I like seeing what my suburb looked like a few years ago. I liked looking at the Himalayan region I will be visiting in a week or so. I liked seeing a street view of the Mexican town where my son was living. Another good time waster.
Google Docs
I guess I can see how this might be useful, especially if I was collaborating with someone on a document. I did not find it easy to use, however, and would probably lose patience with it if it took too long to learn the basics.
Wow, so many ways to waste time. Should I feed my pet turtle or check-out what the Kardashians have been doing in the last five minutes? I did find 3D SWAT tempting. Hey, who wouldn’t want to goof off at work by eliminating “bad guys with extreme prejudice”? I liked that I could delete Gadgets that I didn’t want (go Web 2.0) and thus customise the iGoogle page to reflect my sophisticated personality. I like the news feeds, but couldn’t get Al Jazzera. iGoogle? iAmslightlyimpressed.
In the library, I often use Google as a first "point of call". This is especially the case with document delivery, where a quick Google search can confirm or challenge, for example, an item's title. It is then possible togo into Pubmed or some other database. Also, it is not uncommon to find complete texts available online through a Google search. So, while it is not exactly scholarly, a Google search can be helpful.
Both of the recommended web-sites seemed to be dominated by advertising and an apparently uncritical attitude to new technologies. The content is mostly to do with popular culture and faddish technologies, which reflects much of the digital surface. My real problem with all of this is the way that form dominates content. Lots of bells and whistles, but little new knowledge or evidence of philosophical or analytical rumination.
This leaves me with the impression that the digital world is often lazy and shallow. Of course, this is not the case in our work as information professionals, where digital technologies are powerful tools for accessing important knowledge. This, more profound, aspect of digital technologies is not reflected in the web-site mashable.com. I would like to see a more inter-disciplinary approach, where technicians and theorists collaborate to debate aspects of the digital world.
For example, while I appreciate the participatory potential of the so-called Web 2.0, I do wonder about the low culture domination of content. Also, is there a problem with too much information, where it becomes more difficult to sort the grain from the chaff? Also, I have concerns about privacy and ownership of cultural products in the digital realm. I am not so confident about the blurring of public and private space or the idea that everything belongs to everyone.
Begin with the end in mind: What does this mean? Is there an end to lifelong learning? I understand this as a prosaic concept, as in if you are building a table you either need a schematic to guide the process or at least a good idea of what the finished product should look like? But, what about flexibility? Perhaps I will get inspired and make a chair instead! This is often the way with a research project, for example, where, although one certainly needs a hypothesis to guide the research process, the research findings will often direct the thesis.
Accept responsibility for your own learning: Self-directed learning is great, and after more than a decade of tertiary education I really like doing my own thing in terms of further education. This is one area where I really like new technologies. Never before has so much knowledge been so accessible. I will often watch a documentary or film on television and then get online for supplementary information and often request a book from the library to pursue the area of interest in a fuller fashion. But, there is a great need for self-discipline and self-editing. While the former is not such a big problem, the latter (I believe) is never sufficient. It is important, therefore, to divest some responsibility every now and then.
I was not impressed by the ambiguous 7 ½ habits of life-long learners, which seemed vague and border-line “new age”, with affirmations such as “have confidence in yourself as a competent, effective learner” and “create your own learning toolbox”. I want more concrete concepts. One piece of advice that I would offer would be to watch a documentary on a subject that you would not otherwise have an interest in, or, in a similar vein, read a book on a subject you know nothing about. The best advice, I think, for life-long learning is to develop listening skills and experience the world outside one’s own ego and/or comfort zone.
