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The emergence and huge success of 2.0 applications on the internet and, more specifically, of social networks, has led to new questions being asked as to the potential of the latter as learning platforms. Social networks are an important space for sharing learning resources and an opportunity for the collective construction of knowledge. Several authors consider that the learning acquired from participating in social networks does not follow the parameters associated with on-site education, or with what we can now begin to call “traditional e-learning”. Therefore, the need presents for considering the characteristics of this 2.0 learning: Do social networks provide a real learning opportunity? In what way and what are its characteristics? The purpose of this chapter is to offer an initial approach to the changes in the methods and practices of academic staff and students when learning using these social networks, specifically Facebook.

This paper presents a case study on the design of mobile applications for on-line learning, based on the needs of its potential users. From the User-Centered Design (UCD) perspective and based on a qualitative approach, in-depth interviews have been held with students who carry out learning-related tasks in a commuting context, together with ethnographic observations of this context. The objective of this research was to understand the needs and requirements of students who learn on-line and who take advantage of their travel time to study or to carry out study-related tasks. Through the content analysis of the data gathered, the tasks carried out by students in a mobile context are contemplated, detecting their inconveniences and needs. From this analysis m-learning application scenarios have been built based on the potential users' requirements.

Despite the fact that the Digital Ink Book (DIB) has been developing over the past 10 years in different contexts, it has not made its presence felt within university education. This paper focuses on experimental educational use of the e-book in the context of a virtual university. Based on the available technologies, this research for technological innovation in education aims to carry out a pilot test with the students on the Digital Literacy and Exclusion course from a user centred design (UCD) perspective. Each student received a Digital Ink Book (DIB) for use in both the reading and working notes necessary for learning the different topics that make up the course. The data gathering was divided into a field diary kept by students participating in the DIB pilot test, a final report from each student about their own process of acquiring digital literacy in relation to the DIB, a virtual forum for the course, where the students commented on their difficulties and discoveries in using the DIB, and individual interviews with the students participating in the project once the experiment was finished. Through a content analysis of collected data we mapped the processes used by the students as strategies for the study of the university material using the DIB from a UCD perspective.

Currently, one of the main issues of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) in the area of e-Health is the design of telemedicine services based on the study of interactions established between people and new technologies. Nevertheless, the research in HCI has been mainly focused from a cognitive point of view, and most studies don't consider other variables related to the social impact of technology. This gap is extremely important in e-Health, because Information Systems (IS) changes qualitatively work processes in health organizations. In this paper we present an interdisciplinary perspective that includes the cognitive and organizational aspects to the technical design of new e-Health services in the area of telecardiology. The results obtained permit to accurately define not only technical requirements and network resources management, but also user requirements, contextual particularities of the scenarios where these services could be implemented and the IS impact in organizational processes. Moreover, the ethnographical methodology proposed has been applied to specific emergencies scenarios, obtaining conclusions that allow new user-centered designs that can be directly integrated in medical practice in an efficient way.