For some time now, some of you have heard me speak of The Transformation Society. The idea came when we were talking about The Information Society, and realized that what was needed was not more information, but transformation! Transformation of information into useful knowledge, transformation from aggregation (a collector’s mentality) to diffusion (a community sharing mentality). Transformation from immobility to dynamic flexibility; from habit to exploration; from fixed diplomas to lifelong learning.
Category: Report
First Steps: Structured Content Strategy Spain
Last week, we had the first Structured Content Strategy meeting in Spain (to our knowledge) organized by Urbina Consulting and Blue Stream Software in Valencia. The turnout, as expected, was small. OK – it was WAY smaller than expected. Still, it was the occasion for a few practitioners to start to make some headway towards creating a community in this country where “content” as a business asset is still unknown or misunderstood, and many content professions don’t even exist in the official repertory of professions.
Continue reading “First Steps: Structured Content Strategy Spain”
EuroIA – Design for Good
I can’t begin to express how much this year’s EuroIA conference affected me – in so many positive ways.
This was a conference of Information Architects, which I attended for the first time 2 years ago, in Prague. This year’s edition was in Edinburgh, and I was pleased and honoured to be included among the speakers.
What struck me most about the programme, was that without having any announced theme, almost all the presentations, from Lisa Welchman’s opening keynote to the closer by Andrea Resmini, touched at some point on the need for those of us who design and develop content and the systems that deliver content to people to think humanistically, to be ethical, to think about doing – or “designing for” – good. Continue reading “EuroIA – Design for Good”
Summerfall Conference Season
In June and September your Humanist Nerd spoke at four different conferences. In this post, I’ll tell you about UA Europe, Congility, and TCUK. I’ll save a separate post for EuroIA.
UA Europe – In a Class By Itself
UA Europe has always struck me as different from other tech comm conferences in Europe. I’m not totally sure why, but the audience seems a bit different – perhaps with more of a traditional tech WRITING orientation. This is not to say that they aren’t interested in new aspects of tech comm practice, just that they may be more preoccupied with the specific writing aspects.
Continue reading “Summerfall Conference Season”
Where are the Content Industries Going?
Some of you may have heard me talk, already, about The Transformation Society – a new research group that I have co-founded in Barcelona with Dr. Neus Lorenzo, a specialist in new technologies applied to education.
I’ll be blogging more about The Transformation Society in the near future – but you can already see the results of some of our research.
The Humanist Nerd Reviews oXygen 14.2
oXygen’s new release is part of the company’s policy of regularly (every three or four months) releasing “incremental” upgrades. I use quotes because Syncro Soft, the publisher of oXygen, regularly includes major new features in these free, “incremental” upgrades. This was especially the case with release 14.1 that included forms based editing of XML attributes – about which more in a moment.
A Cognitive Design for User Assistance – Comprehensive Links
Update, 17 September 2015: Adobe has a new platform for its recorded webinars. Links to the recordings are now updated and will work correctly.
It is important to follow the Instructions for viewing them, which is also updated.
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I’ve had a number of emails, tweets, and other requests for information on how to get slides or recordings of the webinar series I just finished for Adobe.
Thanks are in order
First off, I need to thank all of you who attended, asked questions, passed me feedback and food for thought.
Thanks also to Adobe for giving me the space and the freedom to present these ideas, and promote the research we are starting to do in The Transformation Society. I’ll be blogging about that more in the near future.
Some Practical Information
Slides are posted as pdf files to Slideshare. You are welcome to use, but not modify, these slide decks, with attribution.
Recordings of the webinars are on the Adobe site – you need to have an adobe.com account to get to them. This will not hurt, I promise 😉 You can get the account for free, and there’s no obligation attached to it.
Instructions for viewing webinar recordings
When you click the links to the webinar recordings, you’ll arrive at the webinar description page. Click the “register” button, then fill out the form. You’ll be sent a link that will activate watching. The user experience is less than stellar, but don’t worry about it – just plod through, you’ll end up at the recording, just as we promised 😉
The Links
Session 1: Users Become Learners
Session 2: Empowering User/Learners Through Cognitive Development
Session 3: Integrated Learning: Building Customer Loyalty
I’ve tested the links, and as of this writing, they all work as advertised.
Enjoy!
Rant of a Humanist Nerd 