BlogForever D2.6: Data Extraction Methodology

This report outlines an inquiry into the area of web data extraction, conducted within the context of blog preservation. The report reviews theoretical advances and practical developments for implementing data extraction. The inquiry is extended through an experiment that demonstrates the effectiveness and feasibility of implementing some of the suggested approaches. More specifically, the report discusses an approach based on unsupervised machine learning that employs the RSS feeds and HTML representations of blogs. It outlines the possibilities of extracting semantics available in blogs and demonstrates the benefits of exploiting available standards such as microformats and microdata. The report proceeds to propose a methodology for extracting and processing blog data to further inform the design and development of the BlogForever platform

Open budget data: mapping the landscape

This report offers analysis of the emerging issue of open budget data, which has begun to gain traction amongst advocates and practitioners of financial transparency. Issues and initiatives associated with the emerging issue of open budget data are charted in different forms of digital media. The objective is to enable practitioners – in particular civil society organisations, intergovernmental organisations, governments, multilaterals and funders – to navigate this developing field and to identify trends, gaps and opportunities for supporting it. How public money is collected and distributed is one of the most pressing political questions of our time, influencing the health, well-being and prospects of billions of people. Decisions about fiscal policy affect everyone - determining everything from the resourcing of essential public services, to the capacity of public institutions to take action on global challenges such as poverty, inequality or climate change. Digital technologies have the potential to transform the way that information about public money is organised, circulated and utilised in society, which in turn could shape the character of public debate, democratic engagement, governmental accountability and public participation in decision-making about public funds. Data could play a vital role in tackling the democratic deficit in fiscal policy and in supporting better outcomes for citizens

Changing a BTEC computing programme of study towards a more inclusive paradigm

The issue with a product curriculum is that it focuses on the ends and lends itself to an outdated and exclusionary mode of teaching: ‘educational banking’ teacher-led instruction, where educators deposit knowledge into educates, who are passives in this process. This report explains the contemporary meaning of inclusion within education and selects inclusive parameters, based on research findings, that are used, as a measure, to determine the inherent inclusiveness of three dominant curriculum models: (1) product, (2) process and (3) praxis and two learning theories: (1) constructivism and (2) connectivism, which are both innately student-led forms of learning theory. Furthermore, a focus of this report is to determine whether technology, and which eTools, can be employed to develop and promote an increasingly inclusive, participative and collaborative classroom environment, in other words, a student-led inclusive contemporary classroom supported by technology. To inform, and justify, the selection, embedding and importance of eTools, desk research was conducted and a student survey was carried out to assess learners’ expectations and preferences in regards to collaboration and the embedding of technology in classroom activities. Research findings regarding inclusion in education, curriculum models and learning theories accompanied by an analysis of the student survey results are used to propose a pedagogical approach based on Aristotle’s (modified) three disciplines of knowledge that places technology are the heart of student-led collaborative and engaging classroom: a hybrid process-praxis approach to curriculum based on a constructivist-connectivist approach to learning

An investigation into blogging as an opportunity for work-integrated learning for journalism students.

Blogging has become a well-established method of online communication and publication, used by individuals and organisations to disseminate news, ideas and information. In their earlier forms, blogs were used as online diaries, but have now evolved into complex digital environments. This paper argues that these online environments with their associated communities, offer journalism students opportunities for work-integrated learning. It argues that blog environments have the potential to enable students in develop journalism-specific skills, and enhance transferable graduate attributes including creativity, sophisticated communication competencies, initiative and problem solving. It suggests that blogging offers a platform for accessing experiential learning, and as such should be considered within a curriculum for work-integrated learning in the journalism and media subject are

The Anonymous Poster: How to Protect Internet Users’ Privacy and Prevent Abuse

The threat of anonymous Internet posting to individual privacy has been met with congressional and judicial indecisiveness. Part of the problem stems from the inherent conflict between punishing those who disrespect one\u27s privacy by placing a burden on the individual websites and continuing to support the Internet\u27s development. Additionally, assigning traditional tort liability is problematic as the defendant enjoys an expectation of privacy as well, creating difficulty in securing the necessary information to proceed with legal action. One solution to resolving invasion of privacy disputes involves a uniform identification verification program that ensures user confidentiality while promoting accountability for malicious behavior

Choice of Information: A Study of Twitter News Sharing during the 2009 Israel-Gaza Conflict

The study explores determinants of the prominence of public information sources in Twitter. Twitter users are conceptualized as the “gated” who play an active role in selecting and distributing news sources through their Twitter messages. Using Twitter data on the Israel-Gaza conflict, the study identifies three determinants that characterize information sources: whether they are produced by mainstream media, whether they are filtered through aggregator services, and the number of in-links to the source media generated by the online public

Participatory Transformations

Learning, in its many forms, from the classroom to independent study, is being transformed by new practices emerging around Internet use. Conversation, participation and community have become watchwords for the processes of learning promised by the Internet and accomplished via technologies such as bulletin boards, wikis, blogs, social software and repositories, devices such as laptops, cell phones and digital cameras, and infrastructures of internet connection, telephone, wireless and broadband. This chapter discusses the impact of emergent, participatory trends on education. In learning and teaching participatory trends harbinge a radical transformation in who learns from whom, where, under what circumstances, and for what and whose purpose. They bring changes in where we find information, who we learn from, how learning progresses, and how we contribute to our learning and the learning of others. These trends indicate a transformation to "ubiquitous learning" ??? a continuous anytime, anywhere, anyone contribution and retrieval of learning materials and advice on and through the Internet and its technologies, niches and social spaces.not peer reviewe