I sometimes have a hard time getting going in my brainstorming or keeping organized as I storm about. I wonder if the technique of mind mapping might help. I just came across a wonderful new (and free!) program from an author in Austria which feels, at first glance, like a wonderfully natural and enjoyable tool for clearing out the cobwebs and sketching the whole of an idea. Take a look at MindNode, I think it can help anyone from gradeschool to graduate school to real world think out an idea. The interface is simplicity itself.
Closing out CNI yesterday, Tara McPherson described the founding, mission, and outcomes of the journal Vectors based at USC. She sees Vectors as an expression of “multimodal humanities,” a new way of using technology to allow humanities scholars to reach past the surface of screen, manipulating the data of their argument into engaging presentations that have as much in common with the video game as they do with the traditional journal article. Vectors strives to publish only what could not possibly be published in print.
From the first screen it draws the reader into unaccustomed involvement with the “text”. Take some time for a of the gallery of articles at Vector.
A few to check out: Public Secrets shares the voices of incarcerated women and those around them, WiFi.Bedouin suggests you insert wireless signals into unexpected places, and The Stolen Time Archive immerses you in an archive of text worker artifacts.
Disputes over place names and territorial borders exist in nearly every region, and constitute some of the most emotionally charged geopolitical issues in the world today. Since we launched Google Earth in 2004, we have done our best to anticipate these controversies and to address them in a principled, rigorous, and consistent way.
The posting goes on to explain Google’s primary local usage policy for naming bodies of water, which often are referred to differently by their bordering populations. A thoughtful approach.
If you mostly use Google Earth to tour the sights of the world, take a moment for the UNHCR’s tour of refugee camps.
Highlighted are not only the physical area of the camp and surrounding country, but key parts of daily life such as education and health in photo, text and video format. Within seconds, Google Earth brings the daily life of a refugee camp into your home thousands of kilometres away.
A while back I noted the little things that Obama’s campaign gets right, like its typeface. An interesting piece about the consistency of the Obama design appeared in the NYT today.
Barack Obama is running the first real transmedia campaign of the 21st century. His people not only understand how media has splintered, but how audiences have splintered, too. Cell phones, mobile devices, Web sites, e-mail, social networks, iPods, laptops, billboards, print ads and campaign events are now just as important as television. The senator’s design strategy has given these diverse platforms (and their different audiences) a coherence that makes them all work together. I’ve worked with giant, global corporations who don’t do it this well.
I got a note this week about the Obama campaign organizing “fellowships” to train people to organize in their communities.
I got my chance on the South Side of Chicago, as a community organizer, and it was the transformative experience of my career.
It allowed me to put my values to work and to see that real change comes not from the top-down, but from the bottom-up, when ordinary people come together around a common purpose.
The experience changed the course of my life — and I want to share that kind of opportunity with you.
I am impressed by the Wellstone Action/Participation 2000-ish nature of this effort. But I’d like to see them go one step further this summer.
These fellowships seem to be geared toward campaigning (”you will be assigned to a community where you’ll organize supporters”). Wouldn’t it be great to see the Obama campaign do some training for community organizing that goes beyond the campaign for the presidency. Just some good works, like a mini habitat but around important issues this summer (maybe fixing up foreclosed homes, or chasing down the owning banks to get them to take responsibility). The political win would be in the halo effect of these good works, the long term community win would be people trained and active who will stay that way whoever wins the big white house.
Obama raised $40M this month alone. Wouldn’t it be interesting if some of that primary money went toward funding some general community organizing efforts?
I am looking for web sites that indulge in a discussion of design. I just came across notcot.org and have been fascinated by a number of items there. I’m looking for suggestions. Where else should I look?
Ars Technica writes that authors need not be afraid of the net while the Times of London worries that authors will stop writing due to online piracy. Ars Technica suggests that “given the difficulty of breaking into print in the traditional way, the Internet looks to many aspiring authors like a powerful new way to distribute content and find an audience; it has promise, not peril.” What do you think?
