By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Why c and x MOOCs are attracting different number of participants?
Sui Fai John Mak, Learner Weblog, April 21, 2013
It's a question I'm sure many people have pondered: why do the xMOOCs attract hundreds of thousands of people, while cMOOCs attract far few. Sui Fai John Mak rounds up the reasons:

1. branding and affiliation with elite institutions and professors,
2. well established courses with rich support on resources and assessment (grading/peer assessment),
3. granting of certificates of achievement or statements of attainment (in recognition),
4. degrees of difficulties – xMOOCs are much easier compared to cMOOCs,
5. perceptions of learners – xMOOCs are based on 1,2,3 above, and 4 – learners – cMOOCs would have to curate resources and create blog posts/join forums,
6. pedagogy,
7. assessment. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. 2019 Fosway 9-Grids for Learning Systems and Digital Learning
Fosway Group, 2019/01/30
I'm linking to this mostly for the diagram, since there's a spamwall blocking readers from the actual report (I gave my information so you don't have to). The focus is on the learning systems market for the UK and Europe (including learning managent systems (LMS) and Next Gen Learning Environments (NGLE). The category extends to talent managent system like Cornerstone, but what's most interesting is what's missing completely: Blackboard. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. How Much Artificial Intelligence Should There Be in the Classroom?
Betsy Corcoran, Jeffrey R. Young, EdSurge, 2019/01/30
“If our children are educated by AI teachers, then their potential can be fully realized.”  So said Squirrel AI co-founder Derek Li at a recent conference in China, according to this article and podcast episode. "Li painted AI as not just some pale substitute, but as ultimately superior to humans when it comes to some aspects of teaching" and "he hopes to provide each child with a super-power AI teacher that is the combination of Einstein and Socrates." Ah, but should he? Regulation is very important in this domain. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Is it possible to decolonize the Commons? An interview with Jane Anderson of Local Contexts
Jennie Rose Halperin, Creative Commons, 2019/01/30
I admit to having mixed feelings about traditional knowledge (TK) lables. These are lables that denote traditional ownership and limitations on the use of indigenous cultural heritage and artifacts. You can view the lables here. I certainly understand the sentiment behind these lables. As the video accompanying the article makes clear, the colonial past has resulted in the appropriation and debasement of traditional knowledge from around the world, transforming it into Disney princesses or hot yoga. At the same time, I am not comfortable with limitations to the concept of public domain and limitations on access and use based on gender. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Improving reuse of design knowledge in a LMS
David T. Jones, Creative dissatisfaction, 2019/01/30
This is an article that moves seamlessly from a problem with ugly text in Blackboard (who hasn't had that problem?) to a general commentary about the need to be able to develop and reuse design patterns in an LMS environment. This becomes even more critical, writesDavid T. Jones, as we consider the implications of next generation digital environments that involve the use of multiple applications in online learning. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. It’s about Trust, Stupid! Why Blockchain-based BlockCerts are the wrong solution to a false problem (0/3)
Serge Ravet, Learning Futures, 2019/01/30
This is the first of what may be three or four articles on the subject. The key point in the this first post is this: "Trust is the mortal enemy of public blockchains." Or, to put the same point another way, the core message of blockchain technology is this: "distrust each other, the way I distrusted you." I would have though we had learned the limits of trust in this era of hack attacks, online scams and fake news, but maybe not. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Top 10 IT Issues, 2019: The Student Genome Project
Susan Grajek, EDUCAUSE Review, 2019/01/31
This is a follow-up to an earlier article on the top 10 IT issues. The cleverly titled focus of this article is on how to 'sequence' educational data. "In 2019 we are focused on organizing, standardizing, and safeguarding data," writes Susan Grajek, "so that we can use it to address our most pressing priority: student success." This the issues are clustered into three themes: empowered students, trusted data, and 21st-century business strategies. It's no surprise the focus is on data - most of the top 10 IT issues listed focus on data, and the other two themes are almost afterthoughts, interpreted here in terms of data. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Who will become the Uber of packaged elearning content?
Conor Gilligan, Training Journal, 2019/01/31
This article offers a corporate-centered discussion of e-learning trends, and specifically, that "the market for packaged elearning content will continue to grow as the hunger from corporates increases and requires more agility than ever. This will be driven by the growing demand for skills development." This ties into the 'Uber' in the headline in the sense that companies are offering to link content creators with these corporate markets. So, "one of the leading LMS providers has decided to join the race to become the Uber of elearning content — yes, Cornerstone on Demand. CSOD acquired a leading packaged  microlearning provider based in New York, Grovo, for $24m. Another leading LMS, Totara Learn, has also announced its plans to create a content marketplace". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. FLO Facilitation Guide
Gina Bennett, Beth Cougler Blom, Sylvia Currie, Sylvia Riessner, BCcampus, 2019/01/31
This guide (181 page PDF) "is a collection of one- to five-week online courses that help participants
develop the skills they need to confidently and effectively facilitate learning online." The purpose is "to help individuals prepare and facilitate these courses as well as any courses that emphasize facilitating in a community of learners and supporting collaboration and reflective practice". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Get the PDFs – Google Search to Google Folder
Tom Woodward, Bionic Teaching, 2019/01/31
This is the sort of thing that should be easy but that is (for no good reason) hard. "Is there a way to automatically get the links from the search linked (here) into a spreadsheet? Then, from there, is there a way to automagically get the pdf files into a Drive folder?" Why yes, yes there is, which is why I'm passing this along. More...