Google made the engine, let me make the train!
Last five days has been exhausting! I was involved in interviewing craftsmen who came from all over India to attend a Bamboo Workshop at IDC. The Bamboo Lab with collaboration with IGNOU organised a week long workshop for craftmen working with Bamboo. I got an oppertunity to introduce the participants to the world of internet. All of them were novices, some of them had hardly seen a computer. This situation is quite normal here. I used a LCD projector to show them the screens, explained the files, folders and the usage of the mouse etc. I asked them to click on the "e" button of the internet explorer and showed them various kinds of resources which is possible to get from the intenet.
The participants were excited and loved the computers. Many were hesitant as they could not read English, some with the usual recluctancy to technology - "What if it spoils?" syndrome. I showed them, shops, forums, blogs, company websites related to bamboo and all were pretty thrilled. Now I asked them to use it as I instructed, almost all of them easily could manage. Some were highschool drop puts so they knew a bit of English. They typed words like - "Bamboo Crafts, Bamboo Stool, Bamboo Decoration" etc and were delighted to get some pictures, by using Google images. They seemed to get a greaat set of Ideas for themselves. They hooked on!. They saw pictures, many got lost in navigation, naturally didnt know the idea of "end" like anyone of us.
We realised that all of us very naturally, simply kept searching without any goal. We soon found out that we dont consume the page information fully, we dont use the pages fully, we dont connect to work fully, we dont sometimes know what to do with thte information. Surely we find ourselves in a situation of endless searching of something which we dont know, though we start with good focus on the initial "words" like here example " Bamboo Crafts". Soon, many were browsing many things, related and unrelated to their profession and the free search looked like endless activity.
We stared wondering how do I make this information a great useful experience for myself? What is mine? How did it affect me? Where do I end? Why to end? The whole act of search. Or the multiple usage of the internet as a whole.
Well, I have been observing Googles latest editions, Google desktop, alerts, calender, all of them. They are everywhere....on my phone, on my desktop, on my bank bills, on my presentations etc.
All I can say is that, after using it for years now,they are making the train after tightly installing their engine! - different kind of engine with a different kind of train or trains to seat you comfortably and take you to the journey of meaningful experience with information.
Hmmmm............................................What experience? For a craftsmen!!
The participants were excited and loved the computers. Many were hesitant as they could not read English, some with the usual recluctancy to technology - "What if it spoils?" syndrome. I showed them, shops, forums, blogs, company websites related to bamboo and all were pretty thrilled. Now I asked them to use it as I instructed, almost all of them easily could manage. Some were highschool drop puts so they knew a bit of English. They typed words like - "Bamboo Crafts, Bamboo Stool, Bamboo Decoration" etc and were delighted to get some pictures, by using Google images. They seemed to get a greaat set of Ideas for themselves. They hooked on!. They saw pictures, many got lost in navigation, naturally didnt know the idea of "end" like anyone of us.
We realised that all of us very naturally, simply kept searching without any goal. We soon found out that we dont consume the page information fully, we dont use the pages fully, we dont connect to work fully, we dont sometimes know what to do with thte information. Surely we find ourselves in a situation of endless searching of something which we dont know, though we start with good focus on the initial "words" like here example " Bamboo Crafts". Soon, many were browsing many things, related and unrelated to their profession and the free search looked like endless activity.
We stared wondering how do I make this information a great useful experience for myself? What is mine? How did it affect me? Where do I end? Why to end? The whole act of search. Or the multiple usage of the internet as a whole.
Well, I have been observing Googles latest editions, Google desktop, alerts, calender, all of them. They are everywhere....on my phone, on my desktop, on my bank bills, on my presentations etc.
All I can say is that, after using it for years now,they are making the train after tightly installing their engine! - different kind of engine with a different kind of train or trains to seat you comfortably and take you to the journey of meaningful experience with information.
Hmmmm............................................What experience? For a craftsmen!!
Comments
However, it has so many pitfalls...and I am not talking technologically because I am devoid of that perspective!
Google is the perfect tool for this 'Information Age'...searches within a fraction of a second and tons of information on our hands. Like you have said, for novices, it is so easy to get lost as they fail to see an end to navigating. However, even for those who are not novices, all it does is create a valuable resource to tap into. It does this sometimes at the cost of our awareness that there are things and steps to be taken beyond collecting and compiling information...my father always said that information is the first step...then comes knowledge...and finally wisdom! The Google engine and train makes the first step very easy and broad-based but sometimes at the cost of the other two! However, that is more of a pitfall of those who use the tool rather than an inherent characteristic of the tool itself!