By Stephen Downes
April 13, 2004
Creating and Capturing New
Knowledge
What is it about a community that
causes it to not only produce, but also transfer,
knowledge? It is certain that a community produces
artifacts, codifications of the knowledge it creates – look
at any academic society and the first evidence of its work
is the set of journal articles and other publications it
produced. But belonging to (and earning membership into)
such a community requires much more than merely learning
the content of its discourse. It requires immersion into
the practices of the community, learning, as Kuhn said, how
to do the problems at the end of the chapter. By Stephen
Downes, Australian Flexible Learning Community, September
13, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
E-learning Pure-play Vendors Under Siege,
Says Frost & Sullivan
In a way this is old news,
but in another, more important way, this confirms an
existing trend. An analysis by Frost & Sullivan "suggests
the entry of global computer giants into the e-learning
market is a cause of considerable concern among existing
vendors. In a bid to promote awareness of their brands and
increase market share, they are pumping more money into
their marketing and product development efforts." More. By Press Release, Frost & Sullivan,
via Tekrati, April 13, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Minister Vows to Fight
Music-swappers
After meeting with music industry
executives this week, the Canadian Heritage Minister
announces that she will lead a government offensive against
file sharers, including passing legislation to ban file
sharing and ratification of key WIPO agreements that would
broaden music and publishing industry protection. By Keith
Damsell, Globe and Mail, April 13, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Fighting Music Swappers
My
response to the Globe and Mail article, as a letter to
the editor. The debate over file sharing isn't simply a
matter of protecting honest vendors against thieves. It is
about whether these vendors should be able to hold a
privileged position in the marketplace. By Stephen Downes,
Stephen's Web, April 13, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Is Google the Future of
E-mail?
Good discussion of the implications and
issues surrounding Google's new email service, GMail. I was
interested to see the discussion about the implications for
privacy in this new service, since Declan and I exchanged a
few emails about this last week. The main message is this:
"would-be users of Gmail or any similar service should
recognize that their so-called free e-mail comes at a
price." Yup. By Declan McCullagh, CNet News.Com, April 12,
2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
After 40 Years' Work, Gravity Experiment Will
Get Off The Ground
When you watch a lifetime's
work, a $700 million 40-year-old project, blast
off on a rocket, you get a little nervous. But no
matter what the result, I have nothing but admiration for
the sort of dedication it has taken to make this project a
reality. There are lessons here for students about more than
just physics and astronomy. A huge OLDaily tip of the hat
to Francis Everitt, and we wish him every success. By
Glennda Chui, San Jose Mercury News, April 13, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Google Searches Repositories: So What Does
Google Search For?
This commentary deflates the
enthusiasm about Google's plan to search institutional
repositories, arguing in essence that there is nothing
there to search for. Could be. But part of this, responds
one commentator, is that "one of the reasons there are so
few archives and so few papers in them is that it was
rather arbitrary for Google and OCLC to cover only DSpace
archives!" And he notes, "the real OAI google is OAIster,
and it contains over 3 million pearls from nearly 300
institutions." Still, it's an interesting commentary: why
would Google and OCLC choose DSpace? Why not the wider OAI
world? By Henk Ellermann, InBetween, April 12, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
Restrictions Impeding Web-based
Courses
Documentation of the results of two
typical requests an instructor might make of a publisher
while creating an online course. "The first was to store an
electronic version of a journal article, to which we
subscribe, on a secure password protected server. The
second was to reproduce extracts of published material on
password protected web pages and CD ROM." The results were
to be predicted: "Publishers' responses were highly
variable to the requests for access to published
material... Considerable resource costs were incurred by
the exercise." By Michele Langlois, Richard F Heller,
Richard Edwards, Georgios Lyratzopoulos and John Sandars,
BioMed Central, April 7, 2004
[Refer][Research][Reflect]
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