Lots of discussion in the blogosphere about the merits or hype associated with Web 2.0. Two particular posts challenge readers to slow down….
Bryan Appelyard writes in the Australian IT with a cautionary view of Web 2.0, suggesting that ultimately Web 2.0 will only be good for us if, somehow, it succeeds in evolving towards an identity-based discourse. All else is mere anarchy.
In the AASL blog heated debated, inspired by Twitter reflections, also indicates that people are in Web 2.0 overload. The pressure is on, particularly with our current API driven expansion of Web applications – as seen at the Museum of Modern betas! or that fascinating Web2.0 Directory.
Never mind.
From that most esteemed institution of American Librianship – the Library of Congress – we now have the Library of Congress Blog, launched today. The very first post links right into the idea of change, change, change – at the heart of Web 2.0.
How did I find out about this? Through Steven Cohen on Twitter of course 🙂
What hath God wrought? The blog leads right into the topic with….
Those were the first words ever transmitted electronically, in 1844, by Samuel Morse. That message and Morse’s invention of the telegraph marked what was undeniably, at the time, the most significant communications revolution since the advent of movable type.
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judyoconnell.com 
In this context, Postman (1995) makes a compelling analogy between the ICT and the motor car when he asks, How do they use us?
What we needed to know about cars-as we need to know about computers, television, and other important technologies-is not how to use them but how they use us (Postman, 1995, p324).
When thinking about the social and cultural impact of Web2.0 and other ICTs on teaching and learning, perhaps we should start by asking How does ICT/Web 2.0 use teaching and learning? rather than how should we use the technology.
I have never recovered from reading Illich’s In the Vineyard of the Text in this regard – exploring the impact of the culture of the book from the 12 century to the present – and how the way books were organised and even read changed the way the people saw themselves. I had never before even thought about books as changing the way we thought about who we were –
An example of ICT using teaching and learning is reported in The University of London Institute of Education evaluation of the Schools Whiteboard Expansion (SWE) Project (2007). Researchers found the use of a technology marketed as bringing interactivity to classrooms led “to some relatively mundane activities being overvalued.” (p.7) and reduced classroom interactivity.
“The technology can:
Reinforce a transmission style of whole class teaching in which the contents of the board multiply and go faster, whilst pupils are increasingly reduced to a largely spectator role” (p.8)