For the last 100 years or so, written English has been formalized by mass literacy and the printed word: media has meant books and newspapers printed in a set style, following accepted norms. However there has always been – and always will be – a vibrant spoken and ever-changing, living language that runs through our culture. In these latter days, the Internet (blogs, cell phones, chat rooms and email) has put text-production in the hands of everyone. We are seeing now the emergence of that living language into the visible culture which hitherto was controlled by the elite.
— via http://raphael.doxos.com/2011/01/drifting/
Through stacks of unread books, seas of feeds, people, invitations, events, and unanswered emails, if we stand still long enough, if we listen and look, if we pause, we see that nothing is ever the same again tomorrow.
— Liz Danzico
Simulating Worst-Case Scenarios →
The Johns Hopkins University Center for Advanced Modeling in the Social, Behavioral and Health Sciences is being launched by Dr. Joshua M. Epstein. A former senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, Epstein is an internationally recognized pioneer in the field of "agent-based" simulation modeling, which creates virtual worlds populated by "agents" that act like real people.
Verdana – Can a Typeface Be Art? →
Ask most computer users what they think of the Verdana font and you'll typically get a "meh" type response. The big daddy of fonts (or typefaces) is Helvetica – much loved by designers and until last week, it was the only typeface in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Until now.
No snow here...
Nikon D90, 66mm, 1/60s at f/5.3, ISO 800
Serendipity
Just bumped into Turning Award winner Vint Cerf on campus. Crazy.
And that's it, folks. The final five blocks of IPv4 addresses were given out this morning. Ars has a nice writeup on this historical moment in the life of the Internet.
So that's the storm everybody's been talking about. I hadn't noticed; it's 65 and sunny here.
MTA.ME →
Some HTML5, some data visualization, and some creativity, and you have a musical number played dynamically by NYC subway trains.
Baltimore to Post Data Trove Online →
They couldn't have done this when I was around and would have taken a look?