Welcome to episode 123 of the EdTech Situation Room from January 30, 2019, where technology news meets educational analysis. This week Jason Neiffer (@techsavvyteach) and Wesley Fryer (@wfryer) discussed the advance of YouTube’s local video content, Google’s attempt to address conspiracy / outlier content on YouTube, and the new Gmail app for Android and iOS. The global decline in smartphone sales, the expectation smartphones are going to “get weird” to boost sales, Google’s efforts to address website validity confusion by consumers, and companies attempting to turn surveillance capitalism’s economic model upside down were also discussed. On the security front, recent comparison studies of paid versus free antivirus software suites, Facebook’s apps and campaigns to wiretap teenage behavior and pay teens for their data, and Apple’s privacy Facetime snafu were also explored. Companies (like Square) pushing Chromebooks across their enterprise as primary computers for employees (even designers!), the Pinebook Linux laptop, and an extraordinary claim from Israeli scientists that genomics will cure cancer worldwide within 12 months rounded up this week’s show topics. Geeks of the week included YouTube TV, Dell Command Update, video editing software ClipChamp, and Digi.me. 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 115 of the EdTech Situation Room from November 21, 2018, where technology news meets educational analysis. This week Jason Neiffer (@techsavvyteach) and Wesley Fryer (@wfryer) discussed the past week’s technology news through an educational lens. Topics for the show included the recent outages of cloud services including Microsoft’s Azure Active Directory and LastPass Password Manager, and multiple signs of “The Technology Correction.” These included calls for regulating Facebook, surveys showing many young computer scientists do not want to work for Facebook, and Facebook’s apparent inability to regulate / fix itself. Processor upgrades to the Samsung Chromebook Plus, the enduring value of Google Pixelbooks, and Black Friday week deals on Pixelbooks were also discussed. On the security front, a new, stealthy Russian hacking tool, a phishing test tool, the first amendment and Facebook, and student protests over Facebook’s sponsored learning management system “Summit Learning” were also discussed. The use of streetlight concealed cameras by US security agencies and the viability of the iPad Pro as a laptop replacement were topics rounding out the show. Geeks of the week included T-Mobile’s One Plus Plan (great for international travel) and a technique for bypassing news website free article limits with browser incognito mode. 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