The Auricle

On David Wiley's blog we find the following intriguing statement: “Imagine the value OLS (Open Learning Support) could add to MIT/OCW if OCW were a wiki?”. David imaginings were stimulated by Chris Wagner's posting entitled the Impending Demise of Slashdot. As a contrast to the article plus threaded comment model commonly found in blogs. Chris […]

In a series of previous articles we described our initial 'look see' of the open-source Moodle virtual learning environment. In the silent interval since these articles we've been busy working with colleagues in one of our departments to design, develop and implement a distance learning course in which Moodle has started to play a significant […]

In several of my recent postings to Auricle I've proposed the emergence of a 'filling station' model where networks are used to refresh highly portable devices. It seems that at least the College of Business Administration at the University of Texas is already well down this road. The University of Texas' course Digital Media for […]

Via JISC News we learn that the University of Southampton is to provide core funding for its institutional repository and as the items suggests “marking a new era for Open Access to academic research in the UK.” Southampton are to be applauded for their leadership in this regard and it will be interesting to see […]

Following on from Lisa Williams' Google does it again last week there has been some useful analysis and commentary published in the UK press. Read them quickly before they move into their pay-per-view archives. Read the rest of this article, you'll see what I mean. First up is Ben Macintyre's Paradise is paper, vellum and […]

Just in case you missed it elsewhere, Google has announced it's plans to digitise the content from five of the worlds leading academic libraries, and to make them accessible via Google Print. The ambitious initiative will include the full libraries of MIT and Stanford, together with selected archives from Harvard, Oxford and the New York […]

In my recent Leeds presentation, Weblogs: Niche or Nucleus?, I proposed that one of the key affordances of the blog is as an authoring engine for syndicated feeds. In turn, this is contributing to a recognition that syndication solutions, like RSS or Atom, are emerging as the ultimate low barrier, increasingly ubiquitous, metadata solutions. So […]

Voting for Edublog 2004 has started. The organizers wish to have as many votes as possible. Auricle is but one of the nominations. So vote for who you think is best in each category. Download article as PDF

In my previous items on a Filling station model of e-learning I've suggested that portable devices are beginning to offer functionality and utility undreamed of even a couple of years ago. The UK's Guardian Online article You can take it with you (2 Dec 2004) highlights the possibilities offered by the humble USB or thumb […]

Embedded in an article BBC bids to lift standards with 300m bloodletting in the UK's Sunday Times today (5 December 2004 p7) there was a tidbit which suggests that the BBC has plans for a new service called 'Catch-up TV'. I assume this is similar in concept to their excellent established 'Listen Again' service for […]