November 26, 2012
Another list for your reading, gift-giving and collection development pleasure.
Every year for the last bunch of years I’ve been linking to and posting about all the “year’s best sciencey books” lists that appear in various media outlets and shining a bit of light on the best of the year.
All the…
November 23, 2012
College, Reinvented: The Finalists
Napster, Udacity, and the Academy
Is the death of newspapers the end of good citizenship?
MOOCs and the Future of the University
Survival of the Fittest in the New Music Industry
The Stanford Education Experiment Could Change Higher Learning Forever
How Dead Is…
November 23, 2012
Anybody who's followed this blog for any length of time knows that I love books, I love reading them, I love reading and writing about them too. However, sometime it's possible to get a little too enamored of our own little petty obsessions. Of course, my obsessions are fine but yours are a bit…
November 22, 2012
Defending universities: engaging the public
Oxford erupts in 'Battle of the Bod'
Sexy in STEM? (great essay on women in science)
The Free Ebook Farce
Penguin to Expand E-Book Lending
Supporting a new way to peer-review
Transformational Leadership?
CourseSmart Analytics Is a Bad idea (because it…
November 21, 2012
Another list for your reading, gift-giving and collection development pleasure.
Every year for the last bunch of years I’ve been linking to and posting about all the “year’s best sciencey books” lists that appear in various media outlets and shining a bit of light on the best of the year.
All the…
November 20, 2012
Another list for your reading, gift-giving and collection development pleasure.
Every year for the last bunch of years I’ve been linking to and posting about all the “year’s best sciencey books” lists that appear in various media outlets and shining a bit of light on the best of the year.
All the…
November 19, 2012
New LJ Report Closely Examines What Makes Academic Library Patrons Tick
Nate Silver and the Ascendance of Expertise
Stables and Volatiles (balancing personalities in project groups)
Academic Libraries, Information Literacy, and the Value of Our Values
Facebook wants to organise our relationships.…
November 19, 2012
It is time. The season of lists begins again!
Every year for the last bunch of years I've been linking to and posting about all the "year's best sciencey books" lists that I can find around the web in various media outlets.
From the beginning it's been a pretty popular service so I'm happy to…
November 14, 2012
The Fallacy of Digital Natives
Beats vs obsessions, columns vs. blogs, and other angels dancing on pins
Data-Gathering via Apps Presents a Gray Legal Area
Coup at Environmental Journal? (journal editorial board quits when journal changes too much under new admin)
Challenges in Digital Humanities
10…
November 13, 2012
Yes, I've fallen behind a bit on my MOOC due to conferences and other general insanity, but after doing the last week this week I vow to catch up a bit retroactively and do weeks 3, 4 & 5.
My weeks 1 and 2 posts are here and here.
Distributed Research: new models of inquiry (Nov 12- 18)…
November 9, 2012
As I mentioned way back on October 22nd, I was kindly invited to give a talk at the Brock University Physics Department as part of their seminar series. The talk was on Getting Your Science Online, a topic that I'm somewhat familiar with! Since it was coincidentally Open Access Week, I did kind of…
November 7, 2012
The Inked Academic Body
Why I Support an Open Definition of DH
Bring It On! Why the Crisis in Academic Librarianship is the Best Thing Ever and What We Should Do About It.
Administration as Academic Alternative
In praise of the big old mess
Ignore the Doomsayers: The Book Industry Is Actually…
October 27, 2012
The Impact of Social Media on the Dissemination of Research: Results of an Experiment
Would you include your blog in your T&P file?
The Benefits of Open Data – Evidence from Economic Research and Part II
Google Books Litigation Family Tree
Anatomy of open access publishing: a study of…
October 26, 2012
This is a classic case of "so funny because it's so almost true that if you didn't laugh you would stab yourself in the eye but that's a bad idea because all the hospitals are placebo hospitals and placebos don't work so well on stab wounds."
From my new best friend, Newsbiscuit: Jeremy Hunt to…
October 24, 2012
On Naming Names and Calling Out Trolls
Gawker, Reddit, Free Speech and Such
Millennials: They Aren’t So Tech Savvy After All
Project Information Literacy: Inventing the Workplace and How College Graduates Solve Information Problems Once They Join the Workplace
The Philosophy of Open Access…
October 22, 2012
It seems that Brock University in St. Catherine's, Ontario really likes me. Two years ago, the Library kindly invited me to speak during their Open Access Week festivities. And this year the Physics Department has also very kindly invited me to be part of their Seminar Series, also to talk about…
October 18, 2012
I'm at the Access Conference in Montreal this week starting today, so I'm a bit behind on the readings for the Current/Future State of Higher Education MOOC I'm participating in. I'm hoping a nice long relaxing train ride will give me the opportunity to catch up.
Anyways, Week 1 was a great…
October 17, 2012
Fair use: a pseudo-post
What Exactly Is Critical Thinking?
The NPR Model for Higher Ed
Why It's Time for a Canadian Digitization Strategy Based on Fair Dealing
Is Open Access Destroying Academic Publishers?
Survey reveals hidden high stress levels and long-hours culture at universities
The Time…
October 15, 2012
C. Scott Findlay, associate professor of biology at the University of Ottawa and a visiting research scientist at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, had a sobering article in the Toronto Star a few days ago.
It's titled Governing in the dark: Ottawa’s dangerous unscientific revolution and it…
October 13, 2012
Everyone should program, or Programming is Hard? Both!
Oh No: LinkedIn Just Went Klout On Us
Can eTextbooks help save the planet?
Preventing the Second Big Deal (not getting locked into big etextbook deals)
Generation Y Leads in Book Buying, Says Industry’s Most Comprehensive Report
Apress unveils…
October 12, 2012
Longtime readers will know that I'm a big fan of the works of HP Lovecraft. And every once in a while it's nice to do an eldritch, namelessly horrific take on your typical Friday Fun.
I don't know about you, but I've read all of Lovecraft's original fiction (though not all the collaboration and…
October 11, 2012
Well, I've done it. I've signed up for a MOOC. MOOC, of course, being Massively Open Online Courses, are all the rage in higher-ed-more-disruptingly-than-thou circles, what with their potential is greatly expand the reach of higher education beyond a campus-bound constituency. But not without…
October 10, 2012
The PC is Over
The Last PC Laptop
What if Libraries were the Problem?
Annealing the Library
Librarians Talk of Abandoning E-Books
Re-Inventing Public Libraries For The Digital Age
5 Ways That edX Could Change Education
The State of the Internet (ie. mobilemobilemobile)
Does Open Access Tackle,…
October 4, 2012
Finding Fame, and Sometimes Fortune, in Social Media
Why Some Academics Publish More
Why book bloggers are critical to literary criticism
On Becoming a Phoenix: Encounters With the Digital Revolution (trying an online course at UPhoenix)
A Pioneer in Online Education Tries a MOOC
FriendFeed Turns 5…
October 3, 2012
Ten years ago today, three days shy of my 40th birthday, I started a blog more or less on a whim. I have to admit, I only had a pretty vague idea of what blogging was all about or what its potential was. After all, my main inspiration for getting started wasn't even a blog at all, but a zine.…
October 2, 2012
Another World is Possible: Particle Physics Goes Open Access
Open-access deal for particle physics
20/09/2012, SCOAP3 Article Processing Charges announced
SCOAP3 Open Access Initiative launched at CERN
The Cost of Not Reading "The Price of Inequality"
Our Obsession with Scale Is Failing Us
The…
October 1, 2012
The most recent controversy to whip up the library and science blogospheres revolves around SUNY Potsdam cancelling their American Chemical Society journal package because the subscription packages on offer sucked up too high a percentage of their total budget. SUNY Potsdam Library Director Jenica…
September 29, 2012
This past Thursday evening I was honoured to attend the awards ceremony for the 2011 Lane Anderson Award which celebrates the best science writing in Canada.
The winners were announced at the end of the evening. This is from the press release, which doesn't seem to be online yet:
Toronto. 2thth…
September 27, 2012
Why do people go into science? Why do people go to work at scholarly societies? Why do people choose scholarly publishing as a career? Why do people choose a career at the intersection of those three vocations?
There are cynical answers to those questions, for sure, and even the non-cynical need…
September 27, 2012
The current Conservative government of Canada isn't too fond of Canadians having access to information. It's inconvenient for them because I guess a well-informed citizenry would be more likely to call them on the various shenanigans they've been indulging in.
A good general take on the situation…
