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Posted 2 weeks ago

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New Learning Tools

Last week Apple introduced several new things related to education including iBooks textbooks, iBooks Author, and iTunes U (for all entities, not just colleges).

All of these are significant, and the potential for these tools is exciting. The video they presented (7:21) at their event does a good job of illustrating why what they are doing is important to them and for students and teachers. Something one of the educators they interviewed said stuck with me:

There is no reason today to assume that kids have to use the same tools they did in 1950; in fact, to do so is to prepare them for a world that’s already passed.

Six decades is obvious, but I would say tools one decade old are easily too far behind. To not take advantage of the newest tools possible is to leave kids behind, in part because it affords new ways of engaging, interacting, and ultimately learning. If you do any kind of work that deals remotely with using computers, it is imperative that you know how to stay current. What is cutting edge today will be commonplace five years from now (remember, the iPhone was introduced in 2007, and the iPad in 2010).

To me, part of learning is being able to take new things — information, tools, people, ideas — and integrate them into your life or work. To allow students to use technology that is outdated is to set them up for failure down the road. It’s possible that Apple will actually alleviate some of this by continuing to make iDevices ever easier to use, but they will keep changing. Students must be prepared by being used to the pace of change.

Technology plays a more important part in our lives every day and this is a trend that will only continue, even accelerate. A child entering kindergarten today has never known a world without iPhones in it. High school freshmen do not remember the introduction of the iPod. These are not novelties or marvels to them, they are simply a thread in the fabric of modern life. To pretend otherwise is to do a disservice to them.

Posted 3 weeks ago

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What’s going to kill movies and TV is what’s already killing them: better ways to entertain people. So the best way to approach this problem is to ask yourself: what are people going to do for fun in 20 years instead of what they do now?
Y Combinator, Request for Startups 9: Kill Hollywood

Posted 3 weeks ago

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If Hollywood was smart, they would get in front of this change. They would use the Internet as the most effective way to distribute their killer content. Every day they don’t do this, they risk the content flowing to consumers through other means.
MG Siegler, Kill Hollywood, Not Movies

Posted 3 weeks ago

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Thank you for protecting Wikipedia. (We're not done yet.)

Wikipedia, SOPA initiative:

SOPA and PIPA are not dead: they are waiting in the shadows. What’s happened in the last 24 hours, though, is extraordinary. The Internet has enabled creativity, knowledge, and innovation to shine. And as Wikipedia and other websites went dark, you’ve directed that energy to protecting it.

We’re turning the lights back on. Help us keep them shining brightly.

We cannot assume everything will be okay now. The next SOPA must be stopped. The root of the problem must be fixed. I won’t shut up about this because not enough of you have contacted your congresspeople yet. Do it. It’s easy!

Posted 3 weeks ago

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Perfect Expectations

As I know more of mankind, I expect less of them, and am ready now to call a man a good man, upon easier terms than I was formerly.

— Samuel Johnson

It sometimes seems as though life can become defined by expectations — whether it is what you expect of yourself, of others, or what others might expect of you. When you think about it, most expectations are unrealistic, because you are making an assumption about at least one thing that you either do not control or do not fully understand. Granted, it may be reasonable to expect a minimum of someone, but that’s not what I’m getting at. What interests me are the unspoken goals we give ourselves and others that drive our decisions, our thoughts, our actions, and ultimately our lives.

Why do we allow our lives to be dictated by such an invisible force? What is to be gained by it? What does it matter if an expectation is met or not?

You may have heard the expression “it is what it is” at some point. Well, unless you are lucky enough to live completely free of expectations, that’s not the case. Everything is given context by someone because it is either the same as or different than what they wanted, predicted, desired, needed, or relied upon happening. It is only human to look to the future and the past, but I find it bizarre that we perpetuate this vicious cycle of putting unnecessary weight on almost everything we do.

For some, expectations are an excellent motivator. They strive to meet them, push beyond them, and create ever more challenging scenarios in which to put themselves. Others are crippled by expectations. Pessimism and cynicism alone do not account for this. The weight we give this pressure to make something happen is so heavy that it can prevent attempts at meeting expectations from even being made.

Perhaps the most common occurrence of expectations playing a role in how things happen is in perfectionism. Attempting to attain perfection is a completely self-defeating goal. Yet, once this pattern becomes ingrained as a habit, it’s almost impossible to see the world in any other way. Anything short of the very best, or a little better, seems unacceptable. “Failure is not an option.” It’s bullshit.

There is so much beauty in what lies outside of perfection. Art is in some ways the very antithesis of this idea: denying judgement, achieving a solitary existence outside of what anyone thinks it ought to be. When something stands completely on its own, regardless of influence, it becomes something that cannot be tainted by these outside forces.

Art doesn’t give a fuck if you approve of it; it doesn’t spare a thought as to whether or not it is good enough; it doesn’t question its motives or its impact. Art simply is. Why should we expect anything different of ourselves?

Posted 3 weeks ago

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Roswell Park Launches Landmark Immunotherapy Vaccine Trial

Dendritic cell vaccine, manufactured in unique RPCI facility, trains body’s defenses to remember, destroy cancer cells

Roswell Park Cancer Institute (via Mike Rundle):

The Center for Immunotherapy at Roswell Park Cancer Institute (RPCI) has launched a phase I clinical research study of a dendritic cell vaccine designed to both eradicate cancer cells and prevent disease relapse.

It’s a trial, but still — wow.

It uses the body’s immune system, treating cells which then “recruit an army of killer immune cells that seek out and destroy cancer.” It’s both fascinating scientifically and promising medically.

Please support research if you can.

Posted 3 weeks ago

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This is my political credo:

I believe in human dignity as the source of national purpose, in human liberty as the source of national action, in the human heart as the source of national compassion, and in the human mind as the source of our invention and our ideas. It is, I believe, the faith in our fellow citizens as individuals and as people that lies at the heart of the liberal faith. For liberalism is not so much a party creed or set of fixed platform promises as it is an attitude of mind and heart, a faith in man’s ability through the experiences of his reason and judgment to increase for himself and his fellow men the amount of justice and freedom and brotherhood which all human life deserves.

John F. Kennedy, Acceptance of the New York Liberal Party Nomination, September 14, 1960.

I reiterate my wish for nationalism to someday be worldism.

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