(photo from Jeff McNeill’s Flickr photostream via his Creative Commons licensing agreement)

I’m having enormous fun, participating in a free course on facilitating online community, led by Leigh Blackall of the Kiwi-based Otago Polytechnic.

There are over 60 people in this course, which is organized through a wiki curriculum/schedule and synchronous Elluminate sessions. We’ve been communicating through mandatory blogs and non-required mailing list conversations, and it’s been wild! The content of the course is brilliant, with an excellent reading list, and the interaction with the other students is priceless.

I’ve been blogging away on my dedicated new "Facilitating Online Community, aka Herding Cats" blog, if you’re interested in checking out what I’m learning and how I’m reacting to it in more depth.