Category: NewsFeed

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Cambridge University Press to Preserve Cambridge Books Online with Portico

http://www.portico.org/digital-preservation/news-events/news/general-news/cambridge-university-press-to-preserve-cambridge-books-online-with-portico/

Portico is pleased to announce that Cambridge University Press will preserve its Cambridge Books Online content with Portico. Through this agreement, Cambridge extends its relationship with Portico, which began in 2006 with the publisher’s commitment to deposit its entire list of e-journals in the Portico archive.

“As more users turn to online access for books, a digital preservation strategy to ensure long-term access is absolutely vital,” stated Hannah Perrett, Strategic Development Director, Digital Publishing, Cambridge University Press. “Portico’s E-Book Preservation Service provides publishers and libraries with a collaborative solution that we can all get behind.”

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Data.gov to be Open Sourced for World-Wide Deployment

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/datagov_to_be_open_sourced_for_world-wide_deployme.php

Ambitious but largely defunded open government data platform Data.gov is now working with counterparts at India’s National Informatics Centre to offer an open source body of code known as the Open Government Platform or “Data.gov-in-a-Box.” It’s the kind of move that, in theory, the political Left can support because of its impact on transparency and government accountability and the political Right can support because it puts government in a role that emphasizes facilitating innovation and economic development. It sounds like a very smart way to deal with the declining financial support for Data.gov itself. It could be a big win…

The code for the platform is based on Drupal and you can download a copy from Github at https://github.com/opengovplatform/opengovplatform.

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A pedagogy of abundance or a pedagogy to support human beings? Participant support on massive open online courses | Kop | The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning

http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/1041/2025

This paper examines how emergent technologies could influence the design of learning environments. It will pay particular attention to the roles of educators and learners in creating networked learning experiences on massive open online courses (MOOCs). The research shows that it is possible to move from a pedagogy of abundance to a pedagogy that supports human beings in their learning through the active creation of resources and learning places by both learners and course facilitators. This pedagogy is based on the building of connections, collaborations, and the exchange of resources between people, the building of a community of learners, and the harnessing of information flows on networks. This resonates with the notion of emergent learning as learning in which actors and system co-evolve within a MOOC and where the level of presence of actors on the MOOC influences learning outcomes.

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What Is Publishing? A Report from THATCamp Publishing – ProfHacker – The Chronicle of Higher Education

http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/what-is-publishing-a-report-from-thatcamp-publishing/37420

THATCamp Publishing provided a forum for three stakeholders in this changing industry: traditional academic publishers, libraries-as-publishers, and faculty. While traditional publishers are interested in the bottom line, libraries-as-publishers are focused on the problem of access. Faculty, on the other hand, are concerned with how their publications will lead to promotion, tenure, and the advancement of knowledge. THATCamp Publishing highlighted how the evaporation of funding for scholarly publishing and the rise of the Internet as a low-cost, easy-access means of dissemination are radically changing the nature of this industry, and the inter-relationships of these three stakeholders.

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Doctor Who movie: Harry Potter’s David Yates To Direct Tardis On The Big Screen

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2061496/Doctor-Who-movie-Harry-Potters-David-Yates-direct-Tardis-big-sceen.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

TV’s Doctor Who is to be turned into a Hollywood blockbuster.
The director of the Harry Potter movies announced he will be making a big screen version of the long-running BBC science fiction series.
David Yates said he has started a search for writers to plot a new chapter for the ageless Time Lord.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2061496/Doctor-Who-movie-Harry-Potters-David-Yates-direct-Tardis-big-sceen.html#ixzz1dnLPE6RD

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Go To Hellman: Creative Commons Media Neutrality and eBook Rights after Rosetta v. Random

http://go-to-hellman.blogspot.com/2011/11/creative-commons-media-neutrality-and.html

Here’s where it gets complicated.

Not so long ago, book publishers had no idea that there would be such things as digital books. Publishing contracts mentioned nothing about ebooks. Literary agents made sure to keep derivative rights separate, so that translation rights, film rights, stage adaptation rights, etc. for a successful book could be separately monetized.

When ebooks started to become important, the digital publisher Rosetta Books took advantage of the situation, and started acquiring ebook rights to well-known books such as Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five. This did not please the print publishers at all. Random House, one of the “Big Six” US publishers, took Rosetta to court, saying that their publishing contracts gave them exclusive rights to distribute books, and ebooks were books.The coffee’s on, let’s get to work.

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Are Open Access and Traditional Publishers in the Same Business?

http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2011/11/08/are-open-access-and-traditional-publishers-in-the-same-business/

There are industries that use the same raw materials, yet are not the same. Commercial firms that deliver purified water to companies consume water, fuel, and vehicles. Yet, not a single one is in competition with the local swimming pool company.

Guys trucking 5-gallon water jugs around to offices are doing something with the same materials that is completely different than what the other company — digging, lining, and purifying your swimming pool — is doing.

So, are open access publishers and traditional publishers really in the same business?

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Comcast pushes IPv6 forward

http://betanews.com/2011/11/09/comcast-pushes-ipv6-forward/

But it’s going to be slow going, and for good reasons. Despite all IPv6 promises, there is still much, much testing to do before it’s ready for prime time.

Today Comcast revealed that it has started an IPv6 “pilot market deployment” as first step leading to nationwide rollout next year. Broadband providers like Comcast haven’t rushed the switch to IPv6 — despite an increasing shortage of IPv4 network addresses — because of lacking support, ranging from operating systems to network switches and other devices. Then there are security questions that only real-time use can answer.

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U.S. Dept. of Ed. Reaffirms OER Support, Highlights Competency-Based Assessment | EDUCAUSE

http://www.educause.edu/blog/jcummings/USDeptofEdReaffirmsOERSupportH/241218

Last week, Under Secretary of Education Martha Kanter led an education policy briefing at U.S. Department of Education headquarters that put a spotlight on the department’s support for open educational resources (OER). Joined by two of her senior policy advisors long associated with the OER movement, Hal Plotkin (journalist and former president of the Foothill-De Anza Community College District board) and Joel Thierstein (former executive director of the OER organization, Connexions), as well as by the director of the department’s Office of Educational Technology, Karen Cator, Kanter spoke at length about the importance the department places on the continued development of OER.