Richard Baraniuk poses that there is a disconnect between the authors of textbooks and those that read them. Through digitizing books, “tearing out the pages”, and creating a massive bank of this content and making it available to all we can develop an “ecosystem” that allows inclusivity for all regardless of location, language or culture. What do you think?
My first reaction is to question the accessibility to the technology that is required to access this knowledge. I can understand the negative elements of textbooks; textbooks are heavy, expensive and difficult to re-contextualize the information for the local culture or language. What I question is the accessibility to the networking, hardware and software that would need to be installed in order to access this “ecosystem”. Yes, with the infrastructure already in place, this information commons can be extremely empowering. It allows for opportunities to interact and work with knowledge in a way that truly promotes understanding and a dynamic growth of learners. But does this structure empower those around the world who already have difficulty accessing textbooks? Will it really “cut out the middle-man” as Mr. Baraniuk states? I believe that it would simply be replaced by a different title for the person that stands in the middle. The companies and people that could stand to benefit for providing the requisite infrastructure, hardware, software and training are available and eager to benefit from taking this position.
There has been tremendous growth in this movement in its development. It just seems to me that Mr. Baraniuk views the world in a flat world model that Friedman would describe that has happened because of the spread of technology. I would argue that this is still only benefiting a fraction of the globe. Textbooks still have the mobility to penetrate and access parts of the world where technological access is not yet available. Does that mean this idea is worthless? That is absolutely not my position at all. I think that the ability to work with this knowledge is beneficial for so many people. It will enhance and help to grow a learning base that as of right now only has access to textbooks. I just don’t believe that this project means the death of the textbook or how this is the next step of globalizing information. It has its place in our educational world. It just doesn’t mean that we should be saying goodbye to our textbooks yet.
Richard Baraniuk poses that there is a disconnect between the authors of textbooks and those that read them. Through digitizing books, “tearing out the pages”, and creating a massive bank of this content and making it available to all we can develop an “ecosystem” that allows inclusivity for all regardless of location, language or culture. What do you think?
My first reaction is to question the accessibility to the technology that is required to access this knowledge. I can understand the negative elements of textbooks; textbooks are heavy, expensive and difficult to re-contextualize the information for the local culture or language. What I question is the accessibility to the networking, hardware and software that would need to be installed in order to access this “ecosystem”. Yes, with the infrastructure already in place, this information commons can be extremely empowering. It allows for opportunities to interact and work with knowledge in a way that truly promotes understanding and a dynamic growth of learners. But does this structure empower those around the world who already have difficulty accessing textbooks? Will it really “cut out the middle-man” as Mr. Baraniuk states? I believe that it would simply be replaced by a different title for the person that stands in the middle. The companies and people that could stand to benefit for providing the requisite infrastructure, hardware, software and training are available and eager to benefit from taking this position.
There has been tremendous growth in this movement in its development. It just seems to me that Mr. Baraniuk views the world in a flat world model that Friedman would describe that has happened because of the spread of technology. I would argue that this is still only benefiting a fraction of the globe. Textbooks still have the mobility to penetrate and access parts of the world where technological access is not yet available. Does that mean this idea is worthless? That is absolutely not my position at all. I think that the ability to work with this knowledge is beneficial for so many people. It will enhance and help to grow a learning base that as of right now only has access to textbooks. I just don’t believe that this project means the death of the textbook or how this is the next step of globalizing information. It has its place in our educational world. It just doesn’t mean that we should be saying goodbye to our textbooks yet.