So, I've been thinking a bit lately on technology's role in learning, or eLearning, if you will. My goal as an admin is to become the invisible man. Tech should serve users, not the other way around.

I'm an open source advocate and lately have been annoyed with how much 'stuff' old-school software vendors impose on the users of their products. If you really set down and think about the major barriers to innovation, you must consider the so-called 'investment' in 'the way it's always been done' near the top of the list. How many proprietary companies are actively trying to become invisible? Their corporate mission is precisely the opposite.

Several years ago, I got behind the opengroupware.org project in a big way. I thought that immature tech was the reason for the slow rate of adoption of new innovations in the groupware and collaboration space. The second year I presented opengroupware at LinuxWorld Expo in San Francisco it became clear that tech was not the main issue. There were two major factors:

1. Decision makers reluctance to try ANYTHING new.

2. Organizations' refusal to address the real costs of the 'way it's always been done'