faculty and staff orientation at anne arundel community college

i'm in maryland where tomorrow i'll be part of anne arundel community college's faculty and staff orientation. i'm giving a talk and leading a discussion around "college campus 2.0: integrating offline learning and online creating." instead of using paper handouts, i'll be using this blog post.

part one: our students


part two: two articles and one short blurb from "the arts" section of yesterday's new york times.

1. "still vital, 'on the road' turns 50" - from penny vlagopoulos, columbia university: "I still think it's a rite-of-passage novel. The whole idea of the freedom of the open road is still very much alive for young people." from bill savage, northwestern university: "Undergraduates can really relate to it because they live in such a mediated world with the Internet, the cellphone and the iPod."
   
   
2. "they've just got to get a message to you" - jeff leeds: "On Gwen Stefani's recent tour, as many as 20 percent of the audience at some shows agreed to pay 99 cents for text messages and the chance to win better seats, according to the mobile marketing company Impact Mobile. At festivals like Lollapalooza, thousands of fans sign up to receive continuous updates from concert organizers about promotions and special events."
   
   
3. "another radio station for new york and web" - "WFUV says it has been awarded a $500,000 grant from the New York State Music Fund to support the development of a second full-time radio station for listeners in their 20s and 30s, which will emphasize independently and locally produced music. [The station] will be available via the Internet at wfuv.org and mobile streaming audio and, in the New York area, as a high-definition radio channel at 90.7 FM."

part three: learning offline, creating online: five examples

1. telling stories with photographs
   
   
2. when one class meets another
   
   
3. exploring the archive
   
   
4. learning to listen
   
   
5. conversations as collections
   
   

update: a bad photo (taken by me) of some great educators.

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an afternoon in oakland

today, i crossed the bridge to spend an afternoon with michael robertson. we talked about the future, the present, and the past. we had a lot of beer, a lot of pizza, and a lot of fun.

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nene's mind's been blown

save a box or two, we're all moved in. nene loves the outside deck. after thirteen years of indoor living, her mind's been blown with the very concept of outside. all of the plants, including all of the veggies, survived the move. next season, we'll have a farm!

new pew report: online video goes mainstream

researchers at the pew internet & american life project have been busy pumping out reports all summer. first, there was cyberbullying and online teens by amanda lenhart, next there was home broadband adoption by john horrigan and aaron smith, and then, last week, online video by senior research specialist mary madden.

(disclosure: i serve on the project's advisory board and was, in 2001, one of mary's professors at georgetown university.)

online video is fascinating for many reasons including its data that seems to confirm what many of us have felt intuitively: that among US internet users, online video is now mainstream. indeed, 57% of online adults have used the internet to watch or download video. more than three out of four (76%) young adults aged between 18-29 report watching video online. and nearly three-fourths (74%) of broadband users watch or download video online.

moreover, as the report makes clear, many users use online video socially. they watch videos with others, they send and receive links to online videos, they rate videos, they comment on videos, and they upload their own videos.


one of the key strengths of pew internet and american life project's reports - a strength that scholars, journalists, and new media pundits should emulate - is the way they place their object of study (the internet, digital media) within larger cultural, social, and economic contexts. for example, with respect to gender, 63% of men watch and download online video while only 51% of women do so. age is a huge factor: while 76% of internet users aged 18-29 watch video, only 46% of users aged 50-64 do so. education is another factor: 64% of college graduates watch video while 46% of high school graduates or less do so. and, echoing some of the findings in last year's latinos online, written by pew's susannah fox and gretchen livingston, access to broadband is a huge factor: 74% of those who enjoy high-speed connects at both work and home watch video while 31% of those with dial-up do so.

this fall, in a matter of weeks, i'll be teaching both sections of media studies 100, our intro course to the major. i continue to organize the course chronologically - print, radio, film, tv, computer, digital media - a tactic that is becoming increasingly outdated in our current age of convergence. i will certainly assign online video as a reading but am unsure where to put it in my syllabus: under the unit on tv? under video? under music? under digital media? reading through this latest report from pew and speculating where it will go in my syllabus makes me realize once again how fast the medium we use, study, teach, love, and hate is moving, morphing, and growing. thanks mary and thanks pew for helping us keep track.

celebration

last night sarah and i returned from a mini-family reunion in minneapolis. today we finished packing our belongings. tomorrow we move.

the trip to minnesota was wonderful. sarah's whole family including her uncle jack and aunt liz were there. we celebrated sarah's sister jewlee's birthday. we celebrated don and jini's, sarah's parents, forty-fourth anniversary. and we celebrated our announcement that we're getting married.

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CFP: joystick soldiers: the military/war video game reader

this looks interesting - contact editors (email below) for more information. [via cultstud-l]

CFP: Joystick Soldiers: The military/war video game reader

Edited by Nina B. Huntemann and Matthew Thomas Payne

The editors seek essays on military/war-themed video games which explore the multifaceted cultural, social, and economic linkages between video games and the military. The collection will feature scholarly work from a diversity of theoretical and methodological perspectives, including: close textual readings of military-themed video games; critical histories of game production processes and marketing practices; and reception studies of video war gamers, fandom, and politically resistant game interventions. As there is no other collection of its kind, Joystick Soldiers will make a significant contribution to the breadth of work shaping the burgeoning field of game studies, complementing analyses concerning the Military-Entertainment Complex, and offering diverse insights on how modern warfare has been represented and remediated in contemporary video games. The editors invite junior as well as established scholars to submit, and welcome cross-disciplinary work from sociology, cultural studies, anthropology, history, military studies, psychology, economics, media studies, visual communication, graphic arts and game design, education, and so forth.

We are looking for submissions that address a wide range of topics from diverse methodological approaches, including but not limited to:

--Use of games for training, recruitment, propaganda (serious games)
--Video games and military ideology (or Military-Entertainment Complex)
--Representing / playing soldiers, terrorists, & civilians
--Global reception of America's Army and other "pro-US" war games
--Production of war video games
--War video games across genres (e.g., FPS, RTS, RPG)
--Playing war video games of past & near-future conflicts
--War game mods and other user-generated content
--Machinima as social commentary on war (e.g., Red vs. Blue)
--Games and resistance (non-combat games, in-game protests, diplomacy as alternative to force)
--Game for peace
--Networked war games in different spaces (LAN parties, on-line, mobile).
--War games and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)

We are interested in defining "military/war" video games widely, but not so widely as to be useless for critical analysis. The following is a partial list of war video games we hope to include, but submissions for scholarly work about other games are welcome, for example games based on past wars (Battlefield 1942; Call of Duty, etc) and non-US based games.

--Marine Doom
--Counter-Strike & its mods
--America's Army & America's Army: Rise of a Soldier
--Battlefield 2: Modern Combat
--Close Combat: First to Fight
--Conflict: Desert Storm II - Back to Baghdad
--FA-18 Operation Desert Storm
--Freedom Fighters
--Full Spectrum Warrior & Full Spectrum Warrior: Ten Hammers
--Kuma War
--Ghost Recon 3: Advanced Warfighter
--Operation Flashpoint: Resistance
--Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield
--Sniper Elite
--SOCOM
--Under Siege, Under Ash, and Special Force

Please submit a 500 word abstract and short bio (100 words max) by September 17, 2007 in Rich Text Format (RTF) to Nina Huntemann and Matthew Payne at joysticksoldiers@gmail.com. We expect final papers will not exceed 5000-7000 words and will be due December 10, 2007. Feel free to repost this CFP on relevant lists. Please contact us if you have questions about potential essays or the book project in general.

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the september project 2007

the web site for the september project has been launched!

what is the september project?

The September Project is a grassroots effort to foster public events in all libraries in all countries in September. September Project events can include book displays, panel discussions, civic deliberations, film screenings, theatrical performances, community book readings, and kids’ art projects. September Project events are free and organized locally.

The September Project encourages libraries and communities to come together in meaningful ways throughout the month of September.

if you know a librarian, please let her or him know about the september project. if you are not a librarian, please consider organizing an event in your library.

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a wedding on vashon island and a quick visit to seattle

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tenure track job in communication studies at usf

last week, i blogged about a tenure track job in media studies at USF. here is another tenure track job - in the department of communication studies - at USF. for more information, contact marilyn delaure, the chair of the search committee.

University of San Francisco
Department of Communication Studies
Interpersonal Communication (tenure-track):

The Department of Communication Studies at the University of San Francisco invites applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in Interpersonal Communication to begin in Fall 2008.

Teaching responsibilities will include the introductory course "Communication and Everyday Life" (a theory-based introduction to interpersonal communication) and additional upper level courses in the candidate’s areas of expertise, such as, Interpersonal Communication, Communication and Technology, Organizational Communication, Communication and Aging, Communication and Culture, Language and Social Interaction, Discourse and Power, and Intercultural Communication. The teaching load at USF is two courses per semester with an additional course every fourth semester (2-2-2-3 over 2 years).

Qualifications: University teaching experience, evidence of a strong commitment to teaching, evidence of scholarship, an earned doctorate by Fall 2008, experience and willingness to work in a culturally diverse environment, and an understanding of and commitment to support the mission of the University are required. The candidate will be expected to develop a significant, independent and ongoing research program.

Applicants should submit a letter of application, curriculum vitae, graduate transcripts, brief description of research plans, copies of recent publication(s) and/or research paper(s), statement of teaching philosophy, evidence of teaching ability including copies of official teaching evaluations, and three letters of recommendation to:

Communication Studies Search Committee
c/o Marilyn DeLaure, Search Committee Chair
Department of Communication Studies
University of San Francisco
2130 Fulton Street
San Francisco, CA 94117-1080.

Applications must be received by October 1, 2007 in order to ensure full consideration.

The University of San Francisco is a Jesuit Catholic university founded in 1855 to educate leaders who will fashion a more humane and just world. Candidates should demonstrate a commitment to work in a culturally diverse environment and to contribute to the mission of the University.

USF is an Equal Opportunity Employer dedicated to affirmative action and to excellence through diversity. The University provides reasonable accommodations to qualified applicants with disabilities upon request.

planting a move

for the last year, sarah and i have been subletting a third-floor flat in the lower haight. the place is centrally located: a ten minute walk to the castro, a ten minute walk to the mission, a fifteen minute walk to haight-ashbury. sarah's walk to work is thirty-five minutes and mine is twenty-five. if we can't hoof it, muni trains are a two minute walk away.

this month we move - to a flat in the mission. the place is a dream and still has sarah and me occassionally pinching ourselves and saying out loud, "really?" there's a lot to be excited about with our new place but one thing my mind returns to again and again is the outside deck. an outside deck in the sunniest part of the city means we get a garden. with luck, we'll be all moved in by the end of july.

in the meantime, a growing number of tomatoes, cucumbers, and spices have begun appearing, apparently hoping to make the move to the deck in august.

sometimes the present archives the past in beautiful ways

bob dylan, allen ginsberg, and (a buried) jack kerouac remixed. music, poetry, and film - not to mention a book, on the road, which never appears in the video but is everywhere to be seen. sometimes the present archives the past in beautiful ways.

thanks pablo!

tenure track job in media studies at usf

MEDIA STUDIES POSITION:
Media and Society
Deadline: October 1, 2007

The Media Studies Department at the University of San Francisco invites applications for a full-time, tenure-track position at the Assistant Professor level, anticipated to begin Fall 2008.

Responsibilities include teaching two undergraduate courses per semester, plus one additional course over two years (2-2-2-3 over two years), and an active program of research and service. The successful candidate will be qualified to teach at least two of our introductory and core courses (Introduction to Media Studies, Media Institutions, Media Audiences, Media Stereotyping and Violence, and Communication Law and Policy) as well as courses related to the candidate's specialty. Expertise and interest in teaching basic digital communication practice will be a plus as will an emphasis on race/ethnicity and international/global issues.

The Department is seeking an individual who is able to work with diverse students and colleagues. Ph. D., or equivalent advanced degree in a related field, plus a record of teaching, professional experience and research, or other relevant creative activity, are required.

Applicants should submit, by October 1, 2007, a letter of application, curriculum vitae, graduate transcripts, brief description of research plans, evidence of teaching ability (including sample syllabi, student evaluations, and a statement of teaching philosophy) and three letters of recommendation to:

Dr. David Silver
Media Studies Search Committee
Media Studies Department
University Center 538
University of San Francisco
2130 Fulton Street
San Francisco, CA 94117-1080

We encourage minority and women candidates to apply. USF is an Equal Opportunity Employer dedicated to affirmative action and to excellence through diversity. The University provides reasonable accommodations to qualified applicants with disabilities upon request.

The University of San Francisco is a Jesuit Catholic university founded in 1855 to educate leaders who will fashion a more humane and just world. Candidates should demonstrate a commitment to work in a culturally diverse environment and to contribute to the mission of the University.

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talk at sfpl

on wednesday, i gave a talk called the power of web 2.0 at the main branch of the san francisco public library. i thoroughly enjoyed the experience and hope to collaborate further with sfpl.

i began with the most basic definition - web 2.0 sites are less about lectures (broadcast) and more about conversation (participation) - and talked about user generated content. using o'reilly, i suggested britannica online is web 1.0 and wikipedia is web 2.0.

using the personal, i noted that my old homepage was an example of web 1.0. it acted as a single silo. it broadcasted and controlled information. it gave readers little opportunity to interact. and it was totally about self promotion! then i suggested my blog is an example of web 2.0. it serves as a space for conversation, especially in the comments section. much of its content is generated via remixed media. and, through feevy, my blog becomes a part of a community and - even better - the community becomes part of my blog. along the way, i introduced key terms like online communities, crowdsourcing, tagging, and remixing.


then i stepped back and got critical. first, i identified web 2.0 as a marketing meme, one intended to increase hype of and investment in the web (and web consultants) and hinted at its largely consumer rather than communal directions and applications. second, i warned against the presentism implied in web 2.0. today's web may indeed be more participatory but it is also an outgrowth of past developments like firefly, amazon's user book reviews, craigslist, and ebay - not to mention older user generated content applications like usenet, listservs, and MUDs. third, i argued against the medium-centricness of the term web 2.0. user generated content can and does exist in other media, of course, including newspapers' letters to the editor section, talk radio, and viewers voting on reality tv shows. and i ended with my all-time favorite example of user generated content, the suggestion box, which uses slips of paper, pencils, and a box.


i ended the lecture (a lecture?!? very 1.0) by raising various questions and generalizations about the intersections between web 2.0 and economics, politics, and militarism.

the discussion that followed was exciting. i like how spinning uncensored put it: "The discussion that took place during Silver's talk was animated, though not heated. Most of us were librarians after all!" there were between fifty and sixty in attendance, mostly librarians, and the hour and a half went fast, too fast. it felt, in fact, the way the first day of class often feels - you race through all this exciting material and then the moment discussion begins to go in multiple directions class is dismissed. doh!

thanks to jerry dear and his colleagues at sfpl's herb caen magazines and newspapers center for the opportunity and i'll be sure to keep up with their events and resources through their recently launched blog.

grannies rage against the war

yesterday in capitola (near santa cruz, california) there was a standoff over military recruitment. at issue was military recruitment of at-risk youth. the peaceful demonstration was organized by the raging grannies of the women's international league for peace and freedom (or WILPF, to which my mom belongs). both the police and the protestors were recording.





ten people, including an 81 year old woman with a walker, were arrested. one arrested granny, phyllis greenleaf, 64, told the santa cruz sentinel, "there's been enough bloodshed, and we are outraged."


the demonstration got fair coverage by the santa cruz sentinel (which, unfortunately and predictably, has gotten emptier and emptier since its recent media consolidation phase). allowing readers to post comments is, however, certainly a step in the right direction for citizen media and the comment thread, like american democracy, ranges from interesting to insipid.

but the good stuff comes, once again, from santa cruz indymedia. citizen coverage and convergence from ~bradley, miss l. ainie ous, katya komisaruk, and jean provides a fuller and more visual depiction of what went down. plus, miss l. ainie ous was able to photograph the navy's It's Up To U oversized check.

fade to cat

my USF colleague michael robertson knows how to tell a story. here's a recent one:

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free and public presentation in san francisco

what? a public presentation and discussion
when? this wednesday, june 27, 6 - 7:30 pm
where? san francisco main public library
cost? free.

The Power of Web 2.0, Collective Intelligence, and Online Communities

What is Web 2.0? What implications do innovative ideas like collective intelligence, crowdsourcing and online communities hold for the Internet and beyond? Professor David Silver from the Media Studies Department at the University of San Francisco will explore this pervasive phenomenon that has flooded the virtual information landscape in recent years through social networking resources such as Wikipedia, YouTube, Facebook and Flickr.

back from new york

on the last day of last week's foundations of online course development workshop, each of the participants presented their work. there was an excellent spectrum of ideas, questions, and answers and it was impressive to see how much ground we travelled within a week. plus, it was great to meet and learn from so many committed professors.


i'll be back in new york soon - mostly to check in again with these cuties.

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twins in new york

since sunday, i have been in new york, participating in a faculty resource network workshop at nyu. together with twenty-five other professors from all around the united states and puerto rico, i am part of a workshop called foundations of online course development. the workshop runs each day from nine to five and is facilitated by ian david aronson.

the workshop has been fairly interesting and i've learned some educational theory to bolster what i've been doing naturally in the class for over a decade. i must admit, i have little interest in distance education - time spent face to face with students in the classroom is one of the best parts of my job. but i am always interested in using digital learning environments such as blogs, wikis, and facebook to enhance, not replace, what we do in the class.

the first day we were assigned to groups and i got lucky - our group, group one, rocks. we be (left to right): perpetua ruiz (mathematics and computer science, chicago state university); me; juan martinez-colon (accounting, university of puerto rico, rio piedras); martiza sostre rodriquez (english, university of puerto rico, bayamon); and tae kim (nursing, st. joseph's college).


workshop participants' knowledge, experience, and comfort levels around computers and digital resources varies widely and ian has done a good job keeping us all on track. unfortunately, however, there is a major design flaw in the workshop's curriculum. the workshop is based not on the technology resources of participants' home colleges and universities but rather upon those found at nyu. this is extremely problematic.

for example, early in the workshop, ian was talking and said something like, "at this point, you take your project to your IT staff." a professor from puerto rico turned to me and whispered, "what is an IT staff?" another professor, also from puerto rico, told me that his university has a single lab of twenty computers for all students in four departments. "and," he added, "nearly none of my students have computers at home." it is awfully nice for nyu to host all of us but it sure is wrong to assume we have access to similar kinds of resources and staff.

the workshop ends at five and that's when the fun begins.


five months ago, my sister lisa and her husband jean had twins. through phone calls and photographs, i have tried to keep up with the lil' guys' progress but there's no substitute for seeing them face to face, holding them, and squeezing their cute little feet. they are like two little chunks of sweetness.


last night, after lisa put the twins down, we feasted. jean cooked up a delicious asparagus and shittake mushroom risotto and lisa made a salad that would make the folks at stonelake farm proud. numerous times throughout the evening, i excused myself and tip-toed into the boys' room to watch the twins sleep. with bellies full and proud parents nearby, the twins slept blissfully.

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off the grid

if stonelake farm is off the grid, how come the octagon has lights? how come the octagon has running water to cook, wash, and shower? and how am i able to access the internet to upload this blog post? where's the electricity coming from? where's the running water coming from? and how can it be that my showers are hot?

it starts here, at the top of stonelake's property, where pipes and storage tanks collect water from the creek.


the pipes take the creek water downstream and down the hill, all the while gaining velocity.


this contraption, a pelton wheel, inputs gushing water and outputs electricity.


electricity is stored in two car batteries tucked neatly away in this wooden box.


at the same time, stonelake farm derives energy from the sun. multiple solar panels, including these two outside melinda and francis' home, input the sun and output electricity. the first panel supplies much of the farm its electricity; the second panel supplies melinda's editing studio and the farm's internet cafe. access to the internet is limited at stonelake farm and i was able to use it for two hours a day. one thing i learned at stonelake farm was that two hours of the internet a day is more than enough.


the secret to the octagon's hot showers is the nearby solar panel. the water comes from the creek, travels from one side of the farm to the other through pipes, and is made piping hot by this solar panel.


in addition to being a natural wonder, stone lake farm is a technological wonder.

now i'm home. tomorrow morning, i leave for a week at new york university for a faculty workshop on teaching with technology. while in new york, i'll finally get to meet my two new nephews.

farming

there are many animals living on stonelake farm.

there are lots of chickens, maybe a dozen, most of them hens. collectively, they pump out around ten eggs a week. the eggs are delicious. they taste the way eggs used to taste. at times, the chickens are allowed to peck and poke their way through fallow fields in the garden. they feed on and distribute the compost (mulch), peck peck peck on the ground (hoe), and poop all over (manure). the chickens, while not too smart, are experts at prepping garden beds.

there is one dog and her name is lalune. lalune is the most self-confident, self-assured dog ever. if you see lalune, there's a good chance that francis is nearby.


during various points of time, stonelake farm's duck population ranged from two to twenty; currently, two ducks - duckalito and duckalita - call stonelake home. early in the morning, the ducks quack and flap their way into the garden where they, hypothetically, find the fattest slugs and snails and eat them uncooked. realistically, duckalito and duckalita spend most of their time tearing through the garden indianapolis 500-style. when possible, the ducks' poop is mixed with hay and made into mulch for the garden and orchards.


there are currently six humans at stonelake. most of what we eat comes from the garden (plus the eggs from the chickens), most of what we throw away is composted, and our trash is kept to a bare minimum. francis and melinda's home comes with a composting toilet, a living system that converts human waste into humanure, which is then fed to the fruit-bearing trees in the upper orchards. farm visitors use the outhouse and our wastes nourish future fruit-bearing trees on the lower orchard. it also affords views like this.


there are six goats - three adult goats, three baby goats - on the farm. tiny, the proud mama, is one hellava goat - friendly, social, vain. she's making a lot of milk, which is a good thing - the three little goats require three bottles of milk three times a day. although tiny is the only one making milk, all of the goats make poop, which is, i believe, the farm's main source of mulch and manure. on a farm, goats are all-stars.

the three baby goats - florence, zetta, and alfalfa sprout - are 100% cutie pies. the baby goats are comprised almost entirely of leg, and they are not exactly sure how to use them. they jump - upward, with a mid-air booty-shake to one side - for no apparent reason.