The NOSE

The Several Habits of Wildly Successful del.icio.us Users

I have known about del.iciou.us but haven't had the time to put the pieces together or the knowledge to use the tool effectively. A great posting by Slacker Manager --"The Several Habits of Wildly Successful del.icio.us Users" has finally put me on the del.iciou.us path once and for all. Via Portals and KM. Thanks Bill.

Gregory and Caruso on Net Neutrality and Higher Education

In an article in the Bangor News, John H. Gregory (executive director of Information Technologies at the University of Maine) and Ralph Caruso (chief information officer at the University of Maine System) advocate net neutrality from the perspective of higher education.

"The network operators are now proposing to create a two-tiered network infrastructure that allows only certain applications onto a “premium” Internet lane leaving universities, entrepreneurs, consumers, small businesses and any other individuals without deep pockets to the slower lane. Taxpayers of our state already pay hard-earned money to support state-funded organizations like our universities, libraries, K-12 schools and museums.

Under the network operators’ plan, these vital distance learning courses and other Internet related educational programs may be cut due to already scarce education resources. Consumers, small businesses, students and other innovators also unable to pay these premium fees would also be left behind in their ability to compete and make their inventions readily available to the public via the Internet."

Net Neutrality

I try to stay away from politics but this one is just too important. Net Neutrality. Understand it. Do something about it.

The US Congress is considering an overhaul of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. If some of the Telcos (those who control the last mile of the Internet infrastructure) have their way, they would be able to slap a tarrif on internet content of their choosing.

Doug Ross has an excellent article on this topic called "Net Neutrality: Why It's a Big Deal". Also check out Mark Luker's The End of the Net As We Know It?

Educause has created a special resource page on the topic and is urging everyone in the higher education community to contact their congressmen. Do it!

Identity Management in Universities

We have begun an Identity Management Project at MNSCU (Minnesota State Colleges and Universities) to tie together the disparate systems and various user authentication and authorization components. The MNSCU system comprises 32 institutions, approximately 300,000 students, and 50,000 faculty, staff, contractors, and other affiliates.

I have started a separate blog called "Identity Management" at Wordpress to track the project.

Rebranding The Nose

I am rebranding this weblog to focus more directly on IT in higher education. I will continue to write about the topics that interest me, such as open source, innovation, and elearning, but I will do so now more directly through the lens of IT in higher education.