I’ve wondered before about how one might measure the spread of memes across blogland, and now Scott Eric Kaufman is doing exactly that in preparation for a panel on academic blogging at the MLA. Here’s the post explaining his project in full; here’s the basic explanation: Most memes, I’d wager, are only superficially organic: beginning […]
Wow. Google is now letting people make their own search engines. Just a few days ago I was trying unsuccessfully to find a specialized search engine only for opera companies and performers and performances; now I can make my own. I wonder if I can get extra credit for my Information Resources and Services class […]
In my systems analysis class this week, we learned about the differences between various models for software development, and we talked a bit about the circumstances under which you might choose one model or another. For instance: the waterfall model, in which the programmers and everyone else involved in the project move through a series […]
How on earth did people manage to move to new cities before the internet? Somehow, of course, they did. But, as is the case with a lot of other things that are much easier with access to e-mail and the web, it’s hard to imagine. At any rate, one of the perks of moving to […]
I have an idea for colleges and universities looking to do a quick-and-dirty website usability check: Recruit every newly hired employee to provide feedback on their experience using your site. Hand them a questionnaire, convene them in focus groups with food as a bribe for participation,* whatever — I bet you’ll garner a ton of […]
1. Cole Swensen’s Oh, a very short book that does for opera what her later books of poems did for the Tres Riches Heures and the history of illumination. A fellow LibraryThing user recommended it, and I snapped it up, because I dug Goest big time, and there are so few poets who write about […]
I’ve nearly finished entering the data about my books into LibraryThing. Some additional thoughts I’ve had while cataloging: The social data aspect of this is fascinating. I’m sure I’m not the only user who’s had the experience of entering a title, seeing that nobody else has it, and then noticing weeks later that someone else […]
One more reason why Barack Obama should run for president someday: He now has a podcast. What a great idea. (In other news: Finally upgraded to a paid LibraryThing account. The catalog is now at 276 books and climbing rapidly. My word, but I’m tired.)
Things I love about living in the 21st century (a partial list): The way the advent of blogs and social tagging services (del.icio.us, Flickr, and the like) has created so many wonderfully geeky conversations about low-tech tools like pens and paper and notebooks. That I can share bookmarks pertaining to the kinds of obscure topics […]
If you haven’t yet visited the New York Public Library Digital Gallery, you must. Among many other things, it offers the joy of serendipitous image-discovery. I browsed around the collections for a while and then tried a keyword search for "snow." I used the selection tool to grab everything that looked particularly interesting, and ended […]