Life blog

links for 2010-02-09

• ImPACT Test
  "ImPACT (Immediate Post-Concussion Assessment and Cognitive Testing) is the first, most-widely used, and most scientifically validated computerized concussion evaluation system."
  (tags: concussion medicine sports safety athletes kids children injury brain health testing test)
• Concussion care for student-athletes - The Boston Globe
  "Due to awareness raised by the media, advances in clinical assessment and treatment, and implementation of sports concussion management programs in a growing number of schools, we are beginning to see progress for student-athletes."
  (tags: concussion medicine sports safety athletes kids children injury brain health testing test)
• High schools south of Boston catching up with head injuries - The Boston Globe
  "High schools and educators are taking concussion injuries seriously"
  (tags: concussion medicine sports safety athletes kids children injury brain health testing test)

links for 2010-02-08

• Best Connected Individuals Are Not the Most Influential Spreaders in Social Networks
  "By contrast, "a less connected person who is strategically placed in the core of the network will have a significant effect that leads to dissemination through a large fraction of the population."" [via @drkiki]

  Maybe now folks will realize that numbers of followers alone, doesn't cut it.

  
  
  (tags: interesting social research socialnetworking network sharing psychology socialnetwork relationships networks content socialmedia sociology influence k-shells)
  
  

links for 2010-02-04

• Technology Review: Blogs: arXiv blog: The Curious Case of the Evolving Apostrophe
  "A new technique for analyzing early English texts is gradually revealing the history of the apostrophe." [via @EvilSue]
  (tags: grammar apostrophe writing history)
• Dynamic Dummy Image Generator - DummyImage.com
  "Simply add the width, an 'x', and the height (example) of the image you want and my script will spit out a gray box to the size you want with the image dimensions in black Arial text centered in the middle of the box." [via @mattbalara]
  (tags: web design tools tool webdesign development service online free webdev Lorem Ipsum generator resources graphics images placeholder prototyping loremipsum image dummy)

links for 2010-02-02

• Where bio begins: The Future of Life Science.
  Very intriguing. Well done. Where does Biology begin for you?
  (tags: biology marketing science molecularist future buzz)

links for 2010-02-01

• Elements of Twitter Style: Attempts at Clear Communication and Attribution for People and Machines
  "Slashtags are a simple way to add information to a tweet that helps both people and machines understand context around a tweet. At the end of the content of the tweet you add a / followed by some two and three letter codes that provide the meaning (common slashtag codes are by, via, cc, and re)."
  (tags: twitter grammar socialnetworking hacks)

links for 2010-01-31

• Subtraction.com: Notes on iPad
  "Those looking to the iPad to return us to some semblance of a print-like reading experience are basically wrong, I believe. In fact, lots of really smart people will continue to get this wrong going forward. We’re all still figuring out. That’s the definition of an opportunity." [via @moleitau]

  We shouldn't try to make the iPad reading experience mirror a static paper-based magazine anymore than Gutenberg should have tried to make static paper-based books be like monk-o-matic manuscripts, that is, hand-written mutli-dimensionally illustrated books. Indeed, I repeat, the opportunity is to take hundreds of years of print-publishing and set it free in the digital realm where there are a whole new set of rules and parameters in which to evolve new forms of reading experiences. Do not do just "more of the same." That'd be a waste of time. [and folks in the comments know this too]

  
  
  (tags: ipad apple design media newspapers print publishing future)
  
  

links for 2010-01-29

• Inkling lets textbook makers embrace the iPad | VentureBeat
  "“The book will never die. But the textbook probably will,” says Inkling CEO Matt MacInnis. Inkling is working directly with textbook publishers. First, they’ll port their existing tomes onto Apple’s iPad as interactive, socialized objects. Then, they’ll create all-new learning modules — interactive, social, and mobile — that leave ink-on-paper textbooks in the dust."
  (tags: technology apple publishing books education apps learning ebook textbook textbooks ipad)
• Inkling
  "Inkling makes it easy to bring rich, interactive learning content to tablet devices like iPad."
  (tags: mobile design software webdesign publishing development iphone edtech ebooks ebook learning interaction applications education ipad textbook textbooks)

links for 2010-01-28

• Blogging on the firm's public website :: Blog :: Headshift
  I like the tag cloud as marketing and navigation. [via @leebryant]
  (tags: information design web visual ui)

links for 2010-01-26

• Google beefing up new 'Social Web Team' | The Social - CNET News
  I don't think this is for building social networking services (front end), but very sure this is for plumbing the depths of all social networking services (data end). With the gang that is either at Google or gone through Google, it's about opening up our social graphs to the Machine that is Google.

  [via @karllong]

  
  
  (tags: socialnetworking services web google openid opensocial future)
  
  
• 
  
  Railways and slime moulds: A life of slime | The Economist
  
  
  Cool article on using slime molds to model best connections in complex networks. Key thing is that the molds do as well as engineers, so therefore, there must be some simple principles governing the building of these networks. And we won't need engineers anymore?

  "Tokyo’s is not the first transport network to be modelled in this way. A study published in December by Andrew Adamatzky and Jeff Jones of the University of the West of England used oat flakes to represent Britain’s principal cities. Slime moulds modelled the motorway network of the island quite accurately, with the exception of the M6/M74 into Scotland (the creatures chose to go through Newcastle rather than past Carlisle)."

  
  
  (tags: science biology evolution network biohacking design molecularist cool)
  
  

links for 2010-01-25

• The future of journalism | Technovia
  "My gut feeling is that the model of journalism as a craft will end up more like astronomy, where amateur astronomers are a vital part of the progress of the subject as a whole. Amateur astronomers produce vital data that the professionals use and build upon, as well as creating the odd “exclusive” themselves." [via @moleitau]

  I think the astronomy community is a good model, not only for journalism, but for the way DIYBio can go. Similar balance between working together with main-stream-practitioners and striking out on one's own to gain insights and such.

  
  
  (tags: jounalism business future)
  
  

links for 2010-01-22

• BIOFAB launches as world's first biological design-build facility | BioFab
  "The new BIOFAB: International Open Facility Advancing Biotechnology (BIOFAB), with two years of funding from NSF and matching support from founding partners, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) and the BioBricks Foundation (BBF), aims to produce thousands of free standardized DNA parts to shorten the development time and lower the cost of synthetic biology for academic or biotech laboratories." [via @thisischristina]
  (tags: syntheticbiology synthbio business science biology engineering biotechnology biobricks molecularist)

Back to the future: Mag+, BERG, and hypercard

If 2009 was the Year of the Netbook, it's getting to be pretty clear that 2010 is the Year of the Digital Book Reader.

The Kindle and Nook are simple readers with whole bookstores inside them. Indeed, the Kindle has hit on a formula that I think everyone will riff off of (as opposed to exploring other potential biz models).

Now we hear of big magazine publishers exploring layouts that are digital reader friendly. And the amazing BERG worked on a project called Mag+ (video below), showing the future of digital magazines.

It's been really interesting to see the traditional publishing industry drooling at a way out of their downward spiral (being drawn down by their 20th Century biz models). Equally interesting is to see that what was old is new again.

I'm reminded that the early days of the Web was about converting traditional print publications into digital facsimiles. And stretching my memory pre-Web, all this digital book reader talk reminds me of Alan Kay's Dynabook, Jack Scully's Knowledge Navigator, and, my favorite, Hypercard.

So, we're back to creating digital facsimiles of print pubs (albeit better than before). But, when viewing Mag+, I think we could go a wee bit further.

Nah, I don't think we need to turn digital book readers into full-fledged, 'net-connected, hyper-linked information devices (can you say "tablet"?). I'd like to see traditional publishers extend into a third hyper-linked dimension to take advantage of digital formats, rather than just a flat, though pretty, book or magazine. Mag+ does show that, but I am left wanting a tad more.

Yeah, print pubs are mostly flat, but let's not reproduce that flatness in a digital world.

What do you think?

Mag+ from Bonnier on Vimeo.

Image from TheCreativePenn

UPDATE 29jan10: Here we go again. The iPad was announced on 27jan. And Venture Beat writes about a company, inkling, that is taking the textbook into the 21st century. Very exciting.

links for 2010-01-19

• Time Wastes Too Fast - And the Pursuit of Happiness Blog - NYTimes.com
  via @preoccupations
  (tags: interesting culture ideas history inspiration art life people awesome illustration creative america usa time blogs travel thomasjefferson jefferson monticello kalman happiness)

links for 2010-01-18

• Future imperfect - The Irish Times - Thu, Jan 07, 2010
  "THE HISTORY of scientific research is littered with failures that did not deliver the expected outcomes. Here I present: Scientific and Technological Predictions that Didn’t Come True." [via @wendypedia]
  (tags: history predictions future futurepast science technology)
• Is the Haiti Response a Game-changer for Mobile? | Social Citizens Blog
  Mobile and philanthropy - the reminds me of something...

  "Early yesterday evening, the American Red Cross announced it had received more than $5 Million in texts, $10 at a time. That means more than 500,000 people from all over America have texted "HAITI" to 90999. Although they are still raising much more through other forms ($35 million so far in total), this is a record for the organization and for mobile giving."

  
  
  (tags: philanthropy mobile donations giving money trend haiti)
  
  
• 
  
  Culturing bioluminescent microbes, part 1
  
  
  22:00 It GLOWS! wow!
  
  
  (tags: diybio kitchen biology science microbiology cool molecularist)
  
  
• 
  
  Thomas Friedman - What’s Our Sputnik? - NYTimes.com
  
  
  "I hope Americans see China’s rise as the 21st-century equivalent of Russia launching the Sputnik satellite — a challenge to which we responded with a huge national effort that revived our education, infrastructure and science and propelled us for 50 years. Unfortunately, the Cheneyites want to make fighting Al Qaeda our Sputnik."
  
  
  (tags: future government america usa leadership)
  
  

links for 2010-01-11

• BBC News - Is the US media helping the terrorists' cause?
  Hear hear! "It is all a bit coded but he is saying that it is his critics and those who thought Bush got it right who are really soft on terrorism, giving al-Qaeda what they desire: a terrified United States that dances to their tune." [via @alfie]
  (tags: terrorism culture usa analysis)