OpenMusings

TMA01 is done! Let’s get this puppy submitted…

Oh. Right. I guess the lesson here is, the OU doesn’t want you getting too far ahead.

As an aside: I tend to wait until the results from one TMA are back before I start the next, in case there’s anything worth learning from one to the next. With 7 TMAs, though, they’re so close together in T214 (4-5 weeks apart) that that’s not going to work. Time to live dangerously?

Needed to draw a spray diagram for TMA01 on T214 – there may well be a tool for this on the Course Software CD, but a) I haven’t looked at that yet, b) at home I’m a Mac user and they usually don’t support us too well, and c) while I do some work on the office Windows PC when things are quiet, I can’t install things on it without invoking the wrath of the IT Gods. So I needed a web app that could do the trick.

Enter Gliffy. It’s a “freemium” diagramming web app – and, for what I’ve been using it for the past few days, it’s pretty darned good. “Freemium” refers to the business method of letting users have free access to certain levels of a tool & charging them for more advanced ones – in Gliffy’s case, it’s the groupwork and collaboration tools that come with a price tag. For basic use drawing spray diagrams and the like for TMAs, the free option is perfectly good enough. Could have used this when I was doing M359 (SQL), I can tell you…

Block 1 of T214 includes a case study on Napster and its affect on the internet – the beginning of the rise of peer-to-peer, essentially. What’s funny / curious about it (depending on your point of view) is some of the articles the case study links to to help you learn more about how Napster was viewed at the time, and the issues the legal battle between it and the RIAA raised. Have a read of this article over at the Harvard Law School (warning: long) as an example – especially the six possible ways forward that the article posits.

As far as music is concerned, the way things are today is almost unrecognisable from then – music is now freely available from legal download services, with no DRM restrictions, for reasonable per-song costs. The music industry has learnt the lessons that those who turned to Napster wanted them to learn.

But the RIAA’s place has now been taken by the MPAA and their ilk, who are seeking to keep their control over the movie business. It’ll be interesting to see if history repeats itself in their case.

Something for the T214 crowd – there’s a general forum on the ‘net with a section devoted to the course, and that seems to have reasonable input from at least some of the OU’s course team – worth a look as an additional source of support for the course. Here’s the link.

Speaking of T214, the course mailing for this one was impressively large – probably what you should expect for a 60-pointer, but I have to admit I do like digging through large piles of books.

My, that's a lot of books...

First thoughts: Block one is The Internet, which should be simple enough given that a) it’s my dayjob, and b) I’m never off it. Block four is criminal justice, and comes with a hefty “evidence file” book that implies some detective work will be involved – looking forward to that block, then, although it won’t be until June / July time that I get to it.

Course reviews for this one are mixed, but my own first impressions of it are quite good. Looking forward to getting properly stuck into this one – even though I need a distinction out of it if my hopes of a first-class honours are to be kept up.

Oh dear. I have been somewhat remiss about updating here, haven’t I? Only two years since the last update. ::shame::

I have been busy with my OU studies in that time – M256 (Software Development with Java) and M364 (Fundamentals of Interaction Design) have both been done and dusted, and the study path to B33 (BSc(Hons) Computing and Systems Practice) is now down to just two courses: T214 (Understanding Systems: Making Sense of Complexity) and T306 (Managing Complexity: A Systems Approach).

T214 starts, well, today, with an opening block all around the “network of networks” that you’re using by reading this blog: the Internet. The course recommends posting a lot of activity work to the ‘net for reference and whatnot, so I’m figuring this will be as good a place to post as any – so you may find seemingly random posts appearing. That’ll be why.

But I’m also going to try and keep this updated with other thoughts on my OU studies, as I’d originally intended to when I set the blog up. After 16 completed modules in 5 years, I’ve seen some changes in the way the OU, so there’re plenty of things to talk about.

For now, though, I’ve got some set-book reading to do. Later!