Briefly Noted for November 4, 2010

Jason Scott at MITH — I am extremely bummed I won’t be in town for this. Next week our friends at the Maryland Institute for Technology and the Humanities (MITH) are hosting a two day visit by Jason Scott, computer historian and documentary filmmaker. On Monday November 8th, Scott will introduce a screening of his latest film, and on Tuesday November 9th, Scott will deliver a talk as part of MITH’s Digital Dialogues series. Please see the full announcement for more details. The events are open to the public (that means you).

Geoffrey Rockwell on Method and Theory — In this post about a recent spate of “cluster hires” in digital humanities at places like the University of Iowa and Georgia State University, Geoff Rockwell notes: “The digital humanities, in part because of the need for practicioners with extensive skills, tend to look undertheorized, and it is. It is undertheorized the way any craft field that developed to share knowledge that can’t be adequately captured in discourse is. It is undertheorized the way carpentry or computer science are. To new researchers who have struggled to master the baroque discourses associated with the postmodern theoretical turn there appears to be something naive and secretive about the digital humanities when is mindlessly ignores the rich emerging field of new media theory. It shouldn’t be so. We should be able to be clear about the importance of project management and thing knowledge – the tacit knowledge of fabrication and its cultures – even if the very nature of that poesis (knowledge of making) itself cannot easily (and shouldn’t have to) be put into words. We should be able to welcome theoretical perspectives without fear of being swallowed in postmodernisms that are exclusive as our craft knowledge. We should be able to explain that there is real knowledge in the making and that that knowledge can be acquired by anyone genuinely interested. Such explanations might go some way to helping people develop a portfolio of projects that prepare them for the jobs they feel excluded from. Put another way, there is nothing wrong is valuing thing knowledge as long as we also recognize the value of theoretical critique.”

@alexismadrigal unpacks the Google Books search algorithm — Writing for the Atlantic Monthly, Alexis Madrigal provides insights into how Google indexes book data and uses (or misuses) library metadata.

Briefly Noted for November 3, 2010

@sramsay goes on recordSteve Ramsay argues against anonymity online, asking faculty “to consider whether it’s appropriate for someone who is paid to be a teacher and an intellectual to behave like an Anonymous Coward on Slashdot” and reminding us that we “are not political dissident[s] fearing reprisals from a hostile government.” Something good to keep in mind whenever we start to take ourselves too seriously.

What’s a bigger deal than a $300 smartphone? A free smartphone — T-Mobile is offering the LG Optimus T, a more or less full featured Android device for free with a two year contract. This could really change things, not only for Android, but for those of us building mobile websites and apps for teaching, research, and cultural heritage. For just the price of a monthly contract ($79 for 500 talk minutes and unlimited SMS and Internet), we’ll soon see smartphones in most of our students’, colleagues’, and visitors’ pockets.

Tomboy Notes — It’s the little things that make good software. One of the best little things about Linux/Gnome/Ubuntu is Tomboy, a simple little note-taking package that just plain works. I’m only running Linux about half-time these days—alas, I’ve been forced back to dual-booting Windows for MS Office, easy projector support, etc.—but I’m still running Tomboy full time and syncing across platforms with help of the gtk-sharp and Ubuntu One. There’s a Mac version too. If you’re searching for a good note taking tool, I highly recommend dipping your toe into the Linux bathtub and giving Tomboy a try.

Failing Quickly at Google — James Fallows’s much discussed Atlantic Monthly article on Google and the future of journalism contains this little gem from Josh Cohen of Google News: “We believe that teams must be nimble and able to fail quickly.” Something for managers of teams working in digital humanities and cultural heritage to remember.

Briefly Noted for May 13, 2010

Yet more evidence big associations have lost the plot: watch nine sessions of AAM online for only … $300?!? — The American Association of Museums (AAM) has announced that it will host its first “virtual conference” during this year’s annual meeting in Los Angeles. I understand AAM’s motivation here. They’re surely hoping to recover some of the revenue all big associations have been losing in recent years. AAM is an important institution, so that is an important project. But maybe someone can explain the value proposition of this particular solution to me from a consumer’s perspective. Why would I pay $300 for live web video and chat (when I know can get plenty of that at zero cost through Ustream or Justin.tv plus Twitter) or for post-conference access to recorded video (when YouTube and iTunesU offers content of similarly high quality for free)? I’m not saying the content of the live conference program will be anything but excellent and well worth any time spent on it. But in an age when all of this can be (and is being) done for free, why shell out $300 bucks for it?

Briefly Noted for May 6, 2010

Two Reviews of NARA Civil War Exhibit — Last week The Washington Post and The New York Times each reviewed the National Archives’ new Civil War Sesquicentennial exhibit, Discovering the Civil War. I haven’t seen the exhibit yet myself, but I’d characterize both reviews as “mixed.” Hat tip: Lee White of the National Coalition for History.

The Economist Weighs in on CopyrightThe Economist newspaper makes a very nice, very concise case for copyright reform in a recent leader, arguing for a return to Queen Anne’s statute of 1709-10, “An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors or purchasers of such Copies, during the Times therein mentioned.”

Briefly Noted for April 29, 2010

IMLS UpNext Wrapping Up with Discussions about the Workforce and What’s Next — The IMLS UpNext project has entered its final two weeks with open forums on two new topics. In the first, Joanne Marshall of UNC leads a discussion of the shape of 21st century library and museum workforce. In the second, Larry Johnson of The New Media Consortium considers how the conversations started this spring at UpNext should move forward in the weeks and months ahead and encourages each of us to be the change we wish to see (my words—actually Gandhi’s—not Larry’s). Join in to let IMLS know where you think the museum and library fields should be headed.

Paleofuture on NPR — Anyone interested in the history of science and technology, cultural history, science fiction, or the crackpot fantasies of generations past should subscribe to Paleofuture. To get a sense of what you’ll find there, have a listen to this recent segment of NPR’s All Things Considered with the blog’s author, Matt Novak.

Flash Support Coming to Android — It seems the death of Flash has been greatly exaggerated. Apple’s refusal to support Flash on the iPhone and iPad have been cited by some as signaling the demise of Adobe’s much loved and hated web development and display environment. Now comes news that the next version of Google’s quickly growing Android mobile operating system will fully support Adobe Flash. This is not only the latest salvo from Google in its tiff with Apple (though the timing of the announcement just after Apple’s announcement of iPhone OS4 is certainly intended to tweak the folks in Cupertino). It’s also important news for the hundreds of educational and cultural websites built in Flash and currently inaccessible to users of the latest generation of smartphones. I’m not a great lover of Flash (in fact quite the opposite), but I also find Apple’s refusal to support the technology on the grounds they are defending open standards more than a little specious. Moving forward, I’d rather see dynamic websites and video delivered via open technologies like HTML5. But for now I’m happy I’ll be able to visit the many educational and cultural websites already built in Flash on my Nexus One and that those institutions may not feel compelled to choose between a hasty reworking of entire swathes of their content or being lost to the growing numbers of mobile web visitors.

Briefly Noted for April 28, 2010

On "Uninvited Guests" — As I tweeted when it was first posted, Bethany Nowviskie’s “uninvited guests: regarding twitter at invitation-only academic events” is “*the* must-read Twitter-at-conferences post.” But it’s more than that, of course. It’s also a nuanced unpacking of the ways in which new, technologically-driven modes of scholarly discourse are colliding with older, analog modes—in particular how Twitter disrupts closed academic gatherings and how closed academic gatherings disrupt the ethical assumptions and practical expectations of the Twitterverse, which by default takes all discussions to be open, public, and distributed. Unusually, however, Bethany doesn’t take a strong side in these disputes, treating seriously the concerns of both traditionalists (who cherish the intimacy, privacy, safety, and efficiencies of closed meetings) and the Twitterati (who often view closed meetings as elitist, counter-productive, and just plain suspicious). This is refreshing. What bothers me most in most discussions of these issues is the righteous indignation of both defenders of private meetings/opponents of Twitter and defenders of Twitter/opponents of private meetings. Issues of public v. private and discussions of who’s in and who’s out are always very complicated, and indeed are made more complicated by new media, and anyone who claims to know the “right” answer is just full of it. So how’s that for righteous indignation?

Briefly Noted for April 27, 2010

Be Your Own Privacy Settings — Recent missteps at Facebook and Google Buzz have put privacy on the front burner of conversation among internet watchers and digital humanists of all stripes, including this one. To be sure, there is lots to criticize in the way big social media companies have handled their users’ supposedly private information of late. But @vambenepe makes a very strong case that the energy directed at shaming Facebook and its peers into shaping up would be better spent on reforming our own social media habits (and, I would argue, those of the students in our charge). He writes, “Yes you should have clear privacy settings. But the place to store them is in your brain and the place to enforce them is by controlling what your fingers do before data gets on Facebook. Facebook and similar networks can only leak data that they posses.” Good advice.

"Twitter Archive is Nothing Without Tools, Funding"Digital Campus listeners will already know my take on the Library of Congress Twitter announcement. But for those who missed our most recent podcast, I was also quoted on the matter in an article in Read Write Web entitled “Twitter Archive is Nothing Without Tools, Funding.” #shamelessselfpromotion

Briefly Noted for April 23, 2010

An Asset Bubble in Higher Ed? — Michael Feldstein (currently of Oracle and formerly of SUNY) argues that we may be seeing an asset bubble in higher education of the kind that recently burst in the housing market. Taking Anya Kamenetz’s observations about the problematic economics of higher education one step further, Feldstein argues (with substantial facts and figures to back him up) that the price of a college degree may well have risen “out of proportion with the rise in its intrinsic value,” the defining characteristic of an asset bubble. More frighteningly, he posits the possibility that the bubble may burst, leading to “large and painful contractions in college budgets leading to layoffs, cuts in services and the closing of a significant number of colleges.” Scary.

Steven Johnson on "The Glass Box and the Commonplace Book" — Writer Steven Johnson has an interesting post comparing the well-regarded early modern intellectual practice of “commonplacing,” which he describes as the habit of “transcribing interesting or inspirational passages from one’s reading, assembling a personalized encyclopedia of quotations,” to the early blogs of a decade ago, which were similar compendia of serendipitous inscriptions and insights. He contrasts this kind of annotative reading to the kind that can be done on Apple’s new iPad, a “glass box” which does not allow for easy clipping, moving, and reworking of text. We’ll see how the iPad changes reading and blogging, but I have noticed that the more I use my fairly “glassy” and keyboardless Nexus One for web browsing, the less likely I am to blog or email or bookmark what I find there. It also occurs to me that this whole “briefly noted” thing I have going is a little like commonplacing, and I should probably do more of it.

Briefly Noted for April 21, 2010

edUi Call for Proposals — edUi has posted the CFP for its November 2010 conference in Charlottesville, Virginia. edUi provides a forum for user interaction and experience designers to talk about designing for institutions of learning including higher education, K-12 schools, libraries, and museums. Full disclosure, I’m on the speaker selection committee. But that doesn’t change the fact that it’s a great event.

Oxford Bibliographies Online — I shutter to think that this is what counts as innovation in today’s university press. Tell it George Sarton, who started publishing the Isis Current Bibliography of the History of Science in 1913. More from Ars Technica.

Briefly Noted for April 8, 2010

Teachinghistory.org’s New Look — If you haven’t visited recently, take another look at CHNM’s National History Education Clearinghouse (NHEC) at teachinghistory.org. The NHEC team has spent several months completely redesigning CHNM’s one-stop history education portal. The result is easily one of the best websites we’ve ever built. Congratulations to all!

CHNM to Build Transcription Crowdsourcing Tools — Congrats to Sharon, Jim, and the Papers of the War Department 1784-1800 team on NEH’s recent award of a Digital Humanities Start-Up Grant to support the design and development of software for crowdsourcing documentary transcription. A much needed tool and the right people to build it.