One: sign the petition from the EFF to the RIAA concerning the tactics they take against alleged filesharers.
Two: sign the petition to protect the Internet from corporate control.
It’ll just take a few minutes, and every little bit helps. Forward these to any group you think might care about basic digital freedoms.
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Laugh of the day: Web 2.1
For all you old fashioned Web 2.0 peeps: we’re so over that.
Web 2.1 is here, and it supports a server side BLINK tag. In your face Web 2.0.
From Arstechnica:
Microsoft, in an attempt to spread the word about Windows Live, has struck a deal with 72 colleges all across the world. And what is this said deal? The colleges have agreed to let Microsoft host their student’s e-mail accounts.
Windows Live@edu, as the service is called, will allow university students to keep their existing e-mail addresses but use Windows Live Mail as their client. Better yet, students won’t have to deal with ads because Microsoft has agreed to turn them off for those specific accounts, at least until the students graduate.
Google has already done this with one school…MS just hit 72. How do we feel about for-profit, publically held corporations taking over infrastructure duties of public universities? I am more than a little wary of these sorts of deals…
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Database Issue…
No, we didn’t go back in time, and I didn’t delete a bunch of posts.
Something happened at LISHost last night, and some of the databases were corrupted, so my blog is back to last Sunday’s backup.
I’m not quite sure what recreating the posts will do to my RSS feed, so those of you subscribing that way may get some dupes as I recreate and back-date a few posts. Sorry about any duplication…
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Favorite Photo from Shakerag
Originally uploaded by griffey.
I just loved this shot from our hike in Shakerag Hollow the other day. Something about the curves and the vertical trees in the background. Gonna have to get a big print to hang somewhere in the house.
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Hiking Shakerag
So after discovering Shakerag Hollow here in Sewanee last spring, Bets and I decided to try it again this weekend. Needless to say, it didn’t disappoint.
And the flowers were just amazing.
Indy had a great time:
Go now! My presentation is live…I’m not entirely happy with the presentation (I produced multiple screencasts resolutions, and they only linked to one) but overall, I think it’s pretty good.
If anyone needs other resolutions, or a stand alone download of the screencasts, I’m going to put links in the comments of the HigherEd BlogCon post.
Does anyone out there have any experience getting a small run of something manufactured? I’m talking small, plastic or foam, less than 1000 pieces. Could be easily formed, one piece, nothing complex…just an injection model of some sort.
I have another $1000000 idea, and am interested in seeing the cost of experimenting with it. Thoughts?
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HigherEd BlogCon…again
Just a reminder to anyone that cares: My presentation for HigherEd BlogCon goes live tomorrow! I’d love to hear from anyone who makes it through the whole thing…it took a ton of work to put together. I know that there are some problems with the timing on some of the screencast, but I don’t think anything actually effects the meaning behind the cast.
I’ll be available on the HigherEd BlogCon site tomorrow, answering questions in the comments section of the blog.
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Microsoft Academic Live Search
Today, Microsoft launched their answer to Google Scholar: Microsoft Academic Live Search. It’s an interesting product, but clearly young. Google Scholar is much larger (Academic Live currently only indexes a few scientific sources), and seems to have more integration with libraries. But the interface for Academic Live is much better, from a librarian’s point of view. Here’s a quick roundup of the important differences:
- Academic Live allows sorting of results…Google Scholar only sorts by relevance
- Academic Live has a much better interface, and allows customization of what you see…Google Scholar does not
- Academic Live has built in support for citation managers like EndNote…Google Scholar doesn’t
- Academic Live does a very poor job of letting you know if a paper is available freely, or via library subscription…Google Scholar is far ahead in this area
In all, it’s nice to see some competition, even if it is from the evil empire. Librarians will definitely have to keep an eye on this, and see how we can integrate it into our search strategies. Things I’d like to see:
- RSS feeds for common searches…Google does it for News, why not Scholar?
- Live Bibliography: using GreaseMonkey or some other client side script, enable an automatic search of information in a bibliography of a paper…being able to look at a bibliography, and link out of it to another Google Scholar search would be amazing
Last thought: in the FAQ, Microsoft Academic Live suggests that if a library is interested in getting their OpenURL resolver attached to Academic Live, they contact their link resolver company. This strikes me as a completely unrealistic expectation. We’re supposed to drop our provider a line, and then expect them to provide Microsoft with our IP range? Seems easier to do it the Google way, and have each school contact Google if they want listing.