the future for educational resource repositories in a web 2.0 world

A centre of expertise in digital information management

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Edspace Workshop 2009:

The Future for Educational Resource Repositories in a Web 2.0 WorldBrian KellyUKOLNUniversity of BathBath, UK

UKOLN is supported by:This work is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence (but note caveat)

Acceptable Use PolicyRecording of this talk, taking photos, discussing the content using email, Twitter, blogs, etc. is permitted providing distractions to others is minimised.

Acceptable Use PolicyRecording of this talk, taking photos, discussing the content using email, Twitter, blogs, etc. is permitted providing distractions to others is minimised.

Resources bookmarked using ‘edspace09’ tags Resources bookmarked using ‘edspace09’ tags

http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/edspace-2009/http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/edspace-2009/

Email:[email protected]

Twitter:http://twitter.com/briankelly/

Blog:http://ukwebfocus.wordpress.com/


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About Me

Brian Kelly:• UK Web Focus: a advisory post on Web standards,

developments and best practices• Involved in Web development since Jan 1993• Promoting innovation and best practices for the

Web, including Web 2.0

UKOLN:• National centre of expertise in digital information

management• Funded by JISC and MLA to support the

higher/further education communities and the cultural heritage sector

• Based on University of Bath


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Web2MemeMap, Tim O’Reilly, 2005

Characteristics Of Web 2.0

• Network as platform• Always beta• Clean URIs• Remix and mash-ups

Syndication (RSS)• Architecture of participation

Blogs & wikis Social networking Social tagging

• Trust and openness• Benefits of scale






Web 2.0

What Is Web 2.0?

Marketing term (derived from observing 'patterns') rather than technical standards - “an attitude not a technology”

Web

2.0


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Web and Web 2.0

Initially differing perspectives:• It’s a trendy marketing term• It’s meaningless• It’s not a formal technical term• …

Now:• Widely accepted• Let’s embrace the term• Let’s put higher educational use of

Web 2.0 in a historical context

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JISC Development Approach The JISC Information Environment diagram has afocus on backend provider issues:

• Establishment of calls• Project management

guidelines• Standards document• …

Later:• E-Framework• SUMS• Service Genres• …

IE Technical architecture


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My Take (2001)

In 2001 in a talk on “The Web In The 21st Century” I suggested that applications could be provided on the network:

• Bookmarking services• Spell-checkers• (Word processing

applications)

What I missed:• Commercial provision of such services (I envisaged jisc.ilicio.us!)• Mixed economy (I was Old Labour)• New business models (Google makes money; we spend money)

Local National International


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Web 2.0 – It’s WorkingIn brief:

• It’s attracting users• It’s attracting investment• It relates to aims of educational sectors and

political environment: Importance of social & informal learning Encouraging students to become well-informed digital

citizens Allows our rich cultural & scholarly resources to be

accessed widely Public / private collaboration Avoidance of unnecessary public expenditure

In the opening plenary talk at the Umbrella 2007 conference Lynne Brinley highlighted the importance of Web 2.0 to the British Library and encouraged conference delegates to “just do it!”

In the opening plenary talk at the Umbrella 2007 conference Lynne Brinley highlighted the importance of Web 2.0 to the British Library and encouraged conference delegates to “just do it!”


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Opportunities & Challenges

The challenges:• Getting our audiences back• Responding to the wide diversity of applications

being developed• Responding to the lightweight development tools

and approaches being taken

The opportunities:• Learning from Web 2.0 successes• Responding to changes (we’ve been doing this

for centuries!)• Applying innovative practices appropriately (and

not just on top of existing working practices)

Slide used at JISC conferences in 2007 & 2009

Slide used at JISC conferences in 2007 & 2009


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Getting Our Audience Back

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If we build it will they come?


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Web 2.0 and EdshareEdshare:• Embracing a

Web 2.0 approach

• But which aspects?

• What’s missing?

• What are the risks?

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Edshare and Web 2.0

Edshare service: provides RSS feeds11


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Edshare and Web 2.0

12Edshare service: provides tag clouds


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Edshare and Web 2.0

13Edshare service: provides cool URIS and embedding


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Edshare and Web 2.0

14This looks interesting


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Edshare and Web 2.0

15D’oh!


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Web2MemeMap, Tim O’Reilly, 2005











Web 2.0

Another perspective on Web 2.0

It’s not about the technological aspects, it’s about rethinking ownership and use of services and content

Web

2.0


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The 1 – 9 – 90 ChallengeParticipation Inequality: Encouraging More Users to

Contribute In most online communities, 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute, 9% of users contribute a little, and 1% of users account for almost all the action. (Jakob Neilson, Oct 2006)

Potential Benefits:• Globalisation• Cross-fertilisation• Unexpected benefits• Maximising impact

Potential Dangers:• Globalisation• Mono-culture• Unexpected dangers• Loss of impact

Remember that Social Web services improve as the numbers of users increase

Remember that Social Web services improve as the numbers of users increase


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Why I’m A Fan

Slideshare:• Easy to upload slides• Can be embedded in Web

pages• Statistics provided

More importantly:• Annotation facility• Slides can be ‘favourited’• I can see my fans, and the

other slides they like• Amazon style “readers who

bought this book also liked these”

Would this level of popularity be possible on an institutional or even national repository?

Would this level of popularity be possible on an institutional or even national repository?

http://www.slideshare.net/lisbk/...http://www.slideshare.net/lisbk/...


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Research Influencing Teaching?

Note 8,617 views in June 200819


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Is It Risky?

Scenario

What happens if a third party provider goes out of business?

http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/features/londoninmaps/exhibition.html

http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/features/londoninmaps/exhibition.html

There’s a need for risk assessment, risk management, etc. But this also applies when you are developing software, procuring development work, etc.

There’s a need for risk assessment, risk management, etc. But this also applies when you are developing software, procuring development work, etc.

Application ElsewhereWhat will happen to our life savings if our bank goes out of business? Do we keep our money under the mattress?And note Guardian headline “Secret List of Universities Facing Collapse”


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A Mixed Economy

We are likely to have a mixed economy:• Systems managed in-house• Use of external services

We need to ensure these can co-exist and utilise their respective strengths

http://efoundations.typepad.com/efoundations/2007/06/the_repository_.htmlhttp://efoundations.typepad.com/efoundations/2007/06/the_repository_.html

“… there is potential for institutions to push out their repository content to other services that have a more up to minute Web interface? This would not need to be a long term commitment and would enable institutions to cater in a more targeted way to their particular 'consumers'.

Rachel Heery, UKOLN


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A Question“How Can Institutions Develop Innovative and Affordable Tools to Engage Increasingly Sophisticated Audiences” (JISC Digitisation Conf 2007)Some thoughts:

• In some areas they shouldn’t attempt to compete with market place successes (e.g. Google)

• If some cases institutions should be indifferent to the service provider (e.g. Microsoft or Google Docs)

There are real needs to:• Answer the question “Why develop?”• Be realistic if development work is funded• Be user-focussed (and this isn’t necessarily easy)• Be prepared to write off investment if users don’t

want what we’ve developed


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Being RealisticOptions in light of the credit crunch:

• Let’s build up an empire now which will be embarrassing to close down

• Let’s use issues of ownership, stability, privacy, … to stifle discussion of 3rd party solutions

• Let’s explore a blended approach (a 3rd way?)


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Can We Expect To Compete?

We:• Focus on the rules• May find innovation breaks the rules• May encounter ‘job’s worth’ in our institutions

They:• Have to deliver the goods in order to make money• Can be more flexible in interpretting the rules• ‘Job’s worths’ won’t to last in innovative companies

We: “don’t use trendy technologies like AJAX. We care about blind users and WCAG AA conformance”They: know WCAG approach is flawed; know about ARIA and hybrid accessibility. They will take risks

We: “don’t use trendy technologies like AJAX. We care about blind users and WCAG AA conformance”They: know WCAG approach is flawed; know about ARIA and hybrid accessibility. They will take risks


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A Hybrid Approach

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University of Bath’s OPUS repository


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Risk Management JISC infoNet Risk Management infoKit:

“In education, as in any other environment, you can’t decide not to take risks: that simply isn’t an option in today’s world. All of us take risks and it’s a question of which risks we take”

Examples of people who are likely to be adverse stakeholders:• People who fear loss of their jobs • People who will require re-training • People who may be moved to a different department /

team • People .. required to commit resources to the project • People who fear loss of control over a function or

resources • People who will have to do their job in a different way • People who will have to carry out new or additional

functions • People who will have to use a new technology


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Critical Friends

See <http://critical-friends.org/>See <http://critical-friends.org/>

JISC U&I programme is encouraging establishment of “Critical Friends”


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Scenario Planning


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Biases

Subjective factors

Towards a Framework

“Time To Stop Doing and Start Thinking: A Framework For Exploiting Web 2.0 Services”, Museums & the Web 2009 conference

IntendedPurpose

Benefits (various

stakeholdersRisks

(various stakeholders

Missed Opps. (various

stakeholdersCosts


• Sharing experiences

• Learning from successes& failures

• Tackling biases• …

• Critical Friends• Application to

existing services

• Application to in-house development

• …


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Using The Framework

IntendedPurpose

Benefits (various

stakeholdersRisks


Missed Opps. (various

stakeholdersCosts


Community support

Rapid feedback

Justify ROIOrg. brand

Community-building

Low?

Twitter for individuals Organisational Fb Page

Marketing events,…

Large audiences

Ownership, privacy, lock-in

Marketing opportunity

Low?

Critical Friends• UKOLN blogs• Email list

discussionsLearning

• Many blogs Engaging with a Twitter community

• Conferences• Papers• …

Note personal biases!

Note personal biases!

Use of approach in two scenarios: use of Twitter & FacebookUse of approach in two scenarios: use of Twitter & Facebook


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Conclusions

To conclude:• Adding AJAX interfaces, folksonomies,

annotation features, etc. to existing may miss out on the benefits that large-scale social networks can provide

• Remember 1 – 9 – 90• You’ll need to assess the risks of 3rd party

services• But this is nothing new• The main issues are policy ones, not

technical


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Conclusions

Acknowledgments to Michael Edson for the Web Tech Guy and Angry Staff Person post / comic strip


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Questions

the future for educational resource repositories in a web 2.0 world

Education

web standards

web development

importance of web

characteristics of web

social web services

uk web focus

web pages statistics

edshare edshare