December 5, 2006
OLDaily
[link: 2 Hits] The trend in this list seems to be toward multimedia, with things like mobile Flash and video players, video downloaders and audio recorders leading the way. [Tags: ] [
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[link: 6 Hits] As Tony Hirst notes, "In a bid to attract new students, the OU appears to be making use of online games to try and grab the attention of the 'younger' student market." Links to a couple dozen nifty diversions. [Tags:
Games and Gaming] [
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[link: 1 Hits] With all the attention being paid to the company as a result of the Blackboard patent, questions are beginning to surface about its long-term viability. Alfred Essa, for example, asks why Blackboard insiders and continuing to dump Blackboard stock. "Even Forbes recently took notice ("five insider selling plays") listing Blackboard as one of the top five companies with significant insider dumping of stocks." Meanwhile, from South Africa,
James Kariuki lays it on the line: "like I have said before, online learning is an idea whose time has come, and NO action by the likes of Blackboard would stifle it."
[Tags:
Online Learning,
Blackboard,
Copyright and Patent Issues] [
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[link: Hits] Tim O'Reilly has found another common term to trademark, labeling the emerging trend toward identity-based content navigation 'Who 2.0' (I still prefer my term, the '
Semantic Social Network). O'Reilly writes: "We are just in the early stages, digital identity doesn't really work yet. But that will, you know, start to coalesce, where all these different sources of identity will start to be resolved and connect to each other. And we'll have a rich identity system you could call Who 2.0." [Tags:
Usability,
Copyright and Patent Issues,
Navigation] [
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[link: Hits] More on informal learning. Tony Karrer
responds to my post from yesterday, which leads me to pen
this addendum today. Meanwhile, Juliette White writes in to note that my account is very similar to one
she posted last April. "The degree of informality of learning is the degree to which you haven't been told what to do i.e. informal learning by definition can only be influenced by creating an environment and not by direct instruction." [Tags:
Online Learning] [
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[link: 1 Hits] There have been a few fawning comments about this program, where Google places teachers into a classroom, working with a Google mentor, for two years before employing them. I am rather more sceptical. If Google wants to support education, why doesn't it simply pay more taxes, the way the rest of us do it (the same question could be asked of Bill Gates)? Why does Google focus on American classrooms - in my view it should focus on countries that really need teachers, not countries that merely don't want to pay for them. And what are the dangers of having company-selected teachers and Google mentors in the classroom? Do you
want Google - or Coca-Cola, or Microsoft, or Disney, or Halliburton - teaching your kids? What happens to your culture and your values when you sell them to the highest bidder like that? Via
A Teacher's Life and
Mark Wagner. [Tags:
Microsoft,
Web Logs,
United States,
Google,
Mentors and Mentoring,
Children and Child Learning] [
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[link: Hits] More from Danah Boyd on MySpace. "In thinking about Friendship practices on social network sites, it is crucial to evaluate them on their own terms, recognizing the role of technology and social navigation rather than simply viewing them as an extension of offline friendship." This shouldn't be a deep insight, but I guess there's no end to people who want simply to transfer properties of real world friendships to online friendsters. [Tags:
Usability,
Networks,
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[link: Hits] I have made the same argument on numerous occasions and still companies and organizations have charged ahead with top-heavy and encumbered identity schemes. But now the winds are beginning to shift. "Some have told us they consider the OpenID community to lack a clear process or structure, to not solve the 'real' problems in identity (yet?), or to be only applicable for low-end problems. They are probably right; however, we think of it as the early days of Internet-scale innovation in action, where these characteristics are desirable, not detrimental... Full decentralization and a very light-weight cost structure directly attract and catalyze innovation unlike any other approach. In the end, that is why you should pay attention to OpenID." See also
OpenID in Ruby on Rails (links to various OpenID scripts in different languages). [Tags:
Ruby,
Ruby and Ruby on Rails] [
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I want and visualize and aspire toward a system of society and learning where each person is able to rise to his or her fullest potential without social or financial encumberance, where they may express themselves fully and without reservation through art, writing, athletics, invention, or even through their avocations or lifestyle.
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