December 2008
63 posts
Kevin Kelly -- The Technium →
This blog is where Kevin Kelly is drafting his next book — online. Worth browsing through…. Re the future, change, digital technology, and the long view on culture.
New Rules for the New Economy -- it's all about... →
Kevin Kelly is a very interesting character — one who’se been around for a long time and is highly influential. I couldn’t help but pass this particular blog posting on as it relates to Communication, which Sam is choosing to major in. (Do find a way to get Kevin Kelly into one of your papers or projects in the coming two years…)
«The new economy is about...
Books - Still Revered for ‘The Catcher in the Rye’... →
A classic you should read sometime… Published in 1951… its author JD Salinger is turning 90….
«With its very first sentence, his novel “The Catcher in the Rye,” which came out in 1951, introduced a brand-new voice in American writing, and it quickly became a cult book, a rite of passage for the brainy and disaffected. “Nine Stories,” published two years later, made Mr....
We start a school in Cambodia - Nicholas D.... →
A family who also spent Christmas in Cambodia, but doing something a bit more noble than our casual visit….
«There was a special reason for the timing of this trip to Cambodia, one you won’t read about in my columns: My family has built a junior high school in Cambodia, and we just had the opening ceremony. We timed it for the Christmas vacation, so our three kids — aged 11 through 16...
Watch
May 01,2008 - James Howard Kunstler | ColbertNation.com
James Howard Kunstler being interviewed on The Colbert Report….
He is someone Joe Bageant cites in his book, Deer Hunting with Jesus….
Kunstler is known for his book “The Long Emergency” as well as his criticisms of the suburbs. See his TED talk on the tragedy of surburbia.
"Web Therapy" mini comedy series -- brought to you... →
Funny new online series starring Lisa Kudrow as a web therapist who sees people via webcam for 3 minute sessions….
“Wikipedia:List of controversial issues”
– A look at controversial issues in Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The 10 best indie movies of 2008 - Beyond the... →
Would love to know if you’ve seen any of them…
36 Hours in Siem Reap, Cambodia - NYTimes.com →
Check out what the New York Times recommend you do if you only had 36 hours in Siem Reap…
«Siem Reap, the town that lodges and feeds Angkor’s million annual visitors, has evolved into a chic haven of rest and relaxation.»
“The whole secret of life is to be interested in one thing profoundly and in a...”
– Horace Walpole - English author (1717 - 1797)
This Is Your (Father’s) Brain on Drugs - New York... →
Quotes from This Is Your (Father’s) Brain on Drugs - New York Times
“Why, then, do many pundits and policy makers rush to denigrate adolescents as brainless? One troubling possibility: youths are being maligned to draw attention from the reality that it’s actually middle-aged adults - the parents - whose behavior has worsened.”
Our most reliable measures show Americans ages 35...
Long Bets - By the end of the year 2020, a... →
Here’s an example of a long bet… a 13 year one… 2008 to 2020…..
Long Bets - On the Record: Bets →
Oh, my god, I’ve found the site to satisfy my urge to make long-term predictions… And I’m in the company of people like Mitch Kapor, Ray Kurzweil, Esther Dyson, Nathan Myhrvold, and other forward thinkers…
«The Long Bets site is
…an arena for competitive, accountable predictions (Long Bets). How Betting Works »
…a forum for focused discussion and...
The Rules | Brain Rules | 12 Principles for... →
«
EXERCISE | Rule #1: Exercise boosts brain power. SURVIVAL | Rule #2: The human brain evolved, too. WIRING | Rule #3: Every brain is wired differently. ATTENTION | Rule #4: We don’t pay attention to boring things. SHORT-TERM MEMORY | Rule #5: Repeat to remember. LONG-TERM MEMORY | Rule #6: Remember to repeat. SLEEP | Rule #7: Sleep well, think well. STRESS | Rule #8: Stressed brains...
Philosophy in Alabama - The Thinker - The College... →
A rural campus of the University of Alabama has an outstanding philosophy department thanks to the outstanding teaching of Kevin Jolley. Reading this made me think of Chris White (not that I know him as well as you guys do)…
«When [Kevin Jolley] first arrived at Auburn as a young professor 17 years ago, there were just a handful of philosophy majors, and there wasn’t much interest...
Edge: SOCIAL NETWORKS AND HAPPINESS By By Nicholas... →
Choose your friends well… your happiness obviously depends on it…
«We found that social networks have clusters of happy and unhappy people within them that reach out to three degrees of separation. A person’s happiness is related to the happiness of their friends, their friends’ friends, and their friends’ friends’ friends—that is, to people well beyond...
Elvis Costello talk show -- Sundance Channel :... →
«Costello’s ear, intelligence, and musicianly generosity are all in play in “Spectacle: Elvis Costello with … ,” his weekly one-hour show on the Sundance Channel, which is part showcase for musicians and part master class; the lineup this season includes Elton John, Rufus Wainwright, Renée Fleming, Rosanne Cash, Herbie Hancock, Tony Bennett, James Taylor, and one amateur musician, a...
Year In Ideas 2008 - Interactive Feature -... →
Fascinating stroll through a wide range of news items… all point to the future…
«Welcome back to the Year in Ideas issue. For the eighth year in a row, we have compiled an alphabetical digest of ideas, from A to Z Start Reading (almost), that helped make the previous 12 months, for better or worse, what they were.»
Best Careers 2009 - US News and World Report →
Best careers, overrated careers, ahead-of-the-curve-careers, and the 11 best-kept-secret-careers… (one of the best careers? ghostwriter…. one of the overrated careers? professor… one of the best kept secret careers? “accent reduction specialist”… casting director… creative perfumer…)
«We scored hundreds of careers on five criteria:
Job...
Maine man takes top prize on 'Survivor' | Portland... →
«If you can survive in Maine, you can probably survive anywhere.
That’s the message Bob Crowley – a physics teacher, tree pruner and lobsterman from South Portland – delivered to a national TV audience Sunday night by winning $1 million on the CBS reality show “Survivor.”
With his patience, stamina and cleverness, the bowtie-wearing 57-year-old teacher beat out 17 other...
Would You Take a Tumblr With This Man? | The New... →
Profile of the guy who started Tumblr (this microblog site).. home-schooled 17-year-old…
See this recent news story re Tumblr getting investment money:
«Tumblr is exactly the kind of start-up that’s supposed to be gasping for air in today’s dismal economy: A trendy but niche Web service with a prominent founder and exactly zero revenue. Instead, the New York-based company...
Photo Contest Winners Photo Gallery - National... →
Something for you to aspire to, Maggie…
Watch Free Documentaries - SnagFilms →
«SnagFilms is committed to finding the world‘s most compelling documentaries, whether from established heavyweights or first-time filmmakers, and making them available to the wide audience these titles deserve.
SnagFilms.com is a website where you can watch full-length documentary films for free, but we’re also a platform that lets you “snag” a film and put it anywhere on the web. With a...
5 Great Science Books to Expand Your Mind -... →
«The recently discovered science of complex systems is about common patterns that span diverse disciplines from physics to biology, from ecology to economics. This recent science of patterns is directly relevant to what we are doing around the Web. In this post we will discuss 5 different books that will get you fired up about modern science.»
Read through the comments on this blog...
Stuart Kauffman: Reinventing the Sacred -... →
In the SOMONE YOU SHOULD KNOW dept……
Stuart Kauffman is a professor of biology, physics, and astronomy, MacArthur fellow (those genius grants), and leader of the Institute for Biocomplexity and Informatics.
He came out with a new book this year — Reinventing the Sacred — in which he argues for “a new scientific world view of emergence and ceaseless creativity…...
HEDGE FUNDS - An Address in Mayfair →
by Donald MacKenzie — in the London Review of Books
Good, detailed explanation of what hedge funds are and what the implications of this financial crisis is for them…
"Ice Tree" made from mineral water bottles :... →
«The tree is made from Canadian mineral glass water bottles assembled together. The piece contains over 300 bottles and took 4 people two days to produce. Lights shine on the piece giving it an ice-like sparkle. The installation will be on show until January.»
Randy Komisar: Engaging Mind And Heart : NPR's... →
From the author of “The Monk and the Riddle: the education of a Silicon Valley entrepreneur”… listen to his essay on what he believes in…
«So I parachuted out of a perfectly good company and started down a different path. I began by looking for where I had mislaid my passion. I studied with a Zen teacher and started an odyssey of self-discovery which continues today.
...
Annals of Gastronomy: Don’t Mention It: The New... →
The story of a very unusual little restaurant in Greenwich Village… classic New Yorker kind of profile…
«I suppose Kenny Shopsin, who runs a small restaurant a couple of blocks from where I live in Greenwich Village, could qualify as eccentric in a number of ways..»
A 73-Year-Old Gives Basketball a Second Shot -... →
I just love these stories of people who keep going, no matter what their age…
«Before Sunday’s basketball game, Coach Yogi Woods gathered the junior varsity at Lambuth University. Watch out for 73 on the other team, he said. He did not mean the player’s number. He meant his age. The visitors, Roane State Community College, had a septuagenarian guard, Ken Mink, college basketball’s...
A Good Appetite - Luxury on Sale - The Lobster... →
Lobster is temporarily very cheap as the author of this article explains, so he set out to cook some…
«But before I could cook my lobsters, I needed to end their watery lives as quickly and humanely as possible. In the past, I would always drop them into a pot of boiling water and clamp the lid on tight.
Trevor Corson had another suggestion.
“The best way to kill them, according to...
While Detroit Slept - Thomas Friedman --... →
The author of “The World is Flat” warns:
«our bailout of Detroit will be remembered as the equivalent of pouring billions of dollars of taxpayer money into the mail-order-catalogue business on the eve of the birth of eBay»