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After Having My Parents in For the Weekend…I Can Relate…
Posted by admin on Jan 25, 2012 in open source, Productivity
Yeah, Been There Before...
Apple’s New Textbook Program–Continuing Their Tradition of Monopolies
Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe that the fanboys of Apple did not nearly get in as much of a tizzy as they usually do with an Apple announcement. So two reasons. One, they were all in line for the next iPad or iPhone or something. Or two, this textbook agreement, yes that which was supposed to redefine education, was pretty underwhelming.
Definitely the latter. What you get from Apple is the ability, or as they think, the honor, of buying dressed up textbooks for $15.00. Dressed up, as they could have some movies and music in them. You know, high tech interactivity. Oh, and a supped up MS Publisher to build your own textbooks. Yawn.
I really like the zdNet article on the ‘evil agreement’ for the iBooks (available here). When you have an expert on EULAs say:
I have never seen a EULA as mind-bogglingly greedy and evil as Apple’s EULA for its new ebook authoring program.
that will scare me a little. Even for Apple. So going back to that MS Publisher-make your own book thing…by using it, you give Apple the exclusive rights to be the ONLY one to sell anything you make for a fee. Hmm…
And then you have the cost in general. So yes, you can run iTunes on PCs, but what they really want is you to run it on a grossly overpriced iPad. Or MacBook Pro. That way they can totally corner the market. So yes, let’s go 1:1 with iPads. Spend something like a few hundred thousand dollars on the hardware. And when it’s time to buy content….well, maybe next year. Just showing once again, Apple has no touch on reality.
Hopefully Google or Amazon is working on something quickly…
A View From Space
Posted by admin on Jan 21, 2012 in Creative Commons, Devices
I love these videos. So many teachable moments here for every curriculum at every level. Enjoy!
Cease and Desist Over Beer
In my previous post about the threatening bills SOPA and PIPA (and no, not Kate’s wild sister), I expressed my concerns over how they could lead to loss of freedom for Americans. Now, I ran across something equally as troubling, but I am quite proud for this person who stood up to the system.
We hear all the time about how trial lawyers (Democrats) should be reigned in and settlements for negligence lowered. But when you look at it on the most basic level, don’t:
trial lawyers=people
Copyright/patent lawyers=corporations
So the real difference in them is who they work for, right? We have a lousy system for identifying Copyright infringement. No proof is needed to send a Cease and Desist letter to someone. At our school, we have had one sent to us for a clearly Copyrighted letter shared on a teacher’s Moodle page, but most times, it is much more gray than that. YouTube handles it the same way–pulling down a video without question, if a takedown notice is issued. Innocent until proven guilty, indeed.
So enter the story about beer. A brewery in San Antonio uses the name Hopasaurus Rex in it’s brewing process. A brewery in Oregon hears about this, and immediately sends a C&D letter, since they have a beer under the same name. Definitely would effect their sales, as a lot of people in San Antonio go to Oregon for BEER!. So what does the San Antonio brewery do? Just cease and move on? No…they reply with the BEST letter ever…and it makes quite a lot of sense. Read it over at: http://www.edibleapple.com/2012/01/13/best-letter-ever-written-to-a-lawyer/ Good for them! Looks like I will need to buy some beer from Freetail!
Boycott SOPA/PIPA
On this blog, we always try to share free and open ways of using tools for productivity and education in the classroom. Much of what we do with the blog, with the tools, and eventually what you do in your class with students relies on an open internet and open tools. Congress, though, backed by the media moguls is trying to stop this freedom. Something they did not even create, they are trying to conform to their 20th Century business model.
The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA) are Hollywood’s way to stop piracy of software, movies, and music. They could care less what that does about our freedoms, they just want to limit the ability to pirate their content. On the one hand, I cannot blame them. Piracy is real, does cost them money, but on the other hand, change your business model. Be like the other industries who had to think outside the box.
This gives a good explanation of the situation:
PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.
So Congress may finally be getting the message…as companies across the country have been weighing in, along with the general public. All amazing, considering the major media companies, NBC, Fox, etc, all have not been reporting on it, since it would potential help them. Fair and Balanced, indeed. Many major websites will go blank on January 18th in protest, possibly even including Wikipedia.
As educators, look at what you hope to do with children. We live in an age of focusing on content creation. What do they do with that content? How often does it involve mashups? How many times on this site alone did we look into Creative Commons, mashups, and things of that nature? Do we really want someone coming along changing those rules? Changing how we can embed video content on Moodle, blogs, Google Docs, etc? Now is the time…reflect on how you use the Internet, and let your congressmen know!