By Stephen Downes
March 2, 2004
Opportunity Rover Finds Strong Evidence
Meridiani Planum Was Wet
For the last two years,
I have very proudly had a link on my home page saying my name will go to Mars. Who cares if
it's the "Space Kids" site? Anyhow, I was a bit
disappointed when I signed up, because I was so far down
the list my name would not be on the first Mars Rover,
"Spirit", but on the second, "Opportunity". Little did I
know that Opportunity would be the one to bounce right into
a crater and hence become the spacecraft that discovered
evidence of liquid water on Mars. And my name - my name! -
is sitting there, etched on a tiny CD-ROM, just a few yards
away from where that discovery took place.
And you know - I have watched most of this mission,
including this afternoon's announcement, live on NASA TV. It gave me an incredible sense
of being there, of being a part of this. I am part of
history, even if I am only one of the millions of people
saying to the scientists at NASA that this is something
that matters to me.
Now I think that there is no reason, no reason, why
we couldn't learn from NASA here. I think that all of the
amazing things that our researchers are doing should be
broadcast and made available on the web. What a learning
opportunity! We academics and researchers need to teach
ourselves to teach as we work, and to make this available
to the people of the world. There's a lot more than just
knowledge at stake. There is the excitement of discovery,
and it does happen, every day, in labs around the
world.
Something to think about. And for now,
congratulations to NASA, and thanks. By Press Release,
NASA, March 2, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
IFLA Supports Open Access
Movement
The International Federations of
Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) writes, "IFLA
recognises that achieving affordable, global access to
scholarly information and research documentation will
require a great deal of commitment and a variety of
strategies. IFLA strongly supports the Open Access movement
and welcomes the launch of many OA compliant publications."
By Press Release, IFLA , February 24, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Canadian
Language and Literacy Research Network
The
Canadian Language and Literacy Research Network (CLLRNet)
has launched a new website. The purpose of CLLRNet "is to
generate, integrate and disseminate bias-free scientific
research and knowledge that is focused on improving and
sustaining children's language and literacy development in
Canada." Founded with a 4-year, $14.2-million grant from
the Network of Centres of Excellence (NCE) program, the
network involves more than a hundred researchers across
Canada. Based at the University of Western Ontario, the
purpose of the network is to "improve language and literacy
skills in Canadian children." It would be nice to see the
Network create an RSS feed to distribute news, research and
information about language and literacy in Canada. By
Various Authors, March 1, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
The Problems With Training (and What to Do
About It)
As the author asserts, "Mirroring the
7th grade classroom and the freshman college 101 lecture
hall will serve only to copy their mediocrity." Too true.
But what to do about it? This essay contains a number of
good suggestions, ranging from the ever popular 99-second
talks to the importance of food, round tables, and varied
activities. When I plan a conference (and I will
plan a conference some time over the next couple of years)
it is my intention to employ a number of these tactics to
draw on some of the lessons on learning that we all know
but never seem to apply for ourselves. Like, for example,
having the conference participants themselves design the
conference online before the actual event. Whoever heard of
such a thing? Via elearningpost. By Scott Berkun with
Vanessa Longacre, UIWeb, February, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
CC-enhanced Search Engine
Another
step in the right direction (you almost think we'll get
there some day): a search engine that indexes only Creative
Commons licensed pages. Of course, this is only a step -
such a search engine would not be useful for many purposed;
copyright information needs, in the long run, to define a
search field or a type of search, not a whole search
engine. And in the search results, the copyright icon
should not dwarf the link title. But, the main things is,
people are now using copyright information as a search
parameter. One step forward. Meanwhile, also check out BlogDigger blog serach engine, which
provides search results in RSS. Something like this, I
think, will eventually remove weblogs' dependence on
comments. By Mike Linksvayer, Creative Commons, March 1,
2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
FOAF Myers Briggs Addition
This
has been around for a while, but it's worth noting: the
FOAF (Friend of a Friend) specification supports Myers
Briggs Type Indicators. FOAF supports other interesting
personal information, in addition to listing your friends,
things like 'nearest airport', 'geek code' and 'school
homepage'. Via Jeremy Hiebert's headspace. By danbri,
RDFWeb and Friend of a Friend (FOAF), December 17, 2002
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Report Raises Questions About Fighting Online
Piracy
It's a fairly basic article, but it
signals a change on the part of at least some economists
regarding strong copyright protection. "The ideas of
copy-left, or of a more liberal regime of copyright, are
receiving wider and wider support," said Debora L. Spar, a
professor at Harvard Business School. "It's no longer a
wacky idea cloistered in the ivory tower; it's become a
more mainstream idea that we need a different kind of
copyright regime to support the wide range of activities in
cyberspace." By John Schwartz, New York Times, March 1,
2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
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