By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Reddit and Weep
Barbara Fister, Inside Higher Ed, 2015/07/23
Kudos to the headline writer for the best pun from the spate of articles surrounding the current controversy at Reddit. The website Reddit calls itself the 'front page of the internet'. Its stories are contributed by thousands of members, and readers can 'vote up' or 'vote down' the story. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. A Master List of 1,150 Free Courses From Top Universities: 35,000 Hours of Audio/Video Lectures
Dan Colman, Open Culture, 2015/07/22
At a certain point, pundits will stop saying there's a shortage of open learning resources out there, and will begin thinking about how to use what already exists in courses (hint: cMOOCs). More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Study of colleges shows ‘encouraging’ texts dramatically cut dropout rates
Paul Offord, FE Week, 2015/07/22
I think I want to see a few more studies before jumping to conclusions here, but wouldn't it be funny if the retention problem could be solved (or substantially impacted) simply by sending encouraging text messages. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Big Data, Learning Analytics and Distance Education
Terry Anderson, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, 2015/07/22
Terry Anderson remains optimistic about learning analytics, but the two concerns he cites in this short post are more interesting. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Listen to 188 Dramatized Science Fiction Stories by Ursula K. Le Guin, Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, J.G. Ballard & More
Dan Colman, Open Culture, 2015/07/22
Off-topic, but I don't care. I grew up on science fiction. I've read all these authors and more. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. MOOCS and Social Learning Networks
Stephen Downes, Jul 21, 2015, MOOCs Y Aprendiazaje en Redes Sociales, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
In this presentation I look at the intersection of MOOCs and social learning networks by looking at the various aspects of openness in MOOCs - open admissions, open content, open instruction, open assessment - and considering how they change when applied to networks and to social networks. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Adblock Plus Study
Press Release, Simon Fraser University, 2015/07/20
I use ad blocking software all the time. I refuse to turn it off - even when 'free' wifi in Madrid airport was conditional on turning off ad blockers, I decided to go without internet rather than turn it on. It's a good choice. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Next Wave
John Markoff, Edge, 2015/07/17
Although it feels like the future is rushing forward at us, argues John Markoff, in fact, right now, it's on a pause. "In the last two years, the price of each transistor has stopped falling." We're seeing advances in pattern recognition technology and in robots. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Web We Have to Save
Hossein Derakhshan, Medium, 2015/07/17
When blogger Hossein Derakhshan - also known as 'Hoder' - emerged from six years of jail in Iran, he encountered an internet very different from the one that existed the last time he blogged. More...
By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Turning self-assessments into powerful engagement tools
Sarah Beckett, HRSG, 2015/07/17
I'm sure most Facebook users remember the appeal of the spate of Buzzfeed quizzes that made the rounds last year. The Facebook algorithm has since moved on to promoting other branded content, but it remains true that quizzes - especially quizzes about oneself - remain an excellent way to engage readers. More...
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