Remembering Kuta

Weligama

Houses
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

Alex is at this moment on a bus traveling to inland NSW. My son is somewhere in the ACT camping out while building a structure somewhere that will replace something that went west in the ACT bushfires. My brother is somewhere in the red centre in the Uluru region. And I’m at my desk at home. Happily. Partly because I’m about to join the travelers. In a couple of days I’m going here - Weligama - a place I visited several times 25 years ago.

25 years ago I traveled with nothing that needed plugging in. Now I have to check here to make sure I’m prepared. Make sure that I’m able to connect and share. I will read what you have to say when I’m half a world away. I will share pictures and words from where I am. 25 years ago I’d happily be out of contact with everyone I knew for weeks. But times have changed. My phone will beep on arrival in Sri Lanka telling me I’m connected. Hotel rooms in Colombo will have Internet. There’ll be Internet cafes in the villages. I can post images, movies, and audio to the Net from my phone.

I will post content to a collection of sites that may not be compliant, probably break laws of copyright, and I will engage in debate and discussion about learning in between swims and seeking out old friends. I won’t be enrolled in any course but I’ll be learning because I’m networked. Happily. I’ll be engaged. It will just seem natural to continue the conversations from a place far removed from the desk I sit at now. And I know I’m not alone doing this. The world has changed…….

Inaugural Supper Club

Above: the host for the evening, Outrageous Jones, keeps things flowing.

Where I could have been....Nagoya

I wasn't able to make the one day Wireless Ready conference in Nagoya, but Aaron Campbell's done a great job describing what happened over in his blog. I was interested to read that "the salient point for me was that Web 2.0 technologies do not necessarily imply 2.0 mindsets, and the institutional “fit” here in Japan isn’t all that great."

Daf and Tere

Daf and Tere
Originally uploaded by beewebhead.

Two long time Webhead colleagues together in TESOL Seattle.

Goodbye Dad

My dear Dad, Leonard Ambrose Coghlan, passed away peacefully yesterday afternoon aged 86. St Patrick's Day, March 17th, 2007.

Womadelaide Wrap

Wu Man (playing the Pipi)

Huun-Huur-Tu (Throat Singers from Siberia - amazing!)

Etran Finatawa (Niger)

Celenod (New Caledonia)

The Garden Cafe

Rembetiki (Greek)

Swan Reach

Swan Reach
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

As I say in the audio - it's nice to know there are still places where life is still slow enough to accommodate this kind of transport across rivers.

The New Tools Keep on Coming - Splashcast

So here's another one. As Robin Good wrote on Jan 30th:

"Every week it seems to become a little bit easier to get involved in multimedia content delivery and syndication - whether through sharing videos using Youtube, photos through Flickr, or your thoughts using popular blogging platforms. The ability to upload, embed and easily share media content is now something we take for granted, but until now there hasn't been an easy way to gather all of this content together into a personalized online channel. That is all about to change starting today."

And as usual, the following example is light in content, but should be enough to give you an idea of what Splashcast can do. You can mix and match audio, video, images, and text.

Adding Spoken Thoughts 2

UPDATE OCT 16, 2007: MYCHINGO NO LONGER FREE :(

Ok. Here's another option using MyChingo. The advantage of this tool seems to be that all messages are kept here for others to hear, and unlike Gcast, the messages don't autoplay. (Messages have 60 second limit.)

Add Your Spoken Thoughts

It seems it may finally be possible to enable visitors to make spoken comments in blogs using this little plug-in from Evoca. I'll believe it when I see it. Still, here goes....
.....it's not quite as neat as it seems. You can indeed record a spoken message using the recorder below, but of course the audio is sent off to Evoca so people who come in later can't hear the spoken posts unless I go over to Evoca and copy the code and paste it here. Which I might do. I don't seem to be able to enter my email or any written text in the applet below so you might not be able to either, but if you drop by record a spoken message and I'll see if I can get the code and insert it here. Capiche? :)

Welcome to BAW 2007

I was sitting here as I posted this message. (Photo also taken using the same phone and posted to Moblog.)

My Tagroll

Well I've finally weaning myself off Powermarks (which was the greatest bookmark manager until Delicious et al arrived) and am now routinely dumping things into my Delicious account. And because I'm fascinated by the number of things you can do with a blog I'm adding my tagroll here!

GCast v Hipcast

To see GCast working on its own in a separate blog go over here.While GCast is free, Hipcast costs US$4.95/month.

Audio Post via Hipcast

This post has arrived by phone using Hipcast. (I'll edit this later.)

Life's a Beach

In this short vid I'm referring to Greg Whitby's presentation (podcast) here. And boy it's weird to see yourself up this close. Still...here ya go:

Students' Thermoses

Students' Thermoses
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

Chinese students like to take a thermos of hot water with them to Uni. They use it to make tea or just to drink hot water. I found out in my last day in Nanjing that Chinese people regularly drink plain hot water with meals. You live and learn!

My First Slideshare Presentation

Wonderin' Aloud

Well I haven't posted any movies on BlipTV yet but dear Steven has done one for me here. Ian Anderson's Wonderin' Aloud - just about my all time favourite song. Filmed in the lounge of a hotel in Christchurch. My bit starts about half way through.

The End of Audioblogger!

What a bummer! Got this in my inbox a couple of days ago. Interesting to see that it comes from the folks at Odeo! I'll now have to look at the other options. Stay tuned.
====================================================================================
As of November 1, 2006, Audioblogger will no longer accept phone
calls. MP3s made with the service will continue to be hosted and
served but you will no longer be able to use Audioblogger to post
new audio.


Audioblogger is an independent product, run by Odeo, Inc., a small
startup company in San Francisco, CA. We are not affiliated with
Google or Blogger except that we operate and provide the
Audioblogger service.


Given our limited resources, we have to make tough decisions
about what projects to focus on. And we've come to the difficult
decision that Audioblogger demands too many resources, time, and
money for us to continue its operation.


However, there are several other services that offer similar
functionality. Odeo is not affiliated with any of these services,
we only suggest them only in hopes that one or the other will be
a good alternative for you.


Gabcast.com is a free service for recording by phone
Hipcast.com has a seven day free trial and lots of features
Gcast.com is another free service for phone recording


All of the phone posting services listed above are compatible
with Odeo in that they produce podcast feeds, which can be
imported to Odeo. Any audio file at Odeo can be posted on a blog
by copying and pasting some embed code.


Odeo would like to extend a huge thank you to everyone who has
tried Audioblogger. If you are interested in keeping up with our
other blog-friendly projects, please have a look at Twitter.com
and our customizable audio players.


Thanks,
The Odeo Team


Links:
Gabcast - http://gabcast.com
Hipcast - http://hipcast.com
Gcast - http://gcast.com
Odeo Importing - http://www.odeo.com/create/addfeed
Twitter - http://twitter.com
Players - http://odeo.com/channel/102054/embedded_player

Future of Learning in a Networked World - Reflections

OK. It’s time to get this down before the thoughts float away in time. People who experienced the whole 2 weeks of the roadshow may even forgotten I was there! But I was there for the first five days in Dunedin and Christchurch. I wonder if what I think and feel now might be different if I’d been part of the whole event….

As Konrad hinted, this was one of the more significant experiences of my life. Not something that I could or would want to forget. A pressure cooker of learning, thinking and relating. I find my thoughts about it all are more about process than content. I can’t tell you what extra knowledge I gained in the sense of hard facts or artefacts or new skills. That’s something of a disappointment actually as I had hoped to sit down quietly in a corner and grill Sean, or Leigh, or Stephen et al. But it just wasn’t like that. I think about how it was, what it was, what we did, what was said, who I spoke to……

It was exhilarating and exhausting (as I think everyone found) – even for those 5 days. So much information was relentlessly taken in, shared, and recycled or created as audio, text, photos, video. Others have written about it taking ages before it all finds its place in the overall – I know it will be like that. But I’ve already had the chance to run a kind of debrief session with some interested colleagues in a workshop back home. After outlining what it was and how it worked I asked the 12 or so present whether they would like to take part in that kind of professional development event and most were extremely amenable to the idea so I think the idea has legs. Not only for larger groups geographically dispersed, but small groups from the same location or workteam.

One of the more challenging aspects for me was to have to surrender myself to the group totally for all my waking hours, and in the case of the Marae, sleeping hours as well! Stephen’s initial comments about groups v networks, and subsequent discussion from others, are all the more interesting in this context. I came prepared to do that – surrender to the group – and consequently found myself feeling much closer to people within days. So for me it was not just an intellectual exercise of processing ideas and discussion, but about managing personal relationships. None of this was hard per se. It’s just that there was so much of it! Relentless as I said. And as a group travelling together in real as opposed to virtual space, I don’t just function as a head or a brain as I might be able to do online. Online there is also personal stuff of course, but it takes longer, and you have a choice about to whether to explore that side of a relationship with someone.

Though I was there for only 5 days I frequently heard, and have since read, how people needed more time and space to process what was happening. We were in a totally networked environment, even when we were ‘decapitated’ with no Net connection. No break for personal grounding. And I hear everyday how people are busy. Too busy. So networking of any kind 24/7 is too much. OK. This was an experiment and we were learning as we went, but next time round I’d be suggesting allotted times for

• Working with specific others in the group (though many made this happen anyway)


• Thinking time for processing, creating, and uploading

I guess this is stating the obvious really, but it’s now down on record. I think what I’m trying to say is that we need to be able to model how living the life of a networked knowledge worker/educator can be managed in such a way that there is equilibrium with other parts of your life. That it’s not just constant cognition and personal media bombardment.

Leigh -  for all the driving you did before we all arrived in Dunedin – a huge thank you. You have proved that such things are possible. To everyone else who was in Dunedin and ChCh physically or virtually, thank you for a smorgasbord of media, stimulation, and good vibes.

And is this still the best one stop shop to go to get as much of what was produced as possible? (It’s still pretty daunting for the uninitiated BTW. Will there be a book/CD/DVD?

If you’re interested a few other thoughts HERE

Demo posted from ACEC Conference

Example from eDayZ

Audioblog Example for eDayz

End of Day 1

DSCN2818
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

Bee (Barbara Dieu) packing up at the end of our first day in Dunedin.

FLNW Day 2

Invite a group of elearning experts to gather in one place to take part in an unconference on the Future of Learning in a Networked World and the rest will take care of itself. Konrad Globowski, Teemu Leinonen, Barbara Dieu and I spent several hours wandering around Dunedin yesterday discussing what might happen at such event. We questioned each other about why we had been invited, and how we might present ourselves and our work at such an unstructured event. There was a level of uncertainty at how one might ‘present’, or not present, but the conversation naturally turned to many of the issues that resulted in the need for this kind of event. In essence it is to present an alternative model to the stand and deliver model of the typical conference, and that typifies so much teacher methodology in classrooms. With a new breed of technological tools available that encourage personal publishing and collaborative learning among groups of connected learners it is timely to offer another way of offering professional development that more closely mirrors what might be regarded as better practice for teaching in a networked world. Fragments of the conversation as we walked included: Konrad: the creative aspect is key. Blogs, wikis, repositories for self-created media like YouTube and Odeo offer free publishing and storage of student work that can be used for self-expression, connecting with like-minded students, and even assignments set by imaginative teachers, and that engage students in ways that traditional text based or rote learning may not. The urge to create and make sense of the world through self-expression in various media is a natural human urge and not typically found in average courses. (I didn’t have one art lesson in my entire school life.) Teemu: the railway is a symbol of how connection was expressed in previous eras. In particular, the grandeur of the Dunedin railway station is indicative of its importance at the time. These days connections via the Net join more people across time and space than railways ever could. Later in the day the entire unconference gang gathered at a Maori marae. Caroline bemoaned the reduced importance of physical place in the new networked world. She wanted her children to feel grounded and know where they come from. I suggested that this notion of place has indeed been reduced in importance, and had been counter balanced with the ability to know people far away from your neighbourhood – people who you perhaps had more in common with than the people who lived next door. The concept of virtual place is now a reality, and rather than detract from my sense of being grounded in my home location, my attachment and enjoyment of home has been enriched by global connections made possible by the Internet. “Home is the where the Internet is.” Teemu : it was only when he realised that he could use them to communicate with people elsewhere that he became interested in them. This initial intrigue has resulted in him taking a path where he has developed a sytem of communication between a mobile phone and wikipedia. Using this system you can ask for wikipedia for an entry on a particular topic and it will call you back and read back the entry on your queried topic. Konrad wanted to do his Ph D on the role of blogging in forming communities for year 8 students. When he presented his proposal to his review committee they asked what previous research had been done on this topic. Of course there is none (because it is a new field) and they were consequently not keen to approve his topic. Such courses of higher study are normally assumed to be based on the work of other scholars, and approved on that basis. This is another example of how new tools and approaches (blogging for example) are challenging accepted practice in education. The educational world is now a place where knowledge is being created and distributed via egalitarian networks without a role for the traditional gatekeepers. Published academics are no longer the people you would seek out if you wanted information on most recent good practice in elearning. So before this unconference had begun, the conversations had already covered: 

• The importance of creativity and personal publishing tools in the new and connected world 
• The importance of the Internet as tool of connection between people 
• The role of the mobile phone as a tool of inquiry and information retrieval 
• Changes in how we view the concept of place 
• The challenge to education presented by distributed knowledge sharing networks 

The learning and discussion on the future of learning had begun in earnest without a single presentation!

Konrad G at Language Centre in Dunedin

First Church Garden

DSCN2794
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

Yep - Bee and I are both in New Zealand for the 'unconference'.

We spent some time this afternoon at language school talling about blogs, community, role of the teacher, personal publishing, etc

Lovely to be here together!

Bee in Dunedin

The First Day in Dunedin

Some thoughts on this before we begin:

Broome

A sample Digital Story

Blog Cheese and Value of Video

Just when you think that you can have everything in the one place like here at Blogger you find something else....Apparently it's been around for a while but I only found it yesterday....Blog Cheese is a video blog. See my beginnnings over here.

Embedding Podomatic

This is very neat! Now I no longer need to refer people over to my Podomatic (podcast) site. It can all happen here in the one space. Bravo Podomatic and Blogger!

Day of the Longtail

I seem to be on a roll here - need to be able to find these videos again in hurry so if I put 'em here on my blog I know where they are. This one on DISINTERMEDIATION (Thanks for the tip Alex.)

Global Warming Comic

This is a ripper - a very funny take on a very serious topic.

Office Politics

Demo post from SA LearnScope Day

Broome Pic

DSCN2528
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

Heather, Peter and Anja

jurassic

jurassic
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

Demo

The Australian

The Australian
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

The average Australian relaxing on an average day in the average Australian back yard :)

Broome at Sunset

DSCN2602
Originally uploaded by mikecogh.

Just ensuring that Flickr still talks to Blogger....I haven't tried this for a while. There is really an astounding number of ways to get content into your blog - directly via Blogger, via phone, via email, via Word, via Google Videos and YouTube....

anyway...this is one of the many beautiful classic images of a Broome sunset. The boat is just there for tourists - it's a fake lugger that takes you out for a pearling demo and a few drinks, but it looks really inviting as you fly in to Broome, and gets the digicams clicking if you're on the beach watching the daylight fade.

To Blog or Pod? Blog or Pod? Blog or Pod.....

...this time I decided to pod(cast). Go over here for some thoughts on a recent seminar where Philip Adams and James Farmer were two of the speakers.

Blogging Movies in YouTube

Me on August 2nd

Sorry about the poor audio quality. Just seeing how YouTube links to Blogger.

Test from ATP

What Old People Do For Fun...

Just trying out the post to blog feature from Google Video.....looks very impressive.

LECTURER DROPS LECTURES FOR PODCASTS

From: berquist <berquist@PA.NET>

LECTURER DROPS LECTURES FOR PODCASTS
A lecturer in microbiology at Bradford University in the United Kingdom
has said he will eliminate traditional lectures from his biochemistry
course and replace them with podcasts. Students in Bill Ashraf's class
will review the podcasts on their own time. They will submit questions
to Ashraf through text messages, and he will respond to those inquiries
on his blog. In addition, students needing to meet with Ashraf will be
able to check his schedule online and make appointments with the
professor through the Web. "Some lecture classes have 250 students,"
said Ashraf, "so I question the effectiveness of a didactic lecture for
an hour." He said the new format will be especially beneficial for
distance and part-time students and those with less flexible schedules.
BBC, 26 May 2006
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/west_yorkshire/5013194.stm

Comment from Workshop

TELLS Conference Presentation - Creating Online Presence

Full details of content, references, and recording.
Audio already in podcast format (thanks Stephan!)

Storing Media Elsewhere

The audio above was phoned in.
This audio is stored over on Podomatic.
This photo of a beach in Portugal is stored on Flickr.
This movie (about Audacity) is stored at YouTube.*

So I can use a blog to point to media stored elsewhere on free sites. Wondering where to put large files on the web is no longer a problem. (I could also have just inserted the photo here in Blogger.)

* But check this re YouTube!

And now to test Word

And now to test Word to Blogger……

Test

Just a little test to check if this email to Blogger thing still works.....

Real Students, Real People, and the Benefits of Technology

Check Terry Marler's Blog

Message for VALBEC Participants

VALBEC Conference

Loss and Change

From this

to this:

Another sadder story of loss and change.

Another Phone Blog Test - Proof for Jason!

Message for Participants of Teresa's Session at the APPI Conference

This message posted by phone to Audioblogger.

Will Blogger Last Forever?

Listen HERE

Luc Luya Waye

And check this out - Luc's first tribute! Look and listen HERE.

Are 'They' Too Wired?

Listening to Podcasts

Calling Audioblogger.....

Marc Prensky in Adelaide

Wander over to my podcast site for the good oil on this :)

The Uraidla Show

There's yet another neat new blogging tool to play with - Bubbleshare! It allows narrating a sound track over a series of photos to produce shows like this. (You create your slideshow and Bubbleshare gives you the code to paste into your blog. Easy!)

This album is powered by
BubbleShare - Add to my blog

Message for Jyothi

The Last 24 Hours

BTW - check out a nifty new voice email tool. Springdoo

Gigablog?

Mark (the pup), Mike, and Dave from Old Dogs Can.
Michael in Song


Who's Mark Keough?
What do I sound like?
Where do Michael Coghlan and Old Dogs Can play?
Seven Stars Hotel
First Friday every month
187 Angas St City
7 - 11 pm

Text to Audio Files - use in podcasting

More cross referencing I'm afraid. Audio is over HERE :)

Learncasting, etc

Thoughts generated by a conversation with Allan Carrington. See Allan's great slides where he introduces the concept of Learncasting, and lists the value of using audio as part of instructional content.
Scholar360 is the new LMS referred to that attempts to incorporate a social software approach.
Image above courtesy of www.castaways-resort.net/index2.htm

Exploiting Technology in Language Classes

Go here for an excellent post by Aiden Yeh on how you can use media rich technologies in language classes.

Where to Post???

My Podcasting site at Podomatic

Moving Demented Parents out of their Home

And check out Podomatic

Origins of Social Software

I imagine this blog is going to get blogged a thousand times but I just read this account of where it all came from. Origins deep in the past - 1940's even! The term 'social software' first used by Clay Shirky in 2002.

eLearning - an Interview

David Day has just posted an interview with me recorded earlier this year about

* What I was doing in 2005
* My journey through elearning
* The Webheads
* Vance Stevens
* David Winet and EFI
* Jonathan Finkelstein and LearningTimes
* Communities of Practice
* Moving f2f teachers online
* mature age teachers and elearning
* liaising with IT support staff

David had an individual LearnScope project for 2005 looking at the "very complex process of moving a VET practitioner from the traditional classroom delivery environment to becoming an online facilitator" and has published the fruits of his research on this engaging and comprehensive website.

Thanks for posting this David. (41 minutes and not a fast download) And it took my mind off what's happening in Sydney. I can't help feeling Australia has changed this week......

PS You can also listen to more than 20 interviews with other Australian elearning leaders!

Thank you

It was a breeze, Michael...

(This photo of the Chinese Gardens in Sydney is courtesy of Ken Gooding who was also looking for an oasis of serenity.)

eLearning in 2005 - Repost

eLearning in 2005

Is this message decipherable? It isn't over my current 26.4 connection......

Audioblogging

Marie W at Cool Connections