Multiple-Intelligences Neural Interfacing Optimization Node
I'm a geek. No. Really. Really geeky. And I write poetry. And I read poetry. I'm an English teacher to-be.
Amplify’s curriculum, including video games as elaborate as anything played on an Xbox, is expected to contribute another 40 percent.
“The ultimate goal of this is to turn students into readers,” said Damien Yambo, a producer on the Tom Sawyer game and a former public-school teacher in Detroit. The games, he added, must also compete with Angry Birds.
—News Corp. Has a Tablet for Schools - NYTimes.com
I worry about Rupert Murdoch in the classroom. Also, the price-point doesn’t seem all that great. The Amplify will cost $299/device + $99/year to get the content subscription, or $349/device for a 4G option. At those prices, you could get any number of Android tablets, possibly even cheaper, and just pay for the News Corp content.
Again, though, how much do we trust News Corp to provide educational content?
At this point, I have to say that they’re likely to be no worse that the big mega-publishers that dominate the textbook market anyway.
Huzzah! BlueFire has setup a page on their site that you can visit with your Kindle Fire to get BlueFire Reader installed. We’d been telling people that it was a semi-complicated process, which it was, involving cables, another Android device and a more powerful, but free, file browser app.
Now you can just go here to get Adobe ID capable ebook reading on your Amazon Fire.
To quote BlueFire:
Several months ago we released Bluefire Reader for Android. While the app is available in the Amazon App Store for Android, it’s not available in the Kindle Fire App Store. Amazon has blocked most third-party ebook apps. We think that’s a shame and wanted to make Bluefire Reader available for you to download to your Kindle Fire.
Hey, you. Yeah, you. Want to use the Android SDK and ADB to tweak your Kindle Fire. One command (or one line in your favorite text editor) and you’re golden.
It’ll run Android, but the appearance of the Amazon App Store for Android already told you that, didn’t it?
Quick write-up from PC World. HT Slashdot for the link.
This is the really nice Adobe DRM-capable reader that iOS devices have had for a while. Aldiko on Android is OK, but BlueFire has been impressing me when I see it. Already downloaded and ready to test it. You know it.
The reason you want this is that BlueFire reads the library ebook lending format! (As does Aldiko…)
(via TouchDroid Will Turn TouchPads Into Android Tablets | PCWorld)
If you managed to snag an HP TouchPad, you can soon (hopefully) run Android Gingerbread (because Honeycomb hasn’t been released as source code yet) on it.
Official Google Blog: When patents attack Android (via interestingsnippets)
This is despicable.
(via gamerchick02)
As much as I agree with all of this, one interesting thing to note is that within the Android experience itself, there seems to be this belief that Android is truly open source and is the freedom-lovers choice. It really isn’t as much as you think. To quote my boss, “Google kind of creeps in and starts taking over in ways you don’t even notice. At least with Apple, you know you’re buying into a system they control. They’re some kind of overlord, but at least you knew that going in. With Google, they always seem to be doing little things here and there that you don’t notice are problematic until it’s too late.”
Now, this is not to disagree with the obsequiousness of patent-warfare, nor to discount the disgust I have over what patents have become, but only to say that Google themselves are not above reproach.
(via gamerchick02)
In which I take “this person” as a term of endearment…
subtlefire replied to your photo: nook color running honeycomb on Flickr. Via…
Oooooooh! *flail* You may have just solved my Nook/Kindle dilemma! Of course, I need to look into this person’s definition of “ridiculously easy” first.
…and offer some level of expertise/judgement/what-have-you on the e-reader front.
For reference, here’s a nice walk-through:
Here’s a video-based thing (which I haven’t watched because I generally get annoyed with how-to videos, but some people prefer them):
http://theunlockr.com/2011/02/07/how-to-load-honeycomb-android-3-0-on-the-nook-color-usd-method/
The nook isn’t mine, but, at work, we own a Kindle 1, Kindle 2, nook, nook color, and iPad, all for testing things on. My boss is fairly tech savvy, but she doesn’t generally go around “root-ing” her devices, so the fact that she could turn the nook color into an Android tablet just by tweaking a fairly inexpensive microSD card was appealing to her. I took a shot of the Android Honeycomb (3.0) OS running on the device. Honeycomb is tablet-optimized (for the Motorola Xoom, largely) version, but you can also run the phone-based Android OSes as well (Gingerbread and Froyo).
I generally still prefer something like my Sony Reader Touch because it is smaller, lighter and still eInk, but while I may like reading graphic novels in grayscale just fine, others might prefer theirs in color.
Also, a final vote for the nook in the Kindle/nook debate, the nook can read Adobe Digital Editions books (they can be side-loaded), and, if you use the Android/microSD hack, you can also borrow library ADE books via the OverDrive app for Android.
nook color running honeycomb on Flickr.
Via Flickr:
A nook color running Android Honeycomb from a Micro SD card. It’ ridiculously easy.
Sadly, not all sites are differentiating between tablet and mobile browsers.
*cough* tumblr *cough*
