focused on the wrong literacy

In 2018, while working for the government of Finland, I developed a model of network literacies. Today our Prime Minister says that Canadians need to develop AI literacy and he even has a Minister of AI to implement it. Let’s look back at network literacies — They could be described as individuals and communities understanding and being part of global networks that influence various aspects of our lives. For individuals, the core skill is critical thinking, or questioning all assumptions, including one’s own. People can learn though their various communities and develop social literacy. Information literacy is improved by connecting to a diversity of networks. But control of networks by any single source — such as Generative AI platforms — destroys the ability for people and communities to develop real network era fluency, which is not good for society in the long run and may kill innovation and our collective ability to adapt. Mass network era fluency can ensure that networks remain…