Wikinomics

Usually in this space I rant about how we must change our teaching methods to fit the learning styles and habits of today’s students.

Instead, today’s blog is about how these same technologies affect the economy. This effect is called wikinomics. Wikinomics is a term used by authors Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams to describe how Web 2.0 technologies have transformed many aspects of 21st Century society. More than just a way to engage and motivate students, Web 2.0 has become a corporate strategy to facilitate collaboration not only among employees, but suppliers, customers, and perhaps even competitors as well.

In the first chapter (which you can download for free), the authors tell a story about a company who took a chance and used collaboration with their own competitors in a desperate attempt to stay afloat—and it worked. The company is described pre-collaboration as “desperately needing to inject the urgency of the market into the glacial processes of an old-economy industry.” (I can’t think of a better way to describe schools.)

Tapscott and Williams believe that businesses will have to “harness the new collaboration or perish,” and that individuals will be required to “embrace constant change and renewal in their careers.” But the good news, according to Tapscott and Williams, is that growth and innovation can be achieved by learning how to facilitate this engagement through co-creation activities such as wikis.

This concept has interesting parallels with Cable Green’s stance that learning can no longer be proprietary: witness MIT and Stanford’s posting of all their coursework online.

And these authors walk their talk. On their website, www.wikinomics.com, anyone who’s interested can collaboratively write and edit the last chapter of the book.

On second thought, this post IS about teaching, learning, and schools. I stand corrected.