There’s a new book out that Taylor pointed me to a few weeks ago called Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives. The book’s website describes the phenomenon in question and the purpose of the book:
The first generation of “Digital Natives” – children who were born into and raised in the digital world – are coming of age, and soon our world will be reshaped in their image. Our economy, our politics, our culture and even the shape of our family life will be forever transformed.
But who are these Digital Natives? How are they different from older generations – or “Digital Immigrants” – and what is the world they’re creating going to look like? In Born Digital, leading Internet and technology experts John Palfrey and Urs Gasser offer a sociological portrait of these young people who can seem, even to those merely a generation older, both extraordinarily sophisticated and strangely narrow.
A book about the impact of technology on an entire generation, written by two law professors? Consider it Kindled, my friends. But wait, there’s more! Make the jump!
Continue reading ‘Who Are The Digital Natives?’
Last Tuesday, my otherwise trusty MacBook sputtered out for the second time in six months. In February, I returned home to find my white plastic-encased sidekick unable to boot up. One new hard drive later, I was back in action (Apple’s awesome Time Machine utility saved me from any data loss). Unfortunately, I had to relive this scenario last week when my MacBook wouldn’t revive after a routine reboot. And so it was, after a painless call to AppleCare tech support, that I shipped my MacBook off to let the wizards work their magic on my poor, sick machine.
(Don’t worry, Mac lovers, this isn’t a hate-on-Apple post. I’d much rather have my backed-up MacBook die every six to twelve months, and be bug-free in the interim, than have a constantly bogged down PC frustrate me on a daily basis. What’s more, AppleCare was impeccable with their service. I called them on Wednesday, and they had a box to me for my MacBook on Thursday morning. They received, repaired, and reshipped it on Friday, and it’s been in D.C. since Saturday.)
In the period between shipping my computer to Apple’s repair depot and this moment, I’ve enjoyed a nice weekend away from the computer. It’s true that I cheated a little and used my roommate’s iMac to do some quick e-mail checking and such. And although I don’t exactly count the Kindle as a computer, I did spend some significant time with it as well. My computer vacation, though, has made me realize just how much of my free time revolves around my laptop.
Continue reading ‘Stepping Back from the Mac’
My birthday was last week, though I unfortunately had to spend the majority of the day taking an evil standardized test. How’s that for bad timing? My parents were gracious and awesome enough to offer me an Amazon Kindle for my birthday, which we’ve written about some before. Now, after about a week of fairly regular first-hand use, I’m ready to offer some more thoughts.
When I first turned it on and downloaded a free sample chapter, the thing that most struck me about the Kindle was that, man… this thing is slow. Every button press is followed by at least a one second pause — a considerable delay in today’s high tech world. For a device that promises to usher in the next evolution of reading, I was perplexed at first. Where’s the gee-whiz slickness, the instant page-turns, the animation? (Amazon’s explains the slight delays by pointing to the E-Ink display, which at its current stage of development requires a little longer to render).
Ironically enough, however, I’ve almost come to appreciate the delay. Just as the E-Ink display mimics the ocular experience of the printed book, so do these delays mimic the time required to turn a page. It’s a subtle reminder when you continue to the next page that it is just that — a new page. You don’t scroll to the next screen on the Kindle; the scoll wheel is only used to access the menu and other features. You have to take the time to hit a button and wait as the screen momentarily flashes dark, and then rekindles (ha) with the next segment of text. That brief second gives you a chance to process the page you just read, to look out the window for a moment, to readjust the device in your hands. Looking back at the past week, I’m not sure now that I’d want it any other way.
Continue reading ‘Kindled’
Holy Moly, it must be Jarred’s birthday.
Be sure to check out the latest entries in our Bomomo contest. We’ve gotten some great submissions; maybe later this week we’ll fire up a poll to determine a winner. How about a few links to start the week off right:
- I’ve started casually following an oceans and fisheries conservation blog called blogfish. Recently, the blogfish bloggers pointed out this fascinating account of the New England Aquarium’s latest collection trip to the Bahamas. I now know how aquariums get their fish, and you can too. Random, but fascinating stuff. Come on, check it out (lots of gorgeous tropical fish!).
- Not to get too political, but being the “change lovers” that we are, I think we’re entitled to post an Obama speech every once in a while. From his Father’s Day remarks at a church in Chicago (via Ezra Klein):
Yes, we need more cops on the street. Yes, we need fewer guns in the hands of people who shouldn’t have them. Yes, we need more money for our schools, and more outstanding teachers in the classroom, and more afterschool programs for our children. Yes, we need more jobs and more job training and more opportunity in our communities.
But we also need families to raise our children. We need fathers to realize that responsibility does not end at conception. We need them to realize that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child – it’s the courage to raise one.
- Sam points out an important pending case related to internet privacy. You may remember hearing this tragic and twisted story a few months ago; this is the case where a 14 year old commits suicide after receiving devastating messages from a “boy” on MySpace who turns out to be one of her classmates’ mother. This piece helps emphasizes why, despite the horrible circumstances, precedent in this case could (negatively) impact life on the web:
How many of you have lied about who you are online? How many have fudged the numbers on how old you are? Be honest, your MySpace profile says your 103 years-old, doesn’t it? How about creating fake email addresses so you have a place to direct annoying SPAM emails you’d be otherwise inundated with should you be forced to cough up your genuine email domain? Imagine that each time you lied to a computer, you committed a felony
- I haven’t written about algae in a while (don’t worry, I’m still an algae fanboy), but one company (Solazyme) leading the way on algae biodiesel recently met US standards for auto-ready fuel. Exciting stuff, although a commercial roll-out is still distant.
- I couldn’t figure out what to give Jarred for his birthday (read: I am a lame friend), so I opted for a little somethin’ somethin’ from…The Something Store. I even decided to give it a shot myself. We’ll report back this week with what our respective “somethings” turned out to be (fingers crossed for a Kindle; realistic expectation is a flash drive).
That’s all for now–more stuff later this week, including “50 things Jarred looks forward to doing after the LSAT.”
June already? Welcome to summer. A few of these links are old because I’ve been out enjoying the weather…and the North Carolina Wine Festival.
- I’ve been digging the heck out of PolicyMap lately. It’s basically a GIS application for those of us who don’t know how to use real GIS. Which is to say, it’s lots of data over-layed with maps. Demographics, socio-economic data, education levels, Super Fund sites, etc. Fun to play with, and maybe even useful (depending on your line of work).
- The NY Times reports on high schools that are trying to prevent their students from over-scheduling:
[N]early half the students at Briarcliff High School have packed their schedules so full that they do not stop for lunch, prompting administrators to rearrange the schedule next fall to require everyone to take a 20-minute midday break
Wal-Mart’s goal to work with laundry detergent suppliers to shrink the packaging of every liquid laundry detergent product on the shelf is completed. Water has been pulled out of the bottles, and now all of the laundry detergents are compacted by a factor of 2 or 3.
I love this kind of small change with a big impact for two reasons. First, this change is so practical. Though it has been literally years in the making, it is just at first blush a little occurrence until you think about the effort and the impact of a change to all of the detergent bottles that are sold at Wal-Mart shelves across the country. [...]
Second, these changes are great b/c they end up being about more than just Wal-Mart. Because this was done in partnership with the suppliers of detergent focused on efficiency across the entire supply chain, the impact will be seen at the rest of the retail over time too. Soon, every bottle of laundry detergent will be compacted in every store.
- Wired’s Gadget Lab provides a bit of follow-up on the e-book debate that’s familiar on this blog. They point out a fatal flaw in Kindle and other e-readers: the screen, like any cell phone at some point in its life, will probably break:
Books, while more bulky in, well, bulk, are substantially more durable. And being analog, when they break, they’re still readable. Try using your Kindle after you drop it in the bath. With a book, you have a slightly swollen wad of paper, but it’s still serviceable. And if you leave a book on the subway, you have only lost one $10 title, not a $400 gadget.
- Jarred’s Satellite Challenges just got more interesting, because a new plug-in allows Google Earth to be used through a browser (instead of as a separate application).
- Finally, if you’re looking for a good summer dessert: Katherine and I made this Strawberry Tart for a few friends last week and it. was. awesome. Easy to make, too (though lots of whisking).
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