EDUCATION NEWS
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NEW TRICKS (E-LEARNING PAYOFF)
You don't need more employees, just smarter ones. E-learning really works—and it pays for itself.
[Other e-Learning articles in this issue of Smart Business including Better Than Being There, The Hard Way, Top 5 Reasons to Use E- Learning, Tomorrow's Training Grounds, E-Learning Scorecard, and Top E-Learning Providers. Links to these stories are on the right.]
http://www.smartbusinessmag.com/article/0,3658,apn=2&s=103&a=25455&ap=1,00.asp

NEW "COL-LABORATORY" TRAINS THE MASSES
The IC2 Institute at the University of Texas at Austin is expanding its international, multidisciplinary think-and-do tank to include its E-Learning and Training (ETL) Labs. ELT Labs is a laboratory-without-walls that brings together transdisciplinary teams from academia, business, and all levels of government to research and develop leading-edge workforce development, training and learning programs.
http://www.elearningmag.com/elearning/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=17761

AS AMERICAN AS A WIRELESS U.
At Washington's American University this fall, students will be able to check their grades, see if a class has been canceled or mix sunbathing with Web surfing on their laptop computers over a new first-of-its kind wireless network. The 10,000-student institution in the nation's capital said Wednesday it plans to become the first fully integrated wireless university by getting rid of telephone lines and installing a wireless system to handle voice, data and messaging.
http://www.wired.com/news/wireless/0,1382,52234,00.html

THE USE OF WEB INSTRUCTIONAL TOOLS BY ONLINE INSTRUCTORS
In studies comparing instructional tools and how they support online teaching, educators have stressed the importance of tools that support specific tasks, and thus allow more flexible teaching, facilitate access to resources and peers, and promote collaborative learning.
http://ts.mivu.org/default.asp?show=article&id=966

FIRMS AUGMENT TRAINING WITH ONLINE COURSES
Corporate America, keeping an eye on the bottom line, is helping employees improve their skills and knowledge by supplementing classroom training with online instruction. This "blended learning" approach enables employers to upgrade staff performance more quickly and so grasp a bigger market share, authorities on business education say.
http://www.wired.com/news/reuters/story?story_id=20020504RTTECH-COLUMN-WORKPLACE-DC

TEXTBOUND
The written word is not what it used to be. At MIT, some researchers are persuaded that text has had its 5,000 years of fame, and it’s high time to get some newer technologies into the communications act. They even have a word – “textbound” – to describe people who are overly dependent on text and don’t yet appreciate digital information sources that could make learning easier and more fun.
http://www.darwinmag.com/connect/opinion/index.html

UNIVERSITY SYSTEMS A HAVEN FOR HACKERS
College is intended to nurture the quest for knowledge, but many universities are also unwitting breeding grounds for hacking and online piracy. In a presentation here at the CanSecWest security conference, David Dittrich, senior security engineer with the University of Washington, said that university politics and a lack of emphasis on computer security have made college networks rife with online piracy and hacking. The networks "are a real fertile ground," Dittrich said in an interview after the presentation. "There is a responsibility that the universities are not meeting."
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-898084.html

BLACKBOARD PROGRAM AIMS TO LURE WEBCT CLIENTS
Blackboard Inc. stepped up its efforts to become the dominant player in the higher education e-learning field. The six-year-old private company launched a program to allow universities using the services of a top competitor, WebCT Inc., to easily switch to Blackboard's program. The Washington company also persuaded a top WebCT executive, Stavros Cademenos, to lead Blackboard's international development unit.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A64793-2002Apr28.html

E-DEFINING EDUCATION
To appreciate how e-learning is changing the landscape of education, you need only look at the numbers. Already, 12 states have established online high school programs and five others are developing them, 25 states allow for the creation of so-called cyber charter schools, and 32 states have e-learning initiatives under way, according to a new Education Week survey of state technology coordinators ("E-Defining Education: A Survey of State Technology Coordinators").
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61269-2002May9.html

SCENARIO-BASED E-LEARNING: A STEP BEYOND TRADITIONAL E-LEARNING
Have you noticed that there are two distinct types of e-learning? Consider the following example: Text or narration tells you about a particular device. You're exposed to its features, told why the features are important, and shown how the components interact. Finally, a test asks you to identify the device, its components (or the concept and related ideas), and the functions they fulfill. Now, consider a different example. A picture or video thrusts you into a realistic scenario. The situation is described, and you're given descriptions of possible outcomes. Whether the results are good or bad depends on your actions. You make decisions, as each branches into additional choices.
http://www.learningcircuits.com/2002/may2002/kindley.html

MORE THAN DIGITAL CONTENT: LONG LIVE YOUR COURSE
It all used to be so easy. As far as a university administrator was concerned, content came in two forms: written materials and patents. Over the centuries, a very simple way of dealing with these was developed: Faculty were left the ownership of the text materials, and the university got custody of the patents. The university benefited from publication of the texts because the fame of the professor accrued to the institution, which was always recognized on the article or textbook. The faculty benefited from the patent because it could be included in the promotion and tenure process, and they would also share in the profits through a pre-negotiated percentage of the royalties. Then the world changed.
http://www.syllabus.com/syllabusmagazine/article.asp?ID=6331
 
 
TECHNOLOGY NEWS
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HP CLOSES $19B COMPAQ ACQUISITION
After one of the harshest and closest proxy fights in American business history, Hewlett-Packard Co. officially closed its $19 billion acquisition of Compaq Computer Corp.
http://www.wired.com/news/reuters/story?story_id=20020503APAP-HP-Compaq-Merger

MACROMEDIA FLASH BUG COULD OPEN WINDOWS PCS TO HACKERS
Users of the Microsoft's Internet Explorer Web browser are being urged to install the latest version of Macromedia's Flash player to protect themselves from a serious security hole in at least one previous release.
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/176348.html

AS WIRELESS NETWORKS GROW IN POPULARITY, PRIVACY RISKS GROW AS WELL
As wireless laptops, scanners and other gadgets become more popular in businesses and homes, threats to privacy are growing as well. Just this week, Best Buy suspended use of wireless cash registers over concerns that eavesdroppers could obtain credit card numbers and other customer data by sitting in the parking lot with the right equipment.
http://digitalmass.boston.com/news/2002/05/03/wireless.html

HP-COMPAQ: BOTH PC BRANDS WILL STAY
Hewlett-Packard will maintain the consumer PC lines from both Compaq Computer and HP for now, an unexpected twist in a merger that in general will lead to fewer product lines.
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1103-900740.html

MICROSOFT BRINGING PROJECT APP TO ENTERPRISE
Microsoft Corp. announced Tuesday at NetWorld+Interop in Las Vegas that the next version of its Microsoft Project project management application is in final code and will be generally available next month. With this release, Microsoft Project 2002, the company is looking to take the software to the enterprise for project and resource management, company officials said.
http://www.eweek.com/article/0,3658,s=25420&a=26541,00.asp

APPLE'S WORLDWIDE DEVELOPERS CONFERENCE: A NEW MAC OS
Jobs then previewed the next major Mac OS X upgrade, code-named Jaguar, and encouraged developers to follow the lead of Apple and Microsoft in only developing future applications for the Mac OS X 10 line of operating systems, including Jaguar. The new operating system is slated to arrive by late summer.
http://www.pcmag.com/article/0,2997,s=1490&a=26407,00.asp

ADOBE WINS USER INTERFACE SUIT AGAINST MACROMEDIA
Adobe has won its patent lawsuit against rival Macromedia after a jury in the U.S. District Court of Delaware agreed late last week that user interface conventions used by Macromedia infringe on a key Adobe patent. The verdict may be followed up by a set of restrictions on Macromedia's user interface practices.
http://www.pcmag.com/article/0,2997,s=1490&a=26364,00.asp

MACROMEDIA PROMISES BETTER WEB APPS
Macromedia will launch the next stage of an ambitious product upgrade cycle with new Web development and server tools that focus on better delivery of Web applications.
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-893705.html

EUROPE SAID TO PLAN TOUGHER LINE THAN U.S. ON MICROSOFT
Microsoft faces having to make radical changes to meet European regulatory concerns that go well beyond what is being demanded of it in the US. After a three-year investigation, European antitrust regulators are studying wide-ranging measures to prevent Microsoft from using its strong position in the software market to injure competitors, according to people familiar with the case.
http://www.nytimes.com/financialtimes/technology/10FT-SOFT.html

WORKSTATIONS 'DIRTIER THAN TOILETS'
A health expert in the US has claimed that many toilets are cleaner than computer workstations. A study by University of Arizona microbiologist Chuck Gerba demonstrated that the average workstation has 400 times more bacteria than the average loo.
http://www.vnunet.com/News/1131608


INTERNET RELATED NEWS
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NET'S WEBBY AWARDS REFLECT CHANGING TIMES
Undaunted by the dot-com bust, the Webby Awards has announced its nominees for this year's best Web sites by emphasizing the medium's success as a town square and library. The list for the sixth annual Webbys, unveiled yesterday, provided another sign of the Internet's transformation from a potential diamond mine to its original billing as a source of global information.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/04/30/BU85864.DTL&type=tech

ANTI-SPAM LEGISLATION HEADING TO SENATE FLOOR
A measure that would crack down on the unwanted junk e-mail known as "spam" will soon head to the Senate floor, Sen. Conrad Burns said.
http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/tech/2002/05/03/spam-bill.htm

WEB VANDALS HIT GOVERNMENT SITES
A new crew of Web vandals that has taken to defacing government and bank Web sites has hit several new, high-profile targets. Calling themselves the Deceptive Duo, the pair recently hit the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Sandia National laboratories and the California Department of Transportation as well as more than a dozen banks, according to a list maintained by Zone-H.org, a security site that mirrors Web defacements.
http://www.eweek.com/article/0,3658,s=1884&a=26281,00.asp

CYBERSPACE FULL OF TERROR TARGETS
Government and private computer networks are facing new threats of terrorist attacks, ranging from an attempt to bring havoc to a major city to nationwide disruptions of finances, transportation and utilities. But people with knowledge of national intelligence briefings say little has been done to protect against a cyberattack.
http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/tech/2002/05/06/cyber-terror.htm

LAWRENCE LESSIG: THE "DINOSAURS" ARE TAKING OVER
Who should control the Internet? If Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig is right, the Internet will soon belong to Hollywood studios, record labels, and cable operators--corporate giants that he says are trying to cordon off chunks of the once-open data network. Lessig's mission is to stop them. At age 40, he's already the Net's most famous freedom fighter.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/02_19/b3782610.htm

IBM, STARTUP LAUNCH MASSIVE `GRID' FOR ONLINE GAMING
A start-up, Butterfly.net Inc., and computing giant IBM, have created a global network for online video games capable of supporting a million players or more that will be rented to major game publishers, the companies said. The ``Butterfly Grid'' will also be one of the first major commercial applications for IBM's concept of ``grid computing,'' in which far-flung computers are linked using open-source software to create powerful computing networks, IBM said.
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/3226061.htm
 
LONG-AWAITED PRIVACY BILL UNVEILED
Several U.S. lawmakers introduced a long-awaited privacy bill that would allow U.S. businesses to share information about customers who have not explicitly forbidden them to do so.
http://www.msnbc.com/news/749520.asp
 
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[NOTE: The selections above are from the Academic ADL Co-Lab News Report, a limited-distribution, weekly executive summary of trends, strategies, and innovations influencing the future of learning and technology in higher education. It is prepared by the University of Wisconsin System Office of Learning and Information Technology (OLIT) in coordination with the Co-Lab. Collegebuys.org is using these selections with permission. The selections from the weekly summaries were selected and edited by David Stuart of collegebuys.org.]
 
[NOTE: This information is provided for information purposes only. Mention or discussion of a product, company, or person does not represent any official endorsement or criticism of the same. All authors and organizations retain complete copyright.]
 
[SOURCE MATERIAL: The reference as specific as possible is provided to a source for each summary. When using an online link, ensure the URL has not been broken with a carriage return.]
 
[ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Judy Brown is the Emerging Technology Analyst for the University of Wisconsin System, OLIT. Brown conducts research and consults for the 15-institution UW System. She is Director of the Academic ADL Co-Laboratory at The Pyle Center in Madison, WI. Until recently she coordinated the WTCS Hardware and Software Purchasing Consortium and other statewide technology initiatives for 16 technical college districts comprised of 47 campuses. Brown was named one of the Top 100 women in computing by McGraw Hill's Open Computing magazine (December 1994). She writes a business technology column for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and is the coordinator of eWEEK's Corporate Partner Program.]
 
[COMMENTS & CONTRIBUTIONS: If you want to offer material, or if you want to comment on the contents, contact Judy Brown at judy@academiccolab.org