September 2010
2 posts
How do young adults access websites? →
I am currently at the fifth IGF in Vilnius and yesterday I presented some data from our study on the online routines of the digital natives at the GigaNet. Here, i would like to share one…
Seeking your opinions on internet values and core... →
The next Internet Governance Forum (IGF) is just around the corner and for the first time I am organizing a workshop there. I think the title of the workshop speaks for itself. It is: “Core…
August 2010
2 posts
testing WPbook plugin →
Please disregard this post. I am just testing a new plugin…
Is it the time to lobby? →
It’s been quiet on this blog for a while, so I decided to share an observation based on some conversations I recently had at one of the Internet governance meetings. The conversations were about…
May 2010
1 post
Digest #26 →
It has been really long time since I have posted any updates. Yes, I was busy, but the number of open tabs with interesting articles kept on growing. So, today I have a moment to breath and I…
April 2010
1 post
When I have the time… →
I love building things, but I do not have enough time to do that and quite frankly I do not have the best conditions to do that at the moment. So, in the meantime (and as a form of procrastination)…
March 2010
9 posts
Happy Passover! →
A short, but geeky greeting for the coming Passover:
If you are celebrating, I hope you will have a tasty one!
Digest #25 →
I should have posted this a while ago, but I was traveling, so here it is with a huge delay. I think some of the new related updates may be not as relevant at this point, but they may still be…
1 tag
Find me on Buzz
After experimenting with both for about a month, I’ve officially decided to drop Tumblr in favor of Buzz. Tumblr’s a terrific service with an amazing team behind it—this isn’t a “goodbye cruel world” sort of post. But my social network and my conversations have grown much more quickly on Buzz and I need to consolidate my digital life a bit, so it makes sense to...
The story of Felix Zandman →
In the bubble where I live, media, information, and communication technologies (MICTs) are truly ubiquitous. Most of the time I, and those around me, use these technologies thinking very little…
3 tags
Video Game Technology Shifts To Rewarding Play :... →
A really interesting NPR piece that includes, among other things, some good discussion about the integration of advertising into video games and, by extension, everyday life—how one day your toothbrush may be a game controller. An aside: this is one of those instances where the audio/transcript is more informative than the story version.
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Why Ad Blocking is devastating to the sites you... →
The headline is a bit screedish, but the post makes its case well.
“As a blogger, I’m actually required to wear pajamas to work, and my office was...”
– Jesse Lee, White House Director of Online Programs (via somethingchanged)
When comment trolls scare off sources ... →
sasquatchmedia:
Yet another reason for journalists to actively — and strenuously — monitor story comments, per experiences at The Washington Post.
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The Estuary and the Landfill
People are tired of checking all their constantly-multiplying accounts online. They used to be eager to sign up for cool new services on the Web. Now they’re annoyed by having to check “yet another social networking service,” yet another blog, yet another social media site. When your life is inundated with logins to remember and channels to maintain, who wants another?
A lot...
February 2010
24 posts
Demand for internationalized domain names →
Once a year or so ICANN holds a conference called ICANN Studienkreis. This is another forum where one can get updated with various ongoing internet governance topics. The last meeting took place…
Journalism as a Conversation: Horse-Sex Analytics... →
… Or How to Tap Your Audience Without Selling Out
AOL’s use of Web analytics to help decide news coverage might well be the definition of a double-bladed sword in journalism these days:
On the upside, it allows the audience to play, albeit indirectly through click-votes. That’s good…
Interesting and well-considered thoughts on AOL’s decision to use Web stats to curate its news...
3 tags
Hulu's First Original Series to Premiere Online... →
Hulu’s experimenting with highly produced direct-to-Web programming. We’ll see what happens. I love the idea, but having seen the previews I must admit I’m not too enthused about “If I Can Dream.” Doesn’t look up my alley, irrespective of where it “airs.”
Should Web Analytics Decide the News? →
sasquatchmedia:
AOL now using Web analytics to decide coverage. Lots to mull with that one.
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Why Do People Push Placebo Buttons? - Neatorama →
3 tags
From Gadget to Public Utility
There are lots of folks who study the diffusion of innovations—the process whereby new technologies and ways of doing things spread across a population. One thing that always interests me about this process is the way that technologies and software programs seem to move from being nifty gadgets to public utilities, and what that means for the people responsible for producing said technologies.
...
1 tag
Fundamental Attribution Error
Just a note, dear reader, to mention that the recent posts linking to Think Macro come from Dima Epstein, despite their being attributed to me. Tumblr’s group-blogging functionality is still a bit rough around the edges and it’s having some trouble figuring out how to do attributions where multiple authors are involved. If anyone out there knows how to fix this and would care to lend...
CFP: Third International Workshop on Internet... →
If you are interested in Internet Governance research, you may find the following call for contributions, issues by GigaNet, relevant.
Third International Workshop on Global Internet…
Digest #24 →
There is a lot going on, so here is another digest. It starts with some feedback from the recent open consultations for the upcoming IGF. Then it includes links to some studies, including the…
4 tags
ShadyURL Creates, Well, Shady URLs - Geekologie →
This is both a hilarious spoof of traditional URL-shortening services and an interesting comment on the zeitgeist nature of Internet security.
The external voting questiont →
This is somewhat a detour from the usual MICT stuff, but I hope you forgive me as I think the topic is interesting.
The Israeli political scene seems to be very disturbed recently. No, it is not…
6 tags
Google Gets Patent For Variable Content Access By... →
This falls into a number of larger discussions. Obviously there’s an ongoing conversation about the gatekeeping role of search engines. But there’s also a discussion about whether software and business models should be patented. James Gleick’s article, “Patently Absurd” is a great introduction to the latter debate. It’s getting a bit dated in digital—if not...
5 tags
Google Buzz as an archetypical privacy concern
A brief thought about the ongoing privacy debacle surrounding Google Buzz. It seems easy to categorize.
Much has been said about the benefits of interdisciplinary research. And while there are lots of high-minded things to recommend it, I often find that one of the most useful benefits of reading an interdisciplinary article is that when authors are attempting to put two disciplines into...
6 tags
Facebook directs more online users than Google →
This news comes from the San Francisco Chronicle and it’s fascinating. Will there be a “social network optimization” industry in the same way we’ve seen a “search engine optimization” industry? Is there already one? Thoughts?
The Human Shuffle: Is ChatRoulette the future of... →
A well-considered and interesting piece in New York Magazine on the new ChatRoulette Web phenomenon that puts the site in historical perspective (where “historical” means like 12 years ago):
The internet has always been defined by (and drawn much of its energy from) the tension between chaos and control—and over the last ten years, web culture has skewed heavily toward control. Our...
3 tags
Terror Talk Growing Louder on the Web - CBS News →
CBS News reports an uptick in terrorism-related activity online
“Cell Phone Tracking: The most important case you’ve never heard of....”
– cbsandrewcohen
6 tags
...and still nothing worth watching.
A 2002 quote about cable TV from David Hesmondalgh that still rings true today:
Although digital television offers an apparent abundance of choice, it seems that viewers tend not to be able to make real use of that choice. Research shows that ‘when people have forty-eight channels to choose from, they basically use eleven; with seventy-five choices, they use twelve on average; when the...
“Google Wave was built to show younger people how older people feel when they try...”
– 10000Words
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The Braess Paradox
Discovered the Braess Paradox today (or learned about it, rather). It’s a situation in which adding links to a network—for instance roads to a highway system—actually results in greater transit times. A fascinating case from game theory.
The irony is that allowing people more choice results in greater constraint on them. It feels like a spooky example of material agency, but I’m...
4 tags
The Computer as Bureaucrat
I’ve just finished (re)reading Latour’s famous essay, “Drawing Things Together.” I’d read it for the first time so long ago that I’d forgotten most of what was in it, but was struck once again by how much he accomplishes in a relatively short piece.
One of the more interesting moves Latour makes in the course of the article is to reframe Weber’s...
7 tags
'Chuck' and the Future of Television
This is my first post to tumblr. I joined partly to see what the buzz was about and partly because it seems like a nice place to record/share those thoughts that are too large for a Twitter update and not fully formed enough to warrant a full-fledged essay, which is mostly what seems to end up on my Website.
My thought for the moment is about the Warner Brothers/NBC television series Chuck. ...