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TOP STORIES FOR WEDNESDAY, APRIL 06, 2005 Duke Scales Back iPod Program South Dakota High Schools Eager for Distance Education SAP Still Trolling for PeopleSoft Customers Tech Companies Line Up with EU DUKE SCALES BACK IPOD PROGRAM Officials at Duke University have said they will cut back a program to equip incoming students with iPods. Last fall, all 1,600 incoming freshmen were given the devices as part of a pilot program to see how they might influence learning. Next year, the university will only provide iPods to students who enroll in courses that use iPods in the curriculum. School officials said they were pleased with what they learned from the program in its first year, but they pointed out that the larger goal is to incorporate technology into the teaching and learning processes. The narrower focus of the iPod initiative was characterized as an evolution of the university's efforts toward that goal. Lynne O'Brien, who coordinated the iPod program, said some faculty embraced the devices in their classes, while other faculty were more skeptical, seeing no real purpose for the devices. CNET, 6 April 2005 http://news.com.com/2100-1041_3-5657240.html SOUTH DAKOTA HIGH SCHOOLS EAGER FOR DISTANCE EDUCATION A distance education program in South Dakota is having to deal with the difficulties of being perhaps too popular. The Center for Statewide E-learning was set up to provide college-prep courses--which are required for a state financial aid program--to high school students at schools that do not offer them. Many districts in the state are located in very rural areas and cannot afford to hire faculty to teach such classes. The popularity of the program, operated at Northern State University, has led the state's legislature to pass a bill assigning levels of need to various schools. According to Erika Tallman, director of the center, registration begins at 9:00 a.m., and five minutes later "we have about 1,000 registrations." Tallman said no students have so far been left out, but some are put on waiting lists. Chronicle of Higher Education, 8 April 2005 (sub. req'd) http://chronicle.com/prm/weekly/v51/i31/31a02702.htm SAP STILL TROLLING FOR PEOPLESOFT CUSTOMERS Business software vendor SAP has extended a program introduced in January to lure former PeopleSoft customers away from new owner Oracle. The original, called SafePassage, originally applied to PeopleSoft customers who also used SAP software, offering them lower costs than Oracle for software upgrades and customer support. The program now applies to another 6,500 PeopleSoft customers who, according to Bill Wohl, spokesperson for SAP America, have asked for the same deal. Wohl said the wider scope of the program is not an indication that it was failing to draw customers away from Oracle, which bought PeopleSoft in January. Officials from SAP America had previously said they were negotiating with about 200 PeopleSoft customers for a transition to SAP. Oracle currently has around 13,000 customers worldwide. Reuters, 4 April 2005 http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?storyID=8080892 TECH COMPANIES LINE UP WITH EU Five leading technology companies have voiced their support of the European Union (EU) in its antitrust case against Microsoft. IBM, Oracle, Red Hat, RealNetworks, and Nokia have applied to join the case in which the European Commission has already fined Microsoft $640 million and ordered that the company make changes to its operating systems to increase competition with other vendors. Aside from RealNetworks, which has previously challenged Microsoft in court, the other four companies have been reluctant to take a strong public stance against Microsoft. Thomas Vinje, an attorney for the EU, said the support from these companies undercuts Microsoft's claim that the case against it in Europe is not endorsed by others in the technology industry. It is not clear whether the court hearing the case will accept the companies' application, but, according to Jonathan Todd, spokesperson for the EU, their action is not likely to be "relevant or determining in terms of the outcome of a particular antitrust case." Washington Post, 6 April 2005 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30610-2005Apr6.html ***************************************************** EDUPAGE INFORMATION To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your settings, or access the Edupage archive, visit http://www.educause.edu/Edupage/639 Or, you can subscribe or unsubscribe by sending e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To SUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SUBSCRIBE Edupage YourFirstName YourLastName To UNSUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SIGNOFF Edupage If you have subscription problems, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***************************************************** OTHER EDUCAUSE RESOURCES The EDUCAUSE Resource Center is a repository for information concerning use and management of IT in higher education. 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