Needed Skills for New Media

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Needed Skills for New Media
I guess my main reaction to this list is that it is a set of 2.0 skills described as though they were 1.0 skills. For example: "Play - the capacity to experiment with one's surroundings as a form of problem-solving." Um, no, that might make the business perople happy, but I would say 'play' is 'the capacity to mess around with something just for fun'. Or "Multitasking - the ability to scan one's environment and shift focus as needed to salient details." The 'shift focus' definition is very reassuring to pre-net-gen people who only focus on one thing at a time. I would say 'multitasking' is 'the ability to work on two tasks at the same time'. Or "Networking - the ability to search for, synthesize, and disseminate information." This is a definition for people who don't want the messiness of things like connections or emergent knowledge. More...