It's a Tool
With the advent of personal computing in it's various forms, the one thing being noticed at the Community college is the skill of people using their portable devices to interact in the social media of their life, creating groups, private threads, and collaborative groups. The idea that people can be this productive with their social network needs to be expanded to their productivity network within the context of learning.Companies such as Microsoft, Apple, Google, IBM, Corel, Apache Open Office, and Adobe are using cloud computing to provide clients the ability to collaborate on projects online. Collaborative access to files stops confusion as to the version of the document you are working on for the project. It allows each team member the ability to edit and make changes that benefit the end product. Taking the skills people have with their social media to their productivity media does not take very long, however it is a diffusionary process requiring some dedication in order to learn the software that is being used in a collaboartive fashion. This is where the challenge is for people using technology: Being able to relate one set of skills used in one construct and apply it to another. For some it is an easier process than others, however with dedication any obstacle can be overcome.
