Image Credit" Picture Taker 2 CC licence
There may be some at Core Projects & Technologies (UK) Ltd now beginning to feel the heat, as their mailboxes begin to fill up. UK, teacher and blogger extraordinaire Doug Belshaw has found it necessary to remove part of a post he made on his blog. The company deemed that his, (arguably), critical review of their product, the TALMOS Learning Platform, might be "potentially commercially damaging". They contacted his school and the rest is history.
Recalling the UK educational software industries role in the the recent BBC JAM debacle, I really wasn't that surprised that this might happen sooner or later. What did surprise me though was that, a commercial company, (marketing to schools) would choose to 'pick on' an individual teacher; a potential user. They really did not get the fact that Doug has a substantial, informed and influential, following in the blogosphere and the Twitterverse, which are already buzzing. Like the drunken heckler, at a late night comedy show, Core Projects & Technologies really didn't get that, the spotlight would inevitably be turned back on them. They didn't get that, Doug would receive support from around the the world, within hours.
A rather disturbing aspect of this saga, is that although Doug did not mention his school or employer, anywhere on his personal blog, the company took it upon themselves, to trace and contact his school. One wonders how they managed to identify the school, or, as some suggest, if any data protection laws might have been broken?
Being on the Becta Learning Platform Suppliers list one would have imagined that Core Projects & Technologies would have thought this through a bit more carefully. What will Becta will make of all this? I don't suppose I'll be buying any shares in Core Projects, but will watch with interest to see how it all unfolds.
