Sunday, November 06, 2005

open source BBC Examines Open Source Business Model. [Slashdot] 11:07:48 PM    comment

audio University Podcasting is Good for All Involved - Stephan Fassmann, iPod Garage. I get excited whenever universities provide material to listen to. Lectures are natural material for recording, remember that scene in Real Genius were the lecture is given by a tape player on the teachers desk and recorded by a bunch of tape recorders on [Online Learning Update] 11:06:41 PM    comment

eContent blog tech Blogs Vs. Wikis Presentation. This afternoon, I’ll be co-presenting a session with Steven M. Cohen (people, make sure you spell his name correctly – I’m just saying!) about blogs versus wikis. We’ll look at the Open Internet Librarian Blog and the Internet Librarian Wiki and compare what’s working and what isn’t for both types of tools. The session will be a bit improv, but here are the thoughts I plan to share: Advantage: blog Easy to post information Chronological order Automatic RSS feed Comments can be attached to each post Only blog authors can edit the content of a post Why might the blog work? Because it gives non-bloggers a place to post thoughts and it could be easy to audioblog. Why might the blog not work? Because bloggers already have a place to blog, and non-bloggers don’t want to blog. Advantage: wiki Anyone anywhere can contribute True equalized collaboration (when accounts aren’t required) Can create any order/flow to the information (sometimes chronological order doesn’t work well for the type of content) Why might the wiki work? Because anyone at the conference or offsite could add content. Why might the wiki not work? Because no one is sure what to put there (versus somewhere else) and wikis are still a little difficult to use (see Meredith Farkas’ advice?). Plus, they need a password to edit it, which might be too much of a barrier at this point. Personally, I think the tool that ended up working the best in this situation was Technorati. It was the one spot everything was pulled together. Advantage: Technorati (view the IL05 tag) Automatically brought together all pieces that were posted anywhere (as long as they were tagged and the sites pinged Technorati) Made it easy to find things; one-stop shopping I would also argue that we’ve had a lot of fun and socialness with Flickr. Of course, you had to know about Flickr, have an account, and know what you could do. I wish we could have done a whole session just on Flickr. :-P Advantage: Flickr (view IL05 photostream) Mass tagging Human beings Fun, fun, and fun! Technorati tags: IL05, IL2005 [The Shifted Librarian] 11:05:27 PM    comment

eContent mapping Link By Link: Beware Your Trail of Digital Fingerprints. Metadata is sort of the DNA of documents created with modern word-processing software and can hint at things that might be better left unseen by the wider world. By TOM ZELLER JR.. [NYT > Technology] 11:02:57 PM    comment

video Yahoo Plans to Connect Services With TiVo. Yahoo and TiVo plan to announce a deal Monday that will connect Yahoo's vast online service to TiVo's set-top boxes. By SAUL HANSELL. [NYT > Technology] 11:02:06 PM    comment

power Chinese Eco-Cities. [Slashdot] 8:18:35 PM    comment

blog tech RSSOwl 1.2 Released. [Slashdot] 6:23:28 PM    comment

personalization Google Patent for User Targeted Search Results. [Slashdot] The idea is good the notion of patenting personized applications is not good.  Intelligent Personal Proxies offer another layer style approach in addition to the greasemonkey customizations in the browser.  There is a lot of efficiency to be achieved by individualizing the user interface to meet the need of each user.  -- BL 1:11:30 PM    comment

audio Pods put lectures on the go - Rachel Fletcher, Daily Free Press. Universities across the country, including Boston University, have been providing professors with the opportunity to record and post their lectures online for their students' use in a growing trend called podcasting. Podcasting allows MP3 files to be dow [Online Learning Update] 8:08:00 AM    comment

wireless MIT's Wireless Campus Never Sleeps - Ascribe. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology unwired last month when Information Services & Technology installed the last of 2,800 wireless access points, making the MIT campus one of the largest geographic entities - about 9.4 million square feet - served [Online Learning Update] 8:07:00 AM    comment

genetics DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Parent. [Slashdot] 8:06:12 AM    comment

learning Eight Year Old Physics Student Admitted to College. [Slashdot] 8:05:18 AM    comment

disruptive MIT Wireless Campus Tracking Users. [Slashdot] Beam me up, Scotty -- This has enormous potential for social software development -- BL 8:03:42 AM    comment

audio College Podcast Roundup 2005-11-06. And now we turn our attention to news and new episodes from the world of college and university podcasting. All the feeds I scan to bring you updates about new podcast episodes are listed in the podcast section of Thomson Peterson’s Edufeeds.com. -An episode from Wisconsin Center for Education Research News provides information about research surrounding the role of teacher research in professional development (link to mp3). -Paul Baker, who produces and hosts the WCER podcasts, was recently featured in a University of Wisconsin - Madison news story about his work on “Caravan,” a radio program he created on Middle Eastern music (available in live stream here). -Arizona State University DMIT Podcast released an episode of “Conversations with Filmmakers.” -Dan Barnett interviewed assistive technologist Dan Keys as part of the weekly Butte College Chronicles podcast. -Jean-Claude Bradley discussed the state of lecture podcasting as part of the weekly podcast from the Drexel College of Arts and Sciences RSS Club. -Allegheny College posted volume 28 in their podcast series. This one is an interview with Bill Salyer, director of athletics information, about fall and winter sports at Allegheny. -This week’s podcast from Texas A&M Engineering Engineering Works took a look at houses that float. -The University of Western Ontario podcast (link to mp3) provided UWO news updates for the week. -In coming weeks, look for in-depth commentary on this blog regarding the Ball State student blogcasting efforts and the UC Berkeley Haas School podcasts. I had a chance to interview representatives from both institutions for an upcoming talk I’m giving at AACRAO SEM 15 on the role of podcasting in admissions. [Syndication for Higher Ed] 7:59:01 AM    comment

audio More College Podcast News. Here’s some more news from the blossoming world of college and university podcasting this week. -This story about lecture podcasting says that Stanford was the first to offer materials publicly via podcast. I’m pretty sure Drexel University College of Arts and Sciences through Jean-Claude Bradley’s e-learning program has been doing it for quite a bit longer, first via RSS 2.0 and then iTunes. The University of New South Wales (here’s the RSS feed) also came before, among others. -Mansfield University has launched an admissions-oriented podcast featuring interviews with students and information straight from admissions director Brian Barden. Here’s an article on the effort from Star-Gazette.com. Here’s the feed for this new podcast. -In a new episode in the Drexel University e-Learning minute podcast, Dr. Kenneth Hartman talks about comparing and selecting an online degree program. -The Times Educational Supplement provides some resources on podcasting in education. [Syndication for Higher Ed] 7:37:06 AM    comment