Saturday, May 20, 2006

Homeland Security Privacy Office Slams RFID [Emergent Chaos] 6:40:04 PM    comment []

Dilbert Has Patent Troubles. It's like Paul Graham said - Dilbert got money, Dilbert got patent problems: http://www.comics.com/comics/dilbert/archive/images/dilbert2006052442720.gif [Copyfight] 6:39:59 PM    comment []

Leonard's primer on Nintendo DS Lite homebrew. worth it for ScummVM alone   [Waxy.org Links] 6:38:29 PM    comment []

What Is the Best Work of American Fiction of the Last 25 Years?. The Book Review asked writers, critics and editors. Their answers may surprise you. By THE NEW YORK TIMES. [NYT > Books] 12:10:46 PM    comment []

Admissions Officials Lament Practice of Signing On With More Than One College. Many high school seniors and their parents have tried to get around deadlines for accepting offers from colleges by sending in deposits to more than one school. By ALAN FINDER. [NYT > Education] 12:10:35 PM    comment []

The real story behind the 'badges for Iranian Jews'. My friend Mehdi has translated the recent (quite silly and impractical) bill passed by the Iranian Majlis to limit the influence of Western dress code. This has apparently been the source of all recent uproar on Iran and other religious minorities: (Original text) Encouraging fabric designers and producers in using Iranian and Islamic patterns and styles in producing fabric and dress. Respecting the traditional patterns and lively symbols of Iranian ethnic groups and paying attention to proper body coverage based on Islamic Sharia. Taking advantage of research in obtaining original(to Iran) fabric patterns. Encouraging the public in using the Iranian... [Editor: Myself (English)] 12:10:31 PM    comment []

Iran Not Quite That Far Gone?. (Hat Tip: Huffington Post) Reports of an Iranian badge law resembling that of Nazi Germany (or the other way around) are greatly exaggerated--as in: false, according to an Israeli middle east expert. [Pajamas Media] 12:10:22 PM    comment []

Future of Higher Education Is Divisive Topic for Panel. Finding common ground is not easy among the 19 members of the Bush administration's Commission on the Future of Higher Education. By SAM DILLON. [NYT > Education] 12:02:49 PM    comment []

Doc sez: Take it away, Terry. June Gloom came early in Santa Barbara, while the winter rains stayed late. Still, we're going down to this year's AVP Beach Volleyball tournament. (Here's my report from last year's'. And here's the photo set.) Then we're heading over to Paradise Valley, where the fog don't shine. Meanwhile, I want ya'll to dig the depths (emotional as well as intellectual) of Terry Heaton, who is on a roll (and playing an increasingly important role for what's left of Television) lately. Start with A lesson in love, then step through Affiliates increasingly left out, The internet is the new "public", Chalk one up for truth in advertising (sales), CBS's Sunday night problem ("Spin, thy name is Les Moonves"), and Arbitron: On demand explodes. Terry is now headed off to Public TV's Showcase 2006, to which I'm sure he'll bring more perspective and smarts than anybody else in the place. (And that's not a knock on all the other good people there. I just don't know anybody else who makes more, or a deeper, sense of What's Going On in TV.) [The Doc Searls Weblog] 11:55:11 AM    comment []

The importance of the "body" (the why of tangible computing?). I am sure this paper is interested for Adam Greenfield’s next book (”The city is here for you to use”): How Bodies Matter: Five Themes for Interaction Design by Scott R. Klemmer, Bjoern Hartmann, and Leila Takayama For DIS2006: It discusses how "our physical bodies play a central role in shaping human experience in the world, understanding of the world, and interactions in the world", drawing on various theories of embodiment in the field of psychology, sociology and philosophy. What is interesting is that articles presents some relevant arguments and examples that shows the importance of the body. It put the emphasis on the embodiment for (among others), I picked up those I was interested in: Learning through doin: physical interaction in the world facilitates cognitive development (Piaget, Montessori) Gesture is important in terms of cognition and fully linguistic communication for adults (to conceptually plan speech production and to communicate thoughts that are not easily verbalized) Epistermic actions: manipulating artifacts to better understand the task's context Thinking through prototyping Tangibility of representations: The representation of a task can radically affect our reasoning abilities and performance. The tacit knowledge that many physical situations afford play an important role in expert behavior. hands, as they are simultaneously a means for complex expression and sensation: they allow for complicated movement kinesthetic memory is important to know how to interact with objects (ride a bicycle, how to swim) Reflective reasoning is too slow to stay in the loop Learning is situated in space Visibility Facilitates Coordination Physical Action is characterized by Risk: bodies can suffer harm if one chooses the wrong course of action Personal responsibility: Making the consequences of decisions more directly visible to people alters the outcome of the decision-making process. Why do I blog this? This echoes with the literature review I did about how space/place affords socio-cognitive interactions. Embodiment is certainly one of the most interesting component of this relationship. I also think one of the most important dimension is the inherent risk of physical actions, nobody gets physically hurt in virtual worlds but what happened while playing augmented reality quake? Of course this is meant to support the “why” question of tangible computing? [unmediated] 12:05:21 AM    comment []

Google Maps Like You’ve Never Seen ‘Em: According to its creator, “Google Cartography uses the Google Search API to build a visual representation of the interconnectivity of streets in an area.” In other news, our heads just exploded. · Google Cartography [Richard Jones via Curbed Photo Pool] [Too many topics, too little time.] 12:03:31 AM    comment []

The 48 Hour Film Project 2006 Tour. The 48 Hour Film Project is back for 2006, and coming to a city near you. Organize a team of talent to compete head to head in creating a film in just 48 hours time. The winners of each city competition will compete nationally for an as-yet-unannounced prize package (last year they gave away Avid w/ Mojo editing systems and the Panny HVX-200). Winners of the 2005 city competitions will be screened at Cinequest, and past winners of the 48HFP have screened at SXSW. [unmediated] 12:00:13 AM    comment []