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questioning the publishing system of research information

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Week 5, 2012
Joensuu, Finland

Access to information is vital for research. Universities pay considerable amounts of money for accessing the digital repositories. I am grateful to be in a University that is able to have access to a wide diversity of relevant repositories.

My impression is that scholars are aware of the high costs of spreading research information, which forbid several Universities to have access to the repositories for lack of economical means.  However for one reason or another the systems has been working in this way.

When I requested the permission to the publishers who hold the copyrights of my articles – which I wrote- for my dissertation, and one of them indicated me that I needed to pay a fee, my comfort zone regarding this topic disappear. Sad but true, I needed to be shaking to react.

There are many systems in our modern societies, which we must question more about them in order to modernize them.  And things are happening, I invite you to read the article of Wired Magazine by D. Dobbs: “Testify: the Open-Science Movement Catches Fires”, because things are happening.

are we making the correct questions? (sequel)

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In a previous post I was focusing myself on one specific question. However, today, while preparing my lecture on mobile learning I read an inspiring post from Cameron D. Norman:  Asking if Technology Can Reinvent Education is the Wrong Question. I recommend to read the post!

Questions are fundamental for comprehend a phenomena or a situation. Questions help us to think. To make the proper questions is not easy. For me, the question experts are 3 years old, who are passionately discovering and researching our world, learning from it. However, due to different reasons, which I will not reflect upon right now, our capability to make questions is greatly diminished.

Once in grad-school, I heard that a fundamental characteristic in research is to make questions. I see it as re-connecting with my 3 years old me, but surrounded by considerable more information.

Now, I assume that a difference between a 3-years old (I am fan of them) and an ‘adult’  should be to promote  a critical question process. A process involving reflection and thinking. Perhaps, making questions might be more difficult than to find the answers, however enriching.

Questions help to think. Thinking is fun, as it is time demanding and energy taking. 🙂

Now a cartoon, which matches my mini-reflection of today. If someone who does not read Spanish read this post, the translation of the cartoon is bellow.

Intelligence....

Intelligence....

Up-left: Intelligent buildings
Up-middle:Intelligent mobile phones
Up-right: Intelligent autos
Down-left: Intelligent appliances
Down-middle: I say…. Wouldn’t be better to invest more in education….
Down-left: …. and have more intelligent people?

learning week

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week 7 of 2011
Joensuu, Finland

In other times I would say the week was busy, but actually all weeks are busy in different ways. In this week, my surroundings where at charge to teach me a lot of things  😉  As a summary:

  1. Manzanita’s graphic card pass away (manzanita = my mac).  But with Mikko we opened it and I can say I have seen a Mac inside. Mikko saved my data!!!!! 🙂 The future of manzanita still is uncertain.
  2. In-depth week work with Christian. He came for one week visit, with the aim to help us to grow. Oh man! he really helped me to understand different angles of my research I have not think about first. Thank you! Here some memories of his trip.
  3. On Wednesday I joined Mikko to the first workshop of the LieksaMyst’s editor. I enjoy how people is creative!!! and I also notice that my questionnaires are not the only LONG ones 😉
  4. On Thursday we I was invited to meet some Monzambique visitors to my Prof. house, between the surprises is that I found Erkki was here (for some days), and I really connect with the guests.  I hope we can do some stuff together in the future. One of our guests, has been living in Mexico, that was a connecting point, I admit! 🙂
  5. On Friday a full day work at the Museum of Technology in Helsinki. I have write about this last September but I haven’t post it still.  I should. I will do it soon. But I always learn with them 🙂
  6. I submitted for publication the paper “Designing Hypercontextualized Games: a Case Study with LieksaMyst”    YES!!!!!!! When I know the the  bibliographic reference I will post it 🙂
  7. I received the good news from  STELLAR

Result: still digesting the week 🙂 and preparing for the consequences of such a busy week too. And guess what? Yes, I am still writing….

promote more reading habits

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week 4 of 2011
Joensuu, Finland

The days are SO FULL of ideas, events, activities, emotions, dreams and my brain’s digestion is not as fast as the things are happening. But this commitment to post once a week, without pre-awareness, is helping me to focus on the week’s relevant event to be shared.

In the week 4 of this year, I spent considerable amount of time at the university library. One of my favorite places, not only for research purposes as I have mentioned ealier.  But imagine, each library contains the ideas, life, knowledge, fantasy and much more of thousands of humans, from around the world, who have live in so many different periods of time.  The book’s authors might be dead, but their voices are still alive through their creations. Libraries, for me, are magical places.

By coincidence, in these days I also got impressed of the threat that some libraries have around the world. In this case, UK. I can’t believe it honestly. Decision makers in UK are contemplating to close libraries. People is protesting as we can read here. I found very interesting the article of Pullman expressing that decision makers do not really understand the value of libraries. I fully agree with him!

Books  support individuals to change their lives. Unlimited of examples support that claim, as the one I posted some time ago with William Kamkwamba. Books are good friends, they guide us and helps us to think, which supports in turn a life long learning process. This is not only MY personal opinion, it is a fact. In 2008 the UNESCO reported:

“The public libraries in the city play wider role to inculcate reading habits amongst youths and neo-literates. This study suggests that information literacy competency and lifelong education can also be imparted to marginalised groups through public library networks in the country”

Even that the report belongs to a study done in India, honestly I do not think is a exclusive statement for India.

Leaders and decision makers  in “develop” countries, wake up! Instead to take away libraries, we must promote more reading habits!

love books

Image source here

about this blog: reviewing basics

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week 52 of 2010
from Distrito Federal, Mexico

Once upon a time my research group suggested me to have a blog. My memories registered that the purpose of the invitation was to share between us. It made sense to me, but what to share and how to share it was blurry. I was following already some blogs (e.g. Frans Mäyrä, Henry Jenkins), and I never had a blog of my own, but there is always a first time, then I started my blog.

Consequently I started blogging without a virtual identity. I was mainly exploring and experimenting…. I had no idea of what I could, I want, I should do with the blog, which one will be its purpose and meaning, how to handle it, for whom…. Clear examples of my blog’s blurry beginning are my posts from 2006 to early 2009.

In late 2009 my posts started to have a clearer purpose and audience: to share my experiences with individuals who have similar challenges and interests than mine. As a result, some of my latest posts have supported me explicitly while talking with others.  My posts are outcomes of my learning journey. Each post is a mini-informal article where I write some sort of analysis or reflection, ideally with references and some writing effort.

Thus, an evident fact emerged while starting to have a virtual personality and purpose: my blog requires time, discipline and a concept if I want to make it useful.  Puff! it is not easy, sounds as a commitment!  but I know it will be useful, then here I go! 🙂

Resuming, the renewal basics of  “what am I doing” blog:

AUDIENCE:

  • Individuals who identify with my interests (e.g. discovering, enjoying, learning, games, technology, life) and challenges (e.g. be a researcher, thinking, writing).
  • Family and friends who want to follow what and where I am.

ITS PURPOSE:

  • Support me to learn while writing my blog
  • Support the blog’s readers (including me) to get something while reading it.

HOW

  • Writing mini-informal articles with some sort of analysis, reflection of my interests and challenges, ideally with references and some writing effort.

WHEN

  • I attempt to have minimum a weekly post (it happens a lot in a week!)

Today I understand that my blog will always be _work_under_construction_ but, life and internet are always under construction  😉

how to blog?

Source photo here