Open Education, the Long Tail, and Learning 2.0

Via Michele Martin.

A nice article by John Seely Brown and Richard P. Adler in EDUCAUSE. Well worth a reading!

In the twentieth century, the dominant approach to education focused on helping students to build stocks of knowledge and cognitive skills that could be deployed later in appropriate situations. This approach to education worked well in a relatively stable, slowly changing world in which careers typically lasted a lifetime. But the twenty-first century is quite different. The world is evolving at an increasing pace. When jobs change, as they are likely to do, we can no longer expect to send someone back to school to be retrained. By the time that happens, the domain of inquiry is likely to have morphed yet again.

How Android works: The big picture

Ed Burnette started a series of posts on Android, Google's new mobile phone OS. In this first post, he writes:

Some parts of Android will be familiar, such as the Linux Kernel, OpenGL, and the SQL database. Others may be completely foreign, such as Android’s idea of the application life cycle. You’ll need a good understanding of these key concepts in order to write well-behaved Android applications.

More details about the different Android layers are available.

The 2008 Horizon Report

Via Stephen Downes

The 2008 Horizon Report (.pdf) is now available.

The two technologies placed on the first adoption horizon in this edition, grassroots video and collaboration webs, are already in use on many campuses. Examples of these are not difficult to find. Applications of mobile broadband and data mashups, both on the mid-term horizon, are evident in organizations at the leading edge of technology adoption, and are beginning to appear at many institutions. Educational uses of the two topics on the far-term horizon, collective intelligence and social operating systems, are understandably rarer; however, there are examples in the worlds of commerce, industry and entertainment that hint at coming use in academia within four to five years.

I agree with Stephen that the report is actually describing trends that already exist!

Predictions for 2008

Stephen Downes and Karl Kapp point to the eLearning Magazine 2008 predictions compiled by Lisa Neal, the Editor-in-Chief of eLearn Magazine. Below are predictions by Stephen Downes and Jay Cross who are in my personal blog network.

Stephen: The "middle path"—proprietary lock-in services, like Vista, iTunes, Facebook, and Second Life, will be abandoned for more open commercial alternatives rather than free and open source software and content. "Personal networks" will be created by individuals to manage and share their contacts and information sources; people will "peer" into each others' networks or subscribe to filtered versions of each others' network feeds. Digital devices will be synched using online services that will offer a publishing option for "live updating." Finally, open academic publishing will have its strongest year. Many government agencies will require that funded materials be made openly accessible. Useful libraries and indices of open academic content will appear, pushing commercial providers to offer some free content just to stay in the game.

Jay: The suffix "2.0" will be appended to almost everything. Get ready for LMS 2.0, Performance 2.0, and even Google Search 2.0. But be careful when you get to Web 3.0, Third Life, and the other 3.0s. E-learning, knowledge management, corporate communications, and talent management will continue to converge. Some companies will mash them together and put it all under a CPO (Chief People Officer.) Finally, hierarchies will crumble as executives see the speed at which Web-savvy new hires penetrate silos, talk directly with customers, and get things done.

PROLEARN - PALETTE JOINT TEL SUMMER SCHOOL 2008

THE FIRST ANNOUNCEMENT AND CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

PROLEARN - PALETTE JOINT SUMMER SCHOOL 2008

http://www.prolearn-academy.org/Events/summer-school-2008

VENUE: Ohrid, FYROM

DATE: June 15 - 21, 2008

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS: March 15th, 2008

OBJECTIVES

PROLEARN, the Network of Excellence in Technology Enhanced Learning for Professionals, now working under the umbrella of the EATEL Association (http://www.ea-tel.eu/) and PALETTE, European Integrated Project aiming at developing interoperable web-services for Communities of Practice (http://palette.ercim.org) are pleased to announce their joint 2008 Summer School.

Our ambition is to foster cross-domain training and collaboration opportunities among researchers in Europe and beyond, working in the disparate fields of expertise which promote the advancement of TEL at the workplace. The programme includes lectures and working sessions from leading professors in the field, tutoring, mentoring, and joint research opportunities. Additionally the school will offer practical sessions in research methodology for Technology Enhanced Learning.
Advanced PhD students will be identified to present their research at the Third European Conference on Technology Enhanced Learning in Maastricht, The Netherlands, September 17-19, 2008 (http://www.ectel08.org), and to participate in EATEL thematic workshops.

PROGRAMME TOPICS

• Collaborative Design between Educational Scientists and Computer Scientists
• Creation of and Access to Knowledge and Learning Resources
• Practice Modelling, Management & Mining
• Personalisation & Adaptation in Learning Environments
• Privacy and Security
• Pedagogy, Life-Long Learning, and TEL
• Individual, Social & Organisational Learning Processes
• Interoperability: TEL Standards, Models, Processes, Tools
• Research Techniques
• The Future of TEL

In order to increase social contacts among the summer school participants, the programme will include several social events. A variety of sport activities will also be offered to the summer school participants.

Cultural excursions are organised on the Sunday preceding the summer school and the Saturday which closes the summer school.

SUPPORT

This year the PROLEARN/EATEL - PALETTE joint Summer School will benefit from a special grant from SEEERA.NET to promote collaboration with the Western Balkan countries. The summer school has the pro-active support from a growing number of EU IST and eContent funded R&D projects such as APOSDLE, MATURE, iCAMP, PROLIX, MACE, TENCompetence, GRAPPLE, and ARIADNE.

VENUE DESCRIPTION

Magnificent and exciting, mysterious and surprising, Ohrid is one of the most ancient towns in Europe, flavoured with a taste of centuries gone by, full of Hellenistic, Roman, Slavic, Byzantine, and Turkish memories. During the classical and medieval periods Orhid was the artistic, cultural and spiritual centre of the Balkans and has been called a notable bridge of European art. The town is proud of its rich cultural heritage and unique lake which both belong to UNESCO's World Cultural and Natural Heritage (http://www.ohrid.com.mk).

ACCOMODATION AND SOCIAL EVENTS

Accommodation and summer school facilities will be made available at Hotel Granit (http://www.hotelgranit.com.mk). Granit Hotel is located on the coast of Lake Ohrid in St. Stefan, 5 km from the centre of Ohrid. It is 12 km from the Ohrid airport. The Hotel has two harbours which enable access to the hotel and the beach from the lake. The wonderful woods which surround St. Stefan Monastery are located 1 km from the Granit Hotel.

PhD students are asked to share a double room with other PhD students.

COST OF SUMMER SCHOOL

The cost for PhD students is Euro 500 (including accommodation - 7 nights in double room, meals, and excursions). PROLEARN - PALETTE Summer School 2008 will offer 50 scholarships to PhD students to cover summer school accommodation, catering, and events. Please indicate if you are applying for a scholarship in your application.

ELIGIBILITY AND APPLICATION PROCESS

The summer school is intended for PhD students investigating issues related to Technology Enhanced Learning and making progress on their dissertation research.
PhD students are invited to submit applications to mailto:summerschool@i5.informatik.rwth-aachen.de. The application should include a Curriculum Vitae and a summary (not to exceed 5 pages including references and any figures, tables, etc.) describing the student's dissertation. The deadline for submissions is March 15th, 2008. To ensure a high ratio between tutors and students the school will be limited to 60 PhD students. We look forward to seeing you at the summer school!

CALENDAR

March 15th, 2008: Deadline for submitting applications to the Summer School
May 1st, 2008: Notification of acceptance
May15th, 2008: Pre-Summer School videoconferences begin
June 15th, 2008: Summer School begins

ORGANISING COMMITTEE

Local Chair:
Klime Poposki (St. Kliment Ohridski University), klime.poposki@uklo.edu.mk

Programme Co-Chairs:
Luc Vandenabeele (Centre de recherche public Henri Tudor), luc.vandenabeele@tudor.lu Stefanie Lindstaedt (Know Center), slind@know-center.at
Liliane Esnault (E.M. Lyon), esnault@em-lyon.com
Martin Wolpers (Fraunhofer), martin.wolpers@fit.fraunhofer.de

Summer School Website:
Mohamed Amine Chatti (RWTH Aachen), chatti@informatik.rwth-aachen.de

Summer School Promotion:
Margit Hofer (CSI), hofer@zsi.at,

Collaborative Learning Support:
Ambjörn Naeve (KTH), amb@nada.kth.se
Peter Scott (OU), peter.scott@open.ac.uk

Finances:
Fridolin Wild (Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration), fridolin.wild@wu-wien.ac.at

General Co-Chairs:
Katherine Maillet (INT), Katherine.Maillet@int-edu.eu
Ralf Klamma (RWTH Aachen), klamma@informatik.rwth-aachen.de Tomaz Klobucar (IJS), tomaz@e5.ijs.si

PROGRAMME COMMITTEE

Andrej Afonin, Lithunia
Olivier Bohl, Germany
Zuzana Bizonova, Slovakia
Daniel Burgos, Spain
Bernadette Charlier, Switzerland
Mohamed Amine Chatti, Germany
Alexandra Christea, United Kingdom
Hannes Ebner, Sweden
Liliane Esnault, France
Luc Vandenabeele, Switzerland
Denis Gillet, Switzerland
Ashley Healy, United Kingdom
Maurice Hendrix, The Netherlands
Margit Hofer, Austria
Patrick Johnscher, Germany
Anna-Kaarina Kairamo, Finland
Ralf Klamma, Germany
Styliani Kleanthous, Greece
Tomaz Klobucar, Slovenia
Tobias Ley, Austria
Katrina Leyking, Germany
Stefanie Lindstaedt, Austria
Matthias Lux, Austria
Katherine Maillet, France
Mark Melia, Ireland
Ambjörn Naeve, Sweden
Wolfgang Nejdl, Germany
Klime Poposki, Macedonia
Peter Scott, United Kingdom
Steinn E. Sigurðarson, Austria
Martin Sillaots, Estonia
Marcus Specht, The Netherlands
Armin Ulbrich, Austria
Fridolin Wild, Austria

Blogger now supports Arabic, Hebrew, and Persian

The Blogger team announced that Blogger now supports three more languages: Arabic, Hebrew, and Persian. They write:

Blogger is translated into — Arabic, Persian, and Hebrew are written from right to left. As you can see from the above screenshot, we had to flip the whole interface around. Supporting these languages is a huge milestone for us because — unlike the other 37 languages Besides localizing the Blogger interface into these three languages, we have right-to-left templates and have added new toolbar buttons for bi-directional text editing in the post editor.

Slidecast

Slidecast is a service developed by Slideshare. As Slideshare puts it "Slidecasting is a new multimedia format for viewing slide decks synchronized with an audio file". Slideshare also provides instructions and a demo on how to create a slidecast.

• Upload your presentation file to SlideShare.
• Go to Edit slideshow>Create Slidecast tab. Enter your mp3 url there
• Synchronize slides & audio using the synchronization tool and click publish

| View | Upload your own

Yahoo meets OpenID

Yahoo announced its support of the OpenID 2.0 standard.

Yahoo, which counts its registered users at 248 million worldwide, says that supporting OpenID will mean that OpenID-compatible accounts are available to a total of 368 million Web users. When Yahoo's support of OpenID goes live, starting with a public beta launch on January 30, this will mean that a Yahoo ID can be consolidated into an OpenID account that will be valid at all partner sites.

Big Web players like Google and AOL have already begun supporting this open identification standard and Yahoo is the next on the list. I believe that OpenID will have a great future. It's just a matter of time that Google will offer a full support of OpenID. To note that Brad Fitzpatrick, the founder of LiveJournal and creator of OpenID joined Google last year to support the OpenSocial developer initiative.

More OpenID links are available here.

2007 in TechCrunch Headlines

In this post, Erick Schonfeld has compiled a nice list of the most telling headlines from TechCrunch posts in 2007, divided by month. Many headlines in this list are related to Google activities and initiatives (e.g. OpenSocial and Android). Was 2007 the year of Google?

Google-DoubleClick Deal Passes FTC Hurdle. Now Comes the Hard Part: Europe
Google To Announce Wireless Spectrum Bid Friday
Breaking: Google Announces Android and Open Handset Alliance
Details Revealed: Google OpenSocial To Launch Thursday
Google To “Out Open” Facebook On November 5
The FCC Needs To Listen To Google
Google Gears Lets Developers Take Apps Offline
Google’s Office Suite Complete: Google “PowerPoint” Confirmed
Viacom Drops a $1 Billion Nuke on Google.