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Two Bits » Read This Book

New Free Book on OS

Despite the ability to download for free, I have not read this new book called Two Bits. It does however look promising, even if you do as I do these days, and nibble around the edges of a few chapters until you find something that speaks to a full meal. The menu:

1. Geeks and Recursive Publics 27
2. Protestant Reformers, Polymaths, Transhumanists 64
3. The Movement 97
4. Sharing Source Code 118
5. Conceiving Open Systems 143
6. Writing Copyright Licenses 179
7. Coordinating Collaborations 210
8. “If We Succeed, We Will Disappear” 243
9. Reuse, Modification, and the Nonexistence of Norms 269
10. Conclusion: The Cultural Consequences of Free Software 301

New Book Opening Up Education

Opening Up Education: The Collective Advancement of Education through Open Technology, Open Content, and Open Knowledge: John Seely Brown, Toru Iiyoshi, M. S. Vijay Kumar

I'm a big fan of John Seely Brown so will go out on a limb and recommend this book without having read it yet. From the blurb:

Given the abundance of open education initiatives that aim to make educational assets freely available online, the time seems ripe to explore the potential of open education to transform the economics and ecology of education. Despite the diversity of tools and resources already available—from well-packaged course materials to simple games, for students, self-learners, faculty, and educational institutions—we have yet to take full advantage of shared knowledge about how these are being used, what local innovations are emerging, and how to learn from and build on the experiences of others. Opening Up Education argues that we must develop not only the technical capability but also the intellectual capacity for transforming tacit pedagogical knowledge into commonly usable and visible knowledge: by providing incentives for faculty to use (and contribute to) open education goods, and by looking beyond institutional boundaries to connect a variety of settings and open source entrepreneurs.

These essays by leaders in open education describe successes, challenges, and opportunities they have found in a range of open education initiatives. They approach—from both macro and micro perspectives—the central question of how open education tools, resources, and knowledge can improve the quality of education. The contributors (from leading foundations, academic institutions, associations, and projects) discuss the strategic underpinnings of their efforts first in terms of technology, then content, and finally knowledge. They also address the impact of their projects, and how close they come to achieving a vision of sustainable, transformative educational opportunities that amounts to much more than pervasive technology.

Contributors: Richard Baraniuk, Randy Bass, Trent Batson, Dan Bernstein, John Seely Brown, Barbara Cambridge, Tom Carey, Catherine Casserly, James Dalziel, Bernadine Chuck Fong, Richard Gale, Gerard Hanley, Diane Harley, Mary Huber, Pat Hutchings, Toru Iiyoshi, David Kahle, M. S. Vijay Kumar, Andy Lane, Diana Laurillard, Stuart Lee, Steve Lerman, Marilyn Lombardi, Phil Long, Clifford Lynch, Christopher Mackie, Anne Margulies, Owen McGrath, Flora McMartin, Shigeru Miyagawa, Diana Oblinger, Neeru Paharia, Cheryl Richardson, Marshall Smith, Candace Thille, Edward Walker, and David Wiley

Latest Issue of D-Lib Magazine

D-Lib Magazine (September/October 2008)

The latest issue of D-Lib has some good articles on repositories.

Kite Runner and a Few Other Holiday Reads

I love holidays where I can read all day and only feel a little guilty at the sheer cheekiness of it. I just finished reading the Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. Yes, I know it has been out for a long time and you should always read the book before the movie comes out, but hey, life has been busy. I loved it - a literary page turner? Sounds like something from the dust jacket, but it was. I found it hard to put it down: the language is beautiful and the imagery of two very different Afghanistans was so real I could smell it. I found myself going back to some of the places I visited in Egypt and got just a hint of what it could have been like. Highly recommended - I don't want to see the movie - I'm afraid it will ruin it for me.

I also managed to squeeze in a few more books: Minette Walters's latest, The Chameleon's Shadow and like any Walter's book it was a good read. Not my favorite of hers by far, but worth a read non-the-less. The Virgin of Small Plains by Nancy Pickard was a better read - maybe the images of prairies in winter did it for me - missing the plains a bit maybe? A murder mystery which moves back and forth in time and considers the loyalties of small town America in a simple story. Also worth a curl up on the couch. I also took a break from those big books without pictures and read both the 2006 and 2007 editions of the new Best American Comics series. I am a big graphic novel fan, so this was a nice way to get my fix - both volumes are rich and present a range of old and new comic artists. Nice additions to my collection :-)

While I'm at it I thought I would mention a new magazine I just found on the rack. I'm a big science magazine fan and read Science, Nature, New Scientist, Discover and more regularly. Science Illustrated certainly won't rival Science for the latest news in science or the latest academic articles, but it does provide a rich graphical window into some of the latest developments in science. As one would expect the articles are thin on text and big on glossy images, so it should appeal to a wide audience. The January/February issue is the first, so check it out if you can find it.

Voyage of the Turtle - Great Book!

I am going to create 2 posts on this book - this one and one at my Slow Library blog. I liked it a lot :-)

Carl Safina has sometimes been referred to as a Rachel Carson for the 21st century. Having just finished his latest book, Voyage of the Turtle: In Pursuit of the Earth's Last Dinosaur I can understand why. Voyage of the Turtle is a compelling natural history of the Leatherback sea turtle, the largest turtle of the day. Like many sea turtle species, the Leatherback is endangered, although it is making a come-back in some seas. As one could guess, the brink of extinction was at our hand - harvesting eggs being the main culprit. Safina's writing is beautiful and inspiring. A few examples: On indiscriminate forms of fishing:

Each nearly invisible net is one small brick in the Great Wall of Hunger with which humanity interrupts the travels of sea life worldwide.

On the ocean:

You can travel a mile across the ocean and not see any change. But travel one vertical mile into the ocean, and pressure, temperature, and oxygen change in ways so profound you pass through other realms like falling into a magic well.

On a factory sardine boat: ...

sixty or seventy tons of sardines in that hull, removed from nature mostly to feed not people but farm animals. When next you eat meat, taste the ocean.

On sea turtles in general:

Turtles may seem to lack sense, but they don't do senseless things. They're not terribly energetic, yet they do not waste energy. Turtles don't have the intellect to form opinions about greed, oppression, superstition, or ideology, yet they don't inflict misery on themselves or other creatures. Turtles cannot consider what might happen, yet nothing turtles do threatens anyone's future. Turtles don't think about their next generation, but they risk everything and provide all they can to ensure that there will be one. Meanwhile, we profess to love our own offspring above all else, yet above all else it is they from whom we daily steal. We cannot learn to be more like turtles, but from turtles we could learn to be more human. That is the wisdom carried within one hundred million years of survival. What turtles could learn from us, I can't imagine.

Voyage of the Turtle describes an incredible creature (it is amazing how far they will swim in their quest for food and a place to lay eggs) with an uncanny ability to return to the beach of its birth and is a tale of a complex ecosystem where our actions on one small beach can determine the fate of an entire species. Something we should pay some attention to.

Pandemonium: What Are We Doing to Ourselves?

Finally got around to reading Pandemonium by Andrew Nikiforuk and it was a fascinating, if not downright scary, read. This is a popular treatment of the recent outbreaks of bird flu, mad cow, super bugs and other nasties on the biomedical horizon. I found some of his hyperbole a bit much at times and the research he mentions is not well documented (it is listed for each chapter), so it is difficult at time to figure out where he is getting his numbers and conclusions. Having said that, this is an important popular treatment of a science topic up there with global warming in the potential impact on our species. Just don't read it with the lights out...

The New Whole Earth Catalogue

I haven't had the chance to read the entire book yet (it is a brick and a half) but I would highly recommend the new WorldChanging tome. This is the new Whole Earth Catalogue (which I am also reading about in From Counterculture to Cyberculture - more later), which has always been near the top of my list of all time favorite books. WorldChanging provides a positive and action-oriented approach to the things that ail us and our increasingly grey planet. The associated website is also a great resource. The recent post on Slowing Down is a good example.

Cholera, London and Science

Ghost Map by Steven Johnson

I've been devouring a couple of books lately, so I thought I would talk about this one before Christmas Cheer or old age (or both) hit me. Ghost Map traces the 1894 Cholera epidemic in London which not only hit a high percentage of Londoners in a specific community, but also encouraged a scientific quest that rid many cities of the scourge that is cholera. I was amazed that the fine details of what happened in August of that year were recorded and Johnson was able to craft a compelling story of urban life and science. [You may now pause to thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster that libraries have stewarded the written word for centuries.]

Ghost Map also reminded me that there are many men and women of science who have made incredible discoveries and yet still remain largely unknown. With science, as with all things, we tend to focus on the Einsteinian events and personalities, ignoring the equally brilliant minds that have made discoveries throughout history. I was particularly enthralled with Johnson's description of how John Snow managed to overcome the dogma of the day, that disease was spread by miasma, or nasty smells. Ghost Map was definitely worth reading and one I would recommend, but I didn't finish it with the same sense I started with. Johnson gets a little preachy at the end, especially about the merits of living in cities. I disagree with his assertion that many modern cities are less polluting and greener than a country town, especially when cities like Victoria B.C. still spill raw sewage into the ocean. It's clear we still have a long way to go - city and country. One only need read Grabage Land by Elizabeth Royte to understand how mega-cities like New York can impact people living outside the thoughts of those riding the subway.

A Must Read For the Ocean Lover In Us All

Highest Tide a Great Read

I just finished the Highest Tide by Jim Lynch and it definitely has to rank up there with the best I gave read in the lest few years. Having just made the transition from Winnipeg to PEI no doubt helped, as would the fact that my first 2 university degrees were in Marine/Aquatic Biology. The novel is a "coming of age" about a 13-year old who knows more about marine creatures and life in general than most of the adults in his ocean-side community. He makes some startling discoveries that put him, and his community, under the spotlight. I loved the vivid descriptions of sea life and late-night (or early morning) beach-combing and sea kayaking: if I had a car in Charlottetown I would have read the whole book at the beach to get the full effect :-) The final paragraphs are a surprise and a particular joy as well. If you have an affinity for the salty sea, whether you live by or away, then give yourself a treat...

My Reading Table - Grayson

I finished Grayson a couple of weeks ago and enjoyed it, although I wasn't wowed. It is a short tale of a long-distance swimmer who encounters a baby grey whale while out for a morning swim. Lynne Cox was only 17 when this actually happened, so she is writing this 30 years later. Her descriptions of the critters she observes and her interaction with the water and air makes the read worthwhile. I found the author's writing style a bit amateurish at times, although it may also have been due to the switch from the factual and believable to the lyrical and fantastical. Not to say that the author isn't describing something that actually happened: it is such an amazing event that it sometimes seem surreal. In fact, I'm a bit jealous. The experience of swimming with such an amazing creature must have been incredible, so I can understand why it stayed with her for 30 years,