TokyoTechXʼs MOOC Development Toolkit
Nopphon Keerativoranan, Online Education Development Office, Tokyo Institute of Technology, 2017/11/27
This is a set of three tools in Python and Excel to support content development in EdX MOOCs. One is a content modification tool, which basically automates cobtent import and export to make it easier to work with entire courses. The second uses a similar functionality to create a course content and outline tool. More...

Unblock Docker for Windows Firewall Issues with Host Volumes
Simon Williams, Kajabity.com, 2017/11/27
We're not yet where stuff runs out of the box. This is a case in point. I spent all day on this issue, and it's basically Norton Firewall blocking access to shared volumes (ie., shared files) between my Windows system and a Docker container. More...

The End of Ownership
Calum Marsh, Pacific Standard, 2017/11/27
I see these advertisements every time I go to see a movie: "Add a SuperTicket to also own a digital copy for $19.99." They actually stress the word "own" in the theatre. But of course it's a lie. You don't own it. That's what this article discusses. "'Look, there's a mismatch between what people think they're getting and what they are getting," he says. More...

Has everybody lost their damn mind?
Alex Usher, Higher Education Strategy Associates, 2017/11/27
I don't always agree with Alex Usher, especially when he's attacking unnamed opponents, but he's exactly right with this one. The incient concerns a TA who showed a news report about a controversial subject in class. More...

A free, teacher-less university in France is schooling thousands of future-proof programmers
Jenny Anderson, Quartz, 2017/09/08
You might think there's a lot I like about this tuition-free school, where the curriculum consists of nothing more than projects given go students (at 8L:42 a.m.; they get 48 hours to complete them). The students manage everything else, up to and including the design of the elevator ("hip-hop blaring from the speakers and blue and green lights piercing the darkness") to grading to the food truck out back. More...

OPERAS Design Study
OPERAS, 2017/09/08
According to the website, "OPERAS is a distributed research infrastructure project in Europe to support the development of open scholarly communication," especially in the social sciences and humanities (SSH). The design studiy was released over the summer, and has four parts: a landscape study that "identifies recent developments and challenges within the scholaly communication framework," a technical mapping that "provides a global description of the technical, organizational and information systems within the OPERAS consortium," a usage study "describing current practices regarding open access, the evaluation of existing services, the missing services, and the level of interest for integrated new services," and a  European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) landscape study. More...

Feedback: It’s all it cracked up to be!
Brett D. Christensen, Workplace Performance, 2017/09/08
This is a nice discussion of feedback based on the example of traffic signs. Brett Christensen talks about the signs in his town that display your speed as you drive by; they're used to encourage better behaviour in things like school zones. And they work, but only under certain conditions. More...

Digital badging for facilitating virtual recognition of an achievement 
John Arlan Brock, 2017/09/08
Audrey Watters points to this patent granted to SalesForce for digital badges, or more specifically "a computer-implemented method of facilitating virtual recognition of an achievement implemented in a database system communicatively coupled with a social networking system." It has a priority date of 2014. More...

Orion Labs completes $18.25M in Funding to Expand its Next Generation Voice Platform for Real-time Business
Press Release, Orion, 2017/09/08
While I was in Poland I joked with the translator that he would need to find a new job soon. He assured me he was find for now. Well, maybe not. Here's Orion. "Starting today, all customers have access to a preview of Translator, Orion’s new real-time voice translation bot. More...

What Personalized Learning Is Not
Kenya Ransey, EdSurge, 2017/09/07
Overall this article makes some good points, though it is a bit unfocused. Kenya Ramsey defends the idea of personal choice in personalized learning. So personalized learning is not merely selection of options from a list, nor is it having teachers design individualized lesson plans. More...