Interview with a ...

Just been interviewed by two groups of people, both on video. Cristina Costa did a brief interview with me based on my recent Web 2.0 research and the forthcoming Plymouth e-Learning Conference which can be found at the Pontydysgu site. Also met three lads from the University of Umea in Sweden who pounced on me for some vox pop. You can view that interview here. Getting ready now for my afternoon breakout session at Online Educa Berlin. I will be speaking in the Web81 session, chaired by Dai Griffiths, and shared with Peter Sloep, where I will be talking on 'Learning 2.0: How students are using social software in their learning'.

Official twit

I'm here in Berlin for day two of Online Educa where there are 2064 delegates from 91 countries. After the Germans, the Brits are by far the largest delegate contingent with almost 300 members (hurrah!!) Yesterday was frenetic to say the least. From a very early start to a very late end, concluding with another Edublogger meeting, there was so much to see, do and enjoy. There were several highlights in the day, including a live radio podcast by Pontydysgu team including Graham Attwell and Josie Fraser (who grabbed me for an impromptu interview in front of a few hundred people who were all patiently queuing for their coffee at the break. (pictured above, Josie interviews George Roberts from Oxford Brookes University). Several interesting conversations developed throughout the day, and I seemed to bump into just about everyone I had met previously at other events around the globe over the previous 18 months. Educa is like one massive people aggregator.

One of the best sessions I attended was the breakout session entitled 'MUVEs for the 21st Century', which in some ways was a follow up of last year's session we did as the Second Life team. Chaired by Shirley Williams (Reading University) and presented by a host of stars including Steven Warburton (Kings College London) and Graham Hibbert (Leeds Metropolitan University), it was a tour de force of all the latest activities and research into immersive and virtual learning environments. Themes included design issues, formal and informal learning and digital identity (avatar design). I was roped in to act as 'official twit' for the proceedings, and must have sent around 150 tweets out during the two hour session. I think I lost about a dozen followers as a result (I guess they resented what they considered to be spam) but gained an awful lot more on Twitter.

The evening was capped by the edublogger meeting where we discussed microblogging in all its guises. Issues included the question: Is microblogging eroding people's use of Facebook and other social networking tools, what can and should Twitter be used for, and networking through microblogging. I will say more about today's events when I have had a chance to catch my breath...

Go Wesch young man

Everyone today was impressed by Michael Wesch's keynote speech to the Online Educa Berlin conference this morning. Wesch is considerably younger and more dynamic than I expected. He also comes across as self-effacing and certainly does not play up to his image of mover and shaker of the social media scene. Wesch spoke under the title of 'The Crisis of Significance and the Future of Education'. Wesch is probably best known for his YouTube videos including the oft used and quoted 'The machine is Us/ing Us'. I have used the video myself on several occasions because it says it all - we are teaching the web and in doing so, making knowledge and creating new learning possibilities. This was the theme of Wesch's talk - he regaled us with his hilarious experiences working in the jungles of Papua New Guinea, whilst at the same time convincing us that we are in a time of tension between the old traditional approaches to learning and the new ways students learn today. He quoted YouTube as a classic example of the ever increasingly primacy of user generated content. YouTube has broadcasted more content in the last 6 months, he claimed, than ABC has in 50 years. And all this without having to pay any producers or directors! The new mediascape is creating new possibilities, he said, and if we don't grasp these possibilities, we lose the opportunities.

Wesch set the tone for the conference, and to be fair, although the other speakers would have been fair to middling in any other context, they paled into lesser significance in comparison to Michael Wesch's masterly performance. As I write this blog sat in the Marlene Bar, I can hear people around me still enthusiastically discussing his ideas. I'm off now to sit in a breakout session to see what else I can learn that will inspire me today...

.. And now a word from our sponsors

It's bitterly cold here in Berlin, but the snow has gone from the ground and the skies here today are a clear pale blue. I'm sat in the Marlene Bar of the Hotel Intercontinental just before the start of day one of the Online Educa Berlin conference. After wading my way through a couple of dozen German policemen, I made my way into the main reception of the conference...

The first thing you notice about Educa, is that it is shamelessly commercial. Most of the space of this huge event is taken up with exhibition and vendor stands, more than 120, and everyone, it seems is trying to flog you something. I have just opened my delegate pack and out popped no fewer than 19 flyers and brochures from sponsors, around an inch thick. They are discarded on the side without me reading any of them - oh woe to the rain forests! Oh, and this wireless link is brought to you courtesy of Adobe....

Last night I spent a very enjoyable hour or so with some of the more notorious Edubloggers including Josie Fraser, David White, Dirk Steiglitz, Graham Attwell and George Roberts. We chewed the fat over the future (or not) of VLEs, residents and visitors, social software and German caberet. Yep, we aren't completely boring.

I will report back on some of the sessions here today and tomorrow as they take place and try to bring you some interesting images from the event. There is also at least one Twemes site hosting images, tweets and blog postings for the event. For now, I'm off to try and avoid the vendor stands and find the sessions.

Germany calling...

Berlin beckons again next week - it's the end of the year, and it's time for OEB! Online Educa Berlin is without doubt the largest e-learning industry conference in Europe, and some would argue, the most influential. For many, OEB is the uber-conference for e-learning. For me it holds many memories of speaking to large and appreciative audiences, the remains of the Berlin Wall, the Checkpoint Charlie museum, Christmas markets, Unter den Linden, Alexanderplatz, Ka De We, and the Brandenburg Gate. The first time I attended OEB was in 1997 when it was still quite small at around 1000 delegates. The city (and in particular, Potsdamerplatz) was still under construction after unification, and the whole place was one big builkding site. 'Ich liebe Berlin', I gabbled excitedly in fluent German to the taxi driver. In response he said 'It will be nice when it's finished...' I will be there again next Wednesday for another dose of sardonic German wit.


Here are some of the OEB 2008 organising committee's aspirations for delegates:

• Prepare yourself for Generation Y. Debate and discuss the impact and needs of a generation who grew up with the Internet.


• Have a closer look at the value and importance of open educational resources. Get in touch with innovative thinkers and promising initiatives.


• Change your mind about content creation.


• Learn more about virtual worlds and user-generated content in education.


• Join the debate on Web 2.0 and social networking.


• Experience new possibilities with sophisticated learning management systems.


• Move on with mobile learning and check out pioneering tools and applications.


• Explore new ways of storytelling and videos in learning.


• Get serious with game-based learning.

OEB is always staged in the crisp, urbane and cosmopolitan surroundings of the Hotel Intercontinental, next to the famous zoological gardens, deep in the Tiergarten area of Germany's glittering, burgeoning capital city. Just down the road around Kurfurstendammstrasse, are the Christmas markets, and of course the cafes, bars, boutiques and theatres. I love going there for the conference (2008 will be my sixth visit) not necessarily for the papers or workshops, although some of these can be attention grabbers. Nor for the keynotes, although some of those I have witnessed have been among the most inspirational speeches I have ever heard (I will not miss Michael Wesch at this year's event - here's his latest YouTube video). All the corporate types will be there - you can tell them by the expensive suits they sport - to peddle their wares and convince you that their VLE package or software solution is the best on the market. But it's not them I am there to see either, even though I will shamelessly grab some freebies.

No - I go because of the opportunities for networking... there are so many smart and creative people to meet and discuss ideas with, and so many wonderful, atmospheric venues in which to meet. The Marlene Bar last year was an excellent place to just sit, chill (yep, it's Berlin just before Christmas, and that's cold by any standards) and chew over some new ideas whilst excellent live music is played and the iconic image of Marlene Dietrich glowers smokily over the proceedings. OEB is over in a flash each year - but during the intense two days, many contacts are made, new friendships and valuable partnerships forged.

If you are in Berlin and attending OEB next week, and we bump into each other, will you do me a small favour? Please explain to me why a face to face conference is called 'Online...?'