ALT/1977: WE ARE NOT TIME TRAVELERS on the Behance Network

What if the cell phone had been invented in 1977? The product, and advertising, would look something like this, according to Behance. Similar:The Myth of the MegalithI have found that archaeologists are sel…CultureAmerica's ShakespeareShakespeare continues to be the most per…CultureYork Corpus Christi Play Simulator Screencast (PSim 2.1; D.G. Jerz)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwNv1lx3…Academia‘There’s a certain madness to it’ ……

Wireless Oligopoly Is Smother of Invention

Long notorious for crippling their phones and strangling app developers who wanted access to their devices, the carriers have loosened their policies, since AT&T made its fateful deal with Apple, which ripped control of the device out of AT&T’s hands. The result showed to the world how the wireless industry had purposely crippled cell phones…

The End of Men

Lots of speculation and rumination in this article, which I’m blogging because of this paragraph: Earlier this year, for the first time in American history, the balance of the workforce tipped toward women, who now hold a majority of the nation’s jobs. The working class, which has long defined our notions of masculinity, is slowly…

Inform 7 Updated

Ordinarily, this would call for an all-nighter. I’m feeling rather worn down after 4 days of marking AP English exams, and there are 3 days to go, so I’m only going to have time to glance at the new version of Inform 7. Similar:On the Importance of Nonverbal Feedback in the Classroom [an Anecdote]I don’t…

Hovers (and power users) still have a healthy future – (37signals)

I always felt like computers were meant to be used with at least a hand poised on the home row, because without that arsenal of verbs things just take too long. As a power user, watching someone who isn’t familiar with all the shortcuts can put your patience under observation. To some folks, everything about…

iPad WiFi issue with T-Mobile

I’ve checked into the hotel in Louisville, Kentucky, in order to read the AP English Literature exams. People on the shuttle and in the dining hall are very friendly. I’ve nothing to do for the rest of the day, and am just chilling in the hotel room. My laptop logged into the hotel’s WiFi network…

Gallery: Digitizing the past and present at the Library of Congress – Boing Boing

The Library of Congress has nearly 150 million items in its collection, including at least 21 million books, 5 million maps, 12.5 million photos and 100,000 posters. The largest library in the world, it pioneers both preservation of the oldest artifacts and digitization of the most recent–so that all of it remains available to future…

Seton Hill University Recognized Nationally for Mobile Technology Program

Seton Hill University was recognized by IvyWise, a New York-based counseling company, in its “Top Five” list created to assist college applicants in choosing schools that leverage the power of mobile devices to store and deliver recorded lectures, syllabi, homework, tests and a host of other information that can be accessed anytime, anywhere on campus.…

KnowYourMeme.com's research on "The Last Page of the Internet"

In 2001, I posted a brief item on “The Last Page of the Internet,” a meme that was already well-established at the time. I did a quick Google search, posted what I found, and added a few comments. knowyourmeme.com used my page as a starting point for a recent item that traces the meme much…

Walt Whitman Meteor Mystery Solved by Astronomer Sleuths

Very cool little story that also involves a Frederic Church painting and newspaper archives. Following a trail that began with a 19th century painting and led to hundreds of newspaper reports, the researchers discovered that the “strange huge meteor-procession” mentioned in Whitman’s noted collection “Leaves of Grass” indeed refers to a rare procession of earth-grazing…

Respect the Text: Teaching Textual Primacy to Non-English Majors

In the past, I have used the first day of my literature survey classes to define the big-picture, to have the class bond with each other, to watch a movie version of the first assigned text, and to jump right into literary analysis. Since I usually teach this course in a 2.5hr block, I can do many…

Updating a Usability Testing Handout

06 Jun 2010 (updated); by Dennis G. JerzUsability Testing: 8 Quick Tips for Designing Tests If you already have a prototype and you want to conduct a usability test, and you’re eager to learn how to make the most of your opportunity to learn from your users, then this document is for you. Keep the…

YouTube distortion after the same clip is re-uploaded 1000 times

In theory, technology lets people make and distribute perfect copies of digital artifacts. In practice, we compress our media, which introduces imperfections. YouTuber canzona recorded a short video, uploaded it to YouTube, then downloaded it and uploaded it again. Here’s what happened on the way to 1000 iterations. (Apparently, he turns into a Tholian.) …

Does the Internet Make You Smarter?

In the history of print, we got erotic novels 100 years before we got scientific journals, and complaints about distraction have been rampant; no less a beneficiary of the printing press than Martin Luther complained, “The multitude of books is a great evil. There is no measure of limit to this fever for writing.” Edgar…

Beach Books: What Do Colleges Want Students to Read Outside Class?

I’ve been on Seton Hill’s summer reading committee for the past couple years. (My suggestion a couple years ago of Little Brother did not make it, and I was rooting for another colleague’s recent suggestion of Ender’s Game. This year we considered The Kite Runner and The Last Lecture, but rejected them as downers. So…

A Flowering Tribute to Emily Dickinson

NPR has a story on Emily Dickinson’s local reputation as a gardener. Similar:Which State Offers The Best Online Casino With No Deposit Bonus?An in-person casino opened up a few year…UncategorizedShen Yun Chinese dance troupeOne of seven touring groups devoted to s…ArtBig Calculator: How Texas Instruments Monopolized Math ClassMy math education predated the widesprea…BusinessChatGPT Is a…

Barnes & Noble E-reader

I am still looking for a good iPad ebook app. I was frustrated that neither Apple’s iBook app nor Amazon’s Kindle app let you do all of the following: Highlight in multiple colors Type annotations Look up words in a dictionary The B&N app lets you highlight in a single color (gray), and permits both…

Aja Hannah's Dinosaur Dig Chronicle

One of my students, who is double-majoring in new media journalism and creative writing, is spending a few weeks on a dinosaur dig in Wyoming. She’s turned her academic blog into a travel journal. So far she has written: Thermopolis in Black and White What’s in my Dino Pack? dinoTravel Time dinoTaxi-ing dinoTravel I like…

"Narrative-driven 'videogames' are not games at all" — an alternative history by Jimmy Maher

Let’s begin not with humanity’s love for games, but rather its love for stories. Certainly we can see a trend in certain kinds of art toward the telling of stories in ever deeper and more immersive ways. A few hundred years ago the novel came along, introducing the interior monologue; as time went on, novels…

New British Petroleum Logo?

http://i.imgur.com/P0qkj.jpg Via Jason Scott’s Facebook page. Similar:How to Deal With 2016 DespairDon’t let a TV screen make you live a li…CultureSubtle Stylesheet Tweaks for Mobile SiteOn the mobile version of my WordPress we…AestheticsNichelle Nichols, ground-breaking Star Trek actor and NASA recruiter, 1932-2022 https://twitter.com/CNN/status/15538337…Current_EventsNew stamp commemorates Irish priest who saved thousands from the NazisI recall being…