Comments on: Where will it lead? http://ideasandthoughts.org/2005/12/15/where-will-it-lead/ As an educational technologist, I am exploring ways to make learning more relevant, engaging and authentic. Tue, 06 Jan 2009 22:48:53 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 By: dave cormier http://ideasandthoughts.org/2005/12/15/where-will-it-lead/comment-page-1/#comment-161 dave cormier Thu, 15 Dec 2005 23:15:00 +0000 http://ideasandthoughts.org/?p=161#comment-161 This is something we'd love to do as well. As you are probably aware our shows can be VERY long... I've heard that technologies are coming out that will search through mp3 files for specific words. I wonder if we couldn't use key phrases such as 'chapter' to give anchors so that we could search them out. We've experimented with simply leaving times in our show notes... but this is more of a stop gap measure than anything else. dave. This is something we’d love to do as well. As you are probably aware our shows can be VERY long… I’ve heard that technologies are coming out that will search through mp3 files for specific words. I wonder if we couldn’t use key phrases such as ‘chapter’ to give anchors so that we could search them out. We’ve experimented with simply leaving times in our show notes… but this is more of a stop gap measure than anything else. dave.

]]> By: Alec Couros http://ideasandthoughts.org/2005/12/15/where-will-it-lead/comment-page-1/#comment-160 Alec Couros Thu, 15 Dec 2005 19:40:00 +0000 http://ideasandthoughts.org/?p=161#comment-160 I guess what I'm most concerned about is that some of the excellent being produced today will be lost in the format. Rick mentioned something like ... how do you access our thoughts Edna St. Vincent Millay (for example) in the middle of our podcast? How can these long streams of digital recordings be indexed, chaptered, etc.? Sure ... there are technologies that we could use to chapter our podcasts, but they are currently low-use, proprietary formats. And I guess there's more to the argument. When looking for information, people give preferential treatment to the format/medium. If I see something on microfiche, I ignore it ... and find something similar in searchable, digital text. Perhaps, we could assume that everything worth reading has been now digitized, however, I am more pessimistic. I think that much has been lost over the years, has become irretrievable (much like <I>some</I> oral histories). I think we need to be aware of these issues as we blog, create MS Word documents, PDF's, digitize our voices into .ram, .aac, etc. Some formats will prevail of course, while others will reach a dead-end. And certainly, much will be copied over (I still digitize my analog albums). But, certainly, much will be lost along the way. I guess what I’m most concerned about is that some of the excellent being produced today will be lost in the format. Rick mentioned something like … how do you access our thoughts Edna St. Vincent Millay (for example) in the middle of our podcast? How can these long streams of digital recordings be indexed, chaptered, etc.? Sure … there are technologies that we could use to chapter our podcasts, but they are currently low-use, proprietary formats.

And I guess there’s more to the argument. When looking for information, people give preferential treatment to the format/medium. If I see something on microfiche, I ignore it … and find something similar in searchable, digital text. Perhaps, we could assume that everything worth reading has been now digitized, however, I am more pessimistic. I think that much has been lost over the years, has become irretrievable (much like some oral histories). I think we need to be aware of these issues as we blog, create MS Word documents, PDF’s, digitize our voices into .ram, .aac, etc. Some formats will prevail of course, while others will reach a dead-end. And certainly, much will be copied over (I still digitize my analog albums). But, certainly, much will be lost along the way.

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