Liked Cory Doctorow: Tech Monopolies and the Insufficient Necessity of Interoperability (Locus Online)
It’s been 150 years since a lack of coordination among new Australian states created the “middle-gauge muddle”: a nation whose railroad tracks are laid at different widths depending on which part of the country you’re in. In 150 years, no one has figured out how to make a rail car that can change its wheelbase midway through its journey and after hundreds of attempts, Australia is giving up on interoperable rolling stock. Instead, they’re tear­ing up thousands of kilometers’ worth of rail and putting down new ones.

Enjoyable read. One of the things I love about blogging is rss which provides all sorts of interoperability. Micro.blog is a marvellous example.

Listened Episode 46: Lessons from Scotland by The Impact Podcast from anchor.fm
The OECD has published its long-awaited report into Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence (CfE). With Curriculum for Wales sharing many similarities with CfE, Jane and Finola discuss whether Wales can avoid some of the issues raised by the OECD.

Given I am pretty unlikely to read the whole of the OECD report on CfE I found this podcast very interesting. It also encouraged me to read at least the executive summary in the holidays. The hosts discuss CfE from a Welsh perspective of following in the footsteps of CfE and avoiding the pitfalls.

Both the report and the podcast hosts made the point about lack of time being a main barrier to staff involvement in curriculum development.

One of the areas discussed was the difficulty in communication the vision of CfE or Curriculum for Wales. This leads me to think a good way, given teachers are time poor, would be a series of podcasts which can be consumed while commuting or dish washing (if anyone washes dishes by hand any more). I certainly found this podcast easier to digest than I would reading the whole report.

Sidenote, the podcast is on spotify/anchor. I spent a bit of time playing with anchor as it developed but lost touch as it pivoted one time too many.

Replied to Parasocial relationships through digital media by Doug BelshawDoug Belshaw (Doug Belshaw's Thought Shrapnel)
I think we've all felt a close affinity and, dare I say, relationship with people who wouldn't know who we were if we met them in real life. In fact, I've kind of experienced the other side of this due to my TEDx Talk and the TIDE podcast. People at events would come and talk to me as if they knew m

On the other end, this makes me feel a bit uncomfortable listening to some podcasts. I used to listen to quite a few popular mac/tech podcasts, but the feeling that I knew these folk was somehow quite unpleasant. 1. I don’t & 2. I live in a very different world. They are often over long with a lot of friendly, between presenters, chat. I now keep an eye and dip in occasionally when the topic looks good thank to Castro’s triage.

Tide, I very much enjoyed because I had met irl Doug and virtually Dai. My own broadcasting/podcasting efforts  were mostly aimed at folk just like me. I’d guess I knew many of our audience.

Walking round Ardinning Wildlife reserve for a picnic lunch today. The large keep your dogs on a lead signs seem generally ignored. Today a guy’s spaniel took off & quartered a section of moor, 2 curlew going crazy over it. Bloke could not catch or call his dog. Mood: grumpy.

Replied to a tweet by Blair Minchin (Twitter)

The response to this has been very interesting.

Has teacherinstagram become more useful than #edutwitter ? https://twitter.com/mr_minchin/status/1412090247165497351

I use Instagram for photo-sharing rather than Edu. Feel it is becoming more & more problematic. Hard to share, link to, link from, lots of adverts and horrible algorithm. Very silo like.

Replied to a tweet by Kenny Pieper (Twitter)

'Twitter did something that I would not have thought possible: It stole reading from me. What is it stealing from you?' https://twitter.com/janinegibson/status/1412044936476872704

1. Reading your & other blogs.
2. Resources, Twitter is good for easy short term sharing not for long term discovery.
3. Time

Posting this via my blog, where it belongs and is organised by me in my online memory.