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Dropbox pushes further into education by partnering with Blackboard
Dropbox is continuing to make the education market a priority as it looks for new customers. About six months after introducing its first product aimed specifically at schools, the company is announcing a new partnership with Blackboard Learn, one of the most widely-used "virtual learning" applications out there. If you haven't used Blackboard Learn before, it's a tool that makes it easier for students to collaborate and for professors to build an online home for their coursework.
Google for Education gets a host of updates as the school year starts
Google's Chromebook has been particularly successful in the education market -- and that's helped drive its broader software platform, Google for Education. It's similar to the business offerings Google offers, with access to Gmail, Docs, Sheets, Slides and so on, but it also adds the specialized Google Classroom tool that helps students and teachers stay in sync. With the school year about to kick off again, Google has a handful of updates ready for its education products that are rolling out today.
Facebook launches 'groups for schools,' keeps enrollment tight
It's no secret that Facebook encourages users to spend as much time as possible on the site, doing things like sharing photos, playing games, chatting, and of course, sharing status updates. Now, the company is giving students a reason to visit that's actually related to academics. 'Groups for schools' creates a virtual venue for collegiate collaboration, letting students and faculty members share un-copyrighted files within the groups created for their sports teams, clubs and even individual classes. There is a file limit of 25MB in play, so consider those dreams of sharing videos and zipped up apps crushed -- you'll also need to provide a .edu address that matches the school before Facebook grants you admission. At first, online cliques will be limited to colleges in the US, though global institutions will eventually be permitted to join in on the fun as well. In the meantime, who knows -- perhaps Dropbox will also launch some kind of super-secret, exclusive club in the near future.
FIFA trade jinxes another EA Sports cover
FIFA 09 cover athlete Maurice Edu has been traded to another team, meaning EA Sports will, yet again, have to change the box art on one of its games. Edu, who would have been featured on the cover wearing his Toronto FC jersey, will now wear the uniform of the US Men's National Team -- not Scotland's Glasgow Rangers, which is the team he'll actually play on. EA Sports tells IGN that the cover of the game will ship with the correct art -- no "print out" version necessary.This would be the second time in a month that EA Sports had to dump extra resources into changing a cover due to an athlete changing teams. Earlier this month the publisher had to fix the art for perennial high-profile American football title Madden 09 when cheesehead favorite Brett Favre unretired and left for New York New Jersey.
