Jyothi, S., McAvinia, C., & Keating, J. (2012). A visualisation tool to aid exploration of students' interactions in asynchronous online communication. Computers & Education, 58(1), 30:42\. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2011.08.026

Abstract

This paper describes a visualisation tool to aid the analysis of online communication. The tool has two purposes: first, it can be used on a day-to-day basis by teachers or forum moderators to review the development of a discussion and to support appropriate interventions. Second, the tool can support research activities since the visualisations generated provide the basis for further qualitative and quantitative analysis of online dialogue.

Zydney, J. M., deNoyelles, A., & Kyeong-Ju Seo, K. (2012). Creating a community of inquiry in online environments: An exploratory study on the effect of a protocol on interactions within asynchronous discussions. Computers & Education, 58(1), 77–87. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2011.07.009

Abstract:

The purpose of our research was to examine the influence of an online protocol on asynchronous discussions. A mixed-methods study compared two online graduate classes: one that used a protocol and one that did not use a protocol for the same discussion about a complex reading. Analysis of the data revealed that the online protocol more evenly distributed the presence of cognitive, social, and teaching elements necessary to create and sustain an online community of inquiry. Use of the protocol also promoted more shared group cognition and more student ownership of the discussion and empowered students to facilitate themselves, helping to reduce the instructor workload. These findings may enable educators to provide more dynamic interaction and richer learning experiences in asynchronous online environments.

I noticed a rather severe spike in CPU usage on my Mediatemple server, and dug in to see what was causing it. For an hour, someone was hammering the login form for my blog, accounting for 98% of all CPU usage for my account during the "attack". That's not OK (I have lots of CPU/bandwidth left, but it's silly to leave a login form exposed to some kind of sustained script-kiddie "attack").

So much goodness in this article, but this kind of jumped out at me…

Imagine the U.S. Census as conducted by direct marketers - that's the social graph.

Social networks exist to sell you crap. The icky feeling you get when your friend starts to talk to you about Amway, or when you spot someone passing out business cards at a birthday party, is the entire driving force behind a site like Facebook.

First, this is not a pity party thing. If things go that way, comments get turned off or this post disappears.

I finally got a GP, after 20 years without having a regular doctor. Drop-in clinics just don't cut it. So I see him, and he gives me a pretty thorough checkup. If you know what I mean. And he pauses, and checks again. He says there's something he's feeling, while examining a nut.

people gripe about content consumption and distraction and superficiality. but, we choose how we are. we choose to waste the potential of what would have been described as science fiction only a few years ago.

You can decide to throw birds at pigs. You can decide to check in on which strangers are pretending to like you today. You may even decide to see what you would look like if you were really fat.

Good video, put out by the City. I get cut off by motorists turning right on a regular basis.

They've got a whole series of them - now, to get motorists watching them…

I haven't posted a photo to Flickr in a couple months, and am starting to think about how to migrate photos from there (a place I don't own, and where the photos are only fully available if I pay an annual fee) to here (a place that I do own, where I get to say when/if stuff goes offline).

I can think of two scenarios:

1. Some mythical WordPress plugin that connects to my Flickr account and sucks in all of the images as Media items (for management) and Posts (so they're visible) using the correct date/title/description/keywords. This doesn't need to pull in the full resolution originals - I'd be happy with the Large (1024 pix wide) version.

Evan and I headed downtown for some hanging-out time this afternoon, and stumbled into the #occupyCalgary protest. I knew something was planned, but had half-forgotten that it was going down this weekend. We stopped for awhile, watching the protest. He wasn't scared at all - there was no feeling of anything unsafe, even with over a thousand people crammed into a square, chanting and waving signs. There were a couple dozen police officers in full gear, but they were there mostly to make sure everyone was OK. There was a really good vibe in the crowd. We even did some impromptu broadcasting for the DS106 community radio station's coverage of various OccupyEverything events, and did a brief interview with an awesome woman representing a group trying to raise awareness about poverty in Calgary (specifically in regards to women and children, many of whom struggle to get by, despite being in a city that is the home for so much wealth).

I bumped into a computer science prof who was lugging a cart to get coffee. On the cart was a big homebrew remote controlled car, with a Microsoft Kinnect sensor strapped to it. Turns out, they use it to capture the motions of athletes. They use the data both to analyse the motion later, and to provide immediate audio feedback to the athlete. They're working on a model that can follow speed skaters, at full speed, around the track. Awesome!

We headed west today, for what seems to be a Thanksgiving tradition - an easy family hike in the mountains. We stopped at the Barrier Lake ecology research station, which is now part of the University of Calgary campus. The site was originally a military camp, used as an internment facility and later a prisoner of war camp during world war II. Evan was pretty blown away that this camp even exists, and even moreso after learning some of the history. After exploring the research station path, we went across the highway to check out Barrier Dam, and the lake. Definitely not an unattractive region, especially with autumn colours.

I got the chance to go for a quick bike ride this afternoon, and headed out west of our house, into the Bearspaw region. Some really nice rural roads for riding, and gorgeous scenery. One stretch of road has a very steep and longish hill, and I occasionally try to see how fast I can go down it. Unfortunately, the wind was not cooperating, and I only got up to 67km/h. Still, total fun, but not quite what I was shooting for. The wind did line up to make some really fun stretches of open road. Hill climbing into the wind, which is way more fun than it sounds. And fast flat stretches - cruising along at 48km/h on a flat highway is a blast. After that, some quick bopping around roads to the northwest of the city, and then back to ride around our community before heading home.