The SELF Conference 2008 Fira de Barcelona Barcelona 2008-07-13 2008-07-17 5 2008 08:00 00:15 09:00 00:30 UOC Computer Lab Hands-on workshop on SELF Wouter Tebbens 09:30 00:30 UOC Computer Lab Hands-on workshop on SELF Nagarjuna G. 10:00 00:30 UOC Computer Lab workshop 10:30 01:30 UOC Computer Lab Installation demo Hands-on workshop on SELF David Jacovkis 12:00 01:00 UOC Computer Lab Hands-on workshop on SELF Nair Rajiv Bipin S. Apandkar 13:00 01:00 UOC Computer Lab 14:00 02:00 UOC Computer Lab Hands-on workshop on SELF Meena 16:00 00:30 UOC Computer Lab 16:30 01:30 UOC Computer Lab Hands-on workshop on SELF Nair Rajiv Bipin S. Apandkar 15:00 01:00 Plenary Sessions other 16:00 00:30 Plenary Sessions welcome Welcome speech from the General Co-Chairs Plenary lecture en David Megias Wouter Tebbens 16:30 01:30 Plenary Sessions rms Opening keynote Plenary lecture en Richard Stallman http:// 18:00 00:30 Plenary Sessions Plenary other 19:00 00:30 Plenary Sessions other 19:30 02:30 Plenary Sessions reception other en Recepie Recepie 08:30 00:30 Plenary Sessions 09:00 01:00 Plenary Sessions Keynote speech Plenary lecture en The SELF project was started in 2006, to promote the use of Free Software and Open Standards in and by education. One of its outcomes is the initial development of an online platform for the creation, remixing and translation of education materials. The founder and coordinator of SELF, Mr. Wouter Tebbens will explain the set up of the project, its results so far and perspectives for the future. All people interested in building knowledge collaboratively are welcome to participate in SELF. Be SELFish, share your knowledge! Links: http://selfproject.eu/ http://beta.selfplatform.eu/ Wouter Tebbens http://fkft.eu/2008/slides/tebbens.odp Slides of this talk 10:00 00:30 Plenary Sessions Importing and exporting learning materials Educating in Freedom en Jordi Serra i Ruiz Slides of this talk 10:30 00:30 Plenary Sessions Educating in Freedom en Federico Heinz Slides of this talk 11:00 00:45 Plenary Sessions contest en Contest Contest 11:45 00:30 Plenary Sessions Educating in Freedom lecture en SELF has contributed on various levels to freedom in software and education. The work of the SELF Legal Experts Group (LEG) has helped to evolve a better understanding of Open Standards and provided a reference line for free educational materials. The coordinator of the SELF LEG, FSFE president Georg Greve, will provide an insight on how SELF has helped advance the state of the art, and how the work done in the SELF consortium will provide lasting benefit to the Free Software community. Georg Greve Slides of this talk 12:15 00:30 Plenary Sessions Educating in Freedom en Nagarjuna G. 12:45 00:30 Plenary Sessions Educating in Freedom en The authors have submitted a full-length paper: http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/vanleeuwen.pdf Despite the fact that public sector's interest in open source is intensifying, and there is an increasing demand for skills related to Open Source applications, both from a user as well as from a developer point of view, the uptake in educational and vocational training programmes is not yet mainstream. The TRAIN-OS project presends to give and answer to this challenge by providing access to F/OSS training materials, based upon an analysis of the needs of the trainers and trainees. The paper will present the results from the research and will provide insight on the information, knowledge and training needs from European trainers. Keywords: Training, Open Source Manon van Leeuwen Full text paper 13:15 01:45 Plenary Sessions en 15:00 01:00 Plenary Sessions cst Keynote speech Plenary en Carlos Castro Castro Slides of this talk 16:00 01:00 Plenary Sessions Panel discussion Free Knowledge in Public Bodies workshop Karel De Vriendt Carlos Castro Castro Jordi Vivancos Albert Pérez Monfort Manuel Velardo Slides of this talk 17:00 00:30 Plenary Sessions contest en 17:30 01:00 Plenary Sessions Panel discussion Free Knowledge in Public Bodies Karel De Vriendt Jordi Vivancos Albert Pérez Monfort Manuel Velardo Carlos Castro Castro 10:00 00:30 Room1 Free Knowledge in Society en In knowledge development, we stand where software developers stood almost 30 years ago. Tools and techniques are crude, and methodologies are limited. If one freely distributes one work - whether it is a database, a learning module or a scientific paper - it is often done in a manner which impedes re-use. Significant effort must be expended to extract and re-format material so that it is useful for the purposes of others. In software, similar problems were encountered, and a major way they were addressed was by an increased focus on 'componentization'. Initially, most programmers would concentrate solely on writing a piece of code that would fulfil the purpose at hand - with little regard for its readability, documentation, and future reusability. Gradually programmers increasingly showed an interest in developing discrete 'packages' (or libraries) of code that could be easily re-combined in a multiplicity of different contexts for a multitude of different purposes. Unwieldly "all-in-one" solutions were replaced by flexible and recyclable components and patterns. Today, tools such as the 'apt-get' and 'yum' package managers facilitate the recombination of this multiplicity of packages into usable Linux 'distributions' (Debian and Fedora/Redhat respectively). In so doing, they demonstrate the enormous potential of componentization: thousands of interdependent packages can be easily located, acquired and installed. The Comprehensive Knowledge Archive Network (CKAN) is a key part of a strategy to provide support for 'componentization' in knowledge development. Named after several free/open source software archives - such as CPAN, CTAN and CRAN - it aims to provide a fully open, registry of knowledge 'packages' that others are free to access, distribute, modify and build upon. While good knowledge APIs will be developed discipline by discipline, CKAN focuses on automated discovery, indexing and 'installation' of open knowledge packages ? a 'package' in this context denotes any collection of material (datasets, documents, images etc) substantial enough, and with sufficient structure, to warrant distribution together (for example a large collection of photos, a database, a complete set of Shakespeare's works). CKAN will be useful to those across the community of knowledge users and producers - including scholars, educators, librarians and information professionals. For example, climate scientists and environmental information providers alike will be able to explore and automatically acquire journal articles, datasets, and graphical representations pertaining to atmospheric thermodynamics - based on detailed domain specific metadata. A combination of liberal licensing policies and new technologies is creating an unprecedented opportunity for the growth of a rich and vibrant knowledge society. Componentization is crucial to realising this potential and CKAN is the first step on the road to making such componentization a reality. Jonathan Gray 10:30 00:30 Room1 Notes towards a methodology of teaching and promoting the use of the collaborative web, FOSS and standards, applied to artistic, cultural and third sector promotion Free Knowledge in Society en MEPART is an initiative founded in 2006 to provide basic training and counselling for artistic communities, NGO's and third sector activists in Mexico City, on the use of digital technologies for the promotion of cultural projects. The proposed presentation exposes, at its first part, abridged theoretical explanations for the curricular composition of the workshop (2006 version) and its progressive transformation; specially regarding subsequent counselling of artistic and cultural promotion projects in Mexico, public institutions and NGO's; practical situations and classroom experiences. The second part is a general analysis of the project, after the proposal was confronted to practical cases; two situations are revised : 1) the first emission of the workshop in 2006 and the tracking of two artists and a starter NGO that finished their training 2) the application of MEPART's proposals for the migration of the 35th Festival Internacional Cervantino (Mexico) Promotion Department to a 90% FOSS environment, and the adoption of open standards for audiovisual and textual materials. Finally the presentation exposes subjective but analytical answers around three major questions / general problems when teaching and promoting the use of Open Technologies, Open Source Software and File Formats Standardisation regarding the work of ARTISTS and Festivals: 1. It's a known fact that current state of analytic tools and our understanding of symbolic networking through collaborative digital media, has no objective methods of evaluation, providing its absolute multicultural axis. How could we convince and promote standardisation and strategical use of social networking through digital means, without confronting common inaertia? 2. How to eliminate immediate practicality of non-standard technologies at artistic environments? (The “0A” initiative - MEPART's proposal for no the conscious use of commercial media creation software) 3. Notes for the creation of a set of drafts for multimedia created document handling for the use of Festival networks and artistic materials. José Serralde April 2008 Related topics: teaching networking, revision of proxemics, teaching communication theories, copyright, Debian Linux, SVG, ODF, history of computing since numerical systems, i8n, EFA and Festival Networks, L. Lessig, art studies in Mexico, state of FOSS adoption within the third sector, Hinchcliffe's visualization, , Complete submission includes: · CC licensed complete presentation text and PDF slideshow. · Complete bibliography. · First draft of complete MEPART's written recommendation for the use of open technologies within artistic promotion environments. http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/serralde.pdf José María Serralde Ruiz 11:45 00:30 Room1 Free Knowledge in Society en The authors have submitted a full-length paper: http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/wiersma.pdf Wybo Wiersma Full text paper 12:15 00:30 Room1 Free Knowledge in Society Shane will talk about the types of licence that provide and protect freedoms of use, study, sharing and improvement in both technology and educational text. He will review the main challenges that platforms like SELF may encounter from the legal point of view and what kind of mechanisms help support reliable legal infrastructure. He will also discuss the work of FSFE's Freedom Task Force in providing education and support services relating to legal support for Free Software in Europe. Shane Martin Coughlan Slides of this talk 12:45 00:30 Room1 Free Knowledge in Society en Free Software and Content licenses: more international, more compatible? Malcolm Bain, id law partners and UOC Free software and even free content licenses were born and grew up in the USA. They have a US education (legal framework), a US look and feel (document style), and a US (legal) vocabulary. Specific examples are the original GPL, LGPL and GFDL licenses, the BSD and X/MIT licenses, the Mozilla PL, etc. But just as the Internet has expanded and gathered more users, Free Software and Free Content know no boundaries. It is reckoned that GNU/Linux now receives more contributions from Europe than the USA [numbers], more projects on Sourceforge come from outside the US than within, and more content on the Internet is generated outside the US [numbers]. Certain projects have even migrated away from the US, due to certain restrictions like Export Controls (FreeBSD, in Canada). On the other hand, licenses have grown from the 10 or so recognised FOSS licenses in 1985 to more than X licenses listed on FSF license page or 65 licenses certified by OSI. A nightmare for hackers and content producers (remixers, among them) alike. We even have an “EU Public license”. Just when we may think that we are getting to grips with the compatibilities among software licenses (?!), along come a new breed of content licenses – the Creative Commons licenses in particular – with a new language (vocabulary), background (legal framework) and several varieties (copyleft, non copyleft, etc.), that are not necessarily compatible with free software or existing free document licenses. Finally, online platforms are getting more and more sophisticated, mixing or aggregating content with technology – requiring higher levels of compatibility between software and content licenses, e.g. spoken text under free content licenses incorporated into accessible web platforms. These issues of compatibility and internationalisation have basically meant a large headache for project leaders, content mixers and editors, platform builders and … fees for the legal profession. And we know that free software projects and educational / research projects don’t have a budget for lawyers. So from a legal point of view, the free knowledge (as a generic concept for both technology and content) has met with unnecessary legal barriers: licenses that are not understood in non-US legal jurisdictions – or that may have different impacts in those jurisdictions, and incompatibilities when mixing software or content. [examples of problems – license choice, integration of components, integration of software and content, Wikipedia (J Wales comment)] What has happened over the last 3-4 years? We have seen a move to make licenses more compatible and more international Internationalisation: GPLv3 seeks specifically to remove jurisdiction specific terminology, and does not apply any specific law o jurisdiction for resolving conflicts. This second point has also been taken up by the Open Source License (provider specific) and the CDDL adaptation of the Mozilla License. Creative commons has taken another approach: adaptation of the general terms of the license (principal provisions) to many jurisdictions, with version 3 providing that each “principal provisions” is compatible with the same version under a different language and legal framework. This should achieve international compatibility while allowing content providers the certainty of offering content under their own legal framework – something especially useful for public administrations. License compatibility: one of the other important objectives of GPLv3 was to become more compatible with certain licenses – the Apache 3.0 in particular - , and remove “objections” or obstacles to compatibility on non-IPR based characteristics that are not fundamental for the FSF: different wording for disclaimers, different wording for patent clauses (while maintaining an acceptable framework) or specific requests regarding trademark usage or promotion. This type of difference no longer creates incompatibility for the GPLv3. Hopefully, the GDFL will go down the same road, and try to achieve compatibility with the Creative Commons BY-SA license, which will help out the Wikipedia enormously. The EUPL has taken a different road, including an annex of specifically acceptable license, which, while not necessarily being compatible with the terms of the EUPL, are or will be considered compatible for integration and redistribution purposes. The Sakai community has adopted an Apache style license that should help interoperability – while responding to the concerns of the patent-holding academic community. The preliminary conclusion – pending more detailed analysis of the interaction of the GPLv3 with other licenses, or mixing with CC BY-SA or just CC-BY licenses - is that while license proliferation and jurisdictional issues have been causing problems, it seems the free software and content community is generally speaking on a road to greater “harmonisation” between certain “key” - if not all - licenses. This will be a major step towards improving the production and sharing of educational and training materials Malcolm Bain Slides of this talk 16:00 00:30 Room1 The case for African FOSS Business Models Educating in Freedom en The session will focus on how capacity building in Free and Open Source Software has an importnat role in enabling local small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) in Africa and beyond. Based on examples of programmes such as ict@innovation (Africa) and it@foss (Asia) some relevant approaches will be discussed such as regional networking and strengthening of consulting capacities of ICT associations and training institutions. A focus will be on sharing of educational and training materials in the area of FOSS Business Models and FOSS Certification. The approach will however be based on an brainstorming and other interaction between the different experts and stakeholders present as opposed to a presentation of "solutions", which might not (yet) exist. We will showcase some best practices where FOSS education is building human capacity. In addition we demonstrate some of the challenges and opportunities with FOSS Business training. Balthas Seibold Slides of this talk 16:30 00:30 Room1 Experiencing the 21st Century Educating in Freedom As the United States struggles to find an educational policy that simultaneously makes sure that there is 'No Child Left Behind' and that all children are provided with a 21st century education, Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) tools, curriculum and pedagogy provide a unique opportunity to solve several vexing problems simultaneously. This talk will explore how the National Center for Open Source and Education in the U.S. is helping schools understand and seize this opportunity. Background: U.S. educational budgets and particularly educational technology budgets are under siege at the local, state and national level. An increasing number of educators are beginning to explore the use of FOSS solutions in classrooms, driven largely by these budgetary constraints and the desire to start to close the digital divide between students with independent access to computer resources and those that do not have such resources. At the same time, there is a growing recognition that the fundamental model of educating students requires some deep review. In response to this realization, the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) is revising its National Educational Technology Standards (NETS). These standards are used all over the U.S. and essentially function as the national framework for technology literacy since most states base their local standards on the ISTE model. The new generation of NETS is designed to foster 21st century skills in the areas of Creativity and Innovation, Communication and Collaboration, Problem Solving, Digital Citizenship and several others. ( http://www.iste.org/NETS/ ) But what has not yet been recognized by the U.S. educational community is the opportunity to use the Free and Open Software creation process itself to teach students the skills outlined in the ISTE standards. When the students move beyond simply using FOSS tools and started to participate in the creation and improvement in this tools and materials, these students will: “ apply existing knowledge to generate new ideas, products, or processes.” {NETS 1a} “ develop cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with learners of other cultures.” {NETS 2c} “identify and define authentic problems and significant questions for investigation.” {NETS 4a} “demonstrate personal responsibility for lifelong learning.” {NETS 5c} The National Center for Open Source and Education ( http://www.ncose.org/ ) is currently developing materials for classroom teachers to make it easier for teachers and students to engage with FOSS projects. This curriculum and the projects it contains will naturally use FOSS tools but more importantly, it will demonstrate how the collaborative creation process itself of FOSS software and materials teaches the very skills outlined in the new ISTE standards. Presentation: This presentation will be in three parts. The first section will be an overview of the new ISTE National Educational Technology Standards (NETS). The second part of the presentation will introduce the new project underway at the National Center for Open Source and Education (NCOSE) to develop curriculum matched again these ISTE standard. The final part of the talk will be an open discussion of how to coordinate the NCOSE curriculum with other similar projects and teams in other countries for the mutual benefits of everyone. http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/patten.pdf Bryant Patten Slides of this talk 17:30 00:30 Room1 Open discussion using the wisdom of the crowd to direct a conclusion Free Knowledge in Society workshop 1. I am working on a game that will be produced by the World Service leading up to the 2012 games. This game uses the 2012 games as a catalyst to encourage the public to engage with and contribute towards creating Free Knowledge. (more info about the project) 2. Things like this can be developed by individuals. The key is to empower and enable them to start doing things. How should this be done... 3. What other events and activities can the Free Knowledge effect be linked to? Ed Whyman http://fkft.eu/2008/slides/whyman.zip 18:00 00:30 Room1 Free Knowledge in Public Bodies Open Knowledge & Technology Transfer in Publicly-Funded Research Bodies Authors: Cumplido Fernández, J.M; Recio Cuesta J.A, Casas Luego, L; Díaz Aguilar, C.M. Key words:: Technology Transfer models, open innovation, Open knowledge, learning economies. Innovation is normally a source of market power, and technological change comes from the entrepreneurs. These individuals are the ones who have the technological needs that make things work in the economy of a country. In modern economies, companies cannot normally afford to rely entirely on their own research. Then, our economies are characterised as “learning economies” in which knowledge is a crucial resource and learning is one the most important process. This process is materialized in Technology Transfer, which consists of developing practical applications for the results of scientific research and commercialising them. Whatever the relationship is between the developer of technology and the one who can commercialise its results, Technology Transfer models varies widely. They can involve licensing agreements or setting up joint ventures and partnerships to share both the risks and rewards of bringing new technologies to market. Despite these models have been successful between companies (normally large private companies), the fact is that these models have failed, in many cases, for the transfer of knowledge between SMEs and publicly-funded research organisations, such as Universities and research centres. Many companies are developing open innovation approaches to R&D, combining in-house and external resources, and aiming to maximize economic value from their intellectual property, even when it is not directly linked to their core business. In particular, they have begun to treat public research as a strategic resource. The following are some aspects on the policies the European Union that tries to promote a more competitive Europe entrepreneurship by means of a knowledge-based economy and the efficiency of public-funded research. Setting the Scene: Background for Open Knowledge Transfer in Europe. Lisbon Strategy Since 2000, The Lisbon Strategy is the framework action and development plan for the European Union. Its aim is to make the EU "the most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion, and respect for the environment by 2010". In 2005, the European Commission refocused the Lisbon Strategy on actions that promote growth and jobs on the ground of social and environmental renewal, Innovation as the motor for economic change, and the “learning economy” European Commission Recommendations. The refocused Lisbon Strategy stresses the efforts to enable public research institutions to develop more effective links with industry, in particular SMEs. In 2007, The European Commission's Communication COM(2007) 182 “Improving knowledge transfer between research institutions and industry across Europe: embracing open innovation”, encourages scientific, technological and R&D interactions in Europe as a means of implementing the Lisbon Strategy. It states that: “Various "creative commons" approaches [...] can ensure a more effective dissemination of results [...] It is therefore important to ensure that researchers are aware of the benefits of both (traditional and open innovation) approaches and that decisions are made on the basis of socio-economic impact”. More recently in april 2008, The European Commission has launched the recommendation C(2008)1329 “on the management of intellectual property in knowledge transfer activities and Code of Practise for universities and other public research organisations”, C(2008)1329. It advises about the principles regarding collaborative and contract research compatibility, clarity, ownership and access rights. This aspects could be directly approached from the open innovation approach to facilitate the transference of knowledge between researchers and entrepreneurs. The Situation in Extremadura Region. The socio-economic context of Extremadura is conditioned by its low population density (over 1,000,000 inhabitants). It has historically been characterized by an agricultural-livestock-based economy, with high levels of emigration, and high unemployment rates. As the region lost the train of the industrial revolution, the main agents involved in Regional Development decided to make great efforts to develop a Global Strategy of Regional Socio- economic Development. In this sense the Regional Administration has identified areas of interest taking into account the present and further research needs. The Administration has also become an investor in Technology and Research creation by means of several innovative projects focused on Free/Open Software, open standards and Open Knowledge. The Extremadura Regional Government includes Free/Open knowledge as a priority in the 3 rd Regional Plan for Research, Development and Innovation. This is an instrument aimed at vitalising the regional R&D sector as a catalyst in strategic projects of research. This can be used to develop business lines based on the development of applications base on researching results of investigation. A Step Beyond. The following step is, obviously, the creation of a methodology to implement new paradigms that permit technology transfer based on open competitive collaboration, and a system for mutual sharing of knowledge and dissemination of publicly-funded research results, which is compatible with economically profitable products designing and commercialisation. From the Foundation for the Development of Science & Technology in Extremadura (FUNDECYT), we are setting a methodology for the proposal of Open Technology Transfer in Publicly-Funded Research Bodies. Our proposal will include several actions: Revision of present IPR system, and compatibility with Open Knowledge Transfer of ● Technology and coherence with transnational technology transfer Identification of successful cases as examples of good practises ● Formation of an Expert Board to asses and monitor on the mechanisms that are necessary ● for assure compatibility of Open Knowledge Transference and commercialisation José María Cumplido Fernández Slides of this talk 10:00 00:15 Room2 FLOSSCom Workshop lightning en Learning in higher education is usually bound to institutions as platforms on which teachers prepare and distribute the material that must be learnt in order to distribute and create knowledge. However, a FLOSS-like approach enables learners, in principle, to become more independent from institutional platforms and centralised knowledge distribution. Insights in why and how such forms of self-organised collaborating occur, what benefits they provide as compared to traditional higher educational learning, and what their limitations are, can especially be studied by initiatives that develop within traditional higher educational environments but without the direct involvement of these institutions' representatives (e.g. teachers). In this talk we will consider these aspects by the example of “Students' Knowledge Base”, a self-organised learning platform and community established and operated by a group of computer science students at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics (BME). Rüdiger Glott Philipp Schmidt 10:15 00:15 Room2 FLOSSCom Workshop lightning There are clearly many desirable attributes in the learning process that arise in FLOSS communities, for example that it is based around legitimate activity, it is collaborative in nature and often the resultant understanding is deep. Furthermore learners value what they learn, and feel able to apply it. Many of these findings are in contrast to the way in which learning occurs in higher education. In this talk I will consider how these approaches to learning in FLOSS communities could be implemented in higher education, what the potential barriers to uptake are, and the issues these raise for higher education in general. Martin Weller 10:30 00:15 Room2 FLOSSCom Workshop lightning A major issue in teaching software engineering education is how to engage students in real world software development situations. In this presentation, the participation of students in FLOSS projects while teaching all kinds of software engineering disciplines, such as requirements, design, management and quality is discussed. It is shown that students may benefit in all software engineering areas considered by the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge. In certain areas, such as software construction and configuration management, problems may arise, somewhat reducing the vigor of the approach. However, even in those cases, remedies and alternatives exist. The overall approach may alter dramatically the way software education is conducted and assist in preparing students effectively for their software development career. Sulayman K. Sowe Ioannis Stamellos Slides of this talk 10:45 00:15 Room2 FLOSSCom Workshop lightning In more recent years Free / Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) communities gained attention for their community production and support models and regarding their way of knowledge creation and learning. From the “FLOSS perspective” it becomes obvious that the Open Educational Resource (OER) movement falls short in some points. Most strikingly, the traditional way of resource creation using the traditional role distribution models that clearly distinguishes between educators as creators and learners as consumer is still predominant. As a result even the most prominent examples within the OER movement are rather static repositories than Open Participatory Learning Ecosystems (OPLE). The volunteering and unselfish nature in many communities enables members to get involved in activities further than the realms of software development. FLOSS communities possess many characteristics that educational settings seek to apply such as: 1. Open and inclusive ethos: everyone can participate, no charges, no deadlines, life long membership. 2. Up to date and dynamic content; everyone can add, edit and update the content. 3. Materials are usually the product of many authors with many contributions from people other than authors. 4. Frequent releases and updates where product features and community structures are the result of a continuous re-negotiation/reflection process within a continuous development cycle. 5. Prior learning outcomes and processes are systematically available through mailing lists, forums, commented code and further instructional materials (re-use). 6. A large support network; provided voluntarily by the community member in a collaborative manner nearly 24/7. 7. Free Riders (lurker) welcome paradox – the more the better 8. New ICT solutions are adapted early by the community for the sake of their usefulness, but not for the sake of using technology. The FLOSS model shows how users can become active ‘resource’ creators, how learning processes can be made visible and can benefit other learners, how to successfully establish and maintain user support systems, and ultimately how all of this can be re-used and freely maintained. Learning in the FLOSS community therefore highly corresponds to the definition of OER, which is “the open provision of educational resources, enabled by information and communication technologies, for consultation, use and adaptation by a community of users for non-commercial purposes.” The current OER movement is tackling maybe one of the most crucial aspects for education: the free and open access to educational resources being released under a commons license and thus the possibility to re-use those resources and to adapt them. However, up until today the OER movement, analogue to the e-Learning movement, is still following largely traditional educational paradigms using experts’ production and development models, often using technology for the sake of technology and seeing the learner as a passive consumer, or at least leaving him with this role. Andreas Meiszner Slides of this talk 11:45 01:30 Room2 Panel discussion FLOSSCom Workshop workshop en See the full abstract of this session: http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/flosscom_panel.pdf The Flosscom project (flosscom.net) has been investigating how individuals learn in open source communities. The project has looked at the characteristics of learning in such communities. Learning tends to be informal, peer supported, technology-enhanced, community based and activity-driven. Surveys have revealed that learning is a powerful motivation for developers to join open source communities and FLOSS participants, and partly also employers, value this learning more highly than that experienced in formal education. The Flosscom project then examined how some of these principles can be transferred to higher education. The project also conducted a small online FLOSS-like pilot with students in higher education. The aim of this panel discussion is to reflect on the findings of the project and explore the barriers for this type of learning in higher education settings bringing together the different involved stakeholders: students, open source members and educators. Andreas Meiszner Slides of this talk 16:00 01:00 Room2 Free Knowledge in Society lecture en This will be about why we need to remember the source of the free/libre knowledge movement with examples of free knowledge projects emanating in Africa. The key issues to be covered include the need for localisation and research on human language technologies, inclusivity, accessibility, community-led innovation and global sustainability. Projects to be highlighted include MobilED [http://mobiled.org/ ], Singazenzela [http://wiki.singazenzela.org/], WirelessAfrica [http://wirelessafrica.meraka.org.za/ ], tuXlabs [http://www.tuxlabs.org.za/ ], SchoolNet Namibia [http://www.schoolnet.na/ ], Social Entrepreneurship Network [http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Portal:Social_entrepreneurship ] and other initiatives emanating from or involving Africa. Kim Tucker Slides of this talk 17:30 01:00 Room2 Panel discussion Educating in Freedom workshop en Panel discussion with members of different education-centric projects and distros. Magí Almirall Hill Paulo Trezentos Anne Østergaard Francesc Busquets Slides of this talk 09:00 01:00 Plenary Sessions Keynote speech Plenary lecture en Stephen Downes 10:00 00:30 Plenary Sessions A Practical Experience Educating in Freedom The author has submitted a full-length paper: http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/robles.pdf Libre software has gained in recent times a major attention in industry and academia. Due to its importance and impact on industry over the last years, higher education institutions have adopted the development of libre software in their academic programs. However, in developing real libre software projects, several key issues are hard to be reproduced in traditional academic curricula, such as a community-driven approach. This is an essential aspect to both engage and manage contributors in the project. Indeed, libre software projects typically considers a sense of "community" in the software engineering process, which involves important and complex issues, such as intellectual property and external contributions management, as the very rationale of this phenomenon. Despite many post-graduate degrees have been proposed and implemented so far on libre software in quite a few high educational institutions all over the world, their curricula have shown important barriers and deficiencies. To the best of our knowledge, there is no academic experience that provides students with theoretical and practical expertise on how to manage a project, to design and set-up the required infrastructure, to attract and manage external contributions, etc. The closest efforts to this direction are certain university courses where students are invited to join libre software projects and to collaborate with them. Even though this represents an important step toward this direction, we think this is not sufficient. In general, academic programs addressing libre software can be classified into two groups: those that focus on the philosophical, social, economic and management issues and those that are more concerned with the technical parts of the phenomenon, providing technological insight into libre software technologies. The first group is basically theoretical whereas the second presents the most important libre software products, such as Apache, GNOME, and KDE. Despite the technical skills that are required to work with these technologies are involved, these programs lack of any interaction with the community. This paper presents a novel approach for teaching libre software development that the authors have introduced at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). The UOC (http://www.uoc.edu) is located in Barcelona, Spain, and offers full distance education through the Internet since 1995. The virtual campus supports currently about 40,000 students, lecturers and tutors who are involved in 600 on-line courses from 23 official degrees and other PhD and post-graduate programs. The experience reported here is based on an on-line master course at the UOC as part of the curricula of an official post-graduate degree on libre software, which has been put in practice in five semesters with around 30 students over the last two years. As part of this degree's curricula, students have to perform a master thesis course that accounts for 15 ECTS. ECTS stands for European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System, which is for measuring and comparing the study burden and attainment in higher education across the European Union. One ECTS accounts for 20 to 30 hours of learning, including reading materials, class discussions, lectures, homework, exams, etc.). Therefore, the proposed course accounts for 300-450 hours of effort on the student side. Besides technical aspects, community related issues are incorporated in this course. These include how to lower the barrier of entry for new contributors, how to manage external contributions, how to perform release management, what type of infrastructure is required and how to set it up, etc. Once the course is over, the student should be completely familiarized with the tools used for collaborative development in the libre software world as well as those used for the communication exchange of the various agents that participate in it. >From this knowledge, student are able to create and launch their own software project or to become part of an existing one. Gregorio Robles Libre Software Engineering Lab Slides of this talk Full text article 10:30 00:30 Plenary Sessions Educating in Freedom lecture en The authors have submitted a full-length paper: http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/gailis.txt Action research in progress at the universities in Norway and Tanzania Almasi Maguya (Mzumbe University), Patrick Kihoza (Mzumbe University), Janis Gailis (Agder University) Recently, universities have became aware of possibilities to use the free software in education. Experiences of the use of free software in higher education needs to be documented and disseminated to make it more easy to use free software in different learning environments. Traditional practices of software procurement, use, implementation and administration in higher educational institutions are problematic because of costly licensing policies, ineffective user training and poor user involvement in software development and adaption processes. Proprietary software licensing policies are also encouraging software piracy and hindering peoples creativity and innovation. In this article we describe an action research framework for introduction, use and evaluation of free software in higher education institutions in Tanzania and Norway, based on Lewin's action research model (Baskerville & Myers, 2004). The actions we have proposed might imply changes in infrastructure (hardware, communication networks), management of information systems and learning environment at both universities. The evaluation of this action research framework can also include comparative aspects based on the conceptualization. The action research framework includes analysis and fact finding, conceptualization, planning and implementation of action, as well as evaluation, reflection and learning. A work on finding traces of different groups / actants at two universities (one tanzanian and one norwegian) relevant to creation of communities that might focus on requirements, selection, implementation and customization of free software is in progress as a part of the analysis and fact finding. Representatives from groups like managers, lecturers, researchers, students (both master and bachelor) are potential community members. At this point some informal interviews of faculty members and students at the tanzanian university has been done to discover familiarity of the actors with the concept of free software and to define requirements for functionalities based on the percieved needs of lecturers and researchers. Student experiences with the free software related courses at a norwegian university is documented based on course evaluation (two courses about free software). The current situation of free software assets at the universities has also been investigated. Conceptualization will be implemented based on the documented experiences of the community members (including all three authors of this proposal). Authors are writing diaries and collecting other documents created in the action research process (like description of the infrastructure or software assets used at universities). As a general framework, we suggest to use the Gabriel Tarde's approach to the practical social research, where he describes all learning (adoption of practices) as a process consisting of the three phases, - repetition, opposition and adoption (Tarde, 1889). Effects from those three phases can be described in a setting of communities of practice (Wenger et al., 2002). Regarding the planning of the actions, we will introduce changes in the infrastructure, management practices and learning environment. The main changes planned are to (1) install free software (mainly required from lecturers and students) in existing infrastructures both in Tanzania and Norway, (2) involve the managers into the process and getting an acept from those to make free software gradually (and modulary) available to the lecturers and students, (3) test the free software on students and lecturers. To implement the action we will establish communities of practice and facilitate those so that they are able to create a creative and learning environment. Where necessary, we will use a discourse and try to obtain consensus about the baseline of use of free software in higher education. In the evaluation part we will evaluate our conceptual model and interpret it as neutrally as possible (not be able to be neutral is considered as one of the main drawbacks of action research). This paper will provide some conclusion about an added value for individuals at the universities that use free software. Experiments "Experiment implies the idea of a variation or disturbance that an investigator brings into the conditions of natural phenomenon ..." (Bernard, 1865). Our action research approach can also be described by series of experiments, - changes of infrastructure, variations in management of information systems and innovation of learning environment. One could argue if an organization like an educational institution can be considered as a natural phenomenen. It is usually defined as a social phenomenon and this distinction between natural and social is common in comtemporary scientific tradition. Latour (2002) mentions that Gabriel Tarde formulated for more than a century ago that the nature and society divide is irrelevant for understanding the world of human interactions. So, an university can be considered as a natural phenomenon, but it remains to show how it potentially originates from natural human activities. "European Commission (2003) claims that universities have a unique role to play in the knowledge societies and this role refers to the combination of three activities by universities (i.e. human activities) which are functional for the knowledge society: the production of knowledge (research), the transmission of knowledge (education), and the additional training and regional development." (Simons and Masschelein, 2007). African universities have other challenges, but to legitemize themselves in a global world they are forced to follow the same basic principles. The research and (higher-)education, in the information intensive society, which is enabled by information and communication technologies, are not longer only the university domain. Communities, like those producing free and open source software, are also strong contributors to the knowledge society. One of the mantras of the free and open source software communities is "an absolute commitment to the open sharing of information", and is not very different to basic principle of production of scientific material. In addition, the communities plays also a great role in (online) training and can, both directly and indirectly contribute to the regional development, like for example in the Spanish district of Extremadura (Broersma, 2006). Some african universities has also partly adopted free and open source software (OSA, 2007). The first experiment, - changes in infrastructure at a norwegian university, has been a lingering process. At the beginning of 1990s, the most of the software at the universities in Norway, used in research and education, was UNIX-based. At the end of 1990s, the most of the UNIX-based software were replaced by Microsoft Windows applications (software). Impractical software purchasing procedures and costly licensing policies hindered a development of flexible learning environments, especially for the information technology and information systems students. At the particular norwegian university a computer lab with computers with Linux operationg system installed, was made available for students at 2004. The university's IT-service in cooperation with several representatives from faculty staff has now (2008) established a virtual server pool running Linux operating system and is offering the students and researchers different services, - both customization of existing free and open source software modules and development of own software. The software modules available at the universities servers are subversion, drupal, moodle, mediawiki, ruby on rails, python, perl and general LAMP (Linux Apache MySql PHP) environment. The implementation (repetition) of similar experiment is just started at an african university. Informal interview results shows that the lecturers and students are interested in different services offered by information systems department at the university. Among others, the software modules for mathematics, statistics, project management, relational database management systems and learning management were mentioned. The biggest challenge is communication between the IT-department and the representatives from the various faculties at both universities (norwegian and african). To establish an infrastructure that is flexible and at the same time cost-effective is difficult. That leads to the other experiment, - introduction of variations in the management of information systems as a whole. The approach we will suggest is based on adoption of free and open source modules and gradually aquiring competence about those modules in a direct collaboration between the two universities and involvement of actors from the free and open source communities. We have established communications to the Skolelinux project and Moodle global communities. The third experiment is to actually use the implemented policies (Management Information Systems related) and software modules (infrastructure) in research and education. At the norwegian university the students have already adopted several free and open source software modules. At the african university the process is just starting. Baskerville, R., Myers, Michael D., 2004. Special Issue on Action Research in Information Systems: Making IS Research Relevant to Practice - Foreword. MIS Quarterly 28, No. 3, 329-335. Bernard, C., 1865. An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine. Broersma, M., 2006-08-01. Spanish region goes entirely open source. TechWorld, http://www.techworld.com/applications/news/index.cfm?newsid=6558 (last viewed 2008-06-22). Latour, B., 2002. Gabriel Tarde and the End of the Social. In Patrick Joyce (edited by) The Social in Question. New Bearings in History and the Social Sciences, Routledge, London, pp. 117-132. Latour, B., 2005. Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network-Theory. Oxford University Press. OSA, 2007. Open Source Africa. http://www.opensourceafrica.org (last viewed 2008-06-22). Simons, M., and Masschelein, J., 2007. Only Love for the Truth Can Save Us: Truth-Telling at the (World)university? In Why Foucault? New Directions in Educational Research, edited by Michael A. Peters & Tina (A.C.) Besley, Peter Lan Publishing, Inc., New York. Tarde, G., 1899. Social Laws: An Outline of Sociology. Batoche Books, Kitchener, 2000. Tuomi, I., 2007. Learning in the Age of Networked Intelligence. European Journal of Education, Vol. 42, No. 2. Wenger, E., McDermott, R., Snyder, W., 2002. Cultivating communities of practice: a guide to managing knowledge. Harvard Business School Press, 2002. Janis Gailis http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/gailis.txt Full text paper 11:00 00:45 Plenary Sessions 11:45 01:30 Plenary Sessions panel Panel discussion Educating in Freedom en Panel discussion with participants from HEIs using FS in their curricula A panel discussion with short introductions from participants followed by a moderated discussion with participation of public. Jesús M. Gonzalez-Barahona Paulo Trezentos David Megias Lex Bijlsma Bert Melief Slides of this talk 13:15 01:45 Plenary Sessions 15:00 01:00 Plenary Sessions Keynote speech Plenary Karel De Vriendt Slides of this talk 16:00 00:30 Plenary Sessions Freedom, Chaos and Learning Educating in Freedom en The new Network is representing a change in the way we conceive Learning. We are moving from an old hierarchy to a distributed disorder in which identity is reformulated and chaos becomes a new form of organization. Education needs to change dramatically and adapt to the new reality, or even 2.0 won't have enough time to launch lifeboats to water. “Free software” is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of “free” as in “free speech”, not as in “free beer” Richard Stallman "A very large part of what we know, and how we know it is fluid, evolutionary and context dependent" Dave Snowden The new Network is representing a change in the way we conceive Learning. We are moving from an old hierarchy to a distributed disorder in which identity is reformulated and chaos becomes a new form of organization. Education needs to change dramatically and adapt to the new reality, or even 2.0 won't have enough time to launch lifeboats to water. What we call Relatively Organized Chaos has to do with Freedom and Responsibility of individuals and, therefore, with cultural aspects rather than technological ones. As language teachers (ELE / SFL, Spanish as a Foreign Language), we are in a privileged position to implement these changes. That is because, in part, we have dealt with these topics for a long time, through documents and research as important as the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) or the new Spanish Instituto Cervantes Curriculum (IPPC), that advocates an action-oriented approach focused on the learner and it has put into fair value strategies and processes. From there, we must increase the "resilience" capacity of the existing frameworks in order to make them more flexible (“chaotic”) and focused on long-term learning ("learning for life"), all within what George Siemens called “Connective Intelligence", a concept that tries to go beyond the "Collective Intelligence". Contributions as important as the “Connective Theory” (Siemens), “Informal Learning” (Jay Cross) or “Serendipitous Learning” (Teemu Arina) go along these lines. These are ideas that were born from the Network itself, unlike other educational theories such as Constructivism, originated in pre-teaching environments, and that therefore can hardly be adapted to the new reality. We will also draw attention to other emerging concepts, such as “Accidental Learning”: "Every day I make an effort to go toward what I do not understand. This wandering leads to the accidental learning that continually shapes my life." (cellist Yo-Yo Ma ) What should be the position of education towards this new situation and values, when facing with this new order that is disorder at once? Undoubtedly, we must begin to be open-minded and be more receptive to the new physical and virtual reality, because in case these realities don't coexist and feed each other, they are condemned to falsehood. Stephen Downes has explained us that the way to learn is different depending on the time and the context in which we live. Therefore, the concept of Learning is not something fixed and needs to be constantly redefined. Our role as educators, as well as the role of learners and institutions, is to overcome fear – it was called ”Fear 2.0” in the last Educause- and become aware of this. There is no doubt that this is a complicated task because it requires rethinking concepts and basic values, many of whom do not fit with the existing educational structure, based on closed/narrow ideas, courses, final evaluations, contents, low value of the process, collide in a violent way with this new reality of constant change, chaotic and distributed. However, it becomes a need for Education to pact with the referred ideas of the new disorder: informal learning, life-long learning, action-oriented learning and focused on the learner and his or her learning processes, with freedom and individual responsibility. The paradigms and educational values we will speak about go in parallel with the concepts of Free Knowledge and Free Software. These "educational values" are, in fact, an important theoretical and conceptual support for these concepts. In general, e-learning models are still based on a course-structure very similar to the one found in the traditional classroom: closed contents that are evaluated and certified. We believe that it is very important that the community of e-learning and Free Software were aware and took into account new open educational approaches: Connected, informal and distributed learning, since they fit better and are closely related to the concept of Freedom that supports the Free Software and Educating in Freedom, and because we believe that Education should promote tools that allow more open approaches that are connected with reality. Nevertheless, we should keep in mind that the learning environment determines the way in which content is built, so the teacher must pay attention to this context and learn to handle it. In this presentation we will also speak about the role of the School, which maybe it ́s in the way of being transformed to the point of disappearing. This will refer to the "Three Stages" on the relationship between knowledge and individual, explained by Seymour Papert (1980), and the need to came back to Stage 1 -which was interrupted by the limitations of schooling- in order to install "life-long learning" in our lives. The technology helps us to re-locate the individual in the Zone of Proximal Development as defined by Vygotsky. In this way, we discuss a program of maximum where the border is the “abolition” of school and that learning must become part of a vital ecology to do this so as absent, invisible and ubiquitous. Some References and Further Reading: Arina, Teemu: Serendipic Learning and the Third Place (slideshare) Bean, Cammy: Accidental Learning. In: http://learningvisions.blogspot.com/2008/03/accidental-learning.html Cross, Jay: Informal Learning. Rediscovering the natural pathways that inspire innovation and performance. And Learning Blog: http://infrml.com Downes, Stephen: Education 2.0. National Research Council of Canada. In Elearning Magazine. Dewey, John: http://janeknight.typepad.com/pick/2008/04/moving-workplac.html Gatarski, Richard: http://nodosele.blogspot.com/search?q=gatarski Moravec http://www.concepcionabraira.info/img/educacion1a3.png Papert, Seymour (1980): Mindstorms: Children, Computers, and Powerful Ideas. The Harvester Press Limited. Shank, Roger in Edge. 2006: ¿Cuál es tu idea peligrosa?: "No más miradas indecentes de los maestros" Siemens, G. (2005). Connectivism. A learning theory for the Digital Age. In: http://elearnspace/Articles/connectivism.htm Siemens, G. (2007). Knowling Knowledge. In: http://knowingknowledge.com/2006/10/knowing_knowledge_pdf_files.php Siemens, G. (2007): "Collective Intelligence? Nah. Connective Intelligence" in http://www.elearnspace.org/blog/archives/003269.html Stallman, R. (1999). Free Software Foundation. Cambridge, MA: Free Software Foundation Zeitgeist Learning: The Future of Education is Just-in-Time, Multidisciplinary, Experimental, Emergen Emilio Quintana Lola Torres Grupo Nodos ELE 16:30 00:30 Plenary Sessions from Course Management to Active Learning Educating in Freedom en The authors have submitted a full-length paper: http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/hennipman.pdf In traditional directed-teaching methods, the lecturer controls the learning environment, the books, and other resources to be used as well as the way in which students should learn. This ‘didactic instruction’ paradigm is still dominant in education (Soloway et al., 1996). However, this method does not always have the expected results, mainly because students ‘often seek the most expedient and least demanding approaches to learning that enable them to pursue their social objectives more thoroughly’ (Jonassen & Land, 2000). Soloway (1996) advocates a learner-centered approach. ‘The central claim of learner-centered design is that software can embody learning supports – scaffolding – that can address the learner’s growth, diversity and motivation’ Soloway(1996). Existing and new technology enables a learner-centered approach, and can take this even further than in the traditional classroom setting. Laura Benvenuti Slides of this talk Full text paper 17:00 00:30 Plenary Sessions 17:30 05:00 Plenary Sessions Conclusions and farewell Plenary en David Megias Wouter Tebbens 10:00 00:30 Room1 Fifteen years of FLOSS at the National Botanic Garden of Belgium Botanic Garden of Belgium Free Knowledge in Public Bodies lecture How to do more with less -- Fifteen years of FLOSS at the National Botanic Garden of Belgium --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The story began in the mid-eighties with a mini-computer running UNIX, a Novell file server, and a one-man sysadmin infrastructure. From 1993, those servers were progressively replaced by Linux-only ones. In 1995 we installed the /very first/ Linux Web server of the Belgian Federal domain, and in 1998 (a 'first' at least in a Belgian administration) our Library Department was working in a Linux-only environment. http://www.br.fgov.be/RESEARCH/INFORMATICS/tutorial/intro/history/survey_98_index.html <http://betula.br.fgov.be/RESEARCH/INFORMATICS/tutorial/intro/history/survey_98_index.html> Now our computer room is filled with 3 racks of servers, mostly at the 2-8 cores and 2-16 TB level, using cluster tools and grid-computing. We will present our field experience about : * the hardware side (economy to use off-the-shelf hardware and even older one, like the refurbished 486 as X-terminals ten years ago); * the administration side (ease to automate actions with shell scripts, including simple cluster tools, no frequent reboot required : up to 500 days of uptime); * the software side (very low cost for high quality software, stability, diversity...); * the security side (no viruses, high stability of the servers); * the human side (the most difficult one; easy with good-will people, difficult with new incomers not sharing the FLOSS culture and asking for what they only know : MS, Word...; * ODF case http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/empain.pdf Alain Empain 10:30 00:30 Room1 A Philippine Foundation's Glocalized Mashup of Disruptive Web Technologies Free Knowledge in Society In "The World Is Flat," Thomas Friedman writes about how the immense progress in communications technology over the last few decades has sparked a third wave of globalization, which he calls Globalization 3.0. Whereas Globalization 1.0 was driven by the rise of empires and nation-states and the key players in Globalization 2.0 were multi-national conglomerates, Globalization 3.0 'flattened' the world with the parallel development of a worldwide fiber-optic network and open source software. The mobility of ideas and capital, mediated by this new global connectivity, has leveled the playing field between developed and developing countries. In place of the hierarchies and vertical power structures which characterized the industrial economy in Globalization 2.0, Friedman visualizes a new marketplace bound by open collaboration between communities from Manila to New York. THEMES: * Globalization versus localization * Filipino internet user cultural patterns * Walkthrough featuring 4 Vibal Foundation mashups In "The World Is Flat," Thomas Friedman writes about how the immense progress in communications technology over the last few decades has sparked a third wave of globalization, which he calls Globalization 3.0. Whereas Globalization 1.0 was driven by the rise of empires and nation-states and the key players in Globalization 2.0 were multi-national conglomerates, Globalization 3.0 'flattened' the world with the parallel development of a worldwide fiber-optic network and open source software. The mobility of ideas and capital, mediated by this new global connectivity, has leveled the playing field between developed and developing countries. In place of the hierarchies and vertical power structures which characterized the industrial economy in Globalization 2.0, Friedman visualizes a new marketplace bound by open collaboration between communities from Manila to New York. Friedman's concept of a 'flat' global society emphasizes integration and sidelines cultural and historical differences between countries. However, Friedman's ideal convergence of ideas is not necessarily followed by the convergence of cultures. Internet usage may be a uniform phenomenon worldwide, but patterns of behavior within communities remain localized. Dutch anthropologist Geert Hofstede's study (http://www.clearlycultural.com/geert-hofstede-cultural-dimensions/) of national cultures and values lays out the cultural foundations of human behavior. Hofstede classifies cultures within a five-dimensional structure: power distance, individualism, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance, and long-term orientation. Based on Hofstede's index, Philippine society is characterized by hierarchical relationships, integrated social groups, highly differentiated sexual roles, and cultural arrangements which place a premium on respect for tradition. While these arrangements are not an exact reflection of Filipino organizational values, Hofstede's theoretical framework provides important insights into the elements that constitute cultural behavior of Filipinos while using the Internet. The flat world that Friedman envisions must therefore be mapped onto a dynamic network of shifting cultural patterns. While Globalization 3.0 can bridge economic and educational gaps between countries through technology, the true power of such a convergence lies in people being able to bridge cultural gaps between societies. Friedman calls open source and social software 'disruptive technologies' because they have radically changed the way that people behave and interact. It should be pointed out that technologies must be disruptive in order to transform existing organizational structures within communities and to introduce innovation at the level of local interaction. The flattening of the world, that is, the equalization of opportunity for everyone and the democratization of access to essential resources such as knowledge and information, can only be realized through a cultural change in orientation which will depend on people learning to look within their societies first before looking outward to the world. With a population of 91 million people and a rapidly growing Internet penetration rate of 16%, the Philippines is poised to take its place in Globalization 3.0. However, while more and more Filipinos are actively involved with Internet technologies, a culture of collaboration, open access and free content still has to take root in a country where important public discourse is conducted in the margins. Hofstede's study indicates a strong sense of collectivism among Filipinos, a characteristic which restricts their individualistic expression. The high cultural value assigned to observing one's place in the social process also means that the openness and spontaneity associated with collaboration—the fuel which powers competitive economies in the flat world—are compromised. Vibal Foundation, a newly established philanthropy dedicated to furthering open education, has found it necessary to localize these globally pervasive web technologies. The foundation has found that it is not enough to create a technological infrastructure for collaboration through using Web 2.0 software such as Mediawiki, Joomla, Wordpress, and Drupal. While Wikipedia, for example, is arguably the most successful open source model of collaboration conducted on a global scale, building a Philippine encyclopedia such as WikiPilipinas (http://wikipilipinas.org), which is powered by the same software and aligned to the same vision of sharing knowledge, has had to entail an extensive degree of customization or—more precisely—localization to suit Filipino cultural preferences. Where Wikipedia builds on the encyclopedic model of an objective collection of facts purged of editorial bias, WikiPilipinas’ editorial policy is to create an eclectic mix of facts, feature articles, youth writing projects, and social networking functionalities to map the process of information sharing onto Filipino paradigms of community interaction. In fact WikiPilipinas eschews the “neutral point of view” (NPOV) and other ethical guidelines considered as part of Wikipedia’s “Five Pillars” in order to achieve its vision for WikiPilipinas. This presentation will discuss how something as universal as free technology is shaped by cultural particularities, using the example of Vibal Foundation (http://en.wikipilipinas.org/index.php?title=Vibal_Foundation) and its social media initiatives to foster the open content movement in the Philippines: Filipiniana.net (http://www.filipiniana.net), a free digital library of books, images, audio and video; WikiPilipinas.org (http://wikipilipinas.org), an online encyclopedia of Philippine content; Pinoy Online Chronicles (http://thepoc.net), an aggregator of news and meta on Philippine issues; and E-turo.org (http://www.e-turo.org), a repository of open educational resources for Filipino teachers and students. Through mashing up and reconfiguring global technologies to address a specific audience, the foundation’s four projects enable Filipinos to step out into and start participating in the flat and borderless world of knowledge. A short walkthrough familiarizes the international attendees on the following mashups: • WikiPilipinas, a wiki encyclopedia employing MediaWiki that is made to look like a blog with the embedding of YouTube videos, social bookmarks, user ratings, commenting and threading. • Filipiniana.net, a digital library of public domain and copyright restricted, based on Java and MySQL, which is to acquire social bookmarking and social chatting features • ThePOC.net, an online current events news site that is configured to look like a TV channel, mixed with blogging and other social networking features. • E-Turo.org, a free and open education portal based on Drupal which hosts wiki textbooks, a blogging community of teachers and students, and interactive lessons and exercises. Gaspar (Gus) Vibal http://fkft.eu/2008/slides/vibal.zip 11:45 01:30 Room1 Panel discussion Free Knowledge in Society workshop A panel discussion with short introductions from participants followed by a moderated discussion with participation of public. José María Cumplido Fernández Paul Reverter - Cometa Technologies Luis Crespo Mejia - IBM Balthas Seibold Slides of this talk 16:00 00:30 Room1 Educating in Freedom Fee Knowledge and Free Software go together. Even the definition of the two is very similar. Education and life-long learning are about sharing and generating knowledge. The libre knowledge vision has been expressed as follows: "Knowledge for all, freedom to learn, towards collective wisdom enabling people to empower themselves with knowledge and to share it for community benefit." When knowledge is shared electronically, the freedom to use, modify (localise),enhance, mix and share, is essential for effective knowledge transfer. Localisation is almost always required. The "copy left" model, the free licenses and the free and open standards and file formats as well as a few other things are fundamental for free culture, free knowledge, education, and self learning in the future. The question is how do we get more awareness about free knowledge and the free education programs into our schools as well as our homes? There is no single, and efficient strategy. We have to look for more ways to distribute our message in order to reach our goal. Collaboration between learning projects, and other stakeholders is the key. Anne Østergaard Slides of this talk 16:30 00:30 Room1 Comparison between gvSIG and Processing Educating in Freedom The authors have submitted a full-length paper: http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/melenchon.pdf The use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in education has widened the range of learning possibilities and provides the required technological support to create a new learning environment. Classical list-based interfaces are common in virtual environments for online learning and they have well-known open source libraries for implementing them. However, when considering an alternative option based on visual interfaces, they cannot be used and other libraries must be found or developed. In this work, a student-centered visually enhanced interface is selected [1] to ease navigation through complex relationships, including more contextual information and following multimedia principles for learning. The aim of the selected interface is to ease students’ online learning experience, along with the pedagogical values of the new European Higher Education Area. This is achieved by means of: · designing degree maps thereby providing access at any moment to the necessary data for student placement · avoiding common feelings of confusion in a virtual learning environment · allowing access to some information, as sometimes that could be a problem in a traditional Learning Management System · permitting students to identify their own learning pathway. In the same way, subjects could benefit from these improvements in terms of visualization and adaptation to the learning itinerary This paper offers a comparison between two open source libraries; Processing and gvSIG, for developing the proposed student-centered learning environment with an enhanced visual interface. The comparison is made from a set of features needed by the selected learning environment. Both options obtain a goodness level for each feature in an analysis process. Next, those goodness levels are summarized into advantages and drawbacks to obtain recommendations of use for both implementation options. The gvSIG library offers an easy and comfortable means of navigation and has the possibility of showing different information layers directly. Its database connectivity features have to be taken into account, too. However, gvSIG needs a precomputed teaching plan, so modifying any subject is translated to recompute the whole planning process. Since it is used mainly for geographical concepts, it needs all data to be statically georeferenced. Moreover, it needs skilled programming techniques and while documentation is poor, it is being updated regularly. The Processing library has been focused mainly on visualization for design and aesthetic purposes. It simplifies the implementation of 2D and 3D visualization projects, so a skilled programmer is not necessary and as it is focused on visualization, it offers very high quality graphics, as well as accurate animation functions. It is a lower level library than gvSIG, therefore offering increased flexibility with respect to gvSIG when dynamically rearranging the teaching plan, showing different layers and providing any desired interactivity. However, this lower level implementation may entail longer development times. Furthermore, it has no default database connectivity. Nevertheless, as it is based on java language, database support is implicitly given. The chosen alternative is the Processing library which is due to two factors: firstly, the lack of strong drawbacks, which can be found in the gvSIG option for its static definition and high programming skills; secondly, the Processing library offers richer visual options, which is a critical requirement needed in the selected learning environment. Concluding, since current virtual learning environments are not using all the potential of visualization, interaction and monitoring that the Internet allows today, new alternatives need to be explored. When planning to develop a visually enhanced student-centered learning environment, two open source options have been considered: gvSIG and Processing, both rooted in different fields. Different features have been evaluated for each alternative. Processing appears as the suggested option because of its better performance in visualization power, dynamic teaching plan rearrangement and needed programming skills. REFERENCES [1] J. Cuartero-Olivera, L. Porta-Simó, F. Giménez-Prado, M. Serra-Vizern, R. Beneito-Montagut, A. Pérez-Navarro, J. A. Morán-Moreno, E. Santamaría-Pérez, A Geographycal Information System in a Virtual Learning Environment, IASTED VC, Innsbruck, Austria, March 2008 Javier Melenchón Slides of this talk Full text paper 10:00 01:00 Room2 Educating in Freedom workshop Join us for an appreciative workshop to explore learning experiences of participants and discover the positive core of effective learning. Depending on numbers, the workshop will consist of small breakaways and two-way pair-interviews designed to surface factors associated with great learning experiences. We will conclude by starting a discussion on the design of on-line learning environments and an agile research methodology to augment implementation. Participants agree that their stories and discussion may be shared anonymously or otherwise under a free license. Kim Tucker 11:45 00:30 Room2 Educating in Freedom Background: iCamp (http://icamp.eu) is an international research and development project funded by the European Commission under the IST (Information Society Technology) programme of the 6th framework pogramme. The main objective of iCamp is to establish and evaluate open learning environments for university students across Europe by connecting loosely coupled, open source and open access tools and services and to provide interoperability amongst them. Furthermore, iCamp strives to create authentic educational challenges in the areas of collaborating, self-directing intentional learning projects, and social-networking, in geographically and institutionally distributed settings that are mediated by such tools and services (Fiedler & Kieslinger, 2006). iCamp follows a design based research approach(Brown, 1992; Cobb et al., 2003; Collings et al., 2004; Edelson, 2002) and thus carries out an ambitious series of international field trials to explore and evaluate some of its core ideas and concepts. In this context we design and implement prototypical educational challenges on the basis of our current understanding of how distributed learning environments can be initiated and supported within formal education. The empirical insights that we gain through our field research are then fed back into the next round of improvement and refinement of the overall design framework (Fiedler & Pata, 2007). The revised framework in turn will guide and inform further field trials. We expect this iterative process to support a gradual abstraction of principles and concepts and the overall development of a robust framework and design guidelines. Currently, iCamp runs its third international field trial (March 2008 to end of May 2008). This trial encompasses around 80 students and 10 facilitators from 6 European countries (Finnland, Estonia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Croatia, and Spain). It is carried out in collaboration with the EMIM (European Masters in Interactive Multimedia) consortium. iCamp built an educational challenge around an international master course registered with Tallinn University, Estonia, that requires cross-national and -institutional collaboration among students and faciliators. All activities are mediated with loosely-coupled, networked tools and services that students and faciliators and freely select and combine according to their preferences. The whole educational challenge is carried out on the distance. Assessment combines various perspectives and sources, including peers and self. Objectives of the proposed workshop: - present and discuss preliminary results and insights from the ongoing international field research in iCamp - present and discuss the potentials and limitations of supporting distributed learning environments with loosely-coupled, neworked tools and services - discuss conceptual and organisational challenges in such a context - identify directions for further development and research Proposed format: We would like to present and discuss the field trial experiences from various perspectives. Thus we propose short, impressionistic, personal accounts from the following contributors: Sebastian Fiedler (Pedagogical manager of iCamp) Terje Väljataga (Facilitator within the current field trial) Barbara Kieslinger (Overall project manager of iCamp) to be announced (Student participating in the current field trial) This will be followed by a rather open, interactive and moderated discourse and exchange with other participants of the conference. We propose to use some “open space” methods for engaging and steering the overall event. References: Brown, A. L. (1992). Design experiments: Theoretical and methodological challenges in creating complex interventions in classroom setting. The Journal of the Learning Sciences, 2(2), 141-178. Cobb, P., Confrey, J., diSessa, A., Lehrer, R., & Schauble, L. (2003). Design experiments in educational research. Educational Researcher, 32(1), 9-13. Collings, A., Joseph, D., & Bielaczyc, K. (2004). Design research: Theoretical and methodological issues. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 13(1), 15-42. Edelson, D. C. (2002). Design research: What we learn when we engage in design. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 11(1), 105-121. Fiedler, S., & Kieslinger, B. (2006). iCamp pedagogical approach and theoretical background. Retrieved November 10, 2007, from http://www.icamp.eu/wp-content/uploads/2007/05/d11___icamp___pedagogical-approach.pdf Fiedler, S., & Pata, K. (2007). Towards an environment design model for iCamp space. Retrieved December 5, 2007, from http://www.icamp.eu/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/d12___icamp.pdf Sebastian Fiedler 12:15 00:30 Room2 Multimedia didactic unit using DVB-MHP and SCORM Educating in Freedom lecture en This paper shows the design process to build Interactive TV applications using free tools to generate DVB-MHP compliant applications in the learning domain defined by the SCORM standard. This process is illustrated with the implementation of a interactive didactic unit to run in Digital TV platforms with MHP to show this new pedagogical resource, both at classrooms as for distance learning. http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/carrabina.pdf Jordi Carrabina Bordoll 12:45 00:30 Room2 Educating in Freedom This paper describes Ciclope Astro, the first Free Access Astronomical Observatory teleoperate via the Internet placed in the Facultad de Informática of the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid in Spain. (www.ciclope.info/astro) Ciclope is a free software project designed to solve the problem of the lack of practical assignments in technical universities due to scarce resources and to the design of the educational system. Ciclope offers software and content to replicate the educational Web labs that the authors have designed, and whose architecture and work methodology are intended for teachers who want to create new Web labs. The biggest advantages of these kinds of laboratories are that users can work through the Internet as if they were present in the lab, but without space or time restrictions. Furthermore, teachers can have full control of what students do, since all operations are registered in a database which helps them to evaluate the students. Ciclope proposes a modular structure based on software components that are easy to install, configure, and extend according to teachers? needs. see http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/sanchez.pdf http://laurel.datsi.fi.upm.es/~fsanchez/FKFT/ Francisco M. Sanchez Moreno proposal Slides of this talk 16:00 00:30 Room2 Students' views about FOSS in the academic and future professional contexts Educating in Freedom en The School of Education of the Polytechnic Institute of Viseu, in Portugal, provides undergraduate and postgraduate programs in Teacher Education, Media Studies, Cultural Animation, Social Education, Sports and Physical Activity, Environmental Education and Plastic Arts and Multimedia. It has a total of around 1200 students and 75 teachers. Every program has at least one ICT course, taught in one of the six computer rooms of the school. Besides the widespread use of laptops by students, there's a computer room available to them. In 2007/08, the school is beginning a debate about the use of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS), promoted by some of its' teachers. In the second semester (February-June), four important landmarks were accomplished: a) the School Board decided on the use of Moodle as the official e-learning platform for the school, over the already available WebCT; b) for the first time, in some of the courses of three programs, the software used is mainly FOSS (Open Office, Kompozer, GCompris, Blender, Gimp, Cinelerra, Audacity,...); c) in some courses, FOSS and Open Access became official learning content; and d) a special day dedicated to FOSS was organized, with workshops and talks about FOSS. The teachers and students involved intent to disseminate the ideas behind and the potencial of FOSS, bringing the students and teachers to a dimension of discussion where software choices aren't based only on economic cost, software features, marketing strategies or brand awareness, but raise important ethical issues: in a way, the choice is also a statement about the world we live in and how we choose to live in it. The stated goals are to: a) widen the range of choices and criteria students and teachers are aware of, i.e., to promote freedom of choice; b) foster the debate about a possible transition from the present proprietary software use to the adoption of FOSS by the school and the school community, even as an official policy and/or school identity; and c) engage some of the members of the community in the development of FOSS tools and Open Content. Our purpose, as researchers, is to document this process, its' developments and results. A study was designed, based on interviews and questionnaires, to collect data on: a) patterns of software usage; b) arguments used for choosing software; c) knowledge and awareness about FOSS; d) opinion about the importance of FOSS in the academic context; and e) opinion about the importance of FOSS in future professional practices. The School Board, the teachers and the computer support center staff were invited to informal and unstructured interviews, on different moments of the process. We intend to carry on with these interviews to document possible changes in the views and decisions sustained by these participants. Two different questionnaires were designed to gather the students' views. The Plastic Arts and Multimedia students who had used FOSS in two courses and were taught explicitly about it in one of those courses, were asked to answer Questionnaire A. Students from the Teacher Education programs, Social Education and Plastic Arts and Multimedia were asked to answer Questionnaire B. Both instruments cover the five dimensions in analysis, starting with data on ICT and software usage and a question to ascertain if the respondent has any knowledge about FOSS. If not, some information is given so the next question can be answered. This focus on the views and perceived relevance about different dimensions of FOSS. Finally, the questionnaire includes short episodes, describing specific professional scenarios in which decisions about software usage have to be made, requiring the respondent to choose between FOSS, illegal usage or purchase of proprietary software. Each scenario also raises ethical issues. Questionnaire A asks deeper questions on the topic of knowledge and awareness of FOSS. Questionnaire B was answered by 100 students and questionnaire A by 20 students. Both the statistic and content analysis are underway. In this paper we'll present the data from the students' questionnaires, allowing us to describe how FOSS is disseminated and interpreted by the students in their current academic context and how they perceive its' usage and importance in their future professional practice. Also, if the ethical dimension of FOSS is relevant in their decisions. These data are important to characterize the present situation and to allow a redefinition of strategies for raising awareness and promoting the use of FOSS in the school community and future professional practice of our students. It might also be an important argument to reinforce the relevance of FOSS in Higher Education contexts primarily devoted to the area of Education. Nelson A. F. Gonçalves Maria P. Figueiredo Slides of this talk 16:30 00:30 Room2 Educating in Freedom en The authors have submitted a full-length paper: http://fkft.eu/2008/papers/martins.pdf Abstract Escola Secundária Artística de Soares dos Reis (ESSR) (http://www.essr.net) is a secondary school of arts, located in Porto, Portugal. Since 2002, our school has been adopting free software, starting with its information system and servers to its course labs. In this article we describe the use of free software in ESSR, beginning with a short description of our school and its Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) infrastructure. In relation to the use of free software, the article starts with our school information system. Due to the lack of reliable and versatile school management software in the Portuguese market, ESSR decided to start the development of this software and release it under a free software license (http://sie.sourceforge.net/). Nowadays, several schools around Porto are using this information system. Then, we describe our usage of free software in our courses and labs and make a particular remark to a LTSP Edubuntu installation. An art school has specific software needs such as multimedia, web design, video. In these areas it is difficult to find good and stable free software alternatives to proprietary solutions. In order to have students feedback we have built a questionnaire about their views in relation to the free software usage at our school. We got 170 answers from the 220 students attending the 10th grade ICT subject. These are some of their main findings: * 60% of the students had never heard about free software * 74% have installed the software used in classes * 57% intend to continue using free software (39% probably) * 64% find the free software used equivalent to other software (24% better) * 79% see freedom of installation as the main advantage in free software * the main difficulty in its usage is the language/translation * 45% totally agree and 50% agree in the use of free software at schools One may conclude that students understand the concept of free software and agree with its usage in schools. They install free software tools in their home computers and are aware that they are free to do it. From our experience we think free software is a very good choice for the Education sector. Its main principles are tightly related to Education. Students understand them and the advantages in the use of free software at schools. Although in some areas (e.g. multimedia, CAD) there is some delay in free software development when facing proprietary software, the pace of evolution might suppress this situation in a short term. In more generic areas, free software has already reached a level that allows its usage in a great set of courses. The authors wrote this article as a recognition to the Ubuntu team and community and to help other schools change into free software. Copyright Copyright (c) 2007 Alexandre Martins (http://www.essr.net/~amartins) and Fernando Leal (http://www.essr.net/~fjleal). Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl.html) or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. Alexandre Martins Slides of this talk Full text paper