Stephen's Web

OLDaily

by Stephen Downes
May 25, 2010

The New Associated Press for the 21st Century
TechCrunch Disrupthas announced Publish2 News Exchange, "a platform aimed at disrupting the Associated Press monopoly over content distribution to newspapers." Just for fun, I signed up as a journalist. Of course, I think that I am (in part) a journalist. But apparently, these applications are reviewed, and so we'll see if the sages at TechCrunch Disrupt agree. That said, I can't help but enjoy this new initiative. "The New AP is an open, efficient, scalable news distribution platform. We're enabling newspapers to benefit for the first time from the disruptive power of the Web, and from the efficiency of content production on the Web." here's the announcement. Scott Karp, Publishing 2.0, May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Books] [Comment] [Tweet]

Print This, Share This: Moodle Tool Guide for Teachers
This chart (PDF) linking educational activities and Moodle tools is a great resource. For each activity, it displays each tool as either green 'great fit', orange, or red ('not the best'). The tool was created by Joyce Seitzinger of Cat's Pyjamas. Richard Byrne, Free Technology for Teachers, May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Linking and Deep Linking] [Comment] [Tweet]

Learning Technology April 2010
The April 2010 IEEE Learning Technology Newsletter is now available, focusing on usability. But for me the most interesting item was an all-too-short description of idSpace, a platform that "features an integrative toolset... techniques for exploring new ideas (e.g. mind mapping in story writing and brainstorming) and for refinement of ideas... [and] tools to support traceability among stories, mind maps, concept maps, goals, new product features, as well as company values and policies." PDF. Various Authors, IEEE Technical Committee on Learning Technology (TCLT), May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Usability, Visualization] [Comment] [Tweet]

Visit the Visualization Zoo
Some good stuff here, including visualization APIs and Javascript development kits. Gary Woodill summarizews, "A good visualization is one that pictures information in such as way that you quickly grasp the main relationships that are contained in the data. This article by three people from Stanford University has a nice sample of visualization techniques for displaying sets of complex information." Gary Woodill, Workplace Learning Today, May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Visualization] [Comment] [Tweet]

Sir Ken Robinson: Bring on the learning revolution!
Numerous links to Ken Robinson's TED talk, which I just heard, and frankly, I don't get it. The TED blurb says, "In this poignant, funny follow-up to his fabled 2006 talk, Sir Ken Robinson makes the case for a radical shift from standardized schools to personalized learning -- creating conditions where kids' natural talents can flourish." Well, fine, we get that here every week. But the talk, honestly, consists of nothing but stories and platitudes. Ken Robinson, TED, May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Schools, Personalization, Online Learning, Paradigm Shift] [Comment] [Tweet]

Library of Parliament Research Publications
Richard Ackerman pointed me to this collection of Library of Parliament Research Publications. Great stuff, including Recent Federal Investments in Post-Secondary Education and Training and UNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions . Various Authors, Government of Canada, May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: UNESCO] [Comment] [Tweet]

Will the New York Times' Pay Wall Chase Away Bloggers?
The headline is about the Times paywall, but this is the story of an awful Pew study. The suggestion nehind the headline is that since bloggers use the Times so much, the Times will suffer when it closes its doors. And I agree. But then the post notes that, "A new study on news and social media from the (Pew) Project for Excellence in Journalism... found, bloggers draw on a handful of traditional-media sources for their links. Remarkably, just four outlets account for a full 80% of those links: the BBC, CNN, the Times and the Washington Post." According to Pew, 99 percent of all blog links are to these news outlets, which is simply not believable. Pew would have us believe blogs almost never link to each other, which is simply false. What explains this? The Pew data is based on IceRocket. The IceRocket data, in turn, records "top stories posted in the blogosphere, measured by new links to Official News Sources in the last 48 hours." Yes, if you don't count links to non-traditional sources, then 99 percent of your links will be to traditional sources. Proving exactly nothing. I trust Pew data less and less every day. Related: John Connell on paywall failings. Jeff Bercovici, AOL Daily Finance, May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Blogger, Google, Web Logs] [Comment] [Tweet]

The Beatles Complete on Ukulele
The Beatles canon completely reimagined, with new tracks and essays coming through 2012. This could never have been produced in the pre-internet days, and now forms what would be an invaluable resource to any music teacher covering the Beatles. Don't miss this! David Barratt, Weblog, May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: none] [Comment] [Tweet]

Where the Becta closure fits in the ConDem education policies
Graham Attwell with some nice logic behind the closure of Becta. "The closure probably reflects wider ConDem policies. One is the conservative myth that somehow if we return to old fashioned rote learning... then somehow school standards will improve... The second is a movement towards privatising education."

Attwell concludes, "Of course there will be continued development of educational technology. But expect to see less emphasis on research. Expect to see less concern over the learner experience. Expect to see less concern over support for lower achieving students. Expect to see contracts placed with the friends of Academy directors in this brave new free world. And expect to see a widening of the class division in the provision of education." Graham Attwell, Pontydysgu, May 25, 2010 [Link] [Tags: Schools, Online Learning, Experience, Research] [Comment] [Tweet]

This newsletter is sent only at the request of subscribers. If you would like to unsubscribe, Click here.

Know a friend who might enjoy this newsletter? Feel free to forward OLDaily to your colleagues. If you received this issue from a friend and would like a free subscription of your own, you can join our mailing list. Click here to subscribe.