OA and the real world . . . the South!
This is one of those days I wish I could be in 2 places at the same time . . .Peter Pennefather's session on "assignments of relevance" and Eve Grays' talk on African U's and the knowledge economy. Since Peter and I are both here at U of T (and I dropped in to tell him I'd buy him a beer one day if he'd give me a personal presentation) I chose Eve's session and the India, Mexico and Brazil talks that were also part of the "OA in Less Developed Countries" umbrella (less developed than what? and developed how?).
With such such witty lines as "Let them Read cake!" and that "Free the Book" has downloads in every country in the world except Greenland . . . is anyone in the room from Greenland who can tell me why?" I knew I was in the right room. Eve (already meriting a strong reputation in the halls here for her penetrating questions in other session) offered some amazing statistical maps that disclosed the myopic focus of world research and the embarrassing graphic stats of world poverty (check out world mapper for an adventure that just may change your philosophy of life!). Eve tosses out names (Henry Jenkins' Convergence Culture and Jean Claude Passeron) like bread crumbs, but an attentive audience might realize that following them might actually lead one out of the forest of despair our global economy has constructed. Passeron's phrase "knowledge economy and knowledge society" (the 1st about greed, the 2nd public good and public growth) fairly captures the gap that exists behind Publishing North and Publishing South (even within OA! since without a tech infrastructure to access them all the available documents of research are just a watery mirage in a desert journey) . . . this is a gap that Eve seems wisely and shrewdly capable of closing, if only by degrees (she states that there is "360 degrees of openness and it needs to be taken a degree at a time!" in S. Africa).
Here colleague Mark Burke made this observation at the beginning of his piece,
"spending these few days at the conference I am both overwhelmed and really really depressed . . . the wealth and resources I have seen and heard about at ELPUB make all the developments of OA in S Africa pale in comparison!" Not only are there increasing needs of OA awareness and development in SA Universities but also major infusions of infrastructure development and bandwidth increase . . . and something that Eve notes well, "a complimentary metrics and incentives model" that fits the culture and not the bibliometric system that so defines the West.
One promising signal I saw leaving the room afterward was the "computer in plastic" prototype Peter Pennefather and his partners had set up in the hall that sits in a tupperware container, boots and runs from a usb key (the Ubuntu system runs the whole thing on the web and removes the need for a hard-drive . . . pic to follow asap) and is made entirely of generic parts that are available anywhere from Mozambique to Moscow.
. . . and it makes the Macs Thin "so 90s"!! Very Cool!
With such such witty lines as "Let them Read cake!" and that "Free the Book" has downloads in every country in the world except Greenland . . . is anyone in the room from Greenland who can tell me why?" I knew I was in the right room. Eve (already meriting a strong reputation in the halls here for her penetrating questions in other session) offered some amazing statistical maps that disclosed the myopic focus of world research and the embarrassing graphic stats of world poverty (check out world mapper for an adventure that just may change your philosophy of life!). Eve tosses out names (Henry Jenkins' Convergence Culture and Jean Claude Passeron) like bread crumbs, but an attentive audience might realize that following them might actually lead one out of the forest of despair our global economy has constructed. Passeron's phrase "knowledge economy and knowledge society" (the 1st about greed, the 2nd public good and public growth) fairly captures the gap that exists behind Publishing North and Publishing South (even within OA! since without a tech infrastructure to access them all the available documents of research are just a watery mirage in a desert journey) . . . this is a gap that Eve seems wisely and shrewdly capable of closing, if only by degrees (she states that there is "360 degrees of openness and it needs to be taken a degree at a time!" in S. Africa).
Here colleague Mark Burke made this observation at the beginning of his piece,
"spending these few days at the conference I am both overwhelmed and really really depressed . . . the wealth and resources I have seen and heard about at ELPUB make all the developments of OA in S Africa pale in comparison!" Not only are there increasing needs of OA awareness and development in SA Universities but also major infusions of infrastructure development and bandwidth increase . . . and something that Eve notes well, "a complimentary metrics and incentives model" that fits the culture and not the bibliometric system that so defines the West.
One promising signal I saw leaving the room afterward was the "computer in plastic" prototype Peter Pennefather and his partners had set up in the hall that sits in a tupperware container, boots and runs from a usb key (the Ubuntu system runs the whole thing on the web and removes the need for a hard-drive . . . pic to follow asap) and is made entirely of generic parts that are available anywhere from Mozambique to Moscow.
. . . and it makes the Macs Thin "so 90s"!! Very Cool!
posted by librarymann at
3:43 PM
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