Most biologists who have considered insect societies see them as models for studying altruism, with the workers looking out for the common good. But according to Wenseleers, the new work suggests that the more appropriate image is that of oppressed workers in a police state. —Susan Millius —Cops with Six Legs (Science News) While I spent…
The Nerd Watch Message Board is up and running! Visit an online community of LCD wristwatch collectors to socialize and share information about digital watches. —Nerd Watch Museum (Pocket Calculator Show) I had a calculator watch in high school. It had a touch screen. This was in about 1984 — it was awesome. I daydreamed about…
Mistake: A student raises her hand to announce that there’s a typo on a handout. Knee-Jerk Reaction: Saying “I did that on purpose just to see if you guys were paying attention.” Constructive Response: Reward the student who discovered the typo. Ask the whole class to correct the error on the handout by hand. Then…
Some of my offices have had peculiar shapes: 6 feet wide and 30 feet long with a sloped ceiling (once part of an attic); 8 feet square and — if you peeked above the suspended ceiling — perhaps 50 feet high (a ventilation shaft). I once had an office that was like that strange floor…
In 1982, testifying in front of Congress before the Supreme Court had ruled, MPAA President Jack Valenti said, “I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone.” —John Borland —FAQ: Betamax–tech’s favorite ruling (ZD Net) A good primer…
Writing liberated the life of the text from the moment of performance. It allowed the poet to reflect on and manipulate traditional forms and subject matter. Recording the chronicles of oral culture led to the development of prose, a purely written use of language. By the fifth century, the transition of Greek society from oral…
This Yahoo! Search service finds content across the Web that has a Creative Commons license. While most stuff you find on the web has a full copyright, this search helps you find content published by authors that want you to share or reuse it, under certain conditions. —Yahoo! Creative Commons Search (Yahoo!) Slashdot is aflutter with…
Gray, a part-time worker at the Clackamas County library information network and the Tigard Public Library, sold at least $10,000 worth of library materials online in the past six months, according to the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office. According to Jim Strovink, a sheriff’s office spokesman, Gray would check out books, then tap into the library…
Appearing as part of a sextet of high-profile directors promoting 3-D and digital cinema at film industry convention ShoWest on Thursday, Lucas said he hadn’t yet committed to a precise schedule but hoped to have the first film ready for the 30th anniversary of the original “Star Wars” movie in 2007 and that he would…
An international study of about 100,000 15-year-olds in 32 different developed and developing countries suggests that the drive to equip an increasing number of schoolchildren in the UK with computers may be misplaced. In a report to be given at the conference of the Royal Economic Society in Nottingham this week, Thomas Fuchs and Ludger…
About 36 million Americans—or 27% of internet users—say they download either music or video files and about half of them have found ways outside of traditional peer-to-peer networks or paid online services to swap their files, according to the most recent survey of the Pew Internet & American Life Project. […] Current file downloaders are…
Readers are using aggregation services like Google News to save time and find news they’re interested in from one location. But the digital melting pot of news has raised questions about the need for standards that go beyond technology. —Stefanie Olsen —Tough week prompts closer look at how Google gathers its news (SFGate.com) Similar:Using a…
Visiting the Four Seas During the 4Cs (Jerz’s CCCC 05 Notes) On my last night at the Conference on College Composition and Communication (known as “the 4Cs”), after the blogging special interest group, some of us walked through Chinatown in the light rain. What did I spy but a restaurant named “The Four Seas.” I ogled…
[University of Florida] students will not be able to forward their university mail to another account, such as America Online or Hotmail, beginning in the Fall after a technology committee decided in private that too many students weren’t receiving important university messages. —Stephanie Garry —[University Forbids Email Forwarding] (Independent Florida Alligator) Similar:An overnight traffic spike on…
Update, December 2024: Sadly, the “what’s my namber” service has not been operating for some time. I’ve changed the first link to the Wayback Machine’s cached page. What’s a namber? A namber is a word that acts as a mnemonic for a number. For example, 65 is drum, and 181 is push. A namber address…
Don was sitting at a booth toward the back and waved as he saw me come in. The half-empty glass in front of him indicated that he’d gotten a head start on happy hour. It also portended the tone of our conversation. “You hear that Arthur Miller just died?” he asked as I slid into…
Public, Private, Political: Social Theories and Blogging Practices (Jerz’s CCCC 05 Notes) The first panel I attended, Wednesday evening. Lanette Cadle, Bowling Green State University, presented “Their Own Space: Adolescent Girls and the Personal Weblog.” “At Livejournal, girls rule.” 67% are women, and the site features over 2 million active blogs. Yet women are under-represented in…
Calling All Bloggers — Friday Special Interest Group (Jerz’s CCCC 05 Notes) Friday evening’s “Calling all Bloggers” special interest group, organized by Charles Lowe, was an energetic and productive hour. I facilitated a breakout session on institutional blogging, where we discussed ways that blogs might be useful for building an instructional archive to be used by…
The Maltese Falcon: Questions I Wish I had Asked My Father (Jerz’s CCCC 05 Notes) This was a personal and literary reflection by Jo Hammett, the daughter of noir detective novelist Dasheill Hammett. The novel and movie The Maltese Falcon are set in San Francisco, so a conference session on the subject seemed appropriate. After the…
Breaking the Cycle of Hate: A Teacher’s Journey (Jerz’s CCCC 05 Notes) I met Sondra Perl on the shuttle ride from the airport. She told me her presentation would be on her experience talking about the Holocaust with writing students in Austria. Since Seton Hill has a National Catholic Center for Holocaust Education, we exchanged cards…