I sometimes ask my students to do a “media fast,” in which everyone tries to give up whatever is getting in the way. The last time I assigned the “media fast,” I had noticed that I would often ask my older son read a book to my younger daughter, as a way of keeping them…
Google says users will be able to buy digital copies of books they discover through its book-search service. It will also allow book retailers–even independent shops–to sell Google Editions on their own sites, giving partners the bulk of the revenue. The company would have copies on its servers for works it strikes agreements to sell.…
Roger Ebert recently posted this thoughtful essay, which is ostensibly about film criticism, but is also about how an intellectual activity benefits culture at large when the talented amateurs get access to power that was once the privilege of elite professionals. Another thing not everybody knows is that some of the best critical writing on…
A form I just got from the Academic Affairs office, as part of Seton Hill University’s plan to provide iPads to its faculty (along with all full-time students). This is just my roughest first draft. What do you think? What would you do with iPads in the classroom? If you wish to…
My highly dramatic daughter is not likely to achieve kolinahr any time soon, but we can all wish that she live long and prosper on the occasion of her First Communion.P.S. My wife said I could post this photo as long as I also posted a “normal” one. (See below.) Similar:Some editing and cropping makes…
War is peace, ignorance is knowledge, and Apple is open. Oh, the fun one can have with search-and-replace. Here’s the doubleplusfun Hoopty Rides found: Before: Adobe’s Flash products are 100% proprietary. They are only available from Adobe, and Adobe has sole authority as to their future enhancement, pricing, etc. While Adobe’s Flash products are widely…
It’s rather amusing to read Apple’s CEO tut-tutting Flash for not being an open developing environment, but plenty of developers with years of Flash skills are watching this very closely. Flash was created during the PC era – for PCs and mice. Flash is a successful business for Adobe, and we can understand why they…
Tablets such as the iPad will only make it harder for students to pay attention in class and for schools to ban devices. Because the iPad can be used to read textbooks, professors might be unsure which students are goofing off and which are studying. Seton Hill University in Pennsylvania doesn’t seem to mind. In…
Sony is discontinuing the production of the floppy disk. I’ve seen the vast excitement over the arrival of VHS tapes – and the shrug that accompanied their demise. Plus: Betamax videocassettes, reels of recording tape, DAT tapes, audio cassettes, eight-track cartridges, and 5.25in floppy disks. Now, Sony announced this week, 3.5in floppy disks are set…
“Some problems in the world are not bullet-izable.”– A US general, speaking out, not against firing projectiles, but against the popular oral presentation crutch, PowerPoint. Similar:Where the press is free, and every man able to read, all is safe. —Thomas JeffersonEducationJust remember: what you’re seeing and what you're reading is not what’s happening.Words apparently spoken…
To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee Sir: I got your letter and was glad to find you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you.…
Universities “should not be doing anything in the classroom that could be done online” (Times Higher Education) I’ll give the speaker the benefit of the doubt, and interpret that to mean “could be done just as well online.” Actually, I’ve recently been re-considering my goal of collecting and returning all feedback from face-to-face classes electronically.…
Hitler, as “Downfall producer” orders a DMCA takedown from Brad Templeton on Vimeo. As I understand it, the DMCA is not actually involved — it’s YouTube’s internal content-management feature, that lets copyright owners register their material, so that YouTube can search its database and take down, or monetize, any and all instances. Similar:At the Johnstown…
The industry’s great hope was that the iPad would bring electronic books to the masses–and help make them profitable. E-books are booming. Although they account for only an estimated three to five per cent of the market, their sales increased a hundred and seventy-seven per cent in 2009, and it was projected that they would…
For my money, memes on the Internet don’t get any better than the Hitler one. You know, the one in which you take some current event (the more mundane, the better) and shove it into the scene from the German film Downfall in which Hitler is told in his bunker that he cannot win the…
Compare Graduation Days with this Victorian comparative geography image. I’m not sure the diploma motif of “Graduation Days” works, since there’s nothing on a a diploma that has vertical lines like that. The density of information takes a while to absorb, but other than the pie chart seal, there’s nothing particularly interesting to look at…
Responding to reader input, we are changing Web site to website. — Associated Press Stylebook Similar:In journalism, the speech is more important than any speaker. (Put newsworthy quotes first…EducationMultiple Choice = GoogleNo big surprises here, but this blog pos…AcademiaMary Rodgers, Composer of Once Upon a Mattress and Daughter of Broadway Royalty, Dies at 8…Mary Rodgers,…
Roger Ebert recently tweeted this video, calling it a “Brief, well-made video mounting an optimistic defense of videogames.” Similar:Editorial: Video Games and The Great Train Robbery Through the development of crosscuttin…AestheticsThou shalt not commit logical fallacies Thou shalt not commit logical fallaci…AmusingMaking a villain's lair in #Blender3D (this weekend's relaxation)AestheticsParrots learn to make video…
Roger Ebert expounds upon — but does not reconsider — his rejection of the aesthetic possibilities of the video game. Ebert is prompted to return to the topic because of a talk by Kellee Santiago, who used cave paintings and stills from early black and white movies to argue that just as painting and movies…
“I shouldn’t be saying this, but I think I’ll love you always, baby, always,” Adam cried into the email. –Shexmus Amed The winner from Adam Cadre’s “Lyttle Lytton” contest (an awful-first-line contest, named after the author who famously penned “It was a dark and stormy night”) My favorite was actually: There was only one man…