After 180 days in the U.S., email messages lose their status as a protected communication under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, and become just another database record. This means that a subpoena instead of a warrant is all that’s needed to force Google to produce a copy. Other countries may even lack this basic protection,…
What made the early Internet so very threatening to the mainstream media was not just the new opinions being expressed, but the fact that people were spending hours of their lives doing something that didn’t involve production or consumption in the traditional market sense. Families with Internet connections were watching an average of nine hours…
The floppy disk has several replacements, including writeable compact discs and keychain flash memory devices. Both can hold much more data and are less likely to break. Even so, floppies have been around since the late 1970s. People are used to them. They were the oldest form of removable storage still around. —Mark Neisse —Floppy…
Would they enjoy a peek into the diary of a wombat? That, of course, would be up to me. I had the power of a book in my hand, and like any conscientious role model — parent, coach, teacher, baby sitter — I approached this responsibility with enormous respect for its importance. Few things create…
—The Omnificent English Dictionary In Limerick Form A project so glorious and immense; Pointlessly witty magnificence. With limericks numerous Defining so humorous: Versified database brilliance. Via Sarcasmo. Similar:Oh the Overthinks You Can Overthink: Horton the Elephant, the Wickersham Brothers, and Mas…Yesterday, I performed in a school matin…AcademiaLove This Headline: "He took a date to the…
Television started as a powerful community-building force. If you had a TV set, you would watch what was broadcast, discuss it among the family at home, and also with the wider context of friends, relatives, neighbours and colleagues. If you encountered someone else with a TV set, the immediate assumption would be that that you…
Whew… New Class Blogs are Up (Jerz’s Literacy Weblog) The first week of classes is over, and the university modem pool, which was down for about a month, is finally back up. So I can finally return to my habit of blogging a bit after I’ve put the kids to bed. My big project of late…
In short… Someone wrote a really DUMB web scraper, and harassed me with it. —Peter Seebach —Can they really be this stupid? Peter Seebach, who happens to host blogs.setonhill.edu, also hosts a variety of sites dealing with interactive fiction. He recently got an e-mail from the Entertainment Software Association that threatens him with legal action…
Thousands of irreplaceable books were feared lost or damaged in a fire at one of Germany’s most precious libraries, though some 6,000 historical works – including a 1534 Martin Luther Bible – were saved by a chain of people who spirited them away from the flames, officials said Friday. —Jochen Weisigel —Rare Books Feared Lost…
So how do you start? Where do you begin? I start my graduate seminars with “intellectual autobiography.” I ask my students to write a couple of pages about who they are, how they came to where they sit in my room. We share these stories of who we are and how we came to be.…
It is the one great weakness of journalism as a picture of our modern existence, that it must be a picture made up entirely of exceptions. We announce on flaring posters that a man has fallen off a scaffolding. We do not announce on flaring posters that a man has not fallen off a scaffolding.…
Long ago, I realized that computer labs aren’t designed for students writing English lit papers. You may have heard about a revolutionary new development in communications technology. [N]o wires, no electric circuits, no batteries, nothing to be connected or switched on. It’s so easy to use even a child can operate it. Just lift its…
Though, I must admit, blogging is not only extremely addictive–must be the subliminal messages, but also fun. Where else could you find a community of writers and readers that can be as wide or as narrow as you gear your works to be? And where else can you start controversy and discourse short of a…
After a week, Rubel — a blogging aficionado and practitioner who writes about the narrow topic of how blogs and participatory journalism are affecting the practice of public relations — says he definitely lacked the depth of knowledge of current events gained in a normal week. “I felt a little naked,” he says, having received…
Thirty-five years after computer scientists at UCLA linked two bulky computers using a 15-foot gray cable, testing a new way for exchanging data over networks, what would ultimately become the Internet remains a work in progress. —Anick Jesdanun —Web Turns 35, but Still Work in Progress (AP/My Way) Similar:What Twitter Changes Might Mean for AcademicsThis is…
It’s not the online version of an established, well-researched traditional encyclopedia. Instead, Wikipedia is a do-it-yourself encyclopedia, without any credentials. “As a high school librarian, part of my job is to help my students develop critical thinking skills,” Stagnitta wrote. “One of these skills is to evaluate the authority of any information source. The Wikipedia…
Somerby’s comments would seem like blasphemy in the so-called “blogosphere,” but many online writers and observers agree that blogs, with a handful of exceptions, have had virtually no impact on the national conversation, mainstream media coverage of politics or large, orchestrated events like the parties’ quadrennial nominating conventions. —Kevin Canfield —Impact of blogs seen as…
The “Game Development Scholarship for Women” will help cover costs for women attending the Guildhall, an 18-month certificate program at SMU designed by noted game developers. Tuition for the six-term program is $37,000. —School offering women’s gaming scholarship (CNN/Reuters) Similar:Comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. –Mr Dooley on the function of journali…“Comfort the afflicted and…
“Beam Me Up Scotty…One Last Time” is the quite-serious title to a three-day event at the Renaissance Hollywood Hotel billed as a farewell to the actor who, as fiery Montgomery Scott, ran the U.S.S. Enterprise’s engineering deck on Trek’s 1966-69 flagship series and six big-screen adventures. —Joal Ryan —Scotty Says Goodbye (E! Online) I managed to…
British university students spend nearly three times as much on drink as they spend on books, according to a survey by the Royal Bank of Scotland, which is compiling a student-living index. —Social Studies (Globe and Mail) Part of a cornucopia of minutia, pointed out by Katja. Similar:Facebook exec erroneously cites The Lord of the Rings…