Ten Things to Keep You Awake at Night
More Pollard: In Are You a Closet Canadian he documents drifting social and political trends. His thoughts on Integrity. Visions of the future state and how to get there. More...

Time Savers for Bloggers
It has been a constant with me, ever since I was writing on sheets of paper on an old Underhill typewriter (I have been writing for a long time). One page: fifteen minutes. 250 words. A thousand words in an hour. First draft - everything is first draft; I don't rewrite anything. I use almost all of Pollard's tips, everything, in fact, except proper typing. More...

How to Save the World
I have linked to a few of author Dave Pollard's works before, but this morning was the first time I looked at his blog in detail. The result? A number of links to share with you (see below) and renewed thoughts on writing. You see, I am not writing enough. More...

International Journal of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning
Just launched, a new free refereed journal is now available in HTML and PDF format online. The International Journal of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning picks up where the old USDLA Journal left off, reuniting most of the old editorial board, but publishing independently. More...

Multitudes In the Valley of Decision
The gist of this article is that people sometimes prefer less choice. Making a choice constitutes a 'transaction cost', if if there are too many choices, the transaction cost is too high. Though not mentioned in the article, this is the basis for one of the major arguments against micropayments. More...

The Eagle Is Grounded
I think this is exactly right: "In the face of new technologies and competition, the U.S. is toughening patent and copyright protections... if it's not careful, the US will drive its intellectual property offshore..." The core of the observation here is that patent and copyright policy today is increasingly a type of trade policy, responding to foreign competition by making it more difficult to compete. More...

H2O
Andy Carvin posts his photos online and tells the WWWEDU board. I visit the site, see a photo I like and, noting the Creative Commons license, snag one and put it on my home page. I send a note to WWWEDU thanking Andy and flagging the Creative Commons project. More...

The Promise and Peril of 'Open Access'
The headline writers put 'open access' in scare quotes, but the author provided a good overview stating most strongly the case in favour: "...Brain Research, which costs more than $21,000 for 2004; Biochimica et Biophysica Acta, which costs nearly $15,000; and Nuclear Physics A and B, at more than $23,000." She also outlines the counter-argument offered by academic societies, whic depend on publication income, and responses from the publishers minimizing the impact of open access publishing. More...

The Horizon Report
This report, an annual summary of emerging technologies released by the New Media Consortium, includes learning objects as among the technologies to watch, especially this year (it is worth noting that NMC also has a separate learning object initiative). More...

Self-Publish And Be Damned? Not Always.
They used to call it vanity publishing, and it was the last refuge of the talentless. But as writers become more frustrated with publishers - their rules, their share of the profits, their slow response time - they are turning with increasing success to self publishing. More...