N.M School Tries to Connect with Students via Podcasts
Greetings Readers,
In an email I received this week, I was directed to a story about a New Mexico school trying to connect to its students by putting classroom material in podcast from and letting them listen to it on Zunes that the students are given.
The students of Fort Sumner High School have been given Microsoft Zunes to help them with their school work. Students are encouraged to use the devices during class, on the bus and during school trips. Teachers are given a $400 bonus to find 20 downloadable lectures that go along with their lessons as well as creating 5 of their own. This is a pilot program where the schools received donated Zunes in exchange for test score information to see if they have any effect on learning.
The school is utilizing podcasts as teaching tools, something I have advocated for a long time being a podcaster myself. I find it a great tool for picking up on something in a lecture that you didn't the first time or to distribute information in addition to the actual class lecture.
When I was going to school in Utah, since they didn't have any way to download and listen to lectures, I started recording all of the class lectures myself for review and to let other people review lectures when they needed it. It came in handy when I didn't remember something from a lecture that I needed to know for homework or a test. It really came in handy when studying for finals.
Being able to learn on your own time and repeat things as many times as you need is one of the biggest keys to retention. If you have some free time or just want something to listen to during your commute, educational podcasts are a great way to fill that need and learn something interesting at the same time. If you can learn things on your own time when you aren't worried about being distracted, you will pay more attention to what you are learning and will have an easier time retaining the information you are learning. The ability to listen to something over and over again is also a major key to retention. As studies have shown, repetition is great for remembering facts and seeing details that you would often miss on only one encounter. Podcasting brings these possibilities students or anybody wishing to increase their knowledge on a particular subject.
Of course such a program has potential for abuse. Students are likely to increase the time they spend listening to music, watching videos, or viewing photos with a device such as the Zune. While this may be a problem with some students, I don't really think it matters. If a student is dedicated to learning and wants to succeed, they won't let things distract them. If a student doesn't care about their education, they will always find some kind of distraction to occupy their time even if its just counting the pimples on the kids neck that sits in front of them. At least with something like this, it can help those who care to have a higher level of understanding about what they are being taught.
I hope this program is a success and gets adopted across the country to help the students learn more as well as cut down on the number of books they need. If you think this idea has merit, suggest it to your local schools and see what kind of impact you can have on the lives of children in your community!
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Computers in use pass 1 billion mark
Greetings Readers!
For those that haven't heard, the number of computers in use around the world has hit 1 Billion! Im not sure if I am more suprised that we have hit this mark or that we haven't hit this mark until now.
According to this story, the primary reason for hitting this number now and the projected doubling of the number by early 2014 is about broadband and wireless internet as well as low cost computers.
While I think that point is valid, I think its more about computers being necessary for life in a first wold country. With everything moving online from government information to television shows, in the time of high gas prices we are in, it is cheaper and more convienent to do things online than it is to do them in person. With news netorks pointing to their websites for more information on stories, it is clear the value of computers and the internet and to have them is crucial for almost anybody.
While I know there are some people that don't have computers, especailly older people, that is slowly changing as people see how their life can improve by having a computer with an internet connection. Computers and the internet aren't going away so if you know somebody who doesn't have a computer, tell them to get with the 21st century!
That is only a part of this story. The other part here is what happens to computers when people get rid of them. It is epected that 180 million computers will be replaced this year alone. There are many ways that people can get rid of their computer. Many are sold or donated to those without computers while others are broken down and recycled. What is really shocking is that approximately 35 million of those will be taking up space in landfills. That is a lot of computers! If computers can't be saved and donated to local schools or charities, they should be recycled rather than thrown away. The real problem is there is not a major effort to inform people about the harm that is caused by throwing computers away and the benefits of recycling them. There needs to be an organized effort to get this information out to the world and let people know where they can take their dead computers.
People also need to be aware of the security issues involved in getting rid of a computer. Unless you take measures to erase the data on your computer, your personal information is still on the hard drive, often including passwords, credit card numbers, social security numbers and all kinds of other personal information. If you dont want to risk your information falling into the wrong hands, replace the hard drive in the computer before you give it away or use some software that will overwrite the data on the hard drive multiple times so that it is extremely difficult to recover. With a billion computers floating around, that is alot of personal data that can be lost if you don't take proper measures to prevent the stealing of your information.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
I have been BANNED from Digg.com!
Greetings Readers!
I have some rather suprising news for you today. I have been banned from Digg.com! For those who don't know what happend, I will catch you up to speed before I post all correspondence that I had with Digg support.
Last week I made a wrote one of my insightful blog posts about Cisco's predictions on internet traffic in 2013. It happened that a similar blog post from Om Malik made it to the front page of Digg about the same story. To give Digg readers another view, I posted my link into the comments on I believe it was Thursday. Due to my inability to link properly, I only got a single person to visit my blog from posting the link in the comments. Saturday morning I woke up and went to Digg a story that I saw on my Digg RSS feed to find that my account was invalid. I did some searching to find that all signs of my existence on Digg had been completely removed. Being completely confused as to what was going on, I contacted Digg support only to find out I was banned. The following is all of the emails exchanged between myself and Digg support with a few thoughts thrown in. At the end is my thoughts on the whole issue and I will discuss it further on the next Global Geek News podcast.
Support,
This morning I woke up to find myself logged out of Digg when I went to Digg this story: http://digg.com/space/Giant_Tsunami_on_the_Sun_Captured_By_NASA_s_STERO_Spacecraft
Figuring Firefox just deleted my cookies as it does on occasion, I went to login only to have the strange error claiming my account, pcnerd37 is invalid. Can you shed any light on what is going on? Thanks for your help!Sincerely,
Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Digg's Response:
Thanks for getting in touch with us at Digg.com regarding your account.
Your account was reported to us for abusive activity in comments. Specifically, spamming Digg comments with your blog "Global Geek News has a great blog post about this story, www.globalgeeknews.com/blog"
As explicitly stated in the Digg.com Terms of Service located at http://digg.com/tos section 5.1 USER CONDUCT:
5.1 By way of example, and not as a limitation, you agree not to use the Services: to abuse, harass, threaten, impersonate or intimidate other Digg users;
Also, note that in our Terms of Service, we reserve the right to, “Digg may remove any Content and Digg accounts at any time for any reason (including, but not limited to, upon receipt of claims or allegations from third parties or authorities relating to such Content), or for no reason at all.”We are willing to unban your account once we receive notification from you that you have reviewed the Digg.com Terms of Service and re-affirm your agreement to those terms.
Please don’t hesitate to contact us should you have any further questions.
Thank you,
-The Digg Support Team.
Ok, so I screwed up in two ways on the linking, not only did it not link but I apparently forgot to link to the direct article, but with the story remaining the top post on the blog, the main blog link will still take them to the right story.
Digg Support Team,
I have reviewed your terms of service, which I have always agreed to, and find the complaint without merit. The link which I failed to copy correctly, leaving off the part to the direct article (oops), was for more information on the post in which the comment was left. As a service to my fellow Digg users, I attempted to post a link to a blog post where more information on the dugg story could be found. It was not intended in any way to be "spam". If you want to get real technical about it, since I left off the http://, it was not even hyperlinked in the comments.
The Terms of Service section you quoted me seems to lack application here as I was not trying to abuse, harass, threaten, impersonate or intimidate other digg users. I was merely trying to give them a link for more information on the story which I believe to be in the spirit of Digg. Furthermore, I find actions taking against me were overkill. The appropriate response would be to delete the post and send a warning email, not delete or ban the account. Banning would be understandable if it was a case of repeated "abuse". I would suggest it is time to review your policies for interacting with loyal Digg users.
Also, in the interest of full disclosure, I will be podcasting and blogging about this experience on Global Geek News.
Sincerely,
Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Digg needs to better define the terms such as "abuse" that it uses in its terms of service to help avoid confusion. Everything else here is fairly self explanatory.
Digg's Response:
Hi Jeremy,
In addition to section 5.1 on the Terms of Use, we would also like to specifically direct your attention to section 5.7 which states that you agree not to use the Services:
to submit stories or comments linking to affiliate programs, multi-level marketing schemes, *sites/blogs repurposing existing stories* (source hops), or off-topic content;
Also, the Digg FAQ directly addresses this policy as well:
Is it ok to put my website link as a signature in comments?
No, it is not okay to advertise anything of any kind in the comments section. We ask that, as a story commenter, you keep your comments on-topic to the story you're currently on. Any irrelevant links, spam, etc. could result in an account ban for the offending user.-Digg Support
Digg is trying to pull relevant policies out of its butt, but they aren't doing a very good job as shown in my response email.
Digg Support,
Thanks for your response. As far as your Section 5.7, had I posted the correct link that I meant to (again, oops), It would clearly not be repurposing the story any more than the Digg story which was just a repurposing of a release from Cisco. In regards to your FAQ, there are two main things. First, It states IRRELEVANT links! The intended link, which I will include was not irrelevant. Second, asking and requiring are two different things. Asking implies a courtesy, not a necessity. If you are going to quote it, please reword it to say what you mean. Last, I noticed you completely avoided the issue about how you deal with these situations and Digg users. I find this very curious as most companies that care about their users would have a clear and consumer centric policy when it comes to dealing with users. It is best to keep in mind that it is the users that keep you in business and relations with them should be as plesant as possible. If you look at product surveys, people believe that a large part of product satisfaction is customer service, something that Digg needs to work on. The Townhalls are a great step in the right direction but not enough to create a great user experience with the company.
Again, I would like to reiterate that I have no problem with your terms of service other than some poor wording, but attempting to scew it to a situation it does not apply is simply childish. I would like to give you the opportunity to publicly address these issues, especially how you deal with users on your site on the Global Geek News podcast. I do not have an exact time yet, but I will be bringing up these issues and believe it is only fair and in everyones best interest if I invite a representative of Digg onto the show to state their case and join in on the discussion. If you would be interested, let me know and I will set everything up.
Here is the link to the story that I meant to put in the comment but didnt realize until after the edit period was over that the link was incorrect: http://globalgeeknews.com/blog/?p=39
Sincerely,
Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
They seem to be having a hard time explaining themselves so I give them the opportunity to explain themselves and have a civilized discussion on my podcast. As it appears in the end, they don't have enough interest to respond to that request. Thy didn't respond after this email ripping into them, so I figured its time to email them to see what is going on.
Digg Support,
What am I to assume from the fact that you did not return my last email? I have stated I have no problem with your terms of service, yet I am still banned. Why? Unless I hear otherwise, I will assume your lack of a response means that you realized you have screwed up but aren't willing to admit it. When it becomes apparent that this email conversation is over, that is when I will post my blog about this experience. My offer allowing somebody from Digg to come on the podcast to discuss various issues including its policies for interacting with users and how it defines its terms of service is still open. We typically record live on Thursdays if somebody would be interested in joining us. I finalize all show guests by Wednesday night, so you have until then to make arrangements to be on the podcast if you choose. Whether or not you are there, this will be discussed and I feel it is better for digg to be upfront and deal with this issue in an intelligent and civilized manner. If you choose not to take that path, I wish you luck with the bad publicity that results from the podcast and blog. I look forward to futher communications to resolve this issue in a way that can satisfy both parties.
Sincerely,
Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
I again ask Digg to have somebody on the podcast to talk about these issues but they still don't respond to the idea.
Digg's Response:
Hello Jeremy,
Sorry we didn't get back t you sooner. We have unbanned your account. Please note, however, that your account will remain under review, and any violation of Digg’s Terms of Service may result in a permanent ban of your account.
For more information, please see http://digg.com/faq and http://digg.com/tos.
--Digg Support
Getting unbanned is a partial victory. Since this was the last email they sent to me, I have no idea how long I will will "remain under review." There are still many other issues that need addressed but at least I can now Digg stories and leave comments (Not that I couldn't as I do have multiple accounts).
Digg Support,
Thanks for getting back to me. I greatly appreciate being unbanned from my favorite social news website. How long will my account remain under review? All of my points from my previous two emails still stand including my invitation to be on my podcast. Thanks again!
Sincerely,
Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
That is basically everything that has transpired as of this time as it appears they don't want to email me back or appear on the podcast. There are still some major issues here, mainly revolving around how Digg interacts with its users. Banning users with no warning and only giving the error "Invalid Account" is not how to deal with users. If that wasn't bad enough, their pathetic attempts to hide behind their "Terms of Service" and "FAQ" is laughable. Unless there is a huge demand, I will reserve further comment for the next Global Geek News podcast since this is already an extremely long post. If anybody from Digg reads this, the invitation to be on the podcast is still open but you don't have much time to respond! While I am not yet calling for a boycott of digg as I am still a loyal Digg fan, I will say becareful and when you have to deal with Digg, demand a higher level of customer relations than this pathic thing they have now!
Stay tuned for the podcast where I will talk about this in greater detail!
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Microsoft to use Olympics to help Vista, Silverlight Adoption
Greetings Readers!
For those of your who are looking forward to watching the 2008 Olympics but would like to watch the events online at a time that is convenient for you, you might be in luck! If you are running Vista and have Silverlight, thanks to a partnership with NBC and Wavexpress, you will be able to download olympic events off the internet onto your computer. If you are feeling left out for not having Vista, don't be too disappointed as only some Vista users can use the service.
Powered by Wavexpress' TVTonic Internet video service and client, NBC Olympics on the Go will only work for people that have a Media Center capable Vista PC. This means you must either be running Vista Home Premium or Vista Ultimate if you want to use this service. If you haven't been excluded from this service yet, there is more that you should know. The video you download cannot be kept indefinitely and is only certain to last through the games. Also, you wont be able to watch the video from an event until 12 hours after it takes place. Finally, if you aren't sad about this news yet, the service doesn't allow for portable players. They are looking into other distribution outlets for putting the Olympics on portable devices, but as of right now, there will be no easy way to put the Olympics on portable devices.
With the sad facts out of the way, its time to look at the impact this will have on the market penetration of Vista and Silverlight. With the global specticle that the Olympics is, gathering the attention of billions of people, it is no suprise that Silverlight is expecting to see a huge wave of adoption since Bill Gates announced the offical Olympic site will require Microsoft's flash competitor, Silverlight. With the website likely to recieve billions of hits, it is understandable that the games will create many millions of new Silverlight users. While a vast majority of people don't currently have Silverlight, I believe that will change because of the Olympic games website. The ease of of install with Silverlight will greatly work in the technology's favor. It will take an event like this to make Microsoft's Silverlight a true competitor with Adobe's Flash. I hope that adoption numbers will be announced after the games have concluded as I expect it to create hundreds of millions of new Silverlight users.
Vista on the other hand will likely see a small boost from people who want to download the Olympic events, but not near the adoption rate that Silverlight will see. Considering the current state of the economy, I dont expect people to rush out and purchase new computers or a new operating system just because they wish to watch more Olympic games coverage. While I'm sure that some people will see this as the prodding they need to move to Vista, this won't cause a huge exodus from XP to Vista. It is wishful thinking on Microsoft's part and its at least a move in the direction of the mass market adoption of Vista, but this isn't going to be the thing that will cause people to move to Vista. Microsoft needs to work on the public perception of Vista before it can ever hope to achieve true success with the operating system.
This is a huge play for Microsoft in its competition with Adobe's Flash, but not what Microsoft needs to help increase Vista adoption.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Changes on the Global Geek News Blog
Greetings Readers!
I just thought I would post to make everybody aware of the new changes in out legal section. I have adopted new Terms of Service which I recommend reading. They can be found by clicking on the Legal tab at the top of this page.
The Global Geek News podcast will be coming back very soon.
And finally, expect a big post coming regarding my issues with Digg.com since I found myself banned this morning. I will be posting all correspondance with Digg.com and am trying to get them to come on the podcasts to defend themselves. Depending on how much longer the correstpondance continues, the post could be up as soon as tomorrow.
That is all the updates I have for now, but do expect a greater number of blog postings as I have been doing the past couple of days.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Firefox 3 is Here!
Greetings Readers!
UPDATE! This is the correct link for Firefox 3 Final release!
It seems that Mozilla is unable to handle all the traffic from Firefox 3 Download Day so I have the direct link to the file for those who want to download Firefox 3 but don't want to wait all day to access the site. Here is the link: Firefox 3. This is the Windows version!
Here is what I am told is the Mac link: Firefox 3. (I dont have a mac so I can't test to make sure this is the final link. Leave a comment on if its the right thing or Twitter me if its not.)
Here is what I am told is the Linux link: Firefox 3. (I dont have a linux box right now so I can't test to make sure this is the final link. Leave a comment on if its the right thing or Twitter me if its not.)
I will have a blog post about my first impressions up in the next day or so.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Nintendo Tries to Kill Homebrew, Fails
Greetings Readers!
If you are like me and still can't get your hands on a Wii, this story probably won't mean much to you, but if you are a lover of homebrew on your gaming systems, this story is for you.
Yesterday, Nintendo released a new update for the Wii (v3.3) which does two major things. One, you can now move you Mii directly from the Mii Plaza into the Mii Parade. Second, it kills the Twilight Hack which allows players to use homebrew games and applications on the popular console. Luckily, a workaround has been discovered which will allow people to continue to use homebrew although it is not yet been made public.
Much like Sony, I don't think Nintendo understands homebrew. I will admit that Sony is doing a bit better now with the ability to run linux on the PS3, but they still seem to maintain an anti-homebrew stance when it comes to the PSP. Much like the PSP homebrew community, despite Nintendo's best efforts, they will not be able to kill homebrew completely. If there is one thing they can learn from the PSP community its that you cannot kill that which you don't understand.
While I understand that the gaming industry wants to avoid piracy at all costs, that doesn't mean that killing homebrew is the way to do that. As the RIAA and MPAA know, you can never stop piracy. It is better to admit that now so you can go on to more productive endeavors.
Allowing users to do what they wish with their hardware is a big selling point for many people. The ability to put homebrew on my PSP is why I have two of them. The ability to put Linux on the PS3 is one of the main reasons I expect to purchase one very soon. If you allow people to do what they wish with their system, not only will they be grateful for it, but they will spend more time using the system! That is what manufacturers should be wanting, any edge that will keep consumers using their product more than their competitor's product. The ability to do things like turn my PSP into a powerful graphing calculator is a huge selling point when I am faced with having to purchase a $100+ graphing calculator.
If Nintendo can recognize the potential that homebrew brings, it will be a great benefit to their console. The more consumer centric you are, the greater your position in the market will become.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Cisco Forecasts Increase in Internet Traffic. Hello Captain Obvious!
Greetings Readers!
This only comes as a shock to people living under a rock, but according to Cisco, internet traffic is going to increase! Their estimates show that by the year 2012, global internet traffic will reach half a zetabyte! For those who aren't geeky enough to know your bytes, a zetabyte is 1 trillion gigabytes, or around 250 billion dvds worth of data. That is a lot of data!
I will give you one guess why the traffic is going to be increasing by 46% annually. If you guessed anything other than video, you clearly don't check out enough blogs and podcasts. Internet video traffic increased from 12% of global internet traffic in 2006 to 22% in 2007. They predict that it will account for 90% of global internet traffic by 2012. IPTV is included in that figure as well as video transfered via Peer-2-Peer networks. The only other interesting figure in this prediction is that mobile traffic will double every year between 2008 and 2012.
None of these figures should come as a surprise to anybody. With the popularity of viral video sites and streaming video sites growing in leaps and bounds, it doesn't take much of an imagination to see that video traffic will account for 90% of internet data in 2012. This news is floating around the internet, even hitting the front page of Digg like this is shocking information when its not a difficult prediction to make. A zetabyte is a new word for many people but that doesn't change the story any. While this might be worth a small mention, there are more newsworthy things than an obvious story like this.
The only part of the prediction that I take issue with is the mobile data figure. This figure is entirely dependent on mobile carriers. What mobile carriers charge for data services and the availability of mobile data services are the determining factors here. If carriers increase charges or don't continue to expand their networks, this figure will never be reached. Adoption of devices like the iPhone will help realize this figure but it still ultimately depends on the carriers. Time will tell if this figure turns out to be accurate, but I'm not betting on it.
With predictions like this, it is worth asking, how with ISPs cope with this increase in traffic? If we are having issues with companies like Comcast and their network management practices now, what will they be like in 2012 when a half a zetabyte is crossing the tubes every year? This is a discussion for another post or podcast, but I will leave you to ponder that question.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Verizon Throws the Baby Out with the Bathwater, Screws Users
Greetings readers,
In another story of consumers getting screwed, which seems to be a theme on this blog, Verizon has decided to block access to the entire alt.* USENET directory because they are too lazy to enforce their own service agreements. Reading that link will get you up to speed with all the details, but the short version is that Verizon has decided to block the entire alt.* USENET directory after the Attorney General in New York threatened charges for not enforcing their own policies to take down child porn. Instead of blocking the 88 out of over 100,000 offending groups, they decided to just block access to all of them despite whether their contents are legitimate or not.
While I support the efforts to eliminate child pornography, which will never happen by the way, I am suprised at Verizon's actions to shut down thousands of legitimate USENET discussion groups. This is essentially the kind of overreaction that the recording industry has been lobbying for to get ISPs to shut down Peer-2-Peer networks to squash it's piracy problems. With such an overboard reaction that Verizon has taken, what will they do when somebody points out to them that child porn circulates on bittorrent and every other P2P service on the internet? Will they kill all P2P access?
Customers need to stand up to Verizon and fight for the legitimate purposes of services such as USENET. This is just another part of the Net Neutrality issue. Verizon needs to learn from the mistakes of others and not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Taking extreme measures to handle a small problem is never a productive solution.
Despite having considered using it in the past, I have never used USENET before, but I will be reconsidering my desire to switch from Comcast to Verizon Fios now that I know they lack the common sense of a good ISP.
It is time that consumers stand up for their beliefs in how the internet should be used and fight back against such reckless actions taken by ISPs such as Verizon.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
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