EP Topic News: 9th August 2001

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Virtual education report
New IAB ad guidelines
Ads in search engine results complaint
Poaching IPR
Mobile applications platform
iPublish picks new authors
XML resource site
Europeans try Curl
Linux woes
3D world map images
ebrary / Learning Network launch ebrarian
New KM content tools
ON2 release code to open source
New e-zines

Virtual education report

"The Changing Faces of Virtual Education" is a study on the latest developments in virtual education from The Commonwealth of Learning (COL). It follows-up an earlier report "The Development of Virtual Education: A global perspective, 1999". One of the conclusions of the authors of the 1999 report was that the development of virtual education was “more rhetorical than real!”. “This follow-up study concludes that, two years later, virtual education development is a lot more rhetorical, and a lot more real!”. In terms of the rhetoric, virtual education is now part of the planning agenda of most organisations concerned with education and training. On the reality side, there are many more examples of the use of virtual education in ways that add value to existing, more traditional delivery models. The report demonstrates that there are several trends emerging, called “macro developments” in the report, including new venues for learning, the use of “learning objects” to define and store content, new organisational models, online learner support services, quality assurance models for virtual education and the continuing evolution of ICTs. The report (and the 1999 report) can be downloaded from the web site. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.col.org/virtualed/

New IAB ad guidelines

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), the leading voice of the (largely US) interactive advertising industry, today issued voluntary guidelines for rich media advertising formats. These Rich Media Guidelines cover standard 468x60 banners, Interactive Marketing Unit (IMU) Rectangles, IMU Skyscrapers, two different size pop-up ad units - the 250x250 IMU and a larger size, of up to 550x550 - and interstitials or transitional ads. Details on the web site. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.iab.net/

Ads in search engine results complaint

Commercial Alert, a US pressure group, has filed a complaint with US Federal Trade Commission against eight search engines, for placing ads in search engine results without clear disclosure that the ads are ads. However, Search Engine Watch points out that the the story is more complicated than it seems at first sight and links to other comments. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.commercialalert.org/
URL: http://searchenginewatch.com/sereport/01/07-ftc.html

Poaching IPR

As more companies enter into strategic alliances to extend their competitive reach, the risk that someone – possibly a potential partner or a vendor – could poach their intellectual property is increasing. Eric K. Clemons and Lorin M. Hitt, professors of Operations and Information Management at Wharton, tackle this issue in a paper titled, "Poaching and the Loss of Intellectual Property: An Increasingly Important Form of Opportunism." Clemons presented the main elements of this research at a conference organized recently by the Jones Center at Wharton. The paper is summarised in a report in the current edition of Knowledge@Wharton the Wharton School (Univ. of Pennsylvania) e-zine. 9/8/01

URL: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/

Mobile applications platform

Mobilitec has launched the mPower™ platform for wireless Java (J2ME) applications. Mobilitec's mPower™ platform enables wireless service providers to aggregate, provision, manage, measure and bill for applications and services that are downloaded and operated on end user's mobile devices. The mPower™ platform is intended for wireless carriers and service providers who deploy Java enabled mobile phones and PDAs. Mobilitec has developed the product in close cooperation with a number of world-leading carriers, as well as device manufacturers and content providers. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.mobilitec.com/

iPublish picks new authors

iPublish.com, AOL Time Warner's online publishing house has released extracts from the first three books by authors discovered through its online rating system. Potential authors submit work which then has extracts inserted into a rating system for judgement by other authors. Highly rated works are published in e-book form and if successful may be published in paper. The first batch of works / authors is now online and will be released in October. iPublish also sell works in e-book format from an extensive catalogue of established writers. 9/8/01

URL: http://newauthors.ipublish.com/
URL: http://www.ipublish.com/

XML resource site

For developers working on XML, or those who wannabe, Top XML is a useful site. Top XML is a 3 year old XML community where developers can contribute content, share source code and learn. Inside Top XML you will find over 15,000 pages of XML content and well over 100 free XML downloads. They are focused on XML and cover 11 XML topics including: Core XML, XSL, B2B, SOAP, .NET, XHTML, WAP, XML Parsers, Java and using XML with ADO and SQL. There are XML games, XML and XSLT tutorials and free XML source code downloads for you. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.topxml.com/

Europeans try Curl

adisoft AG, a leading German provider of online home banking software, today announced a broad strategic alliance which includes upgrading 500,000 users of adisoft AG's online home banking application to the Curl™ Content Language. They join Siemans and BTexact as developers of applications using the new language. At the heart of the Curl technology is a new content language that was designed especially for use on the Web. The Curl™ language integrates mark-up functionality, scripting functionality, and a full-featured object-oriented programming language, all within one environment. Curl technology can be used with existing Web technologies, such as HTML, CGI and JavaScript, and multimedia animation tools, or it can be used in place of them. The Curl system can be downloaded free for developing applications but requires licensing for commercial use - commercial customers are charged based on the volume of Curl content executed. Non-commercial users can deploy Curl content at no charge. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.curl.com/

Linux woes

Not a good week for Linux with the Linux Expo in Birmingham and Red Hat Techworld conference in Brussels cancelled, and Dell announcing that it would no longer offer the OS pre-installed on desktops and notebooks. Various computer journalists have offered a variety of explanations. However the relevant link in the Dell 'Best bets for Linux' table, to 'Dell Home/Home Office Linux Homepage' returns the simple truth 'You have asked for a page that does not exist on Dell.com ... The page or file you are looking for has been moved, retired or does not exist.' Retired probably. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.osopinion.com/perl/story/12560.html
URL: http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/20813.html

3D world map images

NASA has released the first images from the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission. In February 2000, the SRTM radar system flew onboard Space Shuttle Endeavour and gathered topographic data over approximately 80% of the land surfaces of the Earth, creating the first-ever near-global data set of land elevations. SRTM collected data over most of the land surfaces that lay between 60 degrees north latitude and 54 degrees south latitude. This includes most of Western Europe with the exception of Norway, Sweden and Finland. The project was sponsored by NASA, the German Aerospace Centre and the Italian Space Agency. Processing of SRTM data will take about 2 years to complete. The first continental data sets are due for release in November. The first images are Colored Height and Shaded Relief of Piñon Canyon region, Colorado, Anaglyph of Piñon Canyon region, Colorado and Perspective View with Landsat Overlay of Cucharas Canyon & Spanish Peaks, Colorado. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/srtm/

ebrary / Learning Network launch ebrarian

Learning Network has implemented the ebrarian solution to securely deliver high-value business and economics titles to its communities of students, consumers and professionals. Using a model similar to photocopying, Learning Network visitors pay only to print or copy the information they need. Searching and browsing are free, and there are no membership or subscription fees. The service is now in public beta testing at the web site. To read the titles it is necessary to download an Acrobat-like plug-in. The site is worth trying if you have an interest in business and/or economics (or online publishing!). 9/8/01

URL: http://learningnetwork.ebrary.com/

New KM content tools

The Quiver Knowledge Suite (QKS) is a portfolio of information management products that make enterprises more efficient and more productive. QKS Classifier, the first product in the Quiver Knowledge Suite, efficiently and accurately organizes valuable content into an intuitive taxonomy of corporate knowledge. With powerful tools that make categorizing content more efficient and information managers more productive, QKS Classifier augments advanced categorization technology with an intuitive and flexible directory management toolset. This provides clear visibility into auto-categorization decisions and offers maximum control over corporate content and the end-user experience. Companies can join the beta testing of the product, trying it out on their own content. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.quiver.com/

ON2 release video code to open source

On2 Technologies, The Duck Corporation (AMEX: ONT), a leading technology and services company recognized as developers of the highest performance video compression technology commercially available, announced today that they will be releasing an Open Source version of their groundbreaking VP3.2 video compression algorithm. The licenses and source code will be available at several websites within this quarter. On2’s TrueMotion VP3 and VP4 generation of codec technology has been acknowledged by most leading industry experts as the best-of-breed compression technology for broadband streaming over the Internet and Internet-technology based systems. On2 recently signed a deal with RealNetworks to provide its VP4 compression for Internet streaming and settop boxes. 9/8/01

URL: http://www.on2.com/pressreleases.php3?qs1=open_source_vp3

New e-zines

We have added three new (to the list) e-zines to the E-journals and groups page.

Betanews

Information and downloads for Beta test versions of software. News about beta development.

URL: http://www.betanews.com

Knowledge@Wharton

News and resource site of the Wharton School of the Univ. of Pennsylvania (a leading economics / management centre)

URL: http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/

Top XML

Top XML is a 3 year old XML community where developers can contribute content, share source code and learn.

URL: http://www.topxml.com/

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