Blogs

Andrew Orlowski is drawing our attention to Larry Lessig's important argument against regulated spectrum, which Lessig lays out in detail in his book The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World. That's all well and good, but look what Orlowski says after ranting about email spam:

Google has its own spam problems: a tiny number of webloggers and list-makers whose mindless hyperlinks degrade the value of its search results, and create the Web equivalent of TV static.

Did Orlowski have to go there? Erin Ferdinand of Utne reviews the article.

Should I go see them tonight in Nashville?? I am so torn! My only other chance to see them would be the 4th of July in Milwaukee. I've always loved them and hoped they'd reunite. Remember "Mr. Wendel" and "Tennessee"?

This has to be a joke! I wonder if you have to cook the meat, or when you cut open the grapefruit-like fruit, the taste and texture are like cooked beef? Is the juice blood-like? The disturbing thing is, I'd probably give it a try.

Edited to add: Link credit goes to Lauren.

You are Neo, from "The Matrix." You
display a perfect fusion of heroism and
compassion.

What Matrix Persona Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

Huh? I broke my toe after seeing The Matrix Reloaded, after Amy and I tried to re-enact the scene with Neo and all the Smiths! Maybe every end result of the test is Neo. Take it and tell me what you get!

Uh, today must be quiz day, because I just also took the Geek Quiz. I got "27.0217% - Total Geek."

How will you rank?

Geekish Tendencies
Geek
Total Geek
Major Geek
Super Geek
Extreme Geek
Geek God
Dysfunctional Geek

On the drive home from Indiana yesterday, I heard a Jean Ritchie concert on NPR. Now I want every single one of these CDs. She is awesome.

Per Rich Rice's suggestion at the Computers & Writing conference, I'm going to compile a list of the people in Computers & Writing who are keeping blogs. It'll be part of the blogroll. If you know of anyone I haven't included, please tell me!

Gah! Turns out I didn't really know how to purl, so I wasn't stockinetting after all! Oh well, Aimee is going to have two garter-stitched squares and two stockinetted squares. In case you have no idea what garter stitching is, here's a pic:

Okay, so I just attended the most phenomenal talk by Victoria Vesna. She's a new media artist who has done all these beautiful projects. She was a great speaker too, very relaxed and funny. When she walked onstage, I was shocked at how young she was; I thought she looked far too young to be a department head and full professor. Anyway, she has done work that looks at bodies in networked spaces (Bodies INCorporated) and now she's working on a project about nanotechnology in the body. She is working with Katherine Hayles and nanoscientist Jim Gimzewski. I'm having trouble describing her work; you just have to see it! One thing her work makes me think of is the book How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci. If you haven't read it, it gives seven principles that help you to think like da Vinci. One was (don't know the exact spelling) arte-scienza: the recognition of how closely connected art and science are. Her work embodies that principle very well.

I was going to go to another session, but I'm tired and just wanted to come back to the hotel and chill and watch Comedy Central for a while. I think in a few minutes I'm going to get out my knitting. Now that I'm done with my presentations, I can finally knit...it's my reward. My current project, in collaboration with my friend Amy Patrick, is a baby blanket for our friend Aimee Whiteside (I feel comfortable calling it out like that; she's probably not reading this). She's due to give birth to a baby boy in July. The blanket we're making is with the same yellow and green yarn that we used to make Lee-Ann Kastman Breuch's baby's blanket. I'm working on a 15-inch by 15-inch green square. We're doing a stockinette stitch, which is supposed to look like this:

Mine doesn't though. It just looks like a regular garter stitch. Oh well. Off to knit!