THE UN-LECTURE

Quite possibly one of the strangest and most confronting lectures I’ve been to all year, the ‘un-lecture’ presented to us a new way to interact and learn in Networked Media. Adrian Miles was unlike any other lecturer I’ve sat and listened to, and quite quickly, he presented one of my favourite lectures so far.

Adrian  talked about why we should be in this course: if we want to be the guy holding the cable behind the camera man, this is not the course for us. I breathed easy then, coz I don’t wanna be that guy. But the un-lecture continued on to inform us that even when we graduate, the industry itself is unclear as to what exactly we will be working in. This is something I am thinking about now, but I suppose continuing through this degree it will become clearer (just like clarifying what Network Media in itself actually means as we go through this course).

I was extremely happy to hear that we will never have to write an essay again in the future. Spending the last 12 years in school learning and developing the skills on how to write essays, its been drilled into us constantly. It will be nice to leave the 3000 word essays behind once uni is over. Looks like there is some hope for me.

Adrian has been blogging for over 10 years. We should listen to him – he is the tool for this course. His experience and his knowledge will help us immensely.

Oh and apparently our future employers/colleges/husbands/wives/obsessed-individuals may google our names and find our blogs to read about us (and perhaps have a little stalk). Adrian reminded us that our blog is personal, but public at the same time. It is a private journal on the public domain that anyone can access at any time. As soon as it is posted, this action can’t be undone. Our blog can haunt us, similar to our old customised MySpace pages from when we were in our early teen years before Facebook took over. (awkward photos, embarrassing comments, shocking layouts – you know what I’m talking about). This suggestion stuck with me, and we need to remember that what we post needs to be appropriate as it will influence our reputations.

All that being said, I fully intend to attend next weeks lecture. I’m curious how it will work and what Adrian has in mind for making it more interactive. P.S: loved the shirt.