dinsdag, december 02, 2008
Berlin, here we are again
Berlin, it's that time of year again! For the fifth time, I'll be attending the annual Online Educa Berlin conference, Europe's biggest conference on e-learning. I've arrived in Berlin a few days ago and am looking forward to a good conference. It's not snowing here (yet?), but the Christmas markets are selling their 1/2 meter bratwurst. I also realise that quite some people that I usually meet here won't make it this year, which is a shame (ill, other job, no travel budget this year,...) .
My current planning for the conference:
- Wednesday I attend a workshop by Jay Cross on his new book 'learnscape', or how to make the learning ecosystem for informal learning work (I think).
- Thursday I'm hosting a knowledge exchange session on my hobby project 'about2findout.com': all things people want to know on building a social web application for learning. It's at 16h30.
- Friday at the end of the conference I'll be chairing the 'battle of the bloggers', where a panel of bloggers will give their views on this years conference.
My current planning for the conference:
- Wednesday I attend a workshop by Jay Cross on his new book 'learnscape', or how to make the learning ecosystem for informal learning work (I think).
- Thursday I'm hosting a knowledge exchange session on my hobby project 'about2findout.com': all things people want to know on building a social web application for learning. It's at 16h30.
- Friday at the end of the conference I'll be chairing the 'battle of the bloggers', where a panel of bloggers will give their views on this years conference.
Labels: berlin, online educa
maandag, december 03, 2007
Online Educa: afterthoughts
The Online Educa Berlin conference is done since Friday evening, but I stayed the rest of the weekend in Berlin. So here are some of my afterthoughts on the event:
- The presentation styles of the slide shows have changed. More and more people use very visual slides with only a few words, and no bullet points. I like it better. On a side note: I've tried to so similar with my presentation this year, and I've put it on slideshare.com and in my other blog if you are interested. There is still a lot of difference in the presentation skills of the speakers, but I guess with such a mixed audience it is difficult to screen out the good presenters only.
- I finally saw the famous '100$ laptop' with my own eyes. It is smaller than I imagined, my adult fingers could not really use the tiny keys on the keyboard. But from what I could see it looks like a well designed, fit-for-purpose device. I do believe learning has a great role to play in the development of nations and regions, but it is not a field I find the time to keep up with. Apart from the 100$ laptop a very interesting project 'The hole in the wall' was presented, about how children in rural areas in India can teach themselves to use a computer and speaking English.
- On Friday evening attendance drops of course because people need to catch their planes, but I still had about 30-40 people in the session on corporate learning I was chairing at that time.
- Benjamin is still part of the staff, still plays the piano and still has a cute smile.
- Content-wise, I did not notice many new themes. That's not specific for this conference, it was the same at the Masie one I attended earlier this year. All the things we were talking about now, we had been talking about last year: mobile learning, can Second Life be used for learning, learning 2.0, serious gaming, etc. So no new hypes or themes. I did see however much more practical and concrete cases on the topics above, where some years ago it was still rather theoretical or conceptual. Maybe that is a good sign for the learning profession: we don't need new hypes every year, we finally have the time to improve the things we have.
- Online Educa is a unique conference in that it combines academic and corporate perspectives. Coming from the corporate side, it is also a unique opportunity to hear what universities are currently doing with their students in terms of technology supported learning. Quite frankly, it is scary (but good scary). Oh boy, most companies have no clue what will hit them in 2-3 years when these students will enter the workforce. I hope the organisers will actually make this a main theme for next year's conference: "The Nextgens are coming!" An entire generation of people that live and learn native with technology will massively enter the workforce at a time the baby-boom generation is leaving. That makes they will be on the better side of the negotiation table. And it also makes the learning profession will have a historic opportunity to prove its value in capturing and transferring knowledge and skills between totally different generations. It's gonna be interesting times... What better place than the Online Educa conference to talk about this, having an audience that understands both sides?
- I had the impression there were slightly more academics this year than last year, and the number of big corporations has dropped in favor of a lot of smaller and mid-sized ones. A lot of innovation happens at these little players. My understanding is that a lot of university projects have found their way in start ups that bring the research to the marketplace.
- The presentation styles of the slide shows have changed. More and more people use very visual slides with only a few words, and no bullet points. I like it better. On a side note: I've tried to so similar with my presentation this year, and I've put it on slideshare.com and in my other blog if you are interested. There is still a lot of difference in the presentation skills of the speakers, but I guess with such a mixed audience it is difficult to screen out the good presenters only.
- I finally saw the famous '100$ laptop' with my own eyes. It is smaller than I imagined, my adult fingers could not really use the tiny keys on the keyboard. But from what I could see it looks like a well designed, fit-for-purpose device. I do believe learning has a great role to play in the development of nations and regions, but it is not a field I find the time to keep up with. Apart from the 100$ laptop a very interesting project 'The hole in the wall' was presented, about how children in rural areas in India can teach themselves to use a computer and speaking English.
- On Friday evening attendance drops of course because people need to catch their planes, but I still had about 30-40 people in the session on corporate learning I was chairing at that time.
- Benjamin is still part of the staff, still plays the piano and still has a cute smile.
- Content-wise, I did not notice many new themes. That's not specific for this conference, it was the same at the Masie one I attended earlier this year. All the things we were talking about now, we had been talking about last year: mobile learning, can Second Life be used for learning, learning 2.0, serious gaming, etc. So no new hypes or themes. I did see however much more practical and concrete cases on the topics above, where some years ago it was still rather theoretical or conceptual. Maybe that is a good sign for the learning profession: we don't need new hypes every year, we finally have the time to improve the things we have.
- Online Educa is a unique conference in that it combines academic and corporate perspectives. Coming from the corporate side, it is also a unique opportunity to hear what universities are currently doing with their students in terms of technology supported learning. Quite frankly, it is scary (but good scary). Oh boy, most companies have no clue what will hit them in 2-3 years when these students will enter the workforce. I hope the organisers will actually make this a main theme for next year's conference: "The Nextgens are coming!" An entire generation of people that live and learn native with technology will massively enter the workforce at a time the baby-boom generation is leaving. That makes they will be on the better side of the negotiation table. And it also makes the learning profession will have a historic opportunity to prove its value in capturing and transferring knowledge and skills between totally different generations. It's gonna be interesting times... What better place than the Online Educa conference to talk about this, having an audience that understands both sides?
- I had the impression there were slightly more academics this year than last year, and the number of big corporations has dropped in favor of a lot of smaller and mid-sized ones. A lot of innovation happens at these little players. My understanding is that a lot of university projects have found their way in start ups that bring the research to the marketplace.
Labels: nextgen, online educa
vrijdag, november 30, 2007
OE: Andrew Keen says I'm a monkey
I'm a monkey: spot the 5 differences.
The most controversial speaker here at Online Educa Berlin was no doubt Andrew Keen, the author of 'The cult of the amateur'. Every hype or (r)evolution needs its Antichrist, and Andrew Keen is very good at crying out his disgust on the monkeys and children that are running the show in the web 2.0 world, instead of Harvard professors, and the danger of sites such as Google and Wikipedia - all founded by hippies. I actually enjoyed his keynote. A story is not complete without its other side, and he certainly is good at counterbalancing all the euphoria around web 2.0 and the democratization of the Internet. "The monkeys are running the show."
In my humble opinion, what is going on here is the defense of relevance of expertise. For a very long time, expertise has been a monopoly, decided by the ones-who-knew. Publishers and others decided who was an expert and who was not, and what was worth hearing and what was not. It's a logical flaw to think expertise will necessarily bring greater truth to the table in that model. I'm a Belgian in a foreign country at the moment, and not a day goes by without people asking me about the political state of Belgium (don't worry, we have 6 other governments that still work, just the federal one takes a long time to take off, it will happen, don't worry.) I've only seen correct facts and analysis of that in the Dutch newspaper, other even quality journals like the New York Times get facts all wrong. So that is the world of expertise.
That world now has a competitor: the monkeys that blog, write Wikipedia pages etc. Competition is good. Expertise shouldn't have the monopoly on the truth. To me what Andrew Keen's point is about is the defense of the expertise against the wisdom of the crowds. I like the new world where both have their place and will compete for relevance. Hey, the experts have a cost disadvantage and a quality advantage. It's a fair fight. In the first years of this 2.0 thing traditional expertise-relying business share will drop, but it will remain relevant next to us monkeys. We are just finding a new balance in a competition for relevance. Personally, it excites me.
So I'm one of the monkeys... I blog, therefore I'm a monkey.
Labels: andrew keen, blog, cult of the amateur, online educa
donderdag, november 29, 2007
Online Educa: what universities are doing with web 2.0
Yesterday I attended a very nice pre-conference workshop here at Online Educa Berlin on Web 2.0 and social software. It was given by two profs from Italy (Sarah Gut and Susanna Sancassenni) that explained in a very clear was what they were doing with their students. It is interesting to see how even Flickr photo annotations can be used for language learning, just as wiki's, personal blogs, diigo annotations, etc. During the workshop we were also asked to work out a learning event that uses web 2.0 principles and tools. The project we came up with at our table is actually something I believe in would really work: an intra-company learning community with a common goal to become good at presenting. (There are so many bad presenters, also here at the conference.) I have to find back the photo they made of our project, but from the top of my head it included:
- social network site to make a profile (Ning for example)
- a plan to become good at learning and share it (wiki/blog)
- finding learning resources and experts (links to YouTube, courses,etc)
- sharing your experiences in learning blogs
- ask a question (how do I deal with this difficult audience tomorrow?)
- using Google Docs or similar to collaborate on presentation design
- using Slideshare.com to prepare and get feedback on the presentation delivery
- recorded teleconf calls to exercise Q&A
It was an interesting workshop, especially because it opened my eyes on what is really, really happening in universities right now. Oh boy, we from the corporate learning function have no idea what is heading to us in 2-3 years time. That is another reason for me being here: this is the only conference where corporate learning professionals can preview the learning that Nextgen youngsters get right now and will expect to get from us when they enter the workforce.
- social network site to make a profile (Ning for example)
- a plan to become good at learning and share it (wiki/blog)
- finding learning resources and experts (links to YouTube, courses,etc)
- sharing your experiences in learning blogs
- ask a question (how do I deal with this difficult audience tomorrow?)
- using Google Docs or similar to collaborate on presentation design
- using Slideshare.com to prepare and get feedback on the presentation delivery
- recorded teleconf calls to exercise Q&A
It was an interesting workshop, especially because it opened my eyes on what is really, really happening in universities right now. Oh boy, we from the corporate learning function have no idea what is heading to us in 2-3 years time. That is another reason for me being here: this is the only conference where corporate learning professionals can preview the learning that Nextgen youngsters get right now and will expect to get from us when they enter the workforce.
Labels: online educa, web2.0
dinsdag, november 27, 2007
Berlin once more
I've arrived in Berlin, and I'm preparing for the annual Online Educa conference. Berlin is cold, but still above 0 degrees, no snow, no rain, and Christmas markets everywhere. I did eat my annual 1/2m bratwurst yesterday. Some habits shouldn't die.One thing I noticed is that they introduced the 'Ampelmann' traffic sign everywhere. It used to be a DDR (East-Germany) thing only, and you used to be able to tell if you were in the former East-Berlin or West-Berlin by looking at the traffic light, but they guy is so popular now they put him everywhere. He even has his own shop. BTW, am I the only sick little twisted mind that sees a 'Erectionsmann' rather than an 'Ampelmann' in this?
I'm giving a presentation on the IBM Knowledge Factory on Thursday. As part of that I experimented with Google Maps to create a map of all Knowledge Factory locations worldwide. It was quite easy actually. You need to have a free Google account and log on to maps.google.com. Then in the tab 'My maps', create a new map of your own and give it a title. Next you can add locations to it by simply searching for them and selecting 'add to your maps'. On customized maps you can have signs, areas and lines. You can share your maps or keep them private.
You can see the map on: http://maps.google.be/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=nl&msa=0&msid=107011651517167640797.00043fe5446ddfb17a21e&z=0&om=1
Labels: ampelmann, berlin, google maps, online educa
zaterdag, november 24, 2007
The silence is over... be warned :-)
I just realized I haven't posted an article in just under a month. First I was on holiday in Florida, then work got in the way and the last week I've been very, very busy preparing the go live of about2findout.com on Dec 1st. So it was just silence before the storm really :-). In fact I just uploaded both the brand new about2findout.com quiz 2.0 site to the root of the domain, and moved the experimental about3findout.com site to another server. So if you made links or bookmarks before, you will need to update them. The blog hasn't moved.
Tomorrow I'll be leaving for Berlin, where I'll attend the annual Online Educa Berlin conference on e-learning. It will be the fourth time I'm going and I'm looking forward to it as usual. The conference is a unique place with a mixed crowd of business and academics, and it is the time of year I go to contemplate on the work I've done so far, and what I want to do the next year. I'll be giving a session on the IBM Knowledge Factory and social software, and chairing another on learning in the enterprise.
Tomorrow I'll be leaving for Berlin, where I'll attend the annual Online Educa Berlin conference on e-learning. It will be the fourth time I'm going and I'm looking forward to it as usual. The conference is a unique place with a mixed crowd of business and academics, and it is the time of year I go to contemplate on the work I've done so far, and what I want to do the next year. I'll be giving a session on the IBM Knowledge Factory and social software, and chairing another on learning in the enterprise.
Labels: about2findout, berlin, online educa
maandag, december 04, 2006
Berlin, baby, Berlin
Today I'm back from Online Educa Berlin. This year, the conference has grown to 2012 participants out of seventy-something countries. It was my 3th Online Educa. I really like the conference, not only for the smooth organisation and follow-up, the fact it brings together both academics and business worlds, the content and the networking. It's just a special place for me at the end of the year to reflect on the previous year and get inspiration for the year to come. It's the place where last year I decided to join IBM Learning Development for example.
Anyway, it was one of my most intense weeks of 2006. (In a nutshell: excellent pre-confere
nce by Jef Staes - the IBM exec dinner at the Judisches Museum - meeting all those IBMers I only mail or phone with during the year - speaker's reception - chairing a session with red and yellow cards for time mangement - presenting a case study with my main customers and showing them around Berlin - new blogs to add to my feed list - many business cards - being at our booth - the fun of the speed networking session - Jay Cross after some drinks - the special interest group lunch on learning2.0 - the later hours of the OE party - demo's at the booths - Christmas market in Berlin - 1/2 m bratwurst - being a tourist on the weekend - etc)
I've been concentrating on networking this year and have not followed as much sessions as the years before. Among the highlights for me were the keynote from the World Bank, informal learning and the many practical case studies of e-learning on the workfloor.
Looking forward to next year's edition.
(pictures : Benjamin and me at Hamburger Bahnhof - IBM Booth)
Anyway, it was one of my most intense weeks of 2006. (In a nutshell: excellent pre-confere
nce by Jef Staes - the IBM exec dinner at the Judisches Museum - meeting all those IBMers I only mail or phone with during the year - speaker's reception - chairing a session with red and yellow cards for time mangement - presenting a case study with my main customers and showing them around Berlin - new blogs to add to my feed list - many business cards - being at our booth - the fun of the speed networking session - Jay Cross after some drinks - the special interest group lunch on learning2.0 - the later hours of the OE party - demo's at the booths - Christmas market in Berlin - 1/2 m bratwurst - being a tourist on the weekend - etc)I've been concentrating on networking this year and have not followed as much sessions as the years before. Among the highlights for me were the keynote from the World Bank, informal learning and the many practical case studies of e-learning on the workfloor.
Looking forward to next year's edition.
(pictures : Benjamin and me at Hamburger Bahnhof - IBM Booth)
Labels: online educa
zondag, november 26, 2006
Battle of the flash
Next week I'll be in Berlin for the yearly Online Educa conference. My company (IBM) is gold sponsor, and I wanted to have a series of selected flash movies play continuously at the demo point we are setting up. Shouldn't be too difficult, I thought. I was wrong...
Problem 1 : how can I play a bunch of movies in a playlist continuously?
Two solutions: either use a flash player with a playlist, or use a flash packager that packages a series of movies together in one executable file.
I tried a lot of shareware or freeware flash players : Captivate Player, FlowPlayer, Super Flash Player, Arty Flash Player but the best one is the free Flash Movie Player by Eolsoft. It still didn't solve my problem because the Flash Movie Players all seem either to have problems playing some of my files, or they stop/hang on a movie with an open ending and wait for you to push 'next movie'. So that didn't help.
As for flash packaging tool, I found Flash2X Exe Packager and Flash Packager by GozTun software. The first tool is a shareware that lets you make packages that run for 3 days unless you register. It also has problems with larger movies and larger lists. The one I finally selected was the free Flash Packager. It displays a popup at the start, and you can pay to get rid of the popup but otherwise it is free. (see screenshot) When a movie has finished it jumps automatically to the next one, and also loops back to the beginning. Just what I needed. Only problem is that some movies only show the first part and then jump to the next movie. I couldn't figure out how to solve this.
Problem 2 : how to make .swf files out of .exe flash movies?
I asked people at work and they told me it couldn't be done. So I googled and found some exe to swf convertors. I recommend the shareware Dream Flashsee by DreamSoft to to this, it has nice and easy wizards under the tools section. It runs a couple of times for free and requires registration afterwards.
Problem 3 : how to remove the interaction from movies?
Must admit I didn't quite get it to work for all movies I wanted to, but I did manage after a lot of experimentation to delete some 'stop()' functions in the .swf files and have them skip the introsection. I bought a shareware to accomplish this: Flash Digger Plus. This tools allows you to open an .swf file and change text, extract sound and images and delete some sections such as ActionScript. Another tool I used is the shareware SWF Quicker by SoThink. It is a light and extremely cheap version of Flash to open and edit flash movies. It's complicated for someone like me who doesn't know flash, but does allow you to see the scripts etc inside the file.
Problem 4 : how can you clip flash movies?
I don't think you can. If only it was as simple as video files where you can select the part you want with tools such as Windows Movie Maker and make a new movie... So I'm using the full movies, not parts of them.
So, in the end I have a list of 10+ movies packaged in an .exe file that will run continuously at our demopoint in Berlin. Phew.
- The situation:
- I have a lot of flash movies, some in .exe format, and others in .swf format. Some of those run autonomously but go in a waiting loop at the end, and others are based on interaction where the user has to click a play or next button.
- The complication:
- I need to have a number of movies run one after another and then repeat the whole serie, without any interaction.
- The question:
- How can I do that?
Problem 1 : how can I play a bunch of movies in a playlist continuously?
Two solutions: either use a flash player with a playlist, or use a flash packager that packages a series of movies together in one executable file.
I tried a lot of shareware or freeware flash players : Captivate Player, FlowPlayer, Super Flash Player, Arty Flash Player but the best one is the free Flash Movie Player by Eolsoft. It still didn't solve my problem because the Flash Movie Players all seem either to have problems playing some of my files, or they stop/hang on a movie with an open ending and wait for you to push 'next movie'. So that didn't help.As for flash packaging tool, I found Flash2X Exe Packager and Flash Packager by GozTun software. The first tool is a shareware that lets you make packages that run for 3 days unless you register. It also has problems with larger movies and larger lists. The one I finally selected was the free Flash Packager. It displays a popup at the start, and you can pay to get rid of the popup but otherwise it is free. (see screenshot) When a movie has finished it jumps automatically to the next one, and also loops back to the beginning. Just what I needed. Only problem is that some movies only show the first part and then jump to the next movie. I couldn't figure out how to solve this.
Problem 2 : how to make .swf files out of .exe flash movies?
I asked people at work and they told me it couldn't be done. So I googled and found some exe to swf convertors. I recommend the shareware Dream Flashsee by DreamSoft to to this, it has nice and easy wizards under the tools section. It runs a couple of times for free and requires registration afterwards.
Problem 3 : how to remove the interaction from movies?
Must admit I didn't quite get it to work for all movies I wanted to, but I did manage after a lot of experimentation to delete some 'stop()' functions in the .swf files and have them skip the introsection. I bought a shareware to accomplish this: Flash Digger Plus. This tools allows you to open an .swf file and change text, extract sound and images and delete some sections such as ActionScript. Another tool I used is the shareware SWF Quicker by SoThink. It is a light and extremely cheap version of Flash to open and edit flash movies. It's complicated for someone like me who doesn't know flash, but does allow you to see the scripts etc inside the file.
Problem 4 : how can you clip flash movies?
I don't think you can. If only it was as simple as video files where you can select the part you want with tools such as Windows Movie Maker and make a new movie... So I'm using the full movies, not parts of them.
So, in the end I have a list of 10+ movies packaged in an .exe file that will run continuously at our demopoint in Berlin. Phew.
Labels: dream flashsee, flash, flash digger, flash movie player, flash packager, online educa, swf quicker
