The annual Horizon reports from the New Media Consortium highlight emerging technologies that they believe are likely to impact on learning & teaching over the next 5 years. The 2008 Horizon Report (PDF) suggests the following are set to become mainstream in learning-focused organisations over the next few years:

• On the immediate horizon: Grassroots Video & Collaboration Webs
• Mid-term horizon: Mobile Broadband & Data Mashups
• 4-5 year horizon: Collective Intelligence & Social Operating Systems

Some new terms to me there. Looking back at a post on this blog about the 2007 report it seems to me that the horizons have previously been a bit optimistic… while user-generated content & social networking (last year’s immediate horizons) may be considered mainstream in the wider world, I don’t think that’s the case in “learning-focused organisations”, particularly UK HE institutions. Far from it. While some individuals within these organisations may be ‘generating’ and networking I don’t feel its mainstream practice, certainly not here in the UK HE. Only a few organisations have implemented & encouraged such activities at the institutional level. Timing aside, an interesting look into the future.