Stephen Downes

Knowledge, Learning, Community

Nov 15, 2000

November, 2000: Time to update my sources list - readers may find it interesting to compare this list with the last one, which I compiled in March, 2000.

  • Acme City
    Occasional email newsletter from a site which allows you to build your own online entertainment community. Good for giving me knowledge about online communities from the inside.

  • Active Worlds Newsletter
    Active Worlds is one of the more promising virtual worlds technologies and their monthly email newsletter keeps me up to date on news and developments.

  • Alertbox
    Web usability guru Jakob Nielson publishes this email newsletter roughly every two weeks. Nielson concentrates on the nuances of web site design with an emphasis on ease of use and accessibility.

  • A List Apart
    Monthly discussion in digest form by web site developers and artists. Examines issues like how much to charge for design, cross browser issues, new design technology, and more. Pretty good, but was more useful when it was a proper discussion list.

  • BadBart
    Discussion list for NTN Trivia Players. Classic example of an online community of interest. Much noise, little signal.

  • Best of ZDNet
    Weekly email newsletter from ZDNet highlighting links from their many subject areas, including Berst, Software updates, and more.

  • Boston Review Newswire
    Weekly email newsletter containing links to articles in MIT's Boston Review, a journal covering culture, media and politics. Topical and sometime edgy content, which is why I like it.

  • CADE-ACED
    Canadian Association for Distance Education mailing list. Very low frequency list filled mainly with announcements from the Canadian distance learning community.

  • CAnet-3-News
    CAnet-3 is the world's fastest internet network, which means it pushes the frontiers. This irregular series of postings from Bill St. Arnaud covers high speed fiber networks and applications.

  • CORPED
    Busy mailing list dedicated to the growing field of corporate education. Sometimes rehashes some very old issues, but more often rides the pulse of corporate training, corporate universities and the learning economy.

  • Canada.Internet.Com
    Weekly newsletter focusing on the Canadian information technology industry; a good source for Canadian government internet news plus the major corporate plays.

  • Content Spotlight
    This weekly email newsletter is published by Content Exchange and provides advice and information for web authors, content producers and content syndicators.

  • Democracies Online Newswire
    Irregular but frequent publication written by Minnesota E-Democracy pioneer Steven Clift. Looks at online voting, community forums, politics and government sevices. Very current, very relevant.

  • DEOS-L
    The Distance Education Online Symposium is a busy list populated by distance education practitioners. Discussion mostly focuses on pedagogy and methodology, with the occasional nod toward technology.

  • Digging Deeper
    Moderately busy mailing list delving into specific aspects of online learning. Which aspects? That's not clear. Some useful resources, some good chatter among practitioners.

  • Distance-Educator.Com Daily News
    Daily summary of distance education and online learning news gleaned from newspapers, trade pubs, and (mostly) press release sites. The format still needs a little work (the web site version is a lot better; I don't see why they don't just send that), but it is an essential read in any case.

  • E&P Newsletter Weekly digest of information and news from the online publishing industry. Great source for items about online syndication, content distribution, and more.

  • E-Commerce Minute
    A daily email publication distributed by the E-Commerce Times, this useful item looks at business and technology developments in the field of e-commerce.

  • Eduprise - Need to Know
    Excellent bi-weekly email publication distributed by Eduprise, an e-learning company. Provides the week's top ten stories in the field of educational technology, the top five of which are really must-reads.

  • Elearningpost Daily Links
    Daily selection of important links from the work of online learning. Good links, good summaries. A cross between technological developments and reports in the popular press, with a bit of an emphasis on corporate learning (an odd combination, to be sure). Useful.

  • ENM_News
    Edmonton New Media News is an email newsletter published more or less once a week by Edmonton New Media. A good source for upcoming seminars and worksops in the Edmonton region.

  • Environment Canada E-Eather Forecast
    Daily weather report for the Edmonton area (you can select your own area) and links to other reports I can follow when I'm on the road.

  • From the Ether
    Weekly opinion column written written by ethernet inventor Bob Metcalfe. Provides an insider's view if internet and networking technologies.

  • Gamespot Spotlight
    This weekly email newsletter published by ZDNet keeps me up to date on the gaming community (where the best innovations always begin).

  • Gamesville Times
    Self-proclaimed "news you don't need", this useless publication keeps members of Lycos's gaming community informed about, well, nothing.

  • Guerrilla Media
    A culture jamming site from british Columbia, Guerilla Media sends occasional notices advertising their most recent project. The projects are generally quite good, but they're infrequent.

  • Ideas in the News
    This innovative bi-weekly newsletter from MeansBusiness identifies a half dozen or so ideas from the preceeding two weeks' news. One of the best examples of data mining I have seen, and the ideas are fresh, high quality and relevant. A must read.

  • Individual.Com
    Daily news summaries from selected categories (my personal list includes reports from online learning, internet, new media, etc.). Leans heavily on press releases and company publications, but still provides useful information, a lot of which never makes the mainstream press. Awkward to use, however, as it requires a log-on to view the stories, which means I can't share links or read the site from a remote computer.

  • Industry Standard's Daily News
    Daily email briefing on internet business and technology events.

  • Infoworld Scoop
    Another daily email briefing on internet business and technology events.

  • Inscriptions
    A weekly email publication directed toward web-based and internet writers. Includes writing tips, placement and syndication information, and advice for the writing community.

  • Inside1to1
    A weekly email newsletter published by the Peppers and Rogers Group on one-to-one strategies, success stories and technologies. Covers branding issues, customer service and internet marketing generally.Good anecdotes and leads to new customization technologies and applications.

  • International Forum of Educational Technology & Society
    Modertaely busy mailing list devoted to new technology and learning. An off-shoot of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Learning Technology Task Force (LTTF). Which means the content is very authoritative and cutting edge.

  • Internet Day
    This daily email publication features a column by a different columnist from the e-commerce community each issue. As a result the content is very spotty, which means a lot of culling to find that one nugget in twelve issues.

  • Infoworld Scoop
    Daily email publication covering breaking technology news and the product reviews. Includes regular roundups of networking, application development and e-commerce, coverage.

  • Internet Architect Spotlight
    Produced by The Standard, this weekly features a notable individual who is influencing the internet. I don't always like their selections (a venture capitalist is not an internet architect, for example) and read this only occasionally.

  • I-Syndicate Express
    Occasional email newsletter published by I-Syndicate, the content providers for the news links I provide on my web site. Keeps me in touch with current syndication technology.

  • Jesse Berst's Anchordesk
    ZDNet's flagship email column (in my opinion anyways), this daily publication comments on trends and developments online.

  • Learning Circuits Express
    Published monthly by the American Society for Training and Development, Learning Circuits examines new technologies and how they are being applied for workplace learning. A little off-beat but a good indicator of current trends.

  • Media Grok
    An email newsletter published daily by the Industry Standard, Media Grok looks at the press coverage of selected internet issues. Not only is this the best across-the-board coverage of these issues, their commentary and links give you a good sense of each source's biases and predispositions.

  • Moreover Webmaster News
    Reasonably infrequent (weekly, I think) email sent from the content syndication site Moreover to webmasters who have registered for their headline syndication service. Announces new content categories, mostly, with some company news.

  • MP3.Communicator
    Somewhere in time I signed up for something at MP3 and I have been receiving this newsletter ever since. I don't really read it, but I haven't unsubscribed either.

  • MuniMall Newsletter
    Weekly review of online governance and politics directed toward the Alberta municipal sector. Disclaimer: I produce MuniMall Newsletter.

  • Net Politics Happy Hour
    Infrequent mailings from a Washington D.C. based collection of internet politic activists. More often than not focuses on social events in that city, but occasionally contains a nugget of information unavailable elsewhere.

  • NetPulse
    Biweekly journal of politicking on the internet, this email newsletter is packed with news and information including new technology, websites and organizations, political news and more.

  • Networking
    An email newsletter published every two weeks by Ontario's The Node, Networking covers developments in learning technologies from colleges, universities, government, and organizations across Canada and relevant news from around the world. Useful resource.

  • NewApps Software Archives
    Daily listing of twenty or more new software releases. Provides links to information and download areas. Good resource, but hard to keep up.

  • NewsLinx
    Twice daily round-up of the internet industry's top forty stories culled from major publications around the world. A fantastic resource.

  • NewsTrolls
    Daily summary of news and trends in the online community with a focus on open source, the hacker community, Asia and online stocks. Disclosure: I am a part owner of NewsTrolls.

  • Notes from the Field
    A weekly column written by Robert X. Cringely, Notes from the Field looks at the impact of new technology on everyday life. An interesting, offbeat column which sometimes points me to great links.

  • NUA Internet Surveys
    Frequent (almost daily) Irish-based email newsletter focussed on internet demographics and trends, measuring such things as internet use, user attitudes, sales figures and more.

  • NUA Knowledge News
    Good daily set of news reports in the field of knowledge management and internet publishing, including copyright issues, wireless and broadband technology, knowledge systems, concepts and philosophy. Crisp, clear articles. Very relevant and timely.

  • Online Community Report
    Twice monthly email publication focusing on the development and evolution of online communities and the online community industry. Excellent source for an insider's look at community building and maintenance, plus links to the best community software and hosts.

  • Online Journalism Review
    Weekly review of articles devoted to online journalism produced by the Annenberg School of Journalism at USC. Covers a wide range of issues but with a focus on internet publications. Critical, analytical, sometimes scathing, this excellent publication puts online news reporting into perspective.

  • RLO
    Mailing list devoted to the discussion of reusable learning objects. Low volume list, but is used to announce events and presentations (including regular Centra Symposium online presentations).

  • RSS-DEV
    Discussion list for developers working on the RSS (RDF Site Summary) protocols. Fairly busy; I subscribe in digest form. Often quite technical. Useful source of announcements and resources related to content syndication.

  • Scout Report
    The successor to NetHappenings, this weekly email newsletter advertises new and important site launches as filtered by University of Wisconsin librarians and educators.

  • SiteExperts
    daily email newsletter dedicated to the web site architecture and production community; good resources but very Microsoft-IE-ASP biased, which is too bad.

  • Slashdot
    A daily email news summary focusing on Linux and open source technology, hacker and coder issues, and internet culture.

  • Smart Communities News Bulletin
    Infrequent email publication from Industry Canada providing information and updates on the SmartCommunities program.

  • Spark Online
    Monthly journal focusing on new media and culture. Interesting, alternative and a little quirky.

  • Stay Free!
    Stay Free! is a nonprofit magazine examining commercialism and American culture published about every ten months by Carrie McLaren, who also sends more frequent updates roughly once a month by email.

  • Stop The Presses!
    Weekly column by media pundit Editor & Publisher Interactive's Steve Outing covering the growing internet publishing industry. Good content from an insider's perspective.

  • SupportIndustry Newsletter
    Weekly newsletter looking at technology and processes for online customer service training and support.

  • Syndication
    Moderate volume (I subscribe to the digest) mailing list discussing XML news syndication formats. The home of RSS (not to be confused with the other RSS, discussed at RSS-DEV) development.

  • Tantalizing Media Tittlebits
    An email newsletter published occasionally by Guerrilla Media - "Media Monkeywrenching for British Columbia" - the Tattler takes an irrevrant look at Canadian new and old-line media.

  • TechLearn Trends
    Useful monthly email newsletter published by Elliott Masie of the Masie Centre. Focuses on computer and online learning, especially from a corporate and industry point of view, but with frequent nods to the university and public sector.

  • Technology Source
    Published once every two months of the University of North Carolina, this refereed journal highlights issues and trends in learning technology. Disclosure: I am on the TS editorial board.

  • UWEBD
    A moderately busy mailing list directed toward university website webmasters and administrators. Discussion jumps from server technologies to scripting hints to university website policies.

  • Virtual U Gazette
    Monthly publication by Vicky Phillips of GetEducated.Com. Excellent encapsulated round-up of news in the field of virtual universities and online learning, focusing mostly on institutional trends such as new courses and programs. Also has quite a good jobs listing, heh heh.

  • VISUAL-XML-TALK
    Slowish discussion list on XML and databases hosted by Bluestone.Com, a company which manufactures software which produces XML from database sources. The software never did work for me, but the list keeps me informed.

  • WebReference Update
    Twice weekly email publication with links to articles on the WebReference site. Covers web site authoring and authoring tools, including XML, DHTML, PERL and much much more.

  • Wired News
    Formerly published by Wired Magazine, this daily set of articles looks at online culture and technology. Sometimes cheesy, sometimes commercially biased, Wired News is consistently the first out with product and startup announcments and the like.

  • Wireless World
    A useful weekly email newsletter from InfoWorld discussing new technologies, software and applications in the field of wireless connectivity.

  • WriteTheWeb Daily News Digest
    Really good online publication devoted to issues related to writing for online publications. Articles are forward looking, well researched, clearly written and highly relevant.

  • WWWDEV
    A moderately busy list directed toward world wide web courseware developers. Generally ahead of the field, especially with regard to new technologies and techniques.

  • XML
    Not so busy discussion list on XML in general hosted by Project Cool. Occasionally provides links to new resources; some of the discussion is also useful.

  • xmlTree
    Easily the ugliest email newsletter ever designed, published infrequently, and with links which don't always work, this XML newsletter is useful in representing the very edge of new XML applications and technology.

  • ZDNet's Software Express
    Daily listing of new software. Brazenly commercial and a bit hit-and-miss but interesting if only to follow sofware development trends.



  • Stephen Downes Stephen Downes, Casselman, Canada
    stephen@downes.ca

    Copyright 2024
    Last Updated: Mar 29, 2024 03:46 a.m.

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