http://www.elearningpost.com/archives/cat_big_picture.asp schrieb / wrote: Complexity and Design: Jay Cross makes an interesting observation on complexity, the new meme on the block: ‚Why has complexity become my recurring obsession? Perhaps because complexity challenges the bedrock of Isaac Newton, rationality, cause and effect, an ordered universe, and faith in logic. The worldview I believed in for the first fifty years of my life does not explain the world I live in today. Some things will never be figured out. Prayer does not assure salvation. Anything could happen. The world defies logic. Shit happens.‘ It is true that the life has become complex; this could be its natural emergent evolution. But dealing with complexity is not the human brain’s natural ability; that’s the reason why we strive so hard to make things simple. This introduces an interesting paradox: to make things simple we need to know more. Consider product design. To make simple products designers not only need to know more about the product itself, but also about the users who are going to use the product and the context under which they will be using it (the familiar users, context, product Venn diagram). This is true for all design fields (or any field trying to understand complexity). This is why I think that ‚Design Research‘ will soon be the new meme on the block. http://www.internettime.com/blog/archives/001290.html

http://www.elearnspace.org/blog/archives/001566.html schrieb / wrote: Learning By Design: ‚Video games, he noted, are long, complex and hard – and yet people spent many hours playing them, involving themselves in complex learning, and even pay for the privilege. The task accomplished by game designers, he observed wryly, ‚would be like charging fifty dollars to learn algebra.‘ Comment: This summary of a presentation by James Paul Gee provides a great introduction to what is wrong with learning and right with games. It appears as if game designers understand interactivity and motivation better than many educators. The potential of games in education is enormous…but so are the obstacles. In our department, we’ve used a variety of games and simulation tools to enhance learning. The results have consistently supported the need for more ‚learning wrapped in gaming’…but the time and resources needed to develop games are big limitations. The digital divide between ‚have’s‘ and ‚have not’s‘ (learners, instructors, institutions, countries) is intensified by use of games. Institutions with resources and expertise can incorporate games…the others suffer. Additionally, the move to game-based learning will substantially challenge idealist’s views of open education. Educational institutions will not be the ones to lead the foray into games in learning – it will be for-profit content developers…and the expenses, of course, will be passed on to the learners. http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/website/view.cgi?dbs=Article&key=1079385148

http://www.elearningpost.com/archives/cat_learning_design.asp schrieb / wrote: The Guerra Scale: Nice recap on the user experience of online learning content. http://www.learningcircuits.org/2004/mar2004/guerra.htm

http://www.elearningpost.com/archives/cat_knowledge_management.asp schrieb / wrote: Power Laws & the New Science of Complexity Management: A heavy but interesting read on power laws and complexity management. http://www.strategy-business.com/press/article/04107

http://www.elearningpost.com/archives/cat_knowledge_management.asp schrieb / wrote: Metadata? Thesauri? Taxonomies? Topic Maps! ‚Topic maps are a relative newcomer to this area and bring with them the promise of better-organized web sites, compared to what is possible with existing techniques. However, it is not generally understood how topic maps relate to the traditional techniques, and what advantages and disadvantages they have, compared to these techniques. The aim of this paper is to help build a better understanding of these issues.‘ (Thanks ColumnTwo) http://kidehen.typepad.com/kingsley_idehens_typepad/2004/03/metadata_thesau.html

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