Google is making it more convenient for schools around the country to integrate tablets and educational apps into the classroom.
The search giant on Wednesday officially launched tablets running Google Play for Education, a version of the Google Play app store specifically designed for K-12 schools in the U.S.
Read: Classrooms Go High-Tech With Google Play for Education | News & Opinion | PCMag.com.
A perfect GPA isn’t cool. You know what’s cool? Advancing an open source project. To help computer science students prepare for jobs (and boost its own recruiting efforts) Facebook today publicly launched Open Academy. The partnership with premier CS universities sets up a special class where students get college credit for contributing to open source projects.
Education & Technology
With MakerBot Academy, the 3-D Printing Movement Aims for Schools | AllThingsD
The company announced on Tuesday an initiative to begin seeding its Replicator 3-D printing machines inside of K-12 schools across the U.S. The effort comes in partnership with DonorsChoose.org, a site that allows public school teachers to make online requests for classroom projects, which are then backed by a Kickstarter-like funding drive.
Twitter goes for the masses with new storytelling feature | CNET
Twitter excels in capturing the “moment” as events happen, but it isn’t great at telling a story. With custom timelines, the company hopes to lure a broader audience by giving it coherent narratives rather than just the raw materials.
Librarianship
How Iran Uses Wikipedia To Censor The Internet | BuzzFeed
A new study from the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School claims that Wikipedia might hold the key to understanding how Iran censors, and controls, the internet. The answer, in four words: with a heavy hand.
Education & Technology
The LA Times Trolls Innocent Teachers | TechCrunch
The once-respectable LA Times is leveraging its dwindling platform to attack individual teachers under the guise of data transparency. The editorial board won a court case allowing them to use a highly contentious, self-designed algorithm to rank the best and worst teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Neither the suicide of one of the shamed teachers, nor the widespread criticism of the statistical methods have aroused the editorial board’s better judgment.
Google Earth Tour Builder lets you tell stories through maps | Engadget
Google has used Earth and Maps to tell tales of unfolding tragedies and soldiers fighting for our country. Now its opening up those tools to the public, allowing users to build what they’re calling “Tours” through Google Earth. Tour Builder was released in honor of Veterans Day and it allows users to create narratives tied to points on a map. More Google news: Google Quick Actions Let Users Act on Emails Without Opening Them | Mashable, Your Face and Name Will Appear in Google Ads Starting Today | Gizmodo and Apple maps: how Google lost when everyone thought it had won | theguardian
Librarianship
Education & Technology
Xbox One News: Xbox One’s DRM policy reversal: an oral history | Engadget and Xbox One won’t play 3D Blu-rays — for now | CNET
Intel Has Acquired Kno, Will Push Further Into The Education Content Market With Interactive Textbooks | TechCrunch
We had a tip about, and have now confirmed, Intel’s latest acquisition: Kno, the education startup that started life as a hardware business and later pivoted into software – specifically via apps that let students read interactive versions of digitized textbooks.
Librarianship
Learning to code is a popular topic in educational circles these days. For good reason. When young people code their own apps, games, stories, or websites they have a chance to think critically, troubleshoot, problem solve, and collaborate. It’s a way to create something real that can be seen and used by lots of different people.
Of course, not all teachers or library staff are proficient coders. But, we don’t have to be. There are several apps and Web-based tools that make it possible to learn, with kids, the basics of coding. These also give young people the chance to try things out on their own and even teach adults how to create with code.
Sceencast tutorials for Daisy the Dinosaur, Hopscotch, Scratch and Tynker. Read: From Scratch to Tynker: Tools to Teach Kids How to Code | The Digital Shift.
Education & Technology
Twitter had its IPO today. Twitter’s Strong IPO Leaves The Company More Richly Valued On A Per-User Basis Than Facebook At Its Debut | TechCrunch. You may also like: Post-Twitter IPO: Time to fret about a new tech bubble? | CNET and 14 Moments That Defined Twitter | FastCompany
Did your Adobe password leak? Now you and 150m others can check | theguardian
Leak is 20 times worse than the company initially revealed, and could put huge numbers of peoples’ online lives at risk. Direct link to the Adobe leaked credentials checker.
How Pinterest Plans to Woo the Rest of the Internet | FastCompany
Unlike social media platforms like Twitter that capture the here and now, Pinterest is for dreaming of what’s ahead, says CEO Ben Silbermann…“People use Pinterest every day to get ready for and excited about something in their future–what they’re going to make for dinner, what they’re going to teach their classroom of students. If we can create a set of connections between things that they’re interested in, we can help them plan for that future.”
Librarianship
Education & Technology
Web inventor Berners-Lee sounds alarm on mass spying | CNET
Sir Tim Berners-Lee says the activities of the NSA and its UK counterpart, the GCHQ, could warp his baby, making the Internet vulnerable to attack and depriving humanity of a “safe space” for problem solving.
The Amazingly Unlikely Story of How Minecraft Was Born | WIRED
Excerpt from new book.
Librarianship
Mom Complains About Library’s Porn Policy | NBC Chicago
A suburban mother is demanding the Orland Park Public Library ban pornography on its computers. More scandal: Library book overdue in Texas? Go directly to jail | Teleread
Education & Technology
Startup Gives Free Stuff to Student Influencers | Mashable
Sumpto, a startup that identifies top social-media influencers at colleges across the country, sends students free gifts from brands in hopes that they will tweet, post and share photos of the free swag on their social-media accounts.
Twitter strives to explain itself to the public | CNET
A new “About Twitter” page attempts to describe the social network and explain how and why people tweet.
Bill Gates Believes Human Health Is More Important Than Tech | Mashable
In a wide-ranging interview with the Financial Times, which focused primarily on his work to bring health aid to the world’s impoverished regions, Gates offers a glimpse into how much his views have changed regarding the importance of technology in our lives.
E Ink Looks Beyond E-Readers | MIT Technology Review
Facing a declining market for e-readers, E Ink’s new R&D facility is trying out some different ideas.
Lenovo pursued BlackBerry bid, but Ottawa rejected idea | Globe & Mail
[T]he Canadian government told the smartphone company it would not accept a Chinese takeover because of national security concerns.
Apple: “Our Business Does Not Depend on Collecting Personal Data” | AllThingsD
Apple published a formal report on federal government data requests and in so doing became the first tech company to disclose such inquiries by both account and device.
Librarianship
Museum of Science Fiction might be coming to DC | CNET
Trekkies and wanna-be Mars colonists might soon have a permanent brick-and-mortar site for sharing their love of all things science fiction
Illinois Library Comes Under Fire | American Libraries Magazine
“Sometimes libraries that are doing ‘all the right things’ pay a price for their excellence through uncivil attacks and attempts to dismantle their work,” Barbara Jones, director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF), told American Libraries. She is referring to Orland Park (Ill.) Public Library (OPPL) in south suburban Chicago, which has endured several intellectual-freedom challenges over the past few months.
MELSA, 3M Develop New Ebook Sharing Feature for Consortia | The Digital Shift
The Library Vending Machine | BookRiot
Changing demographics and difficulty securing new funds for new libraries, The Pioneer Library System in Norman, Oklahoma decided to to use technology to meet its patrons needs. So last week, it opened the first 24-hour library vending machine in the United States. Built by EnvisionWare, this fully automated machine will be able to to dispense more than 400 pieces of media (books/DVDs/audiobooks) and store more than 1000 returned items.
Education, Technology
Affordable mini Raspberry Pi monitor smashes funding goal | theguardian
HDMIPi Kickstarter project for affordable 9in high-definition monitors for the Raspberry Pi took just 50.5 hours to hit target
Google to Launch ‘Helpouts’ on Monday | The Wall Street Journal
A new video service from Google aims to connect people with teachers, personal trainers, doctors and other experts is expected to launch Monday evening, according to a recent planning email. The new service, called “Helpouts,” has been in quiet testing for months. There are few restrictions on who can sign up to offer services, though Google has been reaching out to professional organizations such as the language-learning company Rosetta Stone to fill in the ranks of experts.
Google Wants The Government’s Data On You | Forbes
Google’s president for the Americas urged government officials Friday to open all municipal data so Google can use it to become everyone’s perfect personal assistant—an invisible entity that knows what you want before you do.
Libraries, Librarians
OCLC and ProQuest work together to automate e-book collection management | OCLC
Collaboration will help library staff keep e-book information current, offer library users quick and easy access to e-books from ebrary and EBL.
State Library of South Australia to create new technology hub to attract more users of its resources | news.com.au
Will embark on an ambitious program of events and create a university-style hub in a bid to arrest a fall of almost 200,000 visitors last financial year.
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