives
• Business and Professional skills
• Language, spelling and grammar
• Web skillsAnd a whole lot more. Have a look here

So here I was about to type out my favourite webstock presentations and I was sent this link…..
Rest to follow.

Poynter Online have updated their new media timeline for 2008.

Events year to date include:
-Steve Jobs Macworld Keynote
-ABC News and Facebook sponsoring the republican and democratic presidential primary debates
-The White House getting its first blog
-Wikipedia in the newsroom
-Microsoft $44.6 billion offer for Yahoo (will look at this in another post)

While the MTV Myspace closing arguments forum is not covered, there is a very insightful report titled:
“The internets broader role in Campaign 2008″ - Social networking and online videos take off

Welcome to the new media world order, Ed. Everyone can and will blog something newsworthy you might say even in the seeming privacy of a restaurant conversation with your wife. It’s not necessarily a good thing, it’s just a new reality when everyone can snap a photo or take video of you with their cell phones or quickly write up a blog post on a laptop or tap out a text message broadcast over Twitter. If enough people pick that up, the news will spread quickly enough and you’ll be red-faced on Fox News. Read Media Shift: Iowa caucuses blanketed by twitter, blogs, video Here