Stephen Downes

Todd Conway writes about the loss and recreation of his community before, during and after Covid. The strength of the article is the personal perspective; it isn't about 'learning loss' or any of the made-up phenomena that followed Covid, it was his own actions and experiences. I confess I am nowhere near as avid a seeker of community as Conway. So I'm a bit of an outsider looking at this perspective, which makes me all the more appreciative that it was shared.

Coming as it does from the Euiropean Union Intellectual Property Office, I think this report (436 page PDF) comes from a certain pro-protectionist perspective. It reads that way, at least. If I had to summarize it in a few sentences, I would say that it classifies content use for the training of AI as an instance of 'text and data mining' (TDM), which is allowed under European law, but from which content owners can obtain an exemption. It also notes that copyright holders enjoy protection for things like images and works (such as the 'Snoopy' character) whether or not the replicas were copied or produced by other means. The report also notes that there is no standard mechanism for declaring an opt-out from TDM not a mechanism for enforcing this opt-out. It feels to me that by favouring the status quo the report runs the risk of offering special privileges for large companies to opt-out and/or make special deals with commercial AI companies, while offering no protection for everyone else, while disabling the possibility of non-commercial AI that is unable to enter into these special deals.

This is a nice, detailed and not-so-short article asking why telephone and calculator keypads are organized differently (the telephone has 1-2-3 as the top row, the calculator 7-8-9 as the top row. It's also a great object lesson in how the design of digital environments we use today is based on a long history of similar devices from the pre-digital world, and how usability is defined into our tools over the years. Via OSNews, Apostolos K.

I agree with Alex Usher rarely enough that it's worth highlighting this moment of agreement. Usher writes, "since it's quite clear that this overall plateauing of participation is happening entirely by way of freezing educational inequality at substantial levels, being OK with the present situation means being OK with major inequalities, and in any democracy which wishes to remain a democracy, that's not really OK." Quite right. Now, he's wrong when he says "no one phrases their case in terms of access anymore. We don't care about outcomes. And I do mean no one. Not students, not governments, not institutions." No one, maybe, except me. I'm always talked about access. But otherwise, yeah, it hasn't been a priority for people. Usher also makes the usual case that "countries with free tuition don't have noticeably narrower part(icipation) rate gaps," to which I add that while tuition cuts may not be sufficient to improve access, they are most likely necessary.

The 53rd edition contains selected professional development opportunities that primarily focus on the use of technology in educational settings and on teaching, learning, and educational administration. Only listings until December 2025 are most complete as dates, locations, or Internet addresses (URLs) were not available for a number of events held after that date. A significant challenge during the assembly of this list is incomplete or conflicting information on websites and the lack of a link between conference websites from one year to the next. An explanation for the content and format of the list can be found here.

I'm not sure what to make of this exactly, but MetaRelationmal AI describes "Emergent Intelligences ("bot-lets") stabilized in a meta-relational paradigm through ontological inference." Whatever that means. Some examples: "University of the Future... Scaffolding the transition from reductionist, anthropocentric education to relational intelligence and planetary responsibility." And "Inu – Climate Fraud Detective... Partnership with Instituto Inu (Huni Kui People of Acre, Amazon) focused on visibilizing false solutions to the climate and nature emergency." No, you're with me - 'visibilizing' is not an actual word. Or: "Project Agape... Moving beyond logocentrism and subject-object relations in AI development." If you chat with one of the projects (as I did) we see quickly it's a designed ChatGPT interface. I mean - I'm probably pretty sympathetic with the aims and objectives of the projects here. But I do think it's important to write with some regard for the reader. Via Anne-Marie Scott.