Stephen's Web

OLDaily

by Stephen Downes
April 9, 2010

OERs and DIYU

Though directed toward an examination of open educational resources and the DIY university, this talk ends up being an overview of a large swath of my own educational philosophy, as drawn from the statement that is posted on my home page. Audio (great sound) and slides are available. There is also a recording of the Breeze session available (the photo above is from about 1:03:11 of the Breeze recording). Presentation by Stephen Downes, R685 on the Web 2.0 (The World Is Open With Web Technology), Online, via Breeze, [Link]

Linking research & learning technologies through standards
Position paper from Link Affiliates on standards for the ADL Conference next week. Link Affiliates "is a group working on promoting and facilitating the adoption of standards in e-learning and e-research in Australia." Repositories have to keep asking themselves, they argue, 'Why not Google?' They continue, "In e-Learning, the compelling case for repositories is made by a combination of the following, and repositories should be ensuring that they do a visibly better job than Google search." But that's not enough. "Users don't just expect the repository to feel like Google (or eBay, or increasingly Wikipedia); they expect it to be accessible to Google (and Wikipedia)." Unattributed, Link Affiliates, April 9, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Online Learning, Google, Accessibility, Wikipedia, Research, Learning Object Repositories, Australia] [Comment] [Tweet]

Misguided Outrage At NY Times' Ethicist Over Ethics Of Downloading A Book
Reaction from publishers to a column defending the ethics of downloading books you own. NY Times writer Randy Cohen argues that downloading a copy of a book you already own is likely illegal, but not unethical. The fury has been relentless, the arguments mostly miss the point. "It's really a question of whether or not you should be allowed to format change the works you've purchased, and there are many reasonable arguments in favor of that -- especially in situations where there is no loss in the system." But of course everybody knows that downloading books you don't own is increasing in popularity, and publishers are making the same mistakes now the music industry made a few years ago. PDF has become the MP3 of the internet age; don't expect proprietary formats to last longer than the proprietary music formats. Mike Masnick, TechDirt, April 9, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Books] [Comment] [Tweet]

Cyber-Spin: How the Internet Gets Framed as Dangerous
This is the story of how a survey sponsor, Deloitte, spins good survey results into bad and scary results. "Apparently Deloitte, one of the sponsors of the survey, was not happy with the results... How does Deloitte get from a drop in the number of victims and a 10% drop in losses (despite more attacks) and a general improvement in perceived preparedness, to the conclusion that crimes are increasing 'faster than potential victims can cope with them?' It's easy when you've got something to sell." I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to determine how the news media (which also has something to sell) reported this survey. Milton Mueller, CircleID, April 9, 2010 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment] [Tweet]

Jacky Lumarque: Haitian university rector, innovator and agitator
A Haitian university, destroyed in the earthquake, is rebuilding with a new model of learning. Informal, inclusive, participatory - it's what we would expect to build today if we wanted a university that serves both students and community. Interesting story. "With the volunteering initiative, knowledge is acquired in the street and the teacher accompanies the process. We are de-institutionalising knowledge." Unattributed, UNESCO, April 9, 2010 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment] [Tweet]

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