I was able to sneak a peek at Alia's Information Online Conference for the wednesday afternoon and if you have read my previous posts you can probably guess that I chose the "And Action" segment where librarians and information professionals were discussing how technology and especially the visual mediums of video and 3d internet has been utilized in their institutions.
The keynote (I must admit) was a bit beyond me, however I felt that the presentation was very good and used excellent technology and diagrams to emphasise his main points. The address was by a representative of Macquarie bank and the presentation was on innovation in the knowledge management(KM)field. It was interesting to learn that their knowledge systems (or understanding of) involves three spheres of features that are interlinked: 1: Core Knowledge: repositories and processes, 2: Collaborative technologies and processes e.g. sharepoint the software that enables facebook and 3: Knowledge and expertise aggregation and delivery mechanisms (e.g. portals and mashups. It is comforting to know that leaders in the business world are open to using new technologies.
And Action
The first seminar I attended was a presentation by Diana Blackwood from Curtin University (WA) on how their library has implemented and dealt with video streaming and various administrative and technical issues associated with this technology being used by their library service. The university has a diverse need for showing video to students from studying standard movies/t.v. to instructional video content regarding courses (physiotherapy tutorials were mentioned as an example) and of course video of their own lectures.
Some of the administrative issues mentioned were difficulties with using different suppliers that held different conditions for hosting and distributing video content, Where streamed video content should be hosted and considering the cost of obtaining various licences should the university make greater efforts to seek out free content.
The second life is a 3d virtual environment that internet users participate in. This is the basis for a presentation by TAFE Library representatives who used second life as a training environment for one of their subjects (information literacy). One of the aims of this was in order to make it more appealing to students, attempting to engage them closer with the material through an innovative medium. Second life involves people choosing and designing an avatar which they are represented by in the virtual world.
TAFE reported that distance learning is on the rise and that isolation is a factor, so this virtual environment would help students feel like they are really apart of a class as they would be able to see each other albeit virtually.
The presentation actually took us into Secondlife to see the island or "world" that the Tafe class created. In that area they showed the different modules that students could interact with and various tasks that the tafe students were give to do in second life. Some of the outcomes from this project was that it was a great opportunity and a good medium for further study, also you can meet people from all over the world in 3D. Some of the challenges and issues that were raised was that high end technology is needed to participate and client software needs to be downloaded every few weeks and better software skills are needed. Also the teachers found that class control was difficult for example the students in second life could simply and literally fly away. More outcomes from this was that the Tafe Library profile was raised considerably and Second life has connected lots of libraries.
The final segment was a report on Fostering digital inclusion by Leona Jennings from Gold Coast City Council. This report arose from a visit to an international conference in Glasgow. The conference focused on some programs run in Scotland in order to reducing the technology gap between groups that have greater access to ICT's (Information & Communication technologies) and those that don't for example seniors and the unemployed. This was very relevant to me because this topic had been a major topic of my university studies for the previous year. Leona reported that the EU in a commission on digital inclusion set clear targets by 2010 for this technological gap (also called by some the 'digital divide'), however some countries in the EU have made greater progress than others.
In the UK there have been various infrastructure projects that have been supported by the government and other institutions to try and achieve targets in relation to the digital divide. It was interesting to hear of some of the methods involved in bringing people in to participate in learning centres and other ventures, sometimes literally inviting people straight off the street. These learning centres provide a range of self-pace computer based courses, whereas the Gorbals Library and Real Learning Centre had a more of a mentoring /targeted approach to individuals this centre was situated in a quite deprived area of Glasgow. It is admirable that governments realise that technology and communication is so important in today's society and are willing to invest heavily to bridge the digital divide. Not just financially supporting some of the ventures that have been mentioned but also aiding in their establishment and continuance.
