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Somewhat less gleeful Gleevec

When Gleevec hit the market in 2001 for chronic myelogenous leukemia , it was hailed as a major breakthrough in cancer treatment. Gleevec, which inhibits bcr-abl kinase, was the harbinger of targeted chemotherapy and represented a departure from the cytotoxics which, although effective, possess a broad array of adverse effects. A History of STI 571, written by Brian Druker, M.D., the principal investigator who championed the compound, not only illustrates the genesis of the drug itself but also the interdisciplinary teamwork required for drug discovery. Behind Gleevec came Iressa, Astra…

The Neuroscience of Admiration

I know the medium is the message, but does every message have to be about the medium? People on twitter love tweeting about twitter, just as people on facebook love writing about the facebook redesign. Sometimes, this navel gazing can get out of hand, which is what I think happened with a recent (and extremely interesting) PNAS paper on the neural substrate of admiration and compassion. The paper, by scientists at USC, has nothing to do with twitter or online social networks or even the internet, and yet that quickly became the main story. Before long, there were a flurry of posts with…

#scio10 aftermath: some thoughts on "An Open History of Science".

Here are some of the thoughts and questions that stayed with me from this session. (Here are my tweets from the session and the session's wiki page.) The session was led by John McKay and Eric Michael Johnson. John posted the text of his presentation and Eric posted his presentation a la YouTube. I'm going to take this as permission to skip doing a proper recap here. Instead, I'm going to write about the big ideas this session raised for me. First, I'm struck by how easy it is for those of us who were trained to do science to know very little about where scientific practices come from --…

Fast food = corn, corn and more corn

Half of all restaurants in the United States are fast food restaurants. They do $100 billion worth of business a year (that's one seventh of a Bailout, a new unit of expenditure). A lot of the fast food is in the form of beef (hamburgers), chicken (sandwiches, tenders or nuggets) and french fries. A new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS, familiarly known in the trade as "penis") uses stable isotope analysis to trace the input materials in three large fast food chains. The results can be summed up in one word -- corn: We used carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes…

The Evolution of Imprinting

The phrase "genomic imprinting" has come to refer the turning off of a gene (a particular instance of a gene on a particular chromosome duplicated across the cells in a body) so that the gene is not expressed at all, with the turning off of the gene not caused in the body in question, but rather, during the previous generation by a process happening in the soma of one of the parents. A maternally imprinted gene is passed on to junior, but will not be expressed in junior. a paternally imprinted gene is passed on to junior, but will not be expressed in junior. Typically (as far as we know) a…

Teaching science in an anti-science country

The Washington Post has an opinion editorial by Paul Hanle, the president of the Biotechnology Institute in Washington. I recently addressed a group of French engineering graduate students who were visiting Washington from the prestigious School of Mines in Paris. After encouraging them to teach biotechnology in French high schools, I expected the standard queries on teaching methods or training. Instead, a bright young student asked bluntly: "How can you teach biotechnology in this country when you don't even accept evolution?" I wanted to disagree, but the kid had a point. Proponents of…

How bad can it get in my hometown?

Having been born in Detroit and raised both in the city and one of its suburbs, news like this distresses me: DETROIT (Reuters) - With bidding stalled on some of the least desirable residences in Detroit's collapsing housing market, even the fast-talking auctioneer was feeling the stress. "Folks, the ground underneath the house goes with it. You do know that, right?" he offered. After selling house after house in the Motor City for less than the $29,000 it costs to buy the average new car, the auctioneer tried a new line: "The lumber in the house is worth more than that!" As Detroit reels…

Great customer service redux

Some of you may remember back in May 2008 when I discussed the unexpectedly good customer service provided by Mill Creek Entertainment, the company busily mining public domain (and otherwise minimal-license) flicks and TV flicks to create really inexpensive bundles of movies on DVD. (That's not all the company does, to be sure, but I know them most for the "50 Movie Packs"--50 movies on 12 DVDs--of which there are now 23 examples. The company's motto is "changing the face of value entertainment!" and they're also doing other things, including TV series and documentary compilations.) The gist…

The High Cost of College Textbooks

We're a couple weeks into the semester and the ever-popular subject of the cost of textbooks has raised its head. Along with my students, I often wonder why they shell out so much for these works. I think there are several things at play here, but first a little background: I've been teaching at the college level for over 25 years and I've written a few textbooks myself, for two different publishers: West and Delmar/Thomson Learning (including the ever-exciting Op Amps and Linear Integrated Circuits mentioned on the sidebar, complete with color-coordinated matching laboratory manual). The…

A Farewell to Scienceblogs: the Changing Science Blogging Ecosystem

It is with great regret that I am writing this. Scienceblogs.com has been a big part of my life for four years now and it is hard to say good bye. Everything that follows is my own personal thinking and may not apply to other people, including other bloggers on this platform. The new contact information is at the end of the post, but please come back up here and read the whole thing - why I feel like I must leave now. Sb beginnings Scienceblogs.com started back in January 2006. On that day, several of my favourite science bloggers moved to this new site, posting the URL on their farewell…

Reed Elsevier Is Stealing My Words

This displeases us greatly. I received an email from ScienceBlogling Mike Dunford that Reed Elsevier had excerpted one of my posts. No problem there--I like it when people read my stuff....except for one thing: The fuckers copyrighted my words. MINES!!! Lookee: (click to embiggen) Mike Dunford lays out why this is such a fucking shitty thing to do: This blog, like almost all blogs, is an open-access publication. There's no charge to read this blog. If you've got an internet connection and time to waste, you can scroll through the things I've written to your heart's content. The thing is,…

Pandemic Flu Awareness Week, October 9 - 16, 2006

Today marks the second Pandemic Flu Awareness Week, launched by my colleagues over at The Flu Wiki. The good news is that in the year since the first effort to raise the awareness of the blogosphere, much has happened in the way of increased recognition of the pandemic threat. Communities around the world have started to plan for the possibility of a pandemic and the planning process will pay dividends. More good news is that a pandemic strain of H5N1, the leading candidate for a disastrous flu pandemic, has yet to come into the open. The bad news is that there is much, much more that needs…

Winners of the 2011 Lane Anderson Award Celebrating the Best Science Writing in Canada

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, 2012: The two winners of the 2011 Lane Anderson Award were announced today by Hollister Doll and Sharon Fitzhenry, Directors of the Fitzhenry Family Foundation, at an intimate dinner in Toronto. The annual Lane Anderson Award honours two jury-selected books, in the categories of adult and…

Around the Web: Ada Lovelace Day, Wikipedia & Women in Science

My library is hosting a Ada Lovelace Day event tomorrow (ok, a little late...). Continuing in a tradition of having Women in Science Wikipedia Edit-a-thons, we're hosting our own Wikipedia Women in Science Edit-a-thon! I've been doing a fair bit of reading over the last couple of years about Wikipedia culture and especially how it relates to the under-representation of women both as editors and as subjects of articles. So I thought I'd share some of my readings here with all of you. Of course, this list is in no way comprehensive or complete. I welcome suggestions for further readings in the…

Charismatic cephalofauna

Christine Huffard sent me a note alerting me to the publication of her latest paper, and she thought I might be interested because I "seem to like cephalopods". Hah. Well. I've noticed that Dr Huffard seems to have some small affection for the tentacled beasties herself. The paper follows on an old tradition and an old problem. While people have no problem distinguishing human individuals, we have a tough time telling one individual animal from another. This perceptual difficulty complicates problems of studying variations in behavior or physiology, or monitoring numbers and behavior, in…

ScienceBlogs.de Now in Beta

December 10 is a big day for ScienceBlogs. Today, Hubert Burda Media, one of the largest media companies in Europe, and our partner in Germany, launches a beta version of ScienceBlogs.de, a German-language website that brings the ScienceBlogs idea and spirit to Europe. I've had the pleasure these past few months of working with the team behind ScienceBlogs.de, and I'm delighted to let my editorial counterpart in Germany, Beatrice Lugger, introduce ScienceBlogs.de in her own words. Dear ScienceBlogs Community, Just three months after ScienceBlogs.com and the German publishing company Hubert…

Testing new regulatory czar's commitment to transparency with OSHA's silica proposed rule

President Obama's regulatory czar, Howard Shelanski, has been on the job for a month.  During his confirmation hearing Shelanski expressed his commitment to transparency.  He suggested it was one of his key priorities within the White House's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) which is housed within the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).  As noted, however, by CPR scholar Sidney Shapiro and his colleague James Goodwin, OIRA has a long history of secrecy with respect to its role in the centralized review of agencies' regulatory activities.  Many in the open-government…

Bat development

It always gives a fellow a warm feeling to see an old comrade-in-arms publish a good paper. Chris Cretekos was a graduate student working on the molecular genetics of zebrafish at the University of Utah when I was a post-doc there, and he's a good guy I remember well…so I was glad to see his paper in Developmental Dynamics. But then I notice it wasn't on zebrafish—Apostate! Heretic! Except…it's on bats. How cool is that? And it's on the embryonic development of bats. Even cooler! I must graciously forgive his defection from the zebrafish universe since he is working on an organism that is…

Getting OSHA Right

Nearly four decades after the passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, it is difficult to find anyone who will argue that it has delivered on its promise to provide safe and healthful working conditions. In 2005 and 2006 I traveled across the country and met with people experienced in worker health and safety to share ideas about what we can do to protect workers better. There was considerable agreement about the need to strengthen OSHAâs basic functions and use them more creatively â more inspections, stronger enforcement, renewed rulemaking, and a strategic focus on the…

Discourse give me hives

But a fascinating lesson in scientific discourse is currently underway in the blogosphere. It all started with a harmless little analysis of a letter published in NEJM. The strange part (to those of us who live here) was that the authors responded. On the blog. For real. And they were kinda pissed (in the American sense of the word; I have no idea if they'd been drinking, but probably not. After all, they're not bloggers). Communication in medical research is slow. In general, this can be a good thing. Before research is published in a respected journal, it should be thoroughly…

Palin, autism and fruitflies - it does not add up

You have probably heard that Governor Palin, in a recent speech contradicted herself within a span of a couple of sentences. So, she said that "Early identification of a cognitive or other disorder, especially autism, can make a life-changing difference.", then in the next breath dissed that same research: "You've heard about some of these pet projects they really don't make a whole lot of sense and sometimes these dollars go to projects that have little or nothing to do with the public good. Things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not." You can see that part here: This…

Is OSHA expecting too little from violators?

What kind of deal should OSHA cut with an employer after one of his workers has a foot amputated because of an improperly guarded conveyor? A couple of years later at the same worksite this happens: Both legs of another employee are amputated because of unguarded equipment. What should the deal be this time? These are the questions in my mind after recently reading an OSHA news release about Seaford Ice during the same week I read the report "OSHA's Discount on Danger." Seaford Ice in Seaford, DE has been the scene of horrific injuries to some of its workers. An employee lost a foot in a…

Lamprey's Spinal Cord Modelled

[More blog entries about neuroscience, lamprey, computationalmodeling; neurovetenskap, nejonöga, datormodellering.] In Stockholm on 14 June, my psychedelic friend and fellow honorary Chinese Mikael Huss will present his PhD thesis in engineering (available on-line). He has built software models of bits of the lamprey's spinal cord. The book's title is Computational Modeling of the Lamprey CPG. From Subcellular to Network Level -- CPG means "central pattern generator". I understand little of this. I just want to eat the lamprey. Thesis abstract below the fold. Due to the staggering complexity…

The Beginning of The End of [Donald Trump/Tea Party/Fox News] UPDATED

Select one and only one. Or two if you like. --- see down below for update --- Megyn Kelly of FOX news went after Donald Trump, the apparent winner of the FOX-GOP Fauxbate. Donald Trump at first declared that he has no time to be politically correct. Later he proved that he does have time to be politically incorrect, when he seemed to imply that Kelly was out of sorts during the debate because she was having female problems. This led a conservative organization to dump Trump from a keynote speakers spot. We see a crack in the armor form as Erick Erickson, who had invited Trump to…

Ruh Roh. Universe may not be what we thought it was.

Astronomers have discovered something that should not be there. It is an arc of light. The arc is the effect of gravitational lensing which happened as light passed by a massive galaxy about 10 billion years ago in space-time. In other words, in this universe, but very far away and a very long time ago, when our universe was a mere toddler. The galaxy that supplies the light is even farther away. (UPDATE: See this post by Phil Plait for a detailed writup on this observation: The galaxy that shouldn’t be there) Here's the problem. A very massive galaxy...the one that is farthest away...…

Gravity's Engines by Caleb Scharf

The last week or so of silence on the blog has been due to my trip to Ohio (which was very enjoyable), and a lack of child care for the early part of this week. A day and a half home with both kids was just exhausting, but the trip was useful in that it provided me time to read Gravity's Engines by Caleb Scharf, on the plane to and from Columbus (I got the paper edition at Science Online, and figured as long as I had a printed book I wanted to read, I might as well dodge the stupid argument about whether my Nook is likely to interfere with the plane's navigation systems). This book comes with…

Is Bond Dead?

With classes set to start on Monday I am not in the mood for heavy fare. So how about some entertainment blogging! Like all sensible people I am a big fan of the James Bond movies. That none of them, let's face it, are actually all that good, does not affect my inability to change the channel when I notice that one is on. I used to feel strongly that Roger Moore was the best Bond, but that is partly because, given my age, he was the first Bond I encountered. Lately I have moved on to a more ecumenical approach that recognized the strengths and weaknesses of all the Bonds (including…

I've Got Silica on Silicon on My Quantum Stereo

Linear optics quantum computing, where one combines linear optics with the nonlinear processes of single photon creation and single photon detection, is a relative newcomer onto the scene of possible routes toward quantum computing. Whenever I think about these schemes, what jumps into my head is a crazily filled optical bench, like the one below from the Zeilinger group: Now, I'm but a mere theorist, but I think even theorists like me understand that trying to build a large scale version of this scheme, which has considerable overhead behind it in terms of the number of modes needed, is a…

Is our bacteria learning?

This is a cool story, but not for the reason the authors are attributing. Researchers at Princeton showed that bacteria can evolve to anticipate future environmental changes. Here is the coverage in Science: Researchers already know that microbes can mount simple responses to changes in their environment, such as acidity fluctuations, by altering their internal workings. If the changes are regular enough, bacteria can respond ahead of time. But systems biologist Saeed Tavazoie of Princeton University wondered if microbes were capable of more sophisticated reasoning. Could they, for example…

Sometimes it’s hard to remember that some very smart people just don’t know how the web and browsers work

Back when I was working at the public library, I used to do the "introduction to the internet" classes. These were typically at 9 - before the library opened- and so attracted stay at home moms and retirees. Attendees usually picked things up pretty quickly. For one thing, they admitted not knowing how anything worked so would listen and take notes and then stay to practice on the public systems. We assume that "kids today" and indeed all educated adults are fluent in the use of browsers and the web. Not so. There is a strange example recently that demonstrates this point.  I assumed everyone…

Finding Information in Books

I've talked about this a bit at sessions I taught at my library and also at Web Search University but it's still a favorite.  Plus, you asked for posts on finding information. Oh, and one of the tools just released some updates so this is fairly timely. This is not how to use the catalog to see if a book you want is available in your library and to get a shelf location!  Also not about finding something good to read (frankly, I'm completely out of practice with reader's advisory, so can't help you there). Books are useful containers for information, data, and stuff you need to make new…

Comps readings: community detection

Last set of comps readings, I talked about sense of community: belonging, having influence, fulfillment of needs, and emotional support.  Now, let's talk about the physics version of "community" - cohesive subgroups.  In a graph, these are groups of nodes in a graph that are more connected to each other than to other parts of the graph. Clumpy spots.  If you read old href="http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/30594217">Wasserman and Faust, you'll probably think of cliques, cores, and lambda sets... some how these didn't do it for me - literally, when I was trying to href="http://terpconnect.…

Should We Start Killing Orcas?

The Times Online caught my attention today with this grizzly headline: "Killer whales face cull after finding taste for rare otters" The article talks about a possible culling of Orcas because a few of them have taken to eating endangered sea lions and sea otters. While there's no information about exactly how close biologists or wildlife leaders might be to agreeing to such a cull, it does say that the idea is being 'discussed.' Well, if there's a debate, here's my side of it. Of course sea lions and sea otters are important. Steller's sea lions have been dying out in the Aleutian Islands…

Where do I find the time to blog?

Well, you know my answer when you see that I am more than a week late with this post on the 15 June question. How is it that all the PIs (Tara, PZ, Orac et al.), various grad students, post-docs, etc. find time to fulfill their primary objectives (day jobs) and blog so prolifically? Priorities shuffle in relation to time demands, so the last two weeks of grant review have taken priority over substantive blogging, including answering the last two AASB questions. However, this question really gets to the reason that one blogs, given that there are so many interests competing for the time of all…

Women in IT Resource; Technologies That Influence Us CFP

Some interesting things came across my listservs this week; one from WEPAN, another from the WMST-L listserv: a new book on recruiting women in IT, and a very interesting call for papers. Details after the jump. Reconfiguring the Firewall A comprehensive volume authored by three Virginia Tech professors, (published by AK Peters, Ltd.), "Reconfiguring the Firewall" addresses the global challenge of recruiting girls and women into majors and careers in information technology. Written and researched by Carol J. Burger, Elizabeth G. Creamer, and Peggy S. Meszaros, all faculty members in the…

Coralline Algae and Global Warming

Over the last couple of decades, a great deal of research has been done on the effect of global warming on coral reefs. The vast majority of that research has focused on the currently observed and potential future effects of climate change on reef-building corals. Coral, however, are not the only organisms that contribute to building a reef. A group of organisms known as the "coralline algae" also secrete calcium carbonate, and contribute to building up reefs. In a paper available online in advance of publication at Nature Geoscience, a group of researchers report on the results of an…

Casual Fridays: Why most people didn't see this illusion

Just about two weeks ago, I posted this visual illusion (if you haven't seen it yet, make sure to watch it with the sound turned ON): How many flashes do you see? In fact the dot only flashes once, but according to the study I report on in the post, the two beeps are supposed to throw you off. If you are like Shams et al's participants, you would most likely see two flashes, not one. In fact, just 23 percent of CogDaily readers reported seeing two flashes. Much speculation ensued in the comments, but I had a couple ideas of my own, so last Friday I developed a quick study to test two…

Tid Bits

First off, I will be hosting the next Postdoc carnival (What's up postdoc?) here on July 23rd. Email me your favorite blog entry on postdoc life. Next up is a link that I missed in my science publishing linkfest: Revere mouthing off about open-access. One point that he makes has to do with PubMed: It is currently NIH policy -- policy fought bitterly and with some success by lobbyists for big scientific publishers -- that NIH funded research be deposited in the publicly accessible online repository, PubMed Central, within 12 months of publication or earlier. Few scientists do it, and I'd guess…

Giant Blue Earthworms and Friends

Via a circuitous route, prompted by a friend of Zooillogix, Tweet Gainsborough-waring, I found myself looking at the picture below. This otherworldly Australian earthworm, Terriswalkeris terraereginae, not only looks likes delicious candy, but the mucin it releases is luminescent, and it grows up to 2 meters long. I knew Zooillogix readers would want to know more about this fascinating critter but could find almost no information online. Luckily, Dr. Geoff Dyne, Assistant Director, Queensland Section, Australian Government Natural Research Management Team (and more importantly,…

Chem 2.0

The June 25th issue of Chemical & Engineering News has two pieces that talk about ways people are using features of the "new internet" (or Web 2.0) to disseminate and explore chemistry online. Celia Henry Arnaud's article "A New Science Channel" looks at efforts scientists and scientific organizations have made to harness YouTube as a tool of outreach. Organizations like the Museum of Science, Boston and AAAS have taken videos created for museum kiosks and meetings and posted them on YouTube in the hopes that they "go viral" and reach a broader audience. (As AAAS discovered, this can be…

Credit where credit is due (a thought experiment).

Because not every ethical matter involves serious misconduct, or even conscious efforts to grab someone else's credit, I thought I'd describe an utterly mundane scenario and canvass your reactions. Let's say you've worked very hard on a project. You've been part of the organizing from the outset. You've done a lot of thinking and writing and rewriting. You've worked hard to build consensus. You've done loads of personal outreach to try to build a community around the project (including "cold-emailing" people you don't know personally). You've been the dependable facilitator. You've even…

R.I.P. Don Lemmon

Almost two months ago, I posted a rather light-hearted skeptical takedown of a guy by the name of Don Lemmon, who billed himself on his website as The #1 Nutritionist Online. The main gimmicks of the post were twofold. First, I poked fun at his selling of dessicated animal glands, in which he harkened back to a 16th century alchemist and physician named Paracelsus to justify what appeared to me to be a variant of the quackery known as live cell therapy. The second part of my schtick was to feign envy at the success that he appeared to be having over it all, marrying a retired porn star,…

Should Creativity Be Open Access?

Another kind comment from a student reader on one of the older biomes posts: Thanks for posting this! It really helped me get some info for MY "Tropical Dry Forest Biome" project for biology class. I couldn't find any info at the library or on any other sites! So I thank goodness this was here.... You're welcome Haley! Keep up the blogging (and the blogging). So why haven't I written any basics posts in a while? Well, to be honest, much of my time and energy in the past few months has been focused on getting a job in my field. I've recently had to pick up a few shifts doing catering locally…

The worst part is that I'll never get them back

Saturday night, after returning from dinner with friends, I opened the door to my apartment and let my wife in. As I fumbled with the string of icicle lights that run around the room to provide a little illumination, she said "I'll turn on the computer.... the computer isn't here!" Before I could even say "What do you mean the computer isn't here?" I noticed that the back door was slightly open, the lamp was on the floor, and my laptop was gone too. We had been robbed. As the shock set in, I noticed that the cats did not come out to say "hello" as they normally did whenever I walked in the…

Now we've got some big numbers to throw around, too

Only ours are methodologically valid. It's a common creationist tactic to fling around big numbers to 'disprove' evolution: for instance, I've had this mysterious Borel's Law (that anything with odds worse than 1 in 1050 can never happen) thrown in my face many times, followed by the declaration that the odds of the simplest organism forming by chance are 1 in 10340,000,000. It's complete nonsense, of course — their calculations all ignore the reality of the actual events, assuming that everything must form spontaneously and all at once, which is exactly the opposite of how probability plays…

I lose. Or win. It depends. 3:55:53, anyway.

Another in my marathon posts, but! To a new city, Rotterdam. Which is indeed a fairly new city, having been bombed to buggery (by us, mostly, I presume [update: no, I'm wrong, it was the Krauts]) during WW II. Anyway, TL:DR: 3:55:53. Which is one second slower than Amsterdam 2012. Here's my list, in order: * Brighton 2011: 4:20:32. * Amsterdam 2014: 3:58.02. * Amsterdam 2011: 3:57:25. * Rotterdam, 2015: 3:55:53. * Amsterdam 2012: 3:55:52. * Brighton 2012: 3:54:28. * Brighton 2013: 3:46:34. * Brighton 2014: 3:43:42. * Amsterdam 2013: 3:43:06. So if I'd pushed just a tiny fraction harder it…

Embodied Language and Expertise

One of the more sophisticated theories in embodied cognition is Lawrence Barsalou's perceptual symbol systems theory. It is, in essence, an updated version of the "ideas as images" position of the British empiricists, and the mental imagery theories of the seventies1. The basics of the theory are really quite simple. Here's a short description from the abstract of the paper linked above: During perceptual experience, association areas in the brain capture bottom-up patterns of activation in sensory-motor areas. Later, in a top-down manner, association areas partially reactivate sensory-motor…

Why teaching evolution is dangerous

It is so nice teaching biology to adults when there are no (obvious) Creationists in the classroom. It does not always happen that way - I have had a couple of cases in the past - but this time it was really nice as I could freely cover all topics deeply within an evolutionary framework (not always seen in my public notes, though, as I try to gauge the class first and then decide how overtly to talk ebout everything in evolutionary terms). It is always a conundrum. If there is a potential resentment of my lectures, I have to thread carefully. I have to remember that I am not trying to…

Canadian Library Association National Forum: Readings for Digital Strategy and the Government of Canada

I'll be attending upcoming Canadian Library Association National Forum, a kind of sunset conference as CLA reimagines and recreates itself. The idea is to take the pulse of Canadian librarians on the important issues in the library-related landscape. I'll be curating the session on Canada's National Digital Strategy, including presentations by me and two others, Emily Landriault and Bobby Glushko. The details are below.   Digital Strategy and the Government of Canada Presentation speakers Emily Landriault: Open Government and Open Data Bobby Glushko: Cyberbullying and Doxing John Dupuis:…

Openness is Essential Freedom: Interview with Vedran Vucic

Vedran Vucic (voo-tcheech) is a Linux afficionado in Serbia. He and his organization have gone all around Serbia, wired up the schools, taught the teachers and students how to use Linux, taught the teachers and students how to use various online educational resources ranging from blogs to ATutor, etc. Vedran also gives technical support to about 30 Serbian bloggers whose work he also aggregates. He is now putting a lot of energy into persuading scientists, especially the young, not-yet-entrenched ones, to go online and to promote Open Access. It is an uphill battle, but he is persistent!…