#edcmooc Communication technology (the artefact)

I found it really difficult to create my digital artifact  I've been blown away by the whole edcmooc things. There have been many interesting themes, running through the course “E-learning and Digital Cultures”. The important thing for me is writing blogs, because I’ve never done it before.

So I decided to tell about communication technologies. As we know communication is the transfer of information and some means of ensuring that what is sent is also received. Technology is channel in which information can be communicated. 
Communication technology includes the speed of transmission, and the total volume that can be handled at any one time.

There are such communication technologies as: mobile phones, email, blogs, forums, social networks,   websites and etc.

Obviously, it plays an important part in your social and educational life. We can argue a lot about  advantages and disadvantages of it. Yes, technologies can’t replace the real conversation and  real emotion. But it helps us to keep in touch with people who are far away from us.  This technologies is helpful in work, collaboration on projects and sharing resources.  

New communication technology is the key for education which can provides the opportunity to get and share the knowledge. It can contribute to universal access to education,  equity, and quality learning and teaching, teachers’ professional development and more efficient education management, governance and administration.
Communication technology has the potential to:

•  enrich, and deepen skills;
•  motivate and engage students in learning;
•  contributes to  changes in school; 
•  helps to create  economic viability for future's workers;
•  provides opportunities for connection between the school and the world

The big problem is the digital divide between advanced and developing countries. Ukraine has also some problem in providing this technology in educational life. Most people, school students haven’t an access to new tech at schools in distant regions. For instance, having an Informatics subject at school, students have neither computer equipment nor access to the web. The country is still developing. I believe in our future of education. 

But communication technologies can contribute towards violence - both unintentionally and intentionally.

I want to show you another side of communication technologies which can change people’s opinion in one country and lead global changes. All those ideas are due to my country (Ukraine). 

The social networks turn into the tools which can expand the revolutionary spirit in the country (for

instance, the Arab Spring). 

What about Ukraine?

Few in Ukraine were expecting mass protests after  the decision by the government to postpone the association agreement with the European Union. The agreement would be a historic landmark in Ukraine's economic and political integration into Europe, and was seen by many as a sign of its geopolitical choice between Russia and the EU. 

Only about 1,000 people had come to Kiev's Independence Square on Thursday evening, 21th November 2013 - first independent activists, then opposition leaders. The important thing is, all these people come together through social networks (Twitter, Facebook, Google+). According to BBC, the #euromaidan hashteg (rally took place in European Square) first appeared in social networks and become a trend of Ukrainian Twitter. It had been used by more than 21 000 times by November 22. During the Orange Revolution 2004, an important role in the coordination and organization of protesters played mobile phones. The information was shared via sms-messages, and gathered a large number of people. The social network  helped to raise the people in 2013.

Most of reputable journalists posted important information on social network’s pages and blogs. The next action was online translation events through the Internet. The information was shared faster than appeared on TV.

The new media became source of information for all residents.

Sharing the information through the communication technologies, people know the situation all over the Ukraine. The whole world has an opportunity to follow events and news in the country. 

The official EuroMaidan Facebook page, created by journalists and civil activists, became the fastest growing page in the Ukrainian segment of the social networks.Since its beginning (November 21), it has garnered more than 130,000 subscribers. During the first days of the demonstrations the page appeared in the top 20 of Ukrainian Facebook pages and became the most “talked about”.

 Twitter, which until now has been underutilized in Ukraine, finally became a main and important source of information, simultaneously with Facebook. 
But social media is also a powerful tool for opponents. A number of bots used the hashtag on Twitter to promote similar provocative messages. 

So, communication technology is a powerful tool for the development of quality teaching and learning and also it is a catalyst for radical change in society. It helps to create new generation and new type of human.

What if?

There is much debate about what constitutes life. We are living in the age where technology are developing very quickly. Will robots to replace the human?

It is becoming period of creating a creature which is exactly the same as humans. Most of the robots can think as logically as we can and they can maybe act approximately the same we do.

"Robbie" is a short film by Australian director Neil Harvey about an aging robot drifting alone through space 6000 years in the future. The process involved downloading 10 hours of footage from NASA archives. Robbie is capable of  experience loneliness, happiness, faith and friendshipthe question is, what are the emotions that are genuine for the robot? Love, lineless, firth… all of this can be simulated, using special program cod. This program would be able to reproduce human behavior according to emotions. We can create new world with new type of “human being” where robots can be used as an excellent simulation tool to investigate the nature of human emotion, empathy, and social interaction

Can the robot convey all emotions through the computer code. Robots are not human, but humans aren’t the only things that have emotions. There is something deeper …something unconscious that even human can’t control. What about soul? Intuition? Can robot feel this? I don’t think so. There is a line which separate robots from human.  Even Descartes asserts that ‘ if there were a machine were to attempt to mimic human beings, ‘we’ would always be able to tell the difference, to preserve the firm distinction between the human and the inhuman.’

Badmington Neil  says “rational thought, quite simply, makes humans human.” 

Robbie lived a long life. Did robot really know what is life?

Rather than viewing robots as machines, researchers are beginning to see robots as an actors, for example. It can autonomously interact with humans in a socially life. A fanny robot Gumdrop from  "Gumdrop Short Film" ( Kendra Trailer). In this short film from feature director Kerry Conran, Gumdrop is a 27 year old Bulgarian robot auditioning for a role in a feature film. Along the way some clever CGI allows Gumdrop to show her skills dancing with Charlie Chaplin and Fred Astaire. The official description is to the point: “A robot’s life story emerges during a casting session.” Gumdrop has autonomy, rationality, self-awareness, responsibility, and  resilience. So, being a "vacuum machine" she decide to be an actress.She lives lake human. She does what she interest in and  likes.

What if robot has a have the same rights and autonomies of human? We should think about it and, frankly, if in a near future it happens not to give strength. Because it can cardinal change the notion human in the word. I suppose, machines were creates to help people, not replace or being them.

New futuristic future, where no one is human describe in "True skin". The  main hero is Kaye. He’s on the run for stealing an advanced modification. Kaye finds himself in danger of losing more than just his humanity. Here we have new nature of mind, memory and learning, where our memory is as a computer’s memory. According to this the memories can be kept in a digital format. The parts of body can be replaced also. The process of education turned into the loading of requisite chip or program. There is an opportunity to install different memories or knowledge. There is new view on humanism. It is Posthumanism  - technological means that will enable the exploration of the posthuman realm of possible modes of being. 

“The future would begin with the end of Man”.

This video scared me. This new world is like a computer game. Can posthumanism responds to the redefinition of humanity's place in the world  in which the "human" is but one life form among many?

I don’t want to belie in it. But we should admit that humanism transforms itself into something new. This ‘new' is that we call posthumanism. Humans have augmented and enhanced themselves throughout recorded history. Freeman Dyson, English American theoretical physicist and mathematician,  makes the case that, "the artificial improvement of human beings will come, one way or another, whether we like it or not, as soon as the progress of biological understanding makes it possible. Their freedom to choose cannot be permanently denied."

The rapid pace of technology changes, without the proper degree of foresight, knowledge, wisdom and hubris could have devastating consequences. The choice of whether to use them, however, should normally rest with the individual.

"Avatar Days" is a new short film  by  Cormac Kelly that examines the fascinating relationship between a World of Warcraft player and their in-game avatar. They go about their banal, daily work (walking through cubicles, driving forklifts), but instead of people grinding out a 9-to-5, it’s their WoW characters 

  Avatar is a way of the human reflection . Very often  people hide behind their avatars which they use in fabricated world. In that world they are absolutely different. Humans would be like: killers, saviors, bandits, warriors. Playing World of Warcraft is different to drown a line between real and virtual world.  They are obsessed of it. I think it’s not connect with t World of Warcraft players   only, but also  all those people who hooked on games. In the video was shown the  human "passions”.