A Geek Apart

Today, Indiana University officials sent a letter to Virginia Tech President Charles Steger on behalf of the Indiana University family expressing condolences and offering support to those in need.

While not directly tied to Virginia Tech, many faculty members at Indiana University are former Virginia Tech faculty, and many faculty and students have friends and relatives who attend Virginia Tech.

In addition to the “small world” relations, IU officials also recognize their membership in a “university family.” Both universities are focused on the pursuit of knowledge, and it’s great to see separate universities come together in a time of need.

While the reaction from many at IU I work with was more utter shock and disbelief than sorrow or anger, many were quite quick to jump on the phone to find out if anyone they knew was affected by the incident, my dean included.

I strongly encourage anyone, at any university, to offer support to Virginia Tech, and take a moment to reflect on the events. While I’ll not get preachy here (leave that to the other blogs out there), I will note that this event has spurred me to think about my relationships with people at my university and how important it is to build stronger ones.

Technorati Tags: news, virginia, puppy, school, society

I just finished a great presentation about Podcasting technology for university career services offices at the ICICE (Indiana Council for Internships and Cooperative Education) conference at Ft. Harrison in Indianapolis, IN.

Great conference, great experience. A few people had approached me asking to put my keynote online, and I am happy to say its online now…although not as pretty as I would like it.

If you’re interested, the link is in my sidebar under ICICE Presentation, or you can just go here to view it.
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An army of students armed with video-enabled cell phones deployed technology to capture alleged police brutality against a fellow student. Most have heard about the incident at UCLA, and many (okay 609,994) have seen the video over at YouTube.

The students used their cell phones to capture video of the incident. While this technique is nothing new, it certainly raises the question of what the police are willing to do when no one is watching, since they were willing to do this on video with dozens of witnesses around.

The same sousveillance (really inverse surveillance) technique has been used in high-profile incidents such as the Rodney King trial, and in more mundane events like the New Yorker that caught a pervert on the subway.
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Defining “Informatics” has become an exercise in improvisational technique. Informatics is not a new term, rather it is an old term with new ideas behind it. Take a look over on Google or Wikipedia and you will see long, precise definitions. Of course, several are needed because the meaning has changed over time.

Over at inf-O-pacity there is an interesting article about the “information overload” of the 19th century. Not much has changed, in my opinion. We have better tools to manage information, yet we have more information to manage. Seems like the equilibrium is balanced. Much like the problem with computer boot times. Sure, our computers are much faster, with more ram, and more efficient architecture. But why does it still take forever for a computer to boot up? See, equilibrium.

So, what do you do when you’re confronted by someone asking, “What do you go to school for?”
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On The Colbert Report Friday night, Steven interviewed Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway, about his newest invention. During the interview he made a remark about how people should be cautious with their technology, referring to the classic Terminator II movie and the problems people have with advanced technology.

This was very odd, since I had just had a discussion with my Informatics instructor, Jennifer Stewart, about the very same thing on Wednesday night. We were discussing android science, a much more advanced research path within the field of robotics.

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