Generation G in Taiwan: Age gaps in Internet usage and blogging

On The Digital Media Machine blog, I recently discussed Generation G -- the under-40s who belong to the video game generation. I wrote:

Most people in this demographic grew up with games, and many of them still play now. They are familiar with gaming conventions relating to movement, exploration, cooperation, competition, and communication. Additionally, interaction with video games from an early age has created a foundation of familiarity and interest in computing technologies.

While I noted that more than 80 million people in the United States belong to this demographic, I did not get into the international dimension. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there were nearly 4.5 billion people under the age of 40 as of mid-2007. Obviously, many of those in developing countries may never have seen a video game console or touched a computer, but in other countries parts of Europe and Asia, video games, computers, and the Internet are a way of life for people in this age group.

The ESWN blog found a report that supports the Generation G hypothesis in Taiwan. The United Daily News (lian he bao, 聯合報) reported the results of a telephone survey of 15,007 people from all over Taiwan that polled them on their 'Net habits, and broke down the results by age. The inset graphic is from the United Daily News website, and shows the data. Not surprisingly, almost 100% of the youngest bracket (aged 12 to 20) were Internet users. Most of the 21-30 and 31-40 groups were also online. But there was a steep dropoff from the 30-somethings to the 40-somethings, and just over one in five of the over-50s were online:

Age 12-20: 99.8%
Age 21-30: 94.4%
Age 31-40: 84.2%
Age 41-50: 58.6%
Age 51+: 21.9%

The survey also asked about blogging, and I was quite surprised to see how active Taiwan's teenagers were in this respect: Nearly half of the 12-20 year olds said they blog, and about 30% of 20-somethings do the same. 30-somethings in Taiwan are far less likely to blog, with just 12.5% saying that they maintain one. This matches with my own experience -- most of my Taiwanese friends are in their 30s and 40s, and I only know one who has a blog.

Thoughts on the Extension School's Health Careers Program/post-bacc for students interested in medical school

When talking about Extension School programs on this blog, I've concentrated on issues relating to the graduate liberal arts ALM. On occasion I've mentioned the professional ALMs (ALM in Management, ALM in IT, etc.), as well as the undergraduate ALB but have seldom discussed the other programs at the Extension School.

Harvard Extension School graduation

Today, though, I thought I would highlight one of the standout non-degree programs at the Harvard Extension School, the Health Careers Program. The HCP, often referred to as the Harvard "post-bacc", is intended for people who have completed their undergraduate studies but need to take additional science courses (or brush up on their Human Anatomy & Physiology) in order to apply to medical school. While the Harvard Extension School awards a Diploma in Premedical Studies to students who have completed the eight required introductory science courses, a far more valuable document to students is an HCP sponsorship. A sponsorship has a stringent set of requirements (for instance, it takes into account students' undergraduate GPAs), and comes with composite letter of recommendation that apparently is well-regarded by medical school admissions committees (adcoms) across the country.

Harvard Extension School post-bacc and medical school admission

The HCP does not release statistics relating to the number of students who have gone on to medical school, but several students have posted their assessments of the Extension School's post-bacc on the StudentDoctor.net website. I am excerpting some of their comments, which are generally quite positive about the quality of the program:

Curious Tom:

03-14-2005, 11:58 AM

It all depends on individual backgrounds and qualities. Generally speaking, though, the program seems to have people going to not just any med schools, but top schools if that's what you want to hear. Each year about 50 people get sponsored and most of them get accepted somewhere. I myself am debating between a sunny UC school (I'm from CA) and a private in cold northeast (both are top 15). But remember, many people in the program are from ivy undergrads or have very interesting backgrounds. Apart from that, based on my limited experience with the schools I interviewed, this program itself is well perceived by the adcom.

chlorineK

03-14-2005, 12:17 PM

I graduated from columbia and then did the harvard post-bacc and so far, I am going to duke. So it worked for me, too.

twicetenturns

03-14-2005, 12:34 PM

I finished HES's Health Careers program last spring and couldn't have been more pleased. To date, I have been fortunate enough to be accepted to Harvard, Hopkins, Cornell, Northwestern, and Stanford. The program is perfect for people who want to work during the day (research, clinical, etc.) and not go broke. Plus, they write really nice letters. Owen actually sounded personally insulted when I told him that I didn't get into UCSF. But alas, not from sunny Cali.

ads99:

03-14-2005, 08:20 PM

I did the Health Careers Program at Harvard Extension and am choosing between University of Chicago and University of Pittsburgh. Everyone in my study group from school has been accepted to a competitive med school program. One of these people applied very late to schools and is now choosing between several top 20 programs.

As someone mentioned, a lot of people in the extension school program have interesting backgrounds. People like TwiceTenTurns blow us away sometimes, but that just makes the student body that much more interesting. Half of the people in my study group went to ivy undergrads. *But* the other half of my study group attended state schools. The program definitely is perceived well by ADCOM's. I think it was an excellent excellent value and am ecstatic with where it got me. The advising was great and, in my opinion, the classes were very well taught and very well organized. :thumbup:

XildUpNawth:

05-14-2007, 06:12 PM

I went to a liberal arts college with no grades for undergrad, then did an MPH with grades (good ones ;) ), then finished and/or retook my pre-reqs through HES HCP. I was sponsored and applied through the HCP. I have been accepted to BU, UAB, U Miami, U Maryland and USA. I was on hold at AECOM and UF, but dropped off the hold list. I'll be attending UAB. HES is a great opportunity and I highly recommend it.

Mae16:

05-21-2007, 07:56 PM

How tough are the classes at HES? The lectures have 300, 400 people, right? Were you able to get help/tutoring if you needed it?

Also, does the scheduling work out such that you can complete the necessary courses in two years (eg, classes that you needed to take weren't scheduled simultaneously, correct?)

thanks!

Lokhtar:

08-16-2007, 07:39 AM

Someone said that he learned more in Harvard Extention bio course, than he learned in two years of bio, and one year of genetics and part of the first semester of his medical school.

He might have been exaggerating, but the coursework is very tough and time consuming, and part of the reason why it is looked so favorably by adcoms everywhere.

punkindrublic

08-16-2007, 09:03 AM

The coursework is really demanding. You're going to be required to know a ton, and not just regurgitate it, but to apply it to new situations and presentations on exams. It's really pretty fair for the most part though; all the professors give you practice/old exams to study from so you'll be familiar with the structure and timing before you take the real thing.

That said, bio is absolutely brutal. Fixsen will expect you to know everything inside and out, but it was really an interesting and enjoyable course, and prepares you beautifully for the MCAT.

HanginInThere:

08-16-2007, 10:41 AM

As punkin and Lokhtar say, the courses are challenging. In my experience, they were similar to what I'd expect from taking the same class at a competitive undergrad school.

I thought the intro class sizes averaged closer to 100-200 students, rather than 300-400. But that's just a guess from glancing around lecture halls - regardless, they're your typical big intro science classes, where you'll get personal attention from your TAs ["TF"s, actually, because it's Haah-vaahd!] but you'll never speak to the professors unless you actively seek them out. But they all have office hours, so if you want them to get to know you it's definitely doable.

Tutoring/help is easy. You're assigned to discussion sections with Teaching Fellows which meet regularly - one hour a week for most courses, if I remember right. That's your first stop for review/help/etc. If you need more, the TFs and professors have office hours, and everyone seems happy to work with you as much as you want. The whole system is set up to offer you all the support you'll need. If that still isn't enough, I think there are people who offer unofficial paid tutorial services, but I don't have any experience with that. (Oh, and you should look to your classmates for help, too. People will organize study groups, or you'll just get to know the people around you and discuss stuff informally. This is a great resource. Everybody I met was friendly and in interested in collaboration - I never saw any stereotypical cutthroat premed behavior.)

For scheduling, yes - you can do it in two years. General Chemistry and Organic are scheduled for the same time on purpose, because gchem is a required prereq for orgo and they want to be sure you don't double up. Physics and Bio are different nights from each other and from the chems. You can take them in whichever order works for you and finish in two years, no problem.

Of course, these are anonymous, online posters to a two-and-a-half-year-old discussion board thread, but I am inclined to believe that these people have taken HCP classes and are being honest about their medical school acceptances. There were no highly critical appraisals of the post-bacc in this thread.

While I have been in contact with one person who is taking HCP classes, I don't know anyone who has completed it. Current or former HCP students are welcome to add their thoughts below. I'd be interested in hearing what you thought about the classes, the sponsorship, and for those who have completed the HCP, how it helped you navigate the med school admissions process and first year of med school.

Research advice

Some solid advice for grad students considering major academic research projects:

1) Use graduate school to tech up. You'll have time to learn how save the world later, when you're actually in it. Learn all of the theoretical, statistical and other difficult-to-acquire skills you can while in grad school, because you won't have the time later on. You, your cause, and your job prospects will be well-served by the technical skills you build.

2) Hang in there. In the first year of any grad program you will encounter a lot of required material that will feel too theoretical, too divorced from social change, and (occasionally) like too much nonsense. Much of it is good for you (see point 1), even if it doesn't feel like it at the time. After a year of metrics and micro theory, I was ready to run to the real world to do what I thought I really wanted to do. The best advice I ever got (from one of my pre-PhD advisers) was, "Shut up and hang in there; by your second to third year you will discover all the people doing interesting applied work soon enough and be free to work on whatever you want by your third year." He was right.

3) Take chances. The second best piece of advice I ever received came from my dissertation chair, shortly after my oral examinations committee told me that my prospectus was poorly thought out, uneconomic, and overly risky. They were 100% right, and I benefitted from hearing it (although at the time I was miserable). Where I think they were wrong is that they told me to abandon my plans for risky and expensive field work. They favored the less risky route that could get me to a completed dissertation faster. My chair's response: "Hey, if you really want to do this, why not? Give it a shot. If it doesn't pan out after three months, then come back and work on something else. Worst case scenario: you lose a few thousand dollars and a summer, but you have a great experience." I plan to give the same advice to my students.

4) But minimize your risks by being prepared. Don't embark on a big project, especially field work, without a solid hypothesis, research design, and plan. Think through the theory beforehand. Write down your assumptions, your logic, and your econometric regressions before you collect data. Especially write out your regressions. I am still guilty of rushing to the field too quickly, and am continually reminded of the costs.

The author (Chris Blattman, an assistant professor of political science and economics at Yale) has six additional pieces of advice. The post is intended for people considering economics-related research as part of a PhD program, but some of the tips can be applied to what ALM students are doing at the Extension School. Tip #4, above, seems especially relevant -- in my proseminar and in the ALM thesis writers' workshops, other students would sometimes propose complicated paper-based surveys, or ask extremely broad research questions (e.g., "does religion encourage war?"). Fortunately, the ALM program has processes intended to help candidates find realistic, solid research topics -- namely, the proseminar and the thesis proposal.

(Thanks to Greg Mankiw for the link)

Related entries:

• Gary North on the Ph.D. "Glut"


• Thesis proposal: Start, write, throw away, rewrite


• ALM thesis writers' meeting/Revisiting Vietnam?


• Writing an ALM thesis: Solo effort, a personal marathon, and finding a sounding board


• Thesis update: Done!

Boston Globe: Faust gets "high marks"

The Boston Globe has a nice writeup of President Faust's first six months in office. The article zeroed in on the administration's quick moves on College financial aid, as well as her openness, which was on display at a summertime gathering in the Yard:

That July day, she gave a self-deprecating talk, then strolled onto the grass in Harvard Yard and mingled with one group after another, attendees recalled. Faust, who had invited faculty, students, and staff at every level to the ice cream social, spoke with all who approached her. And, she listened.

"It defined her presidency," said James Kloppenberg, chairman of the history department. "I wandered by where she was and thought this was unprecedented for a Harvard president to make him- or herself available to anybody who wanted to chat."

I have to agree. While I did not attend the ice cream social, I did write Faust after receiving her letter to the community in the fall. I wanted to draw her attention to an issue that I feel needs attention and resources (see Online education, sharing knowledge, and a proposal for Harvard and Thesis Update: Formatting horrors, and the Extension School's electronic archiving problem) and she actually replied -- not with a form letter, but with a personal email.

This doesn't mean the electronic archiving issue will be tackled soon, but it was the right response.

... For now.

Related entries:

• Thoughts on Drew Gilpin Faust, Harvard's next president


• I get a message from Larry Summers (I think)

The pitfalls of automated Chinese-English translation

I've talked about issues related to simplified and traditional Chinese before, but the Ritter's Life blog brings up an issue I hadn't considered: Bad words cropping up in the English translations of otherwise mundane simplified Chinese phrases:

In "Gan: whodunnit, and how, and why?" (5/31/2006), I explained one of the sources of this phenomenon: several Chinese characters pronounced GAN1 or GAN4 -- and meaning such widely disparate things as "dry," "calendrical sign," "to do," and much else beside -- all got collapsed into one simplified character: 干. This has led to enormous confusion, especially when people who know next to no English rely on machine translation software to convert Chinese into English. The chaos caused by this combination of circumstances is vastly exacerbated by the fact that this little, three-stroke symbol also has a vulgar meaning when pronounced in the fourth tone ...

The "vulgar word" begins with an F and ends with a K, and has led to some bizarre signage in restaurants and department stores all over China, says Ritter. The Chinese in one example shown on his blog is a listing for fried cabbage with dried shrimps, but the English translation is quite twisted. There are many other examples (with photos) on the blog, and Ritter and his readers have actually identified the Chinese software programs that are likely responsible for the messed-up translations.

You may laugh when you see the signs, but this simple three-stroke character (see inset photo) has probably sunk more than a few international business deals when used incorrectly in translated correspondence or email.

(Thanks to ESWN for the reference)

Priorities: An ALM Management student takes a break

I've been reading a blog by an ALM Management student named Rick for the better part of a year now. Once More Unto the Breach chronicled some of his classroom experiences (distance and on campus), his travels to Africa and Alaska, attending the Berkshire Hathaway annual conference, and an extended stay in Britain. I enjoy checking up on Rick every now and then, and his writings have even prompted the occasional reaction post on my part, such as A Mac In Africa over on ilamont.com.

But Rick is apparently taking a break from the ALMM program, and putting off future plans to get an MBA. There was a hint of this in late September, when he dropped an Extension School class, but an entry from early December explains that he has been reconsidering his priorities:

I've been thinking an awful lot about my life lately. I've been accomplishing a lot, but sometimes I have not been happy with the direction. I feel like I paid my dues living on Riverside Drive for seven years in a small apartment and missing out on things to stay cheap and save money, and I'm ready to collect. This is part of what has been behind this last year of insanity. Going forward, I don't think I can pay more dues with another two years of business school and two more suffering in a high paying job that insures I never seen my friends or family. That was the plan, after all. Suffer as a banker for two to three years then get out of the game. Live incredibly cheap, save two years of banker salary plus two years of lawyer salary, and then get out of the game. But it will make me miserable. I can achieve the same thing without banking, it will just take longer. I calculate about ten years longer, but I wouldn't lose four years to unhappiness.

What makes me happy? Friends. Fireplaces. A dog. A camera. Investing my own way. That is the good life. I think I was smart to come up with the suffering plan knowing I could get out of the game altogether at 30, but I think it would have been a miserable four years, and the opportunity cost of being in business school isn't negligible. I also don't feel like being away from Sarah for another five months, and I worry about the strain that would put on the marriage. Is it worth it?

For these reasons, I've decided to delay business school for another year. I plan to live [leave?] my current degree program, and go back to Austin with Sarah. I will concentrate on managing our investments, building my firm Citadel, and writing for the Motley Fool. When she graduates law school in May, we will be able to move right away to wherever she gets the best job offer (likely Austin or Dallas). I still plan to leave cheaply for two years before buying a house.

It is time to start living life the way I want to rather than worry about impressing other people. Warren Buffett was talking to some kid from HBS a little while ago who was talking about taking a job he really wouldn't like for a few years because it would really boost his resume (my guess is that the firm was probably McKinsey, which these days is an incubator for Fortune 500 CEOs). Warren told him he was crazy. He said to do what he loved, and as smart as he is, the money would follow. It may not be as much, but he would do just fine and would be much happier. He compared taking the job to "saving up sex for your old age. It doesn't make any sense."

This was obviously a tough choice for Rick, especially after committing so much time and effort to school and his other ventures. But at the end of the day, he decided his aggressive educational and career goals would put too much of a strain on his family and personal life.

That's not to say that he's giving up the Extension School and MBA plans. The ALM program can be completed within five years of matriculation, and he already has a few classes under his belt. His GMAT scores also have a long shelf life.

But even if he doesn't go back to school, Rick will do well. He obviously has a drive to succeed and to make the world a better place, and I respect him for that.

The Extension School may be losing a student, and I may be losing a fellow ALM blogger, but it's all happening for very good reasons.

Good luck, Rick.

The HLS Berkman Center explained

The Harvard Law School Berkman Center for Internet and Society is an interesting organization. I subscribe to a few of their e-newsletters, sometimes read blog posts written by Berkman fellows, and also met a few of the Berkman staff when I was in Singapore for State of Play V. Readers may recall that the Berkman Center has teamed with the Extension School to create for-credit courses in virtual reality -- see Interview: Harvard's Rebecca Nesson discusses teaching in Second Life, and Harvard on the cutting edge: A virtual Law School/Extension School class.

A few days ago, the Compete blog published an interview with HLS Professor John Palfrey, the Berkman Center's executive director. He gives a good overview of what the Berkman Center does on a day-to-day basis, as well as its mission:

It’s crucial to us at the Berkman Center that we’re not just another ivory-tower think-tank. It’s important that we do some work that is theoretical and even abstract. We trust also that our work is intellectually rigorous and that our methodologies are sound. But at the same time, we try hard to be certain that we are speaking to an audience online that is bigger than our immediate circle of students and colleagues and other friends.

One way we do that is through our various modes of research, teaching, and activism. We believe in building out into cyberspace as we study it, so we have terrific developers on the team who put up the first blog server at a university, supported the first podcast series, built real-time teaching tools for the classroom, and a whole lot of code for specific research projects. Pretty much everything we do we publish to the web – whether on a blog, on our website, on a podcast, or by video. We are never as successful at this as we’d like to be, but it’s a constant area of focus. We think of our work as relevant to a broad audience and strive to avoid navel-gazing wherever possible.

The Berkman Center is now in its tenth year, and there are several anniversary events scheduled to take place next spring and summer. Check 'em out, they look pretty interesting -- especially the release of the book Born Digital, by John Palfrey and Urs Gasser. For an overview of what the book is about, read Palfrey's blog post, "Born Digital."

(Thanks to Planet 02138 for the link)

Chinese media, international news, and foreign policy

Today's New York Times has a great article on Chinese media coverage of international news issues and events. The article notes that while domestic Chinese journalism is in the midst of a "golden age," foreign news is generally sourced from a handful of state-run news organizations that have foreign correspondents, including Xinhua/NCNA (新華社). As a result, says the article, Chinese audiences get a heavy dose of propaganda when they read about international events:

News media critics say one result of this lack of vigorous independent reporting is that what most Chinese news readers know of the world closely conforms with government policy and propaganda.

“By and large, China’s international reporting is a mirror of China’s diplomacy,” said Yu Guoming, a journalism professor at People’s University in Beijing. “As government mouthpieces, their international reports are linked with the government’s diplomacy. It’s not free, so what we’re really talking about is China’s diplomacy, not its media.”

This is a major problem for China and Chinese audiences, but it can't last, considering the problems Chinese authorities have controlling the Internet and networked communications.

On the other hand, as long-time readers of Harvard Extended know, this media/diplomacy connection in China's state-run press that allows observers to better understand the policies and actions of the Chinese government. Political and military experts have long used Xinhua and other official news sources to fathom internal power struggles (see my description of Beijingology), and I used a computer content analysis of Xinhua content from 1977 to 1993 to gauge Chinese policies toward Vietnam during the Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平) era.

In any case, the NYT article is a good introduction to the topic of international news censorship in China. To learn more about domestic news in China and the challenges Chinese reporters face, I recommend reading some of the reports filed by Edward Cody of the Washington Post over the past few years.

Related Posts:

Censorship in China meets reality of networked communications

Another reason China should fear the 'Net: A million people with camera phones

Watershed event: Amateur riot video circulates in China

Freezing Point tests China's official stance on history and press freedom

Immersive Education Day reminder

I wanted to remind local readers that Immersive Education Day takes place tomorrow afternoon (Dec. 8) from 2-5 at Askwith Lecture Hall in Longfellow Hall at 13 Appian Way, Cambridge (part of the Graduate School of Education). If you haven't been there before, it's very close to the Harvard Extension School HQ at 51 Brattle St. -- the map below will show you how to get to 13 Appian Way.

Immersive Education is a suite of virtual reality technologies and processes for education. This is an area in which the Harvard Extension School has a lot of experience, owing to the joint Law School/Extension School classes that have been held in Second Life (see my interview with instructor Rebecca Nesson.) The Harvard Interactive Media Group, a campus group which I recently joined, is putting on the event, and has lined up five experts and practitioners (more info here). Virtual reality has started to make an impact on distance education, and it will be interesting to see what the panel has to say about future development.

Hope to see some other Extension School students there!


View Larger Map

Quoted: Mitchell Stephens' The Rise of the Image, the Fall of the Word

More great reading from my final course, From Text To Hypertext: A Survey of Publishing. This week, I've been reading Mitchell Stephens' Rise of the Image, the Fall of the Word (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), which tracks the rise of television and other screen-oriented mass media, including the Web. His thesis: We are still at the early stages of the video revolution. Television largely copies what came before, such as drama, serials, discussions, music, and news, and real innovation has yet to come: "I will argue that once we move beyond simply aiming cameras at stage plays, conversations, or sporting events and perfect original uses of moving images, video can help us gain new slants on the world, new ways of seeing," Stephens says on page 18. "It can capture more of the tumult and confusions of contemporary life than tend to fit in lines of type."

A few other choice quotes, starting with a comment on the decline of reading, from page 9:

"In a society where professional success now rewquires acquaintance with masses of esoteric information, books now are often purchased to be consulted, not read."

From page 11:

"The video revolution is, by my reckoning, humankind's third major revolution, and the disruptions occasioned by the first two -- writing and print -- are surprisingly similar to what we are experiencing now. The stages in which the new technologies were adopted seem comparable, as does the profundity of the transformations they cause. Even the anxieties and anger sound familiar."

From page 22, after examining the transition from orality to literacy in ancient times:

"Now we are in the early stages of another great communications revolution, surrendering what Emerson called 'these traditional splendors of letters' in favor of the moving image, in favor of video. This seems at first glance quite a powerful new tool, especially when compared to the little scrawlings Thoth was promoting, Indeed, were visitors from Plato's time (or Emerson's) to find their way into one of homes, they might marvel at the machines we have invented for cooking, cleaning, calculating, and sending mail electronically; but would not their gaze be transfixed by that box in front of the couch, with its constantly changing array of images, its miniaturized people, intense dramas, and brilliantly colored scenes?"

From page 27, after noting repeated attacks on TV programming:

"Most educated people, eminent or not, find themselves asking why video can't more closely resemble more respected forms of communication, such as books, theater, concerts or conversation."

Related:

My final paper for the class, discussing the future of imagery on the Web (cites Stephens' book):

• Video, Computer-Generated Environments and the Future of the Web

A short essay I wrote for The Industry Standard, based on the above paper:

• The future of the Web is 3D, not video

Online education, sharing knowledge, and a proposal for Harvard

Spotted in a Boston Globe article entitled "An MIT education is now just a click away":

On Wednesday, the school celebrated the completion of a six-year initiative to put its entire curriculum online, with all 1,800 undergraduate and graduate courses - lectures, readings, labs, even problem sets and exams - available with just a few clicks and a spirit of scientific curiosity.

The initiative, the first of its kind, has been enormously successful, so far attracting some 31 million visitors from nearly every country who are drawn to such classes as Electricity and Magnetism, Classical Mechanics, and Introduction to Algorithms.

The misleading title aside (while the OpenCourseWare program places course materials online, including some video lectures, but does not provide textbooks, interaction with instructors, or credit), the article describes one of the most important Web-based educational projects in existence. Millions of students from around the world have taken advantage of the online materials in English, Chinese, Spanish, Portuguese, and Thai. MIT deserves a great deal of credit for undertaking such a bold and expensive experiment.

Meanwhile, Harvard has been very cautious in its own experiments involving Internet-based education. The Harvard Extension School has the most experience with online education, and has developed some interesting Second Life-based courses with the Harvard Law School's Berkman Center, but the University as a whole has lagged in terms of sharing lectures, course materials, and research with the rest of the world.

This is not the first time I've blogged about this problem. Here's an excerpt from last year's post, Yale to offer free course video over Internet. Why not Harvard?:

... Why isn't Harvard taking more of a lead in sharing its academic resources with the global community? We see some piecemeal efforts involving individual schools and departments placing some class materials on the Internet for public consumption. FAS and the Harvard Extension School have actually posted Computer Science podcasts online, but video of class sessions is closed off to the public -- if you want to see anything more than a few samples, you have to pony up thousands of dollars to register for the classes, even if you aren't taking them for credit.

Yes, I understand that video production is expensive, and FAS wants to turn online video into a sustainable endeavor. But it is possible to strike a balance between serving the global public (one of former President Summers' big interests) and creating a successful, self-funding academic program. Can't Harvard at least match Yale's efforts, and provide some complete courses online for free without credit? I mean, seriously -- how big is Harvard's endowment now -- $29 billion dollars? Can't Bok or Knowles sign off on a little seed money and staff time to get something off the ground, perhaps using Extension School Distance Ed programming from previous years?

I have another proposal for Harvard: How about organizing a free, indexed, online database of educational research from Harvard and other institutions? In the electronic age, it's remarkable that almost all of the research and analysis taking place in colleges and universities today ends up as droplets of ink arranged on thin white rectangles of processed wood pulp, intended for an audience of one -- a professor responsible for issuing grades. This knowledge is almost never shared with other researchers or the public, thereby stifling learning and the spread of human knowledge. In the age of print, universities had an excuse. Now that the Internet is here, there is no reason to keep this information stuffed in filing cabinets or locked up in individual hard drives.

Would such a project be difficult to carry out? Sure. But MIT has proved that massive online educational initiatives can work and can yield tangible benefits for the public.

The Extension School and campus organizations: My experience with the HIMG

I first started taking classes at the Extension School in 2002, and formally matriculated into the ALM program in 2004. However, other than attending some seminars and symposia over the years, and joining a few Extension School gatherings, I haven't been involved with clubs or other extra-curricular activities at Harvard. Besides being far too busy with school, work, and family, I also haven't been able to find an on-campus group that really aligns with my personal, academic, or professional interests.

Until now. When I was in Singapore for State of Play V, someone distributed copies of the Harvard Interactive Media Review. It was an interesting read. The first issue contained an interview with Berkman Center founder and Law School Professor Charles Nesson (who helped bring Harvard's first virtual worlds-based course to the Extension School) as well as essays about business in the metaverse, new media literacy, and virtual learning. Some of the issues dovetailed with what I have written about in my personal blog, on Computerworld.com, in Terra Nova, and elsewhere.

I found out that the Review was published by an on-campus organization called the Harvard Interactive Media Group, which is an official student group of the College and has members from a few of Harvard's graduate/professional schools. According to the HIMG FAQ, the group aims to "bring together Harvard students and professors with members of academic and development communities beyond to explore the form and impact of interactive media, video games in particular." The FAQ also notes that Harvard has been lagging in this field:

While certainly our projects are valuable in and of themselves, we view them also as a means of establishing momentum, as facts on the ground, in our longer-term bid for an official interactive media program here at Harvard. Schools around the country—MIT, Carnegie Mellon, USC, Indiana, Madison, and others—are moving aggressively into the interactive media space. Harvard is being left behind.

In the past, be it with digital computing or Psychology, Harvard has been a leader in the exploration of burgeoning academic fields. We believe that Harvard should reprise this role, and ensure that its leadership carries over from the physical world into the virtual one as well. For now, we’re networking with various departments around the University. In the next five to ten years, we hope that the HIMG will be a launching point through which Harvard, as an institution, can leap into the field.

This semester I have started to participate in the HIMG meetings and activities. Through the group, I was able to attend a panel discussion at the Business School a few weeks ago ("The Business of Video Games: From Virtual Worlds to Casual and Serious Games"), and next Saturday afternoon we are holding an on-campus event on Immersive Education. (preliminary information here, and I'll post the official description of the event in a separate entry).

Besides the HIMG, Harvard Extension School students participate in other on-campus groups. A friend of mine joined the Kendo club, the Harvard Graduate Council has included ALM students in its governance and activities over the past few years, and Extension School volunteers have joined Phillips Brooks House Association programs. Many clubs and organizations welcome students from across the University, and these are great opportunities for Extension School students to participate in campus life beyond taking classes and conducting research.