By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. English man spends 11 hours trying to make cup of tea with Wi-Fi kettle
Bonnie Malkin, The Guardian, 2016/10/12

Voice-activated WiFi kettles are still in the realm of future technology (and, I would think, about as safe as a Galaxy Note 7) but this nightmare scenario still draws out an important lesson for the internet of things (IoT) and technology integration in general. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Labeling fact-check articles in Google News
Richard Gingras, The Keyword, 2016/10/18
I haven't been able to see this actually working yet, but the promise of a 'fact check' option in Google News is intriguing. For now, the actual fact checking will depend on people, and it looks like fact-checking metadata (called Claim Review) will have to be present in the news story. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Immersive Virtual Reality: Online Education for the Next Generation
Peter Merry, ConVerge, 2016/10/18

A fairly light read with a decent number of links, this short article touts the potential of virtual reality (VR) to reshape education. Of course, if past experience is any guide, instead of creating simulations of ERs and submarines, educators will use VR to simulate the typical college lecture theatre. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Use of Technologies at #IWMW16
Brian Kelly, UK Web Focus, 2016/10/20

If you haven't been watching it must seem like the entire world has changed. Here's the list of technologies used as described by Brian Kelly: Slack, Lanyard, Whova. The last is completely new to me. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Peter Thiel and the Future (and Funding) of Education Technology
Audrey Watters, Hack Education, 2016/10/20
Audrey Watters on Peter Thiel: "At the core of the companies that Thiel has founded and funded is surveillance. Palantir. Facebook. AltSchool. The regime of data collection and analysis is framed as 'personalization.' But that’s a cover for compliance and control." More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Initial xAPI/Caliper Comparison
IMS Global, 2016/10/04

xAPI and Caliper are systems for recording student activities, offered by ADL and IMS respectively. There are ongoing discussions between the two organizations regarding how the overlap and/or interoperate. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. How it feels to learn JavaScript in 2016
Jose Aguinaga, HackerNoon, 2016/10/04

Sadly, it really is like this. "Wait, I learned OOP in college, I thought that was good? -So was Java before being bought by Oracle. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Toward a Constructive Technology Criticism
Sara M. Watson, Columbia Journalism Review, 2016/10/04

This is a long and detailed report that blows through tech journalism like a breath of fresh air. It had me thinking about what it is that i do with this newsletter - not journalism, not curation - is it tech criticism? Maybe. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Sitelock Scam
Jim Groom, bavatuesdays, 2016/10/03

When you receive a report that your website has been hacked, the first thing to do is not to panic. That may be hard to do with your host provider warning that your site might be deleted forever unless you take immediate action. More...