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In this issue: more on Blogathon '03
Web site recommendations: IT/misc/fun

Thanks to those who've kindly signed up to support my blogathoning for
Planned Parenthood. It's not too late to contribute, please see details
here: http://www.esztersblog.com/blogathon03
During the Blogathon, I will be posting all sorts of material related to
reproductive health/rights. Some of it will be serious with a fun twist
like this puzzle:
http://www.eszter.com/flash/jeans-puzzle.html
If you've meant to contribute but couldn't quite figure out how, please
let me know and I'll be happy to help.

And now onto some links.

Online Policy Group - "a nonprofit organization dedicated to online policy
research, outreach, and action on issues such as access, privacy, digital
defamation, and the digital divide"
http://www.onlinepolicy.org/

Wi-Fi access points across the globe
http://www.hotspotlist.com/

Planned Parenthood Files Lawsuit Against Antiabortion Advocates in Web
Site Domain Name Dispute
http://www.kaisernetwork.org/daily_reports/rep_index.cfm?DR_ID=18767

DVD-Piracy Paranoia Proves Counterproductive
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A17791-2003Jun20.html?nav=hptoc_tn

Disposable email - need an email address just for a few days, get one here
(I haven't tried it, because if you own your own domain name you can do
this for yourself using your own name, but it looks promising.)
http://jetable.org/

Howard Dean guest-blogs on Larry Lessig's blog this week
http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/lessig/blog/

Cooperative Digital Resources Initiative: Digital resources for the study
of religion
http://www.atla.com/digitalresources/

New cellphones used in 'digital shoplifting'
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?art_id=qw1056959460701B215

Rape (and Silence About It) Haunts Baghdad
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/16/international/worldspecial/16RAPE.html

Disturbing: "men are paying thousands of dollars to shoot naked women with
paint ball guns"
http://www.klas-tv.com/Global/story.asp?S=1356380&nav=168XGqk0

Decoding Bush
http://motherjones.com/commentary/columns/2002/52/we_245_01.html

Dubya Speak - "We record the damage"
http://www.dubyaspeak.com/

Calendars Through the Ages
http://webexhibits.org/calendars/

Electronic flash cards for studying facts about geography, history, math,
languages, science, medicine (good study tool for students, fun trivia for
adults)
http://www.studystack.com/java-studysta/frames.jsp

Interactive Units Converter (e.g. how many acres is a hectare of land?)
http://www.convert-me.com/en/

About a book: We Won't Budge: An African Exile in the World
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0328/todaro.php

Full text of Plato, Phaedrus
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/texts/phaedrus.html

Learning Japanese? Basic Hiragana Chart (neat little videos with how to
write the characters)
http://www.genki-online.com/kyozai/hiragana.html

Bill of Rights Pared Down to a Manageable Six :)
http://www.theonion.com/onion3847/bill_of_rights.html

Some M$ parody :)
http://www.microsith.com/

Type weapons of mass destruction into Google and see what you get:
http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=weapons+of+mass+destruction

Today's quote:
"I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary
ingredient in living..." -- Dr. Seuss

Recently on Eszter's Blog:
Labor market updates
Hidden treasures of New Jersey
It's not too late
New blog: Crooked Timber
It is not Google but search savvy that may make the Web God,
and only for some
WMD
Always password protect!
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com

From E-BLOG: It is not Google but search savvy that may make the Web God,
and only for some [7/8/03]
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000363.html for underlying links
or to comment

Thomas Friedman recently asked "Is Google God?" (NYTimes June 29, 2003,
Sunday - available for paying subscribers only). Just like there is large
variance in how close people are to a higher power, there are differences
in how much Godlike knowledge people can extract from the Web. The
centuries old attempt to know all things continues and has likely come
closer to reality than ever before. But it would be incorrect to think
that Google is God available to everyone.

Results from a study I conducted on average users ability to find
information on the Web suggest that there is great variance in whether
people can locate different types of content online and their efficiency
in doing so. These findings imply that simply offering an Internet
connection to those without access will not alleviate differences or the
so-called digital divide. Rather, providing training is a necessary
component of making the medium a useful tool for everyone.

Referring to Google has become the high-culture status symbol of Web use.
When presented with an information-seeking task, the supposed savvy
searcher quickly suggests the use of Google. However, just like simply
referring to the latest opera at the Met should not be equated with
expertise in the genre, a throwaway comment about Google should not make
us think that people know how to find information online.

Knowing about Google does not equal knowing how to use Google - or any
other search engine for that matter - effectively. Todays search engines
are not evolved enough to guess what we mean when we type in a single-word
search query while looking for answers to complex questions. Yet research
has shown that the majority of users employ such limited strategies when
using search engines.

Moreover, although it may be hard to believe, many people do not know
about Google and even some of those who do never use it. The good news for
the "Googleless" is that you do not need to use any one search engine to
make the most of the Web. Results from my study suggest that the
particular strategies people employ to look for content is a more
important predictor of their ability to find material than whether they
use Google. As long as users know to include more than one word in a query
or add quotation marks around some of the terms in certain cases, they
will be likely to find a match regardless of the search engine.

But to assume that anyone anywhere has the Web savvy to do this is
misleading. The rhetorical shift to the Web being everything to everyone
perpetuates the idea promoted by the Administration a year and a half ago
that the US is a Nation Online. The reality is that even among those who
do use the Web on a daily basis, some are more online than others.

Finally, the focus on Google is problematic because it is a private
company with no obligations to serving the public interest. I love Google
as much as the next Web user, but we should tread with caution when
thinking of it as our savior (or source of demise). It is a privately held
company with profit motives guiding its evolution over which we do not
necessarily have much say. Of course, in this day and age of media
deregulation coming from institutions supposedly representing the public
interest, it may be our best hope to seek God in a privately held company.