An ancient edublog
D’Arcy is having a good time with spam but I’m having an even better one.
After a couple of weeks of being off and being deluged despite the host of spam blockers I’ve got installed here I stumbled across WP-Gatekeeper and, well, as long as you’re prepared to answer a really rather simple question in the comments field, set by me, then you don’t get through.
Not painful at all, come and have a go if you fancy. Net result… no spam.
“If students are being put through standardized testing and being forced to submit to institutionally defined learning objectives without their informed consent, that is violence. To what extent is any given educator an agent of violence? Why is the foundation of our educational institutions one of control and performance rather than love and respect? What kind of world are we bringing into being this way?”
Well that’s next years April 1st gag scuppered.
Still, at least it saves me saying ‘well, they’re moreorless the same’.
You know who I’d absolutely *love* to be working for now… any of these basically (bar the obvious two). Seriously though, in the next 10 years this’ll be the key to their undoing (of sorts)… a two horse race is much easier to win, the MS model just doesn’t apply on the net.
Google reader looks very cool but as long as I can’t import my xml subscriptions from bloglines… I ‘aint trying it and even then.. it doesn’t look like it matches/extends/simplifies the functionality in any way.
Sometimes I wonder why people don’t get it… just copy whatever Mark Fletcher (Yahoo Groups, Bloglines… could you think of more effective online communication apps???) does and you’ll be alright ;)
Duh: As Rob points out I could just save the xml file as an opml file and upload it. Tum te tum.
Am meeting tomorrow with Josie of EdTechUK, Ben of Elgg and Peter of Schoolblogs… three people that I’m seriously looking forward to having a chat with!!!
So if you’re in Birmingham tomorrow (Saturday 7th) and can make it to the IKON gallery for 3… why don’t ya come along too.
This is the third day after the op and everything is going as planned which is wonderful… still a few more days to make sure things are working but – fingers crossed, touch wood etc. etc. – the worst is well over.
Thanks for all the emails, comments and support… you dunno how special you mob are!
Oh, one more thing, pass it on!
OK, am now officially on leave for a month.
Am spending this week with the girls (and doing a million other things) and flying to the UK on Friday.
My Dad’s having a partial oesophagectomy on Tuesday 27th so again good vibes would be great… it’s a very full on operation but also one that they do very very regularly and well (one of the leading places for it in the UK!) so while we’re all anxious, things should be OK.
But tha blogging never ends y’know and there’s a meetup in Birmingham on the 8th… so along and tell someone who cares :D There’s even a wiki up for venues, signups etc… but don’t all rush there at once…
Over and out for a bit I think.
Am in serious head scratching mode at the moment as looking for a simple solution to allowing people to leave comments on items in a particular (non-blog) page.
Basically I just want a little icon / text link for a popup where people can add a comment / view other peoples.
Doesn’t have to be anything more… it’s to allow people to contribute to case studies that are presented as regular html pages.
Haloscan is great and *I think* would do the job just fine but I get the feeling that people wouldn’t like the third party mechanism and certainly not the ads.
Any ideas?