Welcome to episode 135 of the EdTech Situation Room from May 22, 2019, where technology news meets educational analysis. This week Jason Neiffer (@techsavvyteach) and Wesley Fryer (@wfryer) discussed the threat posed by cyberattacks in the airline industry, a recent ransomware attack on Oklahoma City Public Schools (@okcps), and revelations of Google storing passwords as plaintext for over a decade. Wes discussed some of his takeaways from a recent Oklahoma education cybersecurity workshop, the importance of cybersecurity jobs, continued troubles with Microsoft Windows10 updates, and the security value of adding a recovery phone number to your Google account. The announced ban of Chinese telecommunications technologies from the US Government this week affecting Huawei (among other companies), the US Supreme Court ruling against Apple involving their App Store monopoly lawsuit, ChromeOS news from Adobe, and some eye opening statistics about eSports and the earnings of young gamers rounded out the show topics. Geeks of the Week included SuperHosts from AirBnB, TextExpander for Chrome, and a great video from Derek Muller (@veritasium) explaining big changes to the YouTube algorithm affecting creators, viewers, and the overall quality of YouTube video content. Please follow us on Twitter @edtechSR for updates, and join us LIVE on Wednesday nights if you can (normally) at 10 pm Eastern / 9 pm Central / 8 pm Mountain / 7 pm Pacific or 3 am UTC. All shownotes are available on http://edtechSR.com/links.
Welcome to episode 94 of the EdTech Situation Room from May 9, 2018, where technology news meets educational analysis. This week newly minted Ph.D. Dr. Jason Neiffer (@techsavvyteach) and Dr. Wesley Fryer (@wfryer) discussed lots of news from the Google IO developer’s conference, as well as news from the Microsoft Build Conference. The continued march of artificial intelligence is evident in the forthcoming release of Google Duplex, which was demonstrated at Google IO and allows your Google Assistant to make phone calls to real people and book appointments for things like haircuts and restaurant reservations. Google’s new Android P operating system will focus on wellness and greater awareness of screentime to promote healthy living. They also discussed Facebook’s “Sauron Alert” feature for employees, now called “Security Watchdog,” which is not available publicly but warns when someone is using content or personal information in unauthorized ways on the platform. Microsoft’s announcements for WindowsOS features which integrate with both Android phones as well as iPhones were discussed, as well as their efforts to bring machine learning benefits to all their applications. The use of AI technologies to potentially open up access to the Vatican’s Secret Library was highlighted, along with an older article (September 2017) from “The Conversation” about how software licensing restrictions affecting objects we purchase for our homes is bringing a property rights / intellectual property rights situation into our lives which is regressive and feudal in nature. Geeks of the week included open source software for DVD ripping (Handbrake) and YouTube video downloading (y2mate), as well as software for identifying and installing optimal Windows OS drivers on older computer systems (Snappy Driver Installer). Check out our shownotes for links to all referenced resources, and links to articles we didn’t have time to discuss in this week’s show on edtechSR.com/links. Please follow us on Twitter @edtechSR for updates, and join us live weekly on Wednesday nights at 10 pm Eastern / 9 pm Central / 8 pm Mountain / 7 pm Pacific.
Welcome to episode 92 of the EdTech Situation Room from April 25, 2018, where technology news meets educational analysis. This week Jason Neiffer (@techsavvyteach) and Wesley Fryer (@wfryer) discussed new national standards for online courses in the USA, a strange case of liability for an ewaste recycler, exciting updates for Gmail from Google, and several other tidbits of Google news. These included the movie editor in Google Photos, controversy at Google over proposed AI contracts with the U.S. Department of Defense, and a strange Gmail spam issue which modified email headers so new messages showed up as “sent mail.” Forthcoming updates to the YouTube Kids app featuring human-moderated channels and a new Google Tasks update rounded out the Google focused news updates. On the Apple front, Tim Cook’s announcement that MacOS and iOS will NOT be merging was mentioned, along with sizable reported profits from the iOS port of the game Fortnite. A few thoughts about SmugMug’s recent purchase of Flickr from Verizon were shared. Security hacks including hotel door locks and home wifi routers by Russian agents were also discussed. It was great to have Jason back after a multi-week hiatus as he completed his dissertation, which he’s scheduled to defend in early May. Follow the show on Twitter @edtechSR for updates and please try and join us live on Wednesday evenings if you can on YouTube Live. Thanks for watching / listening!
Welcome to episode 87 of the EdTech Situation Room from February 28, 2018, where technology news meets educational analysis. This week Jason Neiffer (@techsavvyteach) and Wes Fryer (@wfryer) discussed news from the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, net neutrality debate in the U.S. Congress, the forthcoming freemium option in Microsoft Teams, and new Chromebooks from Lenovo. Additional topics included Facebook’s facial recognition features, outlier conspiracy theories focusing on the recent Florida school shooting fueled by social media, and YouTube’s reinvigorated policing of videos required to adhere to community guidelines. Challenges for Android OS security, a possible replacement of Android OS by Google (with Flutter), and the prevalence of “credential stuffing” with online accounts rounded out the show’s main topics. Geeks of the week included a new Google MOOC focusing on AI and machine learning, compatibility of Mac Magic trackpads with Chromebooks, and the free Google Docs Add-On “OrangeSlice: Teacher Rubric.” Please follow us on Twitter @edtechSR for updates on our show. Thanks for viewing / listening!
Welcome to episode 50 of the EdTech Situation Room from May 3, 2017, where technology news meets educational analysis. Visit http://edtechsr.com/links to access all referenced links from our show. This week Jason Neiffer (@techsavvyteach), Wesley Fryer (@wfryer) and Ben Wilkoff (@bhwilkoff) discussed today’s widespread Google Docs phishing attack, Microsoft’s newly announced Windows-S operating system, new Microsoft laptop announcements targeting the Chromebook market and MacBook users, and recent controversy regarding the website Unroll.me selling anonymized user data to advertisers. They also discussed Mark Zuckerberg’s recent forecast for the future of social media and screens (mixed-reality), a new Kickstarter campaign (Jelly, The Smallest 4G Smartphone), and cybersecurity. Geeks of the week included Google Trips (Jason), the Clips app for iPhone (Wes), and the Pocket Video from iOS (Ben). Be sure to follow us on Twitter @edtechSR for updates and show date/time changes. Normally we’re LIVE on Wednesday nights at 10 pm Eastern / 9 pm Central / 8 pm Mountain / 7 pm Pacific. Please join us live if your schedule permits for our upcoming shows!
