Blogging
clock | February 15, 2009Being quite busy lately, I accumulated a lot of links to stuff I wanted to comment on but never found time. Well, it does not appear I will find time any time soon, so here are the links for you to comment on anyway (just because I link to them does not mean I agree with them - in some cases quite the opposite):
In Defense of Secrecy :
Given the pervasive secrecy of the Bush-Cheney administration, and the sorry consequences of that disposition, President Barack Obama's early emphasis on openness in government seems almost inevitable. One of the first official communications issued by the new…
clock | February 15, 2009I know, I know, it's middle of February, but I was busy and neglected my duties. So, to catch up with the monthly feature, here is the best of January at A Blog Around The Clock:
Of course, the entire month was dominated by ScienceOnline'09, so the rest of posts were mostly quick links, cartoons and YouTube videos, which is, I hope, understandable. But I did write, post facto, some of my own coverage of the conference, e.g., ScienceOnline09 - Thursday, ScienceOnline'09 - Friday Morning Coffee Cupping, ScienceOnline'09 - Friday Lab Tour: the NC Museum of Natural Sciences, ScienceOnline'09 -…
clock | February 14, 2009w00t! Miriam Goldstein had a piece published in Slate! The real references to that piece arehere.
clock | February 14, 2009
Nanny Goat Gruff and the Internet Trolls:
Once upon a time, there was a nanny goat who lived to wander from field to field, tasting the grass and bushes as she went. It was a simple life: wander, taste, chew, wander again. Sunshine and air and a million flavors were her world. The only problem was that the most complex, interesting flavors were to be found in isolated meadows, only accessible by bridge. And where there were bridges, there were trolls......
aardvarchaeology | February 10, 2009The sixtieth Four Stone Hearth blog carnival is on-line at Middle Savagery. Catch the best recent blogging on archaeology and anthropology!
Submissions for the next carnival will be sent to me. The next open hosting slot is on 11 March. All bloggers with an interest in the subject are welcome to volunteer to me for hosting. No need to be an anthro pro.
clock | February 10, 2009Lots of excitement this week on science blogs and other fans of reality.
The biggest biggy of the biggest biggies is Blog For Darwin blog swarm - submit your entries here.
But there are some other, smaller initiatives out there. For instance, this Darwin Meme. And Darwinfest haiku contest.
And if you are blogging more seriously and sholarly about Darwin's place in history, or his publications, then certainly that would fit into the next Giant's Shoulders carnival.
On Twitter, follow and use the #Darwin hashtag. On FriendFeed, I am assuming that the Life Scientists room will be the place to…
awild | February 10, 2009I'm up for a busy day doing Scanning Electron Microscopy of some braconid wasps, so instead of enlightening you with my own witty repartée I'll direct you to the following:
Catalogue of Organisms brings on The Most Unbelievable Organisms Evah!
The New York Times has kicked into full Darwin mode. Read them all, but particularly Carl Zimmer's piece on the difficulty of visualizing the Tree of Life. It's a problem I'll be grappling with shortly as we start to put together the Beetle Tree.
Roberto Keller has some great SEMs of the stridulatory organ, the little thing that makes ants…
clock | February 10, 2009Remember a couple of weeks ago, when I complained that Triangle is too narrow a term for a Hub at Nature Network, as there is really no humongous city where everything is centered but the science is distributed all around the state of North Carolina, with people collaborating with each other and traveling back and forth between various regions of the state.
Well, now, to reflect that situation, the Triangle group on Nature Network was renamed the North Carolina group. If it grows in size, it may one day become a proper Hub. So, if you are in any way interested in science and live anywhere in…
clock | February 9, 2009I will be on a panel, Open Science: Good For Research, Good For Researchers? next week, February 19th (3:00 to 5:00 pm EST at Columbia University, Morningside Campus, Shapiro CEPSR Building, Davis Auditorium). I am sure my hosts will organize something for us that day before and/or after the event, but Mrs.Coturnix and I will be there a couple of days longer. So, I think we should have a meetup - for Overlords, SciBlings, Nature Networkers, independent bloggers, readers and fans ;-)
Is Friday evening a good time for this? Or is Saturday better? Let me know.
You can follow the panel on…
skookumchick | February 9, 2009It was one February ago, as in one year ago in February, that I abandoned my old pseudonymous blogging pad, and threw my lot in with the formidable Science Woman as a new coblogger. We were both working our ways through our first year of tenure-track, and I think each struggling a bit with keeping up the blogging (particularly on my end). She invited; I accepted; and as of now we have survived year 1.
I'm so very grateful to have been invited, and to have been welcomed by all Science Woman's readers. To Science Woman: thanks for a good year of blogging together, and even more for becoming…
laelaps | February 8, 2009Back in November I mentioned that I might possibly follow in Ed's footsteps and put together a "Best of Laelaps" collection. The only problem was that it was difficult to pick out posts I was proud of; I didn't want to put out an embarrassing collection of slapdash essays.
By the beginning of January I had nearly forgotten about the project. I didn't feel like I could put together something worth having. As of late, however, I have warmed to the idea of compiling a series of essays in book form. This isn't a matter of just picking some of my better posts, but carefully selecting pieces that I…
clock | February 7, 2009I've been on Facebook since the beginning, in 2005. I explored it and studied it. I always spent minimal amount of time on it, though. I get e-mail notifications and perhaps once a day go there to click on all the "Ignore" buttons for all the invitations. So, I do not see is as a big time drain. But every now and then I get useful piece of information there, or an invitation to something I want to attend. I also use it to monitor what my kids are doing there. It is also nice to reconnect to some people I have not heard of in 20-30 years and see what they are doing.
I am on my third set of…
clock | February 7, 2009When I see news on MSM I check with trusted bloggers if the news is to be believed. Trusted bloggers? Takes time and work to find out who.
I automatically do NOT believe anything coming from corporate media. I check blogs to see what they say if I catch some news on MSM first (rarely these days). Some blogs can be trusted 100% of the time, some 90%, some occasionally, some never. It takes time and effort to figure out who is who, but that effort is worth it - you get immunized from MSM lies. You also learn the skills of critically reading between the lines of MSM and evaluating their "news"…
clock | February 7, 2009Who has power?
Elected officials: they write, vote for and sign laws, they decide how much money will be collected from whom and how it will be spent, they decide on starting and stopping wars, i.e., lives and deaths of people.
Who else has power?
Anyone who can affect the decision of an elected official, e.g., to change a vote from Yes to No or vice versa.
How does one do that?
By having money and using it wisely.
How does one use money to affect policy?
One: by directly lobbying the elected officials. Two: by buying off the media.
I understand how One works, but Two?
Elected officials…
awild | February 6, 2009
I'm hoping the stimulus bill includes a research allocation towards figuring out why "Your Argument is Invalid" can be hilarious and inexplicably odd at the same time.
(h/t Bug Girl)
sciencewoman | February 5, 2009Another duplicate Seed magazine has arrived in my mailbox, and just in time another great Scientiae has been posted. Be the first one to identify the authors of the following three quotes in the comments, and I'll send along the Universe in 2009 issue of Seed.
It's another cool issue focusing on the all awesome innovations waiting on our scientific horizon. So far, I've particularly enjoyed the feature article on the "ecology of finance" and the Seed Salon where a physicist and a social scientist discuss how networks are becoming a dominant paradigm for investigating all sorts of phenomena.…
clock | February 4, 2009From Michigan Daily: University professors turn to the blogosphere, for classes and recognition:
In recent years, academics across the country have started using blogs to relay information and ideas. Many are now incorporating the medium into their classes, asking students to take to their keyboards and post thoughts or resources on course material.
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The time commitment means professors need to prioritize when it comes to blogging. Those who write personal blogs do so outside of their teaching requirements, but as blogs become more popular, the question of their role in…
awild | February 3, 2009
Cyborg beetles. Seriously. (h/t Cicindela)
The Other 95% hosts the Circus of the Spineless #35.
Coleopterist, photographer, and author Art Evans launches a new blog called What's Bugging You?
Archetype illustrates the counterintuitive segmentation of ant body parts.
Beetles in the Bush blogs about dung beetles that have kicked the fecal habit.
Some days I wish I could read Hebrew, because this might be the most awesome blog ever, judging from all the ant pix.
sciencewoman | February 2, 2009The powers that be have declared this the third annual Blogroll Amnesty Day. According to those powers, we are supposed to be celebrate by linking to five lesser-known bloggers, and reiterating our liberal blogroll policy.
First the blogs you should be reading...hard choices here, but I'm going to go with these:
The Alternative Scientist - a group blog on alternative science careers
Life as I know it... - a new blog by thoughtful commenter Jenn PhD
I love science, really - by the wonderful Mrs. Whatsit
Mrs. Comet Hunter - if great bands can self-title albums, why not bloggers?
Chick with…
clock | February 2, 2009Comment threads on blogs are an important aspect of the blogging culture. But I disagree that it is a defining aspect - there are many excellent blogs out there with no commenting allowed. Such blogs usually have a prominently displayed contact information for direct e-mailing to the author. One can always link to and trackback on one's own blog in response: blog-to-blog conservation is just as important to the blogosphere as a whole, if not more, than comments on any individual post. Other blogs have their feeds exported to LiveJournal or FriendFeed where one can post comments as well.
See…