By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Unattributed[Edit][Delete]: Brazilians With Tiny Orange Laptops, L.A. Times [Edit][Delete] July 10, 2006
See, this is just false: "Serious learning will always be boring compared to the entertainment bombarding young people 24/7 these days." But explaining why it's false takes a bit more doing. It's not simply that what Mill called the "higher pleasures" appeal to more mature minds. But more mature minds are more free and more able to engage in a topic of enquiry of their own choosing and for its own reward. Not that this article, purporting to cover NECC 2006, manages anything close to insight on this. The author tries to make the point by talking about riots. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Roger Cohen[Edit][Delete]: Congratulations to Italy, International Herald Tribune [Edit][Delete] July 10, 2006
Congratulations to Italy on their team's win in an exciting and well-played World Cup, and to their opponents France, who would also have been deserving of a championship. We watched the game on a big screen at the market in downtown Moncton. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Ganesan Shankaranarayanan and Adir Even[Edit][Delete]: The Metadata Enigma, Communications of the ACM [Edit][Delete] July 7, 2006
Good paper making the point that there are numerous types of metadata, including what the author calls 'process metada' and 'quality metadata'. I am in agreement with the general point but less happy with his characterization of six types of metadata. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Chris Barlas[Edit][Delete]: Digital Rights Expression Languages (DRELs), Jisc [Edit][Delete]JISC [Edit][Delete] July 7, 2006
Very good article written for JISC on digital rights expression languages (DRELs), a set of languages aptly described as ways of codifying "instructions for digital rights management systems". People familiar with DRELs may want to skip directly to part 9, which describes the author's projections on the role of DRELs in the future, though the paper is sufficiently up to date readers may find it useful to look at things like the description of DReaM-MMI, which was only made public in March of this year. I like the distinction between enforcement and trust systems, but I think the article cedes too much to the DMCA-style regulations allowing distributors to supersede fair use provisions. It is not mentioned, for example, that only 59 nations have signed the WIPO provisions in this regard, so it is hardly a 'world standard', as implied in the text. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Jennifer McLean[Edit][Delete]: Forgotten Faculty: Stress and Job Satisfaction Among Distance Educators, Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration [Edit][Delete] July 7, 2006
Useful study which conforms generally to my own experience. The author writes, "it is important to recognize that distance educators view themselves as dedicated almost exclusively to instruction. The traditional triad of higher educators sharing their time between teaching, service and scholarship is not perceived as applicable." Moreover, "the strong independence shown by this panel makes conformity to institutional regulations less likely among distance educators." You mean I was not supposed to partition the institution server and set up my own private multi-user environment? Heh. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Nick Timiraos[Edit][Delete]: Free, Legal and Ignored, Wall Street Journal [Edit][Delete] July 7, 2006
Even the Wall Street Journal is recognizing the futility of the business models being proposed my online misic services. "College students don't turn down much that's free. But when it comes to online music, even free hasn't been enough to persuade many students to use such digital download services as Napster, Rhapsody, Ruckus and Cdigix." As it turns out, reports the article, people prefer to have music collections that they own, rather than to merely rent. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Robert Sylwester[Edit][Delete]: Connecting Brain Processes to School Policies and Practices, BrainConnection [Edit][Delete] July 7, 2006
The concept of 'brain-based teaching', strictly speaking, doesn't make sense, argues this column. "We educators tended to blindly follow the instructional advice of those who seemed to understand brain processes. We were thus vulnerable to bogus claims that brain research had validated this or that curricular program or instructional strategy." More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Various authors[Edit][Delete]: Web 2.0 Slides, July 7, 2006
Funny. "Web2.0Slides is a self-running slide show of over 1,400 of the best Web2.0 sites. It's categorized by tags and sorted alphabetically. What's cool about it? You can click on any site in the left-hand column to pause the slide show and surf around. When you're done, simply click PLAY, and it will begin right where you left off." Nifty way to show links - I looked for a way to do a TagSlide demo for OLDaily. More...