By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Gnomes Rain From Azeroth'S Skies
Something that hasn't come up a lot - yet: spam in virtual worlds. There is already a pretty well established history of advertising in video games (for But this is of a different order - the spam, in the form of corpse graffiti, was created by players, not game owners. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Transition Network Open Space
How are open spaces conferences conducted. The conference is conducted without an agenda and a set of speakers - but it is not without structure. Rather, the structure develops as the conference progresses. People who want to convene topics put their suggestions up, people who are interested gather, discussions are held, notes are taken, and whatever happens is the only thing that could have happened. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Right to Click
I think that the managers of museums and libraries need to rethink who owns the cultutal artifacts in their possession. These items - the images they record having long since passed into the public domain - belong to the people. They belong to all of us, collectively. Which means there is something very wrong in their attempts to make the use of those artifacts impossible - in this case, by banning copying. Other museums ban photography (like the museum in Taiwan, that wouldn't allow me to photograph 6,000 year old artifacts - I really really think the expiry date has passed, and I doubt that the creators will be motivated into creating any new 6,000 year old artifacts). More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Pedagogical Affordances of Syndication, Aggregation, and Mash-Up of Content On the Web
This article is a basic summary of Web 2.0 tools as they are applied in an online learning environment. Good overview from the perspective of two projects, the Dekita and Writingmatrix projects. They are "are similar in that they are two examples of what is possible when we are aware of and can exploit syndication, aggregation, and mashup of content in distributed learning environments over the Internet". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Nature Network - a Thinking Person'S Social Network?
Coverage of a new social network for scientists, "Nature Network (NN) - a social network for 'scientists to gather, talk and find out about the latest scientific news and events'." So why, asks Andy Powell, is nature - the journal - doing this? "Communication that used to happen primarily thru the peer-reviewed, published article and the conference paper is now beginning to happen in other ways." Good answer. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Visualizing the Signatures of Social Roles in Online Discussion Groups
Interesting article that analyzes patterns of interactivity (which they call 'structural signatures')in Usenet Newsgroups in order to find people playing specific roles in those newsgroups, for example, the role of the 'Answerer', the person in the group who offers answers to members' questions. Good diagrams contrasting the patterns characterizing this role with, say, people who discuss a lot. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Metaverse Roadmap: Pathways to the 3D Web
What happens when the 3D web begins to interact with our usual ways of interacting with the world and each other? This report describes in detail the possible scenarios, from augmented reality to mirror worlds, lifelogging, political change and the transparent society. Lots of detail, illustrations and examples. Very comprehensive. The 28 page report is available as a PDF. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Openness in Higher Education: Open Source, Open Standards, Open Access
The authors describe a support model for the use of (open) standards in higher education. They describe a three-layered model of support comprised of the contextual, policy, layers. The support model is based on contextual support, "which recognizes the diversity and complexities of the technical, development and funding environments," and user engagement. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Free Tuition Offer has Its Drawbacks
Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick proposes to make the state's community colleges tuition free for high school graduates. I love how those writers who never supported free tuition turn around and argue that free tuition is not enough when it is announced. It won't help the people who need the help, say these writers with a newly discovered concern for poor people. Yes, free tuition helps everyone, not just the poor. But that's a good thing. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Interesting Snippets
Alan Levine led me to this fabulous set of 229 images posted on Flickr. Don't skip past this link without at least taking a look - but be ready to be drawn in by the simplicity and attractiveness of the format. Each slide illustrates an aspect of our new web, looking at it from a slightly different perspective. You can also find notes and a reference for each slide. The slides are CC licensed, so you can use them in your (non-commercial) presentation. More...