By Stephen Downes
June 5, 2003
ContentGuard and ObjectLab Collaborate to
Provide Support for MPEG-REL Within Open
IPMP
From the press release: "ContentGuard and
Objectlab today announced the companies have collaborated
to enhance the open source project, OpenIPMP, with support
for the forthcoming industry standard rights expression
language, MPEG-REL. By making available source code for
MPEG-REL interpretation and generation tools within the
OpenIPMP framework, both companies hope to promote and
drive the adoption of interoperable standards for Digital
Rights Management (DRM)." I wish they would rename
OpenIPMP; I keep misreading it. Anyhow, it is available on
SourceForge under Mozilla Public License
(MPL) 1.1. By Press Release, ContentGuard, June 5, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Contract Illuminates Novell-SCO
spat
Could it be that SCO does not actually own
the Linux technology for which it is trying to extort
royalties? That's what Novell claims... but let's not jump
too quickly onto this bandwagon, which may in the end be
the fire to SCO's frying pan. By Stephen Shankland, CNet,
June 4, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Re: SUO: Re: SUO Ballot with 2
Questions
Once more, with feeling. Nice
explanation of "why it is IMPOSSIBLE to have a single
ontology (top or NOT) as soon as two separate entities
(groups or individuals, no matter) claim to rely on it." In
a line, "no two people or groups share ALL theirs purposes
and views!" This is why we need RDF, this is why we need to
be able to import name-spaces on the fly, and this is why
there can never be one standard for learning object
metadata. By Jean-Luc Delatre, Semantic Web Discussion
List, June 5, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
The Self-Made Lawyer
Fascinating
account of the alternative to law school for those who wish
to become lawyers - "reading the law" involves working
alongside a practicing lawyer for a period of time while
preparing for the Bar exam on one's own. It is interesting
that this mode of learning, likely to be more
characteristic of learning in the future in a wide variety
of disciplines, is depicted as antiquated by law schools
that would like to see the practice shut down. By G.
Jeffrey MacDonald, Christian Science Monitor, June 3, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Taking Creativity To Task
This
article begins as though it is some sort of reactionary
criticism to the thesis that the measure of diversity in a
society is also the measure of its creativity. The
objection, though, could be summed up with the observation
that diversity, while a necessary condition, is not a
sufficient condition. And I agree. Creativity isn't
something that emerges like a spark from an inert log; it
is almost always the product of discipline, rigor and hard
work. For this reason, it is unreasonable to say that
"everyone is creative" - for while everyone may have the
potential to be creative, much fewer are willing to slog it
out in the trenches. By Josie Appleton, Spiked-Culture,
June 4, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
The
Electronic Naturalist
I will be talking in
Newfoundland next week about 'learning objects in a wider
context' - and this link is an example of at least a part
of what I'm talking about. "The Electronic Naturalist is a
new on-line education program providing a weekly
environmental education unit. Each unit has artwork, text,
activities, additional web sites, plus online access to a
professional naturalist." Now think about the way this site
is designed and compare it with the picture of learning
objects that are downloaded into a database, pushed
together to create courses, which are then delivered as
static page-turners. That old model of online learning
won't last. The future lies in sites like this:
self-contained, dynamic, interactive, distributed. By
Various Authors, June, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Dave Winer's OSCOM
Keynote
Absolutely fascinating running
commentary of Dave Winer's keynote address last week at the
OSCOM conference. It's an IRC chat transcript, so you may
have to work a bit to isolate the threads and decipher the
geek shorthand. Winer's talk was highlighted by a clash
with Syndic8's Bill Kearney that included allusions to
dictatorships and allegations of death wishes. The
commentator, Aaron Swartz (AaronSw) is himself a major
player in the RSS environment, and he is joined in the chat
by Morbus Iff, the creator of Amphetadesk. All of these
people have been involved in RSS since the very beginning,
have been major players in its creation and development,
and as they quite rightly point out, have at least as much
of a say in its future development as Dave Winer. By Aaron
Swartz, May 29, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
What We Blog About When We Blog About
Blogs
More discussion of what defines a weblog,
and the following definition is proposed: "A weblog is a
collection of discrete entries that are organized
sequentially in time and published to the World Wide Web."
As I comment in the discussion, "I think that the linear
presentation (no threading) and reverse chronological order
are essential features." And I completely agree with this:
"a brief list of things that do not define weblogs: titles,
time stamps, permalinks, archives, categories, calendars,
RSS feeds, Trackback, pings, etc. etc. (basically the last
3/4 of Winer's essay). Those are features of the tools we
use to write weblogs..." Exactly. By Greg Ritter, Ten
Reasons Why, June 4, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Content Syndication: Ready for the
Masses?
The best part of this artile is near the
beginning where the author describes the different
potential uses of content syndication in different
industries, including education. Most of the article,
though, is a sort of 'parallel history' of syndication, as
seen from the corporate perspective. Syndication hasn't
really worked in that market. Mind you, when you have a
proprietary format and exactly one feed, what do you
expect? The author, though, warns that corporations may
have to begin thinking about making a play in this new
market, lest they be left out of the new medium entirely.
(Check out the publication date on this one: don't you love
the way OLDaily brings you the news before it happens?) By
Tony Byrne, EContent, June 19, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Seems Like It's Always Something, These
Days
What makes William Gibson such an
interesting writer is that he understands how our
technology and our psychology intertwine. "...our ancient
project, that began back at the fire, has come full circle.
The patterns in the heads of the ancestors have come out,
over many millennia, and have come to inhabit, atemporally,
this nameless, single, non-physical meta-artifact we’ve
been constructing. So that they form an extension of
Johnny’s being, and he accesses them as such, and takes
them utterly for granted, and treats them with no more
respect than he would the products of his own idle
surmise." By William Gibson, May 21, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
We've Seen the Future, Indian Prez Tells
Gates - And You're Not In It
The main message in
this multi-threaded article is that proprietary software is
"devastating" for developing economies. "Further spread of
IT, which is influencing the daily life of individuals,
will have a devastating effect on the lives of society due
to any small shift in the business practice involving these
proprietary solutions." This, suggests the author, is why
India's Free Software Foundation criticized Microsoft's
educational software plan for that country. Some more
worrisome subthreads, though: one is that open source
software is anti-American, which isn't the point at all.
Another is that India's nuclear missile program is
justified by the same argument, which also misses the
point. By Andrew Orlowski, The Register, June 3, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Oregon is Still a Soft Touch for
Microsoft
The interesting bit in this article
isn't the description of Microsoft's tactics against Linux
in schools. It's this: "When Riverdale High School launched
last year with 80 computers running Linux, the school saved
$40,000. The system runs so well that Nelson, the school's
full-time network administrator, is teaching three-quarters
time." Moreover, "The real savings come not from licensing
fees but because open-source is so much cheaper to
maintain." So much for "total cost of ownership" concerns.
By Steve Duin, The Oregonian, May 25, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Know a friend who might enjoy this
newsletter?
Feel free to forward OLDaily to your colleagues. If you
received this issue from a friend and would like a free
subscription of your own, you can join our mailing list
at
http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/website/subscribe.cgi
[
About This NewsLetter] [
OLDaily Archives]
[
Send me your comments]