CamWorld: Reader Mail …

CamWorld: Reader Mail

Software Excellence: Open Source vs. Free Software

WebTechniques: Weblog software compared

Here’s a list of weblogs being used as teaching tools. In fact, CamWorld started as a site where my students could keep up with their weekly readings back when I was teaching new media design in the Spring of 1997.

Who wants to compare Open Journal with GreyMatter? Which is better? Which is more secure?

It’s all a matter of perspective. Damien posted yesterday the fact that I prefer to eat my cereal dry — even such cereals as Grape Nuts. This reminded me of back when I was in high school in Michigan. My mom ran a daycare out of our house, so there were always loads of kids running around before and after school. One morning, I was sitting at the table, eating a bowl of dry Grape Nuts when an eight-year old named Steven walked up to me, looked at my bowl of cereal, looked at me, looked back at the bowl of cereal again and asked, “Why are you eating kitty litter?” This story always pops into my head every time I come across a situation where somebody has a differing point of view or perspective than I do — and every time it makes me grin.

Another story. [This one is from a book I read in a college design class] A college professor, frustrated with the lack of creative thinking in his classes, walks up to the chalkboard and draws a small white dot on it with a piece of chalk. He turns to the class and asks “What is this?” Silence. Some students fidget nervously, looking quickly at each other. One woman tentatively raises her hand an asks “A dot on the chalkboard?” The other students look relieved and nod their heads. Yes, so obvious. The professor looks at them and says, “I’m ashamed of you. I was in a kindergarten class this morning and drew this same dot on a chalkboard, and asked them what it was. Immediately, dozens of hands shot in the air. One little girl said it was the top of a telephone pole. A little boy said it was a bird flying in the sky. Another boy said it was the button on a giant’s shirt. Not a single one of those kindergartners said it was a ‘dot on the chalkboard.'” The professor then went on to explain that young children are very creative thinkers simply because they have not spent the same amount of time within our society, learning how and what to think.

BBEdit: “When will you have a Mac OS X version of BBEdit?” is the most frequently-asked question in BareBones BBEdit FAQ. Heh!

A bunch of research links about collaborative journalism and knowledge management:

Funny. A couple people have asked if the weird message posted yesterday was a hack. I’m sorry to report that it wasn’t. That was just me trying to be cute. Sorry.

LinuxToday: Community: Microsoft’s New Strategy Against Open Source

Funny. Last week, someone created a project on SourceForge called “Windows” which was clearly a humorous response to the reports of Microsoft allowing source code access to a select group of developers. Too bad the SourceForge administrators shut down the project…

Facilitating Collaborative Software Development: The Enforceability of Mass-Market Public Software Licenses

Securing Mozilla in the Public Library

Slashdot: Clay Shirky Explains Internet Evolution

Posted by Cameron Barrett at March 13, 2001 05:08 PM

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