OLDaily
By Stephen Downes
November 24, 2003

PEGGasus Opens for Business Nov. 24
One of my projects launches today, the PEGGasus learning marketplace. "The PEGGasus vision is to bring together, in one location, information about as many professional development events and opportunities as possible - a location where these opportunities can be searched, evaluated and selected by people in the Alberta engineering and geoscience professions. We want to be your resource of choice on matters of continuing professional development." Originally based on my paper, The Learning Marketplace, PEGGasus has benefited from two years of collaboration and development by the Association of Professional Engineers, Geologists and Geophysicists of Alberta (APEGGA), the Institute for Professional Development at the University of Alberta and Terra Prime. At the launch, PEGGasus lists more than 1500 items harvested from 30 sources, according to today's news release. Since today is launch day, expect some tweaks to the system. But after a shakedown of a few months, we expect to have a model we can export to other professional development communities. "What makes PEGGasus unique in Canada is the fact that it brings together, in one virtual location, information about as many professional development events and opportunities as possible for Alberta’s geoscience and engineering community," says PEGGasus Market Development Manager Derek McCune. "The one-stop shopping approach not only allows users to search, evaluate and select opportunities but an additional feature allows users to initiate a standing search agent service that will alert them by e-mail when an opportunity that meets their specific needs becomes available." PEGGasus is located at http://www.peggasus.ca By Various Authors, APEGGA, November 24, 2003 [Refer][Research][Reflect]

Resource Profiles
Finally finished! The idea of a resource profile is that it is a multi-faceted, wide ranging description of a resource. A resource profile conforms to no particular XML schema, nor is it authored by any particular author. Additionally, unlike traditional resource descriptions, which are presumed to be instantiated as a single digital file and located in a particular place, a resource profile may be distributed, in pieces, across a large number of locations. And there is no single canonical or authoritative resource profile for a given resource. This paper describes the need for resource profiles, outlines their major conceptual properties, describes different types of constituent metadata, and examines the use of resource profiles in practice. Also, check out the new layout I am playing with... By Stephen Downes, Stephen's Web, November 23, 2003 [Refer][Research][Reflect]

Blogs, Learning Objects and Other Cool Stuff!
Long delayed (because I kept intending to add more content, but never did), an MS Word document and associated PowerPoint Slides from my preconference workshop at NAWeb 03. Sorry if it ends a little abruptly... By Stephen Downes, Stephen's Web, October 19, 2003 [Refer][Research][Reflect]

Too Quick to Copyright
In a nutshell: "Teenagers who illegally download music or who cut and paste term-paper material from web sites are not the worst copyright cheats. Corporations routinely flout copyright laws when they claim ownership of works that are free for everyone to use." Quite right. PDF. By Jason Mazzone, Legal Times, November 17, 2003 [Refer][Research][Reflect]

eduSource Key Planning Documents
I'm not sure when this page went up, but as you can see from the dates on the documents the creation of these resources has occupied myself and the rest of the eduSource team for the bulk of the last year. Of most importance (to me) are the eduSource Vision Statement, hammered together at the end of last year, and the Use Cases document, put together through the summer. Still to come is an architecture document and, of course, the software itself. By Various Authors, eduSource Canada, December 31, 200-31 8:33 p.m. [Refer][Research][Reflect]

Newly Published E-Learning Guides
From Seb Schmoller's Fortnightly Mailing, an always useful guide: "The UK's Learning and Teaching Support Network (LTSN), is a network of 24 subject centres based in higher education (HE) institutions throughout the UK which aims to promote high quality learning and teaching through the development and transfer of good practices in all subject disciplines, and to provide a 'one-stop shop' of learning and teaching resources and information for the HE community. LTSN has just published 5 guides to e-learning, all of which are available for free download as PDF files.

I had a look through the guides and they are brief, well written, and fairly comprehensive. They will be especially useful to those new in the field, and are a nice organization of the material for those with more background. By Seb Schmoller, November 23, 2003 [Refer][Research][Reflect]

Embedding the Skills to Teach Online: Is It Technical or Personality Skills That Are Needed?
The responses to this question from a group of people involved in e-learning in the U.K. are surprisingly similar: while technology competence is required, it is only required to a point, after which teaching and tutoring skills take over. The group was also asked to provide influential references, and the resulting links will make a good evening's reading. 4 page PDF file. By Seb Schmoller, October 5, 2003 [Refer][Research][Reflect]

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