(via Stephen Downes) This is why I love the Internet and Weblogs…well, one of the reasons, anyway. Something new comes along (Podcasting), a bunch of people start throwing stuff at the proverbial wall to see what sticks, the meme spreads like the disbelief around the world at the results of our election, and someone like Steve Sloan at San Jose State University cranks up Edupodder.com to filter it all for us.

I have been thinking a lot of the potential of the medium. I really think there is something here for education!

In my opinion Podcasting is a great tool:

for distance learning

to facilitate self-paced learning

for remediation of slower learners

to allow faculty to offer advanced and or highly motivated learners extra content

for helping students with reading and/or other learning disabilities

for multi-lingual education

to provide the ability for educators to feature guest speakers from remote locations

to allow guest speakers the ability to present once to many sections and classes

to allow educators to escape the tedium of lecturing

to offer a richer learning environment

Way too much fun…now, if he just had an RSS feed.
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Last week when I saw this on James Farmer’s Weblog, I wondered what was up:

“Please note that all of the material in this weblog or any services or support that I may provide through this weblog or incsub.org are entirely separate from my employer. This is all done through me, at my expense, separated entirely from my 9-5 life and in no way representative of anyone else’s views apart from my own.”

Now it appears his university has given him a difficult choice; keep the blog or keep the job, but not both:

Last Tuesday I received a memorandum from a manager cc’d by am exec. director instructing me to cease supporting and promoting weblogging, wikis or any other technology not officially supported by the University.

“Cease supporting weblogging.” Incredible. In James’ case, the university sees blog and wikivangelism as in conflict with the use of their big brand CMS. In other cases, it’s the fear of the unknown.

But whatever the case, this work that we’re doing, this exploration into the effects and potentials of the read/write Web is important and has consequence. James is one of many voices that has contributed mightily to my understanding of all of this. To ask him to stop his work is first ignorant and second offensive. And we need to make our outrage felt. As Stephen Downes says:

Silencing James Farmer is to silence us all - and we will not be silent.

Go leave a comment of support on James’ site.
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