Blog Juice for Educational Technology

There’s plenty of commentary about the new propaganda educational video from the RIAA via Campus Downloading. I’m sure we’ll see much more. I love Cory Doctorow’s succinct and accurate overview and call to action:

The RIAA has just released a back-to-school propaganda video called “Campus Downloads” that is full of lies, half-truths, omissions, and intimidation aimed at convincing students to stay away from file-sharing.

This is such a steaming pile that it desperately needs to be remixed. Someone out there needs to make a version where every lie is interrupted with an explanation of the real story, to be shown alongside of it.

Sounds like a great class project to me

I don’t even want to comment on it any further–watch it for yourself–other than to point out the title screen of the video:

They’ve left out the indirect object in that first sentence. A more effective and truthful slide would read,

Protect Yourself from the RIAA. Do It Legally. An Educational Public Service Video from the People Who Will Sue You If You Don’t

Give me a break. The irony! To think that any university would be complicent in promoting a video which pretends to be a public service announcement but is more like a mafia-like strong arm tactic warning.

BTW: I’ve ordered a copy, and will probably show it. It’s an excellent tool for demonstrating the problems with our current intellectual property system. I’d encourage others to do the same.

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I haven’t posted much this summer. I guess it’s a combination of a new job, a good bit of travel, and a general need to take a bit of a break. As I consider getting back to it I find myself conflicted about my “beat.” This blog isn’t too focused anyway, but I’ve largely stayed […]

First let me say that the comments on the previous post have been pretty amazing and thought provoking. I want to comment on the comments at some point, but first I just wanted to throw out this excerpt from Convergence Culture by Henry Jenkins. This is, like, Part 3 in my blog book report.
There is […]

Next generation web - the future’s closer than you think… or is it? by Sali Earls is an article in i.t.wales. It’s an interesting read but this paragraph caught my eye:
Whatever your business, be aware that amongst today’s users of MySpace, Flickr and YouTube are the consumers and developers of tomorrow, who will come […]

We still seem a long way (years!) from figuring out how to have a free software in K-12 conference/summit that actually includes the people who are doing the work on the grassroots level. The problem is that the people doing the most interesting work are usually, say, tech coordinators in small rural or urban districts, who have no travel budget…

Here’s a blurb I discovered in today’s paper but couldn’t find online:

RadioShack Corp. notified about 400 workers by e-mail that they were being dismissed immediately as part of planned job cuts.

Employees at the Fort Worth headquarters got messages Tuesday morning saying: “The work force reduction notification is currently in progress. Unfortunately your position is one that has been eliminated.”

Company officials had told employees in a series of meetings that layoff notices would be delivered electronically, spokeswoman Kay Jackson said. She said employees were invited to ask questions before Tuesday’s notification on a company intranet site.

Jackson said the electronic notification was quicker and allowed more privacy than breaking the news in person.

I guess if you don’t have to look someone in the eye to sack them, it would be quicker and more private. Like those who are left wouldn’t know you were fired once you stopped coming to work. Maybe you’re on extended holiday?

EDIT: Here’s a link the story, though not much is added: ?threadid=8CM6TTBDEED2JJ52…

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UK educator, Mechelle De Craene, is experimenting with using the SIMS video game, as a method for helping her special needs students learn to express their stories. She says in her blog posting, The Sims 2.0 & Students with Special Needs.
My newest classroom-based pilot research project is coming along well. I am exploring The […]

Diane Quirk, of “Technology to Empower Student Learning,” posted a comment on one of my rants about the mantra, “Integrate Technology.” I described how I was much happier with integrating contemporary literacy. But Quirk suggests in her comment that perhaps we should reconsider at integrate as well.
My initial response was that there may […]

I am so proud of those of our students in years 7, 8 and 9 who completed the

Victorian Premiers Reading Challenge

which finished yesterday. They read 182 books between them since the start of the challenge. I think its so great that they can be r…

Some smaller colleges as well as some entire athletic conferences are now using webcasting to bypass the confusing maze of cable availability in order to broadcast football and other school sports on their web sites.

The largest safety recall in the history of consumer electronics is creating a hassle for local information-technology departments. School districts and state departments are inspecting their Dell laptops one by one after the company announced a recall of

In school districts, curriculum and technology experts often sit on other sides of the table. Why the great divide? For starters, K–12 technology leaders typically bring a business perspective to the educational world. For most working in IT, this is a re

I’ve got a PowerMac G5 in my office now, so this is great news. MacWorld reports that the Aqua port of OpenOffice is soon to be released. Now Mac users will have little need to run any MS products on their machines.

(click the image for a full screen version available at ericb’s place)

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