The beauty of blogging and collaborative Internet publishing tools is that users who may ordinarily have little voice in the context of our flesh-based hierarchies of reality are able to speak out and have their ideas and opinions heard.
The ideas of objectivity or veracity may often be discussed in relation to posted articles, but to take on board an impartial or objective approach to a blog posting robs it of its very value. It’s one thing to read what an encyclopaedia may have to say, but it’s a completely different thing to hear what someone actually thinks.
In my mind, contributions to the edublogosphere should be personal. They should be drawn from experience, from reflection, from a first-person view of the actual content. There is value in subjectivity; it broadens the mind, encourages debate and discussion and provides numerous perspectives. It’s the very embracing of cerebral and experiential diversity.
And with the Internet providing a democratic playing field for such discussions, users are able to take to task anyone from a practitioner to a CEO to an e-learning guru. The playing field is level for all. It’s this grand potential for discussion and feedback that makes it all so enriching.
For example, I listened today to a podcast interview conducted by Sue Waters, talking to Dr. John Mitchell about e-learning in the VET sector. He raises some interesting points as well as some that would surely get the hackles up for a number of VET practitioners.
Step 2 features people who listen to the podcast and are then able to provide their own rebuttal either in comment form or on their own sites. In this case, a well-worded rebuke from Alex Hayes.
Having such debates and discussions can only take our understanding and appreciation of subject areas to a new and deeper level.
Unless of course, those discussions are YouTube video comments.
**Updated: The interview has since been removed.
“…..Having such debates and discussions can only take our understanding and appreciation of subject areas to a new and deeper level.”
Too right.
The fact is that it also takes the retention of the original source to remain stationery for at least long enough for others to listen / see / read it.
In this instance it would appear that step 3 has been implemented and that is the right of the writer to be rid of the evidence. Those familiar with such trickery will know that I’m listening too it via my ipod as it was transmitted, delivered, retained and accessioned all in a blip of a second after the writer pressed ‘ publish’.
The plot thickens…..and yes your absolutely correct. Having such debates and discussions can only take our understanding and appreciation of subject areas to a new and deeper level.
Let’s hope the original returns. See Robyn’s comment.