Copyright in Canada: New Responses

Michael Geist, Canada's resident guru on (and, advocate for) the future of Canadian copyright law recently blogged about Project Gutenberg Canada's response that is focused on public domain issues.


You can access the Speak Out on Copyright website by clicking on this image:

For those in the education/e-learning community who are following the ongoing debate about copyright legislation in Canada, you might be interested in this response from the Canadian Network for Innovation in Education:

CNIE Response to Federal Copyright
August 2009
See the full PDF here.

After consulting with it's membership, CNIE's Board of Directors submitted the attached position paper to the Canadian government's electronic consultation on a future Canadian Copyright law. PLease feel free to share this position paper with your colleagues at work and within your networks so as to encourage others to share their views with the government. You can also share CNIE's position paper with your Member of Parliament. The more people who make themselves heard on the topic of a furture Canadian Copyright Law and it's impact in and on the education, library and research sectors, the more likely Canadians are to have a future Canadian Copyright law that appropriately and adequately responds to the needs of all Canadians.

eInfrastructure Use Cases (EIUs Project)

This eInfrastructure Use Cases and service usage models project out of the UK looks exciting. I really like the idea of sharing workflows and research objects in myExperiment -- repurposing these kinds of data and workflows will enable much richer forms of research and scholarship.

Reading about the service-oriented, shareable approach reminded me of Richard Baraniuk's inspirational talk at the 2009 Canadian E-Learning Conference. The more we can look at flexible and sustainable ways of sharing research and educational information, the more potential there is for furthering the connections between disciplines, delivery mechanisms, and content areas.

EIUs Project Videos

Archaeology : eIUS e-Infrastructure Case Study
See the YouTube video.

Bioinformatics : eIUS e-Infrastructure Case Study
See the YouTube video.

PIctorial COmmunication Language (PICOL)

I just stumbled across a neat online library of icons called PICOL; I think I'm going to experiment and give it a try. In many cases, simple visual ways of communicating just seem so much more effective, especially when there is a standard in place to help create consistency and usability.

My PICOL image:

(translation: social network + globe = full group)

According to the PIctorial COmmunication Language website, "PICOL stands for PIctorial COmmunication Language and is a project to find a standard and reduced sign system for electronic communication. PICOL is free to use and open to alter."

Gov. Schwarzenegger terminates textbooks

This article really highlights the wide range of issues that the ever emerging area of learning-technology faces.

Toronto Star, Saturday June 14th:
Gov. Schwarzenegger terminates textbooks
But critics say his cost- cutting shift to digital classrooms is premature

I'm highly skeptical that this transition will be seamless; I imagine it will be anything but. It's really important for some infrastructure and decision-making to occur before this kind of huge transition of this nature. But, there is one point that I agree with in the article: that just like Kennedy's goal of reaching the moon, this will definitely be a catalyst for change and achieving innovations.

Sneeze Game

I just found David Rothman's site --there's a lot of stuff here for medical librarianship, but I have to say that his most recent post on the Sneeze: Flash Flu Fun game that's posted on there; I highly recommend it!

Google Wave: The Next Generation of e-Communications?

By announcing that the new Google Wave is opensource, Google is capitalizing on power of the opensource community to help finish the Wave's development. According to webmetricsguru, Wave will enable new architecture that allows building of new applications -- Wave has the potential to "deconstruct what a document is" and enable further collaboration on documents, as well as the possibilities for art, analytics, not to mention new forms of Google marketing (see Social Media Today's article).

Will this really "make life easier" as many tech bloggers and twitter folk are stating? Am I old-fashioned because I like having separate ways to communicate online, including the difference between private email messages, public blog posts, (semi)private instant messages, etc? Do we really want to integrate *everything*? I like integration where it makes sense, but too much integration could be scary; how will this affect privacy and security?

Google Wave YouTube Video (posted on May 28, 2009 and as of May 31, 2009 almost 1 million views).

State of E-Learning in Canada - Report

Yesterday, the Canadian Council on Learning (CCL) posted their report on the "State of E-Learning in Canada." It highlights some interesting trends in online learning for Canadians -- I particularly like their profile of e-learning for students in first nations communities, students in elementary and secondary schools, students with disabilities, and students in a post-secondary environment.

"Many Canadians go online to pursue learning opportunities. In 2007, one-half (50%) of all home users (16 and older) went online for the purposes of education, training or school work."
- State of E-Learning in Canada, CCL

The CCL also posted a great fact-sheet that summarizes some key points to take away from the ever-growing e-learning trends, including:

"How does e-learning help Canadians learn?
E-learning provides Canadians the flexibility to learn at their own pace at any stage in the lifespan—thereby fostering positive attitudes about the value of lifelong learning.
• Self-directed: Learners can choose content and tools appropriate to their differing interests, needs, and skill levels.
• Reduces physical and geographical barriers: More educational options to learners with disabilities, and those living in remote areas.
• Timely: Learning can be delivered and learned when desired or necessary."

It will be interesting to see if the promise of web 2.0, social software, and other e-learning trends will actually result in more effective learning in addition to increased flexibility, and if we'll be able to add words like "engagement, interaction, community connections, authentic learning" to the list of things that e-learning enables.