[Air-l] re: tech competence

[David Brake]

I suspect for new media-related courses the most important tech- 
related stuff to teach to all of them would be in the area of "un- 
learning" rather than learning. Unlearning the exaggerated  
assumptions many students may have about the levels of tech  
competence and use in the general population (using qualitative/ 
ethnographic studies of Internet use) on the one hand and unlearning  
their assumptions about the way the Internet and key services work on  
the other (eg a primer on how search engines deliver results  
deconstructing the commercial and technical decisions underlying them  
which would be helpful for their own web searching as well as for  
user understanding).

P.S. References to using UNIX for anything research-related made me  
smile ruefully. I wasn't surprised by Ezter's remarks on this. Since  
we at the LSE don't have a Comp Sci department (Information Systems  
is social science-y not primarily tech) there's very little support  
for UNIX here except for an "Advanced Research Computer". Even Macs  
are distinctly second class citizens: "Apple Mac and Unix computers,  
and other machines running non School standard operating systems, are  
not supported other than provision of assistance on how to connect to  
the School’s network." (In practice, fortunately I have found several  
helpful IT people at the LSE who have informally aided me in  
connecting my Mac). There's probably plenty of UNIX around behind the  
scenes but nothing the ordinary student would run across. I too  
wonder for how much longer undergrads at universities will be exposed  
to it.

---
David Brake, Doctoral Student in Media and Communications, London  
School of Economics & Political Science
<http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/media@lse/study/ 
mPhilPhDMediaAndCommunications.htm>
Also see http://davidbrake.org/ (home page), http://blog.org/  
(personal weblog) and http://get.to/lseblog (academic groupblog)
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