By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Noncommercial Isn'T the Problem, ShareAlike Is
David Wiley takes another look at the whole issue of licensing and restrictions. He argues, "The biggest legal problem facing the open educational movement is license incompatibility... Why, when we are so worried about preserving freedoms, do we prohibit choice on the part of downstream users as to how they can license derivatives works they make?" My response is, "The fundamental dilemma, in my view, is that some uses of a work essentially destroy the openness of the work". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Facebook - Friend or Foe?
I thought Facebook was pretty good, in a limited proprietary application sort of way. Then it introduced widgets and third-party applications, and I find myself constantly being asked to joing this application of that application. Meanwhile, Judy O'Connell writes, expressing the angst of the social software user, "I'm not yet sold on Facebook - but on the other hand I am pretty tired of skipping from one NIng network to another - and overwhelmed by the fact that I could actually be writing what amounts to a blog on each of my networks. Chills the spine." She adds, We're told that a major development in the history of widgets occurred just this week; the W3C published a draft of the first widget specification. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Author and the Austen Plot That Exposed Publishers' Pride and Prejudice
Jane Austin novels, barely altered, were submitted to publishers. Not only were the novels rejected, the publishers didn't recognize the novels. Now I will admit, I'm not a fan of Jane Austin either. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Email Becoming Irrelevant? Not for Most Teachers!
"While email may be becoming more irrelevant for teenagers and older power-users of the Internet and other digital technologies, it certainly is NOT irrelevant for most K-12 teachers in the United States in my perception -€“ and possibly K-12 teachers elsewhere around the world." Maybe, but the thrill is gone. Email subscriptions to my newsletter have leveled off (though RSS continues to climb). More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. This Year It's Hair Salons
The music industry has now decided to charge hair salons for playing music while people are getting their hair done. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. IWMW 2007 in York - OpenID and All That
Here's an interesting suggestion, "that no-one in an institution should ever again invent an ad hoc sign-on mechanism for anything they do on their Web site." There's some serious discussion around identity these days - with it being described as of "strategic importance", and also of ensuring that OpenID remain open. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. A July 2007 Snapshot of UK Higher and Further Education Developments in Second Life
The title is pretty descriptive as the report surveys trials and discussions, though it doesn't really look into the problems (because initiatives haven't really scaled up yet) or the criticisms. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Members Only
This article describes a website called 'Late Night Shots', a social network for the Georgetown elite. Serious language and content warning. Everything people think happens on MySpace (but doesn't) appears most likely to be happening on LNS. This is a very detailed and well researched article (compare with the quality of journalism the Chronicle of Higher Education is offering, above) exposing everything people fear about the internet. Via Crooked Timber, where Scott McLemee points to the cultural politics of the comments section. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Pimp My Course
Alan Levine sums up this article - yet another anti-technology screed in the Chronicle - with one word: Loser. More snark, is now New Kid on the Hallway describes it, correctly. "What's particularly disturbing about this column is that much of his dismissal of educational technology seems to be inspired by a deep contempt for his students." Quite so. The blog Twice says the article "was kind of funny." Geeky Mom asks, "Why is it that we never see articles in the Chronicle about successful uses of technology in the classroom?" Aacademic Hack writes, "If I had time I would point out everything that is wrong with the Chronicle piece." Pharyngula writes, "It seems to be nothing but a long whine about modern teaching technologies - it's rather pathetic, actually, but the Chronicle seems to have a fondness for running occasional articles from defensive, confused Luddites". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. TouchGraph
Another on of those web visualization tools that works both for Google searches and Facebook accounts. The star of the show, though, is the Java application that grabs the websites' favicons and uses them to illustrate the connected network of related sites. Alan Levine covers it in a recent post, on which Scott leslie opines, "touchgraph has been around a long time, but man is this much improved. Nice find". More...