Coworking Ireland

Martin Hogan, a Green Party candidate for the 2007 Seanad election in the NUI Constituency, has commented below to say -

“For those working in the digital media space, we have a couple of hotdesks with broadband access still available in the new Media Cube in Dun Laoghaire. I would be happy to talk to companies about renting a desk on an ongoing basis for half-days etc.”

Excellent, thanks Martin.

Paul Giguere had a alternative view on our post about coworking and informal learning -

“I think however that the idea of informal learning and coworking, as described, are a bit off. I agree that informal learning can incorporate the social aspects of learning by and through other people, but in and of itself, this definition is only a part of the equation… The content is important (Corbett would have you believe otherwise) and workers need access to that content when they need it and in the manner they need it to meet the contextual requirements of the task at hand.”

Read Paul’s full post for context. Matt posted a comment which is keeping the conversation going -

“One of the things about Co-Working is that it’s an exploration into what might be possible if people start to consider other methods of working. I used to “co-workâ€? in university more than a decade ago. It was just the way we worked…. Content plus co-working plus good people plus whatever else may make for a compelling learning environment for some disciplines.”

Teemu Arina is partner and CEO at Dicole, a company focused on understanding the role of social technologies in knowledge work and networked learning in organizations. Robin Good interviewed Teemu and asked him for his views on informal and mobile learning. I found his answers inspiring and highly applicable to the goals of coworking -

“Well, let’s take conferences as an example: when people go to conferences they usually do it because of other people, not because of the content. The content is just the share object for people to meet. I think we have to emphasize the social interaction that takes place in such situations when people meet. And that’s when mobile technologies become useful.

I am now in Rome and for me learning is about meeting people; I have been meeting you and your friends here and that’s the same as meeting people in conferences. So mobile technologies enable me to see what other people are thinking and get behind their interests, which creates the opportunity for us to share a conversation.

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