Stephen's Web

OLDaily

by Stephen Downes
November 18, 2009

Spamming all Edublogs
I wondered about the 'Lockers' advertisement in my email, apparently from Edublogs. It was not, though. If you got one, delete it; it's a fake. (And I feel for Jim Groom, who took Edublogs to task for the advertisement before realizing it was a fake - it could have happened to me just as easily). Jim Groom, bavatuesdays, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Marketing] [Comment]

The War For the Web
Tim O'Reilly of dangers to the open internet. As O'Reilly writes (and I experience now, frustratingly, with my iPod), "The Apple iPhone is the hottest web access device around, and like Facebook, while it connects to the web, it plays by a different set of rules. Anyone can put up a website, or launch a new Windows or Mac OS X or Linux application, without anyone's permission. But put an app onto the iPhone? That requires Apple's blessing." And he is not confident of the future. "I'm betting," he writes, "that things are going to get ugly. We're heading into a war for control of the web. And in the end, it's more than that, it's a war against the web as an interoperable platform. Instead, we're facing the prospect of Facebook as the platform, Apple as the platform, Google as the platform, Amazon as the platform, where big companies slug it out until one is king of the hill." Tim O'Reilly, O'Reilly Radar, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Apple Inc., Books, Google, Experience, Interoperability, Microsoft] [Comment]

Mozilla Weave Goes 1.0, Firefox Sync Almost Ready for Primetime
Just to remind me to test this... "Mozilla's Weave, a free add-on for Firefox that syncs your personal data across multiple PCs and mobile devices, is just about to graduate from a lab experiment to a stable, ready-for-primetime add-on." Scott Gilbertson, Monkey Bites, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Privacy Issues] [Comment]

Inside Learning Technologies
Jay Cross recommends this publication, which contains articles by himself and colleague Jane Hart (along with a dozen or so more). What caught my eye was the presentation of the magazine itself, one of those page-turning display sites. As I flipped through it, I found myself not reading the articles, just like I do with a real magazine. There are simple functions (contents, go to page) and you can download the PDF if you need access to the actual text. So I guess it's OK. I wonder how it would look on my iPod... oh, wait. It uses Flash. No Flash for the iPod. Jay Cross, Informal Learning Blog, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Apple Inc.] [Comment]

Digital Books: Dedicated Readers or Smartphones?
So I'm still messing around with my brand new iPod touch, which isn't either a dedicated reader or a smartphone, but is close enough to each. I'm still looking for a way to load and read books on it - the one reader I found requires an always-on connection, and I'd rather store and read offline. Anyhow, this posts notes "the big question is whether they will fork over $300 for a single-use book reader or use the smartphone in their pocket" and argues (in my view, correctly) that "multi-use devices will win out over single-use readers." I can't imagine buying an e-book reader if I have an iPod (or similar device) that will do the job for me. Richard Nantel, Workplace Learning Today, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Apple Inc., Branding, Books] [Comment]

Open Science at Web-Scale: Optimising Participation and Predictive Potential

Interesting report that serves as a starting point for consultations on what might be called "citizen science". The report covers aspects of open access initiatives (especially with regard to data) in academic publishing, and combines that with lessons that can be learned from blogging and citizen journalism. As the table above shows pretty clearly, you don't get citizen science without open access. Here is the full PDF Report, to which I recommend you turn directly, as the summary does not do it justice. Liz Lyon, JISC, UKOLN Digital Curation Centre, University of Bath, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Books, Research, Academia, Open Access, Web Logs] [Comment]

The Technological Dimension of a Massive Open Online Course: The Case of the CCK08 Course Tools
According to the abstract, "This paper focuses on the technological aspects of one MOOC, the Connectivism and Connective Knowledge (CCK08) course, in order to investigate lifelong learners' attitudes towards learning network technologies. The research framework is represented by three perspectives: (a) lifelong learning in relation to open education, with a focus on the effective use of learning tools; (b) the more recent personal knowledge management (PKM) skills approach; and (c) the usability of web-based learning tools." Good paper, with a comprehensive summary of the CCK08 course structure. Antonio Fini, The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Usability, Connectivism, Networks, Knowledge Management, Research] [Comment]

Introducing the Open Web Foundation Agreement
The Open Web Foundation has announced the launch of an Open Web Foundation Agreement, which is a charter that can be signed by agencies contributing specifications to the open web. "Specifications made available under the Open Web Foundation Agreement may include everything from small ad-hoc formats sketched out among friends to large multi-corporation collaborations that ultimately grow into international recognized standards with the help of formal standards setting organizations." There is a guide and a plain-language deed. The agreement is very similar to a BSD license - you are licensed to use copyright and patents "to make, use, sell, offer for sale, import, or distribute any implementation of the covered specification," and you can create your own revision of the specification. A number of specifications have already been contributed under the agreement from Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! Additional content from David Rudin, Eran Hammer-Lahav, David Recordon, Scott Wilson, Steve Repetti, and the Open Web Foundation Google Group. DeWitt Clinton, Open Web Foundation, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Patents, Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, Copyrights, Patents] [Comment]

My Presenter Picks
Kevin Honeycutt, a presenter to schools on the web and new media in learning, offers this selection of presenters. Some of the names in the list - like Wes Fryer - I know, and some - like Clif Mims and Tammy Worcester - were new to me. More grist for my RSS Reader mill. Via Luke Allen in Diigo. Kevin Honeycutt, Weblog, November 18, 2009 [Link] [Tags: Schools, New Media, RSS] [Comment]

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