A disturbing trend: access to information

As I've mentioned before, I am teaching international marketing, one of my favorite courses to teach. Since the first time I have taught this course, in 1990, the way I teach it has changed extensively. By the turn of the millennium, my focus on this course went from finding information about international markets and making decisions with limited information, to learning how to filter and pour through the amount of information found on the internet about any given international market.

However, this year (it has been 3 years since I taught the course), I have discovered yet another trend that will impact how I teach this course. As part of the course, I require my students to write a feasibility study on an assigned country. Using all of the countries of the world, excluding those that an American company would be allowed to trade with (i.e. Burma, North Korea, Cuba, etc...), my students are randomly assigned a country to research (they pick it out of an envelope). This year, as my students began to investigate their countries, I noticed:

1. there are more resources from within countries about their markets, even those that have traditionally been difficult to find out about (e.g. south Pacific Island nations, Indian Ocean island nations, East Timor, Viet Nam, etc...)
2. Most English language resources can be traced back to one or two of the same sources (CIA handbook or BBC country profiles)
3. There are more diverse non-English resources
4. Most English resources outside of the two free ones I mentioned require payment to access the information
5. 
   

The last trend is part of a growing trend which I find especially disturbing. 4-5 years ago I could access information for free. The major barrier was knowing how to find the information. However, once found, it was fairly easy to access it.

Now, I am limited even in the information that I can access through our library and databases. Older material is available, but updated material is not. In addition, there are restrictions on what I can pass on to my students due to copyright laws. Some websites require that information that they have posted cannot be duplicated (copyright laws) OR LINKED to other websites without permission. This linking to other websites limits access to information. But I can understand how an owner of a website might not want to be associated with other websites due to possible misunderstanding as to the relationships between the two.

However, Harvard Business Review has the following restrictions:

It is not intended for use as assigned course material in academic institutions nor as corporate learning or training materials in businesses. Academic licensees may not use this content in electronic reserves, electronic course packs, persistent linking from syllabi or by any other means of incorporating the content into course resources. Business licensees may not host this content on learning management systems or use persistent linking or other means to incorporate the content into learning management systems. Harvard Business Publishing will be pleased to grant permission to make this content available through such means. For rates and permission, contact permissions@harvardbusiness.org.

In other words, I cannot require the article (even if I don't upload a copy, but make the students access the reading). I was shocked when I read this. That an academic institution would restrict access to academic information is disturbing. I find that the current climate of "intellectual property" laws will decrease the potential for the world economy, the US economy, and innovation. The countries that have survived the global recession are those that had open access to information. It is surprising that a country that has prided itself on its "democracy" and "innovation" through a free market economy, allows for the individual hoarding of information. We might find this can lead to our down fall unless we open up access to information.

Do you hoard knowledge?

My son told me yesterday on a walk that his teacher complained that he could recall the most inconsequential pieces of information and would include them on his history essays. This lead me to think about the many times people are amazed at the pieces of information that I can recall. And yet, last week when I played a memory card game with my 4 year-old niece and son, I couldn't remember where any of the matching cards were actually placed (much to my son's amusement and advantage as he snapped up the pair).

Tony Karrer has had a number of posts on effective search skills, PLN's, skills needed for knowledge workers, and skimming/scanning for information. This got me to thinking, do I hoard information the way some people hoard coffee or paper products? Am I unable to access my short term memory because:

1. I have so many useless facts in my head (such as where all of the Natural Gas Pipelines are connected in the US, including producers, distributers, and major end users) I can't keep other facts in there unless they are interesting to me?
2. I need time to sort and sift through all the facts I have that I just put new information on top of the pile "for future reference" (like the piles of readings on my desk)
3. I don't really need to remember it, but I don't want to get rid of it in case I need it in the future. Therefore, it really doesn't get thrown away (out of my memory) but is damaged because of all the other useless facts in there weighing it down. This is why I am always one card away from the correct card.

Why do we hoard?
There are two types of hoarders of material objects. The first time hoard because they were deprived as a child and there is always an unconscious fear of shortage in the future. The other type usually have an addiction or psychological disorder in which they feel more secure with the material objects around them.

Do we do the same with information? Anyone who has ever been caught short in a meeting or had their job affected because of lack of knowledge wants to make sure that will never happen again. As a result, he or she will try to find excess information and background/understanding so as to not be caught unawares (and having to admit to not knowing). Others feel comfortable "knowing" and use internet searches and time to find out more information as a way to avoid work or situations they don't enjoy (in other words procrastination).

So how do we know if we are hoarding information? How do we "let it go" so the collecting knowledge does not turn into the problematic "hoarding information"?

The social aspects of hoarding

The problem with hoarding is that consumers are taking products away from others that may need it. This creates a shortage and poor distribution of resources. If we hoard knowledge, we will are keeping it from others that might need it rather than sharing it. We also might be misusing our own skills that would be better used for both individual and group uses.

To avoid hoarding knowledge, therefore, we should:

1. Share our knowledge through social software such as blogs, community software such as blogs, and social bookmarking programs such as delicious
2. Be aware of our knowledge needs and not make impulse "searches" for information that might be interesting but really never useful.
3. Find alternative places to "store" our knowledge (or access knowledge) for the future. But limit the number of "places."
   

The silver lining

I've been reading a lot lately about the impact of the economic downturn on training and education. Michael Hanley had a great post about the response companies are having to the economic downturn, with less investment in Training and education, and marketing. It is interesting that these are the two areas most likely to use social networking within a company. My own university, in feeling the pinch, has created larger classes (without corresponding classroom space) and a drive towards using distance education with a minimal amount of investment.

While all of this might sound like the death knoll for e-learning or distance education, the fact is that I see it as a great opportunity for instructional design, e-learning, and educational technology. With that in mind, these are the opportunities I see for the next two years:

1) More training for telecommuters. As companies cut their training budgets, they will want a cost/benefit analysis to justify training. Creating training programs that will orient workers to become effective telecommuters (including communication structures and procedures, distributed team building, online supervision, management, and performance evaluation, and new technology skills) will help companies that are closing brick and mortar spaces to be replaced by telecommuters. One of the options that SUNY has identified to cut costs is to either shut down buildings during low demand and allow workers to work from home, or closing building for administrative offices, combining departments and having workers share desks, with telecommuting.

For this to be effective, there needs to be more research on collaboration, distributed teams, and information literacy.

2. There will be a greater need for new technologies, new instructional designs, and new means of assessing learning. History has shown that recessions and depressions create a greater level of innovation and entrepreneurship. Of course, this innovation will come from outside of a firm. I think there will be a greater level of innovation as people lose their jobs and are no longer constrained by the big business fear of risk-taking. Although terrifying, many unemployed will take the opportunity to start their own companies. The use of new technologies are not going to go away, so those that can take advantage of this time to create something useful, will prosper in the long run.

3. The new US administration is committed to connecting the country to high speed internet, creating lifelong learners, and supporting the development of innovation. If the new economic stimulus package is passed, there will be access to grants and tax credits for the development of new technology, wireless and broadband structural improvements at the community level, and education at all levels (children to adults). It is important that we all take advantage of this opportunity to develop new approaches to learning using educational technology.

4. We are currently in the midst of a change in generational power. As such, I see a shift in the way business and education is conducted within the next decade. It is important that we take this opportunity to become involved in the planning process, bridging the gap from the computer (computation) based business practices to the web 2.0 ("connected" and information based) based business practices. This will require the transition of top management into networked communication, a structural change to the organization, and a change in the educational system from information transfer to information analysis to prepare workers and citizens of the future. I think also there will be a new push towards integrating creativity into the curriculum as new solutions are needed for the developing world problems.


As the eternal optimist who survived the 1982 recession (although at the time it was never acknowledged that there was a recession, I think we have a great opportunity to become phoenixes rising out of the crash and burn economy that was really in a downward spiral for longer than many wanted to admit.

Reading in the Digital Age

My sister forwarded an op-ed from the New York Times about reading skills for this generation.
The piece commented on things I have written about and commented on over the last year, namely there being a need to support our students in writing (and reading) non-linearly.

What I found interesting was what was lacking in this article. Two issues I thought about that were never brought up were:

1. Does current standardized testing test the skills needed in the digital age? They do speak about the decline in standardized test scores which some put down to "computer time" (funny how they don't point to the effect that NCLB legislation and its focus on regurgitating information rather than "learning" might have on those scores). They also mention how the US in NOT part of a pilot program to test digital literacy skills (where is AERA or any of the other professional organizations that are trying integrate technology into the classroom).
2. Literacy is more than the "reading skills". It is how to decode symbols and interaction with text. Most literacy experts see that literacy is embedded within a culture and determinates of literacy include an understanding of the context of a text. As a result, is it possible that there is a shift in our culture that those in power would like to prevent (which really is impossible) in order to maintain the current status quo? The article speaks about looking for other viewpoints (that may be contrary to the "authoritative" publishers, opening up new venues). Of course, this also may necessitate teaching students DIFFERENT skills that include analyzing their assumptions, author intent and bias, and checking/rechecking facts. So what happens when they do this to "authorized" versions and find them lacking?
   

Hanzel and Gretel through the internet

Today I logged on to check my e-mail and ended up looking at an article on Faxes. How did I get there? I found an e-mail about a document Tony Karrer was preparing for the WorkLiteracy group on google docs. From there I went to the Work Literacy group site and read a posting about "change". As I read that I remembered a post I had written about instructional design which I thought related to the comment on change management. When I tried to find the blog about instructional change, I found two comments from Ken Allen one of which was a link to an article about faxing.

At that point, I realized that I had really gone off into an area I had not really anticipated (I was waiting for an e-mail about a doctor's appointment). This got me to thinking about how the internet allows us to explore areas we had no intention of going, but then may get us lost in the process.

As I go from idea to idea, I make connections. However, if I don't pull myself back and focus, I lose some of the great ideas I have as I go through the journey. So, here are some preliminary thoughts on how I can capture these ideas:

• Use the good old fashioned pen and pencil and scrape paper to jot down ideas as I go from site to site
• Blog about it after (this forces me to go back and bookmark sites that I thought were important)
• Decide before I start work which type of sessions this is going to be: focused or freeflow. If it is freeflow, give myself a time limit. If it is focused, jot down where I want to go when the session is free flow

I'm not sure if others have a better way in which they work or if they have tips to help them stay focused or at least find their way back.