Omeka | Footenotes

November 3, 2010

The Morning After Round-Up 10/25-10/31

I didn’t even bother trying to write this yesterday. What was the use? For every four words written I would have tabbed over to the Times or Huffington Post to bite my nails and or shake my fist about what a smug jerk Boehner is. It’s not like we didn’t see this coming though. If you have any recall of the 1990’s this whole song and dance will feel eerily familiar.

Hey – at least McMahon lost. And Rand Paul! Oh wait…just kidding, he actually won. Hey remember when that guy wanted to throw out the Civil Rights Act? Good times.

But I’m going to leave the political pontificating to the pros here on the Commons. The hornets’ nest over at the Obama Presidency was relatively quiet this week with three great post. There was some talk about the ‘Rally to Restore Sanity,’ some insightful work about Christine O’Donnell who thankfully did not ascend to power last night, and finally a blogger who wants to send all New Yorkers to Oklahoma. As a successful Texan refugee I have no interest in setting foot back in Dixie thank you. (Yeah yeah I know, Texas is only kind of the South, it’s kind of the Midwest too…yada yada)

Quote of the week on the blogs:

“…one cannot help but come to the conclusion that death is the least of our problems.”

And that wasn’t even on one of the politics blogs.

Moving right along –

Madlibrarian freaked everyone out by pointing us towards an article that pretty much proves you can’t hide. It was bad enough when Facebook couldn’t figure out their own privacy policy, but hiring firms to sniff out people’s Social Security Number and home address is the pits. Wont somebody save us from ourselves? Boehner!

Helldriver popped up again. This week was about Leviathans big and bigger. My now long standing policy on Helldriver blogs is to not be cute and just let the blog speak for itself. So here I am with sparklers in my hands trying to wave you folks over there. Go!

We’ve been talking about Omeka for a long time now here on the Commons and Wiki Wrangler Scott Voth @Scottvoth posted this week that Omeka.net is now in beta! If you don’t know what Omeka is you should so go take a look and play with it. All the cool kids are doing it.

And speaking of elections, I’m sure you’ve all seen the news that our own Boone B. Gorges was made a BuddyPress Core Committer. It’s actually kind of a drag because it means he gets to wear a special hat and we have to clean his apartment. All the same we’re super proud of him and his contributions to both BuddyPress and the Commons. If you’ve ever written in and needed something fixed on the site it was probably Boone that did the fixin’. Congratulations!

Alright well now that everyone is up to speed on the blogs you might have missed last week I’m going to go back to drowning my sorrows. Somewhere out there in the Arizona desert Jan Brewer is kicking over cacti in a powersuit and pumps demanding papers from anyone not practically tumescent.

But since I can’t leave you on such a gloomy note – here’s a crow that is best friends with a kitten:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gj57rI1_JX8[/youtube]

We can raise the level of academic discourse tomorrow. Tonight it’s just kittens all the way down.

September 13, 2010

The Back on Track Round Up 9/6-/12

Look! A Round-Up that’s not apologizing for skipping a week!

It looks like everyone is starting to crawl over the pile of undergrads and get back to their computers. The blogs we’re great this week with some new faces and lots to say. Before I dive in I’d like to pull out this little tidbit from the news this week. Apparently Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer decided to write about his time in Afghanistan and it looks like the Department of Defense wasn’t too pleased with whatever he put in the book.

So what was the strategy to contain this information?

Buy every copy of the book in print and destroy it.

Now…I mention this here because a perennial topic that comes up around the Commons is whether print is dead, dying, or just in a coma. I don’t think anyone really expects to see books go the way of Beta or the 8-track (for those born after say…1985 ask a friend) but this is one of those situations that highlights the advantages of online books. You can’t go around buying up everyone’s Kindle. I suppose you could try and destroy the master, but once that thing is loose there’s no stopping it. Just ask Julian Assange about Iraq. On a slightly catty note – buy every book and destroy it? I just assumed there was some clause in the Patriot Act that allowed the DoD to send a team of commandos to the publisher. Who says things haven’t gotten better?

Blogs!!!

Scott Voth @ScottVoth has been a long-standing Omeka advocate around the Commons. It’s great technology and this week Scott highlighted Commons member Kwong Bor Ng @knb and Jason Kucsma’s book, featuring a chapter on how Queens College put Omeka to work. Ever prolific, Scott also posted some useful tips for wrangling Media Wiki. Yes…that was a pun on his blog’s name. I’m sorry.

Upstart Beniamina Cassetta @Beniamina came back to the blogs this week. There was some discussion of starting a dissertation followed by a grim reminder that summer is done. I mean it wasn’t grim, the selection was lovely, but it’s a bummer digging out the quilts.

David Shapiro @DShapiro32 has returned to the blog roll after a hiatus. I like these blogs posts – They’re quick and kind of mysterious, like lean strangers. I feel like they’re the exact opposite of my long winded rambling.

David Rasmussen @DRasmussen did a little blogging about the Obama administration’s temperamental relationship with the brass. With the exception of Arizona (that lady drives me nuts) I try to stay out of politics here. Naaaaaawwww just playing – frankly I’m glad the executive branch has decided to poke around the Pentagon a little more and look for talent. It’s been nine years. We’ve got to get out of there.

And finally to wrap things up – I found this post digging through the forums. There are some wonderful resources put together by Marisa Panzani @Mpanzani for the incoming class of graduate students. All of those links are worth a read for students and faculty alike. Thanks for finding those Marisa!

See ya next week!

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May 1, 2010

Finally – April’s Over!

Good Lord what a long month.

The blogs were in bloom this week on the Commons. Maybe it was the never-ending rain that forced everyone to sit home and write poetry, or maybe we all just felt like chumps for letting Carl James Grindley do all of the heavy lifting this month over at Poems in Progress. Whatever the motivation there was poetry in spades here. Timothy Wilson was feeling prolific towards the end and broke out some Spanish on us. Good thing we’re not in Arizona or…you know…he’d probably accused of being a Mex’can terrorist commie illegal or something. Ok, alright, Footenotes isn’t exactly a bully pulpit, but come on Arizona. COME ON!

Shhhh…just relax, it’s ok, they’re far away from here and it’s not like I’m in dire need of turquoise or anything.

Anyways, poetry. All of our favorites threw in. Michael Oman-Reagan posted perennial favorite Lawrence Ferlinghetti via Religion Scholars and Linda Wadas at For the Benefit of All Sentient Beings offered some photography as poetry. I was holding out for Scott Voth to write a little ode to wikis but, alas, it was not to be.

But it wasn’t all sonnets and stanzas around here. Tamar Zilkha made a return to the Commons this week thoroughly annoyed with the Census Bureau. It was an interesting post about what constitutes race to the government and good ole Uncle Sam might be a little out of his league when trying to define race. Honestly at this point I wish I hadn’t turned in my Census form yet because I’d love to make a few changes to my own answers. Especially in light of this stupid friggin law that Arizona passed.

It’s basically like a bunch of people in Arizona realized that they’re referred to as the “South-West” and decided it was time to invest a little more in the “Southern” part of South-West. Like, maybe Arizona just got lonely because the only other states that would hang out with it were Utah and New Mexico. I’d be pretty lonely too, but making eyes at Alabama just because you’re tired of the dry heat…I don’t even know what I’m saying. As a southern refugee I always looked towards the desert peoples as wise sages of the brush. Now you don’t need a license to carry a concealed gun and it’s ok to stop anyone (Latino) and demand papers. Because the wild west was so much fun you know, just like at Six Flags.

No seriously, it’s ok, I’m done.

Tony Picciano pulled up Maureen Dowd’s op-ed in the Times this week about the Goldman Sachs hearing over on Tony’s Thoughts. As much as I’d love for something to come out of the criminal charges headed towards Goldman I just don’t see it amounting to much. What I suspect is that Lloyd Blankfein is just going to erect a giant wall of gold bricks around Goldman Sachs downtown and throw big diamonds at SEC investigators till they give up from all of the bruises.

While Scott Voth did not deliver on a wiki poem, he made a post over at Wiki Wrangler giving us a sneak peak at his masters thesis work. The post cards are lovely and it’s a great project suited to the scope of Omeka. Takes some time to visit the Omeka site and learn about what they’re doing.

Speaking of technology and academia, Adam Wandt had a really touching post on the increasing use of technology by the elderly. He set up his grandmother with a computer and got her to explore the internet and technology with some really great benefits on the side. The links towards the end are a nice touch if you’re looking for some further reading on the mental benefits of technology. Congrats Adam!

Finally, Helldriver made it in just under the wire for this week’s round up. It’s a post about spring and music. That, of course, is an understatement, but were I to try and explain what a great post it is I’d just ruin it. To be frank, I think the best thing I can say about Helldriver’s post today is that it’s enough to make me wrap up this week’s round up and get the hell out of my apartment.

See ya next week folks!