Edu_Rss

Ajax's great uncle
All hail Ajax and Jesse James Garrett whose paper named it, laid it out, and kicked off the current excitement about it. As Jesse and Wikipedia acknowledge, as with most important ideas, it can be traced back to lots of beginnings. The other day, one of those beginnings occurred to me. Jeez, I thought, this sounds like something Tim Bray was talking about about five years ago. He called it Taxi, and I thought I'd written it up in my newsletter, although now I can't find it. But Tim did write about Taxi at xml.org in March of 2001. So,... From Joho the Blog on October 14, 2005 at 8:46 p.m..

Wikimania in Boston in '06?
Bostonians are supporting a bid to hold Wikimania — AKA Wikipediapalooza — in Boston next year. That would be just too much fun! [Tags: wikipedia boston]... From Joho the Blog on October 14, 2005 at 8:46 p.m..

Decision-based design
Dan Brown has written a blog entry on what he is calling decision-based design, as applied to content management. To quote: One of the major conclusions of my work in content management theory is that systems designed to enforce decisions... From Column Two on October 14, 2005 at 8:45 p.m..

''Maybe this crap can do some good''
That's what Ken Dow said to me way back in the Fall of 1999 when he generously offered help as we tried Manila for school tech integration. Given the obstacles that come with the TI territory, my optimism is limited. But hey - once in awhile it does do some practical good. Example: Celia Chan, Galileo's model blogging counselor, posted a job opportunity on her weblog at 8:00 AM on Thursday, Oct. 6. I refreshed NetNewsWire at about 4:00 P From homoLudens III on October 14, 2005 at 6:46 p.m..

[berkman] Tim Wu
Tim Wu is talking about broadband. He says [rough notes!]: US broadband penetration, at 16% of inhabitants, is 12th-16th in the world. We are #1 or #2 in terms of total connections; China is the other. There is a fundamental divide between "openists" and "deregulationists" who disagree about the point and nature of a telecommunications network. Tje openists think of the network as an "innovation commons." They're interested in what the network makes possible. They believe the essence of a network is a public infrastructure: a means, not an ends. The network is like the electricity network From Joho the Blog on October 14, 2005 at 5:48 p.m..

Tim Wu Frames the Broadband Debate
The Berkman Center hosted Tim Wu today to discuss his paper, "The Broadband Debate: A User's Guide."  Here are my notes.  If you need reasons to get interested in communications policy, see Susan Crawford. From A Copyfighter's Musings on October 14, 2005 at 5:48 p.m..

Rip Mix Learn , A Difference
Presentation delivered to math teachers in Manitoba today. Instead of using PowerPoint, the presented instead created a blog with the major parts of the talk each as separate entries. Topics covered include blogging, RSS, social networking tools, and more. Good coverage; useful links for others creating similar presentations. [ From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

Liberation and the Internet: Communities of Practice and the Power to Connect
I enjoyed this paper, a look at online learning that takes as a point of departure "Reflections on Liberation," by Suzanne Pharr, which discusses liberation politics as a means of "breaking down the barriers that prevent a large portion of the population from having access to economic and social justice." What I found interesting was the comprison between communities of practice (or, more accurately, communities of interest) today and the practice of identity politics in previous eras. As Pharr notes, there is always a risk that these communities can become "limited, hierarchical [in their] ap From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

Easing the Copyright Challenge , Inside Higher Ed
This item actually came out before the merger but gives us an idea of what to expect. The U.S.-based Copyright Clearance Center is launching a program to link its services with the Blackboard course management system. As Eduventures's Cathy Burdt comments, "By providing a utility that is integrated, you're taking the guesswork away somewhat. That's a net gain for publishers who want to protect their copyrights, professors who want to use a wide variety of works, and universities that are trying to build business processes to manage tasks such as these." The future of Blackboard From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

The Impending End of Traditional .forward-style Forwarding , Campus Technology
It's a typical scenario. Student enrolls at a university and gets a university email account. Preferring to use an existing Hotmail or Gmail account, the student has the university account automatically forward to the existing account. The university then proceeds to send a flood of email to the student, everything from parking notices to Bookstore sales to registration information. Inevitably, some students flag this as spam, and the university is flagged as a spammer by ISPs around the world. The typicial IT solution proposed in this article? Block email forwarding and prevent remote ac From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

Top down or Bottom Up , Random Walk in E-Learning
Short post focusing on the different between Us (BP) and Them (SP). "While the SPs are claiming pedagogical neutrality of the technologies, the fact is, they are NOT. AND, more importantly, SP fails to see the implicit pedagogies embedded in the learning technology standards they are creating. BPs, on the other hand, are pretty open and straight forward about the pedagogy that a particular approach is embracing." [ From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

Mystery Donor Gives Stanford Free Yahoo Music , CNet News.Com
The rush to force music services on universities turns weird as a mystery donor has paid to have Yahoo's music service installed at Stanford. The freebie won't last long as students will be hit with monthly charges at the end of the year. [ From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

Public Schools, Private Markets: A Reporter's Guide to Privatization , National Education Writers Association
Interesting and useful guide providing background and contacts for members of the media covering issues related to the privatization of components of the educational system, including charter schools, vouchers, private management of schools (such as Edison), and commercial supplementary services. The picture the booklet presents is one of mixed to dubious success - the introduction of charter schools in Dayton, Ohio, for example, is reported to have offered no improvement in grades, and also to have hurt educational outcomes in the public school system as well. But that said, the authors cauti From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

Student Achievement - What Shoudl We Really Be Measuring? , Canadian Council on Learning
Interesting report that should nonetheless be read critically. The author looks at Canada's performance in international tests in language, mathematics and science, asking about what additional achievements should be measured and where performance could be improved. Looking at the results - which see only Finland performining consistently better than Canada, and by a narrow margin - one wonders at the attitude behind such half-hearted comments such as "Canada is performing relatively well" and expressions of concern about Canada "lagging behind". As usual, the best indicator of performan From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

JISC Standards: A Presentation To The JISC , Jisc
Some of the observations near the beginning of this presentation are worth noting, for example, the need for simpler, lower level and more flexible standards ("Web services considered harmful"), or for example, an examination of what the word 'must' means in the context of standards. The rest of the slide show describes a JOSC project to create a standards catalogue. [ From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

Set Your Priorities , Joel on Softare
This article is focused on priorizing software improvements, but it seems to me people who design business processes should also take note, taking the point of view of the user. Is following this process going to benefit me? Will filling out this form improve my productivity? If the answer is no, you have a dysfnctional business process on your hands, and implementing it will harm, rather than help, the organization. [ From OLDaily on October 14, 2005 at 5:45 p.m..

The falliest yummiest sandwich
Because I am an insanely obsessive person, when I find some kind of food item or dish that I love, I eat it nearly non-stop until I am sick of it. For evidence, one need only look back to the summer of 2003: I ate bread salad for nearly every meal. I am currently addicted to grilled cheese and apple sandwiches. I got the idea from Martha Stewart Living (September? October?) and have implemented it to perfection, if I may say so. I start with Klinger's Bread Company Sliced V From megnut on October 14, 2005 at 3:45 p.m..

Blogging Drought
So I cant remember the last time where Ive had a stretch this busy, and obviously, blogging is suffering. Three presentations in the last week. Wall to wall meetings at school. On and on Yesterday I was in Rochester doing some serious blogvangelizing to New York State teachers and administrators, trying to carve out some time to write and read. Four different presentations. Whew. So as a result, Im up to 500 unread messages in my Bloglines accountthat has to be a record, and its really weird thi From weblogged News on October 14, 2005 at 2:47 p.m..

Blog blah blog blah
Bill and Melinda noticed us. Someone mentioned the NY Times coverage of our web work at the D.C. event. Does this portend adequate bandwidth someday? Our own web server? Maybe just a banquet. From homoLudens III on October 14, 2005 at 1:45 p.m..

Mail enhancements
No, not male enhancements. That'd be a different post. So to speak. Not that anyone asked, but I'd like my mail client to let me use the autocomplete feature within the body of an email. This is important because I'm stupid. Sometimes when I need to refer to an email address, I will use the autocomplete function in the "To" field, and then copy and paste it into the body of the msg. But sometimes (here comes the stupid part) I forget to remove it from the "To" field, thus sending to someone a msg about that person. Much mighty... From Joho the Blog on October 14, 2005 at 11:48 a.m..

BlogBridge gets more skimmable...
Pito Salas' labor of love — the free, open source, multi-platform BlogBridge aggregator — takes a big step forward with its new release. Download the weekly build (2.4) to get the latest. [Disclosure: I'm on the board of advisors. But I wouldn't lie to you.] The new release has three features I like: First, you can hide the star ratings if you don't use them. Second, it shows a small histogram of posts for each feed you've subscribed to. Third, and best of all, it now makes it easy to browse a list of headlines and expose the entire post... From Joho the Blog on October 14, 2005 at 10:45 a.m..

Berlind champions User Rights
David Berlind has had an outstanding series of posts excoriating what he — following Dan Gillmor — refers to as Digital Restrictions Management. Go, David! We need more champions and hellcats. Speaking of Dan, he blogs about Bush's staged "teleconference" with soldiers in IRaq: "Wouldn't it have been more honest to use actual marionettes?" And Eschaton comments, under the post title "Commander in Chief": He really said this today. Jeebus: I wish I could be there to see you face to face and thank you personally. Probably a little early for me to go to Tikrit. Perhaps one o From Joho the Blog on October 14, 2005 at 10:45 a.m..

Vehicles of the Future
One of the head turners at the Australian International Motor Show is sure to be the Holden EFIJY, a monstrous homage to the Holden 1953 FJ. Plus: Radar plus camera equals automated pedestrian-avoidance mechanism? From the Wired News blog Autopia. From Wired News on October 14, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

PEZ Dispenser MP3 Player
Enough said. Plus: Yamaha brings hybrid technology to the Harley set with its futuristic Gen-Ryu motorcycle, due for a spin next month at the Tokyo Auto Show. From the Wired News blog Gear Factor. From Wired News on October 14, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

How Doomed Is It?
As Doom fans await the first-person shooter's debut on the big screen, Paul Davidson of Wired magazine takes a sneak peek at the movie based on the game. From Wired News on October 14, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

BM Party: Drugs, Dildos, Dipshits
The Burning Man Decompression street fair features pot-laced truffles and a robot with a sex toy. But some locals see privileged white kids playing dropout. Keith Axline reports from San Francisco. From Wired News on October 14, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

A New Career, Courtesy Nintendo
Bored with your job? Two new games for the Nintendo DS let you try your hand at surgery and defense law. Game review by Chris Kohler. From Wired News on October 14, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

Mama Don't Take My Microscope
Very tiny things make awesome images, thanks to the latest microscopic imaging technologies. A fly, a section of mouse kidney and a frog cell are all works of art in the Nikon Small World competition. By Aaron Dalton. From Wired News on October 14, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

Unexpected Downside of Wind Power
Some environmental activists are taking the unlikely stance of opposing wind farms in the name of ecological responsibility. By Will Wade. From Wired News on October 14, 2005 at 7:45 a.m..

Study Says Software Makers Supply Tools to Censor Web - TOM ZELLER Jr., New York Times
It should come as no surprise that the Internet in Myanmar, the southeast Asian state once known as Burma and in the iron grip of a military cabal for decades, is heavily filtered and carefully monitored. But a new report from the OpenNet Initiative, a hu From Techno-News Blog on October 14, 2005 at 2:47 a.m..

Web enjoys year of biggest growth - BBC
The web has grown more in 2005 than it did at the height of the dotcom boom, says a study. In the year to October the web grew by more than 17 million sites, says monitoring firm Netcraft. This figure exceeds the growth of 16 million sites seen in 2000 From Techno-News Blog on October 14, 2005 at 2:47 a.m..

Blogs vie with news for eyeballs - BBC
Can blogs sit alongside traditional media? Bloggers are gaining a higher profile alongside traditional news sources with Yahoo including blogs in its expanding news search system. The decision could reignite the debate over what constitutes news reporti From Techno-News Blog on October 14, 2005 at 2:47 a.m..

Authority
Peter Morville has written an article on the subject of authority, and the impact of folksonomy. To quote: In the good old days, not so long ago, in the context of the written word, authority was a term used primarily... From Column Two on October 14, 2005 at 1:47 a.m..

Web 2.0 and Many-To-Many (danah boyd)
So, when this blog started, it was intended to capture various aspects of social software. The hype has kinda gotten taken over by Web2.0. But what is the relationship between Web2.0 and social software? And what about Many-To-Many? Over on... From Corante: Social Software on October 14, 2005 at 12:45 a.m..