Edu_Rss

Open Source Means Just That
Those who know me personally know that the past year was a bit of an uphill struggle. In addition to battling my Crohn's disease last year, I was the lead on a project to implement a learning object repository here in B.C. based on some code another university had created. The 'partnership' did not work out as hoped, and after 7 months we finally decided to cancel our involvement in the project. We've moved on and should be announcing our choice of software to implement that same LOR in the not too distant future. But when things go the way they've gone, the From EdTechPost on May 7, 2005 at 10:51 p.m..

Receiving Disturbing E-mails
I'm receiving nasty e-mails at my job. The return address is a person with whom I worked two years ago at a different employer. She is no longer there, and is not sending the e-mails. How does someone connect me... From Teaching and Developing Online. on May 7, 2005 at 9:54 p.m..

Tsunami Scientific Web
In this site you will find a wide variety of topics related to the science of tsunamis. Additionally, the origins of the word as well as historical and legendary aspects of these dramatic natural events are explored. Site visitors are... From Teaching and Developing Online. on May 7, 2005 at 8:47 p.m..

Tsunami Health View
Who will ever forget the tsunami disaster of December 26, 2004? Those who survived the experience face serious health concerns, both physical and psychological. This site provides information on health issues to help survivors and those caring for them. Tsunami... From Teaching and Developing Online. on May 7, 2005 at 8:47 p.m..

Better Aid
A resource for disaster recovery workers in countries affected by the tsunami of 12.26.04 Better Aid: Aid partners for disaster recovery in South Asia... From Teaching and Developing Online. on May 7, 2005 at 8:47 p.m..

Context For Your Blog
If you want to gain a deeper understanding of the changing field of communication your blog exists in, take a look at the presentations from WOMMA Summit 2005. The focus is obviously word-of-mouth marketing, and blogs are just one tool... From Teaching and Developing Online. on May 7, 2005 at 8:47 p.m..

So you want to play online poker?
In the last 2 years, online poker has exploded to a multi-million dollar industry with tens of thousands of players on at all times, day or night.  According to PokerPulse, a site which keeps track of the number of users on most major poker sites, the largest online cardroom had a peak of in excess of 40,000 real money players in the last 24 hours Well I've got a little secret for you.  Half of them are idiots. From kuro5hin.org on May 7, 2005 at 7:45 p.m..

"Open Learning" and "Large Learning Objects" (Courses): Support at Utah State University, Rice and MIT
Summary: Formal, instructionally oriented knowledge offerings continue to expand. Now, if certification via passage through a "program" ,i.e., pay-for-learning sequence, is not of concern, you may work your way to learning "world class" knowledge without having to pay "world class" prices. From your home computer. This is, among other things, a move in the direction of distributive justice, countering the tendency for the rich (in knowledge) to get richer and the poor (having little knowledge and little real access to it) to get poorer. All we need now is for everyone to have on From Connectivity: Spike Hall's RU Weblog on May 7, 2005 at 4:45 p.m..

The woman who wasn't responsible for Abu Ghraib
Gen. Janis Karpinski has been busted to colonel but not because of Abu Ghraib. According to an article by Lee Worden, the Army's report says specifically: "Though Brig. Gen. Karpinski's performance of duty was found to be seriously lacking," the summary said, "the investigation team determined that no action or lack of action on her part contributed specifically to the abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib." So, somehow a woman has taken the fall in way that enables us to continue to deny systemic responsibility. If Kafka hadn't died so young, he would have had the opportunity to die From Joho the Blog on May 7, 2005 at 12:48 p.m..

Microsoft does the right gay thing
From an internal from Steve Ballmer: "I've concluded that diversity in the workplace is such an important issue for our business that it should be included in our legislative agenda" Posted by Scoble, noted by Salon, saluted by me among many others. Way to go, Microsoft. [Technorati tag: microsoft]... From Joho the Blog on May 7, 2005 at 12:48 p.m..

CraigsNews
From the AP, about the founder of Craigs List: Craig Newmark told Associated Press editors and writers in a bureau visit, his newest fascination is community journalism. Newmark hopes to develop a pool of "talented amateurs" who could investigate scandals, cover politics and promote the most important and credible stories. Articles would be published on Internet sites ranging from Craigslist to individual Web logs, or blogs. This is how stuff happens. Go, Craig! [Technorati tag: journalism]... From Joho the Blog on May 7, 2005 at 12:48 p.m..

Metadata without understanding
I was thumbing through an Italian newspaper in my morning hunt for cognates when I realized that while the information in the paper is noise to me, I am fluent in the metadata. I know that this is a headline, that is an ad, this is a caption, that is a pointer to the page on which the article is continued, this is a table of contents, that is a byline. Of course that's predictable: The information in the paper is primarily linguistic while the metadata is typographic and positional. Nevertheless, my fluency in metadata extends to every newspaper in... From Joho the Blog on May 7, 2005 at 11:46 a.m..

Court Nixes 'Broadcast Flag'
The FCC exceeded its authority by requiring consumer electronics makers to help restrict copying of digital TV broadcasts, a federal appeal court rules. Michael Grebb reports from Washington, D.C. From Wired News on May 7, 2005 at 10:46 a.m..

Italy Day 3 - Capri
Another difficult day to capture, which are, of course, the best days to have. (And the worst.) I wandered through the perfect little town of Anacapri as work was beginning. It is carefully kept, in the manner of towns that live by creating memories. The buildings are small and many of the shops are quotidian, although others sell tourist gimcracks and the artifacts of fashion. Every turn offers at least one loveliness: Yellow flowers poking through a gray bamboo wall, a gate that opens up the aromas of a garden, a modest church newly painted a brazen white. After breakfast... From Joho the Blog on May 7, 2005 at 9:45 a.m..

Beautiful people
Elaine Scarry, in On Beauty and Being Just, on the modern fear of acknowledging and discussing the beautiful: Even if we could be persuaded that loooking at beautiful human faces and forms were harmful to ther persons we seem to be admiring, it is not clear why the entire world of natural and artifactual, physical and metaphysical should be turned away from. It seems that at most we should be obligated to give up the pleasure of looking at one another. [p. 62-63]... From Joho the Blog on May 7, 2005 at 9:45 a.m..

Google eyes better news searches - BBC
Google is planning to improve online news searches. A patent filed in the US will allow stories to be ranked according to their quality, rather than just by relevance. The patent would create a system to compare the track record and credibility of differe From Techno-News Blog on May 7, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

Nanotech useful for spies, government report says - Declan McCullagh, CNET News Blog
Nanotechnology developments eventually may help U.S. spies, a new government report concludes. Devices that are incredibly and near-undetectably tiny -- under 100 nanometers -- offer "exciting possibilities" for exploitation by U.S. spy agencies, says the From Techno-News Blog on May 7, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

Spyware Lurks On Most PCs - Enid Burns, ClickZ
Personal computers continue to fall victim to spyware. According to Webroot's "The State of Spyware Report," 66 percent of personal computers scanned by the company's online tool were found to be infected with an average 25 spyware entities each. The repo From Techno-News Blog on May 7, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

For CMS vendors: At-a-glance product summary
At-a-glance product summary Importance to consumers? Very important42% Important37% Somewhat important18% Not important3% How do vendor websites rate? Very good8% Good36% Acceptable37% Poor17% Very poor3% CMS vendor websites benefit from a succinct, plain English summary of the product and... From Column Two on May 7, 2005 at 2:47 a.m..

The problem with usability change recommendations
John Ferrara has written an article on the dangers of recommending changes based on usability testing results. To quote: User testing, then, affords a strong empirical basis for recommending that designers make changes to resolve the problems found. Most test... From Column Two on May 7, 2005 at 1:46 a.m..

New Job and Reflections on Organization
I will be starting a new job next week. I'll post more about that later, but as I clean up from my current position, I am finding myself reflecting a little bit (probably not enough) on how I organize myself. Maybe it's time to actually getting around to ... From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Another Blackboard Scripts update
Following on from my previous post fixing the version 5 script, here's the version 6 script fixed. From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Drupal for educational sites
I've spent the evening catching up on my aggregator reading. It's been a fascinating set of reading that is really chiming with where my work life appears to be headed, assuming I can find the time to keep up. More about that will follow. I followed a link from ... From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Great Wikipedia Introduction
In Jon Udell: Heavy metal umlaut: the movie, Jon tracks changes to a document over time including content, style, language, and abuse. It's a great screencast and as a by-product provides a wonderful riposte to many of the standard objections to the use of Wikipedia. From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Tag, You’re It!
Alan Levine, in What We're Doing When We Tag says: "And while structured meta data provides the framework for setting up systems that are easily searched, shared, moved from one automated system to another, we ought to accept that asking mortal humans to repeatedly supply data for 11, 30, 80, 324 ... From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Another kind of meta-data - conversation
David Wiley announced that they have integrated OLS (Open Learning Support) with CNX (Rice Connexions project). OLS is already working with the MIT Open Courseware Project, but they've now added this. Not much activity yet, but good to see. From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Over five years
It's been over five years since I started consistently blogging, and although things have tailed off recently, I can't imagine not having a space to write in. It's still a bit galling to hear about weblog "pioneers" in education who started recently, but there you go... From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Student Weblogs
Well, the semester is under way and while some are still scratching their heads about it, some of our experiments in class weblogs are going gangbusters. The Bio-Medical ethics one in particular seems to be working well. To see how it would all work, I subscribed to the RSS feeds ... From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Institutional Repositories and Who Doesn’t Use Them (everyone?)
Auricle quotes some statistics on the use of Institutional Repositories. Here's the orginal article: Understanding Faculty to Improve Content Recruitment for Institutional Repositories, although the statistics themselves come from an article in Learned Publishing titled Institutional Repositories and Scholarly Publishing, which I was able (somehow) to download ... From Serious Instructional Technology on May 7, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..

Open Admin for Schools
Posted on school-discuss: "Open Admin for Schools is a freely available web based school administration program. It now includes an online gradebook, and allows parent viewing of attendance, report cards, and gradebook, if desired. This is being developed by both the Battlefords School Division and the North West Catholic School Division in Saskatchewan, Canada." Version 1.80 was released today. By Various Authors, May 6, 2005 [Refer][OLDaily on May 7, 2005 at 12:45 a.m..

Filling up Experiences at the Online Learning Filling Station
Like Derek Morrison, I have rolled my eyes at the thought of using a PDA, this after my less than fruitful experience with an iPaq a few years ago. I wonder whether my thoughts would change with one of the newer devices. To judge from this item, Morrison is a convert: working with a Dell Axim X50v PDA, he describes the experience as "liberating". After taking a pass on the tablet, I am looking with more interest at the Ultra Mobile tablet PC 2007. Still - I'm the person who won't carry a m From OLDaily on May 7, 2005 at 12:45 a.m..

Overkill on Copyright Law
This editorial is typical of the reams of criticism piled on recent legislation passed in the United States, Attached as a little-noticed rider to a bill allowing families to filter offensive content, the new measure imposes harsh penalties on people copying and distributing movies. "Let's save prison for the folks who are genuine threats to society, not people who chip away at Hollywood's bottom line." Sheesh, no kidding. By Editorial, The Daily Herald, May 5, 2005 [Refer][OLDaily on May 7, 2005 at 12:45 a.m..

The Age of Engagement
The funniest slide - slide 15 - rewrites Maslow's hierarchy to incorporate the desire for connectivity. The slide reflects the tone of this otherwise serious, and dauntingly documented, look at the bright, bright future of the internet. According to The Age of Engagement, the impact of the internet is just starting. As Google indexes all the world's content ("doable before most of us retire") commerce and advertising will continue to migrate to the internet. The blogosphere, meanwhile, continues to revolutionize content creation. PDF. Via OLDaily on May 7, 2005 at 12:45 a.m..

Developing and Implementing a Methodology for Reviewing E-portfolio Products
Recently published report on e-portfolios commissioned by JISC (very recently - my copy still has corrections). The authors offer a literature survey and mapping of twelve products("a relatively small sample of the total number of UK e-portfolio products") with a focus on academic, not corporate, offerings. The authors note (p.34) that "It is therefore of considerable concern that few developers report that they are working towards accessibility specifications, such as IMS ACCLIP, or WCAG 'AAA' compliance." The authors also noted that about half the sites did not have privacy policie From OLDaily on May 7, 2005 at 12:45 a.m..

Resistance is Useless: There is no Point in Authentication Systems (According to Stephen Downes)
Some more commentary on my mIDm proposal. Johannes Ernst writes "it does not allow a user to use different identifiers as easily as we do in LID (Lightweight Identity)." I disagree - using the User Agent Switcher, changing identities is as easy as selecting your preference from a drop-down menu. Moreover, the big different between LID and my proposal isn't the way I get around the need to type in your URL (though it does that), it's that it avoids the need to make changes to the server as a Super-User (something most of us can't do). Meanwhil From OLDaily on May 7, 2005 at 12:45 a.m..

1973: premio Pulitzer al Washington Post por el escándalo Watergate
El prestigioso diario norteamericano vio reconocido su papel en el escándalo político que rodeó la revelación de actividades ilegales por parte de la administración republicana el presidente Richard Nixon durante la campaña electoral de 1972. El escándalo nació con el arresto en junio de 1972 de cinco hombres que habían penetrado para espiar al Comité Nacional Demócrata en el hotel Watergate en Washington. Después de múltiples peripecias judiciales la implicación de la administración de Nixon se fue haciendo cada vez más evidente. (...) From martinalia.com | Gestión de Contenidos on May 6, 2005 at 11:47 p.m..

SaskTel YOUTHnetwork
For students: Discover our interactive tools where you can have live online chats with SaskTel experts, play a virtual interview game, or find out what SaskTel is all about. You'll find everything you need to plan the career you've always... From Teaching and Developing Online. on May 6, 2005 at 11:46 p.m..

Sask Trends monitor
Sask Trends Monitor tracks social, economic, and demographic trends in Saskatchewan Sask Trends Monitor , Saskatchewan... From Teaching and Developing Online. on May 6, 2005 at 11:46 p.m..