end of services

I've just picked up this email from JANET. It spells out the end of the JANET talk (VOIP) pilot to UK educators. I just need to clarify one point. JANET TXT service is still alive and very much kicking.

Read more:

" We have now made the decision not to take JANET Talk beyond its trial
phase. As the previous email pointed out we received feedback from JANET
Talk users and administrators, and also conducted a separate market
research exercise. All of the information gathered indicated strongly
that JANET Talk was not a suitable solution to meet the collaboration
needs of the JANET community. The main facts behind this lack of
appetite are:

* JANET Sites are now able to manage / allow peer to peer applications

* The commercial market has made significant advances since the JANET
Talk concept was realised, JANET(UK) is not in a position to compete
with the amount of zero cost alternative collaboration solutions

* The JANET Talk solution has significant usability issues

We are proposing to end the trial on the 29th May. Although we initially
set up the trial to run August 2008 to August 2009 in the light of the
feedback received and the lack of usage of the equipment it seems
relevant to end things early."




JUMPCUT - also dies

I also recently caught wind of the termination of another online technology. Namey JUMPCUT (masing up videos online). This service (owned by Yahoo) is wrapping up. It just goes to show, how careful you must be when relying on "free" Web2.0 services, as they can be quite easily pulled. The same thing happened to Google Pages ( now Google sites) and the Google Lively MUVE. And also many others - read the comment from Paul Jinks >>>>

Sounds Good?

Another couple of back-to-back presentations I attended @ the 2008 ALT-C conference were connected with using short podcasts to give timely and personalised feedback to students. Bob Rotheram of Leeds Met Uni' "sounds good" project highlighted exemplars of good practice, namely;

• use short (less than 5 mins) podcasts
  
• Use a good quality Mp3 digital recorder/dictaphone . you can roam, and save in Mp3.
  
• Students liked receiving rich arual feedback, compared to written. They felt it was more personal!
• in most instances the short recordings can save marking time
• in most instances staff developed skills easily
• seek approval from course leaders before launching on a big project, there's lots of privacy issues here.

Some useful links were given out on a handout;

• http://sites.google.com/site/soundsgooduk/Home
• http://www.evoca.com (free web based audio recorder)
• http://www.impala.ac.uk/outputs/podcasts.html (learn from those who been doing this very successfully)
• 7 things you should know about podcasting
• Resources for educational podcasting
• Resources for developing podcasts for learning and studying (IMPALA)
  

Contact Geraldine Jones or Andrea Taylor of Bath Uni to obtain their staff guidelines on working with digital audio.


The second presentation also discussed the shift in pedagogy to more of a constructionist mode, whereby the students are the authors of the podcasts. Again, a move away from a primary diadactic delivery would help embed the use of podcasts in modern teaching.

There is also a Special Interest Group (SIG) on Podcasting for pedagogoc pruposes centred in Chester. Access a wealth of resources here: http://pppsig.podomatic.com/ , or from their wiki http://podcastingforpp.pbwiki.com/. You could also try exploring the art of podagogy @ this blog : http://blog.podagogy.com/

and.. spookily I just learned that Professor Gilly Salmon has just edited a new podcasting book :

http://www.atimod.com/podcasting/index.shtml