TAD Consortium February 2000 Information Update 3
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CONTENTS
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NEWS/TRENDS
--- Net triumph for dyslexic boy
--- Interactive Forum on Land and Water launched
--- Business-To-Business E-Commerce Seen Soaring
--- UK Online Ad Spend Explodes
--- Simultaneous TV and Internet Usage Patterns
--- Gender Gap has Almost Disappeared in US
--- US Lawmakers To Seek Permanent Ban On Internet Taxes
--- Egypt's biggest Internet service provider supports program
to bring more Egyptian users online
ANNOUNCEMENTS
--- Training For Telecentre Management And Operations: A
Research And Development Program
PROFILED ORGANIZATIONS
--- Foundation for Media Alternatives (Philippines)
--- Ndizathozomwe - Malawi
--- International Education and Resource Network (I*EARN)
ONLINE RESOURCES
--- Teaching With The Web
--- Cyberpunks in Cyberspace: The Politics of
Subjectivity in the Computer Age
--- The Future Of Peer-Reviewed Journals
--- Physics and Astronomy Lesson Plans
--- URLs on the DVD and Microsoft wars
PRINTED AND OTHER RESOURCES
--- Sesame Street Radio - South Africa
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NEWS/TRENDS
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Net triumph for dyslexic boy
By Sanjeev Srivastava in Bombay
A 16-year-old dyslexic boy in Bombay has won an international award for seting up his own website to help others who suffer with the condition.
The award - from the UK-based charity Childnet International - commends Jason Fernandes for single-handedly producing an internet site "to reach out to other Indian children who have learning difficulties and provide resources to help them."
Jason - a secondary-school student who was found to have dyslexia just over a year ago - has had his life revolutionised by the internet. After designing a site for disabled kids, Jason is now a celebrity and a role model for other children suffering from dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia and other learning disorders. He is due to travel to Barbados in April to collect his award and now features regularly in Indian newspapers and features on television chat shows.
Jason gets mail from around the world seeking help, counsel and guidance - and not just from kids suffering from learning disorders and their parents. Even doctors and nurses treating dyslexic children communicate with Jason trying to learn something from Jason¿s experience.
Ridiculed
But life was not so good to Jason until about a year ago. A target of ridicule in his school and thought of as stupid by his teachers and parents, Jason was often punished for being lazy and careless. It was only after he was diagnosed as a dyslexic that his parents realised that there was nothing wrong with him - except for the fact that he couldn¿t read written text. He was then shifted to a school which provides facilities for children like him and given a dictaphone and a laptop.
Computer knack
Since the age of twelve, Jason had displayed a knack for handling computers - he would completely take apart his brothers computer and then reassemble it in a matter of hours.
"Dyslexics are not disabled. Often, they are more able than a normal child," Jason tells a group of parents who have come with their dyslexic children to the Fernandes home on a Sunday afternoon to seek help and inspiration.
He then talks about how the right brain is more dominant in a dyslexic than the left brain, and how it would help dyslexics to think not in terms of text and words, but in images and visuals.
He now also works with the software team of India's leading computer magazine - Chip - and helps solve PC problems for computer users who write into the magazine. He has also designed entertainment software and after finishing school he wishes to enroll in college in the US.
Links:
Learning Disabled Kids Support (India) http://www.ldkids.f2s.com/
ChildNet International http://www.childnet-int.org/
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NAIROBI, 20 January, 2000 - Klaus Toepfer, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), today formally launched the internet-based Interactive Forum on Land and Water, an initiative of the Global Environmental Facility (GEF).
This initiative will build upon the United Nations System-wide Initiative for Africa. It aims to address land and water related environmental challenges facing African countries in an integrated manner, and will provide a framework for the coordination of bilateral and multilateral donors.
"The fact that the Africa Land and Water Forum is being launched during the 'African Month' of the United Nations Security Council is not a mere coincidence," said Klaus Toepfer. "It is a clear reminder that environment issues and global environmental threats are an integral part of the new agenda of world peace and security," he said.
According to Prof. Okelo, Secretary-General of the African Academy of Science, "The Forum provides an unique opportunity to engage the wider scientific and technical African community in the design, preparation and implementation of this important GEF initiative. Scientific networks of the Academy comprising of more than 1600 experts will actively contribute to the forum."
"The forum will play a major role in the implementation of the coordinating mechanism on desertification established by the Algiers Summit of the OAU," said H.E. Sid Ali Ketrandji, Ambassador of Algeria and Nairobi representative of the chairman of the Organisation of African Unity. In Algiers, in July 1999, the 35th Assembly of Heads of State and the OAU welcomed the GEF initiative.
The forum web site address is: http://gef-forum.unep.org
For more information contact:
Sean Khan, UNEP, INFOTERRA/GEF, P.O.Box 30552, Nairobi, Kenya, tel: +254-2-623271, fax: +254-2-624041, email: sean.khan@unep.org Tore J. Brevik, UNEP Spokesman, on tel: +254-2-623292 or Robert Bisset, UNEP Media Unit, on tel: +254-2-623084, fax: 623692, email: robert.bisset@unep.org
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BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS E-COMMERCE SEEN SOARING
Reuters
Business-to-business electronic commerce will show blistering growth in the coming years, with the worldwide market expected to expand to $7.29 trillion by 2004, more than 50 times larger than in 1999, a market research firm said on Wednesday. Growing from $145 billion last year, business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce by 2004 will represent about 7% of the total global sales transactions, estimated at $105 trillion, GartnerGroup said. "The B2B explosion is imminent, fuelled by a combustible mixture of investment financing, IT spending and opportunistic euphoria that is being funneled into start-ups and brick-and-mortars' e-commerce initiatives," said Leah Knight, principal analyst for GartnerGroup's e-Business Intelligence Services. "Collectively, they will drive short-term economic disruption but long-term business efficiency across industries and geographies," Knight said. So-called e-market makers are expected to be the catalysts of growth -- developing business-to-business, Internet-based markets of buyers and sellers within a particular industry, region or group. GartnerGroup said e-market makers were seen facilitating $2.71 trillion in e-commerce sales transactions in 2004, about 37% of the overall business-to-business market, and 2.6% of worldwide sales transactions.
For the full story go to: http://www.itweb.co.za/sections/internet/
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Taken from Nua Internet Surveys: January 31st, 2000
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Fletcher Research: UK Online Ad Spend Explodes
The UK online advertising spend is set to rise dramatically to STG479million in 2002, from the 1999 figure of STG50 million, according to thelatest report from Fletcher Research. Advertisers currently allocate 7percent of their budgets to online advertising but this should increase to14 percent by 2004.
Between April and September 1999, 26 percent of new advertisements ran on portals and search sites, the most popular being Yahoo, Excite and UK Plus.News and reference sites carried 22 percent of new campaigns while entertainment ran 23 percent. Financial services and computing sites ran 10percent and 7 percent respectively.
Advertisers devoted 53 percent of their budgets to banner advertising, 11percent to search engine listings and 9 percent to key word searches. Sponsorship deals and sales partnerships each accounted for 6 percent of budgets while 5 percent was allocated to exclusive tenancy deals. Email and microsites took 4 percent and 1 percent respectively.
Almost 60 percent of UK Internet users have clicked on an online advertisement. Just over a third of users consider such advertisements annoying and 24 percent say they are a "time-wasting diversion". 20 percent say they are informative, however, and 24 percent say they are useful.
The report also covers offline advertising spend by dotcoms and finds that UK Internet companies that have advertised in other media are enjoying high mass consumer awareness.
Total spending across all sectors on offline advertising in 1999 was STG7billion. Despite the increasing acceptance of Internet advertising, television will remain the most popular medium for advertisers targeting the mass consumer audience until at least 2004. Direct mail, press advertising and telesales are also deemed more effective than the Internet by advertisers.
http://www.fletch.co.uk/content/press/ads.html
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Taken from Nua Internet Surveys: January 31st, 2000
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Cyber Dialogue: Simultaneous TV and Internet Usage Patterns
10.2 million US adults spent an average of 7.3 hours per week surfing the Net while watching TV in the fourth quarter of 1999. Of those, 24 percent did so during sports programs, according to new research by Cyber Dialogue.
The survey found that sports and business news was the most frequently requested content by survey respondents, accounting for 10 percent and 9 percent respectively. News magazines, dramas and nighttime comedies were also highly rated. Two thirds of all time spent using both media was spent with the TV on in the background.
The above findings are from Cyber Dialogue's American Internet User Survey. AIUS consists of in-depth interviews with 1,000 Internet users and 1,000 nonusers. AIUS is a quarterly survey that has been conducted since 1994.
http://www.cyberdialogue.com/press/releases/index.html
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Taken from Nua Internet Surveys: January 31st, 2000
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Reuters: Gender Gap has Almost Disappeared in US
Women constituted 50 percent of the US Internet audience for the first time during the holiday shopping season, according to a Nielsen NetRatings report.
The number of US women online grew 32 percent in 1999, while the number of male Internet users only grew 20 percent. There are now 119.2 million Internet users in the US.
The report shows that men and women still differ in their use of the Internet as men tend to visit news sites which are deep and rich in information, while women prefer health and lifestyle sites.
Men tend to spend longer online than women and this trend is becoming more definite. In the month of February, men surfed for 95 minutes longer than women but that gap had increased to 132 minutes in December. Across the sexes, the average time spent online increased by almost 11 percent to 8 hours and 17 minutes between February and December.
Usage patterns are changing in other ways too. US Internet users now tend to visit more pages on fewer sites. Users visited an average of 9 unique sites in December, a drop of 40 percent since February. The number of page views, however, increased by 68 percent to 32 in the same period.
http://www.foxnews.com/vtech/0120/t_rt_0120_71.sml
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US LAWMAKERS TO SEEK PERMANENT BAN ON INTERNET TAXES
(Reuters)
Two US lawmakers proposed on Monday making permanent the current 3-year ban on new taxes by states and localities on billions of dollars of goods and services sold over the Internet. Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, and Rep. Christopher Cox, a California Republican, said they would introduce bills "soon" to set in stone the moratorium on new Web taxes enacted by Congress in October 1998 and due to expire in October 2001.The upcoming Cox-Wyden bill would solidify temporary bans on new "multiple" or "discriminatory" taxes on cyberspace, such as state and local levies on the monthly fees consumers pay to use Internet services. Many of those taxes probably will be recommended for repeal by most of a 19-member blue-ribbon panel appointed by Congress to study the nettlesome Web-tax issue. Chaired by Virginia Gov. James Gilmore, that Advisory Commission on Electronic Commerce, is due to report to Capitol Hill by April 2000. "You can not squeeze the new economy into policies written for smokestack industries," said Wyden, who, along with Cox, authored the 1998 Internet Tax Freedom Act that set in motion the 3-year ban and created the Gilmore commission. "With our Internet Tax Freedom Act, Chris Cox and I put a temporary stop to the reckless, special taxing of the Internet," Wyden added in the press statement. "Now it is time to make that ban on discrimination permanent." Consumers, businesses and state and local governments have "thrived" under the existing ban on discriminatory online taxes, Wyden said. In fact, Main Street retailers had one of their best holiday seasons, recording a nearly 8% jump in sales over last year, Wyden said. And state budgets ended fiscal year 1999 with a whopping $35 billion surplus, he added.
For the full story go to:
http://www.itweb.co.za/sections/internet/2000/0002010727.asp
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LINK Egypt Backs 'Internet Baladna' initiative
Egypt's biggest Internet service provider supports program to bring more Egyptian users online CAIRO: February 3, 2000
Egypt's biggest Internet service provider, LINK Egypt, has announced its backing for the Internet Baladna program designed to help Egyptians access the Internet at affordable monthly installments and purchase a new PC. Participants in this program also include Citibank, Compaq, Goldi, MasterCard and Microsoft.
"The Internet has become an integral part of daily life for millions of users and companies all over the world, connecting people to information and each other while providing a window to the world through a PC," said Khaled Bichara, CEO of LINK Egypt.
"Internet Baladna is aimed at providing Egyptians with an easier, more affordable way of accessing the Internet and encouraging them to use the Internet for work, education, entertainment and communication."
The program bundles a new Compaq or a Goldi PC with Microsoft's Windows operating system, and Internet access from LINK Egypt in an affordable monthly package financed by Citibank. Users can pay for the purchase over a three year period while enjoying Internet access from LINK Egypt.
"By providing the bundle in easy-to-pay four monthly installments, Egyptians can enjoy a high-quality PC with original Windows operating system and access to the Internet. This initiative will help bring the Internet into the home and offices of users who could not afford to go online previously," Bichara explained.
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ANNOUNCEMENTS
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TRAINING FOR TELECENTRE MANAGEMENT AND OPERATIONS: A Research and Development Program
Royal D. Colle & Raul Roman
Cornell University
1. Communication centers
Community telecentres (CTC) have become important priorities for international and national organizations in their efforts to support development in Africa, Asia and Latin America. This movement has grown out of the belief that information and communication technologies (ICT) are an important resource for communities, but that these ICTs are often not conveniently available or affordable for many people. While some telecenters are straight-forward business ventures, others are committed to community empowerment through access to information and dialogue. CTCs are particularly important in providing urban, peri-urban, and rural people with access to telecommunications networks (Internet), computers, and audio, video, and print media on a shared basis.
Hundreds of telecentres are emerging in both the public and private sectors in developing nations. Their relevance to the community and their sustainability depend on a variety of factors, one of the most important of which is the amount and quality of training provided for the staffs of CTCs. The published literature and the content of Internet-mediated discussions suggests that little systematic effort has gone into designing, testing and evaluating training for telecentre management and operations. Telecentre sustainability is also closely related to the orientation and training of the host communities.
2. Objective
Our multi-phased project focused initially on developing "guideline modules" for training telecenter personnel. The modules will include rationale, annotated topical outlines, and resources which can be used by telecenters for sharpening the management and community outreach skills of their key personnel. While the modules will be designed for a "generic" telecenter similar to those supported by the International Telecommunications Union, the International Development Research Centre, and the U.S. Agency for International Development, they will be adaptable to various telecenter configurations. This results of this project provide the foundation for two additional phases in telecenter management training: (1) the design and production of training materials and (2) compilation of a self-training handbook and reference manual for telecenter managers that will incorporate some of these materials. Access to systematic training without the necessity of distant travel and costs will be especially valuable for the hundreds of limited service telecenters that can be expanded to multi-purpose telecenters along the ITU and IDRC models.
3. Outcome
In this project data on training needs were collected from 45 international telecenter specialists using the Internet. Additional information was gathered from a non-random sample of telecenter managers and others closely associated with telecenter operations. This included field work in South Africa where the Government has been aggressive in establishing centers. These combined data sources provided a preliminary list of topics for developing a strategy for telecenter personnel training. Topics ranged from technical aspects of computers to business management. These results were circulated to the 45 international specialists for further comment and discussion – by way of an Internet "thinktank." This sets the stage next for development of materials and a handbook.
Royal D Colle (rdc4@cornell.edu)
Raul Roman (rr66@cornell.edu)
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PROFILED ORGANIZATIONS
(This component of the TAD Consortium Newsletter kindly sponsored by Times Media Limited – www.tml.co.za)
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I would like to tell you about our organization, Foundation for Media Alternatives (FMA), a service institution whose mission has been to explore the strategic use of the various communications media for democratization and popular empowerment. Since 1986, FMA has sought to enhance the popularization and social marketing of development-oriented issues and campaigns through media-related interventions, social communication projects, and cultural work.
At present, FMA has streamlined its programs and services in both traditional and new media. A major focus during the past three years has been on democratizing Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs), aimed at empowering Philippine civil society through the critical use of new media.
In a country where the vast majority still has very low access to ICT resources, and where development organizations have not sufficiently unleashed the potential of ICTs, FMA develops programs and projects that seek to strategically address the questions of access to and equity of disadvantaged sectors in the area of ICT. These involve the following:
* programmatic data-gathering and action-oriented research on the state of ICT resources and usage within civil society, especially the NGO/PO sector;
* enhancement of ICT literacy and MIS capacities of CSOs;
* development of ICT-based programs, applications and indigenous online content relevant to CSOs;
* interfacing new media/ICTs with traditional media (i.e. community radio) to further promote the right to information
* networking with other development stakeholders (policymakers, international agencies, business sector, ICT professionals) around the issues of democratizing ICT.
At present, FMA is partnering with major civil society organizations in the Philippines such as the PLDT Foundation, the Caucus of Development NGO Networks (CODE-NGO), Women's Action Network for Development (WAND), and the National Peace Conference (NPC) to mainstream a Countrywide Development-Wide Area Network (CODE-WAN) system that provides online access through a free electronic mail service. CODE-WAN has so far established three nodes in Manila Cebu (Visayas) and Davao (Mindanao) with 24 dial-up lines. There are more than 300 registered free organizational email accounts, but probably not more than 200 are active for various reasons. We have stopped expansion plans for now until we can get new commitments for equipment and helpdesk services for more people. Even this aspect will be a focus of our coming strategy sessions.
FMA also organizes community websites of different issue- and sector-based advocacy groups. It continuously seeks to explore strategic ICT issues relating to Philippine development towards constituency-building and policy advocacy. We have currently developed 4 community sites in coordination with broad alliances and Philippine apex organizations:
- Balay (on the urban poor and housing issues): www://balay.codewan.com.ph
- Salidumay: Women Voices Weaving (on women and gender): salidumay.codewan.com.ph
- Balangay (on local governance and civil society): balangay.codewan.com.ph
- People's PoWER (People's Political Website on Elections and Electoral Reform): peoplespower.codewan.com.ph
Scheduled to be launched in the first quarter of 2000 are community sites on (a) Agrarian Reform & Rural Development; (b) Human Rights NOW! (Human Rights Network on the Web); and (c) the site of the Asia Caucus (an informal group of major Asian regional NGOs/networks which are based in the Philippines).
There are initial discussions also to set up sites on Peace and Conflict Transformation, and on Labor and Trade Unions. FMA itself is leading an effort to set up a comprehensive site on Philippine Civil Society which will feature contact, research, and donor information etc.
These sites are intially just joint websites which become clearing houses for shared information relevant to partners, policymakers, advocates, and students. These are all now initially hosted by project CODE-WAN, a joint initiative of CSOs, FMA and the PLDT Foundation (PLDT is the largest telco in the Philippines). There is a plan to spin off this Project to fully civil society-owned and managed service.
We are now working to bring all these efforts (as well as parallel ones) together within a comprehensive "development information portal"--a sort of a Yahoo! for Philippine Development-- with the civil society sites and the comunity sites as the core. We have partnered with UNDP Manila to move this process along via consultations, validations sessions, and strategy sessions with key civil society stakeholders in the next two months.
As far as the impacts so far: There are some concerns (limited access, lack of equipment, ICT literacy) but it seems to be a good first step in mainstraming critical use of ICTs for development.
We believe that by piloting an interface between new media (internet-based) and traditional media (specifically community radio stations) we can help to expand access and equity (plus right to information). We are trying to wire up these stations with free email, giving them access to the content which we are developing (i.e., the sites) for them to broadcast this to a broader audience—specifically the poor who have no computers and phones, nor even electricity in some areas!
Partnering with the local radio stations, CSOs on the ground can also immediately send their own content for uplaoding into the internet via the network, through CODEWAN's weekly online newsmagazine, CyberDyaryo (codewan.com.ph/cyberdyaryo).
In our recent activities, we have:
1. completed the first round of our baseline survey of ICT Resources and Usage (initially 151 CSOs); we are preparing to launch a second round for 200 more NGOs/POs or grassroot organizations;
2. are conducting focus group discussions with poor/grassroots leaders on their attitudes and aspirations as to ICT and computers. (These are the people who rarely respond to written surveys.)
3. Are piloting ICT literacy sessions (basic computing, internet and email, applications) for NGO and grassroots leaders;
4. Have entered into partnership/service contracts with some large NGO/PO federations in assessing MIS capacities and developing agendas along this line.
Best regards,
Alan Alegre
FOUNDATION FOR MEDIA ALTERNATIVES
68-B Esteban Abada St.
Loyola Heights, Quezon City 1108, Philippines
Phone: (63 2) 426-1037; (63 2) 435-6684 Fax: (63 2) 435-6684
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Taken from the Media Beat Issue No. 38 (compiled by the Communication Initiative - http://www.comminit.com)
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Ndizathozomwe - Malawi - the Malawian Broadcasting Co-operation (MBC) is planning a civic education campaign, "Ndizathozomwe" ("it is ours"), and establishing a development Broadcasting Unit. 26 radio programmes will be broadcast on MBC Radio One beginning Feb. 2000. Programmes will follow a magazine format including village voices and panel discussions. They will broadcast off the back of "Tilitonse" a new civic education based drama produced by the Story Workshop Educational Trust (SWET). Contact Alice Munyua dbu@sdnp.org.mw
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In 1999 the United States government provided a grant to the International Education and Resource Network (I*EARN) to fund a six-country civic education project using computers, email and other basic elements of modern information technology. Sri Lanka, along with Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, India and Pakistan, is a participant in this cutting-edge educational experiment.
"Community Voices, Collaborative Solutions" (CIVICS) is the name of the project in which three Sri Lankan schools are participating. Working closely with the American Center in Colombo, special workshops for teachers were held last week at Isipathana College with participants from both Isipathana and Royal College and are currently underway at Nivaththaka Chethiya Maha Vidyalaya, Anuradhapura. These schools were chosen because of their interest and the electronic facilities they could make available to the I*EARN pilot project. Ideally, these schools could serve as models for other Sri Lankan school programs.
The Anuradhapura project is especially significant since the school only recently acquired its computer facilities -- the result of efforts by the Lanka Academic Network (LAcNet), which is working in coordination with I*EARN and will provide the school with logistical and technical support for the school's new computer lab.
I*EARN is a global network of schools that has pioneered interactive student project work on the Internet since 1988. I*EARN hopes to enable elementary and secondary students to go beyond simply being electronic "pen-pals" and to use telecommunications in joint student projects which will make a real difference in their classrooms, their home cities, countries and around the world. I*EARN encourages students to explore together their common humanity, global citizenship and civic responsibility through collaborative learning, using technology to bring students from different parts of the world into the same electronic "classroom."
Teacher training workshops are being held in each country and students are jumping into interactive project work throughout the 75-country I*EARN Network.
I*EARN helps teachers answer the question "Now what?" after they are connected to the Internet, by providing useful global connections and curriculum-based content. Anyone interested in learning more about I*EARN may contact the organization through their website - www.iearn.org
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ONLINE RESOURCES
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You may wish to check out Teaching With The Web at http://edtech.kennesaw.edu/web/teaching.htm
This is a fantastic list of sites divided by grade levels and sorted by themes put together by the staff at the Educational Technology Center at Kennesaw State University in Georgia, USA. They originally started with sites for grades 3-5 (their largest section), then added k-2 and are currently working on 6-8 and 9-12.
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Cyberpunks in Cyberspace: The Politics of Subjectivity in the Computer Age by Paul Edwards
http://www.si.umich.edu/~pne/cyberpunks.htm
Not every day we have a scientific paper, on the Cyberpunks. Here is an article by Prof. Edwards from the University of Michigan on this topic.
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THE FUTURE OF PEER-REVIEWED JOURNALS
In "Free at Last: The Future of Peer-Reviewed Journals" [D-LIB MAGAZINE, vol. 5, no. 12, December 1999], Stevan Harnad (Professor of Cognitive Science, Department of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton) argues for the electronic archiving of scholarly writing as a means to wider-spread dissemination. He explains how, with the support of universities (primarily through librarians and networks) and the use of interoperability standards (such as the Open Archives Initiative), scholars could "self-archive" their work, and users could locate papers regardless of where it is stored. You can read Harnad's article on the Web at http://www.dlib.org/dlib/december99/12harnad.html
D-Lib Magazine [ISSN: 1082-9873] covers innovation and research in digital libraries. The magazine is available, free of charge, only in electronic format, either on the Web or via email. Subscription information is available at http://www.dlib.org/dlib/subscribe.html Back issues are available at http://www.dlib.org/back.html
D-Lib Magazine is published eleven times a year by the D-Lib Forum, which is based at the Corporation For National Research Initiatives (CNRI) and is sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). For more information about D-Lib Forum see their Website at http://www.dlib.org/dlib.html
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Taken from Network Nuggets
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Physics and Astronomy Lesson Plans
I don't generally recommend lesson plan metasites. These are sites that act as collectors of links to lesson plans. I figure we all do enough browsing and clicking that what teachers want are directions to sites that actually have the lesson plans, rather than having to search for content in an intermediary that just amasses a collection of links to other sites. However, I'm making an exception in this case because the developers have organized the site so well and have collected a comprehensive set of links.
Hosted by Rutgers University, the High Energy Physics Experimental Group offers their collection of links to physics and astronomy lesson plans organized into four categories: elementary, middle, high school, and advanced. Within each of the grade levels, the links are further subcategorized into specific physics or astronomy topics (e.g., force and motion, magnetism, Earth and sky, solar system, etc.). There are quite a number of these categories, and when you get inside them, you'll find quite a number of links to real, live lesson plans. This means that teachers can quickly find what they're looking for - although since this collection draws from a wide number of sites, you will find that the quality will vary. Still..... this site is well worth a look.
The Physics and Astronomy Lesson Plans is hosted by Rutgerts University and is suitable for K-12 physics and astronomy teachers. It is located at
http://www.physics.rutgers.edu/hex/visit/lesson/lesson_contents.html
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Taken from Red Rock Eater News Service
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Here are some more useful URL's, including several each on the DVD and Microsoft wars. Note that several of them are broken across two lines. Many thanks to the readers who contributed them.
DVD wars and related topics
--- CA court hearing that granted an injunction against Linux DVD decoding
http://www.2600.org/news/2000/0121-trans.html
--- Behind DVD Legal Scramble
http://www.upside.com/texis/mvm/upside_counsel?id=3895f2a40
--- Son of DIVX: DVD Copy Control http://www.fool.com/portfolios/rulemaker/2000/rulemaker000127.htm
--- Rulemaking on Exemptions from Prohibition on Circumvention of Technological Measures that Control Access to Copyrighted Works
http://www.loc.gov/copyright/1201/anticirc.html
--- Hardware-Based ID, Rights Management, and Trusted Systems
http://www.law.wayne.edu/weinberg/trusted.1201.PDF
Microsoft wars
--- Plaintiffs' Joint Reply to Microsoft's Proposed Conclusions of Law
http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f4000/4087.htm
--- Microsoft's response
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/trial/p-col/02-01sur-reply.asp
--- Larry Lessig's amicus brief in DOJ vs Microsoft
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/works/lessig/ab.pdf
--- Robert Bork's amicus brief
http://www.procompetition.org/xp/p-headlines/i-current/a-949432096/p_article.view/
--- Software and Information Industry Association amicus brief
http://www.siia.net/siiaamicus.htm
--- Progress and Freedom Foundation proposes breaking Microsoft up (!)
http://www.pff.org/pr/pr012700MSRelease.htm
--- TV discussion of economic issues in Microsoft breakup
http://www.stern.nyu.edu/~nwhite/videos/nicktv.ram
Privacy wars
--- Hacking cookies
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00/01/25/2356236&cid=19
--- Information Privacy / Information Property
http://www.msen.com/~litman/infoprivacy.pdf
--- Swiping at Crime: Cases Solved by Tracking MetroCard Use
http://www.nydailynews.com/2000-01-31/News_and_Views/Crime_File/a-55245.asp
Technology
--- Designing Augmented Reality Environments, Denmark, April 2000
http://www.daimi.au.dk/~dare2000/
--- Wireless Craze
http://www.upside.com/texis/mvm/story?id=3884d0710
--- Next Century Challenges: Data-Centric Networking for Invisible Computing
http://www.cs.washington.edu/research/portolano/papers/mobicom99/mobicom.pdf
--- W3C approves an XML version of HTML
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-1532441.html?tag=st.ne.1002.tgif?st.ne.fd.gif.f
--- J. C. R. Licklider's early papers that shaped the Internet
http://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/DEC/SRC/research-reports/abstracts/src-rr-061.html
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PRINTED AND OTHER RESOURCES
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Taken from the Media Beat Issue No. 38 (compiled by the Communication Initiative - http://www.comminit.com)
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Sesame Street Radio - South Africa - Vuleka Productions has developed the URTNA award-winning radio version of the Sesame Street educational children's series. Co-produced by Children's Television Workshop, "Takalani Sesame" is an "edutainment" approach using radio, TV and outreach to pre-school children and their care-givers. Contact Julie Frederikse vuleka@iafrica.com
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Telematics for African Development Consortium
P.O. Box 31822
Braamfontein
2017
Johannesburg
South Africa
Tel: +27 +11 403-2813
Fax: +27 +11 403-2814
neilshel@icon.co.za
www.saide.org.za
* To view an archive of previous updates
visit:
www.saide.org.za/tad/archive.htm
* For resources on distance education and
technology use in Southern Africa visit:
www.saide.org.za/worldbank/Default.htm
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