Posted by Jerry on April 19th, 2008 — Posted in New media, Technology, Theory
The wikipedia phenomenon has been with us for a while – but aside from the occasional press article, scholarly treatments of wikis are few and far between.
Here is one exception – a serious look at the evolution and development of a wikipedia entry on heavy metal music – and the introduction and use of the umlaut in the names of heavy metal bands. John Udell’s video examines several aspects of the wiki through this example. One of the more interesting aspects is the ‘wisdom of crowds’ – the self-correction of wiki entries. At one point the wiki entry was vandalised, and within a minute it was restored by someone else. This phenomenon has been observed elsewhere. I recall reading that the ABC TV Australia did a short documentary on wikipedia and deliberately put in wrong information on some prominent entries, and the longest it took before the entry was corrected was four hours. That’s pretty impressive for a global free gafitti wall!
Thanks to Beth Kanter for bringing this to my attention.
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on April 11th, 2008 — Posted in Journal, New media, Technology, Writing
The Virtual Shakespeare Consortium is a consortium of individuals and organizations dedicated to bringing Shakespeare and his culture to the Internet and beyond.
View my page on vShakespeare
Partly it’s about bringing together people from all over the world – virtually – to perform his plays in virtual worlds, like SecondLife.
Shakespeare’s sonnets are often forgotten in such ventures, but I think the richness of their imagery and of their conceits would lend themselves to creative treatment in SL, along with sonnet readings in-world.
This venture will celebrate the polyglot nature of Shakespeare’s language – he emerged after all, at a pivotal point in the development of the English language, benefiting from the three major language groups that made up English, in a context in which new words were being coined daily and entered the language with the kind of speed not seen again until the birth of the internet.
I look forward to see how this develops
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on March 29th, 2008 — Posted in Journal
The Turner to Monet exhibition at the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra is visually sumptuous and well worth a visit.
The exhibition traces the rise of landscape painting from the late 18th to the late 19th centuries into impressionism and post-impressionism.
Monet – Water Lilies – photo: Everard – Musee d’Orsay, Paris
The website is fantastic – if you skip the soap-commercial intro – and get to the Director’s introduction and views of the works themselves. I thought the days of the deep masculine voice-over and images of a young anglo woman stunned by the sublime works of art were long gone. That is not the way to sell an exhibition. The works are quite strong enough to stand as sufficient advert for the display.
Ok rant over – this exhibition is about how an inherited tradition was transformed by the plein air painters to show the landscape in new and dramatic ways – usually with some sense of humanity’s insignificance in the face of nature.
As the exhibition moves into the impressionists you can see how the play of light and colour made the paintings glow as though backlit on screen – it must have been at once amazing and shocking to the 19th century audience, and still has immense power today.
If you get the chance this is an exhibition well worth seeing
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on March 27th, 2008 — Posted in Journal, Steam, Technology
The late Peter Barrett’s experimental steam car is up for sale – currently at US$20,000 (my guess would be a UK bid from Jeff Theobold – one of the few who could make real use of this amazing vehicle.
The car uses two cylinders of a converted VW engine and is mounted in a fibreglass kit car. It is reported to have been run at 80mph. The car comes with full design notes – Peter Barrett was a meticulous engineer and every aspect is documented. It would be great to see this car go to someone capable of understanding the system and getting it on the road as a modern turnkey steam car.
Some of Barrett’s notes are here, so you can see the kind of work that has gone into this.
If it sells for less than US$50,000 the buyer will have quite a bargain – with 20 years of documentation. This is an outstanding opportunity for the right buyer. (why can’t I just win lotto now?).
Cheers
Jerry
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Posted by Jerry on March 24th, 2008 — Posted in Journal, Music
I have returned from the National Folk Festival here in Canberra with a notebook full of tune names and a camera full of images. Great session, great concerts and a fabulous meeting of old friends – some of whom I hadn’t seen in twenty years!
Highlights were:
- the Vin Garbutt, Genticorum and Trouble in the Kitchen concerts;
- getting up close and personal with a nyckelharpa
- playing sessions with Bob McInnes and Scott and Louisa Wise and Chris Duncan
- my Full Circle concert at the Merry Muse (maybe they’ll hire us next time?)
- playing a Dave Guscott violin – and buying Octave Violin strings
- the positive reactions I got to my pochette fiddle; and
- playing music with such wonderful people and meeting old friends
You can read the full write-up on my other blog – Fourstrings
Cheers
Jerry
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