 Good morning. Hey, Maren. Hello, good morning and good afternoon. I am so happy that it's Friday. Yeah, we're kicking off the Friday stream here to start talking about an upcoming conference that we both know and love, OER 24, and kind of continuing on with the Open Education Week as well on that side too. Yeah, it's awesome. Meredith and I were just saying that we were very excited about the chat we had with Ellen Naveen about Open Education Week just a few days ago, and so we might kick off by sharing a little bit about that in case you missed it to give you a chance to catch up with that. But then, yeah, talking about lots of OER goodness and I think we're going to troll for our archives a little bit, share some personal history, give you a sense of what we're going to talk about in our session, and just what is there to look forward to? I think big plans is the main message. So... Yeah, absolutely. And very timely with Valentine's Day. We're kind of keeping the good vibes going from that too. I just posted the archive to the chat with Ellen in the Discord chat as well, so definitely keep an eye out for that. I probably should keep the ReclaimTV chat open as we're going so we can post that for any viewers not in Discord. Okay. From there, but definitely check it out. I unfortunately did have to miss the chat, so I'm going to... That's going to be in my playlist for today to catch up on all of that as we're kicking off Friday, so cool. Yeah. Do you want me to share some... just a few things about the Open Education Week? I've got my... I can share my screen if that's okay. Yeah, totally. I'll add that to the stream itself. Yeah, so for those of you, I think most people will be familiar with Open Education Week, but it's a fantastic annual event to get involved with all around Open Education. It's a global activity organized by OE Global, and we were really fortunate to have Ellen with us and kind of sharing what's happening. And if you go to the OE Week website, you can see here the dates March 4th to March 8th. So that's only, I think, two weeks away now. And also, there is a couple of calls to action, so you can check out the calendar here on all the things that are coming up during Open Education Week. And importantly, you can add your own activities to that calendar as well. So if you have things to share, there is a Contribute Now button, and please do click on that and then share and explore what you can to contribute to Open Education Week. And yeah, 16 days to go. So there is a lot of in store in terms of the annual celebration this year. And I'm really looking forward to it. I must say, it's kind of slap bang between where we are now and the OER conference at the end of March. So yeah, I'm really looking forward to that. Yeah, absolutely. That'll be really fun. Cool. Thank you for sharing that, too. So we are attending as we claim for OER 24. Jim Merritt and I will be in Cork, Ireland the end of March, the 27th and 28th of March, which I'm super excited for. We're starting, I think, through how to present our topic as a group, which we've got the topic itself, but just putting together all the presentation and all of that goodness. So I'm excited. I haven't been to an OER conference in person since 2019. And we obviously partnered with the Alt Association for OER by Domains in 2021, which is really fun. So that was super cool. But yeah, so do you want to share some photos or anything that we've got? You know, you posted someone massed it on, but I went through my archives and my photos to kind of talk through what I've been working or like the experience of reclaim at OER from over the years itself. So my first OER was in 2018. I had just started at Reclaim full time back like in September of 2017. So this was my second trip with Reclaim to a conference and it was kind of timely how we partnered with OER in that time that we had just started building Reclaim video. Oh, my album went up. So this was taken just before we left and we had got the storefront sign posted up on the building, which was super cool. And then these are the shelves. This was like the first iteration of the shelves that we had just finished building, putting in the carpet. We wanted to replicate like a super old like 80s like Blackbuster video rentals-esque carpet. So that was super fun. I remember coming in on the weekend and like painting my shelves, helping paint the shelves and putting those all together and then putting out the VHS tapes and everything like that. So it was super cool. And then this is Tim and Jim talking about the first idea of Reclaim Cloud that became Reclaim Cloud and they were starting to work through containerized hosting and everything like that, which was super cool. And I really liked the location in Bristol of like the movie theater vibes for it. It played really well into how we partnered with Alt and with the VHS video and everything like that. But the views were beautiful. It was right on the river. We have these like beautiful row houses across the way. And then what's the presentation itself? I think we were able to walk to the venue, which is really nice where our Bill Kirby and V was. And then this was the city center at night as well. And then Lauren and I actually stayed after and we traveled to Bristol Bath in London for a couple of days. They just have like a couple of photos from Bath there. And then this one's 2019. So I will the next iteration of Reclaim Video. We turned these VHS tapes into gifts to post at our little table in 2019. So this was really fun to work through. We all kind of collaborated to create the gifts of all of the tapes and I was able to recreate or like shake off my Photoshop skills for this one. I had a while. It was really fun to use that there. And then this is Galway for 2019, which was so fun to love Ireland. I loved this. This was like our meeting space for like the welcome event. Yeah, that was awesome. Yeah. So this is super fun. And then our table. We had t-shirts and we remember that so well. Yeah. The stickers and then I think the if I can I zoom in. I don't I don't really use photos very often. There you go. But the VHS tape here that I think we played to introduce the conference in 2019, which is really fun. Brian Mathers at a zine session. Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. So I like stole a regular sticker to include in the zine and that sort of thing. So more row houses and views of Galway. And I think this is a video. I love that we had like the portrait monitor set up on both ends to kind of show showcase what was going on there and then some just travels of Ireland. And then this is what we are 2020 looks like. We had just gone working from home. This is actually my parents house with my with with their cat. And this is what my view looked like from we are itself. This is my desk set up at my apartment. So as I was presenting in 2020, this is what the view looks like. So yeah, and then more desk views for 2021. When we put this back on in a remote way. Yeah. We use a lot of took 36 hour days for weeks in this in this year. Like I think that was the most work I ever did in any week ever in my entire life. Like that took everything. And it was amazing. You know, it was the best online event I've ever been to. But yeah, that's what in tears. Definitely. Yeah. Absolutely. And all the planning like you and Lauren did to help put this on was like so much fun. We had just turned the conference room in our office into a green screen room. And behind me, I have a I have a fun photo of the great stuff. So behind me is the green screen and have these like studio lights on me to help with the backgrounds and stuff that we like switched on backgrounds. And this was actually the beginning of reclaim arcade. So behind the green screen is the arcade itself. And then it expanded into the building that was now. So I just have that that view. I think that's all I had for photos, but I wish I'd taken more now that I look back on it. But yeah, that's all that was like super fun memories of putting this all on together. Yeah, I love that. I love you sharing and it's funny to see how much parallel like they are. So I have a couple of photos that I can share as well. So I think my first ever OER conference was in 2015 and that was actually here in Cardiff. The year before in 2014 I did go and visit briefly, but I wasn't really there for the whole conference. So yeah, that was that was interesting. And although I didn't know that in 2015 10 years ago, that was a conference that was then co-chaired by the person I now live with and co-chaired by another person who now lives in the same village as me. So that turned out to be a more faithful event than I imagine in 2015. Yeah, I'll share my screen and share some images as well. So I took these from my blog. So 2016 was the first year I went to OER kind of full time and that's also when I met Jim in person for the first time. So 2016 and 2017 I have lots of fun memories of but the one you mentioned 2018 in one of Bristol I have loads of photos from as well. And this is when I met the whole reclaim team. I think in person for the first time up to that point I'd only met Jim and this was the year where shoes really came into being at OER and these main shoes are like I think these are Lorna Campbell's keynote shoes and she was having like there were little anchors on there and it was like on the harbor in Bristol. So for those of you who understand about the world of shoe tweets, this was definitely it. But the video launch was so awesome and I have a picture here. So this is I think Daniel Daniel's picture and it was like a VHS tape that played on the cinema screen and this is the VHS tape. So I still have that and we were just talking about this before. This is the this is the actual tape. So I don't have a VHS recorder to play it anymore, but I still have the tape. I have to find the video somewhere. I was trying to find it on the on our YouTube channel before, but we actually recorded the V8 the video on to the VHS tape, which I thought was like hilarious throughout the whole thing and we filmed the video like on I think Tim's iPhone at the time for the day we filmed which is so super funny. All right, I know that I'll place the link in this court to the OER opening video because I think it will be on there. But yeah, it'll be it was so fun and one of the other things that I took away from the conference was this remixer that Brian Mothers made for the OER conference at the time and I'll put the link in there as well. But basically you can change the text and then you can change the colors and it was one of the first sort of remixes that I ever really had a big play with and I still use it. And like I found it was absolutely awesome to to have that from Brian. So yeah, really appreciate it. And there were a lot of stickers and other gifts like there were so many t-shirts and things like that I took away with from that conference. It was just really awesome. There was lots of drawing. So yeah, the OER conference. Oh, this is a picture of behind the scenes in the projection room where my colleague Martin Hooksey at the time was like behind the scenes during the online delivery. I think you're still in the OER remix tab. Oh, yeah. There we go. Yeah. And that's Brian Lam's son. That's right. Yes. He had his name, but he traveled all the way. Harry, he traveled all the way with him for the conference. That was so fun. That's right. And I think that was really that was a really awesome way of looking back at that as well. And I was just I'm just going to go back up because there were some really fun pictures of drawings and yeah, lots of things that pictures that I had of the of the conference. Cool. And then I had some I think I had some pictures here of the OER 19 conference. Oh, no, that's mainly just remixes. Sorry. Yeah, there is definitely the this piece of art. Do you remember this? And that is yeah, Brian made for the OER by the Mainz one as well. I have Brian Mothers. So yeah, and that was the awesome OER by the Mainz. Yeah, I love that. I think there's definitely one of my favorite ones. Yeah. And this was a big conference of art work too. Absolutely. Yeah. Cool. Anyway, so there are some pictures for me as well. And yeah, obviously this year I get to go to the OER conference kind of as a delegate rather than as an organizer. So I'm doubly looking forward to it because it will be a little bit like going on holiday for me. So yeah, I'm excited for that. There too. And it's a new you and Martin are also presenting on a fun level as well. So it'll be really fun. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, we're so I'm doing two presentations, one with you and Jim and one with Martin Weller. And yeah, we're going to talk a bit about sort of blogging, obviously blogging. And the hallmark of all open practice throughout all time and also podcasting and radio. So yeah, I'm definitely going to get a couple of radio moments in there. So we'll have some fun like doing a little bit of play around vinyl casting on DS 106. Oh, fun. That'll be awesome. There might even be live broadcasting from the conference. You know, amazing. Yeah, so we can talk a little bit about our presentation that reclaim will be putting on as well if that works. So we have a 15 minute session on the theme five within the conference and self innovative pedagogies and creative education. And we're titling it reclaim hashtag reclaiming a hashtag attack for life in open education and focusing on how a lot of our work is done in the community and how we're creating the solutions for a lot of folks that we see within within the community itself and kind of finding our niche there, which I'm super excited for and kind of teasing some new things and some new product offerings as a result as well. Yeah, I really love that. And I think, you know, I'm really hoping that we can give a shout out to activities around, you know, open and community building like this kind of chat and and what would we did on Wednesday with Alan, but also kind of, you know, the challenges of making ed tech expertise openly accessible. And I think, you know, I always find that people who are already enthusiastic about all things open kind of make the effort to find, you know, find stuff that they want to they they have their RSS readers that are they are there, you know, they are in the tent and they're not like necessarily the people who need the most help getting there because they are already enthusiastic. They already see the benefits of open education. But I think that's one of the pieces I'm excited about is that, you know, in Reclaim, we have so many new folk joining the community. They sign up for a domain of their own and they take a first step, you know, and then they don't already know all the people, you know, they don't know where to start with. They might be the only person in their college or in their course who does this and they might be like, oh, you know, am I the only one? Like I meet so many people who are like, I think I'm the only one who's interested in this and I'm like, no, no, there's like, there's thousands of people who are interested in this. You just haven't met them yet. And I think part of our role, you know, like being ambassadors of open education in general, as well as the stuff that Reclaim does, you know, as a business, I think that's the really thing that I'm so excited about, you know, because like I, you know, I'm totally converted by the OER conference to open practice. And I think a lot of the stuff that we do day to day, you know, is designed to pull people in and say, hey, you know, are you new to having a domain of your own? Are you new to administrating this for students? Here are other people to connect with. Here are people you can meet who have the same experiences, the same problem, and you can learn from each other. And so that's why I'm really excited about kind of sharing with people as well. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I definitely agree there and we're hoping to showcase the existing projects like we have like the Discord, which a lot of you are chatting through from our peer tube instance where we're live right now and in the Discord app itself. But Taylor has done a lot of work to help kind of build out this Discord server to foster that community. So I'm like super excited for to showcase all of that sort of stuff as well. Yeah. And, you know, the kind of things like our colleague Amanda as well, like, you know, I'm so like inspired by the recent case study that Amanda published with, you know, and looking at sort of how one course can empower students in in new ways, you know, and and that is such a that is such a transformative experience like, you know, if the students gain that control over their online identity through a publishing course, you know, that is a skill set that they can go on to develop and that they are going to keep having as students, but also as professionals and they're going to have a completely different relationship with, you know, the Internet and the stuff that they do on there. If they have like, you know, their own domain, their own place, they have some idea about it. And I think that's sort of, you know, I think we have a privilege in that we work with people who are so excited about the stuff all the time, but like OER is magical for bringing new people into the tent each year who are just discovering this who are like, wow, I've just found open textbooks, you know, and we're like, wow, open textbooks like they've been around for 20 years, but there are, you know, so many more people who can benefit from the stuff. So yeah, I think like that's what, you know, things like the reclaimed video launch and things like really helps people get over that barrier of sort of, I'm not an expert. It's not for me and be like, oh, this looks fun. Maybe I could have a go. Yeah, absolutely. Or having that fear of like not knowing everything, but then the person you're sitting next to is like the expert of everything. So you don't know how to like approach them to talk about the specific topic or anything like that, like that's always been something that that I fall into. Sometimes it's like, if I don't really know, I don't know how to like talk about it. But I've always been so appreciative of like of the whole community itself, like you and the reclaimed crew and honestly, everybody I've met at OER too, like it's been so fun to talk through and get that the learning different topics of all of that. So I'm super excited to see what everybody talks about too. So the keynotes themselves, like I'm really excited to talk about them. So or to hear their talks too. So if we want to go through like what is in store there? Yeah, that's a good idea. So yeah, we're just screen sharing the OER website just to highlight a few things we're really looking forward to. And you just mentioned the keynotes, Amanda. So there is, sorry, not Amanda, Meredith. I'm still thinking about Amanda and the case study. So yeah, the keynotes speakers this year look fabulous. You know, and I think like, I know we're all big fans of Rajiv and I must admit like how much I love Rajiv. I'm even more excited this year to hear Katherine and Laura speak together because they are a new book Higher Education for Good, Teaching and Learning Futures is like such a fabulous project. And I know that, you know, many people who'll be listening to this and watching this have probably already read and downloaded it. But I think this is one of the biggest kind of sort of pieces to come out of open education to really kind of show a new vision for the field for quite a while. So, you know, I've had the privilege of meeting Laura and Katherine before and I'm so excited to see them, you know, coming together to celebrate this. So yeah, I wasn't successful getting a chapter into the book. I made a proposal, but I am still the biggest fan of this fantastic collection. So yeah, I'm really looking forward to that. Yeah, absolutely. And Rajiv was a keynote at Reclaim Open in this past June. So I'm very excited to see him again and speak and honestly like his presentation was amazing at Reclaim Open. So I'm so excited to hear that. And I am actually going to read the book too before Katherine and Laura speak because I think that would be great airplane reading while we're traveling over so that that'll be so fun. Yeah, I agree. And I think all the themes this year, you know, look really so spot on. And I think I saw online like an update that, you know, the ticket sales are close to full. Like I think there's a need like a 10% or so of the tickets left. So there's not a lot more people to fit in. So you can really tell that these themes have really resonated with the community. And, you know, the OER conference is ultimately the UK's Open Education Conference. You know, that's what it was originally intended to be. And, you know, I've been fortunate to be involved with it for, you know, I don't know, 10 years now. But I think it's sort of become much more of a dialogue between all the UK and Ireland colleagues who attend every year and international folks who join in and really enliven and enrich that program as well. So the themes I'm particularly excited about, you know, is the equity and inclusion piece. Like that is always so critical. But also the ethical dimensions like around AI and OER creation, like that is one piece that I'm really interested in. And I know some of the colleagues from the GOGN network are going to be specifically speaking on that topic as well. So that I'm excited about. Are there any themes that you're particularly interested in this year? I like love them all actually like looking at them again. The AI is always so interesting to kind of think about like as like in an educational aspect of it too because you just see so much about like quick content creation on AI and that sort of thing. So like kind of think I've never really thought about it in an educational perspective. So I think that'll be really kind of kind of interesting to look through and see where we can go with it. So yeah, that was super cool. Well, I think we need to give a big shout out also to the co-chairs and Tom like both of them I've learned both them for a couple of years and obviously I've had so much fun with Tom Farrelly in over the years in the GASTA session. So I don't know how you feel about these but they're a big favorite of mine. And sort of for those of you have met a GASTA session before it's a five minute short session and Tom has made these his own. He is the GASTA master and the one and only and he is absolutely wonderful in getting the audience engaged and one of the unique aspects of doing a GASTA is that Tom conducts the audience to count down from one to five in a number of ways. So sometimes you have to get up and get down. You have to move right and left on each number. You always count, you know, in Gaelic. So it's like you have to learn all the numbers and it's like a whole sort of wonderful way of breaking the ice and letting five minute presentations really shine. So I think last year when we were up in Inverness like the room was packed for the GASTAs more than for the keynotes because everybody was like I must not miss that. So that was I think Jim was giving a GASTA last year and it was absolutely fabulous. Oh, awesome. Yeah, I've never been in a GASTA session. So I'm excited. That'll be really fun. Now that you talked about it, I remember hearing about Lauren and Jim's recap of all of them. So that's super fun. Yeah, definitely. Although it can also so one of the kind of funnest parts that Tom is very passionate about is when people run over they're five minutes and he's kind of very dramatic about interrupting the five minute deadline. And it's just, you know, like, you know, it really makes the most of a five minute conference presentation. So and I'm really looking forward to going to Cork as well. I have never been to Cork before, although I've been to Ireland. So I'm really looking forward to kind of seeing Cork and going to visit a new university. So that I am pretty excited about. Yeah, absolutely. I went to Cork back in 2016. My dad's side of the family is actually from the, his mother's side is from Cork. So I'm going over a couple of days early to visit some of that family. So that will be very fun. But I've never been in the city itself. Just the county surrounding areas. So very excited for it itself. I just spotted in Discord, Mark posted a link to a fantastic session on Brian Alexander's future Transform recently where Catherine and Laura were discussing their new book. So I've watched that session as well. And that was really fantastic. So thanks, Mark, for sharing that. Absolutely cool. So Meredith, I'm wondering like now we've talked a lot about OER and what the conference is about. I'm curious, like you said, this was your first kind of OER in person. Is there kind of anything that's changed for you in terms of preparing for a conference or preparing for international travel over the last few years? Because like last year, it was my first OER back in person and I did do some things differently to what I would have done before. Yeah, I've just started thinking through like what it'll look like for travel because this will be my first international trip since the pandemic. So I'm interested to see how it goes. I'm not worried about the travel aspect of it just because like I'm used to all of that, like the changes. I was in New Orleans in July for the WordPress Campus, WP Campus Conference, but this will be my third second time speaking at OER here. I'm so bad at remembering. So I think in terms of like preparation, I kind of want to turn it into a little bit of a blog post style of like the way that I approach the presentation to kind of like help outline. Like honestly, I feel like having it written down is like more of an outline than we'll have slides and that sort of thing too. But I think that method helps me kind of frame like get my thoughts out of my head onto paper instead of trying to like do it slide by slide. I do feel like I'm better talking in front of people because the way that I shifted from speaking in like a college setting into like the virtual space of like having a screen in front of me, I feel like a lot of a lot more comfortable talking in front of people. The streams that we do through at Tech and all of that sort of stuff is like definitely helped. And like running the conference virtually through when we did OER by domains, that really helped. So I'm definitely excited to see like how the presentation itself really goes in that aspect. But I'm definitely still, excuse me, thinking through how to present the presentation like the preparing for the presentation instead of presenting it in that scenario. Like I think we'll definitely practice beforehand, but having it in that block post I think makes a lot more sense in my head than working through slide by slide sort of scenario of like notes. Yeah. Oh, I love that. And you know, like blogging in OER go together like I don't know the best kinds of things in life. So I think that's genius. So I'm looking forward to that. Yeah, absolutely. I was just thinking through adding to my calendar like the dedicated deadline of like, okay, I need to sit down and do this. I think that's that thinking through like that structured approach versus like all wing it the day of sort of thing, which never really wanted to do for a conference. You want to like prepare as much as possible for sure. But I think that will be good. And I definitely need to dust my blog off. I told myself I needed to blog a little bit more and I have a draft of like the word the WP campus post that I was supposed to put out in July sitting there. So I gotta I gotta write that. Well, I'm sure you'll find loads of renewed energy for blogging and that's one of the things I love about travel. Like I think I often have like ideas when I've been to an event and then like on the way home, you know, when you have those kind of hours where you're waiting for a plane or you're having transfer time or something and I'm like, you know, just like making loads of notes so that that I can share that when I get back. Yeah, absolutely. What are you doing to prepare? Like how are you kind of approaching the the conference itself this year? I think also like you, I'm keen to prepare for the talks and I'm giving like I'm preparing with two presentations where they're both really short and they're both with, you know, obviously other people, which is so much fun, but it also means that I have to be more disciplined about not just making it up on the day. So that's important. But also like as I was saying, like it's like I'm so thrilled to be able to go to the conference this year and you know, be there as a delegate. So that is a big change for me and a really welcome one. Like, you know, I'm a huge fan of the conference, but when you are involved in organizing it as you well know, from the years when we ran it together, you just work so much and you don't really get to enjoy it as an event. So I'm looking forward to it as well. So I'm looking forward to that. But also I think like last year, I really noticed my social battery was kind of just like draining quite fast because people were all excited about seeing each other and there was so much hugging and chatting and catching up, which was amazing. But after like two hours of that, I was like, right, I need a little walk on my own, like just to recharge and calm down. And on the way home and we travel back like sort of we had like a morning in Inverness before traveling home. And like we went for a walk and we just had a completely silent walk, but we were both just chatted out. I mean, there wasn't anything else to say. We were both like, oh, let's just have silence. I think that is something that surprised me how towering I found it. So yeah, the best possible way. So absolutely. Yeah. I'm planning in. Awesome. Yeah, cool. I'm super excited for it. I was, wow, what were we talking about yesterday about the there's something that like I solidified the final travel plans of everything and oh, this is like definitely definitely happening. Like it's it's it's like on the radar. It's no longer like super far out in front of you. And I'm like, I'm like getting super excited for it. So yeah. So well, talking of blogging and I'm hoping that we can share a little preview of what we're going to do on the reclaimed blog in the coming weeks. So, you know, if you're listening to this and you're not able to come to the conference, never fear. We will definitely share what we're going to talk about on the blog and also I don't know if we might do a follow-up to where we are on here as well. Yes, absolutely. I would love to do one of those. They're always so fun to have like the kind of deep brief session of like of a stream or a podcast, whatever we decide even radio broadcast to that be super fun. So absolutely awesome. I'm really looking forward to it. And yeah, thank you everybody for joining in today. It's been so nice to catch up and I am still following some of the links on Discord in the chat as well for some of the things everybody shared. So thank you for doing that. Yeah, absolutely. Cool. Well, we will catch you in the next live stream. Some events coming up. We've got our EdTech workshop for domain of one zone and WordPress multi-site. They're both one-on-one sessions as new administrators. We've got that next week on the 21st and 22nd. So Wednesday, Thursday, next week. So definitely check that out. And we've got some fun streams coming up as well afterwards. We're going to do a deep brief session on Friday next week of the workshop itself. And then we've got looking at our event calendar really quick. So I think we have one session coming up in on March 1st with Anne-Marie Scott, where we're going to talk about using open source tools as key infrastructure, which I am very excited about. And I mean, I'm a big fan of Anne-Marie's work in any case, but like it's rare that we get to have her kind of not give a structured presentation. We kind of just talk at her best about all the stuff that she's doing with the open ETC and with her own work. So yeah, I'm super excited with that. Yeah, that will be awesome for sure. So cool. We've got all of those and stay tuned for more. We've got more planned this year as well. So check the blog, check our newsletter, all that good stuff. So awesome. Thank you, Mary. And I'm so glad we got to sit down and chat. Oh, we are. And we have some fun stuff planned. So all right. Enjoy the rest of the Friday, everybody watching. And you, Mary, as well. So we will chat soon. Thanks, Marida. Thanks, everybody for joining in. Yeah.