IrishEyes: Classroom Archives

May 26, 2004

Vikings couldn't spread memes

CLONMEL -- One of my biggest delights is "360 degree education" through which I learn by what students write. I gave top marks to an essay by Denise Kelly in which she explains why Columbus got credited with the discovery of the New World, not the Vikings. Columbus landed 500 years after intrepid Viking explorers and proved he could spread the meme of the New World better than the Vikings.

Denise Kelly explains it best, drawing some material from essential reading materials written by Jared Diamond.

Christopher Columbus discovered the New World in 1492 but Europeans had discovered the New World long before Columbus. No word of these discoveries were spread ecause of the lack of technology in spreading the word.
Jared Diamond in Guns, Germs and Steel uses the advancement in microbiology and new technologies to explore why Europeans had invaded other continents before the Americans, Africans and Australians had invaded Europe. In 1500 Eurasia was in its Iron Age, with regard to writing, domesticated animals and agriculture. At the same time, other continents were in the Stone Age.
Diamond believes that the major difference on the continent was due to domesticated animals, the creation of guns, and the orientation of the continents (whether they had a north/south axis or an east/west axis). All these factors explain why Eurasia invaded sub-Saharan Africa, Australia and America first.
Europe and Aisa were on an east-west axis, so any animals that proved domesticable in the east could be moved to the west or vice versa, because there was little difference in sunlight hours or climate. Animals had to meet serveral requirements to be domesticated. They had to be able to eat food which humans could provide, have a fast growth rate, and be tame enough to live behind fences.

Perhaps one of the messages to be drawn from this historical example is that messages spread when sustained by technology.

Jared Diamond -- Guns, Germs, and Steel ISBN 0099302780
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May 26, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

May 16, 2004

Call to action

KILKENNY -- Every film shown in the UK and Ireland starts with the stupid statement, "You are not permitted to use any camera or recording equipment in this cinema. This will be treated as an attempt to breach copyright. Any person doing so can be ejected and such articles may be confiscated by the police. We ask the audience to be vigilant against any such activity and report any matters arousing suspicion to cinema staff. Thank you." This force-fed propaganda pisses me off.

Cory Doctorow has the same reaction to this rude imposition. "Every time I see this, my blood boils. I just paid a fortune to see this movie, I've been subjected to 500 percent concession stand markup and half an hour of commercials and now you're going to give me a little lecture about how badly I'll get beaten up if I turn out to be a pirate, and ask me to snitch on my fellow moviegoers?"

I like Doctorow's retaliatory reaction. "Here's what I've started doing: whenever this warning is screened, I take a very obvious flash photo of it. I've done it twice now, and both times, I got a round of applause. You can do it too. If we all do it, if we all laugh and boo when this warning comes on, maybe the movie companies will get the picture."

I'm the one with the Fuji S602Z camera with rapid flash.

Cory Doctorow -- "UK Cinema Copyright Warnings: A Call to Action"
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May 16, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 12, 2004

Writers in Schools

POETRY IRELAND -- Students from different schools converged on Kilkenny's Adult Education Centre last weekend in a culmination of 20 literature residencies held in schools throughout the preceding year. Six of the writers who have completed residencies in schools were present at the day of Masterclasses. Larry Cotter from St Kieran's College in Kilkenny ran the event in conjunction with Poetry Ireland and th Southeast Arts Advisory Committee.

Poetry Ireland (+353 16799860 education AT poetryieland.ie) runs the Writers in Schools programme.
Katharine Blake -- "Young poets flock to local masterclass" in The Kilkenny People, May 14, 2004.
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May 12, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 07, 2004

Writing Skills Final Revision

UNDERWAY -- A good portion of my daily activities centre on teaching college students how to write better. As I wrap up another academic year, I'm culling strands of information for review in revision sessions and for discussion with other lecturers. The Writing Skills course dovetails nicely with three other third level courses in our Multimedia Degree Programme at Tipperary Institute.

After reviewing my "dirty notes," I can make some timely observations.

The essence of good Web Writing embodies an ability to be clear, correct and concrete.
When preparing good copy, a writer must think like an editor and produce compelling memes, sentences, and paragraphs. Each of these elements has key metadata features.
Eats, Shoots and Leaves draws several lessons from the 1918 edition of The Elements of Style.
Throughout my course, students kept A5 journals. They extracted nuggets of information from these copy books and transcribed these nuggets into a separate section in the journals. Excerpts will appear online for Internet viewing. These excerpts provide clues to the personalities of the writers.
After lectures and practical sessions, students know how to write an effective press release. Students transferring into our degree programme from other institutions must prove their skills in this area. This coreskill maps directly to our Public Relations course.
There are elements of copyright in a Creative Commons license. There are rudimentary ways of establishing a claim to copyright.
Distinctions exist between ©, ®, and ?.
Specific characteristics distinguish a patent pending from a patent.
Both ISBN and ISSN documents infer traditional publishing has occurred.
Multimedia creatives can annotate digital files with identifying marks.
As Trinity College Dublin has shown, an owner of a listed structure can file a legal objection to the use of a listed structure in matters unrelated to the structure.
Finding Nemo succeeds on many fronts, including the technical achievement of simulating action in, under and on water.
Fixed identifiers include Date Time Groups and geodetic attributes.
Most project deliverables include elements of written project management documentation.
What makes something a signifuicant emotional event?
Distinguish between a fact and a factoid.
Know why the TITLE tag is important with regards to information architecture.
Describe how Google calculates a Page Rank.
Provide an example of white noise in print media.

More information in the Irish Typepad Classroom channel.
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May 7, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 04, 2004

Global backpack

KILKENNY -- After sitting around a pub table with Lithuanian artists and discussing how globalised we have become in the last decade, I read how Joi Ito's day in Tokyo is saved on account of a Nokia 7600 that he got in Helsinki. I didn't see a single Lithuanian without a mobile phone during the official Day of Welcomes ceremonies on May 1st. Like many students on campus, visitors have their fav phones in their backpacks and purses. Mobile phones have become essential travel devices. The Nokia 7600 is a little special--it handles GSM alongside WCDMA. J-Phone/Vodafone have rolled out WCDMA in Japan so that means the phone is effectively quad band. Japan does not have GSM so the only way you can use GSM phones in Japan is when they're quad band.

Joi Ito's Stuff -- "My new Nokia 7600"
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May 4, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 03, 2004

Video Art for Plasma Screens

KILKENNY -- During next year's academic term, we will create video art for plasma screen playback. Following the last World Cup, many pubs were stuck with black plasma screens. Today, Irish pubs are buying millions of euro worth of outdoor furniture to seat smokers outside. Combining the outside audience with the plasma screen playback is a natural evolution.

Using their plasma displays, pub owners can hang video art, images and sound on a wall or pointing outside. Several companies are involved in this space already, devising content for home or public entertainment systems. They come normally as programmed DVDs meant to play in the system for hours or days. The autolooped DVDs are available in PAL or NTSC and vary in length from 7 to 70 minutes.

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May 3, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 30, 2004

Stealing baby ideas

TEMPLE BAR -- Based on the amount of press coverage surrounding the concept of "derivative works," Irish gallery visitors will see fewer piss-takes on original work. Xeni Jardin described how a "reality-TV human baby giveaway pissed-off Uri Geller." Geller alleges breach of trademark. Irish viewers won't see the ABC-TV program 20/20 when it airs "Be My Baby", a contest between five couples on the show, because that TV feed isn't part of any broadcast package in the Republic. As Jardin prepares her viewing schedule, she note, "the winners of the show get to adopt a real-live, pooping, crying baby." And the viewers get "a reality show with a human life on the line--all disguised as news programming."

The updated article on Boing Boing gets interesting. BoingBoing reader Kevin T. Keith says: "As a matter of fact, Uri Geller does hold a patent for a reality TV show that involves competing to adopt a baby. You can view the patent by going to the Patent and Trademark Office's Applications search page and entering the phrase "in/geller-uri" (without quotation marks) in the large search window."

But BoingBoing reader Marc Ascolese, who is a patent attorney, points out the search page is for applications, not for approved patents. "This does not mean that a U.S. Patent has been granted. Under certain circumstances, the USPTO requires applications to be published. In fact, if you go here, and enter the application number for Geller's patent application (09/757609) you can see some current status information. Basically, the application has not been examined yet. Because this application has been classified in U.S. Class 705, we can expect that it will be examined pretty rigorously. It may be a long time before Geller has an issued U.S. Patent he can enforce. Class 705 is where most "business method" type applications end up.

Xeni Jardin -- "Let me get this straight. You can't say 'fuck,' but you can broadcast a raffle for a human being?" Jardin owns the patent on any reality-TV show involving live mudwrestling smackdowns between Uri Geller and Barbara Walters, and will personally bend the spoon of anyone who forgets it.
Mike Cassidy -- "Adoption contest may be new reality-TV low"
Marc Acolese -- "Intellectual Property"
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April 30, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Blogging work activities

MOODLE -- One of the strongest acclamations that blogging can play a valuable role on the job comes through the use of a group blog in the work placement module for multimedia degree students in Tipperary Institute. All students, whether on industrial placement or those doing projects, fill out weekly logs and complete all monthly reports. These reports are first-hand evidence of learning on the job. We need to generate RSS feeds on them too.

Tipperary Institute -- "Weekly Work Journals"
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April 30, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 29, 2004

Writing for the Web

CROFSBLOGS -- We are at the tail end of a successful year in the evolution of the first year writing class at Tipperary Institute where we have concluded yet again that a focus on "writing for the Web" is a worthwhile one. If anything, this focus proves you can learn to produce content by following a formula for immediate or embargoed release. That's a conclusion probably shared by Crawford Kilian at Capilano College in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

Crawford also runs an excellent blog that I consider essential reading by anybody who plans to earn a living working in the Fourth Estate. In one of his posts, Crwawford recommends "a great resource for online writers, created by Dennis Jerz at Seton Hill University." Called "Electronic Text: Writing Tips," it puts a lot of good links on one page. I agree with Crawford, "whether you're interested in Webwriting, email, or writing interactive fiction, you'll find something useful here."

Crawford Kilian -- "Electronc Text: Writing Tips"
Dennis Jerz -- "Writing Electronic Text: Tips and Guidelines for Writers" with crammed white space and resource-heavy sidebar.
Rachel McAlpine -- "Quality Web Content: Words that Work"
Anne Pepper -- "Mistakes made in Web Writing"
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April 29, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 28, 2004

Bootleg Bowie

BOWIE -- David Bowie, scheduled to play in Ireland in a gig that will dwarf all others, wants bootleg fans up front. He is offering a new Audi for the most creative theft of any classic song taken from Reality to create a "mash-up" track that uses vocals from one song superimposed over the backing tracks of another.

This is a tease for the bedroom DJs among my first year multimedia degree students.

In Monday's The Times newspaper, Bowie said that mash-ups were "a great appropriation idea waiting to happen."

"Being a hybrid maker off and on over the years, I'm very comfortable with the idea and have been the subject of quite a few pretty good mash-ups myself."

You can get the music software needed to rip and mix from BowieNet. You can get the tracks there too, although Bowie won't mind if you're a student and you rip your mix from the Media Boom Box.

You have to finish your track by May 17th, upload it to Bowie and he will name the winner. He will release the derivative work as an MP3 single. He will give the winner a new car.

Canada -- "Take my songs please, says Bowie"
Total Blam Blam -- mash-ups
Adam Sherwin -- "Just take my songs, says Bowie"
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April 28, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 27, 2004

Blocking discussion of censorship

UNDERWAY -- Isn't it interesting that required third level revision notes are "scanned by ScanMail for Lotus Notes 2.6 with scanengine 7.000-1004 and patternfile lpt$vpn.865" then automatically relegated to the trash heap before reading? IT should not direct academic discussion. But since much of my academic discussion occurs electronically, it's being snarled by IT. Time to educate the IT support structures.

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April 27, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 25, 2004

Bladerunner Neuroethics

NEW SCIENTIST -- As I slip Bladerunner into its sleeve for another first year film review, I thumb through New Scientist for some interesting discussion on detecting traumatic memories. Getting suspects to respond to memory events is a tactic used in the film by Harrison Ford, the police detective. The movie (and the scientific article) raise ethical questions. Do you want to block traumatic memories from scarring your mind? What if someone else did it for you? Or how about receiving marketing messages beamed directly at you in hypersonic waves? Mind control is getting smarter by the minute, says Richard Glen Boire, co-founder of the Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics in California. He told Liz Else much more.

Like propranolol, which has been tested in emergency rooms. Boire says, "In 2002, there was a study of the effect of propranolol on car accident victims in emergency rooms. It found that one month later, patients who received propranolol had fewer symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder than patients who suffered similar injuries but were given placebos rather than the drug." Take propranolol after a life-threatening event and you might lose your ability to testify about it.
Then there's applied neurotechnology like "brain fingerprinting," technology being tested by the FBI. Boire explains, "It works by picking up the P300 electrical wave emitted by the brain when the subject is shown images relating to a crime. Its strength is that the P300 wave is involuntary - the suspect can't affect the outcome. It is said to be much more accurate than the polygraph."
The Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics has no problem with brain fingerprinting so long as it's voluntary. The problems arise when law enforcement agents use it coercively. CCLE believes "such compelled use ought to be forbidden, because it would pierce one of the most private and intimate human spheres: our own memory."

Zack Lynch -- "Who's protecting your freedom of thought?"
Liz Else -- "We hold these freedoms to be self-evident"
CCLE -- "The Neuroethics Project"
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April 25, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 22, 2004

Working in Canice's Tower

KILKENNY -- Each year the Cathedral Church of St Canice receives a large number of visitors and they need summer tourism assistants for the June-August 2004 period. Applicants must be over 16 years of age. The ability to speak other languages besides English and Irish is desireable. Applications must be by CV and covering letter by Friday 30 April 2004.

Tourism assistants come into daily contact with visitors. Duties include working at the visitor services desk and gift shop and conducting guided tours of the cathedral. This would appeal to third level students with an interest in tourism and heritage.

Beside the Cathedral stands the 9th century round tower, monument to pre-Norman times. Visitors can climb the tower and enjoy an unsurpassable view of the surrounding countryside. Tower assistants must be available on a weekly basis to monitor people climbing the tower, answer questions, and to track visitor numbers.

Contact the Administrator (administrator.cathedral@ossory.anglican.org) in St Canice's Cathedral, The Close, Kilkenny, Ireland (Fax +353 56 7723646) for information on hours and salary details.
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April 22, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 20, 2004

Strands of Postmodernism

CAMBRIDGE -- We plough the field of post-modernism during our Mass Communications and Culture course, with students lamenting the fact that "postmodernism" remains remarkably impervious to definition. ("How do you test this on the final exam?") So we slice up the idea into several strands that we map to visual examples. Along our academic journey, some students get lost or frustrated with postminimalism, body art, land art, performance, neo-expressionism, feminism and multiculturalism. All of these genres rail against the artisitic enterprise. That completely frustrates new media students who often begin their studies with captalistic dispositions.

We superficially dissect several strands of post-modernism.

Neo-expressionism. In 1984, Marxist theorist Frederic Jameson lamented the eruption of a new style of painting that borrowed promiscuously from history and mythology was yet another symptom of a malaise rooted in the emergence of consumer capitalism. In the cultural sphere, according to Jameson, it has produced a world dominated by the twin condititons of pastiche and schizophrenia. This is not a clinical condition. Rather, it is a condition in which "isolated, disconnected, discontinuous material signifiers ... fail to link up into any coherent sequence."¹ Crudely stated, the work can look unbalanced.
The Anti-aesthetes. These artists embraced text, photography and film as the proper tools of late 20th century art. They married poststructuralism to postmodernism in order to unearth the contradictions hidden in ideological constructs.
Commodity critics. Lots of hand-crafted objects that no longer asked philosophical questions. For them, the key element was the reognition of identity of artworks and consumer products.
Postmodern Feminism. The language of art history--with its emphasis on gender-loaded words like "mastery" and "masterpiece"--is rife with hidden assumptions about the nature of genius. Western art replicates the uneuqal realtionships already embedded in Western culture.
Postmodern Multiculturalism. The search for authentic identitiy often ignores the realities of migration and immigration. I listen to Irish slag off Irish-Americans ("How can they wear green and say they're Irish?) I wonder how an artist of multiple ethnicities can return to his or her identity.

Eleanor Heartney -- "Postmodernism" ISBN 0521004381
Roland Barthes -- "Images-Music-Text" translated by Stephen Heath.
Linda Nochlin -- "Why have there been no great women artists?" in Art News, Hanuary 1971.
¹Frederic Jameson -- "Postmodernism and Consumer Society"
Image from Robert Mapplethorpe Retrospective in Temple Bar Gallery of Photography -- "Embrace" 1982.
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April 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack

XP DOS emulator

CLONMEL -- While reviewing presentations of third year software development projects, I discovered that I needed a DOS emulator for XP Pro. So I went upstream to HEANET's mirrors and found DOSBox0.61-win32-installer.exe sorted me just fine. DOSBox emulates a full x86 pc with sound and dos. While it's major audience uses it to run old dosgames on win2K/XP/linux/FreeBSD, some of our programming students find life inside the DOS Box a whole lot easier than the world of complex servlet development.

Peter Veenstra -- "DOS BOX FAQ"
Sven Rosvall -- "XP for testers"
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April 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 18, 2004

National branding for cars

CLARKSON -- Who better to talk about the branding of cars than Jeremy Clarkson? He's copped it totally.

Advertising men will tell you that when it comes to cars they need to attach a single word to the brand. So if you want a "safe" car you buy a Volvo. If you want a "reliable" car, you buy a Volkswagen. And if you have a small "penis" you buy a BMW.

It's not just brands either. There are single words that describe the national characteristics of a car too. A German car is "engineered." A French car is "soft" and an Italian car is "exuberant."
I've alsways felt that a British car is "traditional." We, as a nation, don't like change. When the submarine was invented, for instance, the navy top brass dismissed it as "underhanded and ungentlemanly" and we see the same sort of thing with our cars. They all hark back to the Blower Bentley, which set the scene by being big, heavy, powerful and green.
Everything from the Bristol to the Allegro Vanden Plas and from the old Aston Vantage to the Jaguar XJ6 looked like a Spitfire from teh outside and a Harvester pub on the inside. Lots of dark colours, lots of heavy wood and very little natural light. Given half a chance the British car designer would fit an open fire instead of a heater, and some horse brasses.

Jeremy Clarkson -- "Please sir, can I have one of these?" in The Sunday Times Driving, April 18, 2004.
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April 18, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 17, 2004

Smart made simple

FREELANCE DESIGN -- I like Joe Murphy's mantra, so I'm spreading his words around in my new media classes.

Get to the point. We build websites, develop brand identity and design print pieces. We're a small shop with a large range of skills.
Got there.
We make design that comes with a breath of fresh air. Clarity of message is too often missing in today's world. Not here. Our services will bring the professionalism and identity that makes people take note, and we do it for a reasonable price.
Get it? Our work is simple, but not dumb. It delivers the point with speed, because we all have other places we need to be. Whether you're a small business, a lone soldier with a great idea, or an established corporation, we can help.
Let's talk.

Now Fintan Friel has adhered to this same code of practise since I met him in Temple Bar more than five years ago. He's knocking out am edgy "Maviszine" that might appear here in various forms of its development.

Joe Murphy -- effective design: what he's done.
Fintan Friel -- "Any minute now"
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April 17, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 14, 2004

Workers Personalcasting

BBC -- Radio LabourStart broadcasts its message around the world, using bandwidth from Live365. The Internet radio statio (part of a "folkcasting web ring") reports on the plight of workers around the world.

Eric Lee set up Radio LabourStart to cover news stories about workers that are often ignored by the mainstream media. He runs the Internet station on a shoe-string budget and reaches listeners in 38 countries. We are teaching web radio skills in our multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.

Eric Lee shown in his studio in a BBC photo.
BBC -- "Workers find voice on the net"
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April 14, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 10, 2004

€20 steadycam

SLUM DANCE -- For no more than 5% of the price of a real Steadicam costing more than €500 in Dublin electronic shops, you can knock together your own "Steady-Cam" for $14 with parts from a hardware store. The sample video makes it look pretty good. But know that you still need to learn to glide and that spending less for a steady cam harness than you do for a sit-down Irish dinner means you're setting yourself up for some tired arms. Still, you can't beat the price.

"Great gift for the amateur videographer in your life who refuses to use a tripod, the bastard. (Oh, and stabilized images compress much better for the Web, too.)"

Mark Frauenfelder -- "The $14 steadycam"
Keyser Soze -- "$14 steadycam"
Brian Flemming --
Johnny Chung Lee -- "The poor man's steadicam"
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April 10, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Episodic writing

BBC -- Jim McClellan is researching the online narrative as part of his three-month post as interactive writer-in-residence at the BBC. Along the way, he has equated blog writing to episodic writing. This is our tactic in the Writing Skills course we teach to first year college students. It's a technique that works for several other Irish bloggers as well. It adds further credibility to blogging being a credible web publishing platform. The mainstream world might be intrigued by Belle de Jour, "the blog of a London call girl," but budding writers can get more than just prurient interest from the call girl blog. The anonymous writer proves that short daily entries, reader feedback, link tracking, and referrer analysis can create and focus a narrative. Writing is just the first step. Blogging makes the writing part easier.

Jill Walker, a specialist in interactive writing and online narrative at the University of Bergen, told McClellan that "many writers see blogs as a natural way to update/extend the traditional fictional diary." You have to be episodic to carry this kind of storyline. Linking and synopses helps there. I think of footnotes as pointers.

If you get into the space of episodic production, you cross into television production. The blog helps this evolution, through tech like RSS enclosures. Adam Curry passionately absorbs RSS enclosures. They work with item level tags in the RSS feed. The tags associate a multimedia file at a named URL with some item in the feed. For example, you can download the entire spoken contents of Free Culture by simply pulling the text file through your news aggreagator and later the same aggregator pulls the sound files down for you. Radio Userland does this nicely. You can get even more efficient uses of bandwidth if the sound files are stored at a bit-torrent URL. In this case the file will be downloaded in pieces, different pieces coming from computers that have previously downloded the file. This conserves bandwidth.

Jim McClellan -- "How to write a blog-buster" in The Guardian Online, April 4, 2004
Diego Doval -- "blogs and fiction"
John Robb -- "Personal TV networks"
Rahul Dave -- "Blog News Network"
Robert Scoble -- "Your technology isn't important enough syndrome"
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April 10, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 07, 2004

Banning Google from classroom

CLONMEL -- Could a college survive if it banned Google from its network? I have a small problem -- I cannot even see this blog entry through my daytime upstream because Surf Control is blocking the word "Google," any site with Google in its stem. Initial reaction from the Common House: "impressively idiotic." This situation affords me the opportunity to experience living inside a Chinese ISP's control. It forces me into tight workarounds.

Most of my Google APIs don't work.
Computer architecture students and those working on database project notes can't read supplemental material that's too Googley, like the online version of print materials concerning the Google Operating System.
Students have to wait until dialing up from home before reading any of my revision notes containing the name "Google" in the file name.

This Nanny Net constraint comes on the heels of a discovery that you can pervert Surf Control by exploring items secreted in Google cache. You can back door the dark side of the Internet through the Web Archive so I guess that excellent source is threatened by the heavy hand of censorship as well. This is not a unique initiative--the feds are pulling out the stops to fighting online pornography as well, so it could be that I don't realise how I'm benefiting from "early adoption" of new anti-porn measures in Ireland. But I miss the Google-side of things.

All is not lost. As knowledgeable IT specialists point out, there's always AltaVista, askJeeves, Yahoo, and FAST services available. But a world without Google?

Update: We got our Google back after a night of no access. The good thing is only the early morning classes were affected by the outage.

The Common House is a cool project and includes Danny O'Brien among its users.
Laura Sullivan -- "Administration wages war on pornography"
Googlekoll -- "Bra strategi"
Slashdot -- "Google disappears in China"
Sleekfx -- College without Google?"
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April 7, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBack

April 06, 2004

Grammar God

QUIZILLA -- I found a spyware site using Quizilla. It told me "You are a grammar god!" after I correctly answered 20 questions. It gave me the same result after answering 10 questions correctly. Now I can point out yet another reason to use anti-virus and spyware protection on personal computers. I use SpyHunter from Enigma Software Group and it told me that Sure-Seek had loaded into my system after I took the online grammar quiz. You can also get good anti-spyware results without buying protection like I did.

Quizilla -- "How grammatically sound are you?"
AKMA -- "Spyware"
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April 6, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

April 05, 2004

Free Berlin Culture

FREE-CULTURE -- One of the things that hits most visitors to Berlin is how much of the visual culture borrows from that which has gone before. Innovative things are reshaped and spun out in ways that delight the original authors. That fact would resonate well with Larry Lessig and prove the point he hammers away in his new book. Lessig explains the evolution of Disney's animation and how "Disney's great genuis, his spark of creativity, was built upon the work of others." Walk through the 3rd Berlin Beinnial for Contemporary Art and this lesson of creativity repeats itself. The key to some of the most successful artisitic exhibitions in Berlin today rests on the work of others. That is not heresy--it's tantamount to best practise in visual art.

As Lessig puts it, the catalog of Disney work drawing upon the work of others is astonishing when set together.

Snow White (1937), Fantasia (1940 and 2001), Pinocchio (1940), Dumbo (1941), Bambi (1942), Song of the South (1946), Cinderella (1950), Alice in Wonderland (1951), Robin Hood (1952), Peter Pan (1953), Lady and the Tramp (1955), Sleeping Beauty (1959), 101 Dalmations (1961), The Sword in the Stone (1963), and The Jungle Book (1967). In all of these cases, Disney ripped creativity from the culture around him, mixed that creativity with his own extraordinary talent, and then burned that mix into the soul of his culture.

For the sake of enhancing the Visuelle Kunst, we need to carve out space in our public domain for public use of past work. We need to permit the next Walt Disney to emerge from places like East Berlin or from one of the ten new accesssion countries. We don't need a Walt Disney monopoly on creativity. No one benefits from that.

Lawrence Lessig -- Free Culture. "Ours was a free culture. It is becoming much less so."
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April 5, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Active writing for digital photography

CLONMEL -- One of the most unfortunate things about digital photography is taking many more images than you can label and catalog. But if you have a system of recording information about the images, you have a better chance of incorporating quality meta data into the image. With the Fuji S602Z and many other megapixel cameras, you can record voice information with the images. It's often easier to literally map out your snaps by highlighting your route on a paper map, circling street names or marking prominent features. I carry an A5 copybook and need to use it to record street addresses, exhibition titles and gallery names.

There is an entire discipline inside the space of "active writing." As part of a classroom exercise, we will simulate walking the streets of Clonmel (County Tipperary, Ireland), searching for pub smoke. We will map some meta data prior to embarking on an active writing exercise.

Name of venue
Geodetic or physical cross-reference
Distinguishing marks
Keywords
DTG or image number
Caption
Author
Copyright info

If the search engine referrer logs for this blog are any clue, there is pent-up interest around the world concerning the no smoking ban in Ireland. Our little exercise will put active writing to the test while documenting a very topical social issue.

In the context of the smoking ban, some leading questions help frame our analysis. Who imposed this ban? What is its effect? How is it implemented or enforced? Where does it have its greatest impact? When will we know its real impact? Why stop smoking in Irish work places?

Bernard Goldbach -- "Three Rules for Active Writing."
Active writing is part of the multimedia degree programme in Tipperary Institute.
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April 5, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 30, 2004

Situated software in student projects

SHIRKY -- Last year, Clay Shirky taught a class called Social Software in which the students "worked in small groups to design and launch software to support some form of group interaction." Shirky required that whatever project proposed by students had to be used by other students. "This first order benefits of this strategy were simple: the designers came from the same population as the users, and could thus treat their own instincts as valid; beta-testers could be recruited by walking down the hall; and it kept people from grandiose 'boil the ocean' attempts."

Shirky hadn't anticipated the second-order benefits. "Time and again the groups came up against problems that they solved in part by taking advantage of social infrastructure or context-sensitive information." He cites two strategies worth considering on projects set at Tipperary Institute.

The first had to do with reputation systems.

One project, The Orderer was for coordinating group restaurant orders, common in late-night work sessions. The other, WeBe was a tool for coordinating group purchases of things like chips or motors. Because money was involved, a Web School approach would require some way of dealing with deadbeats, using things like pre-pay or escrow accounts, or formal reputation systems.
Instead, in both projects the students decided that since all the users were part of the ITP community, they would simply make it easy to track the deadbeats, with the threat of public broadcast of their names. The possibility of being shamed in front of the community became part of the application design, even though the community and the putative shame were outside the framework of the application itself.

Shirky's conclusions about projects completed by his students last year should be required reading for all educators engaged in monitoring university students who work on graded independent assignments.

Clay Shirky -- "Essay: Situated Software"
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March 30, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 29, 2004

Media literacy

CLONMEL -- Drive along the western part of Clonmel's ring road and you might see a white building housing the multimedia studio of Tipperary Institute. Kitting out this studio would have cost €40,000 more just five years ago. Today, we get professional quality results with equipment costing less than €400. Students learn media literacy in this studio setting.

When we first received HETAC accreditation for our multimedia degree programme, we underscored the need to enhance core literacy skills, then to forge elements of media literacy in students. You become media literate by understanding the way media works, the way it's constructed, the way it's delivered, and the way people access it.¹

Larry Lessig makes a stong case for building these skills.²

In a world where children see on average 390 hours of t elevision commercials per year, or between 20,000 and 45,000 commercials generally, it is increasingly important to understand the "grammar" of media. For just as there is a grammar for the written word, so, too, is there one for media. And just as kids learn to write by writing lots of terrible prose, kids learn to write media by constructing lots (at least at first) terrible media. A growing field of academics and activitists see this form of literacy as crucuail to the next generation of culture.

I try to break through writer's block so often manifest in classroom settings by deconstructing the deliverables of writers, editors, and journos. I teach elements of sequencing story items, tactics to grab attention, and a rigor that seeks to remove casual text from written submissions. Our Media Studies course dissects how multimedia works, how it holds an audience, how it unfolds a story, how it triggers emotion. We build these skills by examining media objects, deconstructing them, and discussing revisions arising from the process. Unfortunately, we may tread on new copyright constriants being promoted by the leading production companies.

¹Dave Yanofsky, the executive director of "Just Think!" knows it is important to make kids literate about the way media is constructed.
²Lawrence Lessig -- "Piracy" in Free Culture
Maria van der Hoeten -- "Time to rethink what it means to be a citizen" in The Irish Times, March 19, 2004..
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March 29, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 28, 2004

Define multimedia

KILKENNY -- We have a fine art course running in Ormonde College where elements of multimedia enter the classroom discussion. And we have students sitting in a multimedia degree course in Tipperary Institute where they use multimedia. I wonder if both courses share the same definition of multimedia?

Google's approved web definition comes from Get Net Wise where multimedia is "Information presented in more than one format, such as text, audio, video, graphics, and images." I remember working in Arthouse in the mid-90s when the Irish Art Council awarded grant money to a joint submission that conceptualised multimedia as a mixture of sculpture, textiles on the wall, and paintings. We have evolved from that.

Google -- 924,000 definitions of multimedia
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March 28, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Things never taught in design school

DESIGN OBSERVER -- Michael McDonough, the accomplished New York-based architect, writer and teacher, ran “The Top 10 Things They Never Taught Me in Design School” last month in The Architect's Newsletter. He offers some useful observations that fit multimedia design.

Talent is one-third of the success equation.
95 percent of any creative profession is shit work.
If everything is equally important, then nothing is very important.
Don’t over-think a problem.
Start with what you know; then remove the unknowns.
Don’t forget your goal.
When you throw your weight around, you usually fall off balance.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions; or, no good deed goes unpunished.
It all comes down to output.
The rest of the world counts.

Michael Bierut -- "Michael McDonough’s Top Ten Things They Never Taught Me in Design School" along with acclamations from industry.
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March 28, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 21, 2004

Better than digital radio

BRIAN GREENE -- Ireland is a long way from digital radio. At the moment, three other options exist to digital audio.

Improve your existing FM reception. Adding an external FM antenna outside your home could cost EUR 150 in parts but it delivers in quality.
List to more than radio through Sky. They broadcast at a quality of 192kbps. The Sky+ recorder can capture the audio at broadcast quality.
Listen with Real Player over the Internet. Thousands of stations offer 192kbps and if your home broadband feeds a wireless router, you can snag the signal from any room in your home through any other computer with a Wi-Fi card.

Radio guru Brian Greene explains the various bit rates.

256kbps. The default on Sony MiniDisk recordings.
192kbps. Better than FM. Radio 3 in England.
160kbps. Much of FM104 around Dublin. An average FM signal should sound like this.
128kbps. Worse than FM. The bit rate normally captured by my laptop.
64kbps-96kbps. Medium wave. Low file size audio for Shockwave streaming.

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March 21, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 20, 2004

Gavin encounters John's attorneys

GAVINS BLOG -- Interesting comments have percolated onto Gavin Sheridan's blog after he announced receipt of a demand for retraction of comments he made concerning John Gray. Ho hum -- these solicitors letters are as simple to generate as cranking out a Word document. Or in Gray's case, use a well-oiled Word Perfect macro to make it look like a legacy item. Gray diminishes his legacy by being overly-sensitive to the academic credibility of his doctoral work. Anyone inside the halls of academia has an opinion about the pedigree afforded by parchment. A lot of future employability depends on where you studied. And if you followed the path of less rigor, you invite community skepticism. That backlash could affect speaking fees and book sales.

Gavin Sheridan -- "My blog has been threatened with legal action"
Chris Gulker -- "Diploma mills"
Dave Winer -- "About John Gray and his PhD"
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March 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 18, 2004

Winning through waffling

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- We expect our college graduates to learn to creatively express ideas because many employers need their accounts executives to retain and to win clients with their waffling. I have deconstructed some core skills into first year deliverables.

Using information in a classified advertisement, construct a bullet list in Shockwave Flash.
Create a rough sketch of a logo. Mark its file information with an explanation. Digitally annotate the file for identification by specialised electronic crawlers.
Extract facts, suppositions and nuggets of information from technical explanations. The extracts must have value as social currency.
Prepare material suitable for use as part of a public consultancy process. Submit the information to highly-visible Internet locations. Distill portions of the information for publication in local newspapers.

The coreskills behind each of these deliverables would complement the skillsets expected of press officers, PR executives, talk radio researchers and content developers. Jobs related to these skills appear in Irish and British newspapers every week.

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March 18, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 14, 2004

Jwalk Lesson

J-WALK BLOG -- John Walkenbach teaches me something on every visit. His observations about ExpressionEngine from pMachine bear noting by anyone considering blogging for cause. This software resembles a mating of Movable Type and a full-blown CMS. It works well for campaign sites. CircleID uses a precursor to ExpressionEngine and deserves further review for our content management course.

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March 14, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 11, 2004

Nero Burning Works

AHEAD SOFTWARE -- Sometimes you need to reinforce past best practise to ensure you don't slip into unfortunate situations. In my case, it means acknowledging the power of Nero-Burning Rom because of all CD-creating programs, it has saved me from frustration and embarassment by clinically transferring important and time-sensitive information to CD-ROM. Its dependability means I can sync data faster, offload raw audio quicker and never worry about whether I produce a good burn. Nero works every time. It tells you that in clear and unequivocal advisory messages. I like that.

Major tasks I do with Nero:

Quickly record a CD at 1200 KB/sec from student sessions.
Back up ripped tracks.
Create image files for easy mapping and repeat burning.
Burn hard disk backups with cheap CD-ROMs for use on other computers.
Copy CDs quickly.

Nero Burning is made by Ahead Software GmbH.
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March 11, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 10, 2004

Revamping Moodle

TIPP INST -- Tipperary Institute recently updated its installation of Moodle, the online distance education programme used to deliver third level courses in software development and multimedia. This Open Source program has saved the college a minimum of EUR 20,000 of subscription fees. That money equals the outlay required to get a commercial license for the likes of WebCT or Blackboard.

It makes sense to extend the Moodle framework into second level schools, perhaps as part of a formal outreach programme. There are modules from third level that are well-suited as foundation elements for selected Transition Year students, perhaps those interested in developing software programs or multimedia content.

The latest version of Moodle adds several new features.

Automatic embedded audio streaming
Support for groups and cohorts within courses
Text filters which allow arbitrary processing on all text in Moodle, including automatic linking, mathematics support, and multi-language content
Glossary module with many different ways to contruct learning activities based around collecting definitions
Lesson module that easily creates active content with pathways and multiple-choice questions

Our Moodle revision work has begun in earnest.

Tipperary Institute uses the Moodle Open Source e-learning portal.
Sent mail2blog using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service from Horse&Jockey, the mid-point of my Dublin-Cork travels.
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March 10, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 09, 2004

Marxism in the Irish Context

CLONMEL -- One of the topics concerning the Mass Communication and Culture course that I teach involves Marxism in Irish society. It normally involves some dry reading and lethargic discussion. We decided to push the discussion into our Blue Room Studio where five students shared their perspectives in front of the microphone.

Denise Kelly: on the classless society
Eanna McAteer: thoughts from the Irish Worker's Party that eliminate the class divide
Niall Kearney: "Social welfare isn't working."
Des O'Hara: reflections on class struggle and bourgeoise
Martin Keane: need minimum wage to protect workers.

Studio session forms part of multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.
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March 9, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 08, 2004

Making microcontent

CLONMEL -- This was the first time we used the new sound studio in Tipperary Institute. We used it to take our voices and keep it on the computer to upload to the internet at a later date. This will be used to show the world our colleges personal view of a subject. We also have three points on job info we got in class. Which also will be on the Internet as our own point of view. This is good because it's our view and our voices and not someone else talking for us. This is also a good way for us to for us to learn in hands-on situation instead of just hearing about it in a classroom.

Comments by Thomas Lonergan using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service.
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March 8, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 07, 2004

Learning by managing

KILKENNY -- I teach a database course in which students, working in groups, set up and manage online databases. One of my goals is to give students a feel for how much effort is required to get a database server set up, the effects additional RAM can have,and how fickle configuration can be. Once they're configured and running reports, I learn more about the treasure trove of raw material I've given them to pore through. I have to incease the number of tasks the students do next year, hoping to get a tutorial system running where we use WebSphere, in addition to ASP, Cold Fusion, and MySQL.

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March 7, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 06, 2004

Eureka Moments in Temple Bar

TEMPLE BAR -- I spend most Fridays in Temple Bar, amazed at the imagination of lecturers, guests and students participating in the Master of Arts programme held by the Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design, and Technology in the Temple Bar Gallery and Studios. I can immediately apply many of these eureka moments to my practise as a new media lecturer.

When with first year students, set down a marker where you record the first-ever work they publish on the Internet.
Rather than a simple round of introductions, consider introducing new groups to an exercise involving their descent. Use their family names as the entity in descent or get feedback on the previous three generations and the counties or countries where the family lived.
There are natural Multiples in Writing.
"What part of our life would you lose?"
A gallery can become a reading room.
Pay it forward.
Houses of Hospitality form part of the vision of Utopia.
In the "Perfect Vacuum," imaginery critics write reviews of things that never happened.
What about a Museum of Digital Artefacts in The Maltings?
Students performing in-house work placement activities are actually developers in residence. They must keep notebooks about their installations.
By looking at the branches of trees, you can see the wind.
Transmission: The Show
A public space needs to be over the River Nore.
"If you could choose one word, what would it be?"
Fictionalise yourself.

Sent mail2blog using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad services from Temple Bar Gallery and Studios in the MA Programme there.
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March 6, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 05, 2004

Pron Clubs

EXAMINER -- Paedophiles on the the Internet operate on a "club" basis and in order to be in the club, you need to trade with your own images.

Some quick facts about "child abuse images on the Internet:"

The average age of someone downloading abusive images of children from the Net is 25.
70% of all images are of white girls and 90% of all images of boys are white.
The typical age range of children in abusive images is between six and twelve.
More toddlers and babies are appearing in abusive images.
Photographs and video images are becoming increasingly violent and sadistic, often involving torture.

Colette Keane -- "Hidden threat of Internet Child Porn" in The Irish Examiner, March 5, 2004.
The content filters at most Irish colleges prohibit this page from being viewed if it's entitlted "Porn Clubs" and I have not succeeded in getting this constriction removed. It means educating censorware and that's just not something most local IT techs are tasked to do.
Sent mail2blog using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad services.
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March 5, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 04, 2004

I have enough to be doing

UNDERWAY -- For the first time in more than a decade of working in higher education, I have been clearly rebuffed by industry professionals when I solicited their input regarding third level course preparation. You cannot field a meaningful college course without industry assistance because you need to know your academic standards intersect with industry needs. The process normally starts with a collegial query for assistance--I have been rebuffed three times in six days at this juncture. "I have enough to be doing," is a common rebuttal.

I wanted to get a second reader for a third year project but was punted from touch by the industry expert who pointed to a critical shortage of time. I need to review knowledge management materials from another expert but he recused himself and referred me to an intellectual property liaision officer. I needed a simple telephone conversation to clarify best practise in the field of company signage but couldn't get past the voice mail barrier. I suspect that if I had funding for these things, I would enjoy quick uptake in all cases. That's what I have discovered in the case of an upcoming PR conversation because that event revolves around a working lunch, paid as a legitimate expense by the third level institution. Feed them and entertain them and you get them to your table.

But getting turned down on three other occasions suggests rough times ahead on other issues, such as finding work placement for students. If we lose those points of contact, we erode a significant foundation of our third level programme with serious knock-on effects to our international competitiveness.

Sent mail2blog using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service in County Kilkenny.
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March 4, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

March 02, 2004

Media Jobs

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- We will make short online summaries of jobs currently offered in the media for recent multimedia degree graduates. In the meantime, we're intrigued by how far abroad the concept appeals. We can tell when looking at how "media jobs online" looks to someone browsing from Saudi Arabia or Germany. In both cases, the reach of the Guardian's Media section impresses.

We are profiling several jobs, some in traditional media and others in new media, during our Writing Skills class.

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March 2, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 01, 2004

Summarise a novel in 25 words

WH3RD -- Brevity wins every time.

ILXOR -- "Summarise a novel in 25 words"
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March 1, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 29, 2004

EFI Logo Competition

CREATIVE IRELAND -- Electronic Freedom Ireland have launched a logo competition to judge a winning design that visually identifies an organisation that defends against infringement on the civil liberties of computer and Internet users. EFI emulates EFF, with articulate positions concerning free speech online, electronic voting, email and sms spam, employee surveillance, user monitoring, and electronic data retention.

Logo competition:

Logo should be suitable for as many different resolutions as possible.
Submissions of 250x250 dimensions should be made by midnight, Sunday, March 14 to efi-comp@beecher.net.
All entries will be published online together with the name of the submittor.
The creator will need to grant exclusive rights for the image to Electronic Frontier Ireland.
Competition will be judged by the eight members of Electronic Frontier Ireland's council. One image will be chosen as the winner by March 28.
Winner gets EUR 100.

Comments also on Boards.ie and Creative Ireland.
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February 29, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 28, 2004

Tom Moylan on utopia

KILKENNY -- Tom Moylan followed me home from Temple Bar yesterday. I carried him in my thoughts because his take on Utopia is much wider-ranging than any other coverage of the topic. He offers an hour-long lecture that deftly steps around several examples of "utopia" being hijacked in popular culture before embarking on a deep excursion of literature that gives listeners a brief tour of utopia through the ages.

After listening intently to his ideas, I personally conclude that utopia is a dream of a better life. It is a description of those who try to create that better life. In many ways, it is the semi-monastic existence of my aunt. She has spent more than 50 years as a Missionary Servant of the Most Blessed Trinity and now lives in a vibrant community of nuns in the middle of Manhattan. I wonder if she would think she is in utopia?

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February 28, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Worthwhile Sig Element

NTK -- I am making a list of signature elements that deserve a place for posterity, including this warning:

Remember: Your work email may be monitored if sending sensitive material. Sending attachments is forbidden by copyright protocols of the Geneva Convention. Your computer may be impounded by law enforcement authorities if you fail to comply.

Adapted from Need to Know.
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February 28, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 27, 2004

Racism in Ireland

TEMPLE BAR -- More than any other part of Dublin, Temple Bar enjoys real diversity. It's enjoyable because more nationalities visit Dublin's cultural quarter than any other art of the city. They come. They spend. Everyone is happy. But in many parts of Ireland, people are not happy with diversity. Read today's broadsheets and see what I mean.

Juno McEnroe -- "One in five witnessed racism" in The Irish Examiner. Know Racism conducted a survey of 1200 people in 2003 and discovered the range of racism that exists in Ireland. Anti-Traveller attitudes are viewed as racist.
Kensika Monshengwo, training officer with the National Consultant Committee on racism and Interculturalism has "yet to see a coloured person who has not experienced racism in Dublin." There is no magic formula to stop racism but Irish people could look at diversity more positively.
I have witnessed first-hand the sneering authoritarianism inflicted on blacks by members of the Irish Immigaration Service. I believe they should be required to attend annual day-long racial awareness workshops.
Deaglán De Bréadún -- "Immigration group warns on welfare burden" in "European News" inside The Irish Times today. The Immigration Control Platform calls for restrictions to be placed on rights of work, domicile and social maintenance for people coming from the 10 accession countries in the EU. The anti-immigration lobby group would turn the screws on a potentially high-quality labour supply that could immediately contribute to Irish society through taxes and productivity.
Tim O'Brien -- "Some EU states oppose continued funding for developing regions" in "European News" inside The Irish Times today. Ireland would oppose the current initiatives on structural funding as well, since the Republic is now longer an "Objective One-type" region.
Karlin Lillington -- "State pays stiff economic price for racism" in "Business This Week" inside The Irish Times today. "We need skilled immigrants (and skilled foreign students studying here, who are enabled to stay on to work): we need their expertise, experience, energy, and vision."
Kitty Holland -- "Research reveals negative attitudes to asylum-seekers" in "Home News" inside The Irish Times today. The Know Racism campaign finds 54% of people believe most asylum-seekers are bogus while 20% say Travellers should not have the same rights as the settled community. Overall, 66% of respondents believed "anyone should be allowed to live in Ireland if they work and pay their taxes." Tell that to the Mary Harney, who makes me sort out a work permit every year.

Dearbhaile Hanley fingers some coded terminology that needs to be discussed in the same paragraph as racism in Ireland.

‘Non-nationals’ has become a weasel word here, in a country already poisoned by nationalism. It’s a seemingly innocuous construction, but it’s really code for THEM, not us. But nationals need THEM more than THEY need us, though many are still too thick to see it. Eight years ago, Jason and I used to cringe at the unbearable whiteness of being Irish whenever we got off the plane at Shannon. It was the shock of sameness, as jarring in its way as the first experience of New York’s mix. And it is the energy of Ireland’s new mix that tempts me to move back here some day, as the crass Spar generation never could.

I spend two hours each week standing between non-Irish who used the broadband connection in Tim Powers' newsagency. It's remarkable that to know that most of them want to take courses, settle in, pay taxes, pull their weight, and just blend in. As they start doing these things, the system ensures they stand out as "non-nationals" at every juncture.

Dearbhaile Hanley -- "The Limerick County Library"
Guardian Threads on "Keep Ireland Irish"
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February 27, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack

ECDL Quick Facts

EXAMINER -- More than 250,000 Irish people hold the ECDL and are helping reap annual benefits of over EUR 121m for the economy. That's the conclusion of the Itech Research report.

At least 4400 people are employed full or part-time in providing ECDL courses.
Of those who have received an ECDL qualification, 92,000 received the training at work.
The Irish economy has received benefits of EUR 362m in the past six years.
ECDL generates annual direct and indirect benefits to the economy valued at over EUR 121m.
Employers of over 46,000 office workers enjoy EUR 62.3m in productivity savings.

Statistics from Dr Susan O'Donnell of Itech Research reported by Niall Murray in "ECDL produces EUR 121m in benefits" in The Irish Examiner, February 27, 2004.
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February 26, 2004

Watching digital content being made

CLONMEL SOUND STUDIO -- I witnessed a process that transfers sound in sound bytes, to a computer disc instead of to the ear in sound waves. I remember when you needed a tape recorder with spinning wheels to record voices. You could cut the tapes and join them back together with cello tape. Today we cut whole sentences easier than cutting butter with a knife.

Our results are online. Posted by Lucy Gleeson in the multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.
Sony -- "Learning and Teaching with Multimedia Tools"
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February 26, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Flash Personalcasting

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- One of the goals in the Writing Skills course is to observe first-hand and then to quickly share those observations through personalcasting. We have adopted "St Patrick's Day in Ireland" as one theme. Some short extracts appeared earlier as text comments. Effective personalcasting also involves recorded sound, accomplished today by integrating an MP3 to a SWF. Production time constrains us to individual five minute sections where we write bullet lists, record snippets, export them through software, and upload them to the Internet. Five minutes time is less than many people use to find the loo and return to their pub seat after the parade on Patrick's Day, so it's an effective benchmark. This is our first attempt at time-limited personalcasting, so the results reflect our baby steps, appearing at lunchtime.

The step-by-step procedure invites mistakes and it demands attention to detail.

Presenter: Review text comments.
Producer: Sound Forge XP, Powerbullet, Windows Explorer and Cute FTP.
Presenter: check laptop microphone is connected in correct port.
Producer: Open Sound Forge, pull down File-New-Sample 44,100 16-bit mono. Immediately File-Save As _001/activities/patricksound. Save as "namepatrick.WAV" first. Then save as "namepatrick.MP3" after sound is acquired and trimmed later.
Producer: don headset. Click red button to record, accepting all defaults. Toggle mic to normal position.
Presenter: step up to mic. On producer's cue, begin talking. Finish. Switch microphone off.
Producer: Change to View-Zoom Level-Window to trim dead time.
Producer: save as namepatrick.wav and namepatrick.mp3 in designated sound folders.
Presenter: Focus to Powerbullet. File-New. Save namepatrick into _001/activities/patrick.
Presenter: Insert-Text. Type your first name inside the text box handles. Then drag your name to the center of the workspace with the four-arrowed icon.
Presenter: select your name in the text box. Pull down Selection-Animation. Set animation speed to 1 second. Set animation type to a movement effect, such "in from left." It is not necessary to explode text on screen. Record the name of the effect for review later and revised post-prodution.
Presenter: Pull down Insert-Bullet List. Enter no more than three text bullets on separate lines.
Presenter: Enter start time of 1, delay of 0.5. Select a simple animation effect, recording its name for review and post-production.
Presenter: grab the bullet list with the four-headed arrow and move it below your name.
Presenter: Insert-Page Sound. Browse into the sound folder to find your sound file.
Presenter: File-Save.
Presenter: File-Export.
Producer: upload HTM and SWF files to Internet location.
Presenter: check resuts ict.tippinst.ie/~bgoldbach/ws/activities/patrick/ and note observations for post-production.

A Dell personal laptop project using genuine Irish pixels with Icon Forge (free for limited time, so I purchased it), Sound Forge ($395 with MP3 converter), and Powerbullet Presenter (free) conducted during the multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.
Sony Media Software -- download Sound Forge from mediasoftware.sonypictures.com/Products/ShowProduct.asp?PID=668
Powerbullet -- for a free dimension to PowerPoint and simple Flash. Get it at powerbullet.com/
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February 26, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 25, 2004

Gender computing

D2R -- Diego Doval concludes "talent for computer science seems to me to be constant regardless of gender." Diego has encountered as many high-quality women programmers than men programmers--although there are more sweaty men programming. He also sees something we are producing through the degree programme at Tipperary Institute. "In recent years ... as software (and hardware) have become more oriented towards art, social and real-world interactions, I've seen more women on that side of the fence." The best students in our multimedia degree programme have been women. The best student projects I have supervised have been completed or led by women.

Diego Doval -- "gender and computer science" with comments.
Chris Gulker doesn't like the photo above this posting. It's from Scripting News where Dave Winer explains it's perfectly acceptable photojournalism.
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February 25, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

February 24, 2004

Checklist for Crisis Communication

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- The recent accident involving a Dublin Bus that jumped the curb and injured passengers provides a timely example of the need to exercise a well-tested checklist for crisis communication.

Get out your prepared crisis plan, call together the crisis management steering committee, call in experts to help analyse and explain the crisis, and open the lines of communication.
Notify top management and refer them to the crisis plan. Give them the task of making impact projections in preparation for inquiries from employees, government agencies, and the media.
Channel all inquiries to the designated spokesperson, who was selected and trained in advance as part of the crisis planning preparation.

Liam Burke -- "Safety concerns raised before crash"
Scott Cutlip -- Effective Public Relation in the Tipperary Institute Public Relations course, part of the multimedia degree programme.
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February 22, 2004

New media jobs

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- Our monthly survey of jobs for multimedia degree graduates includes a wider range of opportunities than last month.

466. Development officer
467. e-Communications Project Officer
468. Database Officer
469. Administrative Assistant
470. Admin Co-ordinator
471. Data Analyst
472. Office Assistant
473. TV Projects Administrator
474. Press officer
475. Ad agency designer
477. Magazine designer
478. Television show researcher
479. Internal communications officer
480. Subeditor
481. Arts Co-ordinator
482. Chief subeditor
483. Readers
484. PR and events organiser
485. Media Relations Manager
486. Communications Assistant
487. Corporate Website Manager
488. Archive researcher
489. Web developer
490. Conference producer
491. Fundraising research manager
492. Events Programmer
493. Web editor
494. Journalist
495. Volunteer development manager
496. Deputy editor
497. Media relations officer
498. Technology reporter
499. PR Account manager
500. Feature writer
501. Editorial assistant
502. Information manager
503. Staff writer
504. Education assistant
505. Editor, international legal directory
506. Arts access development co-ordinator
507. PR Executive

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February 22, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Put your stuff on Times Square

CREATIVE TIME -- Günther Selichar's Who's Afraid of Blue, Red, and Green? is bundled with a Creative Time competition in which the winner will air on Times Square Astrovision. Creative Time and Panasonic are running the competition and public display. The public art project is based on the elementary visual building blocks of digital display screens. Through March 31, 2004 (in cooperation with the Landesmuseum in Linz, Austria), Selichar invites participants to design an animation derived from 15 vertical compositions in blue, red, and green. Three winning entries chosen by a jury consisting of the artist, Carl Goodman, Curator of Digital Media at the American Museum of the Moving Image; artist Erwin Redl; Christoph Thun-Hohenstein, Director, Austrian Cultural Forum Barbara Pollack, Writer and Artist; Anne Pasternak, Executive Director, Creative Time, and others, will be announced in May 2004 and featured as part of the next installment of The 59th Minute: Video Art on the Times Square Astrovision, June 27 through September 2004.

Drawing upon Barnet Newman's abstract expressionist "zip paintings" from the 1960s, a series in which Newman explored the nuanced relationship between proportion, scale, and color, Selichar invites participants to create their own digital animations in blue, red and green-the three pixel colors that serve as the foundation for all graphic representation in our video, computer, and television screens.

has competition details.
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February 22, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 20, 2004

FreeJoyce 2004

IRISH TIMES -- Mr Stephen James Joyce held a press conference in Zurich's James Joyce Pub to declare that Ireland did not deserve to host the ReJoyce 2004 event. The Joyce estate has also sent cease and desist letters to people running public readings of Joyce writings.¹ All is not lost, however. If people exploited or made preparations to exploit relevant works of James Joyce in the period 1992-1995, they are permitted to exploit those works up until 2011, when they return to the public domain. This right is decreed by Article 27.1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Those who have exploited works under the guidelines of the Declaration should contact Danis Rose² to become included in a database of information related to the release of James Joyce from copyright constraints.

¹Jamie Smyth reported on the cheeky claims of the Joyce Estate in The Irish TImes, Februry 9, 2004.
²Danis Rose, Strawberry Beds, Dublin 20, Ireland is mmlj AT eircom.net and will put people in touch with the many artists, impressarios, and others who would dearly like to make a meaningful contributions to the celebrations of James Joyce's literature.
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February 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Campus Radio

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- The Broadcasting Commission of Ireland has clear standards concerning licensed community radio. A well-run campus radio station fits that remit. And an effective campus radio is one with a sustainable, relevant, edgy voice.

There should be angles related to sponsorship because good radio needs three people in the control room to produce one half-hour segment. They need sustenance. The main sponsor (the college) gets a tagline but real money comes from bigger pockets.
And royalties for songs need to be paid.
I would prefer that campus radio laced into academics. Specifically, the radio voices should interview guest speakers who archive to CD and internal streaming services.
It must have Web roots and grow a demographic.
It must have a by-product like Today FM's "Gift Grub."
It must spawn a quirky blog as a way of testing pent-up interest in topics like "In my fridge," "Survival Tips," "Liggers Listings," "News you can use," and other themes deserving routine programming .
Its name should roll off the tongue like KTIR (pronounced "cater" for Tipp Inst Radio or CRIT-FM).
It should be set up like an association and registered with formal articles of association.

There are several very competent sitting room DJs out there who might agree to be shadow advocates. With the right kind of planning, we would have their support from the get-go.

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February 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

February 19, 2004

Down and out

CRAPHOUND -- In early 2003, Cory Doctorow released his first novel Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom as an experiment in what would happen if he relinquished full control of his copyright by using one of the Creative Commons licenses. Doctorow explains what happened.

I chose the most restrictive CC license available to me, staying cautious, and I waited to see if the sky would fall.
It didn't.
So here we are, just a little over a year later, on a stage at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference, delivering a talk called Ebooks: Neither E. Nor Books, in which I lay out the case for what I've done and explain the myriad ways in which the sky has not fallen on me.

Doctorow has relicensed Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom under terms of one of the least restrictive Creative Commons licenses (Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike) which explicitly allows anyone in the world to make any non-commercial adaptation of his book. In our Writing Skills course, we will examine the prospects: translations, radio scripts, movies, fanfic. Then we will tell him what we've done.

Cory Doctorow -- "Down and Out relicensed today"
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February 19, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 18, 2004

Spring Examinations

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- It must be time for spring exams in the States as well as here in Ireland. My second year students (shown at right) are stressing out about them. I'm also being hit with search engine requests for "examination answers." When I mentioned this to my third year students, one asked, "Can we make money from that?" Good question. I'll set a series of "Revision Notes" baldly wrapped in a title called "Examination Answers" to attract the lemmings who save their studying to the very last minute.

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February 18, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 17, 2004

Students with a Union Message

CUTLIP -- While combing through essays about public relations and labour unions¹, we have found tactics that could be used in a student union initiative.² A student union could articulate a point of view to college management concerning Internet access. The message might come on the heels of the "Net Freedom Challenge" issued by FCC Chairman Michael Powell to broadband Internet providers in America. Powell believes specific four "Internet Freedoms" must be preserved.

Freedom to Access Content. In a student perspecitve, that means students should be able to access to their choice of legal content.
Freedom to Use Applications. Students should be able to run applications of their choice.
Freedom to Attach Personal Devices. Students should be permitted to attach any devices they choose to their desktop connections.
Freedom to Obtain Service Information. Students should be able to see their electronic footprints.(This point modifies Powell's original idea on "service plans.")

¹Scott Cutlip -- Effective Public Relations ISBN 0135412110
²Student "unions" generally get together to achieve package pricing but there is an equally potent purpose of a student union--to articulate requirements and to advocate levels of support for students. Well-defined Internet freedoms could enhance the learning environment.
Jeff Pulver -- "The Powell Challenge: Adopt Net Freedom Principles
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February 17, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Is Utopia Quiet

WIRED -- As John Geirland explains in Wired¹, a unique combination of geography and legislation has rendered 13,000 square miles of rustic communities and mountainous terrain free of the emissions from the electromagnetic spectrum. It's a utopian dreamland for those opposed to mobile phone masts. It's a federally mandated Quiet Zone surrounding the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope, a 485-foot, 17 million-pound structure that emerges improbably from a remote valley in Pocahantas County, West Virginia (population 8,996). Astronomers here observe the universe by studying faint radio waves emitted by stars, evaporating comets and distant galaxies.

¹John Geirland -- "[The Quiet Zone] in Wired, February 2004.
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February 17, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 16, 2004

James Joyce Estate Restrains Bloomsday

IRISH TIMES -- The Joyce estate has informed the Irish government that it intends to sue for copyright infringement if there are any public readings of Joyce's works during the festival commemorating the 100th anniversary of Bloomsday this June. This kind of action continues to restrain public works.

As Andrew O Baoill explains, "James Joyce died in 1941 and the copyright in his work expired in 1991. Then the EU extended terms to life+70 years, and the work went back into copyright in July 1995. The estate has been very active in enforcing their copyright, suing regularly. While some of their actions have been aimed at issues such as protecting the memory of Joyce's daughter Lucia from scrutiny, other suits have been against non-commercial uses of the works by fans. As such, they seem solely concerned with the financial health of the estate [admittedly one of their roles] having no concern for nurturing the greater cultural legacy of Joyce."

Andrew O Baoill -- "Actions of Joyce estate highlight problems with copyright law"
Irish Times -- Joyce estate constrains Bloomsday
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February 16, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Utopian World Championship

TEMPLE BAR -- Job Brunberg filled an entire wall with a map in Temple Bar Gallery and Studios for the Utopian World Champtionship. This is "a worldwide competition in visionary thinking." Deadline for entry: 10 March 2004. Prize: EUR 1000.

The essay contest involves submitting a proposal to the SOC.Stockholm website. Members of the public and a panel of professionals judge the essays. Winning essays are delivered to heads of state and NGOs all over the world.

The Temple Bar exhibition includes samples of essays. We are examining concepts of utopia and ubiquity to see if the two can be linked in a futuristic vision.

Vodafone -- "Vision of the future"
Irish Typepad -- "Workplace of the Future"
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February 16, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 14, 2004

Three Reasons why the broadcast flag won't work

WIRED -- The broadcast flag--an FCC-ordered copy protection scheme for digital TV tuners--will be built into consumer electronic starting July 2005. There are three reasons why this will not work.

More than ¾ of pirated films online are leaked by industry insiders prior to their theatrical release. They are compromised before being flagged.
There is a thriving market for pre-flag tuner cards for PCs. These defeat the broadcast flag.
"The real threat is mission creep," says Boutin. "It could kill unforeseen new markets. If a broadcast flag had kept VCRs from recording TV shows 20 years ago, would Blockbuster exist today?"

Paul Boutin -- "Why the broadcast flag won't work" in Wired Cheat Sheet, February 2004
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February 14, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Pocket Gigs

MBITES -- I carry a gigabyte of memory in my pocket now because I need total synchronicity of my class notes, student blog items, and current play list. Multimedia students need to think about doing this too, instead of lugging around overpacked lever arch files. Twenty years ago, I carried an entire week's work on a 5¼" floppy along with another 5¼" floppy containing the program to print and edit the work. Things have changed. Software comes bloated with features and software companies face the threat of commoditisation. It's the hardware sector--particularly the storage sector--that intrigues me.

As Mike Butcher points out¹, the "storage sector is revitalising all sorts of other areas."

Toshiba launched an 0.85-inch hard drive "designed to be incorporated inside the new generation of mobile phones. Tosh aims to replace the more expensive and lower capacity flash memory in handheld computers and mobile phones." Their drives will hold up to 4GB in your pocket.²
Sony told me the NetMD I got in December will be eclipsed by a new format that expands the recording capacity of Sony MDs to 45 hours. That's using an on-board 1GB HDD.
One of the most commonly searched phrases here is for the 1GB San disk. People want high-capacity memory on their PDAs because they're leveraging them in many different applications.
My Writing Skills students have gone intertextually megapixel, effectively forcing me to cut a new CD containing their snaps of our classroom culture. My three-year old 10GB laptop needs more space.
Every student buying a Digital Still Camera knows the importance of removeable media and the high value-fot-money of Compact Flash. Prices of 256MB CF cards decrease annually--good to buy equipment that works with that flavour of storage.
My Sony Clié PEG UX-50 needs Memory Stick Pro cards. They're pricey. But if I used them with the Sony DSC-F828 Cyber-Shot camera, I could snap, remove images by card from the camera, insert the card to the Clié and upload to the Web over a free Wi-Fi node. I like that convenient convergence.

All of these new options happen because of clever storage in my pocket.

¹Mike Butcher -- "Memory capacity sparks a technical revolution" in The Irish Times, January 23, 2004
²IDC says over 250m mini hard drives will ship in 2004.
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February 14, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 13, 2004

Killing penmanship

WIRED -- Is the keyboard killing penmanship?

Rich Gioscia, Director of design, Palm One: "I can see that happening. I'm not sure time spent typing literally deteriorates the muscle memory of handwriting--the skill appears to be like bicycle riding, learned and never forgotten. But the speed of typing leads to a sense of urgency, of rushing things. It may even get worse when we have things like voice recognition and speech-to-text input at our disposal."
Lisa Marnell, Director, Handwriting Help: "Fourth and fifth grade kids are learning keyboarding when they would've been honing cursive writing, which is much faster than block printing. Note-taking becomes extremely unpleasant if they go off to a high school with just two or three computers per classroom. Also, many younger kids are starting school without the hand strength they need to write well--holding a mouse or playing with a Game Boy simply doesn't develop fine motor skills."
Edward Tenner, Author, Our own devices: "Much everyday 19th-century handwriting was bad. But people had clerks who wrote in standardised scripts, or they did so themselves when necessary. Contemporary cursive tends to be all draft mode except on formal occasions, often delegated to calligraphers. Laser-printed uniformity has become meaningless because it can be achieved so cheaply. Today's recipient cares less that a personal note is half-legible than that it has been handwritten at all."

Aaron Piland -- Wired View February 2004
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February 13, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Site-specific collaboration

ARTWEEK -- I hope to help create a site-specific installation with the input of spectators as the primary part of the spectacle. The exhibition will serve images at the beck and call of text. It will be possible only through interdisciplinary collaboration and depend upon wireless data services to work. I haven't labeled this as "performance art" but comments from Jacki Apple suggests it is.

Jacki Apple -- "Art at the barricades," Artweek, 21.3
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February 13, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

The Performance as Art

TEMPLE BAR -- In 1913, Marcel Duchamp posited that the artist was one who selects material or experience for aesthetic consideration rather than forming something from the traditional raw materials of art. This eventually led to a consideration of real-life activities as art. David Hockney displayed photomontages that called attention in their works to the process of creation and perception. By the early 1970s, such work became known as "body art" and "performance art." Students in my new media courses have started documenting the incubation of ideas, from rough sketch to text descriptions to digital pen and ink. For those who are producing real artefacts, we could set down an argument that they are engaged in the process of performance art.

Marvin Colson -- Performance Art ISBN 041513703
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February 13, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 12, 2004

Five Year Mementos

CLONMEL -- Our hallways are filled with photographs framed and displayed by the second year multimedia degree students. Some of the displays merit remembering as five year mementos and deserve a place on the Web in perpetuity. The display is in the main hall, Tipperary Institute, Cashel Court, Clonmel, County Tipperary, Ireland.

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February 12, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Logo competition for PR

CLONMEL -- PR professionals often recommend low-cost methods of increasing the reach of a brand. One technique could be to launch a logo competition. These competitions often appear on Creative Ireland, even before the names of companies are formally registered with companies offices or domain registrars. That tactic helps weed out possible conflicts in the proper registration of a trading mark.

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February 12, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 10, 2004

Civic elements of classroom culture

CLONMEL -- During my third level multimedia classes as well as during my graduate work in visual arts practises, I often wonder how much of our class dynamic borrows elements of a town hall meeting? The worthwhile classroom sessions are lively and revealing, just like you would expect from a public gallery interacting with the elected members of a town council.

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February 10, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 09, 2004

Communicating in Utopia

CLONMEL -- I wonder about communication channels in Utopia. Are they open and free-flowing? Are they low-cost and easily affordable? Are they regulated for the common good?

Every communication channel should be considered an auxiliary to, or an amplification of, our intelligence. Paul Levinson would concur.

From speech itself to its early expressions in writing in various forms and mechanizations, through the revolution in photo-chemical reproduction of images and electronic transmission of information beginning in the 19th century and proceeding through the personal computer and all of its links and possibilities on our verge of the 21st century, each and every mode of communication has served as an amanuensis of the human brain, a third, extended hand for helping its dreams come true, for shaping its thoughts and launching them out and far and deep into the world where they can have the most impact.

When pundits think about the future, they often take pages from science fiction. Vodafone and DoCoMo might be doing the same as they write their visions of 2010. But the 21st century realm of possibilities also includes many low-cost implementations of technology, such as community Wi-Fi hotspots. These unlicensed communications nodes could beome as ubiquitous and expected as street lighting in the 20th century.

But technology alone does not a Utopia make.Community members must use the new-found mechanisms. In London of the mid-1800s, a late-night walking routine developed affecting all social classes where before people stayed indoors after sunset. Restaurants expanded their evening fare. Pavements and streets became part of the social fabric, day and night. I wonder what would happen if those same streets were lighted by communuty Wi-Fi? Without expensive subscription costs, would people increase their frequency of communicating with family and friends? Would this kind of freedom in communications be a requisite part of Utopia?

Irish Typepad -- "workplace of future"
Vodafone's vision of the future
DoCoMo's 2010 vision
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February 9, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 08, 2004

IT censors Chinese dissidents

AMNESTY -- Matthew Magee¹ draws attention to an Amnesty International report about 54 jailed dissidents in China, imprisoned after the government used IT from Microsoft, Sun, Nortel and Cisco to discover ways the dissidents were circumventing censorship. The large IT companies are unphased, saying it's up to customer to use the kit as they see fit. That sidestep would be indefensible in the conduct of US defense departments and it would not satisfy terms of US export licenses. Turning a blin d eye can get people killed.²

¹Matthew Magee -- "IT runs into human rights row" in The Sunday Tribune, February 8, 2004
²Kenneth Wong, Professor of Business Ethics at University of Pacific says, "Ignorance is no excuse."
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February 8, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Globalism's Dirty Side

SUNDAY TIMES -- Nineteen Chinese workers who were swept to their deaths while picking cockles in Morcecambe Bay, England, were being paid just £1 each for nine hours of work each day. Detectives said the scale of the exploitation of the immigrant workers was "appalling" and revealed they were closing in on the gangmasters suspected of sending the immigrants to their deaths. The tragedy has highlighted the plight of illegal immigrants who work in the black economy.

Jon Ungoed-Thomas -- "Drowned cockle pickers were paid just £1 a day" in The Sunday Times, February 8, 2004
Felicity Lawrence -- "Victims of the sands and the snakeheads" on the front page of The Guardian, February 7, 2004
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February 8, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Janet Jackson's Breast

KILKENNY -- My referrer logs suggest that "Janet Jackson's breast" is the most commonly searched term, perhaps on the Internet for 2004. The singer accidentally flashed TV viewers during the Superbowl. Count it as a wardrobe mallfunction. For the record, the football action was better than the halftime stage antics. Having written these things, I know this single blog item will attract more comment spammers than anything I have ever written--and all without any evidence of frontal nudity.

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February 8, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 07, 2004

Chain letters online

KILKENNY -- I have started getting chain letters about Irish as an official EU language and those e-mails often reveal more than the authors intend.

I got 37 valid e-mail addresses that a spammer could use to target people interested in the Irish culture. So if I was not the intended addressee of the chain letter, I could harvest and sell the addresses. The senders could have prevented this misuse by transmitting the message to BCC recipients.
One of the chain letter gang has named some of his correspondents with interesting nics, including Cocko, Disco, Double doves & herbs, Face, Figgs, Get em Hanni, Ghost, Gorgeous Hugh, Kloset Kay, Kelly Thong, Little Bear, Mossy the liver, Pablos Burrito, Papi-yon, and Wee Man.
The chain letter conscientiously maintained the five different footers from previous senders, all advising me that the "message is for the named person's use only." I don 't think they would mind me sharing in this forum.
Three footers warned me that I "may not copy or deliver this message to anyone." I think I'm alright there as I am not divulging the whole message. Specifically, I have omitted the action step.
All five senders advised me to contact them if I had recieved the message in error.
One company's footer says I was not allowed to read the e-mail that was written above the disclaimer. "Please note that any review, dissemination, disclosure, alteration, printing, copying or further transmission of this e-mail is prohibited and may be unlawful." Like it isn't unlawful to spam me.
The Vodafone footer was more helpful than most, naming all the directors, perhaps so I could let them know an e-mail from their company landed erroneously in my mailbox.
DFS-Dexia-BIL did not "accept legal responsibility" in its footer, pointing out that because "it is possible for data transmitted by email to be deliberately or accidentally corrupted or intercepted ... DFS-Dexia-BIL does not accept any responsibility for any breach which may arise through the use of this medium."
Carlow County Council was the only mail server to thank me in its footer. Four other councils were not as polite.

For a moment, I wondered if I am entitled to spam back in return for the forward behaviour of the spammers. No, I don't think so. If anything, they would take my spam as an endorsement of the chain letter process.

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February 7, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 05, 2004

Scanning, scripting, sketching

TEMPLE BAR -- In the Writing Skills class that I teach, we have briefly touched on the distinctions between a scan of materials, a finished script for performers, and a sketch of finished illustrations. All three tasks come into sharper focus as we use our journals to appreciate the nature and function of notation. This is an on-going task, one marked with deliverables in our multimedia degree programme.

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February 5, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Brain-hand-page

TEMPLE BAR -- Nothing pulls me into a biographical hunt more than the desire to see the artist who sketched a drawing. Good drawings provoke tantalising questions of authorship. Ann Temkin says, "Drawings have generally been regarded as the work most intimately connected to artists, documents affording special insight into their styles and intentions. With a drawing, the brain-hand-page connection seems far more immediate than the sequence of steps involved in making a painting or a sculpture: the inference, right or wrong, is that the graphic record on the page transcribes what is on the artist's mind."

Drawings belong in journals, as part of the confessional undercurrent of those works. Like a guilty sinner, drawings talk as if they were part of a running commentary. But sometimes the reader has to work to ascertain the direction or source of the tone of voice accompanying the drawing. These qualities inject an element of interactivity in good drawings.

Ann Temkin -- "What's better science than creating me?"
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Keys up front

CLONMEL -- The latest multimedia computers on the market and in our classrooms have their USB connections up front. It's a mark of the 21st century office, as much as flat screen monitors make better use of the space. With a little planning, students can carry all their data in their pockets, thanks to Flash memory keys. They weigh less than an ounce and the mid-range one store up to 256MB of files, normally enough for an entire first year and enough for separate keys for sepaprate projects later on. They are USB 2.0 compliant which means they feel as fast as a CD. The best ones as slim so you can manage with two side-by-side in USB ports. Just drag, drop, and go. This convenience saves time and prevents data loss. I hope to see memory keys in student bookstores everywhere and dangling as fashion accessories too.

SanDisk -- Cruzer
A watch list item in the Writing Skills course on the multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.
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February 5, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

February 03, 2004

PR and bizjets

WESTON -- Peer over the wall at Weston Airport, a satellite airport located inside the Dublin Airport traffic area, and you see paved aprons where peacock cages used to be. Portacabins stand where bushy trees used to harbour the birds and compact aluminium fuselages have replaced the feathered species. Some of these changes occurred when Jim Mansfield commissioned upgrades to taxiways and runways so that his Weston airport could handle an influx of business jets during Ireland's time in the EU Presidency. It appears some major enhancements happened without any consultation with local authorities. Those in the business planes would question the need for government involvement anyway. Such is the way real pilots think--they sort out their problems in a straight a line as possible and if they're smooth, those behind never know anything has changed.

But in the realm where corporate aviation intersects politics, predictable battlelines are drawn. Journalists normally view business jets with disdain, equating them with largesse. Bean counters do the sums and see the enormous cost of flying the air miles in a business jet, especially when compared to a Ryanair mile on the same route. So a government PR specialist has a tough challenge when trying to "sell" business jet travel for politicians as an essential task of government.

I wonder.

What three major goals does the Irish government public relations programme hope to attain with its handling of recurring questions concerning the government business jet?
What barriers to effective public relations in government are related to use of business jet?
What kinds of advantages are synonymous with the use of satellite airports?

We discuss these ideas as part of our public relations course in the multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.

Scott Cutlip and Allen Center -- "Government and Politics" in Effective Public Relations ISBN 0135412110
Aerial Advertising -- "Where to fly Eire"
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February 3, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 02, 2004

The Soft Edge

KILKENNY -- Communications media make a big difference in our lives, much more than broadband affects education. Paul Levinson calls it The Soft Edge¹ because information is intangible, pervasive and powerful. And Levinson believes, "for those unaware of the power of media, the edge can also be a precipice."

¹Paul Levinson -- The Soft Edge, 1997
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February 2, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Only the A-List says it is so

KILKENNY -- Local newspaper accounts refer to events in the county dating back 800 years ago. We know these things because they are recorded in writing. We take them as fact when they are placed under the text banner of an authority. That's the way things go in the blogging world too. If an A-lister writes about it, then it is so.

McLuhan¹ explored considerable details about oral cultures and the mythical quality of its most important communications. What is spoken and heard, but unseen, acquires larger-than-life qualities when telling (spinning) the story to another audience. In contrast, written communiques fix information in discrete, readily accessible and easily disseminated units.

We know from Viking artifacts discovered at L'Anse Aux Meadows in Newfoundland that Europens landed in the New World around 500 years before Columbus. And yet word of this event set off no Age of Discovery. Part of the reason stems from the reality of Europe in 1000 AD. The kingdoms of the time had none of the social, technological or scientific capabilities to mount an epoch of discovery and settlement across the Atlantic.

But perhaps the major reason nothing kicked off was because the A-list simply did not take up the meme. The Norse discoveries were couched in oral sagas and were dismissed as folklore by those in other cultures.

After Columbus returned to Europe, the printing press carried his story,² fixed with the seal of Queen Isabella, an ultimate A-lister. It spun around the blogosphere of the day, its eight pages becoming a best seller in 1493. Three Latin editions were printed in Rome. Six different editions in Paris, Basle and Antwerp in 1493-1494, a Tuscan edition in Rome in 1493, two more editions in Florence that same year, a German translation in 1497, and several Spanish editions were also printed during this time.

¹Marshall McLuhan -- The Gutenberg Galaxy, 1962.
²Samuel Eliot Masterson -- Admiral of the Ocean Sea, 1942
Paul Levinson -- "Printed Authorship of the Modern World" in The Soft Edge, 1997.
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February 2, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

All Superbowl ads on single page

IFILM -- Check out all the advertisements aired for Superbowl 2004.

Via Dave Winer
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February 2, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Fuji S602Z Macro

FUJI -- Selecting Macro mode on the Fujifilm FinePix S602Z and S7000 camera allows you to take close-up shots each time you press the button with the tulip icon. Shooting distances vary.

In Macro Mode, you can shoot from 10 cm to 80 cm (3.9 inches to 2.6 feet).
Shooting with flash, you can do macro photography from 30 cm to 80 cm (between 1.0 feet and 2.6 feet).
The optical zoom focal length is approximately 35mm to 80mm.
Although we do not use Super Macro with the Fuji S602Z in the classroom, it is effective from 1 cm to 20 cm when using a tripod.

Info from the Fujifilm FinePix S602Z camera manual. The Finepix S602Z is often used in place of a scanner in the Tipperary Institute Multimedia Degree programme.
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February 2, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Watch Lists

CLONMEL -- Before scratching out a public message, it's often worthwhile to watch the comments of others. This can be automated through the smart use of watch lists. My watch lists follow themes like privacy, open source software, copyright, and Irish artists. I listen to discussion lists, set RSS newsfeeds on trusted sources and then review the process regularly.

Several pertinent watch lists integrate to our multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.

Broadband: setting up to leverage high-speed always-on Internet access
Best practise in Wi-Fi use, including initiatives for mesh networks, high gain parabolic antennas, and community wireless systems (i.e., TSSG and StockholmOpen)
Respecting historical sites in Ireland (i.e., Carrickmines, Archeire perspectives)
Electronic voting
Integrating accession states into the European Union
working with high visibility in web search engines
Mobile porn
Visiting the best of Ireland
St Patrick's Day in Ireland
Christmas in Ireland
Copyright in the new media era, including Creative Commons copyright protections
Removeable storage media
Wireless Internet access
Nominating messages that effectively advocate choosing IT as a third level option (advertising, marketing, industry initiatives and links)
Obsolete technologies
Essential equipment for the mobile worker

Ariana Huffington -- It's more about managing time, not managing information.
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February 2, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 01, 2004

Web Radio DJ

SUNDAY TIMES -- Most of my new media students think they can be a better DJ than whoever they are listening to on the radio. Leo Currie a 25-year old mature student from Glasgow, offers some tips.

Create a clear identity for your web radio station, so your audience will know what to expect.
Make it sound like radio, rather than another MP3 jukebox, by involving other people. The more voices you have, the bigger your station sounds. Buy the best microphone you can afford.
Operate 24/7, even if only by looping one show.
Keep records of what you play, as listeners often inquire about specific tracks. You can automate this if your MP3 files are properly tagged.
Stay legal by making sure you pay the appropriate copyright fees. Seek written authorisation from any unsigned bands you play.

More info:

Shoutcast and Live365 have instructions about setting up amateur radio, with forums.
OtsDJ and SAM2 give you greater control over cueing, mixing songs, and manging huge playlists. Use the tools and sound more professional.
Do Something automatically updates webites whenever a song changes.
MCPS issues umbrella licences reflecting context and audience.

Alex Pell -- "so you want to be a radio DJ?" in The Sunday Times Doors, 1 Feb 04
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February 1, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Students need Wi-Fi

KILKENNY -- I have seen laptops with Centrino chipsets in student backpacks. These students need Wi-Fi access.

Using a laptop over a wireless network increase study time because those students receive greater access to lecture notes, applications and Moodle.
Dead time in canteen settings can become connected time for revision. Students often go to common seating areas when other areas are saturated.
Hot desking becomes a matter of finding a place to sit--even on the floor in a Wi-Fi hotspot.

Students don't need a full complement of services. Normally, Internet access and mail services will suffice.

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January 31, 2004

Semesterising education

UCD -- Kieran McGowan, UCD's new chairman, wants to stoke the development of human capital in Ireland's knowledge economy by semesterising the University College Dublin no later than September 2005. This should be a mandate for all third level institutions in Ireland. Semesterisation revolves around modular courses. The more the modules are offered, the greater the opportunity to cross-feed across modules. Students in one degree programme could dive into modules offered in another track. This would greatly enhance the well-rounded nature of third level graduates. It would appeal to those who cannot timetable themselves into a full-time programme. It would open up the real possibility of a summer term. These advantages deliver more value for money and suggest why McGowan recognises the immediacy of semesterisation.

Dominic Coyle -- "Ex-IDA man to shake up business at UCD" on the back page of The Irish Times, 30 Jan 04
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January 30, 2004

In conversation with Gavin Delahunty

TEMPLE BAR -- Gavin Delahunty feels art acquires its existence in part by critical discourse. You might expect that would be his perspective because he is an art critic. Gavin sits on a Masters Degree Visual Arts Practises course with me where we have seen critical judgment voided by curatorial organisational skills. Said another way, modern curators have direct access to the culture industry. They don't really need art critics to write their stuff or open doors for them. On top of that, most curators are very astute judges of quality. My experience in Ireland is that a well-run gallery has a high-level art connoisseur behind the desk. That curator brings interesting exhibitions to the gallery space, some which could serve as quality investments.

I am a little startled by how art critics seem to be on the path to obsolence. From my perspective, it's the curators with the clout and the critics hope to catch the crumbs off the reception tables during assorted openings around the country. About the only way a critic will jump aboard the high-art train is by bringing a name into the mix (perhaps a well-heeled commercial interest) or by integrating an articulate transdisciplinary approach to criticism.

I know there is a valid role for criticism in the classroom. It's important to know that effective criticism performs a discursive function. Traditionally, its function has been to judge or to parse. The manner in which questions are raised among members in a class is vitally important. Then the manner in which the questions are handled gives criticism its legitimacy. The critical language used should engage and inform, not alienate and confuse. And the same standard applies to critical writing.

Conversations with Gavin Delahunty incorporate memes from October, the magazine and book series focusing critical attention on the contemporary arts and their various contexts of interpretation: film, painting, music, photography,performance, sculpture, literature. Google finds 340 citations for "round table of art criticism"
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January 30, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 29, 2004

In conversation with Michael Kiely

CLONMEL -- While reviewing plans for new academic space, I talked about how we should mark out the function of the studio. I think proper studios are discursive space. They are places to discuss, debate, and challenge. As Mick Wilson explains it, "the studio is a highly socialised space. As well as a space that is contested in terms of its value, meaning and role, it can also be an arena in which the contests of opinions are acted out." The Clonmel multimedia production room has evolved into this function already, much to the chagrin of some facilities managers.

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January 29, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Wireless Journal TOC

CLONMEL -- Unless you have a way of keeping, archiving, and finding notes, your journaling is flawed. One tactic that could help impose order is to use a table of contents in an otherwise free-form journal.

0. Listing of "markers" and "pages removed".
00. Description of markers and pages removed.
i0Table of contents.
iAnnotated TOC.
Raw notes. Page >0 to page >3.
Events Page e0 and page e1.
Nuggets Page n0 to page n3.
Journal items Page 0 to approx p115.
Prime Topics Pages c0 to c13.
Factoids Pages d0 to d3.
Facts Pages f0 to f3.
Greenthoughts Pages g0 to g13.
Knowledge Objects Pages L0 to L7.
Time Out. Pages T0 to T5.
Wish List Pages w0 to w5.
Resources Pages r0 to r3.
Publications Pages p0 to p3.
Index Pages x0 to x4.
Keywords. X4.

Book Factory -- custom journals
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Part of the multimedia degree programme in Tipperary Institute.

January 29, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 28, 2004

Art for Young People

YOUTH ARTS -- There is a European project "looking for an artist who has specialist knowledge of new media, particularly anything relating to distance communication between people (things like blogging, discussion boards, video conferencing, texting) in real time. The artist (or even a techie) would lead a project involving collaborating with a group of young people based in various European countries to develop a piece of art work for launch in Dublin at the end of April. This is a weekly contract and involves weekly contact with the group via Internet technologies during March and April and one week on-site in Dublin in the last week of April.

The art work is based on the event of EU Enlargement, and involves young people from countries who are joining the EU, as well as those already part of it. The artist would have to work with them in a collaborative way to define a focus based on this theme and use raw material generated by each person to generate a final collaborative art piece.

The raw material contributed by each individual could include photographs and/or drawing, text, sound, but nothing too high tech, as not all of them will have access to any specialised equipment. The idea is that most of the conceptual and creative work would be done online, with the final outcome brought together in the week that the group will spend in Dublin.

If interested, contact Margo Kenny in the National Youth Arts Programme.

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January 28, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Stepping up to multimedia degree

CLONMEL -- After two years of grinding out progress towards a multimedia degree, some seasoned students offer their tips for success. And several second level schools are reading their suggestions. The end result should mean a higher qualification level entering our multimedia programme next year.

Kathy Foley suggests several fundamantal skills.
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January 28, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Journaling Now

CLONMEL -- Those who complain about being relegated to unstimulating environs often fail to see the joys of the moment around them. Simple journaling skills help combat this problem. You can convert jail time into a novel, turn a boring queue into a news item or time-filling rough sketches into a valuable diary. Keeping a written journal helps nurture the disciplines of observation, recording, distillation, writing, editing, publication, and syndication. We approach all of these tasks in the Writing Skills course taught in the multimedia degree programme in Tipperary Institute.¹ Items recorded in these "wireless notebooks" form part of classroom assignment materials. The notebooks also serve as raw sample of work in progress by providing a freeze frame of eureka moments, significant emtional events and extensible threads of discussion.

It starts with a hard-back A5 copybook, its pages secured by an elastic strap. The strap keeps items like pens, CDs or floppies from falling out. Specific sections marked in the book help the process take on scientific principles.

Inside front cover. Double-truck (two) blank unlined pages to hold a cover image. The very bottom of the back of the front cover should contain the name, phone and e-mail address of the book's author.
0 - 00. Page 0 names the "markers" and "pages removed" from the journal. Page 00 might describe these pages.
i0 and i. Page i0 is a table of contents. Page i annotates the listing.
Raw notes. As you wish from page >0 to page >3.
Events listed or clipped into page e0 and page e1.
Nuggets are normally pull quotes, captions, sound bites or subheadlines, placed in page n0 to page n3.
The Journal items start on page 0 and run on consecutively numbered pages, normally up to 115 pages in total.
- Pages are numbered on front and back.
- Attributions should accompany all content. If it's not original, it needs an attribution.
- Pages not for public dissemination should be annotated in bold at the bottom with the reserved term "classified."
- If a page forms part of an online conversation, it should carry an appropriate URL at the top of the page.
- Significant events or exceptionally notable items should be annoted with the term "marker" at the top of the page.
- "Eureka moments" should be circled on the page and annotated as such.
Prime Topics are important focal points of coursework, critical tasks, or collaborative work worth distilling for follow-up. They sit on purple-banded pages numbered c0 to c13.
Factoids are forecasts, projections, and speculations, tracked from blue-banded pages d0 to d3.
Facts are substantive and true, tracked on blue pages f0 to f3.
Greenthoughts are items notable for their composition, framing, or originality. They are placed in the green-banded pages, numbered g0 to g13. Many students clip advertisements and photos for placement here.
Knowledge Objects guide your academic work. They are items worth learning and are noted in the pink-banded pages L0 to L7. Page L0 is reserved for "referrers" and page L1 for "referrents" as part of the lecture on "Search Engine Strategies."
Time Out. List your fancied destinations or activites in the orange-banded pages T0 to T5.
Wish List follows in the orange-banded pages w0 to w5.
Resources, primarily URIs of helpful content, sit on blue-banded pages r0 to r3.
Publications worth reading, essential textbooks worth buying, general interest books that attract your interest on pages p0 to p3.
Index sits at the back of the book. Page x0 is a listing of the deliverables you dispatched for payment or assessment. Pages x1 to x3 should be references to your original work, named essays, assignments scored by assessors, URLs of content you created. Page x4 is a listing of keywords, where the letters H and I, P and Q, U and V, W and X are combined to share lines.

¹Tipperary Institute provides writing students with A5 copybooks as part of the Writing Skills course.
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January 28, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 27, 2004

Creative Commons Ireland

CREATIVE COMMONS -- As spotted by Justin Mason, Creative Commons is working with University College Cork on porting the Creative Commons licenses to Ireland. The iCommons Ireland List is lead by Dr. Darius Whelan, College Lecturer, UCC Law Faculty and Louise Crowley, College Lecturer, UCC Law Faculty. Larry Lessig would be proud.

Creative Commons Ireland -- Join the mailing list
Justin Mason -- Software Prole. Probably better than Jameson Disilled Content.
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January 27, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Social software and the governed

CLONMEL -- Disaffected Irish citizens use social software such as electronic discussion lists, mailing lists, and blogs to express opinions. Sometimes it is difficult to know whether these electronic instruments affect the national agenda. There is a lot of talk in America about social software failing to sway the vote in the favour of Howard Dean during the Democratic Presidential primary.

Howard Dean, whose campaign made the earliest and best use of social sofware, did remarkably poorly in the opening round, coming in a distant third to two people he was expected to beat.

Clay Shirky wonders, "Did the use of tools to gather the like-minded create an environment where the faithful were more like Dean believers than Dean supporters, when support (and particularly votes) is what he needed?"

Dean did poorly because not enough people voted for him, and the usual explanations -- potential voters changed their minds because of his character or whatever -- seem inadequate to explain the Iowa results. What I wonder is whether Dean has accidentally created a movement (where what counts is believing) instead of a campaign (where what counts is voting.)
And (if that's true) I wonder if his use of social software helped create that problem.

It is hard to demand results from software alone. Good software tops off good underlying processs. Using mailing lists and discussion boards to affect political change in Ireland has always been challenging. Shirky explains why.

Participation in online communities often provides a sense of satisfaction that actually dampens a willingness to interact with the real world. When you're communing with like-minded souls, you feel like you're accomplishing something by arguing out the smallest details of your perfect future world, while the imperfect and actual world takes no notice, as is its custom.
There are many reasons for this, but the main one seems to be that the pleasures of life online are precisely the way they provide a respite from the vagaries of the real world. Both the way the online environment flattens interaction and the way everything gets arranged for the convenience of the user makes the threshold between talking about changing the world and changing the world even steeper than usual.

I search out communities that respect flat hierarchies as a result of this. I have little patience for organisations who pigeonhole their staff into cubicles marked by job titles and desks weighed down by fat manuals detailing procedures.

Shirky thinks careful use of social software by a well-oiled campaign will produce results because they would complement the "Get out the Vote" efforts.

Clay Shirky -- "Networks, Economics & Culture"
Social Software weblog -- "Is social software bad for the Dean campaign?"
MeetUp -- MeetUp by using software
Margaret McGaley -- Irish e-voting discussion list and forum
Boards.ie -- electronic fora for community activists
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January 27, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 26, 2004

Phone porn

CLONMEL -- Students learning how to produce multimedia content for mobile phones also learn issues related to controlling the type of content on multimedia phones in the hands of young customers

Niall Murphy from The Irish Examiner: "Three Dublin students were suspended from seecond-level schools last year for sending pornographic images from their phones."
Emer Ní Chuagáin, Union of Secondary Students President: "Mobile phones are personal property. Schools and parents shouldn't assume all children are using phones for the wrong reasons."
Barbara Johnson from the National Congress of Catholic Secondry School Parent Associations: "Parents have a responsibility to keep children safe from prosecution."
Stephen Flanagan from The Irish Examiner interviewed students who thought "it is her own falt for letting her picture be taken."²
Michael Brennan from The Irish Examiner: "Minister for Children Brian Lenihan has directed the Internet Advisory Board to address the issue at its meeting next month."³
Irish Senator Terry Leyden: "The picture phone is a tremendous innovation and great use can be made of it, but the abuse being highlighted in The Irish Examiner is just an example of what is going on at the moment."
Niamh Nolan from The Irish Examiner: "Mobile phone operators will give an 18 classification to websites featuring online gambling, gaming or adult material."
Dan Buckley from The Irish Examiner: "Technology now allows images to be distributed so fast that no human force could stop it." No code can protect users either from messages sent from user to user or from material available on the Internet, now accessible through multimedia phones.
Matthew Magee, Sunday Tribune journalist: "O2 Ireland are developing a special mobile phone for use by under-18s. The handset will not be able to snd or receive multimdia messages.
Johanna Cassels of O2: "It is extremely difficult to regulatee content by checking flesh tones without blocking baby pictures or holiday makers on a beach,"
Malachy Murphy of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties: "It is a problem when you permit a private organisation to decide what content is available to people under 18."
Joan Keating, chair of the Irish Cellular Industry Association: "Users of pre-paid phones will find access to adult services unless they register their phone with the operator and prove they are over 18."
Steve Bartholomew from O2 UK: "We have an obligation to give parents the peace of mind that safeguards are in place to protect children."
Gearóid Ó Maoilmhichíl, child protection co-ordinator with the National Youth Federation: "It is now the case that if Johnny has one of those phones, then everyone else has to havve one too." Other phones work fine for calls and texting.
George O'Callaghan, general secretary of the joint managerial body which represents secondary school managers and principals, suggests schools can ban the use of picture phones in schools.

¹Niall Murray -- "Students shun phone checks"
²Stephen Flanagan -- "It's her fault"
³Michael Brennan -- "Use of camera phones must be controlled by law"
Another knowledge object from the multimedia degree programme in Tipperaary Institute.
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January 26, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

New media jobs

GUARDIAN -- Both the Wednesday and Saturday Guardian carried a generous amount of jobs available for new media graduates. I have excerpted a handful related to skills we teach on the multimedia degree programme in Tipperary Institute

119. Tate: Marketing Officer.
120. Muscular Dystrophy Campaign: Web Officer.
121. Central St Martins College of Art and Design: PA to the Director of the Design Laboratory.
122. Roundhouse: Creative Projects Coordinator.
123. Let's Twist and Jive Partners: Communication Co-ordinator.
124. Contol Risks Group: Sub Editors.
125. University of London Computer Centre: Web Support Officer.
127. The Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council: Assistant Media Officer.
128. Elle Girl: Designer.
129. Lexis-Nexus: Researchers.
130. Sky News: News Assistant.
131. Scouts: Assistant Editor.
132. Motivate Publishing: Book Publishing Manager.
133. ITP: Feature writer.
134. Quarto Publishing: Project Editors.
135. IG Group: Copywriter.
136. Andover Advertiser: Trainee reporter.
137. Cape UK: Administrator.
138. New Media: Junior Multimedia Programmer.
139. Henley College Coventry: Website Designer.
140. New Producers Alliance: Events Manager.
141. John Brown Citrus Publishing: Sky the Magazine Copywriter.
143. Post Magazine: Reporter.
144. Haymarket Business Publications: Researcher.
145. Hotwire PR: Account Executive.
147. Digital Vision: Digital Retoucher.
148. Centre for Contemporary Arts: Communications Manager.
149. Electric World: Junior Designer.
150. Foster and Partners: Press Officer.
151. Stonewall: Administrative Assistant.
152. The Perfume Factory: Designer.

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January 26, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 25, 2004

Basket case

THE WOMENS LIBRARY -- By 1917, with WWI done and dusted, my very traditional grandmother had ruled out working in an office in Lancaster, Pennsylania. However, she did spend most of her days working in the family business which had a SOHO setup. Around the same time, English women were petitioning the Royal Post Office for special basket chairs for use in case of emergency or sickness. Management at the Barrow branch conceded that, "With all due regard to economy, it hardly seems right that the department should make no proper provision for dealing with such cases and that a girl who has fainted should be laid on the floor."

Zoe Williams surmises that "since basket chairs were best on fainting occasions, and fainting was seen as synonymous with hysteria, I think you could make a plausible case for this being the derivation of 'basket case.' As time progressed, chairs became less comfortable, Special seating without arm rests was designed to emphasise how busy the ladies ought to be."

The Women's Library -- "Office Poliics: Women and The Workplace, 1860-2004"
Zoe Williams -- "The Paper Clip Inheritance" in The Weekend Guardian, 24 Jan 04.
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January 25, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Towards Active Reading

KILKENNY -- A large block of reading material in the form of Key Texts greets students in their first term of the Masters Degree in Viusal Arts Practises. The material provides a foundation for critical analysis. Mick Wilson suggests a strategy of active reading that means poring over material three times.

Read it.
Read it and take notes.
Read it and check notes.

Sent mail2blog using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad Service over coffee in the Kilkeny Ormonde Hotel.
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January 25, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

From interview to job

KILKENNY -- While sorting through e-mail over breakfast coffee in Zuni (Patrick Street, Kilkenny), I heard from a student who was disappointed not to be selected for an in-house job. I had seen the shortlist and noted that the best candidates had scored high for intellectual capacity, personal motivation, and ability to get along with other people. Caroline O'Reilly, a business studies programme specialist, further refined her criteria to include constructive thinking, decision-making and analytical skills.

Measuring these skills means looking at a candidate's drive for results, ability to plan work activities, pro-active attitude, flexibility and adapabilty.

I believe it is important to set specific projects during the academic year where people test their potential to lead others. How well a third level student steps up to the mark indicates whether they can run teams or should be set into individual specialty task

Cary Cooper -- Leaders in the 21st Century, Oxford University Press
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January 25, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 23, 2004

Art in backyard

TEMPLE BAR -- Sometimes the best things happen in your own back yard but you don't take much notice until the events are replayed to your surprise by someone you respect. That's what has happened to me with Visualise Carlow, an advance programme to Visual, the Centre for Contemporary Art in Carlow. I spent the mid-afternoon enthralled by a quick-hitting presentation given by Caoimhín Corrigan, the chief paper-hanger of a virtual gallery space and the leadinbg man of annual arts festivals in Carlow. I have literally passed every one of Corrigan's set pieces, mistakenly assuming they could not offer the sophistication I expected from Kilkenny, its neighbour. Was I wrong!

While viewing several years of visual arts in the form of slides projected onto the white space of our classroom, I was overwhelmed by The Pleasure of Compulsive Self Destruction, a collaboration between Finola Jones (in our classroom) and the Carlow Young Artists Choir. This CD is an essential collector's piece.

The Pleasure of Compulsive Self Destruction was a stage production. The audience entered the auditorium, unaware that the stage, set with a heavy red curtain and lit with a single spotlight directly references the formulaic trompe l'oeil tableau widely used in cartoons to mark an episode's beginning and end. It is the red curtain of vaudeville, and it opened to reveal the 44 members of the Carlow Young Artists Choir, ages 12-20, who stood poised in bright green robes and red shirts. Director Mary AMnd O'Brien launched the choir into a rigorous performance that produced all the instrumentals particular to the loopy variances, timbres, volumes, and tones of the original soundtrack to Kitty Foiled.

I have never heard anything like it. At first, I thought of it as "barbershop meets Pirates of Penzance" but the sounds, exaggerated score, and distorted noises performed by human voices make this original work much more sophisticated than any other choral group I have heard.

Which makes the tragedy of not hearing this work performed less than 20 miles from my back yard all the more tragic.

Finola Jones with Carlow Young Artists Choir -- The Pleasure of Compulsive Self Destruction (CD) recorded at Poppyhill Studios, 2003.
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January 23, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

In conversation with Caoimhin Corrigan

TEMPLE BAR -- I saw some of Caoimhin Corrigan's work in The Project around 10 years ago. He moved 50 miles away to Carlow, close enough for conversation with a metropolitan audience but far enough away to develop a meaningful local dialogue with "Sean Citizen" in a small town. Evidence of his work as an art director, projected on the wall, passed around as brochures, and played as CD tracks, shows that Visualise Carlow has enhanced the town's profile and the residents' appreciation of art. "We even managed to get a contemporary arts piece reviewed in The Irish Times.

Corrigan offered two hours worth of observations, beginning with an acknowledgement of the generosity of the local council and sponsoring merchants.

"It would be lovely to have a staff that a building has."
"There is a good deal of lateral thinking in it."
"I've learned a lot about process."
"Inflatable art is cheap to move and import."
Carlow has mounted imaginative art exhibits and "people found themselves transfixed and they didn't know why."
"There are not many places in the country where artists are asked to come and make a project."
"Carlow is changing. We can acquire a leadership role and display world-class art."

Extracts of a discussion in the Temple Bar Gallery and Studios as part of the Master of Arts in Visual Arts Practices offered by Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design, and Technology.
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January 23, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Kylie Slow Art

DUN LAOGHAIRE -- While in The Institute of Art, Design and Technology, I sneaked a peak at the Internet and had a Burkie Moment. The moment erupted at the confluence of Burkie on Kylie "Slow" and Paul Virillo on "intensive time." Like many musicians, Kylie has imposed her brand on a common word. In my aural dictionary, Kylie interpretation imposes itself on "slow." Burkie's blog illustrates the visual dimension of this effect.

"Slow" has taken on layered meanings. Those layered meanings are at work when we speak about slowness. As Chris Dercon¹ explains, "such a train of thought presupposes the existence of time conceived as an empty vessel that can be more or less filled, just as one can live a "full" or "empty" life in the same amount of time, or can use the time available to solve a problem."

We should be able to think of "slow" in the same way, as a logical continuation or logical expression of the French philosopher, Paul Virillo's intensive time.² And living in a connected world where bits of information stream at us at the speed of light, we should rehabilitate slowness within this vision. Because at the end of the day, when we are at a dead stop, all that remains is a still image of ourselves. I think of this whenever I see the prayer card I collected at my dad's funeral last year.

¹Chris Dercon contributes regularly to the International Film Festival in Rotterdam.
²Michael O'Pray -- "Cinephilia" in Art Monthly, March 1999
Sent mail2blog during the Masters of Arts degree in Visual Arts Practices using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service.
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January 23, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 22, 2004

Making Micro Movies

CLONMEL -- We teach elements of personalcasting that intersect the realm of micro movie making. Jason Silverman discovered Jonathan Caouette's film at the Sundance Film festival. It was made for less than an overnight stay in Dublin's Clarence Hotel.

Tarnation may be the first feature-length film edited entirely on iMovie, and it cost $218.32 in videotape and materials. Despite its low budget, the film has already earned a high profile.

Jason Silverman -- "Here's the Price of Fame: $218.32"
James Corbett -- "Micro Movie Making"
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January 22, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Listening to the wires

CLONMEL -- In "Listening to the Wires," we learn to deconstruct elements of a technical message. I remember the sound of wires humming and teletypes hammering away with wire services.

Know your audience.
Make things digestible.
Find the parts.
Locate the memes.
Construct the message.
Prepare the message for presentation.

We explore these ideas in the classroom, producing deliverables on paper, whiteboard and sound bite.

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January 22, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 21, 2004

Globalism and Ireland

TASC -- During several academic courses in Tipperary Institute, we examine the effect of globalism on Ireland. I have lived in Ireland since 1994 and think the pace of Ireland's development has been breathtaking. Fintan O'Toole offers an excellent perspective on "Global Ireland" as a starting point for the discussion about the forces behind Irish development.

Ireland's "unique" characteristics: her suffering, the monks, religiosity, literary achievements
The sense of Irish uniqueness is enhanced when it reflects back from outside.
Globalisation makes Ireland's development all the more interesting. "The big winner in the globalisation stakes is Ireland."
Much of the process of making Ireland globalised is driven from the outside. This is very striking when reviewing figures for Foreign Direct Investment.

Fintan O'Toole -- "Global Ireland" in After the Ball
Aparna Jairam -- excerpt from Wired
Eanna McAteer and Niall Kearney and Des O'Hara -- "Globalised Ireland"
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January 21, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 20, 2004

Luddites remembered

KILKENNY -- It is worth remembering that the original Luddites of the early 19th century were not uneducated blockheads who didn't understand machines. In fact they correctly predicted that the new weaving machines would take away their independence and turn them into wage slaves. I think about this fact whenever visiting the Straffan Steam Museum.

The Steam Museum -- Displaying operational turbines in County Kildare from the Luddite Era
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January 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

RSS for coorientation

CLONMEL -- As we learn in our third level public relations course, the correlational approach helps identify three public relations problems. These problems can be addressed by RSS strategies.

Defining an issue. An organisation and a public hold different definitions of an issue. They simply are not talking about the same thing when they engage in communication about "the issue." They are talking about different issues. Careful examination of content trickling in through RSS feeds helps establish proper coorientation on issues.
Actual views. Sometimes an organisation's perceptions of a pubic's views of an issue and the public's actual views do not match. This could result in an organisation's management making decisions about a public based on inaccurate estimates of the public's views. However, if RSS feeds are set up to monitor, harvest and correlate public discussion boards, an organisation can gain a more accurate estimation of public opinion and then revise communications accordingly.
Public perception of organisation position. Members of a public often hold inaccurate perceptions of an organisation's position on an issue of mutual concern. Public responses to the organisation's management, its products, its actions, and procedures are based on inaccurate estimates of management policy and values. SOLUTION: Run an RSS feed from your organisation and ensure it spews relevant topics of interest.

Scott Cutlip, Allen Center and Glen Broom -- "Correlational Relationships" in Effective Public Relations, the essential PR textbook for the multimedia degree programme in Tipperary Institute.
Hookable PR -- "Rescuing corporate commnications"
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January 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Coreskill One

CLONMEL -- I believe Coreskill Number One is the ability to create original content, optimise it for the target medium, save it with metadata identifiers, then expeditiously retrieve the media object for later use. Your must be proficient in this core skill if you expect to be a productive knowledge worker. We emphasize the development of this core skill during the multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.

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January 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Inside the white cube

LAPIS -- John Coplan published seminal essays on the context of art exhibitions more than two decades ago. Brian O'Doherty replowed much of the same ground and effectively articulates three main points:

On the Gallery Space
The Eye and the Spectator
Context as Content

Twenty Masters Degree candidates are meeting in Temple Bar Gallery and Studios to spend two hours for discussion about gallery space "beyond the white cube." Its wide-ranging reach is a tribute to the breadth of expertise on the ground as creatives and in the white cube as curators.

Brian O'Doherty -- "Inside the White Cube: The Ideology of the Gallery Space" ISBN 0932499-14
Bernie Goldbach -- "First impressions off visual arts Masters in Temple Bar"
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January 20, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 18, 2004

Student accommodation

KILKENNY -- As thousands of second level students around Ireland start filling out college preference forms, most third level institutions on the margins hit the newsprint and airwaves with their messages. I wonder why they never appeal to the financial side of going to college. Specifically, it's much less expensive to sort out student accommodation in Clonmel or Carlow than it is to pay slumlords in Dublin or Galway.

Sent mail2blog from McCourts in Kilkenny using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service.
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January 18, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Computers can kill relationships

SUNDAY TIMES -- It is no major revelation to read that the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers have published a booklet of marital advice that warns the personal computer plays a definite role in "alientating the affections" of spouses. The 1600 divorce lawyers contend that in their cases involving a computer, 68% of unfaithful spouses met their lover over the Internet. Sandra Morris, a San Diego divorce lawyer, said 10% of her clients were men who walked out on their wives and children only when they had established another relationship. "These were shy people who may never have met another person before the invention of the Internet chat room. The computer is the fastest-growing threat to marriage that I have seen in 34 years as a divorce lawyer.

While celebrities such as David Bowie, Sandra Bullock and Leonardo DiCaprio have admitted to day-long Internet binges, San Francisco divorce lawyer Richard Barry says such usage should be negotiated between couples before it gets out of hand. "The trick is to get off the computer and see if anybody is still at home."

John Harlow -- "Warning: that a computer could crash a marriage" in The Sunday Times, 18 Jan 04
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January 18, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 17, 2004

Studio Studium

DUBLIN -- Five of the 20 students enrolled to earn a Masters of Arts in Visual Arts Practices have carved out special places to work, study, register and record. These lucky five have their own studios. Getting proper studio space in Dublin is tough. Once you do, the space helps your process. When I had my little home office study properly configured, it helped me focus the fragments and write things faster. In Tipperary Institute's Clonmel campus, we might get more mileage from room 111 if we started treating it as a multimedia studio instead of a multimedia lab. The distinction is more than semantics.

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January 17, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 16, 2004

First impressions of Visual Arts Masters in Temple Bar

TEMPLE BAR -- Although Ireland's only masters degree in visual arts practises is billed to be in Arthouse, it's actually being held being held in Temple Bar Studios, Space 6. An imposing over-sized gray metal door blocks admittance to the premises but that's not suprising when you know you're walking in loud streets just off Dublin's quays that often harbour junkies in need of a place to sit for their fix. They go up the street to the Irish Film Institute. Most don't know these things and I have to say that the rough side of Dublin does not demean the left bank effect of Temple Bar, made all the more authentic through the newly-launched Masters Degree in Visual Arts Practises.

First words: "Hi. Each one take one of these."
First sound: doorbell ringing but no one answering.
Second sound: walking on planks.
First image: art books on shelves.
First kitsch: folding metal chairs for 17 bums on seats.

The adventure begins.

Mick Wilson -- lead lecturer and chief photocopier.
Aileen MacKeogh -- tireless advocate of Irish art.
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January 16, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 15, 2004

Seeing more by active writing

CLONMEL -- One of the jobs awaiting young writers is the role of critic, evaluator, or analyst. All of these roles require active writing skills. We develop this skillset by learning frameworks of analysis then using these frameworks when viewing events, exhibits, presentations and evidence first-hand.

In the context of an art exhibit by Ana Maria Pacheco, some leading questions help frame our analysis. Who did these sculptures? What do you see in them? How are the figures sculpted? Where do you think the artist is from? When in artist's life was the scuplture completed? Why create the figures with the characteristics exhibited in the sculpture? We're discussing all these ideas in classroom settings. It would be wonderful to see the sculptures in person again.

Whiteboard snapped from class lecture by Sean Barry.
Part of the Writing Skills course in the Tipperary Institute multimedia degree programme.
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January 15, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 14, 2004

Another reason to go digital

CLONMEL -- I have long argued that it makes more sense to focus on training students to compose and archive quality images than it does to train them in the fine points of traditional photo darkrooms. Now it looks like Kodak buys the same vision. Eastman Kodak will stop selling traditional film cameras in the United States, Canada and Western Europe, another move by the troubled photography company to cut lines with declining appeal in favor of fast-growing digital products. Kodak's hopes are in the digital realm, where most of the customers are migrating already.

Reuters -- "Kodak to stop selling traditional cameras"
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January 14, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Whiteboard Gems

CLONMEL -- We have stumbled upon something that Tim Kirby has known for ages--you often create the most durable Eureka moments after left brain actions that culminate on white boards. Rather than wiping away those gems, I'm starting to integrate them into deliverables by snapping them with the Fuji S602Z I normally sling over my shoulder. Over a period of months, it will be interesting to see whether the Whiteboard Gems map out to required revision items. If students help create them, then the work should culminate as a major examination event.

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January 14, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 13, 2004

Public relations value of Wi-Fi

CLONMEL -- An inherent public relations value lies behind the deployment of community Wi-Fi nodes because it's possible to buy off good public feeling when you give away something that the public values. After years of extortionate payments for Internet access, the Irish public puts a value on Internet connectivity. When a school principal gets free Internet access for a primary or secondary school, it is often better than getting a new stock of books for the school library. So what if a local business shared its Wi-Fi node with a nearby school? Provided the school has a context in which to effectively leverage this capability, the business could win free public relations value from its shared Wi-Fi node. There is a minefield laced with potential misperceptions that must be examined before exposing this idea directly to a technically-challenged teaching staff. It starts with a process of informing. Skilled PR agents appreciate matters of salience and pertinence as well. We examine these issues in lectures prepared for the public relations course taught in the Tipperary Institute multimedia degree programme. The lecture suggests ways to extract PR value from technology after evaluating a wide range of public perceptions related to the issue.

Animation from the Writing Skills Course in the multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.
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January 13, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 12, 2004

Photoshop disabled for counterfeiting

CNET -- Ernie the attorney provides yet another reason why some people use GIMP. "Adobe and other makers of image-manipulation programs have, at the behest of a little-known group of national banks, inserted secret technology into their programs to foil counterfeiting, the companies acknowledged this week. Photoshop and other programs will no longer be able to open files containing images of several nations' currencies, said Kevin Connor, director of product management for Adobe."

Robert Lemos -- "Adobe, others slip anticounterfeiting code into apps"
Ernie Svenson -- "Adobe tweaks Photoshop to disable ability to counterfeit currency"
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January 12, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Journal of dreams

KILKENNY -- One of the most important things I can do is talk to my mom. We're approaching the first anniversary of the death of my father and there are still many things I don't know about either of them. Mom's memory is pretty good. She remembers things I did as a pre-teen that I can certainly deny. It's the things about growing up with German and Russian discussed around the dinner table that intrigue me. It's finding out how she met dad. And then recording these things for generations. I have to do this. I'm starting to get dreams about these things.

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January 12, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 09, 2004

Modeling data

CLONMEL -- Before we conduct an analysis of Antoin O Lachtnain's proposal concerning Irish postal codes, we are modeling data in the organisation in the database course I teach as part of the multimedia degree programme at Tipperary Institute.

Referring to important terms related to database analysis.
Explaining why data modeling is the most important part of systems development.
Writing appropriate names and definitions for entities, relationships and attributes.
Distinguishing unary, binary, and ternary relationships.
Modeling specified attributes in an E-R diagram.
Drawing an E-R diagram to represent common business situations.
Converting a many-to-many relationship to an associative entity type.
Modeling simple time-dependent data using time stamps in an E-R diagram.

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January 9, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 08, 2004

Clie on top

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- I have started using the Sony Clie PEG-UX50 in the classroom and the first hands-on experience for students was making short messages for an upcoming advertising campaign. The Clie sits flat on top of our fat monitors and its little camera lens captures students directly in front of their workstations. The recording quality is well below the standard of a Sony MD-R but that's to be expected. Within a few weeks, we should be able to snap images, shot videos and upload them directly to blog space. We will effectively have a personalcasting setting inside a normal classroom, running a videoblog as part of the educational blogging network. That would be a wonderful achievement for technology in Ireland.

Click on the Clie image to get a life-sized one.
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January 8, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Mars Spirit Rover in the classroom

CLONMEL -- My third level multimedia degree students have seen the Mars Spirit Rover during scheduled classroom sessions. Some interesting observations have surfaced.

"Breakthrough, historic, stunning, spooky, unbelieveable"
"... reminds me of the Australian Outback or some part of the Nevada desert"
"... just like Tramore Strand"
Proposed caption of the airbag lander: "Bouncing into the future"
"While we can do space age things, we are still unable to find a cure for cancer and arm and leg disabilities."

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January 8, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

India beats California

INDIA TIMES -- "Bangalore, which grew under the shadow of America's Silicon Valley, has finally overtaken its parent. Today, Bangalore stands ahead of the Bay Area, with a lead of 20,000 techies."

It was bound to happen as hundreds of Indians reached the end of their contracts in a post-9/11 world. It simply got too weird to stay in the US when neighbours could inform authorities they thought you overstayed. After HP consolidated operations, huge swaths of contractors were left with no job security as their jobs dried up. Better to return to base and sort out a real job near your family. As the Economic Times points out, "tech giants such as Cisco, Intel, IBM, Oracle and i2 relocated some of their Indian tech workers."

Satya Prakash Singh -- "Finally, B'lore beats Silicon Valley"
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January 8, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Helping cheats

WSJ -- The Cheating Culture Weblog is a compendium to an upcoming book by David Callahan. We are incorporating specific themes from it into our anti-plagiarism efforts at Tipperary Institute. It's instructive when cheaters read about others who cheat.

David Callahan -- "Why the American culture encourages cheating"
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January 8, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 06, 2004

Home archives

KILKENNY -- I have all sorts of photos, negatives, transparencies, DV tapes, CDs, cassettes, and VCR tape stored in boxes, hoping I will back them up. I wil back them up because it's important to convert analog images to digital to stop the aging process. I've learned some things about sorting out my home archives that I will pass along to students in my database course.

Total backup before editing is best practise. Make a mass copy before editing or culling. Fail to do this and your late-night archiving will produce an inadvertent directory deletion.
Photo formats that I trust include JPEG, TIFF and PDF. It takes time to cull photos and more time to label images with names, places, and cross-references.
Video formats I'm keeping are MPEG-2 and MPEG-4.
High-quality branded media lasts forever. However, formats are not as durable, which means things I have on first generation CD-Rs need to migrate to DVD media.
Paper documents get scanned and saved as PDF.
Tranny scanners are the only scanners to efficiently handle images that are pock-marked with scratches and dust.

I'm glad I have Firewire in nearly everything and that all of my cameras save to removeable media. My archiving is much more sure-footed.

Bill Howard -- "Archiving for the Ages"
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January 6, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 05, 2004

Learned during first year of college

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- We are halfway through the first year with students new to our multimedia degree programme and several have shared their impressions of "the most important skill" learned during their first year of college.

"I have learnt the importance of meeting deadlines."
"At this early stage, I'm beginning to integrate some of the principles of accessbility into my basic Web page designs."
"The most important skill I acquired is the use of computers."
"The most important skill set I have acquired in Tipperary Institute is the ability to write computer programs."
"The most important skill I have learned so far as a multimedia student is Web Development.
"I have learned more effective communication through writing and interpersonal classes. That will help me get a job."
"Interpersonal Communcations is the most important skill set so far."
"The most important skill set that I have acquired during my time as a student in Tipperary Institute would be the ability to perform desired research on any topic."
"The most important skill set is Web Development and Programming."
"The use of XHTML in the construction of Web pages in conjunction with a wide range of writing skills."
"I have learned to type properly."
"The most important skill set which I have acquired has been working in groups."
"I have learned what is needed to survive in the multimedia career field."
"I have learned to put my head down and work."
"It's important to be able to talk with a whole lot of people. I have learned to communicate better."

Opinions expressed during the first year of the Tipperary Institute Multimedia Degree programme.
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January 5, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Simple ECM-S80

SONY -- I believe you can verify the simplicity of operating a device by examining the "troubleshooting" section in its instruction manual. The Sony Electret Condenser Microphone has three troubleshooting items. Two deal with "there is no sound" and advise you to flip the battery over or get a new battery. One talks about "the battery check indicator lights momentarily," but that's really not a malfunction.

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January 5, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 03, 2004

Contact Phones

KILKENNY -- While tossing out some old class rosters, I found one from 1997 where no more than 10% of my students had mobile phones. A mirror image of the data exists when compared to my current students--92% have mobile phones now.

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January 3, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Notebook Always

KILKENNY -- A sensible notebook is an essential part of a journalist's wardrobe. And those who strp cameras over their shoulders need to carry notebooks to tickle their memories about what they've photographed. A sensible size is something that fits into a pocket or a handbag. I often sling a sack on my back, so my A5 wireless notebooks work a treat. Writing things in notebooks guarantees you of reference points. It doesn't have to b a diary but its entries often have the same impact as a meticulously kept diary.

The Alwych Book has a durable all-weather cover in A38/90 feint. Get one, carry it discreetly, use it, and leverage the memories it will safguard.

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January 3, 2004 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

December 31, 2003

Digital Yearbook

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- An energetic group of second year multimedia degree students have drafted ideas for an electronic yearbook and I need to constrain its development because of the time required to produce it. Their ideas are really impressive, especially their observations about how to manage the difficulty of the second year through an offering of a digital resource, like a yearbook. As Claire Griffin observes, "Any course in any college could have a yearbook but not necessarily a digital one."

Liam Burke traces the deliverable from mission statement to strapline to several main points.
Claire Griffin points out several compelling reasons why it's essential to compile a yearbook for prospective second year multimedia degree students.
Sharon Fitzgerald thinks the bare minimum is "a photograph of each class member accompanied by some information. It could be a strapline, a poem, basically it will be anything that they feel describes them." Sharon also offers suggestions for six major sections of the yearbook.
Tom Heffernan believes pictures are paramount. He outlines ways to target the yearbook's content.
Nicola Corboy extracts ideas from each of the six modules and also suggests using a Wiki to finalise the content and concept.
Caroline McNamara draws a link between blogging, an electronic yearbook and work placement.
Damien Morrissey explains how a digital yearbook would benefit the revision process.
Fiona Ni Cheirin lists 10 things a person should know before starting a multimedia degree and suggests soliciting such a list from each student.
Mary Nugent suggests including "my best memory" in the yearbook.
Eddie Whelan offers the most diverse ideas in the fewest words, including a need to harvest hard-to-find images, include forms for scholarships, and the need for an on-board search engine.

Liam Burke -- "From mission statement to digital yearbook"
Claire Griffin -- "Yearbook"
Sharon Fitzgerald -- "Digital Yearbook"
Nicola Corboy -- "Wiki and Yearbook"
Tom Heffernan -- "Targeting a digital yearbook"
Caroline McNamara -- "Yearbook, blogging and work experience"
Damien Morrissey -- "In the digital yearbook"
Fiona Ni Cheirin -- "What should be in the digital yearbook"
Mary Nugent -- "Yearbook Memories"
Eddie Whelan -- "Some things are hard to find."
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December 31, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Quiet New Year's Eve

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- I'm rocketing around student assignments in the Media Studies curriculum and stumbled upon Claire Griffin who captures the moment in describing today as a quiet New Year's Eve. It sounds like Claire endured a momentous year, while developing an acerbic touch in writing about it.

Claire Griffin -- "All is quiet on News Years...Eve?"
Picture of Claire Griffin from the Media Studies Faceroll, taken with Fuji S602Z camera.
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December 31, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

December 16, 2003

Starting Digital

NEW YORK -- If you know there's a digital camera for you under the Christmas tree, you might look around for some things that help you leverage your new digital status by learning how to organise your creative photography. Photoshop Elements and Photoshop Album are big helps for me. I store images online here at Typepad and put others into Photobox for friends to download and print professionally.

Ernest Svenson -- "Digital Photography -- Soup to Nuts"
Scott Kelby -- The Photoshop Elements Book for Digital Photographers
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December 16, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

December 05, 2003

Common errors of expression

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- I asked students to write a short essay about Christmas in Ireland and got back a host of lovely expressions. I also noticed some common errors in expression but they didn't detract from the overall message.

People eat "dessert" not "desert."
The season "definitely" marks a high point of the year, not a "definate" moment in time.
"Peoples' pockets" are possessive and they need an apostrophe to describe them that way.
Presents normally are given "by" people, although the Christmas season can also mark an occasion where we receive "presents of people."
Christmas in Ireland differs from Christmas in other "countries" not from Christmas in other "countrys."

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December 5, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

December 02, 2003

Pen-based revision

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- I firmly believe that once someone reviews a concept seven times, it will remain in their memory for a long period of time. The Nokia Digital Pen is proving to be one means of revision for students. I'm asking students to complete questions that are in an Esslete quiz book, then cradling their results from the pen to an overhead projection screen. If I'm correct, the two steps will serve as effective steps in the revision process.

Write answers to the questions.
Review the answers on screen.

If I incorporate this teaching method to every practical session in my academic lecturing duties, I can bring students farther down the path of learning as they use the Nokia Digital Pen with their assignments. The investigation continues.

See our first samples online.
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December 2, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBack

December 01, 2003

Nokia Pen Sketches

Nokia Digital Pen KILKENNY -- I have used my Nokia Pen to sketch a dozen different schematics and I intend to use some of them as part of process diagrams with students. The pen picks up more when it's used slowly and deliberately. I can vary line thickness by carefully tracing over original lines. That's faster than selecting a larger line thickness in the back of the A5 copy book that comes with the pen. I plan to put several things online once I have a small portfolio of work. That should happen rather quickly since using the pen is quite easy.

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December 1, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

November 27, 2003

Q-Plus for academic desktop

UNDERWAY -- Software developers at Tipperary Institute got an opportunity to look deep inside Gael Quality's Q-Plus software as part of the "Excellence in IT" event sponsored by the college in early November. The quality management software brings an element of realism to the BSc programme and encourages learning and understanding within real-life contexts. Q-Plus provides an electronic interface very useful for enhancing compliance and improvement management by streamlining business systems, a process that delivers a competitive edge where it is used in food safety, aviation and health care.

Sent mail2blog from McDonagh Station using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service.
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November 27, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 26, 2003

Public Relations for IT Skills

CLONMEL -- Roisin Harkin writes: We visited two venues in Dublin yesterday, looking at how the world of PR intersects technology. The nine members of our third year PR course have some perspectives to offer the Irish Computer Society's initiative promoting the IT profession to school leavers. After our lunchtime conversation with Cathy Riordan, I saw several distinctions between PR and marketing. I didn't realise that PR agencies put their message through the media rather than directly to the public. I also didn't appreciate how much rests on knowing which people to invite to special events.

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November 26, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 21, 2003

Best Practise in database development

SYSMOD -- Throughout the past academic term, we have discussed the process of developing databases and the applications using them. Database development begins with enterprise data modeling, where the range and general contents of organizational databases are established. Enterprise data modeling is part of an overall process that develops an information systems architecture for an organisation. It's a process seldom understood by small businesses when they unpack and fire up their copies of Microsoft Access.

Patrick O'Beirne -- "The personal software process"
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November 21, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 20, 2003

Short snappy descriptions

DUBLIN -- After talking with two different PR professionals, I think it's time to ask my writing students to describe items in short and snappy ways.

Using one adjective, describe your current living space.
Using two adjectives, describe your current employer.
Using three adjectives, describe your favorite hobby/pasttime.
Using four adjectives, describe your typical day.
Using five adjectives, describe your ideal life.

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November 20, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

November 18, 2003

PR items from blogs

KILKENNY -- Yesterday we learned some things in the realm of PR that would be welcomed by Irish artists. Meanwhile, some interesting reading appeared in my aggregate that will enhance PR lectures in the months ahead.

The Independent dissects the spin and PR campaign in the "Bush Cartel Case for Phony War"
I have always wanted to earn a degree in Rhetoric. UC Berkeley professor George Lakoff tells how conservatives use rhetoric and language to dominate politics.
From Tech Central Station: "Get the attention it deserves."
Blogvertising: Blogs Emerge As Hot New Ad Medium.
CNN: "McJob term irritates McDonalds"

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November 18, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

November 17, 2003

What to measure

KILKENNY -- A third level multimedia student asked me what to quantify as part of her rolling reports during the course of her third year project. I told her to think like eBay and "if it moves, measure it." Her submission has a lot of animated features and slippery deliverables. A copper-fastened planning document is the only way she will keep her sanity.

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November 17, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 15, 2003

Essential ingredients of our e-learning portal

KILKENNY -- During our short dabbling with Moodle, an Open Source e-learning system, we have learned essential items concerning sustaining our vision of a viable e-learning portal. Some of these points are evangelised by students using the system.

The suits must support it. If upper level management doesn't care about it, you won't get money to support it.
You must delegate content creation. Lecturers know enough about creating quality learning materials and they need to upload, revise and archive their own materials.
Search is a key feature. It must be pervasive, easy, accurate and powerful. We need more search capability for our implementation.
Moodle must export down to a digital dashboard for students. It does not do this. Yet.
Moodle must enhance information flow between modules, courses, streams, and degrees. It is not just about accommodating rewarmed courseware.
Good e-learning portals guide users into acquiring information that matters, not just lists.
A good e-learning portal strategy revolves around three things: learning requirements, information architecture, metadata.
As Natasha Kiely is prone to advise: process mapping identifies unmet needs. When lecturers turn to Moodle, they focus on identifying how the information flow works for students, understanding technophobic stressors, and working to develop virtual signposts to ease the journey for new students.
We measure Moodle's success in how it connects people to content, how it connects people to people, and how it connects students to experts.
A good k-logging network supplements the Moodle portal experience by offering yet another route to collaboration and revision.

Sent mail2blog by Nokia Communicator TypePad Vodafone service from The Hibernian Hotel, Kilkenny, Ireland.
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November 15, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 14, 2003

Gaming for college credit

WIRED -- Just like the staff at Tipperary Institute, the curriculum committee at the University of Southern California are studying ways to bring computer gaming into the realm of college credit. It takes a real creative to produce a compelling computer game. And as students in Tipperary have discovered, you have to know how to code as well. Fact is, the most successful games developers are broad thinkers.

To reward some of the most creative games developers in Ireland, point to the Ngage Challenge and vote for Fishtank Fire.

Katie Dean -- "Academics can be fun and games"
Philip Bourke -- "Notes on Fishtank Fire"
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November 14, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Open Source Curriculum

WIRED -- I grew up in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where the Open Source movement dotted the landscape in the form of Amish barn-raising. I work in Tipperary Institute where Open Source appears in the form of Java, Perl, Apache, Linux and Moodle. I would like to donate my course notes to an Open Source initiative, like the Open Textbook Project (OTP). The OTP is building free textbooks in a range of subjects, using the principles of distributed collaboration and open access. The result will be low-cost, high-quality texts. Both our use of Moodle and our integration of Open Courseware puts us on a collision course with business sponsors. In the short-term, we will need the comforting hand of our host Institute to wade through some higher cost factors that inevitably occur when educational media companies reduce their sponsorship of large events. As we move forward, we need to appreciate the direct cost of our implementations. On our present course, some training exhibitions will cost more in the future as textbook companies and software vendors reduce their sponsorship.

Thomas Goetz -- "Open Source Everywhere" in Wired, November 2003
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November 14, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 08, 2003

Distance education under fire

HIBERNIA -- The Irish Higher Education and Training Awards Council (HETAC) approved Hibernia College's online teacher training and immediately kicked off a public outcry from traditional colleges of education. The firestorm of libelous rumours has not deterred 192 applicants from enrolling in the Hibernia programme. If my experience with HETAC and the Distance Education and Training Council are any guide, those on the Hibernia programme will complete a syllabus leading to industry-level proficiencies. And if they earn the teaching certification without meeting industry standards, HETAC will revoke accreditation.

In the meantime, it seems possible to use best practise in distance education to become a primary school teacher in Ireland, saving loads of money without taking time out from emloyment. Time will tell whether the teaching industry approves of the proocess.

John Walshe -- "Why are they all so angry with Mr Nice Guy?" in The Irish Independent, 8 Nov 03
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November 8, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 07, 2003

Speakeasy style of digital trendbooks

50 cent around the neck NTK -- My Media Studies students are assembling a trendbook that contains snippets of interesting data on CD and digital artefacts from their geek drawers. Initial nominated content includes a lot of MP3 files. If I follow the stream of nominations, I will end up building an electronic collection that mirrors favs ripped from playlists. It reminds me of the first time I saw a German BBS operator copying software on 5¼ diskettes for posting to friends in Japan. In the 1980s, Deutsche Post was a broadband service provider. Post it and your megs arrived faster and in better condition than through the Telekom dialup.

On their own, students have figured out how to mask music inside Photoshop images, Word documents and Zip archives. All the service provider can do is constrain space.

Space just got cheaper. USB memory keys dangle from necks like 50 cent diamonds. Irish newspapers tout computers with 100GB drives, more than enough to store the music favourites of an average student. A terabyte on its own costs EUR 900 from Irish suppliers. IBM says its TB storage drives will ring in at EUR 500 next Christmas.

According to Danny O'Brien¹, "by 2008, you will be able to store every piece of music ever recorded, and more, for $1000." That's a terrible thought for the RIAA, because that kind of easy collection and replication means the music industry will have to fight "the free distribution of its entire crown jewels, contained in a single, easily replicable item: an item that as soon as any of your friends score a copy, you will potentially never have to buy a back-catalogue song again."

If the proposed TOC for the digital trendbook is any guide, the party has started.

¹Danny O'Brien -- "PC storage surge could send music sector off key" in Wired on Friday, 7 Nov 03
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November 7, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 06, 2003

In conversation with Brian Mulligan

THURLES -- Few college lecturers more experience in the field of have the range of first-hand experience with electronic learning than Brian Mulligan. So his hallway conversations can be revealing.

"Textbooks are the primary source of learning content. The job falls to commercial publishers to produce the content."
The biggest value of online education? "Online exercises provide the collaborative learning experience."
"Instructional Management Standards groups haven't produced the goods."

Sent mail2blog by Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service.
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November 6, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 30, 2003

Plants in motion

WHERE THREADS COME LOOSE -- Isn't time-lapse photography totally excellent?

As Roger Hangarter explains, "plants grow and change on a time scale that is too slow for us to observe in real time. Time-lapse photography is a simple technique that allows us to see the movements of plants and clearly demonstrates that plants are living and capable of some extraordinary things." For example, you can watch the negative gravitropic response of a Coleus shoot after being placed on its side. The images here show what happens after about an hour.

Roger Hangarter -- "Plants-in-Motion"
Christoper Bahn --"Incoming signals"
John Walkenbach -- "Plants in motion"
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October 30, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 29, 2003

Hoping for a multimedia degree

KILKENNY -- Today a team of five evaluators from the Irish Higher Education Training Awards Council visits our multimedia staff to determine whether we can issue a third level mutimedia degree in our own name. I know how precocious our submission appears to be. We have a campus of one building, 60 multimedia computers in three labs, five classrooms containing fewer seats than several rostered classes, a library holding 82 more new media books than I own and a cafeteria that is bigger than every chapel in County Tipperary. We love our chips in Tipp. This upstart campus community has a higher profile in Google than much larger and long-time accredited institutions that award students a "multimedia diploma" in Ireland. If Google gives the nod to our current visibility, perhaps HETAC should concur with the conferring of degree-awarding status.

Update: We got an informal verbal approval to operate a degree programme, accredited at the third level, leading students to qualification as multimedia developers. This programme will have standing under the European Credit Transfer System and it already attracts mature students who comprise just over 10 percent of the total enrollment.

Sent mail2blog using Nokia Communicator TypePad Vodafone service while awaiting Bus Eireann at McDonagh Station.
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October 29, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 28, 2003

Feedback from Finding Nemo

BAWNTAMEENA -- Nearly one-quarter of my first year students wouldn't find the time to see Finding Nemo. Some openly dismiss animation as a proper film genre so I am glad I set the assignment.

The film is grounded in themes that reflect the real world.

David Maher saw it as a "story of one father's search for his son and the evolution of his role as a single parent." It had a personal link for Maher.

My father and I were much alike and although we got on. We never bonded. I resented my father with his rules and his opinion. My opinion was ignored. I was just a kid, but I saw myself as a young adult and expression of views was my right. My father had his own view of me I was the child and his role was to protect me from bad influences in the neighborhood. Finding Nemo follows their bond as a family and how it matures into friendship. The forbidden open waters and the dangers out there in every community--drugs, gangs, violence and the fear of losing a loved one.

Shane Keogh thinks of Nemo as a dog "because you don't find clown fish here; you haven't got a Great Barrier Reef and the amazing clear sea of the Australian ocean. Our sea and land does not have the overwhelming colour of the South Seas. The themes though are the same all over the world, the fear of loss, of insecurity, horror, pain; friendship, love, family. Then there are the themes of mankind the dentist the love of the sea, father-son relationship, the role of women in society."

Peter Cahill recalled his first day at school as the story of Nemo unfolded.

The first day at school is also a day everyone will always remember, and the school bullies that call you a names and beat you up for your lunch money, and being a lost child, the times you would be separated from your father and having to do things on your own.

Caterina Foley saw the connection between Dory's absent-mindedness and dementia. "Some Irish people do experience a progressive decline in their memory and other brain functions and eventually develop Dementia. It is important to remember that many conditions can cause an upset of the memory and that not all individuals who have memory destruction have Dementia."

Daniel Carroll saw a message about addiction in the film. "Just like the sharks in the film, led by Bruce, there are a lot of people with addictions in Ireland ranging from drugs to exercise and I think that the film portrays this well as we can see in relation to our lives just how easy it would be to slip down the slippery slope by just one taste of that which we are trying to abstain."

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October 28, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Masters in Arthouse

IRISH TIMES -- The fine art department of Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology has opened the windows of the second story of Temple Bar's Arthouse to accommodate an MA course. Come January, the Master of Arts begins in visual arts practices. It innovatively features three streams: art-making, curation and criticism. The course calls for rolling delivery of by-product destined for display in the Temple Bar Studio. Unfortunately, there's no information available online, even as a Friday "last call" date looms near.

Aidan Dunne -- "A new look at the way art is taught" in The Irish Times, 27 Oct 03
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FAQs about the course
This course is a Master of Arts programme provided by the Institute of Art, Design & Technology, Dun Laoghaire hosted in Temple Bar Gallery & Studios and validated by the Higher Educational and Training Awards Council (HETAC) and internationally recognised as such.

How long is the course?
12 months full time OR 24 months part-time.

What will it cost?
The fees are currently under review. However, it can be indicated at this time that the Full-Time Fees will be no more than 4,250 euro.
Part-Time Fees will be no more than 2,500 euro per annum.

How is the year structured?
The year begins in January and ends in December. It is broken into two halves, called Semesters. Semester 1 runs from January to June and Semester 2 runs from September to December. In the period between Semester 1 and Semester 2 students will complete project work.

What will be taught on the programme?
The programme has three separate pathways: curation / criticism / art-making.
Each pathway is designed for a specific student preference and contains separate seminar and tutorial provision. Through each pathway students produce self-directed project work (e.g. exhibitions | publications | events | gallery and non-gallery based projects etc | performance works | catalogues …) The form and nature of the work is determined by the student in consultation with the teaching team.

Work produced by the student on the programme will be publicly presented | exhibited | circulated. The work is required to exist within the "real" world not just the familiar classroom / studio / crit situation. It is a part of the student's task to determine what this "real" world situation might be.

However, there is also a common set of core courses which includes:
(i) a 30 week lecture series on the most recent developments in international contemporary art practice
(ii) a 30 week lecture series on advanced themes within visual culture, visual theory and the themes of visuality and visual representation.
(iii) a 30 week lecture and workshop series on the institutions of the local and international art world.
Each of these courses will have an assessment submission (such as essay or project work).

What is the relationship between the three pathways?
The three pathways will interact through the core lecture series but also through seminar and group crits. These will be regular pre-scheduled exchanges between students, teaching team and external visitors.
It is envisaged that collaborative and crossover projects may emerge for some students across the pathways.

Where will this course take place?
The course will be mainly based in Temple Bar in Dublin's Cultural Quarter.
Productions facilities for the actual making of artworks by those pursuing the art-making pathway will also be provided on the main IADT Campus in Dun Laoghaire.
The course will make use of project administration, exhibition, lecture and seminar spaces in the city centre.

What is the level of attendance required?
Full-Time: Students will be required to meet for lecture and seminar work for one full day per week for 30 weeks. They will further be required to attend for personal tutorial on an approximately once weekly basis also on a separate day. They will further be expected to work on their self-directed project work throughout the rest of the week whether on campus or on site/off-campus as the project work requires.

Part-Time: Students will be required to meet for lecture, seminar and tutorial work for one day per week for 30 weeks in each of two years. They will further be expected to work on their self-directed project work at other times during the week as agreed with their tutor. There is one full-time week of workshop training in each Year. The relevant dates will be flagged well in advance.

MA level students are expected to be self-managing, mature and professional in their approach to their learning.

Can I just make art or do I have to also curate and write criticism?

Each student will determine the nature of their own project work.
It is loosely assumed that:
(i) A student specialising in the art-making pathway will primarily make "artworks" and consider how and under what circumstances "viewers" will be asked to see / experience the work. Artmaking is not just understood here as the production of objects and images but may also extend to many other types of activity. The student who chooses this pathway chooses the task of determining what is an appropriate and / or personally relevant art project | work | intervention | strategy | position | other.

(ii) A student specialising in the curation pathway will organise situations where "audiences" come into contact with "artworks" of some form or other. Curation is not just the co-ordination and care of exhibits in a gallery but extends to the creation of situations where audiences and artists | artworks | art-ideas come into contact with each other. The student who chooses this pathway chooses the task of determining what is an appropriate and / or personally relevant curatorial project.

(iii) A student specialising in criticism will primarily create materials (essays | publications | audio recordings | visual essays | documentary projects…) which facilitate or promote a relationship between an "audience" and an "artwork" or "artworks". Criticism is not just the writing of academic texts but can extend to any form of considered mediation | evaluation | education | response to an artwork or an artworld or an art institution. The student who chooses this pathway chooses the task of determining what is an appropriate and / or personally relevant critical project.

However, in the contemporary art world these divisions between artmaking / curation / criticism are contested and shifting. Therefore the teaching team seek to establish a flexible exchange of ideas and an energetic interaction of projects. These terms and activities are up for grabs.

How do I find out more?

If you have a specific enquiry in respect of course content, or if you require clarification of any of the information presented here contact the Course Co-ordinator:

Mick Wilson [BA, MA, MSc]
+353 1 2144672
mick.wilson@iadt-dl.ie

If you have an enquiry in respect of Fees, Application Forms, Admissions Procedures contact:
Admissions
Institute of Art, Design & Technology
Dun Laoghaire
+35312144626

Applications due by October 31st 4:00pm

October 28, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 27, 2003

Nemo Findings

KILKENNY -- I've required students in my Writing Skills course to see Finding Nemo and to draw parallels between the Pixar story and Irish life. The first submissions include reports made by explaining what five year old nephews saw in the film. Another student critic drew her analysis from Alzheimer's disease in Ireland.

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October 27, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 25, 2003

Watching kids finding Nemo

KILKENNY -- Cinemas in southeastern Ireland may note the presence of 34 college students coming to the showing of Finding Nemo because their attendance is necessary as part of a Writing Skills course. I know three students who plan to write their essays after interviewing their kids or nephews. This will make interesting reading.

Sent mail2blog by Nokia Communicator Vodafone Typepad service from McDonagh Junction.
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October 25, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 23, 2003

Multimedia Degree material in my pocket

KILKENNY -- I have managed to filter my important mail into the space filled by my Nokia Communicator AND to limit most of that mail to material related to matters related to the multimedia degree programme planned by Tipperary Institute. This is a big deal because my daily mail flow always crests above 300 messages a day. I'm handling fewer than 30 a day through my Nokia 9210i and I feel much better about my time management.

My Nokia Communicator lets in mail from "scarecrow" the learning server, including my subscribed threads concerning J2ME. Liam Noonan is talking about J2ME and Bluetooth, a topic interesting me because it affects my next mobile phone purchase.

Stephanie O'Shea thinks part of my efforts ought to be diverted to crafting a highly visible information system that describes the multimedia degree at Tipperary Institute.
Sun -- "J2ME and Bluetooth"
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October 23, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 22, 2003

Multimedia Luddites

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- One way to tell if college students are Luddites is to determine whether they author their own personal music collection. Of the 57 students in my current classes, only 11% do not rip, burn, share music. Most students prefer their music in MP3 formats, although the most experienced have a combination of MP3 and CD formats to ensure their collections play on the widest variety of machines. When it comes to stamping out Luddite behaviour, nothing works better than connections to personal music collections.

Thomas Ruggles Pynchon -- "Is it O.K. to be a Luddite?" via Liam Noonan
Sent mail2blog by Nokia Communicator O2 TypePad service.

October 22, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 21, 2003

When to leave college

KILKENNY -- Several students in Tipperary Institute have asked me whether there is any difference in wage packet between a Diploma graduate and a Degree graduate and I have pointed to evidence showing there is. College education in Ireland increases students' earning power by 10% for each year of study, more than in any other country in the western world.

Research shows that the longer someone stays in college, the more Irish employers are willing to pay for their skills. Few investments pay as well as an extra year in education. The average bonus to earning power for a year in college in other countries, including Britain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States, is 8%. A four-year degree in Ireland can therefore give a person an increased earning power of up to 50% over someone who entered the workforce immediately after school. The study was written by Colm Harmon, an economist at University College Dublin and colleagues at the Institute for the Study of Social Change. These numbers form part of the Irish government's position that calls for the reinstatement of fees for third level education in Ireland.

Free college education was introduced in 1995, and Ireland now spends EUR 178m a year putting students through college.

Paul Colgan -- "Year's Study Puts 10% on Earning Power" in The Sunday Times, 1 Sep 02.

October 21, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 18, 2003

Old leaves make most noise

DUBLIN -- Red leaves mark walls and trees all around Dublin as frosty mornings have become the norm. While out and about during early mornings, I've listened to the old red leaves rustling at daybreak. Hearing them reminds me that some of the loudest proclamations come from the oldest written material. Leaves from old established books continue making their impact on our culture, often more emphatically than newer material coming from bloggers.

Sent mail2blog from The Front Lounge, Dublin.
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October 18, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

In conversation with Kathy Foley

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- I believe students give academic programmes their meaning and merit. Mature students like Kathy Foley provide an essential sanity check to third level programmes I teach.

After talking with Kathy about using blogs as a starting point for discussion and feedback, I realised she wasn't going to type anything online without due consideration. Rather than peck away and publish, Kathy would go away and think. "That's something I can do at home, isn't it?" More better if the home is the quiet zone of productivity. In a natural environment you control, rather than in a computer lab filled with the spastic energy of twentysomethings.

Kathy's reaction to my push for instantism reminded me thst we must be wary of easy publishing methods. As I teach in a Computers in Mass Communications module, computers and software are cultural artefacts and while they can sometimes be inspirations in themselves, we must not permit them to dominate cultural production. I will learn things in conversation with Kathy Foley, including lessons in managing IT as part of the writing process.

Sent mail2blog by Nokia Communicator Vodafone TypePad service while awaiting Bus Eireann.
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October 18, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 16, 2003

Listening to classroom culture

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- One of the subtle things that a circle of student blogs provides is the subtle insights they provide to a particular college culture. I've sparked a blogging circle that involves around two dozen students and think that they might provide guidance counselors and prospective applicants with an inside view of the multimedia culture in Tipperary Institute.

John Porcaro -- "The Inner Workings"
Caroline McNamara -- "Horoscopes"
Diane Reischling -- a four star employee blog
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October 16, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Computers in the home

KILKENNY -- My home is smarter than my granny's because I have more computers in it. When I look around my home to see the most durable piece of home electronics, I look at my washer and marvel at its intelligence. Bosch put bits of computer intelligence inside my washer which causes it to clean clothes faster, with less water and shorter cycles. We use our washer twice a week and it keeps us clean. When I got a washer, I got my Saturday mornings back because I no longer spend those mornings in a self-serve laundry. I can't imagine needing a washer that's more intelligent, but neither did my grandmother. If she were alive today, my grandmother would appreciate the push buttons and rotating dials on my Bosch Maxx. Their analogue style hides the machine's digital intelligence.

Slashdot -- "What's the oldest hardware you are still using?"
John Hannafin -- "Students with home computers"
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October 16, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 14, 2003

Finding Nemo in Ireland

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- Finding Nemo is splashing up cinema revenues as festively in Ireland as it did in the States. So we're looking at the little fellow in my Media Writing course and the storylines behind the film.

WS131 L5 -- "Recording Observations"
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October 14, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (10) | TrackBack

October 09, 2003

Teaching aggregation

UNDERWAY -- Several students in our third level Media Studies course want to know whether there's a single touchpoint showing class activity that they might miss when absent--a question that's actually related to the fundamentals of blogging. When I said they could follow the flow of class through newsfeeds, their blank looks told me they had missed the lecture on syndication and aggregation. It's important enough to be considered an essential ingredient of best practise in ICT.

Sent mail2blog by Nokia Communicator Vodafone Typepad service near Killamery, Ireland.
Diego Duval -- "An introduction to weblogs"
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October 9, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Academic Productivity

KILKENNY -- American productivity has grown by 1.9 oer cent in the past seven years.That is lower than seven European states, including Ireland. I can see that the productivity of my students will double this year from 2001, as measured in the megabytes of content they produce against the number of hours they are timetabled on mutimedia computers.

Sent mail2blog using Nokia Communicator Vodafone Typepad service from the Kilkenny Train Station.
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October 9, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 30, 2003

State of e-learning developers

CLONMEL -- Things are getting rough in the realm of e-learning curriculum development in Ireland. It probably comes as little surprise, with the continuing downturn in the economy. However, e-learning curriculum development has taken a significant blow in recent times with a number of companies forced to close. As Christmas nears, more jobs within the sector are under threat. The ever increasing presence of Indian IT companies offering Irish e-learning curriculum developers the chance to outsource projects, means that a lot of work is now going East. For the forseen future, e-learning curriculum development in Ireland looks uncertain.

Posted by Eanna McAteer using Nokia Communicator O2 TypePad services.
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September 30, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Proposal for collaborative learning

KURO5HIN -- Check out this proposal for a collaborative learning system from kuro5hn. It makes good reading for anyone involved in pitching for European funding for distance education.

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September 30, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Dumbing down with PowerPoint

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- Whenever I prepare class notes for my online classes, I refer to essential readings, then distill my ideas by using PowerPoint, Microsoft Word, Opera, askSam, Moodle, and the Oxford English Dictionary. I consider all these things to be integral parts of the instructional design process. In yet another mainstream story, the New York Times points out how people spend too much time with PowerPoint effects and not enough time preparing for engaging discussion. I lay the blame at the feet of the presenters and also with the attitude of the audience who permit the level of discourse to slide.

NYT -- "The trouble with Power Point"
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September 30, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 29, 2003

Light them, don't fill them

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- I attended a graduation ceremony on Friday where several dignitaries reminded the assemly that education isn't as much about filling a vessel as it is about lighting a flame. I remember my first foray into adult education--the Laubach Literacy Programme. I went from teaching literacy to teaching flying skills to teaching computer literacy skills. I think my past experience in each of those areas is pertinent to a lecture in PR where we discuss the launching of a community literacy programme.

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September 29, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

September 26, 2003

Busy in the back

UNDERWAY -- Because I have an unsustainable teaching load with my online and classroom schedule, my blogging side is slipping. I've actually blogged the same number of hours this week but that might not be obvious on the front page of Irish Typepad but the back side shows a lot of development in terms of photos, new online learning facilities, and electronic copies of five different courses I am teaching across three academic years. That translates into 20 classroom contact hours each week. Add the class prep time, assessment and feedback and my weekly workload balloons above 60 work hours. I am not complaining about the work in the back, but doing all that preparation, delivery and assessment means there's less time for blogging on the front page.

Sent mail2blog passing through Kilamery while heading towards Tipperary Institute shortly after sunrise.
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September 26, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 24, 2003

Analysing images in Media Studies

CLONMEL -- if you really look at advertising images, you are sure to notice they are framed in ways to optimise their message. our lecture today is about analysing images. some of the topics include advertising images and photojournalism. should be an interesting lecture.

Sent mail2blog by Sharon Fitzgerald using Nokia Communicator O2 TypePad services during an Open Media Studies Module.
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September 24, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

September 23, 2003

Getting online with Media Studies

CLONMEL -- We are doing a Media Studies course and learning the basics. Notes have been handed out about OED on media. It will be an interesting lecture today (hopefully).

Sent mail2blog by Eddie Whelan using Nokia Communicator O2 TypePad service.
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September 23, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Getting started with PR classes

CLONMEL -- I have just started my third year in Tipperary Institute's mutimedia diploma programme. The biggest thing I have accomplished thus far is not getting a hangover!

It's the first time I have used a tiny keyboard to write directly to the Web--no HTML, no FTP. I just type it and send it to the TypePad sever.

Moblogged by Lynda McCarra as mail2blog using Nokia Communicator O2 TypePad services.
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September 23, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Blogging from Effective Public Relations course

CLONMEL -- We will Learn strategic skills that are needed to assist an organisation in its communication with key stakeholders.

Sent mail2blog by Martin Keane using Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service.
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September 23, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 22, 2003

Online education and qualifications

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- We're around a year away from offering a series of online learning modules that will give students the same academic credit as the classroom experience. This is nothing revolutionary, because you can become a primary school teacher in Ireland, studying online with Hibernia College.

"It only takes 18 months and the degree is recognised by the Irish government. If a company like Hibernia College with very few employees and no campus of its own can set up and offer courses leading to professional qualifications, then what hope is there for bloated universities and colleges, with thousands of staff and expensive buildings?

We will face the same questions of productivity once our online courses come on stream.

Antoin O Lachtnain -- "Become a primary school teacher online"
Hibernia College -- "Graduate diploma in primary education"
HEA -- "Listing of Education Institutions"
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September 22, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 18, 2003

Signs of loneliness

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- I will never forget the 30 hours that preceded the suicide of a fellow aircrew member. His behaviour was crying out "I'm lonely!" but nobody had the time to sort out what he wasn't saying. For the next two weeks, we're exploring the theme of loneliness, its signs and its emotional weight. We've scrawled some things into a copy book that describe how we feel when we're lonely or an image we remember from an intense period of loneliness. We'll develop a storyboard about loneliness as this project unfolds over a fortnight. And we'll blog it along the way.

An exercise from the Open Media Studies Module, Tipperary Institute.
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September 18, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 17, 2003

Media studies lecture one

CLONMEL -- On a clear and sunny day, we're trapped inside the world of media studies. We all went outside to take unique images which consisted of our shoes, our hands and the clear blue skyline that was present. We will soon see OUR very own shots on screen which will display very vivid images.

Sent by Fiona Ni Cheirin using mail2blog Nokia Communicator O2 Typepad service.
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September 17, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

September 15, 2003

John Jennings on the moodlising of education

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- Thanks to an initiative led by John Jennings, Irish educators will be able to drill down into a host of third level courses offered through Tipperary Institute. It's as big an impact on Irish lifelong learners as the release of MIT courseware to the Internet.

Moodle e-portal at Tipperary Institute.
MIT -- Open Courseware
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September 15, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Lifelong learning in Ireland

KILKENNY -- While reading the White Paper on Adult Education, I noted several important facts concerning adult learning in Ireland. Approximately 25 per cent of the population aged 16-64 (some 500,000 adults) have literacy problems. Those people are the least likely to participate in adult education programmes. If there is to be any hope of finding gainful employment for these people, the government needs to invest in programmes that improve basic literacy. Additionally, special needs groups, such as deaf people, travellers and immigrants must be targeted. And since they cannot read, the advertisements must be placed on radio and television.

I work at Tipperary Institute, a third level college that offers highly-focused programmes that provide well-recognised and carerr-oriented third-level qualifications. The ladder structure of awards, the systems of credit accumulation and initiatives such as accreditation of experiential learning all make TI programmes particularly suited to adult learners. However, I know that five or six people each academic term do not enroll because they are medical card holders or unemployed. They do not have the funds for enrollment fees nor do they qualify for grants to attend these third level programmes. Sometimes potential enrollees need to complete bridging courses prior to being accepted for courses. Students on these courses cannot avail of students grants and are also debarred from availing of the funds provided to TI for student support.

Kathryn Holmquist -- "Funding risks to plan's targets" in The Irish Times 12 September 2003.
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September 15, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 12, 2003

Radio Jobs

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- We are training students for a cross-section of media jobs, including

current affairs reporter
community affairs reporter
sports contributor
programme presenter
commercial producer
music presenter

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September 12, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack

September 10, 2003

Moodle means distance education for Ireland

KILKENNY -- After a fast-paced series of demonstrations by a handful of ICT programme specialists, I can confidently say that the Open Source script library from Moodle will make a big impact on distance education in Ireland before the year is out.

Sent mail2blog by Nokia Communicator O2 TypePad service while watching the sunset kiss St Canice's tower, Kilkenny.
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September 10, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 06, 2003

Four pillars of writing for multiple media

CLONMEL -- After a review of several A5 copybooks, a survey of the accreditation documents an a cross-reference to the "Higher Education Links Scheme," I have concluded that the four pillars of writing for my Writing Skills (BW131) course provided foundation skills for media professionals by covering

Microcontent Writing
Microdocument Research
Media Analysis
Personalcasting

I think we will enjoy exciting times as potential students, affiliated teachers and practising professionals discover how we have upgraded the focus on this requisite course.

Sent mail2blog after eating a raspberry scone at O Tuama's cafe, using mail2blog Nokia 9210i O2 TypePad services.
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September 6, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

In conversation with Bridget Kirwan

CLONMEL -- I need to attack a sore point in the multimedia dlploma programme at Tipperary Institute and today that means finding a way to reduce the attrition due to failures in the Personal Development module. So I am working with Bridget Kirwan, a fellow course developer, to hook Media Writing into Personal Development. After one short review of the course modules, we can see where the same reading list describes a versatile process for students to create content suitable for both classroom delivery and for presentation to an Internet audience.

Sent from O Tuama's cafe in The Market Square using mail2blog Nokia O2 TypePad service.
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September 6, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Information slipstream

UNDERWAY -- One of the most exciting things happened in the field of Irish education this summer but it will take a few years for its effects to be felt. It's the emergence of educational blogging. Without the nudging of higher authorities, a core group of lecturers who I know have started using different blogging tools as part of their course delivery. Their students will benefit by the emergence of new touch points to course materials. Behind the scenes, people like John Hannafin have melded codesets onto blog templates to create attractive entry points to the two-way Web. Hannafin isn't alone. I have eye-watering rich media enclosures from Tim Kirby that can slip into some versions of aggregated newsfeeds as well as provide digital asset management controls to premium course materials.

As soon as I repair my mailing list subscriptions (they were vaporised when my public mailboxes burst with SoBig attachments), I will have a full accounting of blogging at the third level. I am certain that this low-cost initiative will rank among the best examples of value-for-money in the Irish public sector.

Sent mail2blog by Nokia 9210i O2 TypePad services while abeam St Kieran's College aboard Bus Eireann.
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September 6, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 04, 2003

PDFs deploying knowledge objects

LUSK -- Tim Kirby explains why PDFs should be used as the format to containerise deployable distance education knowledge objects.

Tim Kirby -- "Using PDFs as an online education delivery mechanism"
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September 4, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Copy-and-paste plagiarism

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- I am worried about the use of blogging as part of academic training because it could increase the trend of cut-and-paste plagiarism. Thirty-eight percent of the undergraduate students surveyed by Rutgers University said that they had engaged in one or more instances of "cut-and-paste" plagiarism. This is not just a college problem because it's a practise that I have seen across all age groups. Donald L. McCabe, a management professor at Rutgers University, surveyed more than 18,000 students, 2,600 faculty members and 650 teaching assistants at large public universities and small private colleges across the United States.

Sarah Rimer -- "A campus fad that's being copied"
I have used turnitin.com to help detect student plagiarism. Thanks to Karlin Lillington for the pointer.

September 4, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 03, 2003

Creatively fielding accredited courses

KILKENNY -- During the week that Irish students begin to finally accept state-funded places in colleges around Ireland, nearly 1000 IT courses will be underfilled. This is occurring in traditional and distance education curricula. At the same time, courses in business studies and the humanities are oversubscribed. Sometimes a simple change in the name of a course will attract increased enrollment. But in most instances, the course syllabi must change as well.

In order to revise programmes quickly, Irish Institutes of Technology claim they need to be free to innovate and introduce new courses quickly through a realignment directly under the Higher Education Authority (HEA). That's the message of Dr Don Thornhill, chairman of the HEA. However, it's a message that would reduce the financial clout of the Department of Education so in times of fiscal constraint, realignment won't play out for the Irish Institutes of Technology.

Kathryn Holmquist -- "Institute courses being ignored" in The Irish Times, 29 August 2003.
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September 3, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 02, 2003

You are who you are by your playlist

CLONMEL HOTSPOT -- You can often tell as much about a person by their sounds as by their speech. That's why I enjoy looking at what people like Brian Greene, Robyn O'Rourke Pollman, and Ian Bertram have on their playlists or stacked next to their CD players. My sound files intersect their collections in several tracks. I've got to convert my playlist into a Typepad list and show it here. It would be a useful exercise that would help people get to know each other in a distance education class.

Robyn lists the songs that make the whole world sing along with some of the worst music in history.
Brian Greene is an activist DJ behind WXTC.net.
Ian wonders what does all these stacked CDs mean.
Blender lists the 50 worst artists in music history.

Blender's full listing of the 50 worst artists, marked by whether I bought the album or have a track on a playlist.

1. Insane Clown Posse
2. Emerson, Lake and Palmer (bought one)
3. Michael Bolton
4. Kenny G (bought single for sax)
5. Starship
6. Kansas
7. Asia
8. Vanilla Ice
9. Lee Greenwood
10. Air Supply (bought album)
11. Latoya Jackson
12. Tin Machine
13. Mick Jagger (bought several Stones)
14. Yngwie Malmsteen
15. Yanni
16. Oingo Boingo
17. Benzino
18. Pat Boone
19. Dan Fogelberg
20. Howard Jones
21. The Alan Parsons Project
22. Primus
23. Creed
24. Bad English
25. Jamiroquai (bought one album)
26. Celine Dion
27. Colour Me Bad
28. Crash Test Dummies (bought album in German)
29. Skinny Puppy
30. Richard Marx
31. Arrested Development (on MP3 playlist)
32. The Hooters
33. Japan
34. Live
35. Paul Oakenfold
36. 98 Degrees
37. The Doors (bought an album)
38. Nelson
39. Bob Geldof
40. Blind Melon
41. Whitesnake
42. Rick Wakeman
43. Mike and the Mechanics (on MP3 playlist)
44. Manowar
45. Gipsy Kings
46. The Spin Doctors
47. Goo Goo Dolls
48. Master P
49. Toad the Wet Sprocket
50. Iron Butterfly (bought an album)

September 2, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

August 26, 2003

Open courses online

WIRED -- I think MIT has a brilliant idea making much of its courseware available in the open. By pecking around the courses, you can learn things online that help expand your understanding of very sophisticated materials. I hope there's time set aside at the 2004 Irish EdTech confernce for educators to examine the reach and depth of the video lectures, class notes, tests and course outlines available to anyone with a browser.

When the Irish educational multimedia industry is reeling, national educational establishments should open their syllabi to distance learning. After all, the pinnacle of technology and science education is giving away its knowledge objects, and it sill makes plenty of money from charging for its degrees. Free content can generate paid lines of revenue.

MIT administrators, professors and students point out that the Web is no substitute for the experience of learning in a top-tier academic setting. You get a snapshot of a last-generation course. You don't get an MIT education. But other instructors can lace together and build "self-managed Open Courseware communities" in their own campus environments. That's the big lesson I've taken after clicking around MIT's Open Courseware.

Open CourseWare
Top 10 Open Courseware subjects are listed by David Diamond in Wired.
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August 26, 2003 in Classroom | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

IrishEyes

Microcontent seen and heard in Ireland

May 26, 2004

Vikings couldn't spread memes

May 16, 2004

Call to action

May 12, 2004

Writers in Schools

May 07, 2004

Writing Skills Final Revision

May 04, 2004

Global backpack

May 03, 2004

Video Art for Plasma Screens

April 30, 2004

Stealing baby ideas

Blogging work activities

April 29, 2004

Writing for the Web

April 28, 2004

Bootleg Bowie

April 27, 2004

Blocking discussion of censorship

April 25, 2004

Bladerunner Neuroethics

April 22, 2004

Working in Canice's Tower

April 20, 2004

Strands of Postmodernism

XP DOS emulator

April 18, 2004

National branding for cars

April 17, 2004

Smart made simple

April 14, 2004

Workers Personalcasting

April 10, 2004

€20 steadycam

Episodic writing

April 07, 2004

Banning Google from classroom

April 06, 2004

Grammar God

April 05, 2004

Free Berlin Culture

Active writing for digital photography

March 30, 2004

Situated software in student projects

March 29, 2004

Media literacy

March 28, 2004

Define multimedia

Things never taught in design school

March 21, 2004

Better than digital radio

March 20, 2004

Gavin encounters John's attorneys

March 18, 2004

Winning through waffling

March 14, 2004

Jwalk Lesson

March 11, 2004

Nero Burning Works

March 10, 2004

Revamping Moodle

March 09, 2004

Marxism in the Irish Context

March 08, 2004

Making microcontent

March 07, 2004

Learning by managing

March 06, 2004

Eureka Moments in Temple Bar

March 05, 2004

Pron Clubs

March 04, 2004

I have enough to be doing

March 02, 2004

Media Jobs

March 01, 2004