Speaking at Learning Technology

I ran a seminar at Learning Technology in London Olympia last week entitled 'Learning meets social networking' where I spoke about the influence that social networking can have on learning networks that don't offer collaborative environments. The crux of the presentation was around the fact that whilst most organisations understand the benefits of social networks I've found that many are nervous about implementing them on their own.

The presentation looked at how consumers are experiencing learning on demand via content distributed through social networks and how consumers can be split into groups that defines how naturally they engage with social technology.

I recalled the story of my friends daughter who was banned from using MSN on Christmas Day as her mother wanted her to commit to some 'real world interaction' with family and friends. By six PM she was finally allowed to go onto the network and I mistakenly presumed that none of her contacts would be online at that time on Christmas day. It not only transpired that over twenty of her contacts were online, but she had over three hundred contacts in total that she kept in reasonably regular contact with. This story was picked up the Korean news channel OhMyNews who felt rather sorry for her not being allowed to use MSN on Christmas day!

It wraps up with an example of how we produce learning material for organisations that don't want to commit themselves to providing networked learning communities, but do understand the need to engage all levels of learners with inspired content.

Here are the slides and will I'll try to put a v/o over it if I get a chance over the next few days.