OLDaily

21st-century propaganda: A guide to interpreting and confronting the dark arts of persuasion
Gideon Lichfield, Quartz, 2017/05/15

Good article looking at how the internet is being used to support influence and propaganda, with a good helping of George Lakoff (and the theory of frames and metaphors) and a typology of modern media manipulation. None of which, at heart, is new. "What’s changed, of course, is the internet, and the many new ways it creates for falsehoods to reach us. The power of populism today lies in its ability to combine 20th-century propaganda techniques with 21st-century technology, putting propaganda on steroids."

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One business case for OER examined
Tony Bates, online learning and distance education resources, 2017/05/15

Tony Bates looks at the most recent edition of Distance Education and in particular at an article focused on the business case for open educational resources. The case, in a nutshell, is that people can use open access to decide whether they want to invest time and money in a particular program. This of course is a very old argument, and it's rooted firmly in the institutional perspective, as it becomes a 'business case' only when these same students start paying tuition fees. "Without that funding, and other costs, OpenLearn will quickly become unsustainable." Well - no. It's a policy decision to require colleges and universities to earn revenues from their users. Many other government services do no such thing. The only real business case, to my mind, is whether the intended benefit of the institution is being delivered. Tuition impedes that benefit, just as the subscription fees charged by Distance Education impede that benefit.

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How Google Took Over the Classroom – The New York Times
D', Arcy Norman, D'Arcy Norman Dot Net, 2017/05/15

"Natasha Singer wrote a piece for the NYTimes on Google in the classroom," writes D'Arcy Norman. "Is it a marketing ploy? (of course it is – there is no such thing as a free lunch, etc…) Google says 'of course it isn’t – we just want kids to learn! It’s about the learning!'" The main point here, though, is that Google is tracking the students' every move, all in the name of 'improving education'. It's hard to believe that this is necessary. And "we can trust Google absolutely and without question, they aren’t applying their established multibillion-dollar-per-year business model here." Can't we?

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I’m a Deleter
Alan Levine, CogDogBlog, 2017/05/15

It never occurred to me that this could be a thing. "The cool ed-tech kids are deleting tweets," writes Alan Levine. "I’m not cool," he says. He runs contra Audrey Watters. "I now delete all Facebook and Twitter posts that are older than 90 days," writes Watters. "I also delete all email that’s older than a year." And as Michael Tracey writes, "Lots of prominent Twitter personalities who could be vaguely situated under the banner of 'political media' have taken to mass-deleting their old tweets." I don't have an issue with it either way. People should decide for themselves how to use social media. There's no one right way to do it.

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Teacher spends two days as a student and is shocked at what she learns
Valerie Strauss, Washington Post, 2017/05/15

I always thought it was just me: that deep need to yawn in class, or that feeling I can't keep my eyes open. It hit me throughout school and university, and more recently while attending conference presentations. But it's not just me: it's what will happen to most people if you force them to sit and listen all day. That's one of the lessons learned by this teacher doing everything a student does though the day. Another lesson? I see math classes still start first thing in the morning (at 7:45!). This is why I did poorly in math throughout my education (save for the one year it was 1:00 pm). (p.s. yes the headline is total clickbait.)

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