- Sub-titles from China have been added.
- 947,859 page views since Feb 1.
Just imagine being in his classes right now - such fertile discussions must ensue! Not only did he produce a compelling product, he just brought cultural anthropology to the forefront of international attention.
Meanwhile, educators from around the world are also taking note. Here's one teacher's blog from Argentina that has prompted a discussion of the implications of Dr. Wesch's work for teaching and learning.
And I love this interpretation of Dr. Wesch's work from a blogger at global-culture.org:
The Digital Ethnography working group at Kansas State University studies the impacts of digital technology on human interaction. The ethnographer’s job is to immerse himself in the culture being studied and participate in order to get a better understanding of their ways of life. By this definition Prof. Wesch has accomplished a rather unique milestone by summarizing the insights of his work in the digital arena into the short video Web 2.0 … The Machine is Us/ing Us, which digests this relatively new concept in a way that makes it accessible to those that are not part of the elite (l33t) group at the forefront of the web evolution.
The video, which in less than 2 weeks has been watched almost one million times, owes its sudden popularity perhaps to the fact that not only does it provide an engaging explanation, but it turns the message inside out, inviting the viewer to become part of the very same culture being studied. By the end of the presentation almost any viewer realizes it has also being a user (part of the machine) at some point. In my opinion this is the most important accomplishment of this group: create a gateway into a culture to the point that any person is capable of participating.
