Group items tagged

Rating Characteristics 4 Exceptional. The blog post is focused and coherently integrates examples with explanations or analysis. The post demonstrates awareness of its own limitations or implications, and it considers multiple perspectives when appropriate. The entry reflects in-depth engagement with the topic. 3 Satisfactory. The blog post is reasonably focused, and explanations or analysis are mostly based on examples or other evidence. Fewer connections are made between ideas, and though new insights are offered, they are not fully developed. The post reflects moderate engagement with the topic. 2 Underdeveloped. The blog post is mostly description or summary, without consideration of alternative perspectives, and few connections are made between ideas. The post reflects passing engagement with the topic. 1 Limited. The blog post is unfocused, or simply rehashes previous comments, and displays no evidence of student engagement with the topic. 0 No Credit. The blog post is missing or consists of one or two disconnected sentences.

Pete said “everybody blogs” in the same tone of voice that people use when they refer to the children’s book Everybody Poops, thereby making blogging seem as if it’s just as thoughtful and intellectual of an activity as the subject of that children’s classic.

the blogs I read regularly have far more to offer. Some I read for information, some to get me thinking about a topic and to inform me what others have already thought, some to amuse me, some to delight me, some to make me angry, and some because I am trying to find yet another way to distract me from finishing those introductions

As blogging becomes more popular, Saudi Arabian authorities are starting to treat it with the same caution and restriction applied to traditional media in the country. Of course this has gotten many bloggers upset, and people have taken to Twitter to protest, with the hashtag #haza3 which refers to the Ministry official’s last name. Public protesting is illegal in Saudi Arabia.

I'm no expert,

One thing a professional reporter knows that I'm not always sure that a person who isn't a reporter knows is that it is very easy to see part of an event and miss the more important part of an event, to see one thing when something else has happened. You have to be very aware of how complex most events are, and how narrow one's vision of most events are. And the police will tell you -- my father-in-law is a retired FBI agent -- and he will certainly tell you that there's nothing as unreliable as an eyewitness. You don't even have to go to the movies to see Rashomon. Just take any couple that you know that's been divorced and ask for his story of what happened, and then ask for her story of what happened.

It really isn't any one person. It's the experienced news organization that filters this out.

“Awesomeness” doesn’t necessarily have to mean “life-changing wisdom from the fountain of genius.” Sometimes it just means holding yourself to a higher standard in your day-to-day content and avoiding getting into a rut just for the sake of consistency. And wherever you produce content — videos, podcasts, blogs, ads, Facebook — it’s more important than ever that you focus on what you have to offer instead of searching for widgets and plug-ins and toolbars to help you offer it slightly better. The days when people would idly surf the Web, grazing on what they could find, are largely over. Today, we've largely surrendered the discovery process to our social networks, feeding off the great links our friends have found and liked enough to share. Which means that consistency and audience loyalty aren't going to be enough anymore. You're going to need to make sure that everything you create is erupting with potential to be shared. Then you'll find the process is all around a heck of a lot easier. 

a medium without a message is little more than static

This is the great unspeakable fact of American politics: it doesn't matter all that much who wins.

Military suppliers, big Wall Street interests, and the economic middle-class may do better or worse, but they always do pretty well.

I think you'll find that political parties tend to reliably support policies that have nice distributional consequences for the interest groups that support them. And I think you'll find politicians and court intellectuals brilliant at framing pay-offs to party stalwarts as policies absolutely necessary to the common weal.

Okay, hackers, it's time to use your powers for good.

The "public internet" is for the poor Pledging to keep the "public internet" neutral is great, but what happens when companies stop wanting to offer their services on it? Googlezon has the answer: In their proposal, they say that it's perfectly OK for companies and consumers to buy non-neutral, non-public "special services" online. If you're a media company that streams videogames, for example, your customers want a guarantee that the game won't stall out because of a crappy "public internet" connection. So you make your game available only to people with the special service "gamer package." Your customers pay you; you pay Googlezon; now there's a superfast connection for the privileged few with money to burn. And what happens when news websites start delivering their pretty pictures and infographics in 3D? Verizon has already suggested 3D is a perfect "special service" to deliver in a non-neutral way. In five years, the public internet is going to look boring and obsolete. Where's the 3D? Where are all the cool games and streaming viddies? The public internet? Yeah, that's just for poor people. But guess what's going to remain on the public net, the place where you go when you don't have money? Certainly there will be educational resources like Wikipedia. But mostly it's going to be advertisement-saturated free content from major entertainment companies. And of course there will be many opportunities to give your personal information to Facebook, or gamble away your non-existent savings on Zynga games. (Sorry - did I say gamble? I meant "pay for premium poker game content.") Put in brick-and-mortar terms: There won't be any produce markets on the public internet, but there will be plenty of liquor stores.

Googlezon will be a gatekeeper not just for new web services but also for content. The companies can choose to support services from any small business they like, and block others. Same goes for sites providing news or entertainment. Googlezon might make an agreement with the New York Times to load its pages faster than the Washington Post. And Googlezon might not load io9 at all, unless of course you're reading this blog via the Google Reader (as part of the "special service" package called "blogs and podcasts")

Warren

The Caryatids

Neuromancer

we need, first, to take charge of our own learning, and next, help others take charge of their own learning. We need to move beyond the idea that an education is something that is provided for us, and toward the idea that an education is something that we create for ourselves. It is time, in other words, that we change out attitude toward learning and the educational system in general. That is not to advocate throwing learners off the bus to fend for themselves. It is hard to be self-reliant, to take charge of one's own learning, and people shouldn't have to do it alone. It is instead to articulate a way we as a society approach education and learning, beginning with an attitude, though the development of supports and a system, through to the techniques and technologies that support that.