Nouts Education News

Vint Cerf on the History and Future of the Internet

15.01.10

As I begin to wind down this weblog it seems appropriate to reference this video by Vint Cerf on the history and future of the Net. I can remember participating in the early Usenet and with radio packet switching systems and with early newsgroups. The technology has certainly made things easier for current computing! ____JH

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"During a July 2009 lecture at Singularity University, Vint Cerf ('the father of the internet' and Google Chief Internet Evangelist) gives a comprehensive overview of the state of the internet today, and what issues are arising as it continues to evolve. Includes discussions about IPv6, the need for cloud computing standards, the growing Asian prominence online, and the interplanetary internet."

Shutting Down

15.01.10

The EduResources Weblog will shut down in December (at the same time that Radio Userland the server support site shuts down). I will continue to operate my more general weblog at The Open Learner. I'm pleased that there are now many fine guideline sites to open academic resources for students and teachers (see the list of Recommended Weblogs) which did not exist when the EduResources Weblog was launched in 2002. Many thanks to all the readers who consulted EduResources. ____JH

Web-Based Mind Mapping

12.01.09

Robin Good writes enthusiastically about the benefits of web-based mind-mapping, with a special focus on MindMeister (which is free in its basic version). Robin also includes links to other mind-mapping tools. The mind maps that I create are most often done with a pencil and a yellow pad, but there are advantages in using a shareable, web-based tool such as MindMeister. From a very, very broad perspective all online educational resources can be viewed as variations of a mind or topic map. _____JH

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"Web-Based Mind-Mapping: Outline, Plan and Brainstorm Ideas Together With MindMeister. If you are looking to find an effective way to collaborate, brainstorm, visualize and plan ideas collaboratively online, much beyond what voice and text chat can do, it is the time you give a good try to the mind-mapping experience.
 
Thanks to unforgettable MasterNewMedia editor Antonella Pastore, who first covered mindmaps in 2004 (!), mindmaps have been on my radar for quite some time, but with the recent advent of online, collaboratively editable mindmaps the opportunities to reap significant benefit from these tools has just exploded.

The great thing about collaborative, web-based mind-maps is the ease with which you can visualize spatially while giving very precise text labels to ideas, tasks, projects and to the relationships between them. These two characteristics by themselves when mixed with ability to watch and edit in real-time the same visual map with others creates a truly effective, useful and memorable way of collaborating productively at a distance."

Blackboard Loses on Appeal

22.08.09

Inside Higher Ed reports on Blackboard's latest loss, which is good news for universities and colleges who use open source software because we can be sure that despite their disclaimers, Blackboard would certainly move against open source courseware if they succeed against Desire2Learn and other private companies. Blackboard's loss is also an affirmation of common sense since anyone with long-time experience in course management software knew that Blackboard's patent claims were simply assertions, not valid original contributions to courseware delivery methods. ____JH

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"Both companies appealed the parts of the case they'd lost to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which has nationwide jurisdiction over U.S. patent claims. Its highly technical decision upheld the lower court's conclusion that Blackboard's claims 1-35 were invalid. But the three-judge panel rejected the lower court's finding that Blackboard's patented learning system had originated the approach of giving a single user with a single log-in multiple roles, such as being a teacher in one course and a student in another."

"The appeals panel embraced Desire2Learn's argument that such technology existed in 'prior art,' in this case previously existing course management systems such as Serf and CourseInfo 1.5. The appeals court essentially ruled that the lower court judge had framed Blackboard's claim incorrectly for the jury, said Bruce T. Wieder, a lawyer for the Washington firm of Dow Lohnes who was not involved in the case. Having done so, the Federal Circuit court "could have said, 'This is how you should have interpreted it, you go look at it again,' " Wieder said. "But instead, the court said, 'Since we've seen what was argued, we now can say that the district court wouldn't have come to any conclusion,' and declared those claims invalid."