So apparently the really cool plain bag I was so proud of was a temporary fix. The hotel lost the actual conference bag, which is actually just like the DevLearn bag I got two years ago. Meh. I’ll keep my plain bag and not mess with getting a second one that I’ll never use.

I’m trying to convince a colleague to join me for the Santa Cruz pier tour and Beauregard Winery wine tasting and dinner. So far, he’s holding out. I’ll continue to work on that since tickets are still available.

Comments from Brandon Hall:

Innovation is making some kind of improvement by introducing something new. It could be a radical change or even just an incremental change. It could be a product, a process, or a service. Characteristics of innovators were examined by IBM. They are not troubled by a fear of failure. They are working in the advanced areas of their specialty. They are curious about innovations in other disciplines.

Comments from Stephen Downes:

Since 1995, we have seen tremendous advancements in online learning. Open resources have exploded onto the scene in recent years and they are paving the way for more advancements. Access is becoming more widespread and more affordable.

The traditional approach is based on expert systems. There is a representation that is goal-oriented. They are intended to be efficient and adaptive. However, they require knowledge acquisition, representation, and encoding. Competency-based learning will hopefully create more intelligent decision trees.

Admittedly, at that point in his presentation, I began to zone out. Too much info in too little time. It didn’t help that we could post comments to Stephen’s site and they would display on the second screen. Distracting, but amusing.

IIL07