Fortnightly Mailing

Micah Altman's statistical software resouces - via Richard Elliot

Micah Altman's The Impoverished Social Scientist's Guide to Free Statistical Software and Resources, last updated in February 2008, looks like a good source. With thanks to Richard Elliot, whose occasional elearningWatch mailing usually has several items of interest. (Altman works at the Harvard-MIT Data Center, and his The Impoverished Social Scientist's Guide to Data Resources looks impressive too.)

Across Hardangervidda in Norway

Harteigen, 1690 m, from Hadlaskard, 18 March 2008

This Easter, after three days alone a bit further north, skiing from lake Tyin to Bygdin, I went hut-to-hut with two friends across Hardangervidda in Norway, Europe's biggest mountain plateau, from Haugastøl on the Bergen to Oslo railway, south-west to Haukelisæter east of Stavanger. The weather was best described as "variable", hence a paucity of good pictures, particularly at the end of the journey when it was cold, snowy, and misty, with very strong head-winds. In the continuation post below there is a rather fragmented set of pictures.

Google forms - for easy data capture - screencast by Dan Schellenberg

Dan Schellenberg has made a nice clear screencast about how to use the new "forms" feature of Google Docs to create a form for people to fill in, with their information then fed back into a Google Spreadsheet.

Blackboard Patent provisionally rejected in its entirety by the US Patent and Trademark Office - first stage in a long process

Source: The use of inter partes and ex parte re-examination in patent litigation, 2006, by David M. O'Dell and David L. McCombs

Updated 29 March 2008

I reported that on 14 March 2008 the US Patent and Trade Mark Office had decided to merge the till now apparently dormant inter partes and ex parte re-examinations of Blackboard Inc.'s US Patent Number 6988138. On 25 March 2008 USPTO issued a non-final decision [1.7 MB PDF]. The net result is that all 44 of the claims made in the Blackboard Patent have been provisionally rejected, with Blackboard given 2 months to respond. The rejection is on the basis of several examples of prior art cited by Desire2Learn and by the Software Freedom Law Centre in their respective re-examination requests. (Particularly relevant, it seems, were the 29 April 1998 EDUCOM/NLII Instructional Management Systems Specifications Document Version 0.5, University of Nottingham's Ceilidh system, and the Irish Top Class system.) 30/3/2008. The provisional rejections sits alongside the previous invalidation of parts of the 6988138 patent by the US courts in the course of Blackboard's current infringement case.

Does this mean that the Blackboard Patent is dead in the water? The short  "I am no lawyer" answer is "not yet", because:

• the decision may well not stand (today's Blackboard "community update" via Stephen Downes shows that Blackboard does not expect the decision to stand, though note the "PR" rather than "rigorous" tone of the statement; nor is Desire2Learn counting its chickens);
• the patent re-examination process is slow, as the flow-chart above shows (be aware that in this case it has taken 16 months to get from "File Request" to "Office Action" rather than the more normal three to five);
• Blackboard has just prevailed in its patent infringement claim against Desire2Learn, and, as Michael Feldstein indicates, the impact of this development on that case is uncertain.

And even if, as I personally believe it will, US Patent 6988138 is finally ruled to be invalid, the twin problems of the patentability (in some jurisdictions) of software (e-learning or otherwise)*, and of universities using the patent system privately to exploit student innovation and the outcome of publicly funded research, are untouched by this particular case.

* 30/3/2008

1. Blackboard holds an equivalent patent in Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore, which have neither been whittled down in the process of an infringement claim, nor has its validity been challenged (?), as in the US. Furthermore, a number of other e-learning patents exist - see for example the Pearson Education patents listed some way down this August 2006 post by Michael Feldstein (or have been applied for), some of which are probably rather stronger, and most of which are far less in the public eye, than 6988138.
2. For a long article, with informative quotes from key protagonists, including Software Freedom Law Centre's Eben Moglen, who does not mince his words, see this 28 March 2008 piece by Dave Nagel in THE Journal.

Big changes afoot in how FE is funded and overseen in England

Here is an extract from a long statement made on 17 March 2008 by Mark Haysom, Chief Executive of the Learning and Skills Council about the winding up of the LSC over the next couple of years, possibly prejudging somewhat the outcome of a consultation that has been launched on the Department for Schools, Children, and Families web site, which does not close till 9 June 2008:

"In summary, there will be two new bodies that will continue to drive ahead the huge agenda that we have been charged with since 2001. For young people there will be a new national Non Departmental Public Body, with some regional capacity, which will support local authorities in their new role in commissioning and funding 14-19 provision. Local capacity on 14-19 will therefore, as expected, be with Local Authorities. For adults there will be a new Skills Funding Agency, again with some regional capacity, which will oversee the distribution of funds to the sector and manage the performance of FE colleges. The Agency will also house the National Apprenticeship Service (NAS), the National Employer Service, and the Adult Careers and Advancement Agency. As has already been announced, the Train to Gain brokerage service will transfer to Regional Development Agencies in April 2009.

Although there is still a great deal of work to be done to flesh out the detail of the proposals, what we now know is that in 2010 some of our staff will transfer to local authorities and some will move across to the two new organisations. Even before that, some staff will move over within the LSC to work for the NAS which is aiming to be up and running by April 2009 at the latest. Throughout the transition period we will work with and support all our staff as we move to the new arrangements."

If anything it looks as if things will finish being at least as complicated as at present - eloquently described by Frank Coffield in The Impact of Policy on Learning and Inclusion in the New Learning and Skills Sector. Diagrams [130 kB PDF].

Sleep apnoea: joined up government needed to prevent road deaths

19 April 2008. Here is a link to the recently published United States Department of Transportation's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration 28 January 2008  [216 kB PDF], which contains a comprehensive review of the evidence that sleep apnoea suffering drivers are at substantially greater risk of crashing than non sufferers, along with a comprehensive set to (joined up) recommendations on how to lessen the risks.

2 April 2008 update. Here is a document I've had a hand in writing: Preventing death and injury caused by LGV and PSV drivers falling asleep at the wheel – the case for a joined-up approach by Government [10 page 55 k B PDF]. Please feel free to pass the URL of the document on to interested parties.

26 March 2008 update. Today the National Institute for Clinical Excellence published its decision that sufferers from sleep apnoea should be eligible for NHS treatment [34 kB PDF]. Meanwhile the British Government yesterday launched a campaign to increase awareness of the danger of tiredness in drivers, saying that about 1 in 5 road accidents are caused by tiredness - perhaps equating to 600 deaths a year. So far these two developments have not been properly integrated by Government, with the campaign materials bizarrely silent on the problem of sleep apnoea. But with luck, it will now only be a matter of time before further measures are introduced to ensure that employers conform to their obligations under Section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work Act, by identifying sleep apnoea sufferers in their workforce and preventing them from driving until they have been successfully treated.

Accessories for the OLPC laptop - Jonathan Hsu is looking for a UK distributor

Several weeks ago, through a roundabout route, I got into correspondence with Jonathan Hsu of Zoltantech in Taiwan, with the aim of getting hold of a USB-to-LAN adaptor for my OLPC laptop. Jonathan kindly remembered to tell me about Studio Fibonacci (the Zoltantech distributor of the adaptors in the US), and in passing Jonathan mentioned that he is in talks with OLPC about producing a USB-to-VGA adaptor, and also that he is looking for a UK distributor.  Jonathan's email address is jhsu "AT" zoltantech "DOT" com.

US Patent and Trademark Office merges re-examinations of Blackboard Inc.'s Patent Number 6988138

25/3/2008

Most of this post is over 12 months old, included as background to the fact that the US Patent and Trade Mark Office decided on 14 March 2008 to merge [284 kB PDF] the so far apparently dormant inter partes and ex parte re-examinations of Blackboard Inc.'s US Patent Number 6988138. It remains to be seen if this means that the re-examination is now imminent, or whether the merger itself will cause the Software Freedom Law Centre, which made the ex parte application, and Desire2Learn, which made the inter partes re-examination application, to work with each other in the process.

_____________________________________________________________________

Updated 26/2/2007; 27/2/2007

On 24 February 2007, the US Patent and Trade Mark Office agreed to Desire2Learn's  inter partes application for a re-examination of Blackboard's "Internet-based education support system and methods" patent. So US Patent Number 6988138 is to be re-examined from two directions: firstly as a result of the ex parte application by the Software Freedom Law Centre;  and secondly as a result of Desire2Learn's inter partes application. (26/2/2007 - Before you assume that this is necessarily a decision of major significance, remember that since 1999 over 90% of all inter partes re-examination requests have been granted, as this USP&TO document makes clear. For more on this read what US patent attorney David L McCombs has to say - and the report to which there is a link - in his comment on this Fortnightly Mailing posting from December 2006.) You would expect both Blackboard's and Desire2Learn's patent information sites to carry commentary on this in the next few days, and (27/2/2007 - Michael Feldstein now links to and comments on the Patent Office's published determination, which you can also access directly as a 1 MB ~ 40 page PDF), but from a common sense point of view

Yonatan Mendel on the lack of objectivity of Israeli journalists

Grim and informative piece reflecting on the deeply rooted lack of objectivity of Israeli journalists concerning Palestine, in the 6 March 2008 London Review of Books, by Yonatan Mendel, who until recently was the Middle East correspondent of Walla, which he describes as "Israel's most popular web site". This short extract does not do the article justice:

"When it comes to ‘security’ there is no such freedom. It’s ‘us’ and ‘them’, the IDF and the ‘enemy’; military discourse, which is the only discourse allowed, trumps any other possible narrative. It’s not that Israeli journalists are following orders, or a written code: just that they’d rather think well of their security forces.

In most of the articles on the conflict two sides battle it out: the Israel Defence Forces, on the one hand, and the Palestinians, on the other. When a violent incident is reported, the IDF confirms or the army says but the Palestinians claim: ‘The Palestinians claimed that a baby was severely injured in IDF shootings.’ Is this a fib? ‘The Palestinians claim that Israeli settlers threatened them’: but who are the Palestinians? Did the entire Palestinian people, citizens of Israel, inhabitants of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, people living in refugee camps in neighbouring Arab states and those living in the diaspora make the claim? Why is it that a serious article is reporting a claim made by the Palestinians? Why is there so rarely a name, a desk, an organisation or a source of this information? Could it be because that would make it seem more reliable?"

UK Lifelong Learning Inquiry: Call for evidence on technological change

The Independent Commission of Inquiry into the Future for Lifelong Learning, sponsored by NIACE, is putting out a public call for evidence on lifelong learning and technological change. Interested individuals and organisations are invited to submit written evidence to the Commission by Thursday 17th April 2008.

In particular, the Commission "invites evidence on the following areas:

1. What does the evidence tell us about the relationship between lifelong learning and technological change?
2. Where are the gaps in evidence in relation to this theme?
3. What key messages for the Inquiry we should extract?
4. What are the implications of the access to, and use by, young people of information and communication technologies?"

If you happen to have viewson this issue that you are willing to share, particularly evidence-based ones, feel free to post a comment here. They will certainly inform (within reason) any response that I am involved in writing, as well as what I say at a meeting that NIACE has convened in early April that I will be attending.