Micah 6:8 (NIV) — from biblegateway.com
8 He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly[a] with your God.
On 01/08/2021,
in Access to Justice (A2J), Africa, Asia, Australia, Canada, ethics, Europe, faith, global / globalization, hearts -- matters of the heart, India, law schools, legal reform, legislatures / government / legal, relationships, religion, society, UK, United States,
by Daniel Christian
On 01/08/2021,
in accessibility / UDL, assistive technologies, colleges, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, digital learning, elearning, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), instructional design, internet, K-12 related, law schools, Learning Experience Design, legislatures / government / legal, neurodivergent/special needs, United States, universities, web design and production,
by Daniel Christian
U.S. Businesses Potentially Spent Billions on Legal Fees for Inaccessible Websites in 2020 — from boia.org
Excerpt:
In a bombshell report published by Accessibility.com, the organization estimated that 265,000 website accessibility demand letters were sent to businesses last year. Astounding on its own, if the figure is correct or close to correct, U.S. companies could have spent billions of dollars in legal costs as a direct result of inaccessible websites in 2020 alone. Businesses looking for a wake-up call to make website accessibility a priority in 2021 and beyond might have just found it.
The above article linked to:
Also see:
On 01/07/2021,
in adjunct faculty, attention, computer science, data related items, engagement / engaging students, faculty/staff, presentations, teachers, tools, training / L&D, vendors, visualizing information,
by Daniel Christian
Wonder Tools | The Best Data Viz Tool — from wondertools.substack.com by Jeremy Caplan
How and why to use Flourish to make impressive charts fast and for free
Excerpt:
Flourish is a terrific tool for visualizing data. It’s easy to use and free. Unlike some complex tools aimed at data professionals, Flourish is simple enough for anyone to use. It’s also flexible and polished enough to use in professional newsroom projects. And it comes with a wide range of templates so you can create a strong interactive data visual to embed on any site within a couple of hours.
On 01/05/2021,
in innovation, law schools, Legal operations, legal technologies, legislatures / government / legal, tools, vendors,
by Daniel Christian
Longtime Competitors Fastcase and Casemaker Merge, Reshaping the Legal Research Landscape — from lawsitesblog.com by Bob Ambrogi
Excerpt:
In news akin to a wedding announcement jointly issued by the Hatfields and the McCoys, two longtime competitors in the legal research market, Casemaker and Fastcase, have merged, creating a single company under the Fastcase brand that has an estimated subscriber base of more than three quarters of all lawyers in the United States.
Addendum on 1/6/21:
- Casemaker and Fastcase Merge to Become the Leader in Legal Research and Analytics — from fastcase.com
Leading state bar benefit providers create a powerful alternative for legal information
On 01/04/2021,
in 24x7x365 access, adult learning, blogs / blogging / vlogging, changing business models, colleges, community colleges, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, entrepreneurship, Facebook / Meta Platforms, faculty/staff, higher education, history, ideas, journalism, media/film, platforms, social learning / networks, social media, society, teachers, tools, training / L&D, United States, universities, vendors, writing,
by Daniel Christian
From DSC:
After seeing the following two items, I wondered…should more professors, teachers, and staff members be on Substack?
Heather Cox Richardson Offers a Break From the Media Maelstrom. It’s Working. — from nytimes.com by Ben Smith
She is the breakout star of the newsletter platform Substack, doing the opposite of most media as she calmly situates the news of the day in the long sweep of American history.
Excerpt:
Last Wednesday, I broke the news to Heather Cox Richardson that she was the most successful individual author of a paid publication on the breakout newsletter platform Substack.
Early that morning, she had posted that day’s installment of “Letters From an American” to Facebook, quickly garnering more than 50,000 reactions and then, at 2:14 a.m., she emailed it to about 350,000 people.
…
The news of her ranking seemed to startle Dr. Richardson, who in her day job is a professor of 19th century American history at Boston College. The Substack leader board, a subject of fascination among media insiders, is a long way from her life on a Maine peninsula — particularly as the pandemic has ended her commute — that seems drawn from the era she studies.
Is Substack the Media Future We Want? — from newyorker.com by Anna Wiener
The newsletter service is a software company that, by mimicking some of the functions of newsrooms, has made itself difficult to categorize.
Excerpt:
…Substack, a service that enables writers to draft, edit, and send e-mail newsletters to subscribers. Writers can choose whether subscriptions are free or paid; the minimum charge for paid subscriptions is five dollars a month or thirty dollars a year, and Substack takes ten percent of all revenue.
On 01/02/2021,
in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, adjunct faculty, adult learning, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, colleges, communications, communities of practice, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, digital audio, digital learning, digital video, distance education, education, education technology, emerging technologies, experimentation, face-to-face, faculty/staff, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, instructional design, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, interaction design, interactivity, interface design, IT in HE, K-12 related, law schools, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning spaces, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, multimedia, Natural Language Processing (NLP), new media literacies, online learning, online media, online tutoring, pace of change, platforms, podcasting, presentations, productivity / tips and tricks, professional development, remote teaching and learning, smart classrooms, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, technologies for your home, tools, training / L&D, TVs, universities, usability, user experience (UX), user interface design, vendors, videoconferencing, vision/possibilities, voice recognition / voice enabled interfaces, web-based collaboration, workplace,
by Daniel Christian
From DSC:
As we move into 2021, the blistering pace of emerging technologies will likely continue. Technologies such as:
- Artificial Intelligence (AI) — including technologies related to voice recognition
- Blockchain
- Augment Reality (AR)/Mixed Reality (MR)/Virtual Reality (VR) and/or other forms of Extended Reality (XR)
- Robotics
- Machine-to-Machine Communications (M2M) / The Internet of Things (IoT)
- Drones
- …and other things will likely make their way into how we do many things (for better or for worse).
Along the positive lines of this topic, I’ve been reflecting upon how we might be able to use AI in our learning experiences.
For example, when teaching in face-to-face-based classrooms — and when a lecture recording app like Panopto is being used — could teachers/professors/trainers audibly “insert” main points along the way? Similar to something like we do with Siri, Alexa, and other personal assistants (“Heh Siri, _____ or “Alexa, _____).
(Image purchased from iStockphoto)
.
Pretend a lecture, lesson, or a training session is moving right along. Then the professor, teacher, or trainer says:
- “Heh Smart Classroom, Begin Main Point.”
- Then speaks one of the main points.
- Then says, “Heh Smart Classroom, End Main Point.”
Like a verbal version of an HTML tag.
After the recording is done, the AI could locate and call out those “main points” — and create a table of contents for that lecture, lesson, training session, or presentation.
(Alternatively, one could insert a chime/bell/some other sound that the AI scans through later to build the table of contents.)
In the digital realm — say when recording something via Zoom, Cisco Webex, Teams, or another application — the same thing could apply.
Wouldn’t this be great for quickly scanning podcasts for the main points? Or for quickly scanning presentations and webinars for the main points?
Anyway, interesting times lie ahead!
On 01/02/2021,
in faith, global / globalization, hearts -- matters of the heart,
by Daniel Christian
Psalm 90:12 New International Version — from biblegateway.com
12 Teach us to number our days,
that we may gain a heart of wisdom.
On 01/01/2021,
in 21st century, 5G, Africa, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Asia, Augmented Reality (AR), Blockchain, career development, change, changing business models, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, corporate / business world, education, global / globalization, ideas, innovation, internet, machine-to-machine communications, telecommunications, trends, vendors, videoconferencing, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, workplace, XR - extended reality,
by Daniel Christian
The 12/31/20 EIEIO from Michael Moe
Excerpts:
The 10 Megatrends Shaping Our World
- Knowledge Economy
- Global Silicon Valley
- Digitization
- Smart Everything
- HomeWork
The Office has become optional but the Zoom Room has become essential. 88% of companies encouraged or required employees to work from home during the pandemic. A near term problem that is rapidly being solved is that only 1 in 4 people are set up currently to work efficiently from home but 99% of employees say they like that option. Overall, due to reducing commutes, office distractions etc., productivity on average rose for most knowledge workers up to 20% greater.It is expected that many knowledge workers will continue to work from home even post the pandemic. - Winner Take All
- Data King
- Sustainability
- Everything is a Subscription
- Mission Corp
On 12/31/2020,
in library / librarians, productivity / tips and tricks, psychology, student-related,
by Daniel Christian
My Favorite Wonder Tools of 2020 — from wondertools.substack.com by Jeremy Caplan
Excerpts:
Here are a few things I loved in 2020:
Math Tango
If you have a little one, this app is a grand slam. Recommended by her teacher, Math Tango was a surprise favorite for my younger daughter, who started kindergarten this fall. She rarely used a screen until remote school began. She loves the app’s creative puzzles and she’s enjoyed learning lots of basic math. It’s $8/month or $50/year, for ages 5-10.
Seek
Point the app at a plant, flower, bug or animal and it magically identifies it. Depending on how close you are, how much light there is, and how good your phone’s camera is, results vary, but I was impressed.
