Rights management on knowledge-based digital content

The digital networks have facilitated the digital content access and sharing. Although this creates the opportunities to a wider dissemination of information and knowledge, on the other hand it creates challenges on what concerns the protection and enforcement of Intellectual Property (IP). This is particular important on the IP management of digital knowledge-based that is create on a daily basis on educational and research institutions, where a set of researchers and educators contribute with their knowledge creation works to the education value-adding processes. This paper will address the different scenarios/stages where the application of rights management solutions to the protection and management of knowledge-based content can provide an appropriate management of IP. These scenarios will consider the production and protection of the content, the rights establishment for the dissemination of content and the appropriate IP enforcement on the content user-side. This would establish a global environment where knowledge-based content IPR can be governed, allowing authors to establish the conditions that allow others to use their own work

The Effectiveness of PDAs for Enhancing Collaboration in M-Learning

University students live in an increasingly mobile society and they carry increasingly sophisticated mobile devices, including wireless personal digital assistants (PDAs). For the first time, mobile technology and student lifestyle choices are converging to allow mobile learning (m-learning) to be a viable choice for delivery and execution of coursework material. This study addresses the question: In what ways do mobile devices change student interactions in an e-learning, collaborative education exercise? An experimental design methodology is used with control (desktop users) and experimental (PDA users) groups. The study finds that students who use PDAs tend to write shorter messages than desktop users and mobile learners tend to go online more often. The results are inconclusive regards time online per session. The study concludes with implications for instruction and instructors