by Mike Masnick
Wed, Jun 1st 2011
" ...the bill tries to also define what constitutes a potential felony crime in these circumstances:
the offense consists of 10 or more public performances by electronic means, during any 180-day period, of 1 or more copyrighted works
So yeah. If you embed a YouTube video that turns out to be infringing, and more than 10 people view it because of your link... you could be facing five years in jail. This is, of course, ridiculous, and suggests (yet again) politicians who are regulating a technology they simply do not understand. Should it really be a criminal act to embed a YouTube video, even if you don't know it was infringing...? This could create a massive chilling effect to the very useful service YouTube provides in letting people embed videos."
"August 1, 2011, 5:51 pm
By Rachel Wiseman
College students with very poor vision have had to struggle to see a blackboard and take notes-basic tasks that can hold some back. Now a team of four students from Arizona State University has designed a system, called Note-Taker, that couples a tablet PC and a video camera, and could be a major advance over the small eyeglass-mounted telescopes that many students have had to rely on. It recently won second place in Microsoft's Imagine Cup technology competition. (...)
The result was Note-Taker, which connects a tablet PC (a laptop with a screen you can write on) to a high-resolution video camera. Screen commands get the camera to pan and zoom. The video footage, along with audio, can be played in real time on the tablet and are also saved for later reference. Alongside the video is a space for typed or handwritten notes, which students can jot down using a stylus. That should be helpful in math and science courses, says Mr. Hayden, where students need to copy down graphs, charts, and symbols not readily available on a keyboard. (...)
But no tool can replace institutional support, says Chris S. Danielsen, director of public relations for the [NFB]. "The university is always going to have to make sure that whatever technology it uses is accessible to blind and low-vision students," he says. (Arizona State U. has gotten in hot water in the past in just this area.) (...)
This entry was posted in Gadgets."
In "(Arizona State U. has gotten in hot water in the past in just this area.)" the words "in the past" are linked to http://chronicle.com/article/Blind-Students-Demand-Access/125695/ , about a Spanish work book inaccessible to blind students, with a reference to the lawsuit against Arizona State U over the adoption of the Kindle.
So classifying this post in "Gadgets" is particularly paradoxical: in fact one reason why Arizona State U. was sued over the adoption of the Kindle was that Amazon presented its text-to-speech as a gadget.
by spk7 - Aug. 19, 2011
"Some time ago, Head of the School of Engineering, Professor John Fothergill, with the help of son Henry, produced a very engaging and funny video focusing on his experiences of moving some of his teaching online.
In order that his course could still run while he was on sabbatical, John worked closely with Beyond Distance in order to achieve the best online experience for his students.
The video draws upon a number of comic influences, most notably Monty Python. We hope you enjoy it!"
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"VW: The Dark SIde
Volkswagen opposes key European laws that we need if we're going to save our planet from climate change. But all is not lost. We feel the good in Volkswagen.
Tagged with change, climate, co2, darkside, greenpeace, vw, vwdarkside
July 01, 2011"
Video taken down from YT, then from vimeo, due to a copyright infringement claim from George Lucas Films.
" Video Info
English (181 Lines)
Czech (100 %)
Italian (100 %)
Spanish (100 %)
Ukrainian (100 %)
"...We should say to modern democratic government, you need to beware of incumbents bearing policy fixes. Because their job, the job of the incumbents, is not the same as your job, the job of the public policy maker. Their job is profit for them. Your job is the public good.
And it is completely fair, for us to say, that until this addiction is solved, we should insist on minimalism in what government does. The kind of minimalism Jeff Jarvis spoke off when he spoke of "do no harm".
An internet that embraces principles of open and free access, a neutral network to guarantee this open access, to protect the outsider.
But here is the one think we know about this meeting, and its relationship to the future of the internet. The future of the internet is not Twitter, it is not Facebook, it is not Google, it is not even Rupert Murdoch.
The future of the internet is not here. It wasn't invited, it does not even know how to be invited, because it doesn't yet focus on policies and fora like this.
The least we can do is to preserve the architecture of this network that protects this future that is not here."
Excellent video--what state couldn't use this? The Did You Know? (Shift Happens) videos have been seen by at least 40 million people online and perhaps that many again during face-to-face conferences, workshops, etc. This week saw the release of the latest version, this one focused on the state of Iowa.