I promise not to make this a blog that just reposts all Comedy Central videos, but this one is very timely and also funny so here you go, from Stephen Colbert:

I doubt you have to be a Sex and The City fan to appreciate this clip from The Daily Show called “Is American Ready for a Woman President?”, but if you are a SATC fan you are absolutely guaranteed to LOL.

• Video Verdi – Traviata – Choeur Bohémiens
  cute little video, check it out
  (tags: video cute funny opera)

• Sex Offender Laws in the US [pdf]
  by Human Rights Watch – gets into some of the overly broad interpretations of what constitutes a sex offender act
  (tags: legal rights)
• Formal and substantial Internet information skills
  (tags: research article skill)

• Demystifying the Publication Process, Part 1
  should be helpful for grad students
  (tags: publishing academia tips)
• Demystifying the Publication Process, Part 2
  should be helpful for grad students
  (tags: publishing academia)

I’ve long enjoyed cropping images into abstract sections. I like discovering sections of things I don’t necessarily notice otherwise. It’s related to Project 365: taking a photo every day. That also helps discover things in one’s surroundings that otherwise may go unnoticed.

Since it’s a slow Sunday and I just happened upon one in my photostream that I like, I thought I’d post it here:

Any ideas?

Read the rest of this entry »

• oSkope visual search
  alternative way to visualize search engine results (works with Flickr, Amazon, ebay, YouTube)
  (tags: search-engines photos videos flickr youtube ebay amazon search)
• 404 Error Pages
  helpful and/or funny “file not found” pages
  (tags: design usability error)

• PanImages
  image search that supports hundreds of languages – neat tool
  (tags: search search-engines images photos flickr language)
• Video Toolbox: 150+ Online Video Tools and Resources
  (tags: video edit)
• Publish or Perish
  software that works with Google Scholar for citation stats about papers
  (tags: software stats publishing)
• Students wear pink to school to support a peer who had been bullied because of wearing pink the day before
  (tags: bullying schools students article rights)
• “Skills only found in China”
  (tags: interesting photos)

• Trojan(R) Ranks U.S. Colleges and Universities in Second Annual Sexual Health Report Card
  (tags: health universities)
• Monster plant grows 5ft in a weekend and bursts through greenhouse roof
  (Daily Mail)
  (tags: nature interesting photos)

Here’s another find from my time in Switzerland, this time the Zürich Airport.

Approximate translation: “Pirating and counterfeiting is a bad sport: no rules, many fouls, only losers.”

This may actually sound better in English. Does “loser” have that extra connotation in German as it does in English? I didn’t think it did.

In any case, is an airport such a helpful place to put this, especially right near the business lounge in a relatively secluded area? Is any place a helpful place to put this? (I know there is a huge literature on the effectiveness of ad campaigns in various areas. I don’t know if there is any in this particular one.)

I saw this ad somewhere else, too, but I forget where. Have you seen ads of this sort elsewhere?

• PHOTOS: “Marriage is between one man and one woman!” (George W, Bush)
  interestiing compilation
  (tags: war politics photos)
• 82 Years (and 9 months) of being gay
  see photo for the rest
  (tags: political gayrights photo funny)

• Name that Color
  (from chir.ag) a great little tool for figuring out the names of various colors, search by color or browse by color name
  (tags: colors tools design)
• Triangles following each other
  you can move one and see how it changes the pattern
  (tags: flash funny physics)
• The 9/11 Cover-Up
  (Discover Magazine) “Thousands of Manhattan residents were endangered by WTC debris—and government malfeasance.”
  (tags: health 9/11 article)
• Napkin Folding Instructions: 27 Photographed Napkin Folds
  (tags: howto reference tutorial)
• Great advice for folks starting out on PhD programs (or grad students already in them)
  (tags: advice academia gradschool students)

Recently in Geneva, I was filling out this visitor card in a hotel. Notice anything peculiar?

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• Alive Day Memories: Interview with a Soldier
  (The Huffington Post) – interesting interview with a soldier about losing her arm in the war and living life after
  (tags: war interview)
• Men avoid contact with kids in fear of being accused a predator
  (tags: men gender children crime)
• How the RIAA Litigation Process Works
  (tags: riaa legal music)
• Wikitization
  some interesting thoughts about how editing (and deletion in particular) has changed on Wikipedia over the last few years
  (tags: wikipedia commentary)
• Timeline: Internet, Federal Govt, and Communications
  (tags: history internet reference)
• List of publications from The Inspire Foundation in Australia
  the foundation is “a national non-profit organisation with a mission to create opportunities for young people to change their world”
  (tags: papers research youth)
• An IM Infatuation Turned to Romance. Then the Truth Came Out.
  the story’s a bit long-winded, but there are interesting tid-bits in it
  (tags: article chat im deception lies relationships)

• Journalistopia online crime maps directory
  (tags: maps crime)

• How Mark Zuckerberg Turned Facebook Into the Web’s Hottest Platform
  (Wired)
  (tags: facebook history sns)
• FreeFullText.com
  “direct links to over 7000 scholarly periodicals which allow some or all of their online content to be viewed by ANYONE with Internet access for free (though some may require free registration)”
  (tags: journal free research academic)
• Statetris
  Tetris with U.S. states. The easy version is too easy, the medium is okay, the hard can be a challenge with some of them.
  (tags: games maps)
• Author Rights: Using the SPARC Author Addendum to secure your rights as the author of a journal article (SPARC)
  something to read and consider before signing agreements with journals about the publication of our work
  (tags: copyright academia journal publishing rights legal)

• Onion News Network: Web Crash 2007
  funny
  (tags: video funny)
• PhpGedView News – Online genealogy at its best
  free open-source geneology program you can run on your own server (one-click install available to Dreamhost customers)
  (tags: geneology software freeware open-source)

• Ping pong article in the NYTimes
  (tags: pingpong article sports food)

I got an email through Flickr letting me know that one of my photos was being used for a poster advertising an event at a science festival in York, UK on “Chocolate: nice but naughty?”. The poster:

I thought it was just going to be one of many chocolate photos, but there it is, center stage. Yes, I know, note the missing chocolate.

(Here’s the bigger (pdf) version of the poster.)

This photo, by the way, was the subject of a blog post here two years ago. To this day, it is among the 500 most interesting photos (#233 at the time of this writing) on Flickr for November 28, 2005.

I get a kick out of hearing that people find my photos useful so this was a treat.

• Creating & Connecting
  “research and guidelines on online social – and educational – networking” from the National School Boards Association [pdf]
  (tags: sns report pdf)