Group items tagged

“The Chinese government is opposed to and strictly forbids any cybercrime.”

two computer researchers at Cambridge University in Britain who worked on the part of the investigation related to the Tibetans, are releasing an independent report. They do fault China, and they warned that other hackers could adopt the tactics used in the malware operation.

Google must secretly be pleased as punch. It was only two years ago, prior to the 700MHz wireless spectrum auctions, that it was pleading with the FCC to adopt principles guaranteeing open access for applications, devices, services, and other networks. Now two years later, in a different context and under a different administration, the FCC is pushing for the same principles.

FCC cites "pending FCC proceedings regarding wireless open access (RM-11361) and handset exclusivity (RM-11497). That first proceeding on open access dates back to 2007 when Skype requested that cell phone carriers open up their networks to all applications (see Skype's petition here). Like Google Voice, Skype helps consumers bypass the carriers. The carriers don't like that because that's their erodes their core business and turns them into dumb pipes. But dumb pipes are what we need. They are good for consumers and good for competition because they allow any application and any device, within reason, to flower on the wireless Internet.

The FCC also wants Apple to explain the arbitrariness of its app approval process: 4. Please explain any differences between the Google Voice iPhone application and any Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) applications that Apple has approved for the iPhone. Are any of the approved VoIP applications allowed to operate on AT&T?s 3G network?5. What other applications have been rejected for use on the iPhone and for what reasons? Is there a list of prohibited applications or of categories of applications that is provided to potential vendors/developers? If so, is this posted on the iTunes website or otherwise disclosed to consumers?6. What are the standards for considering and approving iPhone applications? What is the approval process for such applications (timing, reasons for rejection, appeal process, etc.)? What is the percentage of applications that are rejected? What are the major reasons for rejecting an application?

Why does it take a formal request from a government agency to get Apple (and AT&T) to explain what the rules are to get on the wireless Internet?

Right answers: School teaches that there are right answers.

But, in real life, there are very few right answers.

Bullying and peer pressure

In school there are always other kids telling you how to dress, how to act, how to be cool.

Stifling of curiosity: Isn’t it obvious that learning is really about curiosity?

Adults earn about things they want to learn about. Before the age of 6, prior to school, one kid becomes a dinosaur specialist while another knows all about dog breeds. Outside of school people drive their own learning. Schools eliminate this natural behavior.

Subjects chosen for you:

Classrooms:

Classrooms make no sense as a venue for learning unless of course you want to save money and have 30 (or worse hundreds of) students be handled by one teacher.

Schools cannot work as places of learning if they employ classrooms.

Grades: Any professor can tell you that students are pretty much concerned with whether what you are telling them will be on the test and what they might do for extra credit.

Parents do not give grades to children and employers do not give grades to employees. They judge their work and progress for sure, but not by assigning numbers to a report card.

Certification: We all know why people attend college. They do primarily to say they are college graduates so they can get a job or go on to a professional school.

Confined children: Children like to run around.

Of course in school, sitting still is the norm. So we have come up with this wonderful idea of ADD, i.e. drug those who won’t sit still into submission. Is the system sick or what?

Academics viewed as winners: Who are the smartest kids in school?

Those who are good at these subjects go on to be professors. So those are certainly the smartest people we have in our society.

But, I can tell you from personal experience that our society doesn’t respect professors all that much, so something is wrong here.

Practical skills not valued: When I was young there were academic high schools and trade high schools. Trade high schools were for dumb kids. Academic high schools were for smart kids.

The need to please teachers: People who succeed at school are invariably people who are good out at figuring what the teacher wants and giving it to them.

In real life there is no teacher to please and these “grade grubbers” often find themselves lost.

Self worth questioned: School is full of winners and losers.

In school, most everyone sees themselves as a loser. Why do we allow this to happen?

Politicians in charge: Politicians demand reform but they wouldn’t know reform if it hit them over the head.

Major learning by doing mechanism ignored: And last but not least, scholars from Plato to Dewey have pointed that people learn by doing. That is how we learn. Doing. Got it? Apparently not. Very little doing in schools. Unless you count filling in circles with number 2 pencils as doing.

Government use of education for repression: As long as there have been governments there have been governments who wanted people to think that the governments (and the country) is very good.

School is about teaching “truth.”

Discovery not valued: The most important things we learn we teach ourselves.

This kind of learning is not valued in school because it might lead to, heaven forbid, failure, and failure is a really bad word in school. Except failure is how we learn, which is pretty much why school doesn’t work.

Boredom ignored: Boredom is a bad thing. We drug bored kids with Ritalin so they will stop being bored.

What they mean is that school should be like they remember rather than how it is now