“Boilerplate was a mechanical man developed by Professor Archibald Campion during the 1880s and unveiled at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition.” A remarkably convincing fake website by Paul Guinan. —Boilerplate: Mechanical Marvel of the Nineteenth Century Similar:Boosting the Signal: Peaceful Protesters in Baltimore are the NormVideo of people throwing rocks or burnin…CultureStop Using 'Poet Voice'This…
: I have no idea how useful this article really is — it’s a classic case of “I found it on the Internet.” (A few posters have evaluated this article on MetaFilter.) —“Real” Deal about Nuclear, Bio, and Chem Attacks Similar:The Most Awesome 450 Page Presentation Everhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bt9F7tKc…AestheticsMake America Meme Again! Create your own Trump executive…
What’s up with public high school students? “They’ve had careful self-esteem training since they were 2. They’re told exactly what to feel about everything and they have to be happy all the time,” says researcher Elinor Burkett. —School Daze in America (Wash Times) Similar:What Critics of Student Writing Get Wrong [T]o improve as writers, student…AcademiaSo,…
The Disney Channel airs a cartoon that comments on file-swapping software. An insightful real-world teenage morality tale, or corporate brainwashing? —Disney’s Peer-to-Peer Pressure (Wired) Similar:Seton Hill's Griffin Holds an iPad in Front of Admin Steps (Blender 3D Models)I textured the model I created yesterday…ArtBen Franklin Sings about Your Rights as a PhotographerIf you’re legally present…
“Who says we aren’t a nation of readers? Shucks. Before you can use a new electric skillet, you’re supposed to read its 12-page manual.” Marti Attoun —My On-and-off Struggle with Instruction Manuals (CS Monitor) Similar:Thesis Critique Activity: Another Use of a Class-edited Google DocA few weeks ago, I had students in my up…Academia'New York Times'…
“MS Word has no right to be a standard for document preparation, since it’s clearly less efficient (for most purposes) than readily available alternatives,” fumes Allin Cottrell. —Word Processors: Stupid and Inefficient If the alternative involves typing commands like “c:\gs\gsview\epstool -b -c -o%1.tmp.eps %1.eps”, is it easier to sell your soul to Microsoft? (See: “Using…
Many of the links on this site are broken, but the message pretty much keeps me going. Comments? “Students need the wonder, awe, and delight which comes from the adventure of confronting the unknown, unfettered by knowledge and common sense. Then learning is wonderful, awesome, and, delightful.” —Nothing Matters Similar:Listening to Weird Al's "Word Crimes." Awesome.…
“It’s like these sci-fi nerds can’t handle the real world, so they hide in a fake one,” says sports fanatic Scott Moreland, whose online fantasy-football team, DaJerseyJintz, was 4-1 at press time. —Walking Sports Database Scorns Walking Sci-Fi Databasesatire from The Onion) Similar:Not bad for a couple hours of work. #blender3d #blender3dart #steampunk #neovictorianNot bad…
E-mail messages, voice-mail recordings and other electronic traces of people were routinely preserved by computer networks or telephone companies… These e-relics often captured a moment in time that is both beautiful and chilling to the people who discovered them. Ariana Eunjung Cha —Salvaging Electronic Last Words (WashPost) Similar:Post-publication review as an efficient alternative to pre-publication…
“New research reveals that 40 percent of Web surfers will visit a news or information site more often if its pages load faster.” Excuse me, but… duh! I guess you should ignore the August 2000 press release in which Jupiter advocated these “expensive enhancements.” —Fast And Efficient Web Sites Will Drive Greater Customer Retention Than…
Microsoft a monopoly? Pshaw. “Microsoft sees themselves as a small fish in a big pond. The pond is all information that could potentially be digitized in the universe. Just some insight into where they’re coming from.” Zimran Ahmed —Belly of the Beast Revisited (winterspeak.com) Similar:The president of the US bonds with Vladimir Putin over journalists:…
The anthrax scare will likely encourage greater use of e-mail. “If you’re connected to the Internet—and, duh, you wouldn’t be reading this if you weren’t—probably your e-mail-to-snail-mail ratio overwhelmingly favors the former.” Steven Levy —The End of Snail Mail? (MSNBC.com) Similar:Kelly Gallagher on "Readicide" I am reading to my daughter the four…BooksJustin Bieber and the…
“Traditionally, each company has had to design and implement all of the services it wanted to offer its website users. This approach leads to incredible waste, unprofitable websites, and lowered usability…” [Jakob Nielsen is talking about e-commerce, not personal home pages.] —The End of Homemade Websites (UseIT.com) Similar:How to fix the internet:Â If we want online…
(satire from The Onion) “Have a long history of experience in the field you’re applying for and glowing recommendations. Either that, or print your résumé on really nice, heavyweight ivory paper.” —Job-Hunting Tips Similar:The Dauphin (ST:TNG Rewatch, Season 2, Episode 10)A pretty 16yo destined to bring peace to…AmusingRaw Deal on Printer Ink”The ink we print…
“The Apostrophe Protection Society was started in 2001 by John Richards, now its Chairman, with the specific aim of preserving the correct use of this currently much abused punctuation mark in all forms of text written in the English language.” —The Apostrophe Protection Society Similar:Jimmy Maher's Appreciation of Infocom's Classic Sherlock Text AdventureI learned a…
There’s way too much information online. What really matters to readers is quality, not quantity. Gerry McGovern —The Need for Editors on the Web Similar:Inverted Pyramid: A news story starts with what's most important, not with whoever spoke f…Jerz > Writing >&nb…JournalismHow To Read a Poem Out LoudRead the poem slowly. Most adolescents s…HumanitiesHow 15 minutes I spent…
Metadata “collects critical information such as heading, summary, author name, date of publication, classification, keywords, etc…. Without metadata a document is left floating in a cyberspace filled with 550 billion other documents. The chances of it being found by the right person at the right time are greatly diminished.” Gerry McGovern —Why Metadata is Important…
“Coming very near the bottom of an official list of religions put out by the [U.K.] Statistics Office, Jedi Knight is known by the code 896. Heathen comes in at 897. Followed by Atheist at 898 and lastly None with 899.” Kieren McCarthy —Jedi Knights Achieve [Sort of] Official Recognition as Religion (The Register) Similar:Two…
“[T]he Internet story has come to an end.” Reuters —Silicon Alley Reporter Magazine Closes (Wired) Similar:The Hut Where the Internet Began – Atlantic MobileLet’s start at the end point: what you’r…CybercultureA Pox On Your Listicle ClickbaitYup, seeing “1 of 21” at the top of your…BusinessA study in breaking news headlines.For the UK Guardian, the news…
“a cybernetic process whereby people in power deepen their dominance by using online communication to negotiate for the consent of the subjugated.” Mike Dorsher —Hegemony Online (UWEC) Similar:Jeff Bezos Plan for News: The Washington Post Becomes an Amazon ProductFor the past few months, a group inside …BooksFlannery O'Connor reading "A Good Man is Hard to…