The Political Notebook: The One-Percentification of Higher Ed
Happy end of the school year. And amen to what thepoliticalnotebook says:
It’s graduation season in an economic downturn, so it’s time to reflect on the sorry state of college affordability, student loans and job prospects in the US. Being a twentysomething here in the US, I take discussions like these incredibly personally.
This afternoon I read this comment piece…
Bay Area Maker Faire is live!
If you’re in Milwaukee you’re not there, but they’re posting video here, and BoingBoing covered a 4th grader’s Arduino-powered cat feeder here. It’s adorable:
More on Wikipedia (featuring Reddit!)
Story from The Atlantic (via The Daily What): how the professor who fooled Wikipedia got caught by Reddit. From the article:
Sometimes even an apparent failure can mask an underlying success. The students may have failed to pull off a spectacular hoax, but they surely learned a tremendous amount in the process. “Why would I design a course,” Kelly asks on his syllabus, “that is both a study of historical hoaxes and then has the specific aim of promoting a lie (or two) about the past?” Kelly explains that he hopes to mold his students into “much better consumers of historical information,” and at the same time, “to lighten up a little” in contrast to “overly stuffy” approaches to the subject. He defends his creative approach to teaching the mechanics of the historian’s craft, and plans to convert the class from an experimental course into a regular offering.
Upcycled knitting needles
From around the inter-webs today: vintage knitting needle bracelets made by Etsy seller Sew New Things! Super cute and an interesting way to deal with disused needles.
via thedailywhat:
Kids Reenact the Darndest Music Videos of the Day: As a tribute to recently-departed Beastie Boy Adam “MCA” Yauch, filmmaker James Winters remade the music video for “Sabotage” with his two kids and their cousin playing the Beasties.
I’m telling y’all it’s an homage.
[vulture.]
via thekidshouldseethis:
Google’s The Story of Send visualizes how an email journeys through their data centers to reach its final destination, all while promoting the energy efficiency of their custom-built servers and their support of clean energy along the way.
I wish they’d gone into a bit more technical detail, but it’s a nice introduction to how much more there is to email technology than what we see, and provides some inspiration in the idea that a large company can innovate its business while still committing to carbon-neutrality.
via Neatorama.
Ditto all of the above.
“Repair cafes” opening in Amsterdam
Yes, another reason to hit Amsterdam cafes: some of them are places where you can fix your broken stuff!
The New York Times reports on it in An Effort to Bury a Throwaway Culture One Repair at a Time:
Conceived of as a way to help people reduce waste, the Repair Cafe concept has taken off since its debut two and a half years ago. The Repair Cafe Foundation has raised about $525,000 through a grant from the Dutch government, support from foundations and small donations, all of which pay for staffing, marketing and even a Repair Cafe bus.
Photo by Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York Times
(via HASTAC)
Wikipedia workshop day
Hi, English 240! It’s Wikipedia workshop day here, so I wanted to bring back a couple of previous posts about the site:
Exciting! And if our discussion today about Wikipedia’s standards sparks your interest, this article at the NYT might, too: When Knowledge Isn’t Written, Does It Still Count? Here’s a preview:
Once routinely questioned about its reliability — what do you mean, anyone can edit it? — the site is now used every month by upwards of 400 million people worldwide. But with influence and respect come responsibility, and lately Wikipedia has been criticized from without and within for reflecting a Western, male-dominated mindset similar to the perspective behind the encyclopedias it has replaced.
Sweet DIY project
The story is here, but here’s the gist:
Kathryn, at age 12, decided that she wanted a Pontiac Fiero for her 16th birthday. After convincing her parents, she bought it and has been restoring it from the ground up, including upholstery, motor rebuilding, welding, and more.
(via)
