[tagging folksonomies]

Working on my presentation for the Reading Revolution seminar due to be given at Penguin headquarters on Tuesday (soooo soon!) has relight my thinking on tagging. As I was leafing through Facebook and contemplating how this site illustrates the community and collaborative spirit of contemporary literacies (i.e. transliteracy) I began to visit people's "stories" (well, feeds of their stories) rather than linking directly to people and noticed how they are tagging their status. I say "tagging" rather than narrating because the stories are more like bits of information which the reader pieces together to create a story or profile of the person/organisation. As an example, friend a "is loving his anonymous gifts" and friend b "is a pirate. Aaaarrrggghhh." These two phrases, seem to me, to work as identity or status tags, giving the reader an idea of what's going on rather than the *whole* (I mean in an entirely problematic postmodern critical kind of way) story. Does the (over)use of the copula "to be" signify anything about people's states; in perpetuum?

Facebook has the new tagging application so users can tag (describe) friends...I've started describing myself (is that ego-tagging?). What I'd like to know: is Facebook tagging evolving in ways similar to delicious (using oft' cited tags rather than creating new ones, working with the community, etc...). In other words, are there "standards" for Facebooking? I wonder if tagging is moving from user-centric preferences to community-centric?

xposted at Frontline Books

[education in the digital world]

A simple video that reminds us what effect technology can have on education:

[amsterdam]

A couple of days in Amsterdam, how could we not experience the red light district? Very educational...Apparently, as with airports (as noted by Chris), no photos can be taken....but oops, I think I accidently slipped:

As we ambled about the canals we heard some fantastic Beethoven booming. At first we thought someone was blaring it from speakers for some kind of nouveau-cool party but slowly a car towing a piano AND painist crept into view. Sadly I was too slow with the camera so the photo doesn't do this eccentric episode justice:



look behind the tree:

[blogging around the world]

I came across this excellent graphic that puts blogging in geographical perspective:




Interesting but not sure if the stats add up, especially given this recent article suggesting Japan as leading blog readers...

[views from a bicycle of utrecht]

[friday night in utrecht]

The local geological survey extended their welcome to me and made sure we experienced *real* Dutch hospitality (code for beer!). The Netherlands Institute of Applied Geoscience TNO - National Geological Survey (or just TNO for short) not only schooled us in science fiction and the merits of Battlestar Galactica (well it is filmed in Vancouver and most of the actors are Canadian...though that's probably not a good thing), Dutch accents (and the need to subtitle television shows because that eastern dialect is a whole other language), differences between American and *standard* English spellings, but also demonstrated rainy day fashion in the form of a fetching blue bin bag.





And they're all off on field work early tomorrow morning....

[utrecht]

We arrived in Utrecht yesterday (a day after landing from Toronto). It's gorgeous and everyone is on a bike. People here seem very relaxed except the guards in the airport who told me: "no pictures ma'am, it's an airport..." (hrumph...)

[toronto in june]

[blogger sued]

I read about this story on Robin Hamman's blog.

From the Ottawa Citizen:

"The president of Steelback Brewery, based in Tiverton, Ont. has filed a $2 million lawsuit against an Ottawa-based blogger he claims repeatedly libelled him on his popular sports website.

Filed late last week in court in Newmarket, Ont., Frank D'Angelo alleges Neate Sager damaged his reputation and his image in comments posted on Sager's blog between August 2006 and January of this year.



In his statement of claim, D'Angelo argues that Sager's comments - which described D'Angelo as a "huckster" and a "two-bit shyster" - are derogatory in that they paint a picture of him as a "peddler," a "con man" and an "irritant."

The claim also says Sager called D'Angelo a "professional nuisance" and described his interest in acquiring the National Hockey League's Pittsburgh Penguins franchise as a "charade."

Sager, who also works as a copy editor at the Ottawa Sun, said he has yet to file a statement of defence and hopes to resolve the matter out of court.

"I am shocked this happened," said Sager, who several weeks ago revised some of the more contentious remarks on his blog, "Out of Left Field," at neatesager.blogspot.com.

"I'm still 100 per cent confident that reasonable people can find a reasonable solution to this and I just hope Mr. D'Angelo can sort of see that it's really kind of silly that it has come to this point."

The statement of claim argues the comments "severely damaged (D'Angelo's) credit, character and reputation" and that he was "brought into public scandal and contempt" as a result.

"The fact is that the conduct of the defendant in failing to remove the offending entries from his website, his failure to issue an apology and his public mockery of the notice letter has aggravated the damages suffered," the claim says.

"The defendant did not provide a balanced view and provided no opportunity to the plaintiff to respond to the aspersions made against him."

None of the allegations have yet been proven in court.

Contrary to the allegation that Sager provided D'Angelo no opportunity to respond, the website has a comment feature that allows readers to publicly share their own views and opinions, Sager said.

"Anyone can leave a comment there."

D'Angelo, an Ontario businessman who also owns a downtown Toronto restaurant as well as a brand of energy drink and a line of apple juice, says in the claim that he issued a notice letter to Sager back in February expressing his concern.

He argues Sager "promptly posted" the letter on his website and mocked its contents.

Sager "refused to remove the offending references" from his site and "revelled in the prospect of being pursued for damages for libel" for the "notoriety" and "attention" it brought him, the claim says.

D'Angelo did not return phone calls Monday."

[burlington lake]

[music at sharon temple]

Ok, I admit. When I heard the word "temple" I thought "oh no..." this is going to be some kind of *religious* thingey...but in fact I was pleasantly relieved and the acoustics were amazing (the temple topped last year's Toronto Star list of Canadian essential architecture) . The choir was moving and the first song, Gloria, written by choir member Timothy Corlis was my favourite - it seemed to suit the surroundings the best.

Here is a blurb from the site:

"June 10: Noel Edison will conduct the Elora Festival Singers in a varied programme highlighted by notable Canadian commemorations including John Beckwith's Three Motets on Swan's "China", which was performed at the first Music at Sharon concert in 1981. Glenn Gould’s witty So You Want to Write a Fugue? will honour the 75th anniversary of the late- musician’s birth, and movements from Glenn Buhr’s Richot Mass will mark the 10th anniversary of Manitoba’s 1997 Red River flood."

[touching down in toronto]

[women, business & blogging conference]

I can't believe it's over...already! Yesterday was an amazing day and we were very lucky to have stimulating speakers: Meg Pickard (I am so copying her ppt style!), Eileen Brown (good use of cartoons! and she's already blogged about it), and Jory des Jardins (lots of hints and tips and helped a few of us win that buzzword bingo!) - they were all excellent!

I have loads to say (I'm sure conference delegates do too!) but I'm off to catch a flight now. I'll upload some photos to flickr of course and I hope all the delegates, (yes you! I know you're reading!) and anyone else interested, join our google group called "nlabwomen." MEN can join too!!

[blogs are corrupting popular opinion]

So says Andrew Keen. Lastnight on newsnight Gavin Esler was supposed to "interview" Keen but seemed rather to put forth his own prepostorous views (though they were aligned with Keen's more of less).

To me, this discussion seemed just another attempt to subvert the positive potential of blogging or any other collaborative enterprise based on the internet. Esler's introduction highlights discrepancies in Wikipedia and he makes grave assertions that the *poor* public will be misinformed. In fact, he says rather smugly, it was the BBC that created the page on Alistair Darling replete with incorrect information; they cunningly replaced Darling's photo with an image of a badger (innuendo?). Oh goodness me. Esler says that's the problem with web 2.0 - "anyone" can edit and create thus everything online is unreliable (his logic, not mine). Really? He's assuming that "the masses" (as Keen calls us) aren't critically literate and the web just enables us folk to do too much. We know that educators are consistenly teaching students on the merits of certain sites and isn't that what we might call critical literacy? Does that mean everyone believes what they watch on television? I think it's safe to say we *understand* life isn't quite like tv...and guess what, neither is the 'net. It does seem that Esler thinks it should be; he asks viewers who think everything they read online (but wouldn't that apply to offline too?) is true whether they'd be interested in his flying machine (which doesn't fly...).

After his scene-setting intro. Esler turns to Keen and says (now how's this for journalistic objectivity?): "Andrew, I mean, a lot of things on the web are pretty stupid or irritating..." Keen later responds: "If we are all amateurs, there are no experts." And there you go - a nice summary of the ensuing talk. I wonder what sites Esler navigates to lead him to that odd assumption. Charles Leadbeater was there too but sadly wasn't able to get a word in with Keen and Esler raving about the woes of web 2.0. Leadbeater did constantly remind Esler and Keen that the public is knowledgable. The key is to make people participants and that of course would help them develop critical literacy.

I did video it and was planning on uploading it to youtube but probably can't do that for copyright reasons (seeing as I didn't make everything in the video...). At least the bbc have put a link up to the video on their site, here. This is the blurb that goes with the video:

"In the era of what author Andrew Keen calls online amateurism, can we trust everything we read on the internet?"

Interestingly, the bbc's blog post about Keen includes segments of Keen's latest book (oh no, is that distributing unreliable information?!), but more interestingly there are 120 comments. All those people participating but does that mean more unreliable information is being created (as both Keen and Esler claim)? Maybe Esler et al should read Nancy Patterson's helpful guide on how to evaluate web resources. To me, though, it seems so odd in this day and age - after postmodernism, modernism, poststrucuralism, feminism, postcolonialism, and a myriad other "events" - that people like Keen and Esler still seem to believe in a single Truth. Whether in print or online or on tv or on radio - who's *truth* is it really?

If you're interested in what Leadbeater has to say, there's a presentation of his here.

[bloghers act]

The BlogHer group is rounding up all 11,000 (and growing) network members to focus on a "red-hot" issue for one entire year. This will be the BlogHers act.

Elisa Camahort, co-founder of BlogHer explains:

"Have you ever imagined the impact if every member of BlogHer – more than 11,000 bloggers strong and growing every day -- focused our considerable brainpower, ingenuity and influence on one red-hot issue? How about if that one red-hot issue was the focus of an organized, year-long campaign to make a measurable difference that this community cares about?

Yes, some of you have. And you've emailed all three of us (sometimes more than once!) to ask BlogHer to take a leadership position in bringing the BlogHer community of powerful women together to create real change

Today, Lisa, Jory and I are very proud to say "yes." We're introducing BlogHers Act. And just like the BlogHer Conference is the conference the community built, we want BlogHers Act to take on a cause the community develops.


So today the work begins: It's up to all of us to determine, between now and the conference, what project we'll unveil and kick-off an action plan for at BlogHer '07 this July in Chicago.

BlogHers Act is an opportunity for the BlogHer community to have a collective impact on a global scale. We're going to pick a single issue, organize a year-long campaign, and blog the heck out of it.

We're starting today: We have asked the incredible duo of Cooper Munroe and Emily McKhann, from the Been There Hurricane Clearinghouse Blog, to lead this effort for us, by helping us work together to identify both:

1. The global issue that the BlogHer community wants to support

2. A voter manifesto identifying the top issues that the community wants addressed during the American presidential election in 2008

Here's how to get involved: Cooper and Emily are taking suggestions for a BlogHer-wide survey of all members, who will vote and pick our red-hot issue. You can suggest anything -- are you already blogging about an issue you want BlogHers to get behind? Great! Suggest it.

You have until June 15 to suggest your burning issues. Then we'll launch a BlogHer-wide survey to vote on which of those issues will be the focus of the first BlogHers Act initiative.

We'll introduce the first BlogHers Act initiative at BlogHer '07 and start work immediately, right there at the conference.

Please help us make the most of this opportunity for a huge exercise in do-ocracy. We women certainly don't all think or vote alike, but we are the majority of voters and the majority of bloggers – and there are certain issues many of us care about, regardless of our ideological stripe.

Working together, we can make a world of difference.

Ready to hear more? Take it away Cooper and Emily…"

[sk*rt: like digg but better]

According to design mom aka Gabrielle Blair, sk*rt is like digg but "she-inspired."

From the sk*rt site:

The Real Dirt on sk*rt
What is sk*rt anyway?
Plain and simple, sk*rt is the female version of Digg. sk*rt is the place to find and/or link to anything and everything on the Web that you'd like to share with other women. If sk*rt users like what you submit, they'll vote for it. The more votes, the more likely your link will make it to the front page. Links on the front page are seen by everybody and get lots of love. The front page content is ever-changing and always cool.

Of course, no one person can keep track of every cool thing out there. So sk*rt users bring the content. Vote for the content. Determine what's good and what's bad. sk*rt works to make sure you don't miss any of the good stuff.

Who's behind the sk*rt?
From the East Coast. West Coast. And in between. Read all about the 4 lovely ladies behind the site here.

What is sk*rt-worthy?
Anything and everything you think women will love. A new Web site. A sample sale announcement. An essay on body image. A pair of gorgeous red peep-toes. The latest on the elections. The best new hair-straightening tips. World news. A funny blog. Environmental updates. A hot recipe. An addictive online game. A party idea. And on and on and on."

From design mom, sk*rt is:

"an online media ranking site created for and by women, featuring topics women dig. Sk*rt was designed to promote sites, blogs, video, products, articles, ideas, art — anything online, really — to women and to the men who want to get in our heads. Sk*rt is basically a filter of cool stuff on the Web. If you aren't familiar with the concept of Digg, it goes like this. Any item (site, product, idea, video, blog, article, etc.) can be submitted by anyone. Readers can vote for the items by clicking the "Love It!" button on the left hand side of each submitted item. The items that get the most votes raise up to the front of the site. It's actually a great design, because it's organized so that if you only have a few minutes, you can scan through what's new, what's highly ranked or what's interesting to you; or you can search more specifically by category."

One word: fabUlous!

[google algorithm]

There's an interesting article on Google's ranking algorithm and the "master" behind it, Amit Singhal, in yesterday's New York Times.

"Google often finds what users want, but it doesn’t always.

That’s why Amit Singhal and hundreds of other Google engineers are constantly tweaking the company’s search engine in an elusive quest to close the gap between often and always.

Mr. Singhal is the master of what Google calls its “ranking algorithm” — the formulas that decide which Web pages best answer each user’s question. It is a crucial part of Google’s inner sanctum, a department called “search quality” that the company treats like a state secret.

[...]

“The fundamental value created by Google is the ranking,” says John Battelle, the chief executive of Federated Media, a blog ad network, and author of “The Search,” a book about Google.

[...]

“Google has become the lifeblood of the Internet,” Mr. Battelle says. “You have to be in it.”

Good news for bloggers:

"Freshness, which describes how many recently created or changed pages are included in a search result, is at the center of a constant debate in search: Is it better to provide new information or to display pages that have stood the test of time and are more likely to be of higher quality? Until now, Google has preferred pages old enough to attract others to link to them."

Enter a new algorithm called QDF (Quality Deserves Freshness!).

"THE QDF solution revolves around determining whether a topic is “hot.” If news sites or blog posts are actively writing about a topic, the model figures that it is one for which users are more likely to want current information."

[visiting portsmouth]

Today's beautiful sun signalled break time. With my friend Keith visiting, we decided to embark upon the 25 min. drive to Portsmouth. After a walk along the seaside we played some mini golf. Even though Keith was keeping score I won...ha ha. We then discovered a beautiful garden filled with plots of different coloured roses and a flower-covered wooden canopy sheltering all walk-ways. The regeneration of Portsmouth is really paying off - the city had such a chilled out vibe that made it mandatory to shuffle along rather than keep pace with roaming thoughts. If you're in the area, I highly recommend Portsmouth sea-side for a relaxing visit (especially if you're entertaining kids). A trip to the historic dockyard is well worth it too, there you can spot the famous HMS Victory, HMSWarrior 1860 and Mary Rose.

[google is growing again...]

Reported in The Sydney Morning Herald:

"Google is rolling out a technology designed to overcome the major drawback faced by all web-based applications: the fact that they don't work without an internet connection.

Google Gears is an open source technology for creating offline web applications that is being launched today at Google's annual Developer Day gatherings around the world.

"With Google Gears, we're tackling the key limitation of the browser in order to make it a stronger platform for deploying all types of applications and enabling a better user experience," Google CEO Eric Schmidt said in a statement.

The Google Gears technology is designed to be used for web applications such as email and word or image processing.

While it can be used with non-Google applications, it's clear that the web search and advertising giant will be the major beneficiary of what is expected to be an enthusiastic take up."

Read more here.