Diaspora Dialogs [.com]

Are we all in dander of becoming talking heads? While I certainly hope not, this is a possibility as the world is becoming more technologically advanced and depending more and more on computers. This class was a valuable experience not only for the materials it covered but also for the experience of distance communication. However, I for one am still very much in favor of human contact. Universally, I think it is more desirable than just a computer. While I know that my classmates and teachers are just a click or phone call away, it is not the same. I loved being able to spend time with my family in Georgia and take a Cornell class as well, it is simply not the Cornell that I have come to love. To me calling and emailing are just not the same as talking after and during class to a human being in person. Perhaps there is some biased on my part due to the fact that I was taught always to look the person you are talking to in the eye and to read body language and emotions along with words, something that you cannot do as well on computer screen. While I thought this experience was very valuable, for the class itself and what it taught me about distance learning, I think that I prefer actual classrooms to virtual ones.    

I do kind of think that we are in somewhat danger of becoming just talking heads.  As technology is developing at an enormous rate, our lives will depend on technology more and more.  And this has changed the way of communication totally.  These days, chatting on computer or talking on webcam are very popular ways of communication.  Writing a letter is technically gone and no one does that anymore.  You do everything online on the computer, paying bills etc...  Basically, computer has become a big part of our lives and we communicate a lot through the computer.  Thus, if this keeps going on and on, we might be just talking heads in front of the computer.  However, I do not necessariy think that communicating through computer or online course is bad.  I am taking this online course, Caribbean class, and actually, I enjoyed it a lot and was very surprised that this online course is not that much different from a regular on-campus class.  You can interact with the prof and the classmates through the virtual classroom we meet online.  So, I think, as long as the technology is good so that there's no lag time and everything goes well, you can have as much interaction with the prof and the classmates through online as you do in a real classroom.  So, online class can be just as good as an on-campus class if taken in the right way and I agree with the prof that the most important thing is students' eager for learning.

I agree that we have become more and more dependent on technology for communication and everyday tasks just as paying bills because the technology we continue to develop has helped us maintain our fast paced lifestyles. I think that the advantages include having the ability to meet people from across the globe in a single instance. However, one must also be aware of the disadvantages including the possibility of having the technology fail on you. As Cornell Students/Faculty recently experienced with the email outage. It is amazing how much the outage effect everyday life and communication. In terms of a classroom experience having taken more than one online class. I believe that you can get out the same amount of interaction and intellectual engagement as a regular classroom if all those involved participate actively through the same medium. I did not like the virtual classroom setting because we were not all familiar with and communicating through the same medium. Personally I would have preferred chatting in a classroom then talking with mics, but it seemed that the technology was not capable of handling such communication due to the time lag we experienced in receiving messages. Something that I think is important to point out is that communicating with someone online that you know is different than communicating with someone you have just met. When you are communicating with someone you know the conversation becomes a dialog and you have a better assumption on the kind of emotions that are behind those worlds. As I am sure many of us have stated "I can just picture him/her saying that". Thus a way to create more of a naturally flowing dialog in a virtual classroom is to have a previous personal meeting