Topic 5

Open Access: Reflection

The topic of Open Access was very interesting and relevant to me currently as a student at University. I enjoyed researching open access and looking into why it is needed and the issue of who will cover the costs. From reading other blog posts I was able to gain further insight and knowledge on this topic. Tom’s post focused on the pros and cons similarly to me. However, he used the music industry as an example to illustrate the problem of plagiarism and giving content away for free. Continue reading →

General feedback on topic 5

For topic 5 we challenged you to push yourselves a little harder and try something different – it was good to see a number of you responded to this with Piktocharts, Prezis and Powtoons! In your final assessed posts (due 10th January) you might like to reflect upon any specific value you obtained from these tools that you will take forward to future modules, or to the building of your own professional online profiles. Continue reading →

Topic five – reflection

In my blog this week I chose to focus on whether academic producers may benefit from making their work free to access online. This was a very interesting topic to research and one I felt very relevant to my current status as an undergraduate student. Continue reading →

Reflection: Topic 5

This week’s topic of Open Access was incredibly interesting as this very course is a product of Open Access. The basis of UOSM2033 is online, all resources, feedback, peer comparison etc. is done online. A somewhat new way of teaching, and so far, it has been incredibly enjoyable. The ability to work whenever and wherever has made the starting of each assignment within this module much less daunting. Without the Internet and Open Access, this module would simply not exist. Continue reading →

Reflection: Welcome to the free for all

Topic 4 and 5 have particularly highlighted the importance of education, and how the benefits of access of knowledge trumps all other potential disadvantages. I have created a prezi containing the main points explaining why education is imperative, hence acting as the justification for why I consider Open Access to be paramount, despite the negatives curtailed for content creators. Continue reading →

Topic 5 Reflection

This week’s topic is quite interesting for me and actually it is a very important problem for us because doing research for independent learning is what professors are able to teach us. And from Tiffany’s post, I found how important education is. The world even cannot make progress without education. Therefore, open access is absolute a good activity for readers. However, it is unfair for authors in the opposite. Continue reading →

Topic 5 – The Final Reflection!

  The Breadth of topic 5 has provided no end of material to discuss. Whilst I chose to focus my research on paywalls in the magazine industry, A quick scroll through the module home page shows the broad range of subjects one could have chosen to undertake for the final topic of the module. Given the choices associated with this topic, I was able to find one that interested me greatly and since publishing my main post, I have been able to research the subject further. Continue reading →

Reflections: Five

This week’s topic was one I struggled with slightly, perhaps because I found it harder to agree with the opposing side to open access. Comments on my post definitely alerted me towards the benefits of paywalls, and whilst I can understand fully why a creator would want money to improve the quality and or quantity of content or research, I am a natural consumer in the situation and therefore my focus will be on consuming. Continue reading →

Reflection: Opening Up

Open access is an incredibly broad topic, and one that can incorporate almost every field of media production. I chose to use the music world to give perspective to the main issue that I discussed – open access in academia – and I felt this was effective, although it may have been slightly confusing as I had to explain my comparison to Joe. Continue reading →

Reflection on free online content…

When I read the Topic 5 question I thought there were many ways the presented question could be answered. To fit all opinions into a 400 word blog post was challenging and I feel only a couple of issues could be addressed.  Others blogs seemed to either focus on open source academic papers or piracy online and how online users can access media for free even if it legally should be paid for. Continue reading →

Reflection on Topic 5

This topic discusses the advantages and disadvantages of Open Access and what they influence. It was something I was aware of but never really fully understood what it meant.   Not having open access is a something that impacts education and scientific sectors and sometimes, prohibits how quickly and how much information gets supplied to both. The problem being due to paywalls and not having enough funding to pay for all of the journals. Continue reading →

Reflective Summary: Topic 5 – Open Access

This was a very interesting topic and one that has a hug impact on me as a university student. Through my initial research and reading of other people’s posts, I gained vast knowledge of the advantages and disadvantages of open access. Melak summed up the pros and cons of open access and discussed the way in which it would be viable in the real world, something I had not included in my post. Continue reading →

Reflection: What the heck! Access denied!?

‘Open access’ – we couldn’t seem to appreciate this idea until we actually understand how it works. It is believed that most students would have taken advantage of the tremendous variety of free resources available online, whether it is a relevant journal article or a random YouTube video. The current trend predicts that most online content will eventually be held behind a paywall. Continue reading →

Topic 5 – Reflection

When reflecting upon Topic 5 using the work of my peers, I am slightly disappointed with my overall answer to the question provided. I feel that by trying to stand out from others – focusing on the knowledge economy – I gave too much of a one sided argument that did not represent enough reasons to why content producers should use paywalls. To aid this, I created the graphic below which includes some arguments that may have improved my own post. Continue reading →

Reflections on Topic 5

When I read the topic 5 question, I immediately knew I could relate my own experiences and opinions. I myself have experienced the annoyance of trying to access an academic journal which requires payment. Although it was an inconvenience, I simply found a new resource and moved on. Continue reading →

Reflection on Open Access

I hadn’t taken much thought into open access, except from receiving a few “you do not have access to read this article” pop-ups. After researching further into the subject, I realised that the impact that open access could offer is tremendous. Bridging the gap between students from low income families is something that I think is extremely important and should be a focus within education. Continue reading →

Reflective Summary: Topic 5 – ‘Open access can save lives’

The topic set this week caught my attention and realization on how vast open access is. Everyone expects to be able to access any information we want and tend to become frustrated if required to pay. However, instead of being shocked to pay for quality information, we should be grateful for the access we already have. The content we find is costly to the author and takes up their time and hard-work. It seems nowadays we are so accustomed to access, that we are now taking it for granted. Continue reading →

Topic 5 Reflection

Above is a quick summary of what I learnt this week. This week’s topic was talking about open access and I found this topic especially challenging. As a student, I require access to a wide variety of material, but only at certain points in the year. I would ideally like to be able to access what I need when I need it for free. However, after reading others takes on the topic, there is so much more to take into account. Continue reading →

Reflection on Topic 5

The future of education should not be reliant on researchers being able to purchase their way through all these paywalls. It is impossible to expect our country to make any advances if they put up these barriers to prevent academics collaborating. When researching my university dissertation, I have come across numerous amounts of journal papers voicing the importance of education for an economy and that education is the driving force for economic growth and welfare. Continue reading →

Topic 5 Reflection

My initial understanding of open access was that information online can be obtained by anyone for free, amongst academic journals and newspapers for example. Advantages and disadvantages of open access to content producers ranged from widespread recognition through their citation, to a robbing of revenue respectively. Continue reading →