OLDaily

Welcome to Online Learning Daily, your best source for news and commentary about learning technology, new media, and related topics.

Feature Article
Big Fedi, Small Fedi - Where I Stand
Half an Hour, 2023/12/28

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Prodromou sets up a contrast between 'big fedi' and 'small fedi', with the bulk of his article dedicated to defining the two terms. Small fedi is, as the name suggests, small, personal and intimate. Big fedi, by contrast, is the opposite of that. But it's the details that matter, and I don't think we can simply choose between one of these options or the other. That's what my post is about.

[Link] [Local copy]

Big Fedi, Small Fedi
Eval Prodromou, Evan Prodromou's Blog, 2023/12/28

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This post offers some definitions to help people describe what sort of fediverse they want. On reading it my response was a glib "I'm happy with small fedi but I'm fine with big fedi too." But my feelings are rather more nuanced than that. Hence I wrote this post. This particular take was also informed by the story of latest victim of investor profit-taking, Goodreads. It ultimately boils down to the question: can we have nice things on the internet? I think we can - but we have to get past the narrow set of options presented in this post. See also: Jon Udell: Critical Mass in the Goldilocks Zone.

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post]

D2L and Unity Partner to Help Revolutionize Education with Immersive Real-Time 3D
D2L, 2023/12/28

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This is just a partnership announcement, not an actual product release, between D2L and Unity "with a goal to transform the education landscape through classroom integration of immersive Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), and Real-Time 3D (RT3D) technologies." I think it's worth noting precisely because (a) it shows the metaverse is still a thing, and (b) it's a company announcement that is not about AI. Via eSchool News which basically reprints D2L's press release (which is what I link to here).

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post]

AI, E-learning & Open Education
Paul Stacey, paulstacey.global, 2023/12/28

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This post is basically made up of slides presented by Paul Stacey for a talk in Taiwan. There's some good stuff here I haven't seen elsewhere, including a list (with links) of AI integrations in common learning management systems (LMS), a list (with links) of education subject specific AI, and a list (with links) of pedagogy-assisting AI tools.

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post]

Zoom: Why Does It Work?
Ian Sleebe, InfoQ, 2023/12/28

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This article doesn't go deeply into how Zoom works, but it goes more deeply than most of us do in our understanding of the conferencing platform. There's a special emphasis on how Zoom adapted to the scaling challenge during the years of the pandemic. It's an interesting look at how software evolves into large scale enterprise platforms, and it represents a turning point for pretty much every successful software application sooner or later.

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post]

We publish six to eight or so short posts every weekday linking to the best, most interesting and most important pieces of content in the field. Read more about what we cover. We also list papers and articles by Stephen Downes and his presentations from around the world.

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