Mike Caulfield posts an interesting observation about 2 different types of openness. There’s openness with re usability as a primary design principle, and then there’s openess with transparency as another design principle. Mike suggests that re-usability can create drag on transparency, and I have to agree.
At Otago Polytechnic we have been trying to achieve both at the same time, and some may have noticed that I use the term “open educational resources and practices” to encompass that intensive approach. There is a sense urgency in our need to update skills, awareness and policies to a point where we able to offer quality services in open (flexible) education arenas. But as Mike suggests, there is observable drag in doing both.
Take for example our use of MediaWiki on the Wikieducator service. Certainly not the easiest wiki to use, but one that does offer considerable amounts of re-usability in terms of MediaWikis. So.. do we support and endlessly motivate staff to use MediaWiki.. or do we start with something easier and focus on transparency alone? Most say start with something easier.. and true, that would get more of us going sooner, but the later workload in redevelopment for re-usability would be pretty sizable.
In saying that though, perspectives change over time, and what may be considered best practice for re usability today, may change tomorrow – which is only another point that at first glance supports the notion that its a bad idea to go for both forms of openness at the same time.
My only hope is that by working towards both at the same time, we are in fact addressing all aspects of openness at once and achieving a deeper level of understanding. By doing both at the same time, some of us will reach that tipping point sooner, a point where we are in fact skilled and aware of what it takes, and not merely cosmetically transparent.
But underneath it all in this approach is a worrisome level of low uptake and motivation caused by that big basket we call “too hard”. If more people toss to that basket, we may in fact never reach that typing point and always be at odds with mainstream operations that are not satisfactory…
I’m just thinking out load here… Thanks for teh food for thought Mike
6 comments
Comments feed for this article
January 28, 2009 at 2:54 am
Mike Caulfield
Thanks for this — a good example I think.
I’ll admit I don’t know what the answer is, or if there is a set answer. But I think you and I agree on the main thing, which is we can’t pretend that these goals are completely synergistic.
Transparency of course does promote a certain type of reuse — but it is generally I think reuse of professionals of the same caliber. This is where the OO vs. scripting language comparison comes in useful — the idea of scripting languages is sort of a single tier — scripters reuse what they learn looking at scripters.
The whole OO idea, when expressed as a business model, was that there are different tiers of user/creators — that the way-smart people make the objects and the less smart (and less paid) people script them together, and this maximizes efficiency.
The everybody is a scripter (which I see as a sort of craft model), and the specialized production OO model (which i see as a manufacturing model) come from two really fundamentally different world views — they intersect in this small place, but at the edges they start to tug at each other.
And I think you’ve just inspired me to write another post…
January 28, 2009 at 3:24 am
Tran|script, by Mike Caulfield » Blog Archive » More on Transparency vs. Reuse
[…] Blackall replies to my previous post using the example of working with MediaWiki (which is a boon to reuse, but […]
January 28, 2009 at 12:01 pm
Jared Stein
Thanks for posting these ideas and insights. I dig the OERP, I dig the approach, I salivate to see how you’re going to pull it off. I’m also aiming for “both” in our still-burgeoning project, but in a low-impact way. Our technical aim is to use Moodle to open up Real Live Courses in Moodle, providing a very authentic transparency, and to provide the “open” parts of the course as downloadable packages (at the very least, a Moodle backup, but preferably some sort of more standardized [say it, Stein, I-M-S] format).
February 13, 2009 at 12:28 am
roseg
This might be an incredibly dumb thing to say, out of context and much ado about nothing but my experience of media wiki is that whenever I tell people what I don’t like about it or what I would like to see developed or what I NEED, I get told to get used to it or get stuffed. Or accused of being a laggard, a digital immigrant, all sorts of stupid terms people bandy about like bullies in a school yard.
When I tried (2 months ago) to contact developers to create the functionality I want I got no response. Even though I wrote to a peak group in Oz asking for contacts. And tried a couple of people who are apparently mediawiki enthusiasts. Others I’ve spoken with insist I should get used to the current convention – make the effort – suffer for art – they spend more time bewildered at why I should want a simple threaded forum than they do helping me find someone who’ll build one and be done with it. I’m reminded of those self-flagellating mystics of old who seem to enjoy the exclusivity of being an aesthete…
Adoption relies on simplicity or ease of access – my experience of media wiki is that as long as geeks and enthusiasts think that users should swim across the divide instead of building a bloody bridge for people to cross, you’ll have problems with uptake. Just ask Apple.
(And if you know anyone who can build a simple threaded forum without arguing about religion, tell them to email me).
February 13, 2009 at 9:57 am
Leigh Blackall
Hi Rose, thanks for the comment. My sentiments too. I really like working on MediaWiki, but the limitations frustrate me and so far my experience in trying to engage with developers has resulted in much the same response as you experienced. Very sour grapes. On the other hand, I have seen some amazing work on MediaWiki. GNUChris does great stuff with MediaWIki, his just a phone call away in Brisbane Rose. Alex Hayes has worked with him on the Learnscope mediawiki.. Stephan Ridgway is doing some great stuff with it as well. I’m not sure about threaded forums though.. but my experience has been that MediaWiki is generally flexible enough to use so that it can feel like a threaded forum. The key – I think – is to get better set of editing tools so that new users feel empowered enough to dive in. This is where Chris, Stephan or Alex could help you.
February 16, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Chris Harvey
Thanks for saying that.
If you go to the Extension Matrix page on mediwiki site and hit ctrl f or whatever key you use to find text on a webpage and type in “forum”, you’ll see theres around 4 extensions available.
I think MediaWiki Bulletin Board might be what your looking for.
Though you can use a talk page for threaded discussion so I can understand why some people would think its inefficient to add a forum and that it would just create more unnecessary work but thats what public servants do best isn’t it?