<Li> Creative production of content </Li> <Li> Informal discussion spaces for conversations about salient issues </Li> <P> Social and participatory media allow for--and, indeed, call for--a shift in how we approach teaching and learning in the classroom . The increased availability of the Internet in classrooms allows for greater access to information . For example, it is no longer necessary for relevant knowledge to be contained in some combination of the teacher and textbooks; today, knowledge can be more de-centralized and made available for all learners to access . The teacher, then, can help facilitate efficient and effective means of accessing, interpreting, and making use of that knowledge . </P> <P> All people want to be a consumer in some and an active contributor in other situations . Being a consumer or active contributor is not an attribute of a person, but of a context . The important criteria that needs to be taken into account is personally meaningful activities . Participatory cultures empower humans to be active contributors in personally meaningful activities . The drawback of such cultures is that they may force humans to cope with the burden of being an active contributor in personally irrelevant activities . This trade - off can be illustrated with the potential and drawbacks of "Do - It - Yourself Societies": starting with self - service restaurants and self - service gas stations a few decades ago, and this trend has been greatly accelerated over the last 10 years . Through modern tools (including electronic commerce supported by the Web), humans are empowered to do many tasks themselves that were done previously by skilled domain workers serving as agents and intermediaries . While this shift provides power, freedom, and control to customers (e.g., banking can be done at any time of the day with ATMs, and from any location with the Web), it has led also to some less desirable consequences . People may consider some of these tasks not very meaningful personally and therefore would be more than content with a consumer role . Aside from simple tasks that require a small or no learning effort, customers lack the experience the professionals have acquired and maintained through daily use of systems, and the broad background knowledge to do these tasks efficiently and effectively . The tools used to do these tasks--banking, travel reservations, buying airline tickets, checking out groceries at the supermarket--are core technologies for the professionals, but occasional technologies for the customers . This will put a new, substantial burden on customers rather than having skilled domain workers doing these tasks . </P>

Which would be an example of participatory culture