My Focus: Participation

             As I looked over my meager number of blog posts, I realized what I am most passionate about in regards to our digital literacy; that people actually use it. In my blog post We Are Being Spoken to and Don't Even Know It, I talk about the shift in our society to this "I don't care" attitude. That post focuses mainly on politics, listening to the information and outreach our government is giving us, but I would love to be able to broaden that idea.
             We have so much, and yet we take it all for granted. We have the means to do amazing things, but so few of us actually take advantage of those opportunities. I talked in that post about being able to respond to and communicate with the President, but it doesn't have to be that grand of a scale. We have the tools to communicate with people across the globe that share our interests and beliefs. We have the opportunity to learn from people that are so much more educated than we are now, but are still able to share with them our thoughts and ideas. The concept of open education is one that I think is revolutionary; the idea that we should learn because we want to learn is something that is both amazing and completely contradictory to the way our society runs, but it shouldn't be.
             I have this completely unrealistic vision in my mind of people everywhere avidly learning for the sake of learning, for the sake of conversation and self edification. I think that though that vision is very unrealistic, sources of open education and the proliferation of knowledge for the sake of knowledge is something that we can and should strive for because it is now so possible to do.
             I would love to understand more about they why people resist educating themselves and participating actively in the global society. I know it sounds like an obvious answer, but it must be more than the obvious. My mom always says that she gets too much reality from life, why would she seek out more on-line? People are tired, people are bored, people would rather take the easy way and play a game or stalk a friend on Facebook rather than take the time to learn something. It's just too hard. But why is it hard? I know that I do this myself, I choose something that will turn my brain to much for a few hours instead of stimulating it, but, again, why?
             My thesis for this class is still rolling around in my head, but I want it to have something to do with the positive functions of technology for the educating and enlightening of people, and the stimulating of those people to work for the betterment of their society. Technology can incite change, it has and does daily; I want to see that change grow. I want to be able to talk about TED with all of my friends. I want to be able to discuss issues and feel educated about what I am saying. I want to understand and reverse the causes of inaction that we see daily. Not quite 160 characters, but it's getting there.
             I have gained from this class realization of the broadness and relevance of the technology and innovations that come through the internet, and I want to be able to share that realization with others.