I used to find the Blue Screen of Death to be disconcerting on giant screens in public places, then I found it humorous, and now I find it oddly comforting, like a rotary phone—that there is still some dumb retro tech in our large systems.
I used to find the Blue Screen of Death to be disconcerting on giant screens in public places, then I found it humorous, and now I find it oddly comforting, like a rotary phone—that there is still some dumb retro tech in our large systems.
Really like a German compound noun I heard Patricia Williams use in a talk last week: Waldeinsamkeit = the feeling of being alone in the woods (plus as a New Englander I like the Thoreau/Walden Pond echoes)
For those in the Boston area: To commemorate the centennial of the passage of the 19th Amendment, we are hosting a transcribe-a-thon of the Library of Congress’s Suffrage Papers on 1/28 @Northeastern. (Please sign up in advance for pizza calculations).
Patricia Williams pushing back against the problematic mental state of our age of smartphones and social media: “To be human is to be relieved of constant watchfulness.” (So well put, @Northeastern’s Dr. Martin Luther King Jr event this afternoon)
New issue of my newsletter: “Humane Ingenuity 13: The Best of Both Worlds”—Historians are no longer reading in the reading rooms of archives; instead, they are taking photos. What this means—plus some helpful tools. (Subscribe to Humane Ingenuity.)
On the first What’s New podcast of 2020, I talk with Jessica Silbey about her forthcoming book, Against Progress: Intellectual Property and Fundamental Values in the Internet Age. Does copyright still promote the arts and sciences, or do we need a new approach? Tune in!
How are books like breakfast cereal? The ones that are on eye-level shelves in libraries are taken off and read much more than the ones that are on low or high shelves. (Shelf #1 is the highest; shelf #7 is the lowest.)
I don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows
Kate Eichhorn’s keynote at the Coalition for Networked Information meeting in December, “Forgetting and Being Forgotten: Growing Up in a Digital Era,” was excellent. It’s now available online and worth your time. (Her associated book is also recommended.)
From a distance I took this photo of a family at sundown, and now I really wish I had their contact info so I could send it to them
Eye-opening survey by @ianmilligan1 reveals the changing practice of historians: Over 90% now use research trips to take photos of archival documents that they will examine when they get home; on average, they take 1,000 photos; 40% take over 2,000 photos.
I like how my web host, @reclaimhosting, has a server for installing new software called “Fugazi,” but it would be extra cool if it played “Waiting Room” while installing the software
“What will the new decade bring? Ducks, I hope.”
As the father of boy-girl twins, I consider Star Wars to be an extended metaphor.
Winter at its most beautiful is more beautiful than any other season.
World’s greatest holiday gift: my colleague Deb Smith’s 2020 calendar featuring her bunnies, Ella and Leo, in month-appropriate outfits
Toilet-paper ribbon-cutting ceremony to open new bathrooms in our library today.
In related news, I am now the proud owner of comically large scissors.
On the final What’s New podcast of 2019: a trio of young researchers and their innovative work on nanotechnology sensors for seeing color, improving the flow of patients in hospitals, and how we can achieve better self-knowledge about our personalities
Look at this beautiful new gadget I just put on my desk
A new issue of my newsletter is out: “Humane Ingenuity 12: Automation & Agency”—can we have a high level of automation and a high level of human control at the same time? Some interesting new examples are pointing the way. (Subscribe)
Belle is having thoughts
Current status: I have been invited to a “Ride with the Rabbis” spin class.