Edu_Rss

Judy O'Connell - Teacher as Learner in Web 2.0 - heyjude
"You can add a bit on about Web 2.0 if you like, but do not make it the main thrust of your paper. You must demonstrate that you understand our philosophy." I guess we must be on to something if education doctoral programs are advising that students should not focus on Web 2.0. Be sure to read the comments. [Link] [Tags: Web 2.0] [Comment] From OLDaily on August 24, 2006 at 10:45 p.m..

Tim Stahmer - Skipping The SAT - Assorted Stuff
High school seniors with a high enough grade can skip the SAT. I never did an SAT (Canadians can take it, but there's no reason to). I did a practice version of it and was doing OK until I hit a question equating freedom and capitalism. "This isn't for me," I thought, and put it away. [Link] [Tags: Canada, Schools] [Com From OLDaily on August 24, 2006 at 10:45 p.m..

Bascha Harris - Belly up to the BarCamp - RedHat
When O'Reilly created the 'Foo Camp', inviting a group of experts to an invitation-only conference, they didn't know what they started. What they started was 'Bar camp', the response to 'Foo Camp' created by those who didn't get invitations. "A BarCamp is the equivalent of an intellectual swap meet. Everybody brings something to the table, whether it's the web server trouble they diagnosed and defeated last week... or the ability to juggle five pins while holding an instructional conversation." [OLDaily on August 24, 2006 at 10:45 p.m..

Barbara Ganley - The Tightrope of Blogging: A Week's Adventure into the Public Nature of Social Software - bgblogging
"Blogs are being judged as though they are supposed to be printed media--finished, the end, the last word on a subject by an expert," writes Barbara Ganley. "But for me as a teacher, the absolute beauty of blogging is that it's not that at all--it's about developing thought, about pushing out tendrils to myself and the world in hopes that through collective intelligence and my own writing them down, the thoughts might both increase my own understanding of the subject at hand and even add something to the greater conversation..." Quite true, but let me say this, that I will hold blogs From OLDaily on August 24, 2006 at 10:45 p.m..

Robert Roy Britt - Scientists Decide Pluto's No Longer a Planet - Msnbc
Some atronomers may have voted to demote Pluto, but I, for one, do not recognize this decision. Pluto is a planet. Why? Because history does count. That is why, as well, Xena (its proper name, not 2003 UB313) and Sedna are planets. And Charon is a moon. In my books. Via Ewan McIntosh. [Link] [Tags: ] [Comment] From OLDaily on August 24, 2006 at 10:45 p.m..

Jay Cross - How About an Order of Slimehead? - Internet Time
Jay Cross argues, "It's time for us to come up with a vocabulary that's not an obstacle to installing learning technology. Take the word blog. For some people, the word sets off alarm bells.... So let's not speak of blogs or slimeheads. Let's talk about Project Logs. Or Collaborative Project Documentation. Or Knowledge Logs. Or professional journals." In a word: No. In a sentence: Web 2.0 is not marketing. In a conditional sentence: if you have to fool people into accepting Web 2.0, they'll break it eventually anyways. Because blogging is "am From OLDaily on August 24, 2006 at 10:45 p.m..

Andrew Rens, Achal Prabhala and Dick Kawooya - Intellectual Property, Education and Access to Knowledge in Southern Africa - tralac
The argument behind copyright has always been that, by protecting authors' rights, it promotes the creation of knowledge and learning. The principle of copyright, however, has have the opposite effect on African nations, making knowledge and learning difficult to obtain. "Ironically, it is precisely in this disabling legal environment that the SACU countries are being asked - by domestic and international publishing industry lobbies - to strengthen the enforcement of criminal sanctions for certain copyright violations, even as they constitute an access mechanism in a context that offers f From OLDaily on August 24, 2006 at 10:45 p.m..

Weird Al Yankovic - Don't Download This Song
I rode on a pirate ship today, on my short trip to Halifax, and if I were in Sweden I would be voting for the Pirate Party. So in the spirit of Weird Al, today's newsletter is dedicated to all you pirates out there, swapping software and burning CDs, keeping the information commons strong and keeping the engine of the knowledge economy running. And, my friends - don't download that song. check your hard drive first to see if it's already there. Let's keep those tubes unclogged for the U.S. senators. [Link From OLDaily on August 24, 2006 at 10:45 p.m..

No Praise for Stem Cell Paper
Scientists express skepticism and call "hype!" on a company that says it found an ethical way to get embryonic stem cells. In Bodyhack. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 9:45 p.m..

Know a Good Business Ethicist?
In the wake of sweatshop charges, Apple advertises for a manager of a Corporate Social Responsibility program, to help improve human rights and worker conditions. In Cult of Mac. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 9:45 p.m..

Home Depot Invasion
What happens when 225 people enter a home-improvement store and start moving in slow motion? Someone creates a web page about it, of course. Plus: A cookie sings the blues. In Table of Malcontents. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 7:45 p.m..

ALA 221: Navigation and writing basics
Building better website navigation. Engaging your readers with writing that keeps them coming back. ALA Issue 221 is all about the basics. From Seb Schmoller's Fortnightly Mailing Home Page on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Thursday links
Typography, design, art, illustration, internet politics, and more. From Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: The Daily Report on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Inspiration and perspiration
Colors from the earth, death from the skies, trends, tools, and forecasts. From Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: The Daily Report on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Get your kicks on Pier 66
An Event Apart Seattle's early bird discount ends Friday, August 18th. From Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: The Daily Report on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Blackboard's patent - the wiki
Seb Schmoller points out that the article in Wikipedia about the history of virtual learning environments was created on July 29, and just a couple of weeks and hundreds of edits later, it's pretty durn good. But this is not idle knowledge. It comes in the face of the patent granted to Blackboard. The article tacitly establishes prior art. Well, not entirely tacitly. A notice at the top of the article links to a wiki that contests the Blackboard patent claim by claim. [Tags: blackboard patent vle education wikipedia seb_schmoller]... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

On reading the reviews of Snakes on a Plane
They spake so plain,of the stakes to gain.Rakes of pain?Flakes of murrain?Complain of a migraine?Inane to the brain?Or parfait by the Seine? A rain of champagne?Playin' with sugar cane?Wayans' amazin'?Stay in a Days Inn?Charlemagne of Acquitaine? The main pain?Sustain three motherf***ing quatrains. [Tags: soap snakes_on_a_plane]... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Two reasons Snakes on a Plane is cool
[Note: I know the following is dangerously close to self-parody. But I do think the Snakes on a Plane phenomenon is interesting.] 1. Remember how we all made Mahir, the Kiss man, famous? Some people spread the link out of a mean sense of superiority. (Mahir used his moment of celebrity to try to engage people across cultures, so now who's the foolish one, eh?) But we also spread it because we could. We — all of us, each of us, none of us famous — could make an unknown human famous. It changed our relationship to celebrity, the continued... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Consumer Internet Bill of Rights
Susan Crawford has a terrific analysis of Sen. Ted Stevens' Consumer Internet Bill of Rights, which, as she points out, is wrong from its very first word. Yo, Ted, you know what I'm exactly not doing with the Internet right now? Consuming it. I'm creating a little tiny bit more of it. Susan's analysis, however, is more balanced and thorough, and does not use the word "Yo" even once. She concludes: The IBR doesn't shift the current situation. Network access providers have all the power and discretion they want — and, indeed, this bill if enacted would codify their From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Podcast interview of moi, about Cluetrainy stuff
Mitch Joel has posted the first half of a 45-min interview on marketing 'n' stuff as part of his Six Pixels of Separation series. This is somehow related to a keynote I'm doing at a Canadian Marketing Association conference. [Tags: marketing cluetrain mitch_joel]... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Want some background music?
Sonific lets you provide background music for your page, choosing from the site's copyright-cleared selection. It's free, but even so, I am so far out of the demographic that I 'd rather have Sonific-earmuffs that auto-mute any site that installs it. Don't get me wrong: Sonific may catch on, and for those who like that sort of thing, it may be just what the dj ordered. The fact that it's not for me is probably a good sign for Sonific - we can only assume that Sonific's target market isn't crotchety old men.... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Unregulated traffic is working well, thank you
From Susan Crawford's blog: From the OECD, a useful paper about interconnection online. It turns out (surprise!) that inter-networking is working fine without intervention. There are zillion networks out there, and as long as the local telecommunications environment is sufficiently open (all the way to opening up incumbent facilities to competitors), these networks are finding ways to connect on their own: The greatest cost barriers to any country connecting to global networks are not traffic exchange relationships, in competitive environments, but monopolists charging high prices in the From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Social network sites research
danah is compiling a list of people researching social network sites....... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Admiring weeds
Meredith Sue Willils, the writer and my sister-in-law, has a poem admiring weeds even as she's uprooting them. (Sue's blog has no visible permalinks, so you may have to search for "Admiration for Weeds.")... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Fear of export
In the new issue of my newsletter, I have a small review of RoboForm, a password manager for Windows that I've gotten quite attached to. It's full featured and works without getting in the way. I like it a lot. But... Among its features, it will generate obscure passwords for you, useful for the lazy ones among us (i.e., all but the 1% of us who are Data Saints) who use the same passwords everywhere. (Software like RoboForm thus brings us the "single sign-on" benefit that is one of the selling points of identity management platforms, but that's a different... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Garrison Keillor on listening to the voices of those murdered on 9/11
He contrasts the voices of those fellow souls and of the politicians who have benefited. If you're not a paid member of Salon, you can choose to watch a commercial first. It's worth it. [Tags: garrison_keillor 911 wtc rudy_guiliani]... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Google the Telco
I think Dvorak gets this one right: Suppose Google discovers that providing free wifi in its hometown actually makes money. Google then has the know-how and the motivation to replicate it over and over and over... Of course, my outlook is heavily tinged with hope. Google is far more aligned with my view of the Web's role and importance than are any of the incumbent telcos. [Tags: google wifi telecommunications dvorak]... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

FTC wading into Net Neutrality - But is it neutral?
Thomas Vander Wal posts the bad news about the FTC entering into the Net neutrality debate. It looks like the FTC's method is not itself neutral. [Tags: net_neutrality thomas_vander_wal ftc]... From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Don't ask, don't care
365Gay.com points out that as Bush calls Marines back to active duty — that's got to be tough news to get — the number of troops discharged for being gay is increasing. Apparently, two a day are now being kicked out, for a total of 11,000 since the policy went into effect in 1993. "According to the GAO more than 800 of those had skills deemed From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

Oh yeah, now I remember why Windows sucks!
I just spent most of a morning trying to figure out why the Blackberry software installer installs the Palm desktop manager instead of the Blackberry desktop manager. After extirpating anything related to palm on my drives and in the registry, including anything containing the words "fist" or "frond" just to be sure, I finally moved the zip file from D: to C:, figuring (correctly, I'm pretty sure), that the zip file was executing a different file that happened to be named "setup.exe." I don't know why the wrong one wasn't overwritten by the right one, or maybe the unzipper was.. From Joho the Blog on August 24, 2006 at 3:49 p.m..

New Berkman WP: Educational Uses of Copyrighted Material
Bill McGeveran sez, "I am delighted to report that the Berkman Center has released the white paper on which I have been working, along with Professor Terry Fisher and a terrific team of Berkman fellows and Harvard Law students, for the last year. The Digital Learning Challenge: Obstacles to Educ From A Copyfighter's Musings on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Were You Exposed by AOL's Data Leak?
If you are an AOL member, use EFF's Action Center to contact AOL and find out whether you were one of the AOL customers whose search data was publicly disclosed. By voicing your concerns now, you can make sure AOL works to prevent another damaging data leak from happening again. Regardless of whether you're an AOL user, send From A Copyfighter's Musings on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Bring On the PRM Wars
Felten's put together a fine series on evolving defenses of DRM and related anti-circumvention laws. He's right that the entertainment industry has begun more frequently offering alternative arguments to defend the DMCA+DRM, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that they are "replacing" the DRM as speed bump to "Internet piracy" myth.  Yet if this were the case, I would welcome the switch. Indeed, if the DMCA's existence hinged on From A Copyfighter's Musings on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

IP Scholars Conference Drafts
The IP Scholars Conference recently took place at Berkeley -- many papers are just early drafts, but plenty of food for thought.And while we're on the topic:* This paper was forwarded to me, haven't read it but looks interesting:David Choi, "Online Piracy and The Emergence of New Business Models." From the abstract: "This explorative paper examines the impact of online piracy on the emergence of innovati From A Copyfighter's Musings on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Not Using Primary Sources–Guilty as Charged
So I’m not sure I would go so far as to say that I’m “another uninformed sheepie in the flock of society” or a “Ditto-head wannabee,” but Jim O’Hagan makes a valid point when noting that I took the word of Roy Mark in the previous post instead of going to the primary source, the [...] From weblogged News on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Quote of the Day–Henry Jenkins
From page 170 of Henry Jenkins’ new book “Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide“: None of us really know how to live in this era of media convergence, collective intelligence and participatory culture. These changes are producing anxieties and uncertainties, even panic, as people imagine a world without gatekeepers and live with the reality [...] From weblogged News on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

More Henry Jenkins
A few more thought-provoking lines from Henry Jenkins’ new book oeConvergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide.oe It’s been giving me quite a bit to chew on in the 30 or so pages I’ve read. I think he has an amazingly perceptive read on how access to people and ideas change the equation in [...] From weblogged News on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Quote of the Day–Susan Mann
Thanks to John Bidder for this link to an article in The Age out of Australia, where he recently presented at a conference discussing Web 2.0 tools and their potentials in education. (There’s a concept.) The quote comes from Susan Mann, CEO of the Curriculum Corporation: “The old concept of curriculum is dead but you [...] From weblogged News on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Learning Economics Through Snowboarding
Pat Aroune who is a high school teacher in upstate New York and a new edblogger (after 16 years in the business) sent along a link to some student Weblogs from his summer class on economics and a couple of them, Greg’s Public Views and Economics According to Andi struck me because of some of [...] From weblogged News on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Testing…Testing
So my Odeo test during my presentation in Coshocton, Ohio didn’t work as expected yesterday and I’m not sure why. I think I’m going to start doing those “look how easy this is” type examples in some other space from here on out. Time to start a beta Blogger blog… It was interesting yesterday speaking to [...] From weblogged News on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Setting Up a Blogging Classroom
So this looks pretty interesting… Jenn has 60 students spread across 3 classes at Saint Rose college in Albany, New York. Jenn is going to have all of the students blog for class, it is a writing class, and I will leave the explanation at that. Jenn can say more about this and her goals for [...] From weblogged News on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

How Our Lives Have Changed and Will Change…
Joyce Valenza has put together an impressive chart titled How my life has changed / How will my life change in terms of the impact that these technologies have had and are having on librarians and educators in general. For me, the ones that really stand out are the differences in how we communicate and [...] From weblogged News on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Red lantern, Chinese gate
Red lantern, Chinese gate Walking through Hoi An at night we came across this gate in front of a small temple. I was quite taken by the rich red colours, even if it took a lot of waiting for... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Selling information architecture: getting executives to say "yes"
Samantha Starmer has written an article on how to sell information architecture to executives. To quote: Does the word salesman seem as repugnant to you as it often does to me? The funny thing is that I recently realized that... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Understanding the requirement for a portal
There is no doubt that fuelled by a compelling business need, a portal solution can provide real business advantage. However provisioning a portal when it is a content-managed site that is required, will result in the most expensive website or... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Login to the intranet
A very simple but very effective improvement to the intranet is to ensure that all staff login to the site in order to use it. This allows a number of immediate benefits to be offered, as well as providing a... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Design intranets all the way to the bottom
Intranet redesigns are not small projects. There is a significant amount of design, usability and information architecture work, not to mention the laborious content migration process. What is launched is almost certainly an improvement on the old intranet, but the... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Presentation: KM Australia (Sydney)
This week I gave a keynote presentation at the KM Australia conference on "The 10 principles for effective information management", which explored what hasn't worked, and introduced some key principles against to measure IM projects against. You can download my... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

The changing face of university websites
Maish Nichani has written an article on the changing face of university websites. To quote: Many university websites are in redesign mode. And that's good news for the web standards and user experience communities. It signifies not only that the... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Intranets: six months at a time
We've recently started some mentoring with a large corporate client, who has offices (and factories) throughout Australia and into Asia. They've had an intranet for a long time now, and it suffers from the most of the common issues: the... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Intranet search questions (Auckland, New Zealand)
Yesterday I ran a one-day workshop on Designing Intranet Search in Auckland, New Zealand. This was a good fun day, with lots of vigorous discussion regarding different search strategies. As part of this, participants nominated their "big search questions", and... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Presentation: Strategic Intranets and Portals (Auckland)
Today I gave the opening keynote presentation at the 6th Annual Strategic Intranet & Enterprise Portal Management Conference in Auckland, New Zealand. This was on the "Hottest intranet trends for 2006", covering a range of topics: Enterprise 2.0 Enterprise IA... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

The importance of intranet leadership
Paul Chin has written an article on intranet leadership. To quote: Intranets are ruled by committee, not by a single person or department. But, in most high-volume, enterprise-wide intranets, there's still a hierarchy to this committee with two distinct leaders:... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

How do you analyse your user research data?
Leisa Reichelt has written a post on analysing user research data. To quote: Of course I've just finished a week of asking users lots of interesting questions and getting a vast amount of even more interesting information in response. On... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Competitive Analysis
Dan Brown has written an article on how to document a competitive analysis. To quote: Because competitive analyses vary along only two dimensions -- competitors and criteria -- you'll always see some mechanism for showing two or more sites side-by-side... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

A web 2.0 tour for the enterprise
Shiv Singh has written an article on web 2.0 tour for the enterprise. To quote: Thanks to the hype generated by Business Week, The New York Times, Fortune, and Newsweek (among others), Web 2.0 has captured the imagination of consumers... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Design methods
The Design Council in the UK has published a site describing a range of design methods. To quote: A collection of easy-to-use design tools, methods and processes for you to use and download. [Thanks to elearningpost.]... From Column Two on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Blackboard Patents Learning!
I'm pleased to see the concerns and objections growing about Blackboard's overbroad patent on Course Management Systems. While I was Director of Distance Learning at Eastern Oregon University I first became involved with Blackboard when the company bought out the CMS we were using, Web Course in a Box. EOU became an involuntary Blackboard customer. As I noticed Blackboard's yearly fees increase I sought an open source alternative and persuaded EOU to begin running Moodle as a trial system and alternative to Blackboard. Unfortunately when I retired, in June 2004, the instituti From EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Mobilizing Opposition to Blackboard's Patent Claims
Several important sources of information have quickly developed to collect evidence of "prior art" that will invalidate of Blackboard's LMS patent claims. The Wikipedia entry on the "History of Virtual Learning Environments" is a good place to start. (I was pleased to see a 1966 entry for IBM's Coursewriter, a course managment system that I used at UC Irvine way back in the 60s to teach Introductory Psychology via terminals and a mainframe computer.) Gerd Kortemeyer  EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

A Little Personal History with Blackboard
Here's a short piece I wrote today about my personal experiences with Blackboard that puts some of their claims into perspective. This personal history makes clear that, even within just the truncated time frame of the last decade, there have been many LMS alternatives to Blackboard, both commercial alternatives and open source alternatives. Anyone exploring a wider timeframe will find even more examples of LMS software that included features which Blackboard is now claiming as their own. _____JH ______ The Blackboard patent claim and infr From EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:48 p.m..

Speech Synthesis on the Web
This tantalizing news item from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) gives a glimpse of what the web may offer in the near future with online sites in diverse languages intelligibly accessible to anyone, not just for a single-language targeted audience. Indeed the broadened audience becomes as wide as the world through instant SSML (Speech Synthesis Markup Language) translations. It's a pleasure to read about authentic innovation in the midst of the Blackboard patent controversy which centers on false claims about innovation. (Thanks to EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

Senate Bill on Patent Changes
This article from CNET News is, of course, especially interesting in the context of the current flap about Blackboard's LMS patent claims. _____JH _____ By Anne Broache: Just before departing for their summer recess on Thursday, Utah Republican Orrin Hatch and Vermont Democrat EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

Lessons for the Future Internet: Learning from the Past
This EDUCAUSE article by Michael Roberts surveys the 25-year history of the Internet from the 1980s and discusses needs for the future. I can still vividly remember doing workshops at Cal Poly University in the 80s when one of the main challenges was teaching instructors how to use e-mail and coping with "bang addresses" that seemed to be a 100 characters long! (Thanks to Infobits for this reference.) ____JH ______ "Lets start by asking: What makes the Internet different from earlier communications systems? From EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

Flash Animations for Physics
I'm often amazed at the high quality of free online resources available for education. These animations are extraordinary--worth sampling, even if you are not a physics instructor or student, just to appreciate the fascination of the displays. Textbooks simply can't compete with graphic animations like these. For example, one of the animations (Bunimovich Stadium) to illustrate chaos theory shows the pathways of two balls, a red and a blue, as they bounce about within From EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

The Gong Project
Scott Leslie points to a highly developed, free voice tool, The Gong Project, which is available for educational applications. The introduction on the Gong site states that  "Gong is a free system for voice communication on the Web. It allows groups of people such as students and teachers to participate in discussion groups using their computers, using both synchronous (real-time) and asynchronous chat. It is commonly used by schools and universities for providing a 'voice board' for teaching purposes. There From EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

Inside Higher Education's Coverage of the Blackboard Patent Controversy
The title of IHE's online article is "Blackboard: Bully or Misunderstood." (Of course this title opens them to a long series of parodies of the "bully or misunderstood" theme.) There are already follow-up online comments at the site about the article by Michael Feldstein, Stephen Downes, and others that criticize the reportage for failing to adequately cover the issues and fully present the ramifications of the Blackboard claims. From my perspective, the best news reported in the text is that the Sakai Foundation has emerged as a critic of the Blackboard patent. If unive From EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

EducaNext--a Learning Resources Portal
EducaNext is a European site devoted to the sharing of higher education learning materials. Users can browse and download materials; registered users can deposit materials. Although the materials are sparse at present, the site does show promise for the future.  _____JH _____ "EducaNext is a service supporting the creation and sharing of knowledge for Higher Education. It is open to any member of the academic or research community. EducaNext fosters collaboration among educators and researchers, allowing you From EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

Patent Battle over Teaching Tools--BBC Online News
This article from the Technology section of the online BBC News is by Michael Geist, the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-Commerce Law from the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law.  The author provides a useful overview of the current Blackboard patent controversy with links to more information resources. _____JH ______ "The patent system is designed to foster innovation by providing patent holders with exclusive rights over their inventions for a limited time.  However, th From EduResources--Higher Education Resources Online on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

Leopard preview
Keynote presentations from the WWDC are always very entertaining to watch - even though the author of this Wired article thinks the presentation was uninspiring. I don't think so. The business numbers were impressive. Apple sales and market share is growing. That is a change. Apple always had a small market share. The machines were said to be unstable, expensive and slow. Gimmicks for design geeks and fashion victims. I think this From owrede_log on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

New Last.fm player
Last.fm has released a new player for Windows and MacOS X. The new player features scrobbling (notifying Last.fm servers of recent songs played by you) and streaming audio. It shows song and artist information about the current song played. This way you can learn things about the bands and artists you have in your iTunes library. It gives some background information which is normall From owrede_log on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

Switch Part 1: The Demise of the Dell
The old Dell Inspiron 8200 notebook did right by me, and, in general, it's been the best computer I've ever owned. My basic computing activity has changed a lot in the last four years -- I'm arguably online more hours per week than I've ever been before, thanks primarily to getting off the road and broadband in the home. For the most part, the Dell kept up with my needs. Unfortunately, it was getting a bit gray around the temples. Time to switch. From Ten Reasons Why on August 24, 2006 at 3:47 p.m..

Merlot RSS for searches
I probably missed this since I don’t typically pay much attention to Merlot, but Merlot looks like it finally has RSS feeds for arbritary searches and categories now (e.g. literature). It could do with a little polish, e.g. putting the search or category in the RSS feed title, and fixing the spelling of “materials”. [...] From Serious Instructional Technology on August 24, 2006 at 3:46 p.m..

RIAA-Proof Music Sharing
A soon-to-be-released Firefox extension will allow you and your friends to share files of any type without any uninvited guests to spoil the party. In Listening Post. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 3:45 p.m..

Apple Pulls Sony-Built Batteries
Citing reports of overheating and damage, Apple recalls 1.8 million laptop batteries only two weeks after the troubled Japanese electronics manufacturer had 4.1 million batteries recalled by Dell. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 3:45 p.m..

Sci-Fi Geeks Trek to WorldCon
Over 6,000 fans are expected at the World Science Fiction Convention, where they can hobnob with the biggest names in sci-fi and check out a full-scale mockup of the Enterprise bridge. Quinn Norton reports from Anaheim, California. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 2:45 p.m..

Global VoIP Market Takes Hold
The voice over IP (VoIP) market grew 83 percent worldwide in 2005, with pure-play, cable and telecoms all competing for market share. From ClickZ Stats on August 24, 2006 at 2:45 p.m..

Not My Bomb, Baby
What does it say about sexual shame when a man would rather be thought a terrorist than the owner of a penis pump? In Sex Drive Daily. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 1:46 p.m..

Join Together With the Band
Music download service Dream Musician lets you play along with your favorite artists. In Gear Factor. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 1:46 p.m..

Gadget Lab: Semisweet Chocolate
LG's new phone looks as tasty as it is rotten, a waterproof MP3 player sinks while you swim, and the Swiss couldn't threaten the iPod with a knife. In Wired magazine's Gadget Lab. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 1:45 p.m..

PS3 Supply Scare Rattles Stock
The electronics giant's stock drops 3.1 percent after a Japanese brokerage firm predicts that the supply of PlayStation 3 will be cut in half at launch. From the Game|Life blog. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 12:45 p.m..

Pluto Stripped of Planet Status
After a week of wrangling, the International Astronomical Union decrees that Pluto does not meet the qualifications to be classified a planet. For the first time since 1930, there are eight planets in the solar system. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 12:45 p.m..

Gallery: Chinese Space Adventures
Will China become the launch pad of choice for a generation of out-of-this-world tourists? From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 6:45 a.m..

Space Tours for Taikonauts
With cheap rockets and lots of rich people to fly in them, China is being targeted by the emerging space tourism industry. Kevin Holden reports from Beijing. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 6:45 a.m..

Refuse to be Terrorized
Arresting would-be attackers becomes a pyrrhic victory if politicians and the media spread fear on the terrorists' behalf. Commentary by Bruce Schneier. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 6:45 a.m..

IWoz Logs Leap From Geek to Icon
Exclusive: Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak complains that Steve Jobs won't write the foreword to his upcoming autobiography, iWoz. Plus happier topics like playing Segway polo and inventing the personal computer. Wired News interview by Rachel Metz. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 6:45 a.m..

Beck Makes the Infinite Album
Release a traditional 13-track CD? No thanks, says Beck. Instead he puts out a cycle of songs, remixes and videos that fans can string together any way they want. By Eric Steuer from Wired magazine. From Wired News on August 24, 2006 at 6:45 a.m..

World Briefing | Asia: China: Teachers May Be Barred From Insulting and Hitting Students
A measure would require teachers to respect minors and would prohibit corporal punishment, the official New China News Agency reported. From New York Times: Education on August 24, 2006 at 5:45 a.m..

Data Breach on Student Loan Web Site
The Education Department said it would arrange for free credit monitoring for as many as 21,000 student loan borrowers after their personal data appeared on its Web site. From New York Times: Education on August 24, 2006 at 5:45 a.m..

How about an order of slimehead?
Hungry? How about some filet of slimehead in Chinese gooseberry sauce? You get the same reaction from many CIOs if you ask them "How about installing blogs, wikis, instant messenger, Skype, social software, collaboration tools, Web 2.0 mash-ups, and maybe some open software." Slimehead is more palatable if you call it orange roughie, Chinese gooseberries better if [...] From Internet Time Blog on August 24, 2006 at 4:45 a.m..

Evolution Major Vanishes From Approved Federal List
Evolutionary biology has vanished from the list of acceptable fields of study for recipients of a federal education grant for low-income college students. From New York Times: Education on August 24, 2006 at 2:45 a.m..