WiFi for Rural Connectivity by Intel
Intel has new technology that boosts the signal reach of WiFi using radio signals. It’s cheap, it stretches for tens of miles further than anything else, and it will mean good things for rural environments (and that’s not just Cache Valley, where I live with the cows… Think India, South America, Africa, Asia…). One step at a time and we’ll get everyone to join our club (you know… Google, Starbucks, MySpace, and eCommerce). And, of course, this is good news for anyone interested in things like breaking down barriers to entry, allowing for participatory dialogue between individuals in developing areas, and opening up access to education.
via Kate Green
Blackboard approaches the dark side
Blackboard just won a lawsuit against a Canadian-based learning management system called Desire2Learn and is well on their way to becoming evil.
In 2006 Blackboard was awarded a patent that covers a single person having multiple roles in an LMS: for example, a Teaching Assistant might be a student in one class and an instructor in another. <http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/08/02/1217219&tid=155> Mr. Small (the trial lawyer for Blackboard) said Blackboard never claimed to have invented the course-management system. What the company did invent, he said, is “a course-management system where a single user with a single log-on could have multiple roles across multiple classes.” For instance, a person who was a student in one course and a teaching assistant in another could log on once and access all of his course materials.- Francis Long of Knowplace
Blackboard promises to play nice with open source or as they say “home-grown” course management systems as long as they aren’t bundled with proprietary software. But we’ll see. Having multiple roles in an LMS is often critical for the LMS administrators to function. So, to quote another organization that I watch with doubtful hopes that it won’t take over the world, to Blackboard I say…”Don’t be Evil.” -Google.
Would you take cognitive enhancing pills?
So there are apparently pills you can take to improve your cognitive performance. Sort of like steroids for your brain. They were developed for people with severe memory and concentration problems. Now healthy young college students are taking them to help boost their brain power (enhanced memory, concentration, planning abilities etc…). An article in Nature raises the ethical questions involved with the rapid advancements associated with psychology and the neurosciences. link to Nature article
Google Knols incorporate identity and reputation, Wikipedia doesn’t really
So Google announced a project called Knol where people can author articles on any subject about which they seem to know something. In contrast to Wikipedia, there is only one author whose reputation and identity are emphasized. This obviously is meant to be competition for Wikipedia which takes a more collaborative approach to article development. I’ll be interested to see a comparison of article quality once Knol is actually released.
Here’s what I like about knol, as it’s been explained…
- Support for Creative Commons content licensing
- Peer reviews of each article
- Recommendations for related articles
- Identity and reputation management for the author (I think this will at the least encourage the generation of tons of content).
Here’s what concerns me about this… Google is the indexer of content - this project also makes them content generators. Which content do you think they’ll list first in a search? It gives them a LOT of power, and LOTS of opportunities to generate revenue via ads. Google is, after all, a really big, cool, helpful ad agency.
Open Source Learning Management Systems
The United Nations has pulled together a pretty good list of open source learning management systems. I’m drawn to dotLRN, it supports collaborative engagement among learners and has Blogger support along with all the other expected learning management system features.
