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OLDaily

by Stephen Downes
June 4, 2007

OERs in Sustainable Perspective
The Slideshare version of the talk I gave yesterday at the SCOP 2007 conference here in Heerlen. There is audio - well, 24 minutes of audio, which is now the battery life of my iRiver (sigh - another MP3 player bites the dust - and they expect me to pay for all those songs again? get real) - which will be posted later this week. Due to a scheduling glitch I only had an hour to prepare for the talk, so I don't have all the nice pictures I would normally have. This is my second time in Heerlen - I'm staying at the same hotel, even sitting in the same chair. It's hard not to have a sense of deja vu, and I have fond memories of the last time I was here. But that feels like a lifetime ago, too, part of a different world, a different version of myself.

I fly back home tomorrow - so no guarantees on a newsletter. Home for two or three days, then it's off to Taiwan. Stephen Downes, Slideshare June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Open Educational Resources, Newsletters, Audio] [Comment]

Tips On Developing A Wiki Community
Practical advice if you're building a wiki. If you are planning something like this, do take the time to read the article. There's nothing worse than spending all that time getting it set up only to have it crash and burn. Quentin D'Souza, Teaching Hacks.com June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

The Future of Education
I haven't had any time to participate in this conference (sorry George), but I certainly wouldn't want to let it pass by without being noted. I'm really hoping contents and resources will be available without a login. In the mean time, here's the conference page. George Siemens, University of Manitoba June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

E-Portfolio Research Wiki Finalised
Worth a look if you're interested in e-portfolios or in the use of the wiki to present a research report. Graham Wegner, Teaching Generation Z June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: E-Portfolios, Research] [Comment]

RSS and Wiki in Plain English
The RSS vieo made the rounds a while ago; the Wiki video is new - and is making the rounds. Geetha Krishnan, Simply Speaking June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: RSS, Video] [Comment]

Personal Learning Environments Are Also Social...
I listened to David Vincent, the Open University pro-Vice-Chancellor, speak of the university's work on PLEs this morning in Heerlen. This post adds some background, especially in light of Vincent's describing the PLE as serving "social needs" (or "social values", as opposed to "public" and "institutional" needs and values). Hirst writes,"I do think that there are containers - or frameworks - that allow a range of personal and social tools" - and I guess OU is developing one - "as well as information feeds and storage, to be collected together in some way (via linking or embedding) to offer the user a single 'place to go' to access these tools; a (personal) learning workspace, if you like." In this, I agree. Tony Hirst, OUseful Info June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Linking and Deep Linking, Personal Learning Environment] [Comment]

OpenLearn Remix Competition
Personally I think every issue of OLDaily is a remix - but even though I probably won 't win the prize I'm still inclined to pass on word of this competition, if only because I want to see the very best of the remixes assembled in one (easy to find) place. Ah... but wait. you have to use OU's OpenLearn materials. Why, this contest is just a publicity stunt! Just kidding - but it would be interesting to see a non-brand-specific remix contest. How about it, Tony? Tony Hirst, OUseful Info June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

Another Educational Social Bookmarking Resource: Qoolsqool
No details on this, but I'll point to it jut beqause: "Qoolsqool uses the collective intelligence of a community to select online educational resources." Jorge Goncalves, Learning Online Info June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Online Learning] [Comment]

What Really Happened at SUNY
Michael Feldstein describes 'what really happened at SUNY' in response to a post suggesting that the university "they insisted that the 'future is now' and ultimately ran out of steam and 'lived in the present' and went with Angel." Felstein responds, "the real barriers to an LMOS approach are not technical but political." Me, I'd prefer to hear the "gory details" - but I guess those will fade into history. Michael Feldstein, e-Literate June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

More Signal, Less Noise: The Power of RSS Mashups
I've talked a lot aout RSS over the years and we have finally reached the point where there is wide adoption - and adaptation - of the format. This article does the service of comparing some of the key systems launched since the inception of Yahoo Pipes, and offering some telling points. Such as the observation that there is no output function in Microsoft Popfly - you do all that work, but you can't create an RSS feed with it. Jay neely also describes how to use these tools and what they mean for companies and for users. Via Mark Oehlert. Jay Neely, Social Strategist June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: Microsoft, RSS, Yahoo!] [Comment]

Canon Rock
A link came through email the other day to this video on YouTube. It was noted that the artist would not have ben able to get anything like the same exposure in the pre-YouTube days (not, I would say, without signing his life away in a recording contract). How much exposure? Try (as of right now) 21,637,087 views, 68883 comments (including one from me) and favorited: 153324 times. I like th video because it really bridges rock and classical music in a way that makes each accessible to fans of the other. As it turns out, there is a whole 'Canon Rock' culture out there, as I discovered when I searched for more background, including jerryc, who I guess wrote the adaptation, as well as numerous others. Here's a New York Times article from a year ago on the videos, and a blog post (check the comments) in case the Times article disappears. funtwo, YouTubejerryc, who I guess wrote th June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: YouTube, RSS, Accessibility, Video] [Comment]

Creating Independent Learners: The MYP Technology Design Cycle
Description of the 'MYP Technology Design Cycle', a mechanism that guides programmers in the development of new software. I am in general a bit sceptical about such devices - yes, I think that planning is necessary, sometimes, but not necessarily in a formal system such as described here. That said, I don't discount such mechanisms entirely either, as they make the essential point, especially to novices, that they ought to engage in some activity other than writing code. Kim Cofino, always learning June 4, 2007 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment]

 

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