Institutional Repositories & Mandated Open Access in the U.S.?

Hard to believe, and it may take some time before we fully understand the meaning here. But this is exciting news. I first saw this on the Chronicle news blog (be sure to read the comments being posted as they reveal that there is a lot of confusion still over what exactly this means). Then a colleague sent me this New York Times article. If you're interested in this topic, more on this can be found at SPARC, the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition. SPARC, is an excellent resource for keeping up on this topic. Developed by the Association of Research Libraries, it's an international alliance of academic and research libraries working to correct imbalances in the scholarly publishing system. Those new to Open Access may want to check out Peter Suber's Overview.

Horizon Report 2008 - Future of Higher Education

I recently downloaded the 2008 Horizon Report. The report is a collaboration between The New Media Consortium and the eduCause Learning initiative. If you're interested in the future of higher education you will want to read this.

According to EDUCAUSE President Diana Oblinger, “The Horizon Report helps all of us put emerging technologies in perspective—what might be useful, what might be further in the future—and links it to learning."

The six selected areas for 2008: grassroots video, collaboration webs, mobile broadband, data mashups, collective intelligence, and social operating systems.

The 32-page 2008 Horizon Report is free and has been released with a Creative Commons license to facilitate its widespread use, easy duplication, and broad distribution. The report can be accessed along with all five previous Horizon Reports from this great Horizon Project Wiki, 2008 edition.

Librarians and IT workers in higher ed will want to be sure that decision makers at their institutions are aware of this report. In the increasingly competitive higher education environment, keeping abreast of these emerging technologies is more important than ever.

YouTube and Academe

YouTube seems like a great venue for many purposes. Upon viewing this YouTube video of a biology course from UC Berkeley, I found myself thinking how a simple to execute idea (at no cost!) could have such an impact. Be sure to notice the number of views and mostly positive comments on the site. This is partly what spurred me to begin experimenting with YouTube and uploading videos myself. Soon I'll be creating Camtasia screencasts for supplemental library instruction and I can't think of any reason why I wouldn't want to upload them to YouTube along with adding them on our library website.
This Chronicle article is about how professors are finding new audiences by uploading video of regular class sessions. What a great way for universities to promote themselves. This also fits well with the global movement to provide open education for all. I would love to see my university doing this. Why would we not?

The Cape Town Open Education Declaration - Open Education For All

Please read and consider signing the Cape Town Open Education Declaration. The quote below describes what has transpired amid the growing open-access, open-source and Web 2.0 movements over the last few years. And, in my opinion and hopefully many others, why the time is now for such a declaration.

The expanding global collection of open educational resources has created fertile ground for this effort. These resources include openly licensed course materials, lesson plans, textbooks, games, software and other materials that support teaching and learning. They contribute to making education more accessible, especially where money for learning materials is scarce. They also nourish the kind of participatory culture of learning, creating, sharing and cooperation that rapidly changing knowledge societies need.

You may be asking why this is so important, bottom line is this:
"Most importantly, we have an opportunity to dramatically improve the lives of hundreds of millions of people around the world through freely available, high-quality, locally relevant educational and learning opportunities."

The declaration lists three strategies to increase the reach and impact of open educational resources. I hope educators everywhere will understand the importance and commit to the pursuit and promotion of open education.

Google & Open-Source Science Data

Good news for scientists and all who benefit from science, which of course would be everyone. Google will be providing a very large home for open-source scientific datasets. And free access for everyone!
Take a look at this Wired Science post. And the quote I copied below excites me because I believe it's saying that Google will be creating Gapminder like visualizations of the data. I'm a fan of Gapminder because information is displayed visually in a way that is easily understood. If it's anything like the current Gapminder website, it will be quite valuable. And the fact that it will have YouTube like annotating/commenting features is icing on the cake. Another great educational resource for schools and universities everywhere.

"Building on the company's acquisition of the data visualization technology, Trendalyzer, from the oft-lauded, TED presenting Gapminder team, Google will also be offering algorithms for the examination and probing of the information. The new site will have YouTube-style annotating and commenting features."

My Flickr, Library of Congress, Web 2.0 Video

I just uploaded the short one minute video clip below to YouTube. I'm impressed with this pilot project, as are many others according to the Wired Campus Chronicle post. The Library of Congress' photos on Flickr has been a huge hit, more so than had been anticipated. I expect "The Commons" will continue to develop and will serve as a wonderful resource for educators and general users everywhere.

FYI - All photos used in the video were from the Library of Congress' photos and the tag clouds were created by using the OCLC TagCloud builder and checking the box to cloud a Web page and then inserting the flickr URL for each invidividual photo. I was just experimenting with the technology here. I realize that using only relevant tags would have been better (though more time consuming).

Flickr, Library of Congress, Web 2.0

Great news from the Library of Congress (LOC) Blog. The article "My Friend Flickr: A Match Made in Photo Heaven" is about a brand-new pilot project between Flickr and the Library of Congress, and people. People everywhere will tag, comment and make notes on the LOC images. This will be a huge benefit to both the community and the collections.

The added value of Web 2.0 and the wisdom of crowds is being more fully understood and it's wonderful to see the implementation of this collaborative project.

Here is the LOC new Flickr page which will include only images for which no copyright restrictions are known to exist.
And that's not all. In addition, The Commons, was also announced:

We’re also very excited that, as part of this pilot, Flickr has created a new publication model for publicly held photographic collections called "The Commons." Flickr hopes—as do we—that the project will eventually capture the imagination and involvement of other public institutions, as well.

I have had great fun tagging the photos, give it a try yourself! What a great resource, kudos to Flickr and the LOC - makes me proud to be a librarian.

The XO Laptop For Needy U.S. Students

I was getting ready to send out a YouTube video plea to Mr. Negroponte and the OLPC to please bring the XO laptop G1G1 program back to the U.S. when I found this Washington Post story. "OLPC America plans to combat digital divide by distributing low-cost laptops to needy students in the U.S." Here is another link on this story from the BBC.
This is great news. I wish them well. There is definitely a need to close the gap in the digital divide in this country as well. I am hopeful that the original intent of the OLPC, to bring education to children in developing nations, will also continue to move forward.
And once again, I have to ask, are there implications here for higher education? Things that come to my mind: 1) Young students with access to these machines will grow up learning in very collaborative ways and this will have an impact on the types of learners they become. 2) They will have a foundational understanding of technology far beyond todays traditional college students and they will be open source program developers as well as users of these programs. 3) Their expectations regarding learning environments will be much different.
I'm sure there is more. I'm still thinking about this. How about you?