Jeff Longland

Oy. I’ve puttered with Linux for a few years, but I decided 6 or 7 months ago that I was going to cast away Windows completely - or at least at home. I’m running SuSe 10 / OpenSuSe / whatever the heck they’re calling it these days. I only use a handful of apps on any regular basis: Firefox, Thunderbird, Netbeans, BlogBridge, xterm, ssh, etc. But every once in a while I run across something I can’t do and it irks me: VPN client doesn’t support Linux, taking quizzes in WebCT Vista 4 I’m unable to save questions or complete the quiz! I could go on with the little things, but for the most part my experience has been positive, even on a PIII 750MHz. Sure, sometimes the road is a little bumpy but I think I’ve reached a point where I feel that I’m as productive in Linux as I am in Windows. So not really a frustration, just a couple of little ones.

The hype surrounding podcasting continues to grow. I can’t go through a day without having a conversation with someone about some aspect of podcasting. One year ago that certainly wasn’t the case. While discussing podcasting today, someone remarked that there’s as much pedagogical value as the audio cassettes that were discarded in favour of ‘e-learning’ due to a lack of engagement. Throughout the day I’ve been pondering the remark and I have to disagree. One of the benefits of podcasting is the delivery vehicle - hence the ‘casting’ suffix. The ability to easily broadcast recently created content - I suspect that updating 200 sets of audio tape lectures is considerably more time consuming than uploading a file that will be automatically pushed out through an RSS feed. iPods and MP3 players are integrated into the lives of many students, delivering educational or edutainment content over the medium seems like an ideal way to enhance the student experience. There seems to be a lot of focus on podcasting for delivery of lectures - but little focus on the uses of iPods and MP3 players in student assignments or exercises - see Michelle Lamberson’s recent post about an audio tour of Stanley Park. See Gardner Campbell’s There’s Something in The Air for other great examples of how podcasting can integrate into the lives of both students and instructors.

So where the heck am I going with this proprietary hype topic? Well, everytime I write, speak, or hear the word podcasting - I can’t help but cringe. It’s a great word but knowing that everytime it’s used I’m furthering Apple’s corporate mission bothers me a bit. But not as much as the credit that’s given to Apple. This is not Apple’s success - RSS deserves all the credit!  It’s only through RSS that podcasting is possible, so let’s give a little more credit where credit is due eh?

I just had to use the obligatory Canadian ‘eh

I just heard through the grapevine that iTunesU will be coming to Canada in the very near future. Apparently the thumbs up has been given to iTunesU Canada. I’ve taken the obligatory stroll through Google and don’t see any announcements or details, but apparently it’s true.

True?  Or simply more blogosphere hype?

This doesn’t really fit under an instructional technology theme, but it’s an interesting article nonetheless: http://paulgraham.com/procrastination.html

I’ve been to a handful of events in the past year where I’ve had difficulty getting Internet access and I’m getting a little loopy about it. At the podcasting conference yesterday, the speaker was talking about the transformation of education via technology. Yes. Agreed. But where’s my wireless access? We’re talking about access to content anywhere, anytime.. but I can’t! I’d like access now. I can see one laptop down front, flipping through what appears to be a stream of blogs… ahhh, presenter access. Similar to my experiences at Educating the Net Generation in the fall. Cyprien was kind enough to share his access with the audience in the morning. I know there are many reasons why one wouldn’t want participants to have access, but if we’re talking about emerging technologies I want to have a personal, interactive exploration of the topics while I’m taking in the conference. These events are about professional development and when I have a full day for reflection, I want to make the most of it. The bigger events that provide conference wide access are great, but typically lacking security. Maybe I’m just picky, but a walk around the neighbourhood reveals one wireless network after another!