E Learning: Powerpoint sharing services make Learning Objects redundant

There are a number of new PowerPoint sharing services that could have a huge impact on the sadly misguided attempts by Vocational Education organisations to create a sharing model for educational content through the use of learning objects. These PowerPoint sites will no doubt succeed where what has gone before will fade away as will their various proponents. They were misguided because they chose about the most complex, difficult to understand and implement model for content sharing possible with scant regard for the abilities of those expected to create them. It was so complex it required it's own language and tools to create. Of course this means teachers cant do it. Perhaps that was the hidden agenda? Anyway, services like Zentation, which i think has huge potential allow us mere mortals to synchronize video recorded to PowerPoint slides in a manner that was recently the exclusive domain of services like Videolinq in Queensland for whom, by the way, I have the highest, admiration. But they will need to take stock, because this Web 2 version of their service makes it easy for anyone to replicate what they have been doing for years. Have a look at this for an example.
This and other examples pull in their slides from a service called Slideshare which is very interesting in it's own right. Another to look at with a similar model is AuthorStream
Zentation from an original post on MasterNewMedia

21 Classes: tailored educational blogs

From Robin Goode comes this news of a beta called 21 Classes which is a blogging service specifically designed to meet the needs of the educational community. Included in its features are the ability to control student entries, engage in collaborative posting, invite friends etc. But as a bit of tub thumping, why is it that the business community can see an opportunity in providing this type of service to the educational community yet so many in education stick to a stand and deliver model of education. To me it's a bit like a four wheel drive (SUV) bogged on the beach. The driver insists on spinning the wheels wildly but all that happens is the vehicle goes deeper and deeper. Then the tide comes in. To their credit some Voc. Ed. providers have official policies on the use of blogs and wikis. Others block access to them, which is really strange, when they constitute so much of what the Internet is becoming.

Web 3, Classroom 3 and Grandma's Tomato Chutney

A contest on Read/WriteWeb asked for reader definitions of Web3. The article has a useful summary of what Web 1 and Web2 are as well.
For instance: "Hindsight: Web 1.0 turned into a broadcast medium. It was all about them. A case of industrial age thinking applied to a new landscape."
My take on this is as follows. The community is talking about Classroom 2 but in reality vocational training has at its heart an industrial model of education based on the transmission of the knowledge of an individual teacher or master to non experts, originally apprentices, all now called learners. In many cases this is being challenged by the way expertise that has always existed in the community is bubbling to the surface as a result of the social web applications that now abound. As a simple example, good chefs have always realised some of the best recipes were created by someone's Grandmother. In Classroom 2 it seems Grandma might get some recognition at last. In Classroom 3 it looks like the user gets to decide whose Grandmother has the best Tomato Chutney and talk to her direct.

Chatstat: How big is your market?

Chatstat is an interesting new free chat service that will translate your conversation into 16 different languages. Perhaps in the future this could be part of your mission to conquer a rapidly growing but previously inaccessible market for Vocational Education or provide assistance to communities that have previously been denied access to training. At the moment 16 major languages are supported. Here is an image of the application in use from the site.
From an article on Kolabora

Videopedia

I came across videopedia in my travels and have been thinking about it's relevance to Vocational Education and also the extent to which the content sharing model can be applied for instructional tasks if we are drawing from the broader general community rather than the Educational community. It shocks me a bit to find myself saying this but I have some reservations. For instance there is a video on here showing how to peel an egg in 5 seconds - you simply remove the top and bottom bits of shell then blow and the shell comes off instantly. Cool if it is your egg that you are shelling totally uncool if it is for a customer. No doubt this video was not posted with apprentice chefs in mind but I hope you get my drift here. By the way I have found that running a hard boiled egg under a cold water tap will achieve the same result but less dramatically. On the other hand the videos of street food in Bangkok have an authenticity ( Bangkok is noisy)that very few lesson plans could create. We cant keep ignoring this stuff because here again we have the worlds expertise coming to us from the bazaar and creating yet another small chink in the cathedral of knowledge mentality that so typifies centralised training organisations. Even if you had reservations about a particular video it's easy to make that a discussion point and use it's limitations to create a better session.

Fast Food Cooking Worse for Air Than All the Trucks on the Road

Fast Food Cooking Worse for Air Than All the Trucks on the Road
From Treehugger

TeacherTube and the cult classic:Mud

TeacherTube is the recently released educational version of Youtube. There are already lots of videos on here. But could this video sharing site become a repository for the worlds most boring content? We teachers do have a big image problem to live down sometimes well deserved. All that could be in the past though if we have videos with the potential to become cult classics like this one called Mud! In all seriousness this site is another great step towards a sustainable teaching model outside the blinkered mindset typifying the vast majority of teaching delivery to this very day, especially in vocational education. Ive always liked mud.

from an article on Masternewmedia

The Hospitality Industries' carbon footprint

A recent article on treehugger has looked at the carbon footprint of a cheeseburger. The resulting calculations originally made on open the future if correct are eye opening. "... adding in the methane, the overall CO2-equivalent emissions from all the cheeseburgers consumed in the US (assuming the average of 3/person is accurate) roughly equal the greenhouse output of 100,000 SUVs." Unfortunately though it is not possible to have a virtual meal - not that I am aware of anyway- and a world without cafes and restaurants would be pretty dull. Every human activity exists as part of the overall system within which we operate. Everything. To single out the cheeseburger isn't really that fair. I'm pretty sure the average cafe or restaurant meal would fare no better. And what a rich part of history they are. One of the world's oldest restaurants La Tour D'Argent has been open since 1582. They are renowned for their preparation of ducks using a duck press to create the sauce. Any meal requires the consumption of energy and the creation of greenhouse gases think of some of the gigantic barbeque's Australians use for instance. Heres a few links to stimulate your thoughts.

Dining on roadkill
Powerplant that uses garbage

Ninjam: a key milestone in music history

Ninjam is the best thing on the Internet, no question about that. It is also one of the most important things ever top appear on the Internet. Why? Because for the first time ever musicians have been able to collaborate worldwide to create music. The significance of that must not be underestimated. I'll say it again, for the first time musicians have been able to collaborate world wide in the creation of music! Some 2800 hours of sometimes fabulous sometimes chaotic jams have been recorded since it was released in 2005. It has created an incredibly loyal following of jammers who become very nervous when the servers are not working, and some amazing improvised music as well. It has had competition as well but no one seems to have been able to create the loyal band of die hards that Ninjam has built around it's loyal community. The creators of Ninjam also produce one of the best multi track sequencers as well called Reaper. The latest version of Reaper now has Ninjam included as a VST plugin. In terms of significance this is massive as well. Every user of Reaper can have the input of a potentially massive number of musos worldwide when they are creating their own tracks. This is important people! The jams are stored here Try searching for Funkify or ONJ for some great jams on here.