Group items tagged

"Everyone's now aware of 3D printing - they've read about it in the papers, on blogs or seen it on TV. The mentality now seems to be that, in the future, we'll be able to download our products or make them ourselves with CAD programs, apps and 3D scanners, then just print them out, either at home, or in localised print shops. Which in turn will supposedly decentralize manufacturing, bringing it back to the West. But like the cupcake, Daft Punk's latest album, or goji berries, 3D printing is severely overhyped - and I should know, because it's what I do for a living."

"A search to recover the very first web page has unearthed a relic from 1991. The page turned up after Cern launched a public appeal for files, hardware and software from the web's earliest days. The original page is missing because the web's creators did not preserve the early work they did on what has become a historic document."

"Since its inception back in 2003, WordPress has grown from a humble blogging platform into one of the world's most popular content management systems (CMS). Now, the much-loved website and blogging platforms has celebrated a special miletsone - its 10th birthday. In today's blog, I'll be taking a look back at the history of WordPress, how it has changed, and is one of the most important tools for companies and marketers today."

"The ongoing copyright arms race between content owners and internet users has taken a new turn. Israeli firm Hola! has recently launched a suite of products that are variously designed to bypass geoblocking and accelerate internet-access speeds."

"Turn your blog's feed into a downloadable ebook." No more than a few simple clicks.

Audrey Watters turns her attention to VR

"A web application framework for R Turn your analyses into interactive web applications No HTML, CSS, or JavaScript knowledge required"

Two years ago I wrote a column for Inside Higher Ed entitled "The iPad for Academics." Now, two years and two new models of iPad later, it seems time to revisit some of that original column: How well does it stand up, how did my predictions turn out, and what have I learned since then? The answers are, roughly, "good" "O.K." and "a lot." When I wrote my column, no one was sure what the future held for the iPad, and there was serious skepticism about the more apocalyptic predictions. In fact, somewhat boringly, Apple's release of the iPad did what most Apple products do -- change the world, sell millions of units, and alter our information ecosystem irrevocably -- but it didn't end the world.

Teens love their cell phones. Duh! But just how often are they using their mobile phones and why? Leveraging the data provided by the recent Nielsen study, "New Mobile Obsession: U.S. Teens Triple Data Usage", FunMobility decided to explore cell phone usage patterns further. The result of our FunChat and FAADChat customer survey with over 10,000 respondents generated even more interesting data points. The survey found teens are spending more time on mobile devices than any other media device, and 40 percent are spending more than four hours per day on their mobile devices. And that's just the beginning. We turned this data into an infographic: "Generation OMG: How Teens Use Mobile Devices", that we just announced and was recently covered by ZDNet's iGeneration blog.

We're at the dawn of the tablet era now. Earlier this month, Apple sold 3 million of its new iPad during the opening weekend, with some analysts expecting over 60 million of the tablets to be sold worldwide. What's more, e-book readers are selling even more briskly than tablets. People are using those e-readers, too. On Amazon.com, books for its Kindle outsell its paper books. What's more, the explosion of e-books is putting pressure on publishers between demands for price cuts on one hand, and competition from independent authors like Amanda Hocking, who earned over $2 million selling e-books on her own before signing with a major publisher. It's no surprise, then, that publishers are turning to the app as a possible product for books moving forward.  This has led to another movement towards enhanced books, particularly as apps for iPhone, Android, and other tablets. Are tablet apps the book of the future?

"An application that turns mouse movements into a modern art. The idea is that you just run it and do your usual day stuff at the computer. Go back to IOGraph after a while and grab a nice picture of what you've done!"

The educational thought experiment I wish to undertake concerns curriculum. Not the specific content of curriculum, but the idea of curriculum, what any curriculum is, regardless of subject. Like Copernicus, I propose that for the sake of better results we need to turn conventional wisdom on it is head:  let's see what results if we think of action, not knowledge, as the essence of an education; let's see what results from thinking of future ability, not knowledge of the past, as the core; let's see what follows, therefore, from thinking of content knowledge as neither the aim of curriculum nor the key building blocks of it but as the offshoot of learning to do things now and for the future.

The key to learning to code is learning to think like a computer--which is a hard thing to do. "It requires structured thinking, ability to abstract details away, and there's little margin for error--one little typo and your program might do something entirely different from what you wanted," says game developer Rui Viana. "The real world just doesn't work like that, so it's hard to get your head around it." Which is precisely why Viana created Cargo-Bot, a simple iPad app that turns "thinking like a computer" into a genuinely addictive puzzle game. It's like Angry Birds crossed with Codecademy, and it's total genius.

Turn your voice into a QR code which is then read back to you after you scan it

" Home NewsRadioTVEducationArtsFoodScienceCommunityDonate "

"With over 170 million active users and playing a significant role in media consumption, Twitter has turned into the go-to site for real-time updates and gathering snippets of info from those we're interested in. Pretty much everyone knows how to put a tweet together and how to reply to users, but what about more advanced features such as shortcuts, apps and SEO. If you want to improve your knowledge or want to pick up a few tips and tricks to help you get more out of the service, then read on."

"Pancake is the easiest way to create and maintain a web page. All you need to do is create a text file, and save it into the special Pancake folder in your Dropbox account. We'll turn that file into a web page for you."

Computer technology has penetrated the classroom for thirty years with little impact. After hundreds of "disruptive" education startups, the best innovation in education is still the chalkboard. This isn't the fault of the entrepreneurs, but the fault of an education system which resists innovation at every turn.