November 29, 2006
When Professors Are More Wired Than Their Students
Kevin Lim, a doctoral candidate at the State University of New York at Buffalo, has posted a video of a lecture he gave this week in an organizational communication class about Web 2.0, a term used to describe highly interactive Web features. Mr. Lim, who describes himself as a trendspotter and “gadget pornographer,” urges his audience, which appears to be composed of students with interests in business and public relations, to consider how the social Web might affect business decisions in the future. Some retailers are going to fight the collective intelligence of the community, but smart retailers and businesses will find a way to harness it, he says. He cites Dell and Amazon as two companies that have responded and reacted to the power of the networked Internet community.
We can assume that the crowd he’s speaking to is young, and yet, surprisingly, they seem out of touch. Lim himself is a blogger who monitors hundreds of news outlets through RSS feeds. He takes seriously virtual worlds like Second Life. But the students, who should be receptive to these ideas, express some skepticism. One student asks: Isn’t spending energy on Second Life just wasting time in your first, real one? Lim asks how many students in the class blog – none of them. “Come on, you guys are way behind!” he says. —Scott Carlson
Posted on Wednesday November 29, 2006 | Permalink |Comments
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As a former computer engineer, a current TA in Religious Studies, a gamer, a user of RSS and someone who has a blog, I would say the kid who questioned the relevance of Second Life had a very legitimate question.
Launching into an inquiry (a non-sequitur really) about who does and does not have a blog is quite besides the point.
— Louis Nov 29, 07:10 PM #
Sadly, I didn’t have the time to listen to the whole movie. However, I would love it if we had such an academic at our university. I still spend a considerable amount of my time explaining to our academics that “web sites” and “blogs” are NOT substitutes…
By the way, I have played Second Life for a while, and as I am playing games like World of Warcraft as well, I am painfully aware of the short comings of Second Life. However, the point is rather that more and more people start seeing the potential for the internet to become a 3D landscape, at least part of it. One might be reminded of William Gibson’s books “Count Zero” and “Neuromancer”. Obviously, most people tag this development as a “waste of time”, but when have visionaries ever been taken seriously?
— Sardionerak Nov 29, 07:30 PM #
Thanks for writing about this. I’m glad to know that I’m not the only one experiencing this technologically-apathetic situation. If readers want more context on the video, I’ve blogged about this lecture experience at http://theory.isthereason.com/?p=1413
— Kevin Nov 29, 09:08 PM #
“We promise sincerely to sell the US and EU gold to you by the lowest price .
Welcome to interact with us whatever you are the big union or single.”
game
— ahxhlq Nov 29, 10:50 PM #
When I viewed this post today, my flash viewer was not working right.
A few minutes ago, I was able to view the clip and found that Carlson is taking Lim out of context. Lim’s immediate reply to the question of whether Second Life is useful was (I’m paraphrasing) “good question!”.
The exchange about blogs happens much earlier than the part about Second Life.
— Louis Nov 30, 12:06 AM #
Just to add to Louis’ bit, I said good question and asked them to apply that same question to when television first came around, and when the Internet first entered our household. These are now mainstream media, and it’s the new media that gets discriminated upon simply because few people have discovered legitimate uses for them. Opportunities are abound, but it’s on a first come first serve basis. Better to get on board earlier if you want to be a pioneer :)
— Kevin Nov 30, 01:42 AM #
The “real” speakers are in the dark, dwarfed by the second life screen; they are colorless, dull, speaking to students in flat tones through uninteresting , limited use of language. I am bored already. No wonder they need to turn to the screen – the second life.
— Joan Goldstein, Ph.D. Nov 30, 10:15 AM #
Way to go Kevin. I showed this story to our UB students in Singapore. Their collective opinion: they are excited that you are coming here next semester.
— andrew sachs Nov 30, 08:36 PM #
This is great, and I feel a kindred spirit here, as most of this content is covered in my own Com 320: Organizational Communication at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
Note to the editors: the headline is misleading. Kevin is not a professor, he is a PhD student (as is stated in your very first sentence). (I too am a PhD student, though also an instructor, but not a Professor.) So the students still know more than the professors. Doh!
— Jeff McNeill Dec 4, 03:10 PM #
Whats up…. I’m the “kid” that asked the question about second life. First of all I would like to say that maybe looking at me as a “kid” and not a student puts this idea into your mind that my question is not relevant to out society. 2nd, to
Scott Carlson. I did not just say “isn’t this a waste of time”, I clearly pointed out that since this is a new technological aspect of society we must weigh this out between social benefit or waste of time, for ALL ages… and 3rdly thank you Luis and Kevin for backing me up in that it was a good question, and not some “kid” being a non receptive smart ass….. I’ve since this lecture looked into second life and currently conducting my own experiments to weigh its benefits and downfalls…. Other than that I would like to say that I did enjoy the lecture and learned a lot. Wish me luck on the Exam tomorrow!
— Forte Dec 4, 07:36 PM #
I do not know if I am interpreting this too literally, but are people actually making money by playing second life?!
— jake Dec 4, 08:25 PM #
Jake, yes, people are making money. One person created a pair of roller skates – a useable object in SL – offered them for sale and sold upward of 30,000. That was the way it was presented to me. I still have ZERO Linden dollars in my account and no time to figure out the economy but there certainly is some interplay between the “real” and “virtual” worlds.
Search NPR for stories on virtual money and listen to http://educationbridges.net/k12opensource/wp-content/uploads/SecondLife.mp3
— Michael Dec 7, 01:10 PM #