Edu_Rss

Jack Munushian, 81, Dies; Developed TV Lectures
Dr. Jack Munushian, an aerospace scientist and an educator at the University of Southern California, helped establish an innovative system to broadcast lectures to students off campus. From New York Times: Education on June 11, 2005 at 9:45 p.m..

Federal Audit Says Lender Exploited Subsidy Rules
A nonprofit student loan company in New Mexico improperly exploited a federal subsidy program that guaranteed it 9.5 percent interest on loans, an audit has found. From New York Times: Education on June 11, 2005 at 8:45 p.m..

Berkman everywhere
First, on the plane ride here I read an article in The Times of London that cites John Palfrey, and tonight I come back from the Reboot social event, flip on CNN and there's Rebecca MacKinnon on a panel about news and bloogging. What next? Ethan Zuckerman Brand soap in my hotel room?... From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 6:47 p.m..

Second chance for a pun
On the irc chat at Reboot, I got a straight line I'll never get again. We were on a brief thread about how tired we all were. Someone posted "We're brain dead." I posted: "And some of us are Dane bred." What are the chances of the opportunity to use this Spoonerism ever arising again? Hence my shameless, context-free repeating of it here. Forgive me.... From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 6:47 p.m..

Jordan Is Preparing to Tone Down the Islamic Bombast in Textbooks
Facing growing extremism and rising security threats, educators are seeking to revamp their religious studies curriculum. From New York Times: Education on June 11, 2005 at 6:45 p.m..

What Lifted Fifth-Grade Scores? Schools Say Lots of Hard Work
Schools across the city with large increases in test scores, principals, parents, superintendents, teachers and students offered this most basic explanation: They worked hard. From New York Times: Education on June 11, 2005 at 6:45 p.m..

No Common Tag Rules Means Problems, Even Dysfunctionality
Summary: Paolo Valdemarin voices concerns that I share. Using some common sense usability ideas (see his entry below) he finds that rule-free Technorati, Flickr and CCMixter tag systems are dysfunctional. The loss between sender/tagger and receiver/tag searcher is too great. Too many items that should be found, aren't, too many that are found, don't fit need. On the other hand there's Wikipedia -- careful development, more front end learning load, but it "the whole system is blooming beautifully". Connectivity: Spike Hall's RU Weblog on June 11, 2005 at 4:47 p.m..

The Challenge of Wikipedia
I'm on a wiki and Wikipedia bender of late, trying to get my brain around all of the implications for educators in terms of how to teach research and the use of sources. I think that this is actually a bigger challenge for elementary school teachers who are in that pre-exposition gray area. For instance, if my daughter gets assigned a "report" on Argentina, why wouldn't she go first to the Wikipedia entry? The bigger question is why would she go anywhere else? The entry has 4,100 words and abou From weblogged News on June 11, 2005 at 3:48 p.m..

Wiki Swarm (Ross Mayfield)
Loic Le Meur started with a simple post pointing to a wiki and asking for help flushing out facts on The European Blogosphere. Over the next 24 hours an incredible resource was generated with 400 contributions. Loic abandoned Powerpoint... From Corante: Social Software on June 11, 2005 at 2:49 p.m..

Heather is blogging
Heather Ross, erstwhile journalist and current research assistant on my virtual learning community research program, has been pulled into the educational technology blogging community by Alec Couros. Now, if I start seeing the progress on the research program falling off,... From Rick's Café Canadien on June 11, 2005 at 1:51 p.m..

[reboot7] Why execs should go to media art festivals
Régine Debatty (we-make-money-not-art.com) shows examples of art projects, from her blog: The Medulla Intima is a "jewel" you wear that betrays your feelings by showing what your face would look like with the appropriate emotion. The Key Table shows your emotions based on how you throw your change and keys on a tabnle. Iyashikei-net lets you pump water in your house to cause "tears" to fall from a sculpture of tears. Needies are a cross between pillows, plush toys, and Furbies; they compete for your attention. Spatial Sounds is a robot arm that tries to establish a relationship with the.. From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 1:45 p.m..

[reboot7] The first blogger
The effervescent Ben Hammersley argues that Richard Steele was the first blogger, publishing his first post was on April 12, 1709. He postsed three times a week, ran comments, had 800 readers, and drank lots of coffee. "This guy is a blogger." Amateur publishing + coffee = Revolution, Ben says. When fashion no longer flagged status, and people were drinking coffee in coffee shops, getting more and more animated, you get conversations among equals. The Tatler then broadcast this cafe society to the hinterlands. Ben's equation: Normal person + Anonymity + Audience = Total fuckwad. "The new From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 9:49 a.m..

Hoder is going home
Hoder is going to visit Iran and is looking for support: donations and the protection that public-ness can provide. [Technorati tag: hoder]... From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 9:49 a.m..

Update on BlogWalk 9.0 participation
We already have 10 confirmations for BlogWalk 9.0 and another 9 invitations pending. This leaves very little room for more people. If you think you should be invited... get in contact as soon as possible.Please, read this recent post to get an idea what Seblogging News on June 11, 2005 at 8:50 a.m..

Legal online music stores make some gains - Adam Pasick, Reuters
Legal online music stores have gained a solid foothold against free file-sharing networks, according to new data released on Tuesday. The beleaguered music industry has been pursuing a carrot and stick strategy of supporting legal alternatives such as Ap From Techno-News Blog on June 11, 2005 at 8:49 a.m..

Companies Aim to Score Big with Tiny Technologies - John G. Spooner, eWeek
Focusing on the small things presents big challenges for the emerging field of nanotechnology. While applications for the technology are wide open and venture capital dollars are readily available"many of the companies assembled at the NanoBusiness Confer From Techno-News Blog on June 11, 2005 at 8:49 a.m..

Microsoft dials up VoIP partners - Bob Francis, InfoWorld
Microsoft on Monday made a big move into the voice over internet protocol (VoIP) market by announcing strategic alliances with AT&T, Amdocs and Sylantro. Microsoft made the announcement today at SuperComm, a telecom trade show in Chicago. Microsoft's go From Techno-News Blog on June 11, 2005 at 8:49 a.m..

[reboot7] Social tagging
Lee Bryant of Headshift talks about five case studies. 1. In an experiment, users get to tag stories on the BBC news page and see other people's tags. (Stowe blogged about this here.) 2. Local aggregation, pulling in news, blogs, links, photos and government information. Text analysis derives common themes. Show the keywords by frequency so people can navigate. Make everything comment-able. 3. Building shared meaning with tags — cluster and search on themes. 4. Negotiating language — learning from unstructured data. They asked for user-driven feedback on health services based From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 8:48 a.m..

[reboot7] Object-centered sociality
Jyri Engestrom (who blogs at zengestrom.com) is applying sociological theory to the online world to explain why some social networks work and others don't. Design is always motivated by theory, he says. The most popular theories behind social networks are ones discussed in the books Links and Nexus: "A social network is a map of the relationships between individuals." (He takes this definition from Wikipedia.) This doesn't explain what connects particular people and not others. But another tradition of theorizing, people connect to each other through a shared object. By object, he me From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 7:48 a.m..

Radio Sets Eyes on Podcast Profit
Commercial and public stations scramble for ways to make money off your MP3 player. Now, listeners can pay to get their Rush Limbaugh fix. By Randy Dotinga. From Wired News on June 11, 2005 at 6:45 a.m..

Plugging a plug
I've posted a 2-minute video plugging my upcoming video blogging of SuperNova. The conference, about business in the decentralized world, runs June 20-22, and I'll be there June 21-22, interiewing speakers and attendees. It's an experiment that I'm looking forward to. [Technorati tag: supernova]... From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 4:45 a.m..

Iranian blogger faces death penalty
From Reporters without Borders: Reporters Without Borders voiced deep concern today about the fate of 25-year-old blogger Mojtaba Saminejad, who has been sentenced to two years in prison by a Tehran revolutionary court for "insulting the Supreme Guide" and who is due to be tried soon on a separate charge of insulting the prophets, which carries a possible death penalty... ...arious initiatives are under way on the Iranian Internet in support of Mojtaba. Internet users have dedicated a blog to him in both English (http://mojtaba-samienejad.blogspot.com) and in Farsi (http://en-mojtaba-samieneja From Joho the Blog on June 11, 2005 at 4:45 a.m..

The Power of Us (Ross Mayfield)
The Power of Us in BusinessWeek by Rob Hoff.... From Corante: Social Software on June 11, 2005 at 2:46 a.m..

Archdiocese Fears Protest and Closes School Early
The Archdiocese of Boston changed the locks at Our Lady of the Presentation elementary school after hearing rumors about a sit-in to protest its plan to close the school permanently. From New York Times: Education on June 11, 2005 at 1:45 a.m..