By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The rise and rise of Mastodon
Eugen Rochko, Medoum, 2017/04/26
The developer of Mastodon, Eugen Rochko, offers this update following an exciting month that found the distributed social network software suddenly discovered and (it seems) accepted by people around the world. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Un-Annotated
Audrey Watters, Hack Education, 2017/04/26
Audrey Watters has posted that she will now be blocking web annotations from Genius and those from Hypothes.is. These are web browser plugins that allow people to share comments on web pages as they browse. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Digital Identities & Digital Citizenship: Houston, We Have a Problem
Bonnie Stewart, the theoryblog, 2017/04/26

I thought I had already posted this last week, but apparently not. I tweeted at the time, "I read this as Bonnie Stewart running smack-dab into 'groups versus networks' and opting for groups." More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Creating learning experiences, and spaces, for future students
Lawrie Phipps, JISC, 2017/04/26
It could be that I was working on personal learning environments a decade too early. Take this as a description of the next generation learning environment. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Essential Underpinnings Of Shifting to ‘Modern Learning’
Katrina Schwartz, KQED, 2017/04/26

It's nice to get an update of what Will Richardson and Bruce Dixon are up to these days. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. We The Educators
We The Educators, 2017/04/25
Launching May 3, the purpose of 'We The Educators' is "to start a new conversation about the future of public education... stimulate a rich public dialogue." More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. People Don’t Want Something Truly New, They Want the Familiar Done Differently.
Nir Eyal, StartupGrind, Medium, 2017/04/25
This is a familiar argument: "the graphical user interface, a milestone in the popularization of the personal computer, used familiar visual metaphors like folders, notepads, windows, and trash cans to appeal to mainstream users." More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales launches Wikitribune, a large-scale attempt to combat fake news
Laura Hazard Owen, Nieman Lab, 2017/04/25
What's interesting is the model: "it’s a hybrid of the paid and volunteer models. 'You have an operational command structure that’s based on full-time staff. The pro journalists and editors provide the supervision on how the story moves forward. The crowd does the heavy lifting on a lot of the combing, sifting, searching, checking. You let the crowd do what the crowd is good at.'" More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Amazon Launches Self-Service Marketplace for Subscription Providers
Press Release, Amazon, 2017/04/25

It's hard not to believe that this will have a significant impact on the viability of subscription-based publication models. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. What is Open Pedagogy?
Maha Bali, Reflecting Allowed, 2017/04/25
This is a link to a video conference on open pedagogy hosted by Maha Bali and including a number of the people talking recently about this topic (but by no means all, nor from all perspectives). Some of the related resources:

• Year of Open - What is Open Pedagogy - various authors
• Catherine Cronin - Opening Up Open Pedagogy (and open educational practices)
• David Kernohan - Roaming Autodidacts and the Neo-Reactionaries
• Tannis Morgan - Openness and Teaching, Learning, and Student Success
• Sukaina Walji - Critical reflections on openness in the ROER4D project
• David Wiley - When Open Worlds Collide and Wandering Through the Open Pedagogy Maze  

Some thoughts gleaned from the conversation: first, there needs to be a recognition that 'open' applies here to more than just pedagogy and more than just the classroom. More...