Hi Essex and all
Discussing Adult Learning in Museums
Technically speaking, it is pretty straightforward setting up a new
discussion list by following instructions at
www.jiscmail.ac.uk , provided certain conditions are met, mainly
relating to the status of the initiating organisation.
This is how the GEM list was formed around 10 years ago, and it now has
over 1000 subscribers. Managing a list is also relatively
undemanding and takes around an hour a month (less initially, as you have
no subscribers...)
Making the list 'take off' is rather harder to achieve. The
majority of online forums fail to generate the critical mass of
contributions needed to sustain dialogue and interest among users, and
simply wither away. Current best practice for museums and others
seeking to engage new audiences is to tap into discussions within their
preferred channels, rather than creating new, isolated, empty
forums.
So unless you are aiming to create a new entity or brand, I would have
thought it would be better to do your talking where the people are
already i.e. on the GEM list and on relevant, mature lists in HE and FE,
including the 12 lists already available via NIACE:
http://www.niace.org.uk/information/Forms/ListSubscribe.asp
A blog or wiki might be more appropriate if the aim is to build up a
resource of useful comments, links to articles, etc - but that would
require major commitment to moderation, editing, dealing with technical
issues etc - which is a role or set of roles requiring significant
expertise and experience. Of course there is also Facebook to
consider, along with lots of other potential platforms.
It is already difficult to keep in touch with all the channels supporting
similar threads of discussion. Many people who sit next to
each other in an organisation or 'opposite' each other in related
organisations are unaware of discussions that would be relevant to them
and are continually reinventing the wheel or missing out on important
social capital, simply because they don't know about or can't be bothered
to subscribe to or check in on all the relevant lists or
forums.
So if the aim is simply to facilitate online dialogue about topics
relating to Adult Learning in Museums, I reckon it is a no-brainer to use
existing lists.
Rather than having to make people join your new list one by one, and then
each remember to suspend mail and sign up again after going on holiday
(as well as all the other lists they are on) and deal with all the
changes in email addresses etc etc... simply initiate new dialogues with
those interested among the 1113 active, intelligent, articulate,
considerate ...(I would go on but can sense you blushing) users already
subscribed to the GEM list.
Martin
---
Martin Bazley
GEM list owner
At 12:03 12/10/2007, Essex Havard wrote:
Dear all
Following on from the GEM conference:
I am able to establish a discussion forum on the general
theme of Adult Learning in Museums. Would you be interested in such a
forum? I envisage several different "threads" within the
discussion forum so that you can keep an eye on issues of interest to
you. The Forum would be promoted to the adult learning provider sector
too (HE, FE, Comm Ed etc) so would be a good cross-sectoral communication
tool.
At this stage all I want to get an idea of is how many
Gemmers would find the forum useful.
Answers please!
Cheers
Essex
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---
Martin Bazley
ICT4Learning
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Wimbledon
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