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A(nother) rant:

I don't typically write "the news" for ReadWriteWeb (although that's changing. Stay tuned for details). So I don't judge my performance by the number of times I get "Techmeme'd." Techmeme is a great site for breaking tech news, as it monitors what the leading publications are saying. The idea is that if you break a big story, you get the Techmeme headline, recognition you wrote the first (or sometimes the best) story... and a little notch on your belt.

Sometimes I do write news, particularly when there's an education-related story, but I've noticed it's always really unlikely that those stories are deemed Techmeme-worthy. Today, for example, I caught wind of the announcement about Zotero's upcoming changes, and I thought it was a good story. Admittedly, there's only a small part of the populace that cares about reference tools, but the announcement was enough to warrant a story in RWW, in Wired, and in the Chronicle. And nary a Techmeme among us.

That's fine. Whatever. Not everyone is "OMG PONIES," to quote Julie Meloni, about citation software.

But then, Mark Zuckerberg donates $100 million to Newark schools, and that's a Big Story?

OK, yes, I'm bitter and jaded and deeply suspicious of publicity stunts.

But hey, tune in to Oprah on Friday. Zuckerberg will be on. And I bet we can TOTALLY fix education if we throw enough talk shows and charitable donations and CEOs at the problem.

Audrey Watters


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Hack Education

The History of the Future of Education Technology

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