| Airport Express, Skype and Distance education | | Date Created: Sep 18, 2004, 05:53 PM |
 Attended a Knowledge Management all-day session today. It was about benchmarking knowledge processes, and tomorrow we continue with a look at blogs in the workplace.
While we've been given loads of handouts and readings, we often veer off course as the group discusses experiences and draws on their own knowledge base. So it can come in handy to have a live connection to the internet to follow up ideas or locate references. Management discussions seem to have loads of TLAs (Three letter acronyms) like TQM, BPO and BPR. But it was a little funny when the lecturer tripped over his tongue and referred to them as "anacronyms". I quickly got a laugh when I suggested he was referring to outdated acronyms, something Management is plagued with I feel.
Pity then, that although we're in the university's new dedicated ICT building, there's no wireless access!
The lecturns are equipped with PCs and Macs and the latest Sony projectors, and they have a live ethernet-based internet connection.
I suspected I might be able to access this, so brought with me my new Airport Express 802.11g wireless router, and hooked it up. Within a minute its yellow "on" light turned to green saying it had a live connection, and with a few tweaks I had access to the net, firstly checking Macsurfer, then collected my email. There were two other wireless equipped Powerbooks in the room, and we all easily got a connection and set up Rendezvous running chats discussing the lecture. They couldn't access their POP mail accounts, but I had no problems sending and receiving with my .Mac account.
We all had our Powerbook volume set to zero so as not to disturb others, but I wanted to test out how Skype might work. So I set up a text chat first with my partner, who was at home sitting up in bed having an easy morning, and then called her so she could hear the lecture.
Even using the Powerbook's internal microphone, she was able to make out what was going on. It would have been much better to use the iSight's mike, and even let her see what was happening. We can't use iChatAV as there are serious firewall issues with her ADSL router, but how hard would it be to engineer Skype to take the video feed I wonder.
When we had a chance to discuss this unusual use of Skype, I was surprised then pleased to hear that after a while she got on with her day, but left Skype running and occasionally listened in. But otherwise, she described it as "comforting" to know I was at the other end of her Skype connection, and reported feeling "close" to me, reminiscent of parents using wireless intercoms to monitor, usually with exquistive sensitivity, to changes in their baby's breathing. In this case, it was more about whether the lecture was going well.
Is this another use for Skype I wonder? Leaving your PC or Mac "open channel" to monitor what's going on at home or in the office? This might lead to more sinister applications, perhaps attending meetings and allowing outsiders to eavesdrop over wireless connections. Hmm... what was that about technologies having a double-life beyond that intended by its inventors?
So, now when I leave the house with the Powerbook in tow, along comes the Airport Express and an ethernet cable. It really helped our concentration through the long day, and anyone who was ill in bed but well enough to listen to the lecture could still have participated in an ad hoc distance education exercise.
And the lecture was also about innovation and how "KM" can contribute to it - nice to have it in action to stimulate dialogue! |
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