towboat: great old pics of an interesting bridge passing.

The Decline and Fall of the British University: Poor communication, expensive reading materials and illiteracy were the foundation blocks for the universities. If today we have excellent communications, free online information and general literacy, we also have an environment in which the universities are struggling to maintain their position. That, of course, is not an […]

phd —– life was hard, but people weren’t as hungry.

Seymour Martin Lipset, Sociologist, Dies at 84 – New York Times: Seymour Martin Lipset, who ignored family pressure to be a dentist and instead became a pre-eminent sociologist, political scientist and incisive theorist on American uniqueness, died on Dec. 31 in Arlington, Va. He was 84. ——- I don’t think that many people get through […]

Lessig and Barlow at 23c3: Sandy Stone told me that I should hear Barlow at 23c3… I didn’t get a reference url from her, but ran across it on boing boing. I’m just noting it here so I can come back and listen when I have time. Isn’t that what blogs are for? [Link] —— […]

The Dork You scored 36 anxiety, 57 awkwardness, and 32 neuroticism! You aren’t particularly anxious, and you don’t count things–but you do notice sometimes that you don’t exactly fit in. Polite people would call you an eccentric, but you truly are The Dork! And proud. Just because you feel a little awkward at parties doesn’t […]

Call for Papers: Association of Internet Researchers Abstract Deadline: February 1, 2007 This conference, which uses Open Conference Systems developed by the Public Knowledge Project, enables participants to submit abstracts online at http://conferences.aoir.org/submit.php?cf=6. Presentations can include: • Single papers (abstract max of 750 words)• Creative or Aesthetic Presentation (abstract max of 750 words)• Panels (abstract […]

sleepless nights with steve woolf: No accountability = no community. —— accountability has no necessary relation to community, it may be present, it may not. two things are necessary for community, a shared space (this may be imaginary, virtual, etc.) and the capacity to exclude others. once you establish the capacity to identify that ‘this […]

Introducing: FISH: FISH: Free (as in kittens) Integrated Search Handler. But never, ever tell your patrons that (unless they want to know). Backranym it to “FISH Isn’t So Hard” or “Finding Instead of Searching Helps.” But let’s break down the orignial meaning: ——- this looks like a nifty tool for drupal using libraries.

sleepless nights with steve woolf: No accountability = no community. —— accountability has no necessary relation to community, it may be present, it may not. two things are necessary for community, a shared space (this may be imaginary, virtual, etc.) and the capacity to exclude others. once you establish the capacity to identify that ‘this […]