Happy post-St. Patty’s Day to ye all,
I hope everyone is still feeling the luck of the Irish today, and are not too under the weather from the cheer last night.
I thought I’d just quickly post some new interesting tools coming down the pipe and also some other items that people might find interesting. First off, here are some of the tools that were demonstrated at the MaRS “Permanent Campaign” event that the Infoscape Lab attended today with Greg Elmer being the keynote:
1) aideRSS: http://www.aiderss.com/
This seems like a generally useful tool for those who read a large number of blogs. However, at the moment, aideRSS are keeping their ranking heuristics hidden, and they do not allow readers to set up their own advanced ranking methods. For instance, it would be useful for someone to just choose to read blogs that have a lot of comments, or that have a large number of blogs linking to them. It would also be useful for the aideRSS tool to present such information as comments and links in an easily readable manner along with the other statistics they offer. Test it out to see what I mean exactly, of course.
2) Blogscope.net: http://www.blogscope.net/
Blog surveillance technology from the U of T. These folks have even automated tone judgments of the postings on blogs in the beta version, which sounds pretty sketchy to me, especially since once again they do not share their heuristics for how they judge tone. Their plan so far is to also make it the blogger’s individual duty to de-list their personal information from their network tracking software, which profiles every blogger on the web. This could be potentially very controversial.
The company linked with Blogscope is: www.Sysomos.com
3) Iotum: http://iotum.com/
Free conference calls for everyone, using Facebook or otherwise. This might be useful, especially if they add video calls some day. It appears to be a step up from plain old Skype.
************************************************
Here are some other items not connected with the MaRS event, but connected with political tools in general:
1) Microsoft’s Blews: http://research.microsoft.com/projects/blews/blews.aspx
This software seems similar to the Blogscope.net platform above, but it appears to have a more elegant user interface. However, the team that has worked on it does not include any political scientists or sociologists, so I’m not sure how well it will target specific user needs to drill into political blogs and news ("blews") in the social media space.
2) Gapminder.org: Interesting use of data visualization software, and there is a TED video of Hans Rosling from the Gapminder.org group on their powerful use of data visualization here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUwS1uAdUcI
3) Morningside Analytics: http://morningside-analytics.com/
John Kelly from Columbia University who was at the OII SDP this summer has officially launched his company with the help of Leonard Lidov, who is a Torontonian. Their business looks interesting, and I wish them well.
4) Michael Zimmer’s bibliography of ethical and privacy dimensions of web
search engines: http://michaelzimmer.org/2007/06/30/scholarship-on-privacy-and-search-engines/
More to come on the MaRS talk when I get a second to write in April.
Showing posts with label SDP2007. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SDP2007. Show all posts
Tuesday, 18 March 2008
Wednesday, 6 February 2008
Ryan Bigge’s “Road-testing the $100 laptop's 'appropriate technology'”
Ryan Bigge continues to write thought provoking and insightful inquiries into our current technological situation. His most recent piece in the Ideas section of The Toronto Star (January 20, 2008) is unique for his interesting use of journalism across media. See:
1. Bigge’s original article in The Star (with an extra movie clip on how to use the laptop):
http://www.thestar.com/article/295647
2. Bigge’s Blogge (Yes, that’s humour) -- Extra excerpts from his article which were not included in the print piece are included on his blog:
http://thebiggeidea.blogspot.com/2008/01/one-more-underperformer.html
Bigge’s story is about the One Laptop Per Child Project (OLPC). The charitable act of being able to purchase a laptop for $400, also provides a laptop for a child in a developing country. Despite the feel good nature of the project, I feel there are two further conversations that need to be opened up here:
1) About media use in general.
2) About the $100 laptop as a solution to the digital divide.
I’ll tackle the first item as follows: In the print version of his article, Bigge wasn’t able to fit his entire story, and so he includes extra excerpts on his Blog which add a more balanced tone to what originally read more like a McLuhanesque, techno-humanist piece in favour of the technology. The Blog remarks offer more of critical perspective to the piece with discussion of some of the issues the project has created and faced.
Another interesting point in terms of media is that the print format couldn’t offer a complete tutorial on how the laptop works, so the article provided a hyperlink to the digital video explanation starring Bigge himself (as seen at the link above). This coordination of media may in fact entice some of the techno-phobic into spending more time on-line because of the limitations and technical constraints of the print product. I know it worked for me.
This extra mediated experience only increases the use of our limited resources in terms of time and the resources of the natural environment, but offers a moment on which to comment during our current in-between media period, where we straddle several media options at once in the West. These coordinated media strategies are becoming more prevalent, and offer many narrative threads to trace for the interested, while also allowing more points of access to grab the attention of a potential audience.
I’ll develop this thought further as a part of my discussion on the $100 laptop. I was fortunate to get to visit the OLPC headquarters in Boston over the summer. Here’s some pictures from my visit:
1) One of the $100 Laptops (photographed at MIT):
2) Laptop display table at the OLPC HQ:
3) The Testing Lab at OLPC HQ:
When I read Bigge’s article, I had some rare quibbles with his description of the OLPC project based on my experiences during my own OLPC visit. As I said, I usually agree whole heartedly with Bigge, but here's a few things that I didn't find in either his article or Blog:
If one were to read only the print version of his work, Bigge seems to sit on the fence a bit when mentioning the problem of the new cheap laptop market that's formed because of Negroponte’s brainchild. In his piece, he mentions a bias for ‘appropriate technology’ that performs the logical tasks that a device should, without any useless or superfulous features that are currently being marketed. I've become a bit more Naomi Klein-ish about liberal markets since visiting the OLPC though, instead of just hoping technology will change the world. Klein's new book The Shock Doctrine talks about the entrenchment of neo-liberal markets during crises, like wars and natural disasters. Basically the idea is that when a crisis hits, big business moves in (e.g. Iraq and Haliburton).
I think something that could be added to her list is "the digital divide" crisis. Specifically, we can ask do agrarian societies need to be (or want to be) attached to the Internet?
Further, is an abundance of cheap laptops without a cradle to grave waste management solution just another environmental disaster waiting to happen? Like the billion cell phones dying in landfills, these $100 laptops aren't bio-degradable...
NB - Clarification from SJ's comment below: The OLPC Project is trying to make the laptops 100% recyclable and have a minimum impact on the environment, but they are still in the process of accessing how to ensure proper disposal according to the following site: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Environmental_Impact
I know it's all high and mighty of me writing this on my own computer, but when we were down at the OLPC they talked about how kids in the developing world were already using laptops (perhaps, not the OLPC laptops yet) in rare situations to make pornography (to make money), or selling them (for money), or hacking (for money), or being beaten by adults who would then steal the laptops (to again sell for money) – that’s just to name a few issues. Overall, in terms of liberalization, could these laptops just be a way of creating armies of third world call centre employees out of a young, cheaply trained labour force, while also taking time away from children's time learning skills they need to survive in a non-digital society? Think scary, Kittlerian style discourse networks here of the variety that occurred around the creation of the typewriter (and now, of course, the laptop).
During my visit to the OLPC, we had a number of problems on the technical side as well. For example, getting the laptops to work in the mesh network never occurred, and obviously Bigge’s own laptop all alone here in Canada will have problems linking to other mesh-network-ready computers since there are none (until other people purchase them).
Another problem during our visit included the laptop’s operating system freezing on a number of the computers we were testing. To their credit, the OLPC project admitted openly they were working on all of these issues, and the system Bigge demonstrates in his video is definitely a bit different from the one that I remember playing with. Hopefully the bugs have been worked out.
The one thing that I was hopeful about with the OLPC project was their commitment to on-going maintenance of the technology, and their focus on going to places and educating people about use and care of the laptop. However, without sustained money, the laptops do break and the issues listed above develop when there is no money to fix them. Several of my peers during the visit were emphatic about embedding the laptops in an educational environment to create a vital culture of care. Without a care network, if (or when) those developing regions become emblazoned with other problems, which they often do, the child cannot eat the laptop, which most would consider a more pressing need, but the laptop could instead be used by others to download bomb making instructions.
I thought I'd write and see what others thought, especially those who have connections to the OLPC project?
Specifically, I know that some other SDP-ers have blogged about this previously, and one of you has done the same as Ryan Bigge and contributed to the give-one-get-one campaign -- hopefull informed discussion can assuage such fears and issues as those listed above:
- Give-one-get-one: http://dpignett.blog.usf.edu/2007/11/21/give-one-get-one
- Law Professor Wendy Seltzer on the project (A comment in this post talks about Korean Laptop Boot Camps for helping Koreans get over Internet addiction): http://wendy.seltzer.org/blog/archives/2007/11/14/one-laptop-per-child-plus-one.html
- Other links and pictures from people during the summer visit to OLPC:
1. http://dpignett.blog.usf.edu/2007/07/21/mit-one-laptop-per-child
2. http://www.lexferenda.com/25072007/closing-the-loop-zuckerman-and-best-on-africa-and-technology/
3. http://ictlogy.net/2007/07/
4. http://www.jorisvanhoboken.nl/?p=66
1. Bigge’s original article in The Star (with an extra movie clip on how to use the laptop):
http://www.thestar.com/article/295647
2. Bigge’s Blogge (Yes, that’s humour) -- Extra excerpts from his article which were not included in the print piece are included on his blog:
http://thebiggeidea.blogspot.com/2008/01/one-more-underperformer.html
Bigge’s story is about the One Laptop Per Child Project (OLPC). The charitable act of being able to purchase a laptop for $400, also provides a laptop for a child in a developing country. Despite the feel good nature of the project, I feel there are two further conversations that need to be opened up here:
1) About media use in general.
2) About the $100 laptop as a solution to the digital divide.
I’ll tackle the first item as follows: In the print version of his article, Bigge wasn’t able to fit his entire story, and so he includes extra excerpts on his Blog which add a more balanced tone to what originally read more like a McLuhanesque, techno-humanist piece in favour of the technology. The Blog remarks offer more of critical perspective to the piece with discussion of some of the issues the project has created and faced.
Another interesting point in terms of media is that the print format couldn’t offer a complete tutorial on how the laptop works, so the article provided a hyperlink to the digital video explanation starring Bigge himself (as seen at the link above). This coordination of media may in fact entice some of the techno-phobic into spending more time on-line because of the limitations and technical constraints of the print product. I know it worked for me.
This extra mediated experience only increases the use of our limited resources in terms of time and the resources of the natural environment, but offers a moment on which to comment during our current in-between media period, where we straddle several media options at once in the West. These coordinated media strategies are becoming more prevalent, and offer many narrative threads to trace for the interested, while also allowing more points of access to grab the attention of a potential audience.
I’ll develop this thought further as a part of my discussion on the $100 laptop. I was fortunate to get to visit the OLPC headquarters in Boston over the summer. Here’s some pictures from my visit:
1) One of the $100 Laptops (photographed at MIT):
2) Laptop display table at the OLPC HQ:
3) The Testing Lab at OLPC HQ:
When I read Bigge’s article, I had some rare quibbles with his description of the OLPC project based on my experiences during my own OLPC visit. As I said, I usually agree whole heartedly with Bigge, but here's a few things that I didn't find in either his article or Blog:
If one were to read only the print version of his work, Bigge seems to sit on the fence a bit when mentioning the problem of the new cheap laptop market that's formed because of Negroponte’s brainchild. In his piece, he mentions a bias for ‘appropriate technology’ that performs the logical tasks that a device should, without any useless or superfulous features that are currently being marketed. I've become a bit more Naomi Klein-ish about liberal markets since visiting the OLPC though, instead of just hoping technology will change the world. Klein's new book The Shock Doctrine talks about the entrenchment of neo-liberal markets during crises, like wars and natural disasters. Basically the idea is that when a crisis hits, big business moves in (e.g. Iraq and Haliburton).
I think something that could be added to her list is "the digital divide" crisis. Specifically, we can ask do agrarian societies need to be (or want to be) attached to the Internet?
Further, is an abundance of cheap laptops without a cradle to grave waste management solution just another environmental disaster waiting to happen? Like the billion cell phones dying in landfills, these $100 laptops aren't bio-degradable...
NB - Clarification from SJ's comment below: The OLPC Project is trying to make the laptops 100% recyclable and have a minimum impact on the environment, but they are still in the process of accessing how to ensure proper disposal according to the following site: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Environmental_Impact
I know it's all high and mighty of me writing this on my own computer, but when we were down at the OLPC they talked about how kids in the developing world were already using laptops (perhaps, not the OLPC laptops yet) in rare situations to make pornography (to make money), or selling them (for money), or hacking (for money), or being beaten by adults who would then steal the laptops (to again sell for money) – that’s just to name a few issues. Overall, in terms of liberalization, could these laptops just be a way of creating armies of third world call centre employees out of a young, cheaply trained labour force, while also taking time away from children's time learning skills they need to survive in a non-digital society? Think scary, Kittlerian style discourse networks here of the variety that occurred around the creation of the typewriter (and now, of course, the laptop).
During my visit to the OLPC, we had a number of problems on the technical side as well. For example, getting the laptops to work in the mesh network never occurred, and obviously Bigge’s own laptop all alone here in Canada will have problems linking to other mesh-network-ready computers since there are none (until other people purchase them).
Another problem during our visit included the laptop’s operating system freezing on a number of the computers we were testing. To their credit, the OLPC project admitted openly they were working on all of these issues, and the system Bigge demonstrates in his video is definitely a bit different from the one that I remember playing with. Hopefully the bugs have been worked out.
The one thing that I was hopeful about with the OLPC project was their commitment to on-going maintenance of the technology, and their focus on going to places and educating people about use and care of the laptop. However, without sustained money, the laptops do break and the issues listed above develop when there is no money to fix them. Several of my peers during the visit were emphatic about embedding the laptops in an educational environment to create a vital culture of care. Without a care network, if (or when) those developing regions become emblazoned with other problems, which they often do, the child cannot eat the laptop, which most would consider a more pressing need, but the laptop could instead be used by others to download bomb making instructions.
I thought I'd write and see what others thought, especially those who have connections to the OLPC project?
Specifically, I know that some other SDP-ers have blogged about this previously, and one of you has done the same as Ryan Bigge and contributed to the give-one-get-one campaign -- hopefull informed discussion can assuage such fears and issues as those listed above:
- Give-one-get-one: http://dpignett.blog.usf.edu/2007/11/21/give-one-get-one
- Law Professor Wendy Seltzer on the project (A comment in this post talks about Korean Laptop Boot Camps for helping Koreans get over Internet addiction): http://wendy.seltzer.org/blog/archives/2007/11/14/one-laptop-per-child-plus-one.html
- Other links and pictures from people during the summer visit to OLPC:
1. http://dpignett.blog.usf.edu/2007/07/21/mit-one-laptop-per-child
2. http://www.lexferenda.com/25072007/closing-the-loop-zuckerman-and-best-on-africa-and-technology/
3. http://ictlogy.net/2007/07/
4. http://www.jorisvanhoboken.nl/?p=66
Monday, 4 February 2008
Brushes with Fame
Charlie Neeson was on The Colbert Report and challenged the Presidential Candidates to a poker match. I was fortunate enough to play poker against him at Harvard in the Summer of 2007 during the Oxford Internet Institute: http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/080125/nyf065.html?.v=101
Neeson uses poker as a teaching tool, and he is very much an interesting and charismatic professor.
Tariq Amin-Khan is a professor in the Ryerson Politics and Public Administration department, and he was recently on The Hour describing the situation in Pakistan, where he use to be a reporter: http://www.cbc.ca/thehour/video.php?id=1889
Neeson uses poker as a teaching tool, and he is very much an interesting and charismatic professor.
Tariq Amin-Khan is a professor in the Ryerson Politics and Public Administration department, and he was recently on The Hour describing the situation in Pakistan, where he use to be a reporter: http://www.cbc.ca/thehour/video.php?id=1889
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