Archive for the 'Monday Links' Category

Happy early Thanksgiving everybody.  Links:

• This makes complete sense but is nevertheless a major shift in higher ed IT.  Wonder what the cost savings look like (I imagine they’re significant):

Officials at Boston College have made what may be a momentous decision: they’ve stopped doling out new email accounts to incoming students. The officials realized that the students already had established digital identities by the time they entered college, so the new email addresses were just not being utilized. The college will offer forwarding services instead.

Starting next year, freshman enrolled at Boston College won’t be given an actual email account complete with login and inbox, just an email address. This address, in the format of johnsmith@bc.edu will simply forward mail to the student’s already established inbox, be it Gmail, Windows Live Mail, Yahoo Mail, AOL, or whatever else they may be using.

• Jason from 37Signals argues that, while completely ugly and elementary, the Drudge Report is actually a well-designed site.  For instance:

The Drudge Report is one page. Every visit and every visitor is focused on that one page with a headline and three columns. He knows exactly what people are going to see, he knows exactly how people are going to see it. There’s no mystery page here that hasn’t been redesigned or mystery page there that’s throwing an error. It’s one page to look at at one page to work on. It is what it is. It doesn’t try too hard to be something it’s not.

• This NY Times post on bamboo is largely positive, and attributes bamboo criticisms to group funded by the lumber industry.  The truth of the matter, from all that I’ve read, should not surprise you: bamboo CAN be environmentally sound compared to traditional building materials or other types of wood; but, with the rise in demand for bamboo, many producers are clearing forests to plant bamboo plantations.  Any time you’re clearing a biologically diverse area and replacing it with monoculture, growing the new (desired) plant product is going to require many more resources (water, pesticides, etc) and detract from the environmental services provided by the world’s natural forests.

• Matt Yglesias wonders why conservatives don’t link their future to quality of life issues like sprawl, traffic, and lack of public transportation:

[T]o my way of thinking[,] an enormous amount of good could be done if conservatives were more interested in applying really basic free market principles to transportation policy. For example, why not allow developers to build as much or as little parking as they want to build when they launch a new development? [...] How about fewer restrictions on the permitted density of development? Why not reduce congestion on the most-trafficked roads through market pricing of access? It happens to be the case that most of the people who are interested in these issues have liberal views on unrelated political issues, but the specific set of views at hand don’t draw on any deep ideological principles, it’s just application of basic economic thinking to the issues and, as such, is something that should be completely accessible to conservative politicians looking to show that conservative ideas can be relevant to the concerns (environmental concerns, quality of life concerns, economic growth concerns) of a set of people who are disinclined to think of themselves as conservatives.

• These HDR images (I’ll admit my complete ignorance when it comes to photography and tell you that I don’t even know what HDR stands for) are stunning.

• Setting aside for a second my concerns that (a) this video will cause tens (hundreds?  God I hope not) of people to think (unrealistically) that they too could raise a friendly, cuddly, pet lion; and (b) the music contained in this video has no place on this blog, please enjoy the cuteness (thanks Jane):

Hi there folks.  Thanks for your patience through our unexpected blogcation these last few weeks.  Jarred and I have both been traveling (in Jrod’s case, cross-country), and I’ve been focused on election stuff and work.  Enough with excuses, you came here for links.  I’m trying to avoid political stuff since, well, we’re approaching saturation on that front (and I’ll probably post a few political things on Tuesday):

• Since I’ll be moving in July to a house with an actual (gasp) yard, I’ve been planning an organic vegetable garden.  The EasyBloom Plant Sensor is a new product that might sound like overkill at first but I have to say that after watching the demo video…I’m sold.  Basically you place the sensor in your garden or in your house to collect data on ambient temperature, soil moisture, sunlight, etc.  After a few days, you hook it up to your computer (via built in USB) to receive plant recommendations from EasyBloom based on the conditions in the spot you’re testing.  It can also be used to diagnose issues with plants that are…underperforming, by identifying insufficient sun, water, etc.  Like I said, I’m sold: for a beginner gardener like me, seems like a good idea.  My birthday is in May (and Christmas is fast approaching…).  Also, for those who are interested, I’ve looked into a number of books on organic gardening and this is by far the best, and most comprehensive, that I’ve found.

• Jrod pointed out this Google Reader Blog post touting the Guardian’s bold move to full RSS feeds on all articles.  As you know, partial RSS feeds are a major pet peeve.  It brings me joy to imagine more major news sites seeing the light of full RSS feeds and moving away from punishing readers (I’m looking at you NY Times, Washington Post, LA Times, etc).

• The Girl Effect video is another example of how well-crafted text can be as powerful and engaging as images:

• Dwell rounds up CFL reviews to help you find a bulb with a nice warm glow (no more excuses…as Michael Jackson says, “make that change”).

• Amazon is trying out a new concept they call “Frustration Free Packaging“: recyclable, clamshell- and plastic binding-free packaging for a variety of (initially, at least) toys and electronics.  This move will hopefully cut down on the outrageous number of injuries that occur each year when gadget nerds stab themselves trying to unpack new bluetooth headsets, and it represents a meaningful step in terms of sustainability for a major retailer.  Like Walmart deciding to sell only concentrated laundry detergent, packaging decisions like this from major market players can have an enormous trickle down effect on suppliers and other retailers.  Hopefully we’ll be seeing less of this kind of thing from Amazon in the future. [Hat Tip: 37 Signals].

Go Vote.

A quick announcement before I share the links: Jarred and I have replaced the lagging “Asides” column on the right hand side of the page (—->) with our Twitter “tweets.”  We’ve both been using Twitter more recently (and, in Jarred’s case, writing about it), so it seemed like a good fit for regularly updated, short form content.  If you’re on Twitter, or we convince you to sign up, you can follow us: Taylor and Jarred.

On to the links!

• So we have a bailout bill.  After waffling all week (and, like many of you I’m sure, struggling to understand issues that are well beyond my expertise and complete understanding), I ultimately came down in favor of what I think is a tremendously imperfect solution.  Since it’s hard to comprehend a figure like $700 billion, I figured I would pass along this great clip from Good magazine explaining an even more incomprehensible figure: the cost of the Iraq war.  [Hat tip: Ezra Klein]

• I love discovering a new blog with a distinct voice.  My latest favorite is ecofrenzy.  Among other topics, author Amie wisely encapsulates a niche of the new environmental movement that I find particularly hopeful and fascinating:

I think i coined a new term the other day – Garbage-to-Goods – to describe the slice of the green economy I am most drawn to – this is where innovative product design coalesces with waste reduction and landfill diversion. I’m talking about making something useful out of someone else’s trash – saving the planet on two levels with one product – by reducing the flow to our big fat landfills, and by eliminating the need to extract or purchase virgin materials to create something new.

In this ‘Garbage-to-Goods’ vein, Amie writes about a company called Recycline:

Recycline’s first product was the Preserve toothbrush, a case study in groundbreaking innovation.  Why a toothbrush?  Toothbrushes should be replaced every 3 months, and we should all be using them.   That’s a lot of waste at the population level.  The Preserve toothbrush is made of 100% recycled plastic including Stonyfield Farm yogurt cups and Preserve encourages customers to return the brushes to the company when their usable life has passed, where they will be carefully disassembled and ground up to be reused as plastic lumber for products like park benches.

• You’ve probably already seen this ‘Don’t Vote” video (it’s loaded with celebrities and shamelessly trying to go viral…), but I’m curious to hear if folks think this is effective or just forced:

• The more things change, the more some things remain the same similar; in this case, pirates.  The Atlantic blog featured a fascinating and chilling post on modern piracy, based on recent events off the coast of Somalia (covered well by the NYT here):

The word “pirate” summons all sorts of romantic images from the great age of piracy in the 17th century Caribbean: a ship flying the Jolly Roger and manned by cutthroats with black eyepatches and sashes around their heads.  The Indian Ocean pirate of the early 21st century — in his flip-flops, tank-top, and light jacket — is different in some ways but similar in others. Only through the distance of time can we find anything charming or romantic about Caribbean pirates, who were murderous thugs just like their modern-day Indian Ocean counterparts.

Piracy is the maritime ripple effect of anarchy on land. Somalia is a failed state with a long coastline, so piracy flourishes nearby, as it does offshore from other weakly governed states like Indonesia and Nigeria. But it is particularly prevalent off the Somali coast because the anarchy is far more severe than in the other two countries. [...]

• I’ve been closely following an intense discussion (on normally very serious, legitimate blogs) on one of the crucial questions of our time: why don’t Star Trek battles employ the ‘tons of tiny little fighters attacking big ships’ battle plan used throughout Star Wars?  It’s a tough time folks, and we all need a diversion now and again…

• Speaking of the bailout…via, appropriately, the Bike Commuter Tips Blog, comes news that a small (and we’re talking tiny) tax incentive for bike commuting was included in the $700 billion bailout bill:

[T]he Bicycle Commuter Act provides employers a tax break of up to $20 a month if they give some bicycle commuting benefits to their employees. It’s a modest step forward.

“Modest” is putting it mildly.  It’s more like a condescending pat on the head to those ‘adorable, impractical little bike commuters,’ but I guess you have to start somewhere.  On a related note, I can’t wait to live in a city where bike commuting is possible.  California, here I coooooooome (maybe eventually).

• Last week I mentioned an artist who crafted creative sculpture out of every day items; well prepare yourself for pencil sculpture (thank you, Mental Floss).

Well the Red Sox just lost (curses!) in 12 innings, so I guess it’s time for me to wish you a happy Monday.