January 2010
“Since the earliest days of the world wide web, newspapers and magazines have...”
– Clash of the titans - Steamboats Are Ruining Everything
definitive iPad thoughts →
John Gruber is one of my favorite tech commentators, but he’s not doing so well with the iPad. He has divided the world into those who “get it” (i.e., adore the iPad) and those who “don’t get it.”…
Merlin's take
merlin:
My Initial Thoughts on Apple’s Announcement Regarding the Release of the iPad, Viz. the High Likelihood of Its Impact As a Paradigm-Shifting, Next-Generation Appliance Poised to Upend the Traditional Notion of Computers As Per Se Computers; Plus, Educated Commentary on the Complex and Sometimes Adversarial Relationships Between Humans and the Machines That They Build to Use and to —...
“On his panel were Eric Schmidt, the chief executive of Google; Rainer Bruderle,...”
– Davos Day 3: Technology Is Magic. “Yes,” he thought, as he lay dying from AIDS/hunger/a rifle bullet in the gut, “This isn’t so bad — after all, I have a powerful computer on my belt.”
the non-digital classroom →
Mark Bauerlein is making a prediction:
As more kids grow up writing in snatches and conforming to the conventional patter, problems will become impossible to overlook. Colleges will put more…
“Apple has created a computer that’s entirely locked down. The only...”
– if:book: and now we have an ipad
“iBooks uses full-justified layout for books, with no apparent option to switch...”
– Daring Fireball: Various and Assorted Thoughts and Observations Regarding the Just-Announced iPad
“Apple didn’t do anything revolutionary with the iPad’s input methods. I guess...”
–
Marco.org - Loosely organized initial thoughts on the iPad
“Despite the iPad’s large color touch screen, I think the reports of the Kindle’s...”
– marclafountain.com - Wither Kindle?
a quick iPad roundup →
Gruber has the need for speed:
Lastly, there’s the fact that the iPad is using a new CPU designed and made by Apple itself: the Apple A4. This is a huge deal. I got about 20 blessed minutes of…
“The iPad appears to be Steve Jobs’s attempt to roll back the multi-decade trend...”
– Timothy B. Lee (via pegobry). I think this is true and therefore worrisome. It also comes a little late in the game: how many people who are now locked in to the Amazon world are going to wave goodbye to all that in order to get locked in to the Apple world — especially book people? The Books app on...
I'm all ears →
If I ever write Text Patterns: the Book, this will absolutely be the cover image. (Here, via Culture Making.)
copyright and making sense →
We interrupt this hiatus to comment that Larry Lessig’s essay in The New Republic on copyright and the Google Book Settlement is by far the best thing I’ve read on the settlement and the many…
“First, great teachers tended to set big goals for their students. They were also...”
– The Atlantic Online | January/February 2010 | What Makes a Great Teacher? | Amanda Ripley
“So is it reasonable to believe that the Gospel passages quoted above...”
– Fundamentalists and the Atheists Who Love Them - Ross Douthat Blog - NYTimes.com
“I decided to visit the [National Gallery of Art] after attending the March for...”
– Separation of Pro–Life and State | First Things
“It’s probably pretty clear to regular DF readers that I don’t care for Flash,...”
– Daring Fireball: Apple, Adobe, and Flash. I hate Flash almost as much as I hate Microsoft Word. Let’s take advantage of HTML5, people.
“CUPERTINO, CA — Claiming that he completely forgot about the much-hyped...”
– Frantic Steve Jobs Stays Up All Night Designing Apple Tablet
report →
Back from my travels — where I was treated wonderfully hospitably by the good folks at Baylor — but under the weather. I’ll get back on the horse ASAP, but I don’t know when P will be.
“While the nation was suffering through the worst economy since the Depression,...”
– They Still Don’t Get It. I’ve never quoted Bob Herbert before, and probably never will again, but I think this is succinct and utterly accurate.
Amazon's bad move →
Amazon’s decision to open the Kindle platform for app development is not smart. It seems obvious that Amazon is anticipating the arrival of the Great Apple Tablet and is trying to forestall its…
“As well as prefiguring (and outnumbering) the literary tourists of other...”
– It’s Burns Night – sae let the Lord be thankit | Ian Jack
“With the supremacy of the chess machines now apparent and the contest of...”
– The Chess Master and the Computer - Garry Kasparov
new world, potentially brave →
I’ve written elsewhere, once or twice, about the experience of homeschooling my son Wesley. We’re still at it, and now, in the humanities portion of his curriculum, studying Dirty London —…
“[Adrian] Johns argues that piracy shaped England’s public sphere by widening the...”
– Terms of infringement: battling intellectual piracy - The National Newspaper
I got Googled too →
Mark Zuckerberg is probably right when he says that privacy is ceasing to be a value; and then of course there’s Scott McNealy’s notorious — and now long-ago — comment that “You have no privacy…
“Winifred Gallagher, a behavioral science writer who lives in a warm town house...”
– For Some, a Warm Home Is Not a Priority - NYTimes.com
“Contrary to environmentalism’s anti- urban bias, David Owen argues, New York...”
– The City’s Limits
“Kurzweil took some serious heat … during a panel discussion after the...”
– I, Robot | Print Article | Newsweek.com
“The key to literature in the early 21st century is one of confluence. There’s...”
– Ask the Author Live: Dana Goodyear with Neil Gaiman
“Sometimes people ask me to write more Neverwhere. They want to know what happens...”
– Neil Gaiman introduces Neverwhere - Telegraph. Oh Lord, please let this happen. Please please please please.
“Here at VQR we currently have more than ten times as many submitters each year...”
– VQR » Blog » Mother Jones: The Death of Fiction?
“Last summer, Louis Menand tabulated that there were 822 creative writing...”
– The Death of Fiction? | Mother Jones
“There are ways around this: we can, for example, see it as a moral duty to buy...”
– if:book: reading vs writing. Yes! You have a moral duty to buy my books!
“Edgar Allan Poe would have turned 201 yesterday, but the mysterious stranger who...”
– Mystery as Edgar Allan Poe’s famously dedicated fan misses anniversary
“The winner of the 2009 Dutch Word of the Year, as selected in an online poll...”
– Language Log » “My friends thou hast defriended”
“American society has, for more than a century, been defined by corporate power,...”
– You’ve Been Yelped
reading resolutions →
Normally I think such resolutions are bad ideas, but these by Wayne Gooderham are sufficiently anti-resolutional that I like them:
My Reading Resolutions are important to me for the simple…
asciimeo →
Speaking of text patterns, how about these beautiful videos in text? And note the related iPhone app.
(Hat tip to Matt Frost.)