Tag Archives: itouch

General, Technology in Education

Paradigm Shift???

Leave a comment

An interesting ‘event’ happened to me earlier this week. I was mulitasking on a number of projects in my office and had taken a short break to discuss a couple of ideas with staff. On returning to my office, I sat down and ‘it happened’ – I started using my laptop but absolutely nothing happened – weird for sure.

Then is struck me – nothing happened because I was touching the screen on a non touch screen device – yikes! I gave my head a shake, reverted to ‘laptop mode’ and carried on with my work after sharing this incident with staff.

Was this a defining moment in my technology use? Have a used my iTouch, iPhone and iPad enough that a touch screen now seems normal? It would almost seem that way. I must admit, this event really caused me to stop and reflect.

For now, like many, I will continue to bop back and forth between touch screen and regular screen devices. Currently I am spending more and more time with mobile technology – a mix of these 2 worlds. I am writing this post with my new Lenovo x100e and plan to write my next blog post with my iPad.

~ Mark

General, Technology in Education

Skype in the classroom

1 Comment

I have used Skype for both personal and work related projects, so I have a good feel for the capabilities of the application. Over the summer I have been following a few interesting blog and Twitter conversations about using Skype as a collaboration tool in the classroom. A few of the posts referenced using Skype with iPod Touches and iPhones. Interesting reading!

I checked the Skype website, and sure enough, they had posted information about releasing a client for the iPhone and iPod Touch through the iTunes store. A couple of weeks ago, I noticed that the new Skype client was available on the main iTunes store in the U.S., but not the Canadian one. After watching the Canadian iTunes store for a few days, no client was posted. I decided to contact Skype directly to gather some additional information. On August 10th, I received the following response from Skype support staff:

Thank you for contacting Skype Support.

We apologize for the delayed response. Due to a recent increase in
inquiries it has taken longer to respond to you.

Thank you for your understanding and patience.

The Skype for iPhone application is not available for use in Canada at
this time. There is an ambiguous restriction in one of the
standards-based technology licenses, and we are looking into it. The
issue is not related to Apple, nor is it specific to Skype.

Best regards,

Skype Customer Support
Visit http://www.skype.com for latest news, updates and tips.

For Canadian customers, it looks like the availability of the client will be caught in a holding pattern for the foreseeable future.

~ Mark