By Stephen Downes
September 15, 2003
Edu_RSS Topics
As promised, more
from Edu_RSS. Today we release the Edu_RSS topics page, a
set of subject-specific RSS feeds available in multiple
output formats (four RSS versions, HTML, Javascript with
SOAP and Atom/Echo available shortly). The idea of Edu_RSS
topics is that the input from 130 or so RSS feeds is
aggregated and organized according to topics. The topics
are defoined using Perl regular expressions (but we are
also adding SQL topic definition and will use more advanced
filtering techniques in the future). Each topic is then
output as a separate RSS feed, resulting in a highly
filtered but comprehensive coverage of specific topic
areas. Please note that this is a work in progress;
there are still some glitches in the filtering mechanism,
RSS 2.0 produces odd errors, other RSS feeds need proper
titles, help is not yet available for SOAP, and the pages
still aren't pretty. The purpose of this release is to
demonstrate the idea of RSS aggregation and
filtering - after all, if we can do this for RSS feeds, we
can do it even more easily with learning object metadata or
RSS-LOM. By Stephen Downes and Raphael Blanchard, Stephen's
Web, September 15, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Why VoIP is Music to Kazaa's
Ear
We have a not-so-quiet revolution in the
making here. Voice Over IP (VoIP) services have not really
taken off, partially because of bandwidth limitations and
partly because of the cost. There's no real incentive to
use your computer as a telephone if it's not really going
to save you anything. Enter Kazaa (yes, the file-sharing
company) with Skype. Essentially, Skype is free VoIP
system. Yes, that's right. No more charges for makingf long
distance calls. Interestingly, "Skype does not mean
anything. It just sounds good, and the dot-com domain name
was available." Kazaa's Janus Friis asserts, "We hope
people will start saying, 'I'll Skype you' instead of "I'll
call you," which means 'I'll call you without paying any
rip-off per-minute charges and with superior
better-than-phone quality.'" Like I said, a revolution in
the making. By Ben Charney, CNet news.Com, September 11,
2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Open-Ended Manifesto on Research and
Learning
This very interesting document contains
many good bits, containing especially an explicit
recognition of the social dimension of learning, an idea of
the complex and social function of artefacts, the
importance of knowledge sharing, the role of creativity in
researchj and learning ("not a representation of the
research lab but rather a representation of the type of
system we already find in the areas of creative businesses.
Examples to look out for are the music or the film
industry"), the realization that research must take place
in and as part of a network, and much more. By Hans
Siggaard Jensen, Learning Lab Denmark Quarterly, September,
2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Community Learning Networks
Initiative
For those of you in Canada, The
Office of Learning Technologies is inviting Expressions of
Interest under the Community Learning Networks (CLN)
initiative. CLN supports cost-shared community-based pilot
projects. These projects develop and test innovative
approaches that help Canadians overcome barriers to using
learning technologies, help adult learners find and keep
employment and support lifelong learning by using
information and communications technologies. By
Announcement, Office of Learning Technologies, September,
2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Hey (Hic)... This Merlot is Tasting
Better
Following a critical post at CogDogBlog,
there is movement at MERLOT on RSS and Alan Levine is
moving the "bad dog" meter a bit. Be sure to follow the
link to the discussion. Not that MERLOT is without
doubts and hestitations. "They still seem (IMHO) overly
concerned about some evil entity harvesting dynamic
generated RSS (i.e. a feed from a custom search result),
cracking the secret meta-data and exploiting it to offer a
non-MERLOT-ian service." By Alan Levine, CogDogBlog,
September 10, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
The Virtualization of University Education:
Concepts, Strategies and Business Models
This
paper delivers exactly what the title promises: a
comprehensive outline of various concepts of virtual
learning, an overview of strategies (including
organizational and management strategies), and business
models. It also outlines some potential issues or problem
areas, and concludes with a set of general recommendations.
There isn't really anything new in this paper, but it would
make a nice overview for people new to the field. By Kelvin
W. Willoughby, Instructional Technology Forum, September
15, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
WSIL meets RSS
WSIL (Web Service Inspection Language) is
an XML format that describes the services offered by a
website. It performs the same function as UDDI
(Universal Description, Discovery and Integration of Web
Services), but while UDDI is centralized, like a phone
book, WSIL is decentralized, like a network of business
cards. As the author says, "In many ways, WSIL is like RSS
for Web services." Though not specifically designed to
announce the existence of RSS feeds (it is intended to
advertise web services) WSIL can be adapted for that, and
this article describes the implementation. By Timothy
Appnel, tima thinking outloud, September 13, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
BitPass, Shirky and The Good Idea that
Refuses to Die
Detailed response to Clay
Shirkey's criticism of micropayments by Scott
McCloud, the author of The Right Number, an online comic sold
for twenty-five cents via Bit
Pass. Significantly, McCloud observes (correctly) that
"Shirky’s first two examples have nothing to do with the
business model of BitPass—the company he’s trying to
rhetorically obliterate!" And McCloud takes on Shirkey's
fame versus fortune argument: " A little fame should make
you a little fortune. A lot of fame should make you a lot
of fortune. And at no point should fame drive you into
bankruptcy and annihilate your livelihood." All well and
good, but let's look at BitPass. I find two major issues
with the service. First, when offering content selections,
it only offers commercial selections - and hence, free
content is squeezed out of the market. And second, if you
want to buy McCloud's cartoon, it's Bit Pass or nothing. I
call that a monopoly, and monopolies undermine markets. By
Scott McCloud, September 9, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Selling Online Content—25 Cents at a
Time
Another response to Clay Shirkey's article,
this one enthusiastically endorsing the inflated price of
twenty-five cents per comic (try a tenth of that, or less),
and like Scott McCloud's article, touting the Bit
Pass payment system. By Henry Jenkins, Technology
Review, September 10, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Open Letter to Web Services, Semantics,
Semantic Web and Ontology Communities
This
proposal and establishment of a working group is dedicated
toward the establishment of a Universal Data Element Framework, and is
designed to provide a (semi) intelligent identifier,
attached in some way to a data element (perhaps as an
attribute within schemas or in an RDF based reference
file), that can be resolved to produce an exact
identification of the data element meaning." UDEF would, in
other words, provide a translation mechanism for tags used
in different metadata schemes. By John Hardin,
udef.builders, August 18, 2003
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
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