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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.
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In this issue:
Web site recommendations: IT/gender/misc
Blogathon '03 takes place this weekend. Feel free to stop by
http://www.esztersblog.com/blogathon03 to see what I'm up to those 24
hours. Thanks to all those who've contributed to Planned Parenthood via
this event!
And thanks to those who keep sending me pointers to interesting material,
here's some of it.
Digging for Googleholes - some thoughts on Google's shortcomings
http://slate.msn.com/id/2085668/
&
my thoughts on this from a few weeks ago
http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000363.html
Journal of Digital Information - full text online
http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/
&
current issue on
Economic Factors of Digital Libraries
http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/?vol=4&iss=2
Report on Internet use for health information
http://www.pewinternet.org/reports/toc.asp?Report=95
Yahoo acquires Overture.. and what does the search engine landscape look
like now
http://www.researchbuzz.com/articles/2003/yover051403.shtml
List of spam laws across the world
http://www.spamlaws.com/
White House E-Mail System Becomes Less User-Friendly
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/18/technology/18MAIL.html
Blogging for Bucks
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,59603,00.html
A map of francophone blogs in Europe
http://blogmap.fr.st/
Microsoft drops development of Internet Explorer for Mac
http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/2003/06/13/explorer/
March for Freedom of Choice in DC - April 25, 2004
http://www.marchforchoice.org/
When Women Lose Health Care Options
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/20/business/yourmoney/20HEAL.html
Weird Science - If You Want the Truth about Abortion and Breast Cancer,
Beware of the National Cancer Institute
http://www.msmagazine.com/june03/jordan.asp
Look for more links along these lines this weekend during my Blogathon
2003 participation. http://www.esztersblog.com/blogathon03
It's not too late to contribute!:)
Game Makers Aren't Chasing Women
http://www.wired.com/news/games/0,2101,59620,00.html
Gender bias in teaching evaluations - a list of relevant readings
http://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~twilliam/teaching/genderteaching.htm
Passenger made to leave airplane for wearing a "Suspected Terrorist"
button - a must read!
http://www.politechbot.com/p-04973.html
Grounds for Sculpture - a wonderful sculpture garden in the middle of New
Jersey
http://www.groundsforsculpture.org/
The origins of words and expressions (e.g. "spitting image", "pushing the
envelope", "sabbatical", etc.)
http://www.wordorigins.org
Something different - an interactive digital art site
http://www.tamar-schori.net/beadgee/beadgee.html
[requires Flash - it's a bit invasive as it goes outside of your windows]
"Hunting for Bambi" (I posted on this last week) is a hoax
http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/bambi.asp
Forgotten New York - lots of old photographs (e.g. signs, cobblestones)
http://www.forgotten-ny.com
A nice description of the game Go
https://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2002/7/11/62356/9269
Today's quote:
"Change has a considerable psychological impact on the human mind. To the
fearful it is threatening because it means that things may get worse. To
the hopeful it is encouraging because things may get better. To the
confident it is inspiring because the challenge exists to make things
better." -- King Whitney Jr.
Recently on Eszter's Blog:
More on how Google isn't God
Scary
Bumper sticker
Completely free credit reports
Blogathon '03 sponsorship update
Daily health reports
Labor market updates
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com
From E-BLOG: Hidden treasures of New Jersey
[7/11/03]
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000366.html for underlying links
or to comment
New Jersey is not exactly known for its beauty. My first exposure to its
reputation for lacking beauty - to put it mildly - was in college via a
woman who lived in my house and always apologized before stating the state
in which she grew up. The reasons for the not-so-positive reputation
become apparent while taking the train south from New York. The tracks
pass by landfills and big warehouse lots. When opting for the highway, one
can even experience the smells while driving by the signs that are
familiar to millions now thanks to the opening credits of the Sopranos.
(And remember Tony Soprano's official occupation? He's in waste
management.) But regardless of all this, I have loved living in Princeton
for the past six years and part of this has had to do with the surrounding
beauty.
Given that I've lived here for this long, it's a bit shocking that I only
now got around to visiting the Grounds for Sculpture. It's an amazing
sculpture garden that practically doubles as a botanical garden with
wondrous landscaping and plants from all over. There are several pieces by
Seward Johnson across the park, among them "Dejeuner Deja Vu". Dozens of
other artists have pieces as well. Walking through the park is delightful.
The sculptures are sometimes hidden behind fascinating trees and bushes.
Some are best during the day, others are more exciting when lit up at
night. There is a restaurant, a bar and a cafe on the grounds so best is
to start with a little tour while it's still light outside, go have dinner
and then go see the lit sculptures after sundown.
It's on the way from New York to Philly, I highly recommend stopping by if
ever in the area.
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In this issue: Blogathon 2003
Web site recommendations: IT/maps/misc
Some people run or cycle for charity, I've decided to blog for it instead.
(I know, it's shocking!:) I am participating in Blogathon 2003, which
means that I have committed to staying up for 24 hours straight to blog
and thereby collect donations for Planned Parenthood. To find out more
about this event and the organization, please see my Blogathon '03 page:
http://www.esztersblog.com/blogathon03
Please consider supporting this cause. You can donate by clicking here:
http://www.blogathon.org/Pledge.php?p=78
Thanks!
If you have any questions about all this, please let me know.
And now onto some links.
Where Are They Now? Search Engines We've Known & Loved - helpful timeline
of search engines
http://www.searchenginewatch.com/sereport/article.php/2175241
How Netflix decides who gets a movie next from the queue
http://dvd-rent-test.dreamhost.com/
Does 'True' Warchalking Really Exist? - if you can prove it, you can win
this bet
http://www.niftyc.org/bet/
Political Artivism Collection - "activism possible through hypermedia"
http://faculty.washington.edu/pnhoward/polart.html
Bloggers Gain Libel Protection
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,59424,00.html
Oxford Univ Press offers developing countries free (or greatly reduced)
access to many journals
http://www3.oup.co.uk/jnls/devel/
College Rivalry "Universities will do almost anything these days to land a
star professor who can bring instant prestige, attract large donors, and,
oh yes, even do some teaching."
http://boston.com/globe/magazine/2003/0629/coverstory_entire.htm
Extreme weather prompts unprecedented global warming alert
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?story=421166
Women and heart disease
http://www.womenheart.org/
Anti-Semitism in Israel
http://virtualjerusalem.com/news/infocus/?disp_feature=y4IF7E.var
What you should know about "zero-percent for life" credit cards
http://money.cnn.com/2003/07/01/pf/banking/q_zeropercent/
Inside Iraq's National Museum
http://www.artnewsonline.com/currentarticle.cfm?art_id=1368
Historic Cities - old maps
http://historic-cities.huji.ac.il/
&
Ancient Maps of Jerusalem
http://maps-of-jerusalem.huji.ac.il
Need a US map to work with? Here's an outline free for use
http://www.io.com/persist1/projects/sketchgfx/us_map.html?pop-up&size=632,432
Giant sea creature baffles Chilean scientists
http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/americas/07/02/chile.science.reut/index.html
For cooking:
Ingredient Substitutions
http://lancaster.unl.edu/food/ftfeb01.htm
&
Preparing Healthy Food: How To Modify A Recipe
http://ohioline.osu.edu/hyg-fact/5000/5543.html
The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation - a parody
http://www.norvig.com/Gettysburg/
Word Search Game - online interactive
http://www.dltk-holidays.com/summer/wordsearch/index.htm
Battleship Flash game
http://www.funsilly.com/free-online-games/battleship.html
Today's quote:
"Planned Parenthood believes in the fundamental right of each individual,
throughout the world, to manage his or her fertility, regardless of the
individual's income, marital status, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation,
age, national origin, or residence. We believe that respect and value for
diversity in all aspects of our organization are essential to our
well-being. We believe that reproductive self-determination must be
voluntary and preserve the individual's right to privacy. We further
believe that such self-determination will contribute to an enhancement of
the quality of life, strong family relationships, and population
stability."
From Planned Parenthood's Mission Statement
http://www.plannedparenthood.org/about/thisispp/mission.html
Recently on Eszter's Blog:
WMD
Always password protect!
Photo scavenger hunt
Blogathon 2003 on Eszter's Blog!
Oxford prof rejects student based on nationality
Photo fun
Blog (and general Web) ban likely worsens
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com
From E-BLOG: Always password protect! [7/2/03]
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000361.html for underlying
links or to comment
Some people very close to me got completely robbed recently. The robbers
took jewelry, anything that was made of silver, who knows what else... and
three laptops. The number of issues that comes up for the victims is
countless. It will probably take weeks if not months to realize what all
is missing. Most of what was stolen was very personal; objects passed down
from generation to generation, personalized mementos, too many things to
list.
One thought I had is that I hope email programs and Web sites they visit
with sensitive information were not set up on their machines to recognize
passwords automatically. As though all the loss wasn't enough, wouldn't it
be just horrible to then think people may be downloading your email and
moving things around in your bank accounts? And what a mess to lose all
that intellectual property and communication (I dearly hope their digital
photographs are saved on CDs!). Maybe it's not a crazy idea to add a lock
to one's computer at home. But where would you keep the key if not at
home? Always on you even when vacationing abroad? This may be where
friends come in the picture. Leave some essentials with someone at another
location.
This reminds me of something a friend of mine did recently. She was taking
precaution in case of a different robbery. She was going abroad and wanted
to make sure that in case she got robbed during the trip she wouldn't be
completely stranded. So she made copies of the important pages in her
passport, copies of her credit cards (front and back) and some other
documents. She then left these with me. In case something did happen, she
could call me and I could help in getting the material/information to her
or whomever.
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In this issue:
Web site recommendations: IT/current affairs/fun
Less IT related material and more fun links in this issue, but also some
outrageous current affairs.
I posted about this over a year ago, but many have subscribed since and
others may have missed it as well. When you are planning trips, do not
miss the opportunity to get some great hotel rates. I explain the details
on this page: http://www.eszter.com/hotels.html
A post-doc is available immediately on a project looking at children's
development and technology use at Northwestern's School of Communication
with Prof Justine Cassell (currently MIT Media Lab), more info here:
http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000354.html
New Google Toolbar in testing phase (as earlier one, only for Win OS & IE)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43955-2003Jun28.html?nav=hptoc_tn
&
its causing some controversy
http://www.atnewyork.com/news/article.php/2228651
&
you can get it from here (I haven't tried it yet, I can't comment)
http://toolbar.google.com/index-beta.php
Yahoo Spam Filter Thwarts FTC
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,59427,00.html
American Library Association Denounces Supreme Court Ruling on Children's
Internet Protection Act
http://www.ala.org/Template.cfm?Section=News&template=/ContentManagement/Content\
Display.cfm&ContentID=36357
Recently I posted an entry about how multi-region DVD players do exist
http://www.canadacomputes.com/story.asp?id=9937&sb=122
A friend of mine replied to note that you don't have to pay extra $$ to
get such a machine. These sites offer more info. (If you're about to buy
a DVD player, you may want to check these out before you decide on a
brand.)
http://www.dvdregionhacks.com/http://www.regionfreedvd.net/faq.html
A free simple little poll builder for Web sites (does have limitations)
http://chnm.gmu.edu/tools/polls/
"Presumably by accident, somebody left a live prototype of President
Bush's 2004 campaign site on the Web for a few hours"
http://slate.msn.com/id/2084803/
"An Oxford University professor has provoked outrage by rejecting an
application from an Israeli PhD student purely because of his
nationality."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/06/29/noxf29.xml&sShee\
t=/portal/2003/06/29/ixportal.html
or click here if that address is too long: http://tinyurl.com/fjbr
&
See original letter from Oxford prof here:
http://allisonkaplansommer.blogmosis.com/history/012787.html#012787
Suddenly, America Has a Brash Neighbor Up North
http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0627/p02s01-woam.html
Teen Sues Over 'Lesbian Barbie' Shirt Ban
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=573&ncid=757&e=6&u=/nm/20030620/\
od_nm/life_barbie_dc
US Court Overturns Gay Sex Ban
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3022026.stm
A matrilinear state in India - and changing times
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3015838.stm
A Nation of Victims - how Bush uses "emotional language--especially
negatively charged emotional language--as a political tool"
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030630&s=brooks
Resumes for a New Millennium
http://www.seattlewritergrrls.org/archive/2003i1_resume.html
Free trip to Israel - deadline: July 5th!
http://www.israel4free.com
Eligibitility requirements: http://www.israel4free.com/eligibility.asp
Play twenty questions - great artificial intelligence program
http://y.20q.net:8095/btest
Irregular verbs in English grouped by type (helpful for those not fully
fluent in English.. and for some who think they are:)
http://www.eslfocus.com/grammarfolder/irregverbgroups.html
You can always tell a two-way mirror by...
http://www.cnet.com/techtrends/0-7311128-8-7319952-1.html
This is pretty cool.. create sketches online and pass them on with full
animation
http://www.imaginationatwork.com/Imagine?_nolivecache
Photo scavenger hunt, starts this week!
http://www.sh1ft.org/26things/
Can you guess which photo is fake (computer-generated) and which is real?
http://www.fakeorfoto.com/quiz.html
Today's quote:
"We're all born naked, the rest is drag." - RuPaul
Recently on Eszter's Blog:
Oxford prof rejects student based on nationality
Photo fun
Blog (and general Web) ban likely worsens
Music recommendations
Post-doc available immediately
Blogathon 2003
More on name changes
Neat ad
How do you feel about English grammar?
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com
From E-BLOG: Blog (and general Web) ban likely worsens [6/28/03]
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000356.html for underlying
links or to comment
Mamamusings and then Invisible Adjunct both comment on the problems with
filtering software. It started out with mamamusings noticing that her blog
was not accessible from an Internet kiosk. The message she got: "Access to
this site has been restricted at the request of this organization". I've
commented on both posts but thought would add some additional notes here
as well.
I posted a related entry back in December when Ed noticed that he couldn't
get to my blog from a location due to "possibly inappropriate content".
One of the biggest problems with these filtering programs is that they
have a very large number of false positives. That is, they potentially
filter an immense amount of content that has nothing to do with
"inappropriate" material. For example, any resume that lists latin honors
would have a good chance of being banned. I won't spell it out here
because I don't want to get E-BLOG banned any more than it is already but
think summa.. magna... Also, as others have noted, geographical locations
- of which there are several both in the UK and the US and easily
elsewhere - that have "seks" (you know what the ks stands for) in them
would get banned as well. Then there are sites dealing with cancer of
particular organs, these are some of the more well known examples, not to
mention sites that address gay and lesbian issues (huh, I wonder if by
merely writing out those two words this blog is getting black-listed).
Perhaps the biggest concern is that we don't know what is being banned
because companies that make filtering software claim that it's proprietary
information and they won't share it. So unlike public libraries, which
would have to make public decisions about not wanting to carry certain
books based on particular types of content, here no one really knows what
is being filtered and why exactly.
Josh Marshall - before his Talking Points Memo fame - wrote a nice related
piece on "Will Free Speech Get Tangled In The Net?" back in 1998 in the
American Prospect in which he explores related concerns in some detail.
Of course, makers of filtering software are not the only ones putting
thought into what content underlies sites with certain words. Search
engines have been doing it for years as well. Do a search in Google on
"seks" (with the appropriate letter) and you'll get sites about "safe
seks". Moreover, note that the popular HBO series with the s word in the
title has no problem staying high up among the results. In fact, it comes
up as #3. I guess it is theoretically possible that these really are the
most popular (as in linked to) seks related sites out there, but one
wonders.
The discussion on Invisible Adjunct's blog about the topic focuses mainly
on adults' ability to request librarians to turn off filtering programs on
library terminals while they are using them. Some in the comments section
have already noted the problems with this approach (e.g. that some
filtering happens at the server level, which is not necessarily that easy
to turn off and would likely influence other machines at the library). I
wanted to bring up an additional point (and I do over there in the
comments.)
This entire discussion about adults having the ability to ask that a
filter be turned off *assumes* that adults know what filtering software is
in the first place and would know what it means to ask that it be turned
off. These assumptions seem problematic. I say this based on research I
have done on people's Web use abilities. When I asked people if they knew
what filtering software is, 45% (of 100 randomly sampled Internet users in
my area) said they had little or no understanding of the term. (I know
it's a small sample, it was a complex project that didn't allow for more
respondents.) People who access the Web in libraries are likely to know
even less about the Web because they don't have the freedom to explore it
in detail like those who use it at home (or use it freely at work).
Moreover, given the limited amount of time people get to spend at library
terminals, it's highly unlikely that they'll spend their allocated 15-30
minutes asking for modifications to the settings.
So yes, there are numerous issues with requiring libraries to use
filtering software (assuming they want to hold on to federal funding) and
there are concerns regarding their use in private settings as well.
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In this issue: E-LIST is back:)
Web site recommendations: IT/politics/humor
Sorry for the long silence, this latest dissertation chapter took a while
to finish.
Feedback tells me some of you don't like the really long E-LISTs so I may
start cutting back.. after this issue that is, since so much has
accumulated. I always welcome your thoughts, by the way, so keep 'em
coming.
And now onto the current finds. Lots of IT related links. If you don't
care for those keep scrolling, there are some very good ":-)" links at the
end.
New data archive related to issues of cultural policy and the arts -
amazing resource very nicely put together, very user-friendly, lots of
interesting data (includes some IT related survey data as well)
http://www.cpanda.org/
Third Annual Graduate Webshop - great for grad students who have Internet
related interests
http://www.webuse.umd.edu/webshop03.htm
Q & A with expert tech tinkerer Ed Felten
"If average voters view censorship of technologists in the same way they
view other forms of censorship, we'll be in much better shape."
http://interviews.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/04/17/1222220&mode=thread&tid=1\
53&tid=123
Internet diffusion levels off in US
http://www.pewinternet.org/reports/toc.asp?Report=88
Being Googled: Web search tool is not without critics
http://www.iht.com/articles/90737.html
Google: Is all the news fit to post?
http://news.com.com/2100-1025-996100.html
Experts: Microsoft security gets an 'F'
http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/biztech/02/01/microsoft.security.reut/
Text messaging used by government to allay SARS fears in Hong Kong
http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/news/0,12597,928906,00.html?=rss
Tracking blog coverage - graph of changes in blog coverage in mainstream
print media
http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000275.html
New virus to watch out for - plays off of current events, yuck
http://weblog.siliconvalley.com/column/dangillmor/archives/000917.shtml#000917
Ruling Backs Anti-Spam Activist
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51418-2003Apr7.html
Judge: File-swapping Tools Are Legal
http://rss.com.com/2100-1027-998363.html?type=pt&part=rss&tag=feed&subj=news
Multi-region DVD players do exist
http://www.canadacomputes.com/story.asp?id=9937&sb=122
Streaming audio files from the 13th Annual Conference on Computers,
Freedom & Privacy
http://www.cfp2003.org/cfp2003/program.html
Call for Report Proposals: gender and Internet use (two-page proposal due
on Apr 30th)
http://www.wmn.ca/uncsw/call_e.htm
Gender equity project post-doc
http://www.rfcuny.org/hr/pvn/cgi-bin/show_job.asp?pvn=RRS-119
"Well-behaved women rarely make history"
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2003/04/09/anita_borg/index_np.html
Summer internship opportunities at MASS MoCA - a very cool
contemporary art museum in Massachusetts
http://www.massmoca.org/jobs/
"THE UNITED STATES may be at war -- both with al Qaeda and in Iraq -- but
the military still knows a domestic threat when it sees one: gay linguists
in training."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34475-2003Apr15.html
Equal Access to Israel's Western Wall Denied
http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/1297/context/outrage
Critics Call On Education Secretary to Repudiate Published Statement or
Resign
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59692-2003Apr8.html
At a Model UN conference, Israeli and Palestinian teens succeed where
their leaders have failed
http://tinyurl.com/8w79
The Museum of Unworkable Devices - very cool!
http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/museum/unwork.htm
Some non-traditional portrait busts with extreme expressions on their
faces from the 18th century
http://insel.heim.at/hawaii/310945/Charakterkopfe.html
New Fox Reality Show To Determine Ruler of Iraq :-)
http://www.theonion.com/onion3915/new_fox_reality_show.html
Looting as an American value :-)
http://www.markfiore.com/animation/looting.html
Patriotic items for fanatical flagwavers :-)
http://www.totalobscurity.com/mind/flagstore/
Today's quote:
"War is about dead people, not gorgeous-looking soldiers." -- Susan Sontag
Recently on Eszter's Blog (just some of the posts from the past month, I
never said I'd suspend blogging!:):
How much is a childhood memory worth?
Expert on technology and policy
Mixing holidays
Looting and apple pie
Movie: Bend It Like Beckham
Gender Equity Project post-doc
How 'bout some serious studies of gender?
The environmental effects of war
More praise for Nobel Prize book
YES: Hungarians vote to join EU
Destroying artifacts, new and old
TAPPED usability
Blogs added
Religion and schools
Rational consistency about religion and the Loch Ness monster
Something different
RIAA vs Princeton student(s)
Letting go
Classifying computer and Internet terms
The new science of networks: pastries and other goodies
Forgetting to remember
Vote for music and more
America's French's
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com
From E-BLOG: Destroying artifacts, new and old [4/12/03]
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000286.html for underlying
links or to comment
As I was looking at pictures of everything being destroyed in Iraq, I
wondered whether it made sense to topple all signs of Saddam Hussein.
Would there not be some historical value to keeping at least some of the
statues in tact just so we have some record of how things used to be?
I am glad that the transition in Hungary in 1989 was reasonably peaceful.
Among other things, this meant that statues of Lenin and Marx were not
necessarily bulldozed and trampled on. Rather, they were taken to a remote
location just outside of the city where they now stand in a statue park.
The park has a nice Web site with pictures of the statues (e.g. Marx and
Engels). Some of the statues could easily represent different time periods
but because of their communist association I guess those in charge felt
they had to be moved out. And isn't it ironic that as statues of Marx were
being destroyed or moved to museum parks in the ex-Soviet bloc, I was
sitting at an American school reading his work - as were many of my peers
- for various classes required by our majors?
Perhaps some would argue that we don't want any reminders of certain
people. But if labelled and discussed appropriately in, say, a museum or
educational park setting wouldn't it be better to remember the past? I
realize "appropriate" is very blurry and potentially arbitrary, but isn't
it also somewhat arbitrary for the current regime to decide what parts of
the past are to be erased completely?
Now comes to us this depressing story about how the National Museum of
Iraq has been stripped of all its contents. (Perhaps some things are
locked up elsewhere but that's unclear and regardless, a lot has been
lost.) [via Matt Yglesias] At this level we're not just talking about
erasing recent history but much more than that. I realize the reasons for
this destruction are different, but overall these acts all contribute to
knowing less about the past. Since that is likely an important component
of making informed decisions about the future, losing so much historical
data is incredibly unfortunate.
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In this issue: Holocaust Remembrance Day
Today is Holocaust Remembrance Day and I want to take more than a moment
to remember. Recently I've realized - albeit I don't base this on any
scientifically rigorous content analysis of materials - that referring to
the Nazis and their treatment of Jews is a very often cited but too often
miscited historical reference. And one wonders, perhaps it's still better
that we remember at all. But is it enough to just remember vaguely and
misrepresent, or should we be better about remembering more accurately?
That's all just some food for thought on this day.
In the US, the Holocaust often seems more distant than it should. One
doesn't walk the streets where people experienced the horrors. Moreover,
survivors are depicted as part of a distant past. I recall in college an
event organized for those whose grandparents were survivors of the
Holocaust. But what about our parents? Why make it seem as though it was
so long ago that our parents couldn't be survivors as well? Some of them
are, like my father, and I think it's important to remain conscious of
that fact.
Today, I share with you some relevant links. Also, below, I share some
book related excerpts. Recently, my brother read a description of events
in 1944 Hungary that is precisely about why some of my family survived.
We knew about some of this, but it's interesting to see it written up.
It descibes the reasons why the train that my father, uncle, grandmother,
great-uncle, great-aunt and great-grandmother were on changed route from
Auschwitz to a camp in Vienna and ultimately allowed them to survive. (My
grandfather had already been killed by then in a labor camp so he was not
part of this journey.) I share with you this excerpt. But then, to offer
some context to its concluding thoughts ("On the whole they were often
treated quite humanely") I also share with you some snippets from my uncle
about his experiences when he was 11 in the camps published in my father's
recently completed book. I wrap up the excerpts with a bit about my
father's visit last year to the camp he'd been in and how poor the
rememberance is there.
So I invite you to join me today in thinking about some of these things,
whether it is the suffering to which people were subjected or the grand
apathy of so many, there's lots to remember and lots from which we can
learn.
Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation
http://www.vhf.org/
The Holocaust History Project
http://www.holocaust-history.org/normal-index.shtml
Yad Vashem The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority
http://www.yad-vashem.org.il/
Some pictures of present-day Auschwitz
http://www.merengo.hu/galeria/?id=340
Pictures of Auschwitz/Birkenau, 1978-1981
http://www.remember.org/jacobs/
---
Excerpt from
"The Politics of Genocide: The Holocaust in Hungary"
Condensed Edition
Randolph L. Braham
Wayne State University Press (in association with the United States
Holocaust Memorial Museum)
Detroit, 2000
Original book published at Columbia University Press, 1981
Chapter 7: Deportation
pg. 147-149
The Strasshof Transports
The Jews who lived in Gendarmerie Districts V and VI fared relatively
better than their counterparts in the other provincial gendarmerie
districts. This was due to a combination of good luck and a new
element introduced in the so-called blood for trucks negotiations
between Rudolph (Rezso) Kasztner, the leader of the Budapest Relief and
Rescue Committee of Budapest (Vaadah), and the SS. On June 14, during
the deportations from Zone III, Eichmann unexpectedly informed Kasztner
that he was willing to allow thirty thousand Hungarian Jews to be "laid
on ice" in Austria as a demonstration of his goodwill. He demanded, as
counterdemonstration of goodwill, an immediate payment of five million
Swiss francs. Since the Jews of Carpatho-Ruthenia and Northern
Transylvania had already been deported, Eichmann insisted that only
Jews from Trianon Hungary could be considered for the transfer. He
referred to the former as "ethnically and biologically valuable
elements," whom he would not allow to remain alive. As originally
envisioned, half of the thirty thousand Jews were to come from Budapest
and half from the provinces. Kasztner revealed the details of the new
Eichmann offer to the Jewish Council that very day.
Eichmann's offer was based on instructions he had received from Ernst
Kaltenbrunner. The head of the RSHA, as the evidence reveals, was
besieged by Austrian entrepreneurs operating war industries and by
government officials, including SS-Brigadefuhrer Karl Blaschke, the
mayor of Vienna, with requests to provide them with desperately
needed slave labor. Since Hungarian Jewry was at that time the one
still relatively untapped reservoir of Jewish labor, Kaltenbrunner
requested that Eichmann have a few transports of deportees diverted to
Austria.
From the Germans' point of view the deal with Kasztner offered
several distinct advantages:
- It provided an opportunity for a demonstration of goodwill in the
"blood for trucks" negotiations.
- It supplied the Austrian industrial and agricultural entrepreneurs
and local government officials with needed slave labor.
- It enriched the coffers of the Sonderkommando.
The selection of the Jews for the Austrian transports appers to have
been the responsibility of the Zionists or other well-known Jewish
leaders in the concentration and entrainment centers in the affected
zones, acting on instructions from Kasztner.
Kasztner had expected that the first trainload of Jews would be
leaving from Gyor and Komarom, the areas from which Jews were being
deported at the time. Although this plan reportedly had the
approval of Eichmann, all the transports from Gendarmerie Districts
II and III, including of course those from Gyor and Komarom, were
routinely directed to Auschwitz, presumably due to the inertia of
some of the officers in charge of the transports. (When the
Scharfuhrer responsible for the take-over of the transports from
Gyor at Kassa noticed that the train's number was not on his ledger,
he called Eichmann for instructions. Motivated by a concern for
efficiency rather than moral obligation, Eichmann apparently
decided that as long as the transport was already at the Slovakian
border it might as well continue on to Auschwitz.) Eichmann decided
to compensate Kasztner with a transport from Zone IV.
It was during the deportations from this zone of anti-Jewish
operations on June 25-28 that six or seven transports were directed
to Strasshof, a camp near Vienna. The approximately twenty thousand
Jews in these transports came mostly from ghettos in Gendarmerie
District IV.
After their arrival in Strasshof during the first days of July, the
Jews were sent to labor in industrial and agricultural enterprises in
a number of communities in eastern Austria, including Gmund, Weitra,
Wiener-Neustadt and Neunkirchen. Many of them worked under the
auspices of the Todt Organization. Their treatment varied with the
disposition of the individual employers and foremen. On the whole
they were often treated quite humanely and about 75 percent of them,
including children and the elderly, survived the war.
Organizationally, they were under the control and command of a
central office in Vienna headed by SS-Oberstrumbannfuhrer Hermann
Alois Krumey, a leading member of the Eichmann-Sonderkommando in
Hungary.
---
Excerpt from "Our Lives" by Istvan Hargittai [my father]
Chapter on Sanger
For Preface, see http://www.eszter.com/ol/
The Hungarian version of this book is out now. My father is still seeking
a publisher for the English version.
[this quote in the book is from my uncle who was 11 at the time]
The first day after our arrival [in the camp] the people got their work
assignments. Mother was directed to be helper to a roofing master who
turned out to be a humane Viennese man. He often shared his sandwich with
Mother who pretended to eat it and brought it back for us. Children
younger than 10 years old stayed behind in the camp during the day.
Children above the age of 15 were considered adults and went to work with
the rest. Children between 10 and 15 years old formed a special labor
unit. I was in this unit, which had about 20 children. We were taken to
bombed-out buildings, immediately following the bombing. We had to reach
places that adults could not have reached. We had to bring out cadavers
and wounded people and all the valuables. If we found just limbs or other
body parts we had to bring them out as well. It was a cruel and
frightening job and dangerous too.
Falling down killed some of us. They were replaced then by younger
children. The German guards were not brutal just for the sake of
tormenting us, but they required unconditional discipline. When they
ordered us to climb to a place, however dangerous it was or to walk on a
beam however unstable it was, they expected blind obedience. When any of
us appeared hesitant, they let out a round next to us from their machine
guns to frighten us. I have sharp memories of various events. I remember
when we were carrying a heavy container and when the guard sensed that I
wanted to pause, he gave a round and I did not dare to stop. From the
heavy weight and the fright I wetted my pants. It was so cold that the
urine froze along my legs. I remember my shoes, which were in a terrible
state and we did not have stockings and used newspaper pieces to wrap our
feet. In one of the bombed-out homes I found a pair of shoes that would
have fit me and I changed into them. Upon my return downstairs, the guard
noticed this, he became very angry and ordered me to return and change
back the shoes. This episode stayed with me more sharply than many more
horrible events. I could not figure out why he did not let me have a
better pair of shoes. At about that time, I started having dreams about
Father. He came for us in my dream and engineered our escape. In other
dreams, we went for long walks in the woods just as we used to when we
lived back home and he was still alive. Such dreams I still have
occasionally, and I am now 61 years old.
Istvan, who was 3 years old, was a good child throughout the deportation.
He was quiet and withdrawn. When soldiers entered the room he always hid
behind Mother.
The sick in the camp were moved to the attic. So was grandmother when she
became sick. It was a final move because seldom did anybody return from
the attic. Nobody tended the sick. Their meals were placed at the
entrance to the attic and those in better condition among the sick
distributed the food and reported in the morning about the recent dead.
One morning then grandmother was among the dead.
[the chapter continues with my father's return to the camp site in 2002,
this is now my father's voice]
Vienna 2002
In June 2002, I visited our former camp, Lager 12 at 10 Bischoffgasse in
Vienna. It was my first visit to the former camp site and I am the only
member of our family who has ever visited the place since World War II.
There was no trace of the former camp there, outside or inside the school,
as if the camp might have not existed. I almost felt embarrassed, but the
director had vaguely heard about some camp. She showed me the school and
took me to the attic, where they keep the old year books. In the one for
the year 1944/45, there were only short notes, and not a word about the
camp that operated on the premises of the school. I found that part of
the attic to which a stair-case leads and which I recognized from
Brother's narrative. I was there, alone for a few moments in empty, dusty
space, held up by heavy wooden beams, and I felt very close to my
grandmother.
On that visit, I contacted the Research Center of the History of Jews in
Austria and they sent me photocopied material of the trial of the
Lagerfuhrer of Lager 12. There were about 130 pages, mostly testimonies
of former inmates, that is, surviving Jews from Hungary, also, testimonies
by Viennese people, who lived nearby, and could see some of what was going
on in the camp. There were enclosures in the material, and I found my
name in the listings as Stefan Wilhelm (Stefan is the German equivalent of
Istvan). [my father later changed his name to Hargittai, this is explained
in another part of the book]
The testimonies described how Franz Knoll, the Lagerfuhrer, beat not only
the young but also 80-year-old people, how he locked people up in the cold
cellar in wintertime without food, how he stole the rations and had them
delivered to his home by the prisoners, and how he tried to hide his loot,
from the prisoners, in three big boxes after the camp had been liberated
by the Russians. He was characterized by former prisoners and neighbors
as brutal, inhuman, ruthless, and sadistic. A former inmate described how
she had to witness the slow dying of hunger of her infant son, her
pleading in vain for help to the Lagerfuhrer, who then did not let her be
there when her child was buried. Witnesses described how others,
including children, perished in the camp. There were close to 600
grownups and about 60 children incarcerated there, and the Lagerfuhrer
referred to them as if they were things rather than human beings in his
testimony. He repeatedly referred to children as children only for the
age group between 0 and 10 years old. [fn8]
Franz Knoll was born in 1894 in Vienna. He did not have much schooling,
did not have any profession, and before the Nazis elevated him to
positions of importance, he used to work mostly as a waiter. He joined
the Nazi party in 1932, that is, long before the Anschluss. He was
accused not only of the crimes he committed as the Lagerfuhrer of Lager 12
but also of other crimes committed during the preceding years in other
positions.
I have no expertise in legal matters, so it is only my impression that the
trial was meticulous, preceded by a meticulous investigation during
Knoll's long detention of about 22 months. Knoll pleaded not guilty, but
the Court found him guilty and on August 20, 1948, it sentenced him to 18
months of imprisonment. The Court considered several mitigating
conditions, among them his partial confession, the difficulty of his
service, his reduced sense of responsibility, and his duties of supporting
his wife and underage child. The Court also ordered to deduct Knoll's
detention from his prison term. Thus, when the sentencing was over, Knoll
walked free.
[Please see http://www.eszter.com/ol for more information about this
book.]
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In this issue: search engine popularity?
Web site recommendations: IT/gender/misc
I am looking for figures on search engine popularity. That is, what
percent of people use Google and/or Yahoo and/or MSN etc for their
searches? There is a LOT of _anecdotal_ evidence that Google is the most
used search engine, but I have yet to see data on this. Can anyone point
me to data? I only know of this one source and this cites 30% for Google:
http://searchenginewatch.com/reports/netratings.html
I would really appreciate any other sources. Thanks!!
Welcome new readers from the SWS list! On to the links.
Princeton Presidential Lecture Series:
Anytime, Anywhere: The Recent Revolution in Wireless Communications
TODAY, Wed, March 5th, 4:30pm, 104 Computer Science Building
Webcast live: http://www.princeton.edu/WebMedia/http://www.princeton.edu/Siteware/WebAnnounce.Princeton_Announcements.shtml#3
New issue of IT and Society on Web Navigation
http://www.itandsociety.org
&
my piece in it on Serving Citizens' Needs: Minimizing Hurdles to Accessing
Government Information Online
http://www.eszter.com/research/a10-taxtask.html
Is Google too powerful?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/2786761.stm
Ratings Agency Says It Erred in Measuring Web Site Use
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/24/technology/24NET.html
AltaVista sold to Overture (example of no source for claims about Google's
popularity)
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/051/business/AltaVista_s_lost_mission+.shtml
Papers about language, literacy, technology, the Internet and more
http://www.gse.uci.edu/markw/papers.html
Communication, Information and Internet Policy Call for Papers
http://www.tprc.org/tprc03/call03.htm
Usability Glossary
http://www.usabilityfirst.com/glossary/index_terms.txl
Usability News newsletter
http://wsupsy.psy.twsu.edu/surl/usability_news.html
Noise Barrier Aesthetics
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/noise/6.htm
How Conservatives Pigeonholed Those Poor Liberals
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/02/weekinreview/02NUNB.html
A chronology of Bush saying one thing then doing another
http://www.house.gov/appropriations_democrats/caughtonfilm.htm
The Mommy Wars: How the media turned motherhood into a catfight
http://www.msmagazine.com/feb00/mommywars1.html
Fighting postpartum depression (10-20% of mothers go through this)
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0302160276feb16,1,4961982.story
[the Chicago Tribune requires registration]
Men Must Join Women to End Violence against Women
http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/1234
PBS American Experience series: The Pill
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/pill/index.html
Save Title IX - for women's participation in sports
http://www.savetitleix.com
Women's Health and Urban Life - fully online journal
http://citd.scar.utoronto.ca/sever/journal/about.html
The Scholar and Feminist Online - women's studies online journal
http://www.barnard.edu/sfonline/
Presidential candidate wife will continue pursuing her own career
http://rutlandherald.nybor.com/Search/Categories/Article/60772
The World's Richest People - Forbes magazine's list of billionaires
http://www.forbes.com/2003/02/26/billionaireland.html
Who is benefiting from all the duct tape sales across the US?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A38109-2003Feb20.html
God, Satan and the Media - Gallup poll shows 48 percent of Americans
believe in creationism, and only 28 percent in evolution
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/04/opinion/04KRIS.html
Encyclopedia of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and queer culture
http://www.glbtq.com/
Some great music: Kasey Chambers
http://www.emimusic.com.au/artists/kaseychambers/index.asp
&
my comments after her concert last week
http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000215.html
Women comment about their ex's online - yet another proof that anything
you can think of already has a corner carved out for it online
http://www.ex-so.com/
&
A different twist on a similar theme
http://www.greatboyfriends.com
Today's quote:
"If a woman is swept off a ship into the water, the cry is `Man
overboard!' If she is killed by a hit-and-run driver, the charge is
`manslaughter.' If she is injured on the job, the coverage is `workmen's
compensation.' But if she arrives at a threshold marked `Men Only,' she
knows the admonition is not intended to bar animals or plants or inanimate
objects. It is meant for her." -- Alma Graham, ``How to Make Trouble: The
Making of a Nonsexist Dictionary.'' Ms., December 1973, p. 16.
Recently on Eszter's Blog:
Ann Crittenden's ultimate survivor game
Local Googles try to second-guess user preferences
Paper: Serving Citizens' Needs
Celebrations
Freedom-to-Tinkerer profile & where are the sociologists?
Concert: Kasey Chambers
The digital divide and what to do about it
More blogs
Sociologist dies
E-LIST update
Helpful software: PhoTags
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com
From E-BLOG: Ann Crittenden's ultimate survivor game (3/4/03)
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000220.html for underlying links
or to comment
Ann Crittenden gave a talk at Princeton this afternoon. She started by
describing what she suggests would be the ultimate survivor game: Six men
on an island, each with four kids. There are no fast food restaurants and
no TV. The fathers have to go through the usual responsibilities involved
with raising children including four hour PTA meetings. After each
episode, the kids get to vote off the fathers one by one. The prize for
the winner is that he gets to go back to his paying job.
Ann Crittenden is the author of The Price of Motherhood which is a book
you should go and read if you haven't yet (Paul Starr reviewed it in the
New York Times two years ago). The focus of the book - and Crittenden's
talk today - is the inability of the U.S. to accept the investment in
children as a social investment. In the U.S. more than most other
countries in the world, mothers bear the economic burden of raising kids,
kids who will be paying for everyone's social security benefits in the
future thus constituting a social good from which all of society benefits.
Crittenden calls this the "Mommy tax" which often costs women easily $1
million in lifetime earnings. She pointed out that the gender gap in wages
has close to diminished for those 35 years old and younger. The real gap
exists between men & childless women as compared to mothers.
The United States joins just four other countries across the globe with no
universal paid parental leave policy: Australia (they are working on it
now), Lesotho, Papua New Guinea, and Swaziland. In contrast, Canada
recently passed a law which grants mothers 12 months' leave. In Sweden,
families get 12 months' leave but only if the father takes at least one of
those months for leave (I'm assuming/hoping they deal with homosexual
couple issues somehow).
Crittenden's book is incredibly well researched and addresses lots of
important points with separate chapters dedicated to the question of
welfare, the argument of "but it's your choice" and policy considerations.
It's the kind of book one hopes everyone will read.
As to forthcoming policy steps, it's hard to say. We are discussing
potential options in a book group partly sponsored by the Gender and
Development Policy Network here at Princeton.
Crittenden has a nice piece about A National-Security Gender Gap in the
latest issue of The American Prospect.
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In this issue: National Condom Week
Web site recommendations: IT/politics/photos/misc
I know you're probably thinking Happy Valentine's Day which is nice and
all (or silly depending on where you stand) but I'd prefer to call your
attention to something else that kicks off today: National Condom Week.
I realize it's not relevant to all of my readers personally, but the focus
here is more of a public health issue. Read up on it on these pages:
The Truth About Condoms
http://www.ppcw.org/outreach/NCW.asp
&
Take Action! Send a Condom to Africa in the President's Name
http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/sendCondom
&
Spread Condoms - Not Aids
http://www.plannedparenthood.org/about/pr/030214_condoms.html
&
Counting Condoms: How Many Are Needed for HIV Prevention Efforts?
http://www.popact.org/resources/publications/condomscount/CountingCondoms.htm
And now on to other sites. There's less IT related material (although
I'll start with those as usual) and more political content, I guess a sign
of the times.
Programmers redesign Back button so it retraces your steps (MUCH more
efficient than the current model!)
http://www.nature.com/nsu/nsu_pf/021230/021230-3.html
(a more detailed piece is forthcoming in a journal I'll post about in a
future issue as soon as it goes public)
Computer scientists campaign for trustworthy e-voting
http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/archives/000290.html
3D model search engine
http://shape.cs.princeton.edu/
Power Laws, Weblogs, and Inequality
http://www.shirky.com/writings/powerlaw_weblog.html
How MP3 Files Work
http://www.howstuffworks.com/mp3.htm/printable
FBI Seeks Hacker Who Stole eBay Info
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&ncid=1212&e=1&u=/ap/20030208/ap_on_hi_te/\
ebay_hacker&sid=95573501
New York Times' Web Site: Plans Print-Like Ad Format
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/0,,SB1044045107442450944,00.html
Electronic Surveillance Spies a Perfect Gift
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/10/technology/10GIFT.html
Amazon Tries Word of Mouth - no more TV ads
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/10/business/media/10ADCO.html
Senate Remarks: Reckless Administration May Reap Disastrous Consequences
http://www.senate.gov/~byrd/byrd_newsroom/byrd_news_feb/news_2003_february/news_\
2003_february_9.html
College Try: Why universities should stop encouraging applicants to take
the SATs over and over again
http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2003/01/vigdor-j-01-24.html
Partial Issue: The "partial-birth" abortion debate is back. And it's just
as contrived as ever.
http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2003/02/sullivan-am-02-11.html
Catholic Hospitals Refuse Patients Contraception
http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/1209/context/archive
"independent reviews of survival equipment and outdoors gear"
http://www.equipped.org/
NJ Governor proposes eliminating all state funding for arts and culture
http://www.artpridenj.com/ - suggests ways to take action
A Prolific Genghis Khan, It Seems, Helped People the World
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/11/science/11KHAN.html
Some GREAT political cartoons
http://www.claybennett.com/archives.html
Gulf Wars Episode II: Clone of the Attacks
http://www.thescreamonline.com/images3-1/clone2.html
Iraq Goes Up For Auction on EBay
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=1093&ncid=1093&e=10&u=/pcworld/200301\
31/tc_pcworld/109146
It's Not Easy Being Orange - thoughts about orange terrorist threat level
from an orange-loving Princetonian
http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2003/02/11/opinion/7244.shtml
UK census: hundreds of thousands affiliate with Jedi faith
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/2757067.stm
Did you know that the Swiss electorate accounts for about half the
referendum ballots conducted worldwide?
http://apnews.myway.com//article/20030209/D7P36ER00.html
What the Hell is the Fibonacci Series - very nice little flash
http://www.textism.com/bucket/fib.html
Breathtaking nature photographs
http://zoltantakacs.com/
Snow Crystals
http://www.its.caltech.edu/~atomic/snowcrystals/
Today's quote:
""It isn't enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it.
And it isn't enough to believe in it. One must work at it."
-- Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962)
Recently on Eszter's Blog:
E-voting - striking the right balance
NJ art funds in danger
Nature photos
Political cartoons
Innovative ways of teaching
A penny a song
Blog types
Power law distributions and blogs
From above
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com
From E-BLOG: Blog types (2/10/03)
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000191.html for underlying links
or to comment
Blog types
Yesterday's entry inspired me to think about blog types in an attempt to
create a classification scheme (I said earlier that's an interest of
mine).
First of all, there is style and then there is content.
Regarding style, there are the interactive blogs and closed ones mostly
based on whether the blogger allows for comments on the page. This gets a
bit blurred by the Trackback feature on Moveable Type (MT) which is an
indirect way to allow for comments. (Trackback allows for links to entries
on other MT blogs that refer to the entry with the Trackback option.)
Unfortunately, the interactive nature of this feature is limited by the
fact that it's only available to other MT users.
Interactivity isn't only relevant via comments or the Trackback feature,
however. There are bloggers who engage the content of other blogs in their
posts and those who simply post material without ever (or almost never)
referring to other blogs.
As for content, there are all sorts. There are those who comment on very
personal topics. Then there are the political commentary types (including
lots of economic and social commentary). Some bloggers comment on anything
and everything whether political or personal. Then there are those who
focus on a particular topic, say law or information technology (both
pretty broad, but still somewhat confined in relative terms).
Merging the styles and contents, here are some types.
* personal journal (mostly includes descriptions about the author's
day-to-day activities perhaps not directly aimed at but certainly of most
interest to friends and family)
* links galore (offers lots of links to elsewhere on the Web with little
commentary on behalf of the blogger about the links)
* interactive commentary (has a lot of commentary on a particular topic -
often political, economic or social commentary - which often addresses and
engages in a conversation with commentary from other sites)
* one-way commentary (commentary without any interactive nature, almost
like reading the editorial pages of an established media outlet but the
author doubles as editor)
* hodge-podge (addresses all sorts of topics, sometimes offers links
without much commentary, sometimes offers commentary without (m)any links)
Of course, there may be overlaps which makes this less useful than I'd
like, but it's a start.
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In this issue: lit review query
Web site recommendations: IT/heritage/environment/misc
I'm looking for literature on
1. people's Internet use for health information
2. how people with disabilities use the Web (especially for health
information but also in general)
I have some leads (like the Pew report on the topic: The Online Health
Care Revolution: How the Web helps Americans take better care of
themselves http://www.pewinternet.org/reports/toc.asp?Report=26 and pieces
from the Journal of Medical Internet Research http://www.jmir.org ) but
would appreciate any other pointers that come to mind. Thanks!
Thanks to all those who contributed to this issue!
The Value of Reputation on eBay - A Controlled Experiment
http://www.si.umich.edu/~presnick/papers/postcards/index.html
The Hole-in-the-Wall experiments in India
http://www.niitholeinthewall.com
The A to Z of Usability (including great use of network analysis to map
the community)
http://www.usabilityviews.com
Thumbnails of the day's newspaper's from around the world all on one page
- very cool!
http://www.newseum.org/todaysfrontpages/
Start-Up Marries Blogs and Camera Phones
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/64/28773.html
Postdoc/Fellowship at Institute for Security Technology Studies, Dartmouth
http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/ISTS/fp.htm
Did you know that Happy Birthday is copyrighted?
http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/birthday.htm
&
given recent events, that copyright will continue to hold :-((
Supremes Uphold Longer Copyrights
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,57220,00.html
Interactive multi-source news summarization
http://www.newsinessence.com
The Internet picture dictionary - simple pictures with their names in
various languages for a learning tool
http://www.pdictionary.com
More on airport security experiences - this one with a different twist
"freedom is kind of a hobby with me, and I have disposable income that
I'll spend to find out how to get people more of it"
http://pennandteller.com/sincity/penniphile/federalvip.html
Study Looks at Squatters and Land Titles in Peru - a good friend's
fascinating work written up in the NYTimes
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/09/business/09SCEN.html
Net Captures Lost World of Shtetl
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,57204,00.html
&
Jewish Heritage in Central and Eastern Europe
http://www.centropa.org
Cuba popular study destination for US students
http://www.cnn.com/2003/EDUCATION/01/07/cuba.studies.ap/index.html
Pictures of Cuba
http://alai.cigb.edu.cu/HavanaCubaBiomed11.htm#hav
A good starting point for the human health antibiotic-resistance and
livestock story
http://www.environmentaldefense.org/article.cfm?ContentID=2500
End of critical protection for sea turtles? (sad picture:( )
http://www.environmentaldefense.org/article.cfm?ContentID=2587
Organic dining options come to Princeton dining halls (largely thanks to a
good friend's efforts)
http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2003/01/08/news/6688.shtml
Scientific American: Top Science Stories of 2002
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa003&articleID=00077641-A3BF-1E03-8B3B8\
09EC588EEDF
Stories about people's cherished ticket stubs
http://stories.about.ticketstubs.org/
"slang, webspeak, colloquialisms.." - can be useful for communicating with
people from other generations and regions
http://www.pseudodictionary.com/
Today's quote:
"The earth laughs in flowers." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson
Recently on Eszter's Blog:
Recent work
Mobile blogging.. any blogging?
Short break
Overdue thanks
Cool quote
Some good empirical work in econ
21st century 8 ball
Bloggies 2003
Google does seem to love blogs
The New Year is finally here, blog on
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com
From E-BLOG: M$Speak (11/17/02)
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000123.html for underlying links
or to comment
I found the following gem via "soy sauce and garlic". Microsoft has a
Manual of Style for Technical Publications which has the following entry
for "navigate":
"Avoid the verb navigate to refer to moving from site to site, page to
page within a site, or link to link on the Internet (or on the desktop or
in other applications, as well). Instead, use explore to mean looking for
sites or pages generally, move to or move through to refer to sequentially
moving from one link or site to another, or a similar neutral term
describing the action."
It turns out that others have commented on this years ago and with some
added wit. If you didn't really understand why the above quote is so
interesting then let me just say that Netscape used to rule the browser
market with its program called Navigator. This Manual of Style was written
around the time when Netscape Navigator was still an important player in
the browser market. Microsoft's own browser is called Internet Explorer
and thus the encouragement to use "explore" instead of "navigate".
I think it's fascinating how powers-that-be try to influence people's
thoughts, understandings and attitudes via use of particular language.
This reminds me of the Bush Administration's approach to the digital
divide, or the supposed lack thereof, to be precise. I commented on this
on my E-LIST but since I didn't have a blog then yet, I'll just repost the
comment here:
Looking for the latest US Govt report on Americans' connectivity? You
won't find it at http://www.digitaldivide.gov . The report is no longer
part of the Falling Through the Net series, instead, it is now titled "A
Nation Online". And although differences are decreasing, it's interesting
how the change in language is supposed to make all the difference. Of
course, this new spin on the topic will help justify the cuts in spending
on info tech subsidies. (February 7, 2002 E-LIST issue)
And here's another related note (from the April 8, 2002 E-LIST issue):
The other day I needed to look at the various Digital Divide reports of
the NTIA so I went to www.digitaldivide.gov . The site no longer exists.
As the "Falling Through the Net" reports transformed into a report called
A Nation Online, the URL referring to the divide is also falling into
oblivion. Links to the past reports are now available under a new
directory "digitalnation" on the ntia.doc.gov site. It's possible to get
archives of the www.digitaldivide.gov site using the Wayback Machine:
http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.digitaldivide.gov but if you
simply type in http://www.digitaldivide.gov you get a page-not-found. (It
is possible that this is a temporary glitch, but somehow I doubt it.)
[Jan 2003 update: the URL now redirects.] This is all in line with the
Administration's related proposed budget cuts and some recent commentaries
that there is no longer a digital divide problem. But note that although
the gap may have decreased in terms of connectivity, or technical access,
it's important to recognize that with the Internet, mere access does not
constitute effective access to all that the medium has to offer. For more
on this, see my new paper on what I call "the second-level digital
divide", or the differences in people's ability to use the Web:
Second-Level Digital Divide: Differences in People's Online Skills
(some findings from the Web Use Project)
In any case, these are just some more examples of Agendaspeak.
(cc) Eszter Hargittai
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons license.
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In this issue: intertwining E-LIST & E-BLOG
Web site recommendations: IT/politics/misc
Some people read both E-LIST and E-BLOG, some people read just the list,
others just the blog (and billions out there read neither.. go figure).
Although there's a reason for maintaining them separately, I'm going to
merge some of the content. With this issue I'll start posting the entire
contents of a blog entry at the end of the list, just to give E-LIST
readers an idea of what the blog is about.
There's lots of good stuff out there, increasingly I find sites via blogs.
See my thoughts on this on my blog, of course:)
The New Year is finally here, blog on
http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000159.html
Please keep sending me stuff and thanks to those who do!
Association of Internet Researchers 4th annual conference CFP
http://aoir.org/2003/
Dust or Magic Conference: Creative Work and Workmanship in Cyberia
http://publishing.brookes.ac.uk/emedia/dustormagic/index.html
Teen Cleared in Landmark DVD Case
http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/01/07/dvd.johansen/index.html
Professors Vie With Web for Class's Attention
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/02/technology/02WIRE.html
(as always, the NYTimes requires free registration)
Trying to map blog networks
http://radio.weblogs.com/0114726/2003/01/02.html#a176
Google Loves Blogs
http://www.microcontentnews.com/articles/googleblogs.htm
&
an example of this (much of my blog traffic is via Google as well..
and sometimes I'm amazed at how quickly my entries get indexed)
http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000160.html
Lots of interesting material for librarians and other "information
junkies"
http://marylaine.com
Web site/ISP to be shut down due to law suit (another DMCA victim)
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,57011,00.html
Troubles among Amazon's reviewer community
http://www.dancingbadger.com/amareview.htm
Is the Computer Desktop an Antique?
http://slate.msn.com/?id=2075219
Eight e-mail mistakes that make you look bad - a good recap
http://www.bcentral.com/articles/komando/115.asp?cobrand=msn&LID=3800
Spiritual Connection on the Internet
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/28/national/28RELI.html
(this comment is a bit suspect though: "who has been studying religious
Web sites for more than a decade" .. since 1991? hmmm...)
"webloggers [..] serving as an early warning system for traditional
journalists"
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,56978,00.html
An Online Course Gets Students Thinking About Drinking
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/parents/conversation/articles/25ALCO.html
Divided We Stand??? - on today's political book networks
http://www.orgnet.com/leftright.html
&
an earlier piece on this: The Social Life of Books
http://www.orgnet.com/booknet.html
A New Antisemitic Myth in the Middle East Media: The September 11 Attacks
Were Perpetrated by the Jews
http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=subjects&Area=antisemitism&ID=SR00802
Scientists Develop Remote-Controlled Rats
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scitech/DailyNews/rats020501.html
Gay Focus at Holocaust Museum
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/04/arts/design/04HOLO.html
Joe Chemo: A Camel Who Wishes He Had Never Smoked - great little
anti-smoking site, especially geared toward kids
http://www.joechemo.org
The rise of "super-size" at American fast food restaurants
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A46261-2002Dec27
Research about merit-based financial aid (especially Georgia's HOPE
Scholarship)
http://www.terry.uga.edu/hope/home.html
Postdoc in demography (bottom of page)
http://www.brandeis.edu/departments/anthro/news-events.html
Images of pre-prohibition era products that used cocaine
http://wings.buffalo.edu/aru/preprohibition.htm
Need the official US time?
http://time.gov
Facts behind topics that come up in some of our favorite TV shows
http://www.footnote.tv
Managing supermarket queues :)
http://newyorker.com/talk/content/?030113ta_talk_parker
Today's quote:
"I always say ... keep a diary, and someday it will keep you." -- Mae West
Recently on Eszter's Blog:
Bloggies 2003
Google does seem to love blogs
The New Year is finally here, blog on
Mp3 player recommendations?
Continental DiViDes
Memories
Movie: Chicago
Welcome to 2003
See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com
A recent blog entry: The thinking behind movie ratings (12/29/02)
See http://www.esztersblog.com/archives/00000151.html for underlying links
or to comment
I saw Catch Me If You Can last night upon the recommendation of a friend
of mine, but I'm not here to tell you about that movie. I enjoyed it, it
was entertaining, but the most long lasting effect from that movie-going
experience comes from some of the previews.
You've all seen it before: "This preview has been approved for all
audiences". I saw a preview for a movie that is all about featuring in the
most gruesome and practically more-real-than-life-itself manner accidents
that can happen to us on a daily basis. I had to wonder about not only
what sicko would make such a movie but what deranged mind would approve it
for all audiences?! (I will spare you the details because I don't want to
inflict on you the kind of graphical description that I was involunteerly
subjected to last night.)
So this started me thinking about movie ratings and how much they tell us
about the values of the society in which they are implemented. Growing up
in Europe, I was used to seeing shows on TV with fairly elaborate physical
intimacy scenes [I have to avoid the s word here to make sure my blog
doesn't get censored by too many]. So it's been a shocker how prude
certain regulations are in the US. But perhaps it's even more of a shocker
that in grave contrast, violence of all sorts is fully acceptable. How
else could some of those previews possibly be "approved for all
audiences"?
Catch Me If You Can has a rating of PG13 (Parents Strongly Cautioned -
Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13). It took me a
while to figure out why it did not get a G (General Audiences - all ages
admitted) rating in light of the G-rated previews we saw. The movie barely
has any physical intimacy scenes and there are certainly no images of
people without clothes on [I'm avoiding the n word here as well]. Then I
realized the likely culprit: the f word is spoken twice! That must be it.
Hearing the f word will corrupt our youth much more than seeing the most
lurid horrible violent scenes. How could I miss that?!
You have to wonder what kind of values are being advocated when people
losing body parts and being killed in the most ghastly ways is completely
acceptable for general audiences but seeing two people express love and
affection for each other is a grave sin from which we must protect the
next generation. Only one question remains, I guess: what is going to
protect me from the kind of generation that grows up on such values?
(cc) Eszter Hargittai
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http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd-nc/1.0
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In this issue: E-LIST is one year old
Web site recommendations: from E-LIST archives
One year ago I sent out the first issue of E-LIST and I'm very glad I did
because it's been a blast. I can't quite say why I like to do it so much,
but it's a lot of fun and useful too (it's useful for me and some of you
have let me know that you find it helpful as well which is a pleasure to
know). Recently at a job interview I was telling someone about my tiny
journalistic background. We were talking about my academic interest in
communication research and I noted how at one point in my life I was also
interested in the day-to-day of journalism. In addition to the various
school publications I'd worked on, one summer I also worked as a reporter
at a big Hungarian daily. I decided that it was too stressful on a
day-to-day basis and coverage of topics was necessarily too superficial
for my interests so I did not pursue it. The person listening to me talk
about this noted that I haven't completely given up on it though as per my
list and blog. I thought that was an interesting point. Thanks to the
way we're using new technologies, it's been possible for me to pursue my
journalistic interests, broadly defined, in some way.
Thanks for joining me on the ride, you're a great readership!
Some of you sent me pointers to your favorite links from E-LIST issues.
Here I share these picks adding some of my own. I'll be sending out a new
list in a few days. Thanks for contributing, you know who you are!
The Internet Archive: Way Back Machine
pick a Web site and see what it looked like years ago
http://www.archive.org/
Digital Divide and Libraries: Equity and the Internet - a bibliography
http://web.syr.edu/~jryan/infopro/divide.html
Is your email being filtered without your knowledge?
http://strom.com/awards/293.html
Weblogs: a history and perspective
http://www.rebeccablood.net/essays/weblog_history.html
Blogosphere: the emerging Media Ecosystem
http://www.microcontentnews.com/articles/blogosphere.htm
Resource Center for Cyberculture Studies (syllabi, book reviews, etc.)
http://www.com.washington.edu/rccs/
Mailing lists related to Internet research
http://www.aoir.org/list.php
SocioLog - Sociology references, departments, organizations and much more
http://www.sociolog.com
Creative Commons - a non-profit to help those who "do not want to exercise
all of the intellectual property rights the law affords them"
http://www.creativecommons.org/
The Free Expression Policy Project - on copyright & free expression,
media literacy, media violence research and much more
http://www.fepproject.org
Pew Internet and American Life Project reports (fully available for free
online)
http://www.pewinternet.org/reports/index.asp
Visualizing Internet industry partnerships
http://www.orgnet.com/inetindustry.html
Who Owns What - what the major media companies own
http://www.cjr.org/owners/
a critical look at entertainment giant Clear Channel which owns stations
with a total of 103,000,000 listeners in the U.S. and 1,000,000,000
globally
http://www.clearchannelsucks.org
&
a Salon article on them: Radio's Big Bully
http://www.salon.com/ent/feature/2001/04/30/clear_channel/index.html
"Do the conflicts of interest of our highly concentrated media constitute
a threat to democracy?"
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/29/opinion/29KRUG.html
Visualizing Internet Topology at a Macroscopic Scale
http://www.caida.org/analysis/topology/as_core_network/
The Censorware Project
http://censorware.net
Evaluating the Quality of Information on the Internet
http://www.virtualchase.com/quality/checklist.html
Staying Safe Online
http://www.staysafeonline.info/
'Have an Excel puzzle you can't solve? Post a query on this board.
(people were amazingly helpful and got back to me within minutes)
http://www.mrexcel.com/board/index.php
WordNet - "a lexical database for the English language" - it not only
gives definitions and extensive lists of synonyms, but also links words
together via a web of semantic relationships - very cool
http://www.cogsci.princeton.edu/~wn/
Common Errors in English
http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/index.html
NameBase - great examples (graphical and otherwise) of social network
analysis
http://www.namebase.org/
The Dvorak Keyboard - for a healthier and quicker typing experience
http://www.mit.edu:8001/people/jcb/Dvorak/
&
Online course for teaching yourself Dvorak
http://www.karelia.com/abcd/
Tips on Academic Professionalization
http://www.eszter.com/academia.html
Metamorphosis: Transforming the Ties That Bind
Communication Technology and Community Program
http://metamorph.org/index1.html
Hard-to-find Apple software and hardware (plus donation program info)
http://www.mactreasures.com/
Women: The Shadow Story of the Millennium
http://www.nytimes.com/library/magazine/millennium/m2/index.html
Distinguished Women of Past and Present
http://www.distinguishedwomen.com/
If Men Could Menstruate (great little piece I read in my sex and gender
course in college that I was happy to find online)
http://www.mum.org/ifmencou.htm
For young women, pass this on: GYN101
http://www.gyn101.com/
Sex Slaves in Europe
http://www.msnbc.com/news/725802.asp
Prison Sucks - Research on the crime control industry
http://www.prisonsucks.com/index.shtml
You Are a Suspect
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/14/opinion/14SAFI.html
WHY: Art about the attack on the World Trade Center & Pentagon
http://www.whyproject.org
Chocolate Exhibition at the Field Museum in Chicago - I saw this a few
weeks ago, it's open til 12/31
http://www.fieldmuseum.org/Chocolate/
You probably already know about the Internet Movie Database
(http://www.imdb.com ) for anything and everything about movies,
but did you know there's a similar site for Broadway shows?
Internet Broadway Database
http://www.ibdb.com
The MegaPenny Project - visualizing large numbers
http://kokogiak.com/megapenny/
The Comic Book Periodic Table of the Elements - neat
http://www.uky.edu/Projects/Chemcomics/index.html
Today's quote:
"If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change
your attitude. Don't complain." -- Maya Angelou
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See them here: http://www.esztersblog.com