Brains working towards machine consciousness

Whilst I found much of Catherine Fitzpatrick's style of communication and apparent unwillingness to listen to reasoned argument a trial in the first couple of weeks of the Connectivism and Connect Knowledge course run by George Siemens and Stephen Downes, I have to say a few of her recent posts on the topic of the forums and blogs and whether there is a problem with dominant voices to be 'on the mark'. She has introduced a rating mechanism for the blogs, which she acknowledges has some subjectivity in its nature, but which I feel relatively comfortable with over all - she has posted on it in the course forums.

This 'blog' only attracts a rating of '2' because there are not many comments let by visitors - which isn't a problem, as far as I am concerned, and may indeed be caused by her observation (which I am re-phrasing slightly) that I tend to post closely argued content, and also by the fact I am not all that bothered about formatting my posts to clarify things for the reader. I should be more concerned about that, but the blog is not primarily for disseminating my ideas and work, but more of a way of making sure I know where I have posted things. I also post some material on my RedGloo blog (and even more rarely on other blogs).

One choice Fitzpatrick has made in assessing another blog is that an rss feed of tweets (from Twitter) doesn't constitute a blog. I think this is slightly unfair (although I haven't read the blog, so the overall assessment may be reasonable) as I see Twittering as a form of microblogging, and an aggregation of microblogs brings them back to the macro scale, thus forming a blog. Probably, in general, not a very coherent blog, but a blog nevertheless.

The point Fitzpatrick makes, though, is that the 'dominant voices' on the course forums are, in fact the same voices heard in the blogosphere. Whilst the figures are harder to get, it would be interesting to know how many reads the various blogs on the list get. A relatively current list of blogs being used by course members is available in OPML courtesy of Steve Tuffill re-using Stephen Downes' OPML file (which I haven't been in search of, and Tuffill made the location of his easier to find by putting it on the forum (shock! horror!))

I've mentioned this on the forums (somewhere) - I think the major problem with expecting (or hoping) for discussion to take place in the blogsphere is that it really is not suited to having conversations about things. It is more like the old days where the only means of communication over a distance was by letter - whilst it allows for a more considered point to be made, it lacks much of the spontaneity found in most forum systems I have used. Blogs are a personal space used by many (most, I believe) to expound upon an idea (or to blog about what the owners cat did last Thursday) - they are a great tool for reflection, if you don't mind reflecting in the public gaze, but actually not much good for dialogue. Threaded forums, on the other hand, provide (for me, and I know others disagree) a practical way of viewing and participating in conversations, complete with side topics.

I mentioned that I have always found side topics (off topic chat) some of the most valuable contributions on forums. Apparently that did not sit well with Stephen Downes who then attempted a roasting (more of a weak sun on a foggy day in September, but still, the intent appeared to be there) by saying that I was bound to think the forums were good because I post on them.

It does concern me that I make a lot of posts on any given channel. I have stopped posting so many things on RedGloo because I do not want to scare our Freshers away from it by having too much to say. On the other hand, there are a lot of things I have an opinion on - and I believe that often it is an informed opinion (actually I believe it is normally an informed opinion, but really that is up to others to judge). Three cases tend to happen in a multi-party discussion:
1) somebody posts and nobody responds
2) somebody says something blatantly daft
3) somebody says something blatantly right
(there are some middle ground cases, but surprisingly not that many in my experience)
My responses to these cases are:
1) To reply because I value the input from the someone and want to hear more of what they have to say
2) To try to point out why I believe the content is daft
3) To support the sensible contributions by letting the author know I agree, and why

Often a post just makes me think of a connection which is new to me (or remind me of an old one) and the discussion channel seems to me to be the right place to post it.

So why haven't I posted this on the course forum?
Because I am increasingly getting the impression that Downes doesn't appreciate people taking up the space on the server (or has some other reason for not liking people posting there)
Because I am concerned that others will think I am 'stealing all the oxygen' (strange concept in a forum which has no air but nevermind)
Because there is content in Fitzpatrick's post which I think speaks to a wider audience, relating to the nature of blogs versus forums in education.
Because our surveys of students tell us that students want to have discussions in forums (though this may be because they are not familiar with other modes of discussion, I suppose)
And, if I am honest, because I haven't blogged much over the last few days because I have been busy with academic affairs.