August 17, 2006

OLDaily

Mark Gerencser, Fernando Napolitano, and Reginald Van Lee: The Megacommunity Manifesto, Booz Allen Hamilton August 17, 2006
[link: 10 Hits] How do we solve the hard problems facing our communities? Poverty, for example, or environment, or employment? With a provincial election to be called Friday evening, this question is especially relevant here. Some say such matters are best left to the private sector; others place the responsibility on government. This paper argues that "the conventional managerial decision-making style - in which a boss exercises decision rights or delegates them to subordinates - is no longer adequate. Solutions require multi-organizational systems that are larger and more oriented to multilateral action than conventional cross-sector approaches are... a megacommunity is not strictly a business niche. Nor is it a public-private partnership, which is typically an alliance focused on a relatively narrow purpose. A megacommunity is a larger ongoing sphere of interest, where governments, corporations, NGOs, and others intersect over time." [Tags: ] [Comment]

Christian Long: Toymakers and Textbook Publishers In a Race to Keep Up with Those Pesky Astronomers, think:lab August 17, 2006
[link: 19 Hits] Within a few seconds of the IAU vote, Wikipedia will be up to date, recording the fact that we have 12 planets in the solar system. Newspapers and television will record the information some hours later, some course materials by this september, textbooks in a year or two. Encyclopedia Britannica? Maybe never. As for me, well, while I celebrate the addition of Ceres and Xena to the solar system, I question why Charon ought not be counted as a moon, and I will not rest until Sedna takes its place in the pantheon. [Tags: , ] [Comment]

StevenB: Google Jockeys For Conference Sessions, ACRLog August 17, 2006
[link: 10 Hits] Someone at the Masie Center must be reading blogs, as this items tells us that the next masie conference will use Google jockeys, people who search Google for resources (displayed on a large screen) while a presenter talks. The conference will also have someone developing mindmaps during presentations, a la e-learning forum. These are good developments: they increase participation and provide multiple streams of information to the attendee. [Tags: , , ] [Comment]

Unattributed: MobiFilm Academy, Nokia August 17, 2006
[link: 16 Hits] Although the focus of this set of lessons is film-making using a mobile device, it nonetheless offers some excellent advice for video recoding in general. How to frame your shot, how to pan and zoom, and much more. Recommended if you're playing with video. [Tags: ] [Comment]

George Siemens: Michael Feldstein and Blackboard, Elearnspace ELearnSpace August 17, 2006
[link: 103 Hits] Alfred Essa raises concerns that IMS might have now that one of its partners has played the patent card. The next IMS meeting, to be hosted by Blackboard in September, should be a pretty interesting session. Essa wonders what a question and answer with Blackboard would look like.

The British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (BECTA) send an email advising "the patents are afforded no 'presumption of validity'" and that, as Michael Feldstein summarizes, "there is no patent in Europe yet, it will take a long time for there to be a patent in Europe, and in the event that there is a patent in Europe, the EUÃf¢xTMs patent law is much friendlier to challenging patents than current U.S. law."

Michael Feldstein also explains why Desire2Learn CEO John Baker is our hero, explaining that "Desire2Learn is doing an enormous public service." Of course, others have observed, D2L may have no choice - once you cave on something like this, you can count on the gravy train leading to your doorstep.

George Siemens agrees, Michael Feldstein will not be winning an "educator of the year" award from Blackboard. He adds, "Personally, I'm not convinced D2L is doing it out of altruistic reasons...but it does appear to be a side effect of their willingness to challenge Blackboard's boorish behaviour (that is officially my first use of "boorish" in five years fo blogging :))."

"It's almost too easy nowadays to make the case that government frequently makes bonehead plays," observes Lanny Arvan. "What about the private sector? And specifically, what about the Blackboard Patent and the D2L suit.... IÃf¢xTMm not confident either way whether what weÃf¢xTMre seeing now is rational or a bonehead play by Blackboard. But I do know enough about economics to understand that goodwill is a non-tangible asset with real market value and it is not hard for me to see that under certain assumptions that Blackboard could take a hit in the goodwill department beyond what it ever might recover in royalties and deterrence benefits."

Via Liberal Education Today, we read that "A website urging people to boycott Blackboard has gathered hundreds of signatures in a petition drive."

Confused of Calcutta writes, "I am not sure whether open source information has been used as a defence before, but this becomes a case to watch and to learn from."

Project Open Source | Open Access writes, "BlackBoard's American patent is curious in that it purports to patent any kind of course-based multi-user system, particularly common features such as assigning roles and permissions to provide users with various levels of access. These are features which have been generalized in all kinds of software, and have a long history in educational technologies." [Tags: , , , , , , , ] [Comment]

Projects&Collaborations
Browse through the thousands of links in my knowledge base sorted according to topic category, author and publication.

Research
Browse through the thousands of links in my knowledge base sorted according to topic category, author and publication.


Stephen Downes

About Me
Bio, photos, and assorted odds and ends.

Publications
You know, the ones that appear in refereed journals of Outstanding Rank.

Presentations
Lectures, seminars, and keynotes in a wide variety of formats - everything from streaming video to rough notes.

Articles
All my articles, somewhere around 400 items dating from 1995.

Audio
Audio recordings of my talks recorded in MP3 format. A podcast feed is also available.

Calendar
What I'm doing, where I'm doing it, and when.

Photos
Newly updated! A collection of my photographs. Suitable for downloading as desktop wallpaper.

Canadian Tech Mob
Previous Random Next
List Join

Feeds

[ ClickFlicks.net - Interviews]
[0xDECAFBAD]
[2 Cents Worth]
[42/1]
[A Difference]
[A List Apart]
[A poke with a sharp stick]
[Abel Newsletter]
[Abject Learning]
[Academic Commons -]
[ACRLog]
[ADLNet.org Event RSS Feed]
[ADLNet.org General News RSS Feed]
[adult and community e-learning: uk [ace:uk]]
[adult literacy meets technology (AL-T) - technology as literacy]
[Alan November Weblog]
[alt tags]
[Andy Carvin's Waste of Bandwidth: The DDN Edition]
[Archer central]
[Around the Corner - MGuhlin.net]
[AssortedStuff]
[Auricle]
[b.cognosco]
[B.Mann Consulting - Technology Consulting in Vancouver]
[blog of proximal development]
[Blogarithms]
[Blogging IT and EDucation]
[Blogscholar Syndication]
[BoardBuzz: NSBA's Daily Weblog]
[Brad Jensen's Posts]
[Bud the Teacher]
[BuzzMachine]
[Canadian Journalist]
[Central Ranges LLEN News]
[CETIS: Standards in Education Technology]
[Chris Correa]
[Christopher D. Sessums : Weblog]
[Chronicle.com - Today's News]
[CIDER]
[Civilities - media structures research]
[Clay Shirky's Essays]
[CNN.com - Education]
[CogDogBlog]
[cogdogblog]
[Cognitive Daily]
[Cognitive Dissonance]
[Column Two]
[Connect Learning, with David Warlick]
[connect.educause.edu - Technology In Academia -- Connect @ EDUCAUSE]
[Connectedness]
[Connectivism Blog]
[considering education]
[considering education]
[Cool Cat Teacher Blog]
[Copyfight]
[Couros Blog]
[Creative Commons Blog]
[cuonline.blog-city.com]
[Curb Cut Design]
[D'Arcy Norman dot net - Just a lowly edtech geek, blogging from the University of Calgary]
[Dan Atkins on CLEAR]
[Dan Gillmor's blog]
[Daring Fireball]
[Dave Tosh : Weblog]
[Dave's Educational Blog]
[David Davies' Weblog]
[DEOS-L]
[Distance-Educator.com's Daily News]
[DJ Alchemi]
[e-Clippings (The Application Becomes The Platform)]
[e-Learning Acupuncture]
[E-Learning Queen]
[e-Literate]
[E-Portfolios for Learning]
[Eamonn's Home]
[eContent]
[Ed-Tech Insider]
[EdBlogger Praxis]
[Edge Perspectives with John Hagel]
[editThisPage News]
[EdNA Home Page Headlines]
[EdTechPost]
[EdTechUK]
[edu.blogs.com]
[EduBlog Insights]
[Education/Technology]
[Education/Technology - Tim Lauer]
[Educational Technology]
[Educational Technology That Talks - EdTechTalk - EdTechTalk Educational Technology That Talks...]
[Educational Weblogs]
[EDUCAUSE RSS | Recent Recent Library Submissions Listings]
[EduResources Weblog--Higher Education Resources Online]
[eGram@sd40.bc.ca]
[eLearn]
[eLearning Technology]
[elearning-reviews.org: new reviews]
[elearningpost]
[eLearnopedia]
[elearnspace]
[Elephant News]
[eSchool News Top Stories]
[everyhuman]
[Ferl Newsfeed]
[FLOSSE Posse]
[Fortnightly Mailing]
[Forum on Information Technology and Research Universities]
[Forum- RSS Feed]
[foss4us blogs]
[Full Circle Online Interaction Blog]
[Golden Swamp]
[Graham Glass, etc.]
[Gurteen Knowledge-Log]
[hackdiary]
[Half an Hour]
[Harold Jarche]
[HeadspaceJ: Instructional Design and Technology Blog]
[Here at WCER]
[Higher Education Insight]
[How to Save the World]
[Human Productivity Lab]
[ICT in Education]
[Ideas and thoughts from an EdTech]
[IDxchange]
[IEEE Learning Technology Standards Committee]
[incorporated subversion]
[incsub - online community projects and publications]
[Infocult: Information, Culture, Policy, Education]
[Informal Learning Blog]
[Innovate]
[Inside Higher Ed]
[Inter/National Coalition for Electronic Portfolio Research blogs]
[International Education Webzine]
[Internet Time Blog]
[Ipseity]
[IT Forum]
[iterating toward openness]
[iterating toward openness]
[J-blawg]
[Jane's E-Learning Pick of the Day]
[Jeffrey Zeldman Presents The Daily Report]
[jg's ramblings]
[JISC e-Learning Focus]
[Joho the Blog]
[Joi Ito's Web]
[Jon's Radio]
[Just Learn News Review]
[Kairosnews - A Weblog for Discussing Rhetoric, Technology and Pedagogy]
[Keith's weblog]
[kottke.org]
[kuro5hin.org]
[Lanny on Learning Technology]
[Latest Issue of SourceOECD Education & Skills]
[Latest News]
[Lawrence Lessig]
[learndogpup]
[Learning - Educational Technologies :: Robin Good's Latest News]
[Learning in Hand]
[Learnlets]
[Lessig Blog]
[Lifehacker]
[little train]
[Lost Remote]
[Many-to-Many]
[Marc's Voice]
[Mark Berthelemy's Connections]
[markhemphill.com]
[Mathemagenic]
[McGee's Musings]
[McToonish]
[Meir Navon's Blog]
[Michael Geist\'s Blog]
[Michelle's Online Learning Freakout Party Zone]
[MicroContent Musings (RSS 2.0)]
[Mike Klonsky's Small Talk]
[Most Viewed Articles]
[Multiple Intelligences]
[Musings about Social Computing and Ed. Tech.]
[News Forum]
[NEXTTEXT - ]
[Nouvelles de la Télé-université]
[ongoing]
[Online Journalism Review]
[Online Learning Update]
[Online Rights Canada]
[Open Mind]
[Open Social Forum]
[OSS Watch Announcements]
[OSS Watch Reports]
[OSS Watch Summary]
[OUseful Info]
[Portals and KM]
[Practical Theory]
[PressThink]
[Random Walk in Learning]
[randomselections]
[Recent Items]
[Reflective Ramblings About Teaching and Learning and Other Inconsequential things]
[Release1.0 - The Conversation Starts Here]
[Relevancy]
[Remote Access]
[Rick's Café Canadien]
[Rik Abel]
[Robert Paterson's Weblog]
[Ross Mayfield's Weblog]
[Ruminate]
[Sakai Project News]
[Sasan Salari's blog]
[Scott Sorley's Education Technology Guidebook]
[Scott Wilson's Workblog]
[Seb's Open Research]
[SEGA Tech]
[Simon Willison's Weblog]
[Slashdot]
[Smelly Knowledge - Exploring the depths of learning, identity, and community over technology.]
[Socrates Technological University]
[spokenwordmatters News]
[Stephen's Web ~ by Stephen Downes ~ OLDaily RSS 2.0]
[Sterling Silver Jewelry, Cubic Zirconia CZ Rings, Necklaces, Bracelets]
[Sterling Silver Jewelry, Cubic Zirconia CZ Rings, Necklaces, Bracelets&Pendants, Earrings, Fashion Watches&Jewelry Gifts For Men]
[Stievie's adventures in e-Learning]
[StigmergicWeb]
[Student Self Directed Learning]
[Teach and Learn Online]
[Teach42 - Education and Technology, by Steve Dembo]
[Teachable Moment]
[Teaching and Developing Online.]
[Teaching Generation Z]
[Technologic]
[The Business of Emotions]
[The Chronicle: Wired Campus Blog]
[The Community Engine Blog]
[The Educational Mac]
[The Google Weblog]
[The Illuminated Dragon]
[The Intuitive Life Business Blog]
[The Learned Man!]
[The Learning Circuits Blog]
[The PLE Blog]
[The Shifted Librarian]
[The Wales-Wide Web]
[think:lab]
[Thot]
[timbl's blog]
[TLN Teacher Voices]
[Trends in the Living Networks]
[Tuttle SVC]
[U.S. Department of Education]
[Virtual Canuck]
[VRoot.org - Virtual Reality News and Resources edited by/for the VR Community]
[Weblogg-ed]
[WeblogsInEducation News]
[What is the (Next) Message?]
[wiley.ed.usu.edu - thinking]
[Will at Work Learning]
[WiseWordPress]
[Write Technology]
[XplanaZine]
[XplanaZine]
[Zeugma]

Stephen's Web
Since 1995

About this Site
Why this site exists, what it does, and how it works.

OLDaily RSS Feed OLDaily
Edu_RSS RSS Feed Edu_RSS
FOAF (Friend of a Friend) FOAF
Podcast Link
OLDaily Audio

OPML

About the Author

Stephen Downes

Copyright ÃffÃ,¯Ãf,Ã,¿Ãf,Ã,½ 2006 Stephen Downes
National Research Council Canada

Contact: stephen@downes.ca

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License

.

I want and visualize and aspire toward a system of society and learning where each person is able to rise to his or her fullest potential without social or financial encumberance, where they may express themselves fully and without reservation through art, writing, athletics, invention, or even through their avocations or lifestyle.

Where they are able to form networks of meaningful and rewarding relationships with their peers, with people who share the same interests or hobbies, the same political or religious affiliations - or different interests or affiliations, as the case may be.

This to me is a society where knowledge and learning are public goods, freely created and shared, not hoarded or withheld in order to extract wealth or influence.

This is what I aspire toward, this is what I work toward. - Stephen Downes