So I went to NetHui2013

I spent two and 1/2 days in Wellington at NetHui this week, missing the first part of Monday. I want to understand what internet issues are. I am an internet user. I was surrounding with people who "get the internet" and "make the internet". As someone tweeted (wished I captured!) "if the building was to collapse it would set back New Zealand for years to come!"

InternetNZ organises NetHui. It has been a great opportunity to understand better the role and work of InternetNZ, it above all feels right and it is well beyond worth my humble membership!  Jordan Carter's (Internet NZ Chief Executive) Scene Setting Comments for NetHui is a great intro.

My few lines won't make the event justice:
Bill Bennett's Ten Things we learned from NetHui  is a sounder analysis!

NetHui brought together all sorts of people from all walks of kiwi life to talk about the internet and how it shapes what they do or rather how they shape it? Who knows... 

If you wanted to read up and see the wealth of conversations that took place, head over to Conversation, where all the collaborative note taking is compiled. This has got to be one great thing about the internet, the fact that I have spent the last hour "rewinding" through NetHui! I have learnt soooo much at a frantic pace. And I need to revisit. And the most relevant will rise to the surface faster while much will  have given me reasons and impetus to explore further.
There were a few highly clued up edu-peeps, and a few teachers talking  Open Internet Networked Learning and Making BYOD work. Wished I had some students to introduce to the youth forum too!

The beauty of these three days is that I spent them out of my depth!
> I am listening to people from "another" world, whose interest in and understanding of the internet reach far beyond mine at first glance and whose activity and/or raison d être have been also deeply turned upside down by the internet  (security, journalism, music, health, business, role of the state, open data...)
> I venture a few comments and contributions here and there as the format of each session, with a mic being passed around, manages to invite me to take a bit of a chance: many venture comments, that is what makes the conversation progress...
> I come to realise as the days progress that many an Internet issue actually deeply concerns me: public interest vs national security, copyright, open source, access for all (Rural, disabilities etc), privacy, digital literacies, identity...

What I take home from NetHui is that the internet is about people, faith in people: relationships, partnerships, high trust, it is also about building together, including,  it is about voice, it is about choice, it is about being pro active, being free to act, to self regulate, organise... All of those "things" I can see baking in every single child in an NZ school and that in fact apply to all!

Quinn Norton (who has covered extensively Hacktivism and the Occupy movement) gave a breathtaking (literally thanks to the pace of her "tweet" like statements) keynote (I hope the recording becomes available soon and I will edit here with it). She speaks about liminality,  refers to the internet as the Network and its disorganised, organic nature,  that is throwing doubt to established ways, talks about moving from democracy to do a cracy. 
The one concept I related to straight away in her keynote was her mention of Agency:

Agency is the key word that totally underpins all of my thoughts and interest and practice in eportfolio. That is another story, a personal and professional journey, but it is absolutely enabled through experiencing for myself the transformative powers of the Internet.