This is a blogging experiment. I am trying to see what I could blog about in 10 minutes or less.
Well, here are some of the things I could blog about:
What I'm doing in my astronomy research
The cool idea I have for the final project of the Digital Civilization class
I could try and get recruits to join my final project
I could write two quick biographies about the two gentlemen that I spend large portions of my day with.
Ok, that last one sounded fun and very do-able in ten minutes. Actually, I now only have 7 minutes left!
So there is a computer lab on the forth floor of the Erying Science Center on Brigham Young University campus. This computer lab is for those doing astronomy research at BYU. Since the majority of students doing research are actually graduate students who have their own offices with their own computers, this lab is mainly occupied by three people and sometimes others.
The other two are two of my good friends. (oh no! I only have two minutes left).
Well, they are great and we all do homework in this computer room together.
Hmm... the lack of time is starting to stress me out and I really don't know what to write anymore. I think that this experiment has shown me that I should at least think about what I am going to write about before I start writing. But, then again, if I didn't, I would be telling you about the cool computer lab and my friends. In fact am in the computer lab as I am typing.... times UP!
I feel like the character Flynn in the movie Tron because
this class has thrust me into the digital realm. Or in
other words I have been "digitally reborn."
I've been in a Digital Civilization class for almost a month and its time I take some time to look back, look to the present, and look forward, and find out where I am in the class.
Looking Back: Where was I Pre-#digiciv?
Before this class I had finished a History 201 course which focused on civilizations up to 1500 AD. The class was taught by @lisa_maren (i.e. Prof Lisa Halverson). It was interesting because she encouraged the class to use some new digital tools that I had never used before. For example, she used the LMS BrainHoney, rather than the BYU staple LMS, Blackboard. She also asked us to use Twitter and tweet about what we were learning with the hash tag #hist201. So I got my first Twitter account @xinianlai. Besides this, however, my digital literacy was still just average. I used the basics" like Gmail, Facebook, iTunes, Microsoft Office, YouTube, and occasionally watched the NBC Nightly News video podcast. Instead of learning history the way I do now, I would read hours of text from my history book. My digital literacy started to change when I got my new phone and I started to learn history different once I came to my Digital Civilization class for the first time.
Looking at the Present: How far have I come in #digiciv?
Since being in this class I have learned a lot. I have really enjoyed making the connections between the digital revolution we are in now and the changes that took place in Western culture in the past especially with the advent of movable type, the Protestant reformation, and the Enlightenment. The way I have been learning the historical content for this class is by looking at learning objectives for each lesson. I will look at the prominent themes/ideas, major events, and influential people/works. I will try to read all the assigned readings first, then I use those as a springboard into helping me learn more. Earlier in the class I would use Google/Wikipedia to do me self directed reading and learn more about the historical content.
Lately, however I have been able to find and consume better content because I've been going through several of the digital literacy labs. In learning how to use Diigo, mindmaps, Prezi, Twitter, and Blogger I have had digital doors open me up to better content. These platforms have often been my new starting point in consuming content. These avenues have also helped me focus on learning the computing concepts and digital cultures. I always try and guess what the teachers had in mind when they relate various computing concepts to certain historical themes/events. I also really enjoy and appreciate the help my classmates give me in creating Diigo bookmarks and making page annotations/highlights. The Diigo bookmarking has become one of my key portals into the internet rather than Google (at least for this class).
In the last paragraph, I mentioned how Diigo has helped me with one of the three C's, that is, consume. Diigo has also helped me with the other two C's of the class (Consume-Create-Connect). Each time I make a bookmark, I have created content on the internet. It is a way of micro-blogging what I have been up to because it documents where I have been and what I like. (I even use the "like" feature on Digiciv Diigo Group). This in turn has allowed me to connect content with other users and discuss the website via comments annotations, and highlights. I also connect with others online by commenting on everythingIread.
As far as creating with blogging. Blogging has encouraged me to both consume and connect because both are necessary to produce relevant content for my blog. If I wanted to write a good blog post, I needed to research and learn about what I was going to talk about. The more I have blogged, the more I have researched and the more I have researched the more I have wanted to blog.
Looking Into the Future: Where could I improve?
I can think of two areas where I could impove the most that will help me make the most out of this class. First I need to better learn the historical content. For the past week or more, I have been focusing more of my attention to the digital concepts portion of the class rather than the historical. If I want to count this as a civilization credit for my university core I need to put more effort into making sure that I have learned the historical content.
Second, I could work on time management. I know we were encouraged to use the 3 hours out of class for each hour in class rule. The challenge of this class has been that I want to consume a lot of content because that is what I am best at rather than create or connect. So I need to work on equally partitioning my time so that I create and connect as much as I consume.
Welcome to academia. Here you have the opportunity to learn from the vast expanse of human knowledge. You may, if you are lucky, also be able to add to that collection of knowledge. You already, however, are the lucky one. You have completed the rigors of high school, an institution that very few in the world have the opportunity to attend. You have applied to this university and unlike others, you were accepted because you met our high criteria.
Now where do you go from here? First, you will attend general classes for at least half of your 4 (or probably more) years here. Eventually you will be able allowed into the courses that cover the things you've actually wanted to study for a long time. However, those courses are really only an introduction or watered down version of the stuff that we, your teachers know. To really learn what we know, you will need to attend graduate school.
Congratulations, you have an undergraduate degree. So now you get the chance to actually doing research. We wish you the best of luck. If the peer reviewers are nice, your paper might not get too slaughtered that you may be able to publish it.
Had enough satire.... well, it all has a little base in some truth. Thankfully I go to BYU where undergraduate research is so heavily pushed. I have the opportunity to do astronomy research and there is a high probability I can publish into the scientific gated community as an undergraduate.
So what do you think? Should the scientific communities be more open to the public or should they be gated to maintain quality control?
I've been learning how to use Prezi, and I've created my first Prezi. It outlines the perfect way plan a party. This is obviously not a true algorithm because it is a linear path and does not tell you what to do at each junction or step of planning a guy party. Regardless, I am impressed at Prezi's ability to display content. It is a remake of PowerPoint with a twist. I really enjoy how your layout and sizes can help add meaning to what you are trying to do. I tried to use size and movement to help give the presentation some life.
Here is a plus to Prezi: if you have university email, you can get an educational license and enjoy a number of the great Prezi features for free. I would recommend that everybody at least try this new presentation tool. I am going to try and use it for a military briefing on Friday. I'll let you know what they think.
The United States a (mostly) open government. Americans (and the world) have instant free access to every word spoken in congress thanks to CSPAN. On the channel CSpan you can watch complete coverage of the House of Representatives. On Cspan2 you can watch the Senate. Still despite this openness, there is still a lot of stuff that goes on in the US government (especially in the Executive and Judicial branches) that goes on behind closed doors with public scrutiny only allow after the fact. Regardless of openness, our government gets things done which is why most Americans consider it a legitimate government.
Thomas Hobbes was one of the first to talk about the social contract. The idea that a group of people give up some of their natural rights to an entity (known as government) and that entity in return is supposed to protect them and establish laws. This deal between people and the government (or social contract), allows people to no longer be in a constant state of war as Hobbes calls it, but to be able to have industry and development.
In a similar way, computer users make the same deal with computer servers. Servers offer services to computer clients on a network. However, those computers must give up some of their total independence and self protection to be a part of that network. In long run though, both networks/servers and governments help the people and computers that give up some of their freedoms.
Computers, programming, and the internet ushered in the digital age. We live in the digital age (at least here in the United States). We connect with each other online. We perform many tasks vital to our academic, social, and economic success on a computer screen. We type our essays on computer word possessors. We rarely place a stamp on a piece of mail. Instead we connect with Grandma by writing her an email each week. We no longer organize parties by calling our friends and sending out invitations. We create an event on Facebook and send digital invitations.
Just as the printing press revolutionized the world, the computer is revolutionizing the world today. The Protestant Reformation was a result of the tools given to the world by the printing press. So, what kind of reformation can we expect to result from the new tools we have in the digital age...
I met with my group today and we discussed our three different digital literacy labs.
Rhett taught us about Data Organization Tools like Mind-Meister and Bubbl.us
Brian taught us about IP Telephony like Skype
I taught my group about RSS Feeds and Feed Readers such as Google Reader
It was fun because as we were teaching each other we also discovered some new things. For example, as Brian was teaching us about all the sweet things that Skype can do like phone conferencing and screen sharing, we decided to try out Google Chat 's new form of IP telephony. We called ourselves and heard ourselves on Rhett's laptop. How cool is that?!
From Rhett I learned about some cool organization tools and he pointed out to me that Mind-Meister ISN'T free! Sad! I am a lowly college student, I can't pay for online services. So, Rhett directed us to a free version of mind mapping software. Bubbl.us ! I tried it; I like it, so I have embedded in this post a mind map that I created. It is an overview of what I learned today from my classmates. Enjoy!
The end of the printed word - a huge example that the digital revolution is so real and powerful that the world will be very different once we've made the transition from type to byte. Click on the title to go to the page and comment on the news yourself.
I started this blog for my Honors 202 class to tell the epic story of my past life and experiences. Turns out I was wrong, this blog is about my new life as a digital consumer, creator, and connector. Due to this awesome class I have dived deeper into the internet and technology world than I ever have before. It seems like my new cell phone (a KIN two) got me close to the edge and this class kicked me way over the iceberg. The revolution has begun.
Speaking of revolutions, around 1450 Johannes Gutenberg started a revolution by beginning the European use of movable type. It wasn't just movable type though... Gutenberg worked on everything related printing that would make his movable type work. He had to make a paper strong enough to rip in the press. He needed to create an ink that wouldn't bleed through the paper. He even needed a way to make the type. With one of his largest printing works - thousands of Catholic indulgences - he showed that he could do just that. What was the result - massive political and religious change.
Flash forward to today. We are, as Clay Shirky says, in the midst of a new revolution. We are going from movable type to digital byte. We don't know what the end of this new revolution is going to look like, but it is the experimenters that will movers and shapers of tomorrow.
How does that relate to me and my new phone. Well, I was originally on the skeptical side of immersing myself into the world of Facebook, Twitter, and digital media when I got home from my mission to Singapore. However, slowly I began to sign up for things slowly. With the persuasion of my bishop I got a Facebook
account. For some past classes I've begun using new LMS's and Twitter. Here comes the chocolate story.
(This video is gives you an idea about my phone and why it is pushing me to be more digital)
My previous phone (a 2005 Verizon model) was working just fine for what I needed until an uneaten chocolate melted in my pocket and destroyed my phone. Having seen the advertisements and the recently discounted price of the Window's KIN two phone, I decided I would upgrade. The KIN links all your social networking sites and lets you view your friends updates and RSS feeds continually. This made me Tweet more and Facebook more. Finally I signed up for this Honors 202 class and in the past week and a half I have already signed up for numerous new websites and services that are helping me consume content, create content, and connect with users around the world.
New things I've done:
-First time embedding something into my blog post (see above)
-First time using Google reader
-First time on Prezi.com
-First time I am ashamed that my blog post was too long : (
-First time I've thought about approaching BYU administration to change the university core to fit our new and changing world (more on that next time)
Coming next: Ideas to experiment with the digital revolution.
The problem with computers is that if you stare at one a lot during the day your eyes start to hurt before you go to bed. Anyone ever seen the movie Battlefield Earth? In one scene of the movie the hero is placed in a learning machine which mainstreams knowledge into his mind via his eyes (consider how Neo learning Kung Fu in The Matrix). (See above picture)
This is me (from my webcam) after being
in front of my computer screen for too long.
I am still getting used to this self-directed learning idea. In fact, my new Digital Civilizations class is really confusing as far as what I should be doing. I enjoy how the class focuses a lot on digital things, but also, because I have to get on a computer to do stuff for class I end up falling victim to my addiction to wikipedia, and youtube. For Example:
I read the class assignment on Utopia my Sir Thomas More. Unfortunately, reading an exert from a story I didn't know about piqued my hunger for wiki knowledge and I was instantly Google-ing who in the world Sir Thomas More was and what was his book about. Fascinating. It was interesting how More wrote that there was still slavery on the Island of Utopia. Today a society with slavery would be far from a Utopia.
I really enjoyed reading about the geo vs. heliocentric models of the world. That is because I delve into this realm often because I am an astronomy major. So it turns out that even the heliocentric model is wrong! The sun isn't the center because there is a center to the galaxy to which the sun is a part of. There are billions of other stars and planets (exoplanets being my area of research) so we could never say the sun was the center of anything except a meager solar system on the edge of the galaxy in the Orion Arm. Makes you feel small doesn't it. Well, it was Galileo who first pointed a telescope towards the heavens and noticed that Jupiter had moons. Guess everything doesn't revolve around the Earth!
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