randomwalks/dj

A tutorial on how I did the dashboard effect on endo's screenshots page.

Originally from chaotic intransient prose bursts, on March 7, 2006 10:28 PM

Christopher Blizzard thinks Mozilla's millions are not an issue, but the lack of transparency suggests otherwise. If you don't want us spreading rumors (I heard $30M, but that was a while ago), tell us what the real numbers are.

Originally from Hack the Planet, on March 7, 2006 10:28 PM

Amiri and Amina Baraka
Originally uploaded by triciawang.

Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn

Amiri and Amina Baraka are the first people I saw perform when I moved to Brooklyn - He signed my copy of his poem book. It was at the Bowery Poetry Club and it was post 9-11 and has just written that inflammatory poem that pissed everyone off and resulted in NJ stripping him of his Poet Laurete status. I don't agree with all his statements - especially those about Jewish people - but he aptly catpures a lot of the anger that people have with the system and makes a lot of great points about society and government - his antics are a bit old school but you still gotta give it to him speaking up still.

Originally from Hi Tricia!, on March 7, 2006 10:28 PM

I was really sad to miss Simon Willison’s Javascript tutorial at ETech this week, but happily he’s posted all his slides and detailed notes. Thanks, Simon! Definitely gonna brush up on the Javascript with this.

My ETech JavaScript tutorial [Simon Willison]

Originally posted by Gina Trapani from Spun, on March 7, 2006 10:27 PM

Now that most phone calls at the office are official, not private, I’ve been practising answering my office phone with a serious, deep-voiced “Jill Walker” rather than my habitual, informal “Hei det er Jill!” I forgot last Wednesday though. The man on the other end had to ask me: “Jill Walker?” Yes, I told him. “This is Sigmund Grønmo,” he said. “You might know who I am?” Uh, yes. He’s our university’s rektor, the top boss of Bergen academia. We’re quite a large university, with 16000 students and over 2000 employees, so I’ve never actually met our current rektor, though I briefly met the previous one. The rektor doesn’t ring you every day.

“I’ve got great news for you,” he said. “You’ve won one of the Meltzer Foundation’s prizes for excellence in research dissemination!”

I yelped a TAZ DINGO (or words to that effect) and then fell silent.

“Are you sure this is really Sigmund Grønmo?”
“Yes.”
“You’re not some Nigeria spammer?”
“No, you can ring me back if you want to check,” he said with a chuckle in his voice.
“No, no, I believe you! But you’re really sure about this prize?”
“Yes! And there’s a hundred thousand kroner for you and we want you to come to the dinner, of course, next Wednesday. You’re not busy? I don’t supposed you’ve been to the Meltzer dinner before, have you?”
“No…”
“All the professors go. And of course we’ll want you there. Oh, and don’t tell anyone until the press release is out!”
“OK… And, my goodness, thank you!”

The internal university newspaper announced it this morning, so I guess he must have been telling the truth.

I’ve been very ambivalent about blogging in the last months. I suppose this sounds a little, well, obvious, but seeing that the university officially, publically and financially are saying that this blogging is great stuff and we’re glad you’ve been doing it, well, that’s astounding. It’s incredibly motivating and validating. And while I’m still not exactly sure how a somewhat established, young, female, head-of-small-department academic in new media blogs, I’m sure I’ll find a way I’m comfortable with and that’s mine. I had the PhD student blog, the newbie university teacher and the brand new head-of-small-department blog down pat, after all).

And hey, you know, if I’d had a pseudonymous academic blog like my almost daily reads Bitch PhD, See Jane Compute, Dr. Crazy, See Jane in the Academy, Profgrrrrl, Learning Curves or Confessions of a Community College Dean (the thought of which has appealed more and more to me) I couldn’t blog this! And would that blog be mine if I couldn’t blog something like this?

Somebody must have nominated me for this prize. If they’re reading this: thank you. I had absolutely no idea, and sudden official university recognition of research blogging as important for the university as a whole is amazing and just extremely motivating.

(Also, I have this sudden urge to email Ivan Tribble, who famously claimed in The Chronicle of Higher Education that blogging would guarantee you not getting an academic job, and tell him the news. Heh.)

Originally posted by Jill from jill/txt, on March 7, 2006 08:34 PM

With regards to recent storytelling techniques on 24, Amy and ADM have some opposing viewpoints... Amy says: Last night's 2 episodes of 24 were like a breath of fresh, bloody air. People got shot! Tortured! Gassed! Did the plot...

Originally posted by Amy from Amy's Robot, on March 7, 2006 08:33 PM

(jess uses this in her class on wired lit)

Originally from jill/txt, on March 7, 2006 08:33 PM

Finally! I’ve been dreaming of this since I was a child! Go on, the story’s even better than the result! (Unfortunately, via Satirewire)

Originally posted by Jill from jill/txt, on March 7, 2006 08:33 PM

matt webb's text adventure game that runs locally on a mac, with web api awareness (go west into the gallery room to look up flickr images)

Originally posted by mathowie from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 08:32 PM

Renders of a Ratnerized skyline.

Originally posted by yatta from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 08:02 PM

Fantastic visualization of IRC participation

Originally posted by djacobs from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 08:02 PM

Trailer, X-Men 3. Why am I so excited for this?

Originally posted by jkottke from kottke.org remaindered links, on March 7, 2006 06:49 PM

Jupiter is growing another big red spot. The gas giant has been told by solar system pals to "keep an eye on it" and "have it checked out" if it gets any bigger.

Originally posted by jkottke from kottke.org remaindered links, on March 7, 2006 06:48 PM

where's the RSS feed. I Care!

Originally posted by fruminator from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 05:00 PM

"Creating great display intermediaries and visualizations that get widespread use has lots of potential as a business, even if untested territory. You can always make money from infrastructure, once it’s been adopted."

Originally posted by stamen from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 05:00 PM

Melody Nelson is organizing a Gainsbourg tribute in early April. Not to be missed! I first heard "Je t'aime moi non plus" in Israel on Galgalatz. Formidable.

Originally posted by axt from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 05:00 PM

March 5: Anil Dash: Reinventing Copy and Paste.
March 7: Ray Ozzie: Rewiring the Web (Clipboard Live).

Originally from hello, typepad, on March 7, 2006 02:31 PM

d2_lostcoast0128 
Originally uploaded by streaky.

Eyeball it and weep.

Originally posted by Alice from Wonderland, on March 7, 2006 11:05 AM

In my conversation on ESPN.com with Bill Simmons, the Sports Guy, I argued that many NBA General Managers--especially Isiah Thomas of the Knicks--could do a better job if they abandoned any pretense at all about exercising their own judgement. It would make more sense, I wrote, simply to draft or trade for players who attended either Duke or the University of Connecticut.

Here's part of the argument:

Let's say I'm so dumb about basketball that all I know is that the best college programs in the country are Duke and UConn, and so as a GM my rule is only draft and/or trade for the first and second best players, in any given year, from those two schools. So I fire all my scouts. I disband my front office, and basically say that I cede my basketball judgment to Jim Calhoun and Mike K. What's my team? It's some combination of Elton Brand, Emeka Okafor, Ben Gordon, Luol Deng, Shane Battier, Mike Dunleavy, Rip Hamilton, Corey Maggette, Jay Williams, Caron Butler, Donyell Marshall and Grant Hill -- which is a really wonderful team. Now, of course, in the real world I couldn't get all those people, because lots of them were really high draft picks. But let's say I got Brand in a trade, after Chicago soured on him, and I was lucky enough to be in the lottery for Okafor. Maggette was a 13; Hamilton and Deng were 7s; and Butler was a 10 -- so at least some of them are doable, particularly since in off-years for Duke and UConn I can trade down and stockpile picks. Battier I wine and dine in the free agent market, because who wants to be stuck in Memphis? Ditto for Gordon, who, it seems, Chicago is thinking of moving anyway. Is that the best team in the league? No. It is better than the Knicks? Absolutely. The point is that clinging to a very simple rule of thumb here -- that doesn't require knowing much about basketball -- can leave you looking pretty smart.

A reader points out that I neglected to mention one of the very best UConn players--Ray Allen.  And given that, I think I was mistaken to say that an all-Duke/UConn team wouldn't be the best in the league.  Think of it (assuming you could put together all those players). Okafor at center. Brand, Maggette and Battier at forward. Some combination of Grant Hill and Rip Hamilton and Ben Gordon and Ray Allen in the backcourt. Is there a better team in the league than that?

In defending the knowing-less-is-more position, I cited research by the psychologist Dan Goldstein. The relevant paper is here. It's definitely worth a read.

Goldstein's blog is here.

If you're interested in this line of research, Goldstein is part of a really fascinating band of psychologists interested in heuristics--that is, mental shortcuts that have the effect of helping us better navigate the world. Take a look here, for more.

Originally posted by malcolmgladwell from gladwell.com, on March 7, 2006 11:05 AM

Sometimes I feel a lot like this:

An excellent photo from HOGBARD, and proof that we do read that giant sprawling FlickrBlog recommendations thread in FlickrCentral.

Originally from FlickrBlog, on March 7, 2006 11:04 AM

nycexposed discovers the last page revs wrote before he was caught

.

Originally from Wooster Collective, on March 7, 2006 11:03 AM

Jill Walker’s excellent jill/txt blog about electronic literature, social networking and, well, blogging, has won an award from the Meltzer Foundation at the University of Bergen. She will receive NOK 100 000 (approx EUR 12 000) in recognition of her “excellence in research dissemination”. This is exciting, as it reflects an official recognition of the potential of blogs to create and disseminate knowledge. Read Jill’s blog post for more info, and her publications page for more of her work.

Congratulations, Jill, keep up the frontier work!

Apropos: If you are hip blogging scientish, you should have a look at the Hard Bloggin’ Scientist manifesto. It provides operating guidelines for a new movement. While a bit tongue-in-cheek, it’s got some valid points.

They even have sticker images (in pink!) that you can put on your blog to represent the blogging massive. What better way to feel like a part of something important…

Originally posted by watz from Generator.x: Generative strategies in art & design, on March 7, 2006 11:03 AM

Thought the last Flickr mash up rocked your world? Well you aint seen nuffin yet. Brevity has written a programme that blends 50 different Flickr images into one. Very nice

Originally from Protein Feed, on March 7, 2006 11:03 AM

Last week in Brooklyn, Thoroughfare, a terrific show opened featuring the work of Leon Reid (Darius Jones), Andrew Poneros, and Alex Holden. If you missed the opening, the show will be up at the RIVIERA GALLERY in Brooklyn until the 19th of this month. Check for more info after the jump:

Originally from Wooster Collective, on March 7, 2006 11:02 AM

"...a categorized list of all of the AJAX image solutions I've been able to find that were of some use."

Originally from unmediated, on March 7, 2006 10:58 AM

This is fascinating..."sex might have evolved as a way to concentrate lots of harmful mutations into individual organisms so they could be easily weeded out by natural selection".

Originally posted by jkottke from kottke.org remaindered links, on March 7, 2006 10:58 AM

Eliot Shepard has some advice for those entering a photography competition...or really, on how you might go about taking a good photo.

Originally posted by jkottke from kottke.org remaindered links, on March 7, 2006 10:58 AM

We use email and web pages, blogs and instant messenger regularly to stay in touch. Still we don't have a solid shared calendar system.

I've been watching the Open Source Applications Foundation eagerly for years now, as they develop an open-source alternative to Microsoft Office and Exchange.

Groups need to share calendars, so they can see where people are, when the important meetings are, when their associates are available. After years of philanthropic bootstrapping, an early beta of an open-source alternative was released!

It's called Chandler; here's a link to a free Windows/OSX/Linux download. You might try running it if you don't have any other calendar program on your computer!

To use Chandler for group calendaring, you need to be running Cosmo which is only on version 0.2.6 which is why I haven't emailed Marientina suggesting we use it for the IMD. It's probably just too early!

But some day, probably shortly after I graduate, the Division will be able to use something cross-platform and free, like this, to organize events, concerts and meetings. Yee hah!

Originally from just in teractive, on March 7, 2006 10:57 AM

"Pearl Jam is pleased to offer their new single World Wide Suicide as a completely free and unrestricted download." 256kbps mp3 file

Originally posted by yatta from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 10:55 AM

NOTE TO STEWART from Michael Parenti : just give this guy some money and incorporate the feature on flickr... its damn hot

Originally posted by exiledsurfer from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 10:54 AM

Useful.

Originally posted by finn from del.icio.us/inbox/djacobs, on March 7, 2006 10:54 AM

DSC_3070.NEF
Originally uploaded by Lady Macabea.

I am sucker for mirror shots, so here's one Adriana took as we were driving out of Portland on Sunday night.

Originally from hello, typepad, on March 7, 2006 05:31 AM