Archive for the ‘Primary School’ Category

  • Is it illegally anticompetitive for Google to give schools Google Apps for free?

    Date: 2012.02.02 | Category: google, ICT, open source, Primary School, Primary School ICT | Response: 0

    Today a French court ruled that Google has broken the law by providing the Google Maps API for free. While this may seem like an extreme ruling it is based on the fact that Google used to offer the service for free then began charging once all of their competition had been beaten into submission. I wonder if Google are trying to do the same with schools and Google Apps?

    Microsoft and Google have been caught out doing predatory pricing on quite a few occasions in the past. Essentially predatory pricing is where you provide a service for free then after a period of time (Usually once all of your competitors have been destroyed) you start charging for this service. Companies accomplish this “scam” by providing propriety software, propriety software is basically software that can only be provided by one company. I am constantly warning the schools of the risks of investing in propriety standards and I’m sure that nearly all of my readers are tired of me beating on this drum… In this case I think the court actually got it wrong.

    Google Docs doesn’t thwart our ability to develop PrimaryPad, PrimaryBlogger or SchoolEmail further, it’s obviously that Google Docs does affect our bottom line but we develop PrimaryPad because we believe in our products and in we know that our contributions towards Etherpad and an open standard for collaborative writing on the web will ultimately be the winner of the war. Remember folks.. Good customer service and open standards always win.

  • What a difference a door makes…

    Date: 2012.01.19 | Category: ICT, Primary School, Primary School ICT | Response: 0

    Yet another burglary last night in a Bradford Primary School. Yet again the thiefs target is the technology. PrimaryT is the maintainer and provider of this technology so it is somewhat concerning that the schools ICT budget will be spending more of their budget on insurance premiums next year instead of new kid for the kids to use.. But wait.. Not at this school because a recently installed security door thwarted the thieves..

    In my opinion you can’t get much lower than stealing from resources primary school kids use to learn with.   I realize that anyone reading this is  already in that school of thought.  I guess I’m completely biased though and blind to the other social subtleties at play in the surrounding area.

    The school is going to need to replace some parts of that door though if not the whole thing.. It’s not all bad news at least as the kids can still continue to learn with technology :)

  • Do your kids to the same?

    Date: 2012.01.18 | Category: Primary School | Response: 0

  • The first school meeting

    Date: 2012.01.01 | Category: primary, Primary School, primary schools | Response: 0

    Warning: Contains some strong language

  • Writing electrical circuits using a ballpoint pen

    Date: 2011.12.31 | Category: Primary School | Response: 1

    This looks like it could be really useful for teaching electronics.

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