Open Badges Closed

Well, that was another massive waste of time. For all the hype and hope of having truly transportable awards for training and achievement, backed by Mozilla, no less, the current state of play is pretty disappointing.

I’m running an online resource for some of my students using Moodle, and have been experimenting with badges for minor achievements to help them remain motivated in an unpressurised way, in what is otherwise a highly pressurised programme. Feedback from them has been that the badges are just a bit of fun, really, and not a significant feature of the course. However, talking to one of the students recently revealed that if the badges were to be publicly show-offable, such as on a LinkedIn profile, then they would add a new level of significance that might help them work just that little bit harder to earn these little digital stickers.

Enabling the backpack link within Moodle and trying it for myself (yes, I have awarded myself one of my own badges, for testing purposes obv), I discover that the whole open badges thing is now dead, having been abandoned by Mozilla. Simple issues such as having multiple email accounts within the backpack remain of no interest as the whole idea withers and dies.

Shame. This whole internet thing seemed like a good idea when it was new.