etc@bmc
Monday, November 21, 2005
What's Now and What's Coming
There's an excellent series of articles on news.com about current trends in Internet technology. One of the best articles is on the so-called millenial generation, a generation of kids, ranging in age from 8-22. These kids have always been online, on cell phones, making connections with each other. The way these kids have grown up has not only changed their social lives, but it's changed the way they learn. Seymour Papert of MIT's Media Lab explained it this way:
Via Blended Edu.
web 2.0, educational technology
"The question at stake is no longer whether technology can change education or even whether this is desirable . . . The presence of technology in society is a major factor in changing the entire learning environment."I highly recommend the whole series as a good introduction to what we often refer to as Web 2.0.
Via Blended Edu.
web 2.0, educational technology
Monday, November 14, 2005
Free Culture
On Friday, I went to a lively presentation and discussion about the Free Culture movement and its implications for education, a part of the Science and Society series at Bryn Mawr. The Free Culture movement is primarily a networked group of college students with chapters at lots of different colleges. They are interested in examining existing copyright laws and exploring other options for copyright. The movement has evolved from the Open Source Software movement as well as others. There are many ways in which the issues raised by this and other similar movements affect educators.
From my perspective as a technologist, I am aware of the many ways in which technology is being used to protect intellectual property, preventing educators from using video, music, even text in their courses or research. On the one hand, the copyright law allows for fair use; on the other, the DMCA prevents us from circumventing measures in place to protect materials. In other words, the law actually prevents us from exercising our fair use rights set forth in another law. I only see this getting worse.
The problem with attempting to protect materials is that there are always people out there who figure out ways around the protection. And the real pirates are best at this. They have enough time and motivation to figure out how to make a million copies of the latest Sony DVD. Who suffers as Sony tries to crack down on the pirates? Us. And as text goes digital, these protections could be applied to it as well. Imagine if you went to photocopy an article for use in your class either as a digital copy or hard copy and the copy came out blurry because you didn't have permission to copy it; it was protected. Imagine if every time you wanted to do this for a class, you had to obtain permission and maybe even pay for it. What if you had to get permission just to quote the text in an article or book you're writing?
Google is attempting to scan and digitize millions of texts, but they're getting a lot of flack from the Publishing Industry and even being sued for their efforts. I did a quick search for my old dissertation topic, the poet Mary Wroth. I got 1500 results, a great way to find potential sources. Publishers apparently don't want you to find those. Lawrence Lessig, the inspiration for the Free culture movement, explains the key issues in the Google Print project in a recent Wired article.
Part of a university's mission, I believe, is to give people ready access to information. Current copyright law coupled with Digital Rights Management and other protective technology might seriously prevent ready access to that information. And if information is power, think about who is holding that power now and who might hold it in the future.
free culture
From my perspective as a technologist, I am aware of the many ways in which technology is being used to protect intellectual property, preventing educators from using video, music, even text in their courses or research. On the one hand, the copyright law allows for fair use; on the other, the DMCA prevents us from circumventing measures in place to protect materials. In other words, the law actually prevents us from exercising our fair use rights set forth in another law. I only see this getting worse.
The problem with attempting to protect materials is that there are always people out there who figure out ways around the protection. And the real pirates are best at this. They have enough time and motivation to figure out how to make a million copies of the latest Sony DVD. Who suffers as Sony tries to crack down on the pirates? Us. And as text goes digital, these protections could be applied to it as well. Imagine if you went to photocopy an article for use in your class either as a digital copy or hard copy and the copy came out blurry because you didn't have permission to copy it; it was protected. Imagine if every time you wanted to do this for a class, you had to obtain permission and maybe even pay for it. What if you had to get permission just to quote the text in an article or book you're writing?
Google is attempting to scan and digitize millions of texts, but they're getting a lot of flack from the Publishing Industry and even being sued for their efforts. I did a quick search for my old dissertation topic, the poet Mary Wroth. I got 1500 results, a great way to find potential sources. Publishers apparently don't want you to find those. Lawrence Lessig, the inspiration for the Free culture movement, explains the key issues in the Google Print project in a recent Wired article.
Part of a university's mission, I believe, is to give people ready access to information. Current copyright law coupled with Digital Rights Management and other protective technology might seriously prevent ready access to that information. And if information is power, think about who is holding that power now and who might hold it in the future.
free culture
Thursday, November 10, 2005
GeoHistory of Philadelphia
There's an upcoming conference on mapping the history of Philadelphia put on by the PA Consortium of Special Collections Libraries. If you're in the area, interested in history or GIS technology, this looks like an interesting conference to attend. There's more information on their web site.
Monday, November 07, 2005
Podcasting in Education
We're featuring podcasting resources on our home page this week. Some of you may be wondering how to apply podcasting to education in practical ways. Well, thanks to the beauty of RSS, I found Barbara Ganley's post on this very topic. She has a lot of good things to say, both about the whys of using podcasting and about the hows.
Speaking of podcasts and education, you should see what's going on Ed Tech Talk.
Speaking of podcasts and education, you should see what's going on Ed Tech Talk.
Friday, November 04, 2005
Link collection
Once again, I've collected a number of links to articles of interest. Here's an overview:
- Blended Edu reports on a wonderful collection of WWII photographs (b & w) on Flickr.
- A very nice presentation by George Siemens on Web 2.0 and Connectivism.
- An excellent post on the Blackboard/Web CT merger, its implications and open source alternatives. From Stephen Downes, links to reactions to the merger.
- Another George Siemens item on Feedbook, a collection of multimedia and text items that might replace a textbook.
- Bryan Alexander points to some tablet pc resources for physics.
- Links to podcasts of Internet Librarian 2005 presentations.
- A post on Open Source in Education. Very informative.
- How blogging helps students learn.
