My servers conspire against me. Somehow, they “know” when I leave town and immediately generate some problem that I cannot fix remotely.
I am in Columbus, OH, to provide a presentation for the Midwestern Educational Research Association. The conference has a theme focused on technology this year so that provided the basis for their invitation to have me present. I am having a good time, attending sessions, taking notes, meeting people, etc. Somehow, the server that I use to offer my collection of bookmarks recognizes that I am not in town and decides to shut down. I added some new bookmarks to this system just yesterday. It has never failed in the nearly a year I have been experimenting with this service. I attend conferences maybe a max of two weeks per year and somehow it knows.
I am taking this as a sign of affection. My dog acts up when I leave town, too.
The “social bookmarking” data are intact and the site will be reactivated on Monday (I hope ;)).
The political ads tend to annoy me. The short duration, carefully scripted presentations never answer the questions I want answered. In fact, they contain little of what I would regard as actual information. It almost seems that such ads are crafted to avoid offering specific information. This may be the case because small segments of such ads could be abstracted and used by opponents to offer counter claims.
I have decided that the election season provides a great opportunity to collect and analyze political ads. Perhaps such a task might serve as a way to develop general literacy skills. Here are a couple of personal observations.
1) Why are our politicians always “fighting?” They will, as our champions I assume, fight for higher taxes for the wealthy, lower taxes for us all, health care, protection for our children, etc. Why do they assume we will respond to what they would like to be represented as a competitive and combative environment? Maybe understanding the focus of the political process in this manner is the problem. Maybe the focus should be on getting things done, making progress, coming to an agreement, or some similar way of representing what is necessary to change things.
2) I am trying to understand what is really meant when a candidates suggests they will operate according to regional values. As in, “I will fight for our North Dakota values.” I live on the eastern border of North Dakota so I get confused by the messages touting both North Dakota and Minnesota values. Maybe those of us living near the border have somehow tainted our values by exposure to those of the nearby state. Actually, I am wondering if such values differ and I wonder if I would list the same list of values as most others from my state. Perhaps there is a bit of intended deception here. Maybe the intent is to suggest that I will represent your values and you know what your values are because you are a North Dakotan. It is kind of a “fill in the blank” claim and safer if there is never a need to be more specific.
3) Another thing that annoys me is the reference to longevity and generational attachment to the state. I was not born in North Dakota, but I have lived there for approximately 30 years. Does this mean I have less of an attachment to the state than some 25 year old politician who was born in the state and is running for the state legislature? Perhaps North Dakota values are in the water and there is a critical period for being influenced by such values that ends when one reaches the age of 2.
4) Another factor that seems to be prevalent in ND ads is imagery with a rural focus. Pictures that might show a candidate as a young girl “on the farm” or a candidate “hunting ducks” seem always to be worked in to a 30 second ad. Even in North Dakota, most folks don’t live on a farm and I would guess most are not hunters. I actually grew up on a farm, but that was in Iowa so I guess that does not count. I sometimes wonder if they dress these folks up in hunting gear, warn them which end of a gun is which, and find a nice rural scene to get a few pics. There must be some intersection between North Dakota values, multigenerational local heritage, and killing birds, but I cannot identify exactly what it is.
The examples I mention here may not apply in your area. Perhaps farm scenes are replaced with factory scenes. Perhaps a scene from a rural cafe is replaced with a scene from a city deli. I am guessing no one wants to claim being from the suburbs.
What does any of this have to do with real issues? I assume the intent is to help voters identify with candidates and then hope that assumptions regarding common interests (values) follow. Why not simply make clear statements regarding how you stand on specific issues? Is it that there is not enough time to explain anything in 30 seconds? Is it that specific positions get candidates in trouble because voters will identify points of disagreement? I don’t know, but it does bother me that what works, I assume candidates are getting expert advice on what works, offers so little actual information and assumes so very little of those who consume these efforts to influence. Maybe students are the place to start.
What types of imagery are used in ads supporting a candidate vs. attack ads? How is language selected? Are the ads offered by competing candidates allowing voters to understand how candidates stand on the same issues? Make up your own questions.
Google has integrated the browser and Internet writing (Writely) and spreadsheet program as Docs and Spreadsheets. The only advantage I can think of at present is that this change makes these services more obvious to those who have a Google account.
Writely and the Google spreadsheet app were described in previous posts. I have found these tools useful when I know that I am going to work on something for brief periods of time from various locations. Others will likely find opportunities in the collaborative capabilities these apps offer.
It would be hard to miss the Google/YouTube deal – it even made the local news in Grand Forks. Must be the staggering amount of money that was involved. NPR provides a nice summary if you want an audio description of the deal and related issues (copyright concerns).
Why should you care?
Some argue video is the individualized information source of preference (e.g., John Naisbitt) and this deal will likely increase distribution of video resources of all types.
Popular culture has a way of influencing what we think the role of schools should be and influencing how some feel new learners prefer to learn. This may be the new MTV.
The trend toward the focusing of resources and services within a smaller and smaller number of companies can’t in my opinion be healthy in the long term.
The capabilities of Google Gadgets I described in a previous post on creating a personal portal are available for inclusion on your own web pages. To provide a demo, I must link you to a simple page external to this blog.
I encourage you to examine the collection of gadgets that are available. You may find a resource that those who visit your site will find useful and that you could not create yourself.
If you happen to be a Mac user and use Dashboard widgets, Mesadynamics offers a free resource for converting gadgets to widgets.
Tom Hoffman, writing as an ed-tech insider – comments on the tendancy of congress to respond to a problem by proposing new legislation. Quick, the elections are coming and how could anyone oppose legislation to protect our children. Among the concerns, IM messages are not stored by ISPs so evidence is lost.
Imposing restrictions on schools would not have stopped one of our nations leaders and according to the data on how other predators contact minors, it would stop only a small proportion of inappropriate attempts. But, why bother with the data. Unfortunately, the Foley example is a typical situation – an adult made inappropriate online contact with a minor outside of the environment in which restrictions and monitoring are or will likely be applied. I am just guessing that IMing will not be banned (except perhaps in schools).
Should ISPs be required to store IM transactions? Is a record of the communication the issue? Is IMing more dangerous than cell phone communication that involves audio? Perhaps providers should be responsible for storing the audio too. But wait, what problem really needs fixing? At least in the Foley case, lack of evidence does not seem to be the problem.
The cost of textbooks seems to be a theme that catches may attention. My current audiobook (I listen while I do low attention tasks at work) is Anderson’s Long Tail. The Long Tail concerns the opportunities present when a system offers the flexibility to serve many individuals with many unique interests in contrast to providing the same product to many individuals. The sale of used books is an example from the book (both textbooks and rare books). As I understand the author’s perspective on textbooks, the present system works to allow students a way to “rent” books at a reasonable cost. An $80 book is typically rented by a student at a rate of $40 for the semester. The distribution system (the bookstore buybacks and online methods for exchanging used books) provide the means to rent an expensive product at this low rate to relatively small groups of students.
Anderson does discuss related topics – custom printing “on demand” to reduce the cost of maintaining an inventory of books within the tail, etc.
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