newspeak

Impact and Numbers from Uruguay's One Laptop per Child Program.

The Judgment In Novartis v. India: What The Supreme Court Of India Said | Intellectual Property Watch.

UX Write – Live Demo.

UX Write has a demo: an interactive one so that you can try the app directly. The demo, unlike the app itself, will likely suffer from latency issues. The app is native; the demo is not. But you ought to be able to get a feel for the matter.

Why is UX Write important here? For starters, the approach, technology and ease of use differentiate it and point to very interesting future. But it’s also here now, as an editor on the iPad, and can work quite well–very well–with MS Office files. OO can read those, of course, so there is little problem; and ODF support is being worked on.

I am not being paid for my endorsement. I have gotten to know Peter Kelly, the lead developer through my interest in UX Write and my commitment to getting a usable and superior application on the most popular tablet–the iPad–now. Big companies are reluctant to do this. Disruption is needed. And UX Write is radically disruptive.

Try it, let me (or Peter) know, and then–

Page Layout in the Era of Electronic Publishing | UX Write.

Peter Kelly has been doing brilliant work making texts used by enterprises editable on the iPad. UX Write, which I use (albeit a pre-release version), is actually usable. This latest post by him goes over some of the issues that modern app makers have been working on for over 5 years. (I had a version of this discussion at Canonical’s offices some time ago.)

Analysis of Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons (Parallel Importation Case); Supreme Court Applies International Exhaustion | Knowledge Ecology International.

For-Profit Fiasco: California Public Colleges Turn to Web Courses | The Nation.

Like anyone who has actually taught a college course, I’ve been skeptical of the rush to online coursework. But I also recognize, and have repeatedly lectured on, the need for ICT solutions to the unprecedented need for instructors worldwide to teach not just advanced material but even the most basic. Online education can do that.

But if done badly, it can also wreck not just the particular course experience but far more. This is obvious. What do I envision as a system that is done right? One that does not imagine the student isolated in his or her room with the computer, doing drudgework to recorded videos.

Rather, I’d insist that the necessary element is community, and emphasize the importance of in-person community, where students can be led through courses by mentors, who can also conduct discussion sessions.

The Enemies of Internet – Special Edition : Surveillance.

[liberationtech] Whonix ALPHA 0.4.5 – Anonymous Operating System.

One of the most interesting developments in the last few years has been the rise of “liberation technology,” which can mean a raft of things. You get the idea.

CONVERSABLE ECONOMIST: Big Data and Development Applications.

So, a revolution is happening and has been now for several years. It’s not the computer one but one that has more to do with informatics and, even better, the way in people’s doings are understood, characterized, and made then available for further use: as data.

(Of course, Asimov’s Hari Seldon, Robert Silverberg’s Stochastic Man, and the most wildly brilliant, Bester’s Golem^100 anticipated this move. Bester went furthest in deconstructing the self.)

When open-source eats itself, we win • The Register.

As is often the case, a good examination. But I’d emphasize that the issue is not open source v. open source but the shift to event-driven systems, architectures, programming.