Copyright, RSS, & more

Apparently today is copyright day…

Given that I use RSS feeds to pull my content into other sites (facebook, my portfolio, etc.), I sometimes get caught up in the ease of use and forget that RSS is a really a form of syndication.

Hmm… today I came across this interesting post via my google reader: a brief discussion of some of the issues surrounding copyright and RSS.

So, if I don’t allow sharing of my images in my image gallery, but then I crosspost them via RSS, I should probably make sure I have a copyright statement in the feed, too(?) I do allow some selected image usage licensed under creative commons for some of my work at flickr (images which do not live in my image gallery). Sigh, it’s all very complicated.

On the other hand (and in another mailbox), I received a link to the nifty copyright slider, i.e., a online tool to check the potential copyright clearance needed…and really, if you are still confused about creative commons, may I suggest this (again):

Learn a new language with Babbel (not babelfish)

I think this sounds like a really interesting way to learn a language — social networking & multimedia style! Mashable has a good overview & review here:

Babbel is the latest site to teach new languages through a social Web-based immersion program, where the majority of the content is packaged into lessons created by Babbel. So far, languages such as Spanish, French, Italian, English, and German are supported. Each lesson package contains material pertaining to a different theme, such as travel or business, so you can learn a series of words and phrases within context.

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Although I do like that the information is presented in multiple ways as it SHOUlD create a richer learning environment appealing to a variety of learning styles, I didn’t find a lot in the way supporting documentation, research, etc. on the site. It seems to be all about language and play… but hey if it works (but how will they know?)

I also wonder if they will expand to other languages — seems like kind of a short list, hmm?

Google and Librarians — the lovelorn relationship

Well, if you haven’t heard all of the chatter and buzz, Google Librarian Central hadn’t been updated in a year (before today, that is)…and Google wasn’t at ALA leaving some librarians to call out google for punking librarians or even using librarians, while other librarians proclaimed, we weren’t surprised!

While I fall more on the side of “google is a business, google is a corporation” , I do understand a little bit why some people feel, eh, jilted(?).

and really, You can make money without doing evil doesn’t necessarily mean that they will do good. Because some good things are not profitable, ya know?

Golly, it’s the equivalent of a bad soap opera romance — so, where’s the child spawned by the rival (microsoft? yahoo?)

Educational uses for social networking sites

First-of-Its-Kind Study at the University of Minnesota Uncovers the Educational Benefits of Social Networking Sites
University of Minnesota News (06/19/0 Badaracco, Luisa

University of Minnesota researchers have determined the educational benefits of social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook and also found that low-income students are in many ways just as technologically proficient as their more advantaged counterparts. The researchers found that 94 percent of students in the study used the Internet, 82 percent used the Internet at home, and 77 percent have a profile on a social networking site. Students said social networking sites taught them technology skills, creativity, being open to new or diverse views, and communication skills. Data was collected over six months from students in 13 urban high schools in the Midwest. In addition to the initial surveyed students, a follow-up, randomly selected subset were asked questions on their Internet activity while they used MySpace. University of Minnesota learning technologies researcher Christine Greenhow says students that use social networking sites learn and practice the kinds of 21st century skills that educators say are needed to be successful. “Students are developing a positive attitude towards using technology systems, editing and customizing content, and thinking about online design and layout,” Greenhow says. The results show that social networking sites provide more than just social fulfillment or professional networking and have implications for educators, who have an opportunity to support what students are learning on the Web, Greenhow says. The study contradicts a 2005 study from Pew that suggests a digital divide is forming in which low-income students are technologically impoverished.

More at Univ. Minnesota News

LinkedIn, what it is and how to use it

From the excellent commoncraft folks.

What is LinkedIn? from LinkedIn Marketing on Vimeo.

..and finally.. the rest of the story

Not exactly sure what happened with the search functionality in the opensource software that I’ve been working with. After going through the php and template files line by line, nothing ever jumped out as being a problem. I even tried reverting to an older version of the search code + template, but that didn’t work, either, which really doesn’t make sense. I finally did get everything fixed, mostly through a painstaking process. I’ve not had this problem before but I can now see what happened (I think): First when I downloaded and unpacked the upgraded version, I had one file (the search template!) which was empty (mistake no. 1). Not sure how that happened, but I think this begin the problem. I uploaded an empty file, which then started the chain reaction.

Then when I upgraded (attempt no 1) I just used the built in upgrade script, so I was kind of working off of old data and old smarty (mistake no. 2). Although this project relies on smarty templating for the php. I’ve never felt comfortable working in smarty. I feel much better going directly to the php — in this case, I think was mistake no. 3.

Although I cleaned out my web caches, I’m not sure I ever cleaned out my smarty cache (mistake no. 4). To be honest, I didn’t even consider that and under normal circumstances, it’s probably not a problem, anyhow.

The end solution was to delete all of the content in the web folder (actually I put an blank index page with a note about upgrading) , dump the database, dump smarty, and delete all caches.

Of course, since I had backups of everything, once I installed clean copies from a new download (doublechecking to make sure all of the files were as they should be) then I reloaded my database tables (mysql) in one by one, then verifying in the database that, yes indeed, they did import correctly. Once all of that was completed, I doublechecked to make sure it was all working correctly, and sure enough, the problem was solved!

Final step of course, was to take the site back online and THAT is the end of that story. I hope.

Sounds like a fun weekend and past few days, doesn’t it?

sigh.

So, the opensource dev group I’ve been working with has hit a snag… or maybe, I’m the only one who has hit the snag. The rest of the group is remarkably quiet — I think it is because some of them haven’t upgraded yet! ;-D

I seem to have a broken search template and for the life of me, I can’t make sense of it.

SOoooo… that is what I have been doing. Upgrading, re-installing, installing, tweaking code, scrapping it all…

sigh. I need to give my head a break, I think. The lead developer has been very helpful, but I’m not sure he can make sense of it, either. uh-oh….

Sticky notes go high tech

So, you thought those yellow paper sticky notes were useful as they are, hmm? What if you could transfer your sticky notes to your computer? I don’t mean stick them to the frame of your monitor, either ;-D

And it would be better than my PDA if it would somehow manage all of the sticky notes that people leave me. Now, if I could get those transferred to my calendar/todo list, I’d love that. ;-D

It does look as if the “pen” writes ink as well as electronically, which is a plus because I’d need both. ;-D

So, how do I find these, so I can try them?

OpenLibrary news

If you’ve not heard of the openlibrary.org initiative, the idea is “one web page
for every book ever published.”

A pretty noble undertaking….
Anyhow, news is that have now have a total of 13.4 million books,
with about 18 million more records to go.
Of course quantity and quality are not the same. ;-D
As for where these records are coming from, they have started
merging library records with other book data (vendor data?)

An API has been created for use by developers at
http://www.openlibrary.org/dev/docs/api
Other news includes some translation services,
and the fulltext searching of 230,000 books.

To visit the openlibrary project,
http://www.openlibrary.org

it’s all photoshop to me — on film and reality

Well, I thought about pre-posting (aka future posting) a few entries, but then I decided against it. So, you all got a break from me, while I got break from computers and some days, even technology, well, except for my camera. ;-D

I did finally fully migrate from film to digital. I’m still not sure I buy into the whole “death of film” idea, but at some point the cost of developing, the lack of good film developers, and the lack of film, in some cases, contributed to my feeling that it was time to migrate. I used to buy film at the film shop near work, which catered to a wide variety of customers, but somewhat catered to art students, which meant stocking pro quality films lacking in the discount spots around town. However, the shop went out of business, leaving a huge hole in my choices.

I’ve had a digital camera since 1999 (don’t ask how much it cost…), but I always preferred film for “real” photography. Sure, film can be altered. It can certainly be altered using Photoshop or some other digital imaging software after the fact, scratched, spliced, painted on, developed poorly, etc. However, the general ‘realness’ of film just seems better somehow.

The whole migration to digital photography has made me think about the “photoshop factor.” Just about anyone can take a good photo these days — and if they can’t TAKE a good photo, they can probably MAKE a good photo. It used to be that photos read as ‘real’. They were evidence of something — an event, a place, a person, etc. Now that photo manipulation is so common place, it seems that the ‘realness’ of photography has gone out the window. Images are so routinely manipulated, that a ‘real’ image — an actual photograph that is unique in some way is often read as photoshopped.

I wonder if one of the factors in the rise in video is partially due to the photoshop issue. If you see/do something UNBELIEVABLE, then would people be more likely to trust a photograph, which is just one instance in time and can be easily manipulated, or a video, which is a slice of time and not as easy to manipulate (at least, at this point in the game?)

True video offers other advantages: capturing more of the contextual as well as the audio.

Will photography be completely subsumed by video? It would seem like the answer is no, as I still know quite a few photographers who have polaroid cameras (and even use polaroid camera).

Oh, and here is a slideshow of my vacation photos. All shot with a canon xsi.