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

#ShrugCon – the technical backend for an online conference
Dave Cormier, Dave's Educational Blog, 2024/07/16

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Dave Cormier's ShrugCon is on right now (I thought about dropping in but even though it's free you have to register and that was too much of a commitment) and he describes how he set it up in this post. "While I'm using the Universities time and technology," he writes, "I'm supporting the whole conference as one person with a budget of $0 (with the exception of some of my Office of Open Learning peeps reviewing the submissions). It started out this way because i didn't want to jump into people's schedules on a project that I wasn't sure was going to succeed and it turned into a bit of an experiment about running an online conference as a team of 1."

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Relationships and learning in the "AI Boom"
Nafez Dakkak, Nafez's Notes, 2024/07/16

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Interesting interview with Isabelle Hau, the Director of Stanford's Learning Accelerator and who "brings almost two decades of experience investing in some of the most impactful education initiatives around the world." Obviously my view of the world and hers don't exactly align. But it's still a useful insight into that way of thinking. The focus of her work these days is on the messy human side of learning, which is actually a refreshing change from what investors traditionally want to do, which is to "streamline" learning. She is "fascinated by how human relationships are evolving in a world increasingly powered by technology" and "thinking about learning differences".

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Zambia education: Schooling was made free, now classrooms are crammed
Marco Oriunto, BBC, 2024/07/16

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I'm sure this article is only one percent of the whole story, so I'm not going to draw too many conclusions from it, but it's interesting how this overtly positive story - schooling is now free in Zambia (what? it wasn't?) - is presented as a story with a bunch of negatives. And this: "experts say overcrowding is now threatening the quality of education, especially for low-income students." Such a ridiculous statement when you realize that what the low-income students were getting previously was nothing. What do you mean, it was "threatening the quality of education"? Here's the proper response: "This is a good problem," says Education Minister Douglas Syakalima. "I'd rather let the children be in a congested classroom than in the street."

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Are digital textbooks the way of the future? Can publishers keep up? - World Education Blog
GEM Report, World Education Blog, 2024/07/16

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This article feels like it could have been written  in the 1990s. "Digital textbooks also have the advantage of increasing student access to content outside school hours. Moreover, those openly licensed as OER encourage contextual adaptations that can improve inclusiveness and relevance. However, this requires a reconfiguration of some of the dominant business models." Why is it being written in 2024? Because publishers won't let go even as they continue to profit from the digital divide. "For instance, e-books only represent about 10% to 13% of publishers' printed book revenue in Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria, as they face challenges adapting and maintaining new technologies." And maybe this explains the UNESCO writer's attitude: "Digital textbooks will not – and never should – replace printed materials." Yes they should. The sooner, the better.

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The ethics of personalised digital duplicates: a minimally viable permissibility principle
John Danaher, Sven Nyholm, AI and Ethics, 2024/07/16

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OK, I should be clear, if I could create a digital duplicate of myself, I would. But the very concept raises a number of concerns, which are addressed at length in this paper. Daniel Dennett, for example, argued that "counterfeit [digital] people are the most dangerous artifacts in human history, capable of destroying not just economies but human freedom itself." I'm less worried. For the sake of argument, I assume that they will work correctly (not misrepresent me, not be biased or prejudiced, not give all my data to Microsoft). Then, even the disadvantages turn into advantages. For example, while "controversies have arisen in recent years as a result of universities in Canada and the UK continuing to provide pre-recorded lectures from deceased members of staff," I hope people still want to listen to me after I'm gone. A digital copy facilitates that! Also, if my digital copy is any good (and if I have unique skills), my digital copy could do my job while I travel to the Galapagos. Via Philosophical Disquisitions.

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Can AI be an author? Federal Court asked to decide in new copyright case
Anja Karadeglija, CP24, Canadian Press, 2024/07/16

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So here's the scenario: an AI is used to combine a photo with a van Gogh painting; the author then tries to claim it as copyrighted content. Is it? "The United States Copyright Review Board refused to register it." In Canada, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) accepted it, but the case is before the courts. David Fewer, who helped file the case, says one of the aims is "to lay 'down in bedrock' that only humans are authors under the law." According to Fewer, "It's important at this point, just before this stuff enters the commercial zone in a really serious way, that we get rules down." If this case succeeds - and there are good reasons why it should - then there will be a flood of copyright-free artificially generated learning resources hitting the internet. Ready? Via Clint Lalonde.

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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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