Rebecca's Pocket

The 2010 Foraging Challenge

Mon, 08 Feb 2010 04:15:00 -0800

Starting From Scratch is a blog detailing 6 New York City families' preparations to survive between July 22nd-July 29th, 2010 exclusively on food they have hunted, fished, farmed, or foraged. Many of the challengers have started foraging and planning gardens already. (via fpf)

How to: report the news

Tue, 02 Feb 2010 04:16:00 -0800

Don't miss the most entertaining bit of media literacy I've ever seen: Charlie Brooker - How to Report the News. (thanks, jjg!)

Five ways the iPad will change magazine design

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 09:11:30 -0800

Five Ways the iPad Will Change Magazine Design. (via @jayrosen_nyu)

Stephen Fry on the iPad

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 08:53:06 -0800

Wow. Stephen Fry is a convert.

There are many issues you could have with the iPad. No multitasking, still no Flash. No camera, no GPS. They all fall away the minute you use it. I cannot emphasise enough this point: "Hold your judgment until you've spent five minutes with it". No YouTube film, no promotional video, no keynote address, no list of features can even hint at the extraordinary feeling you get from actually using and interacting with one of these magical objects. [...] The moment you experience it in your hands you know this is class. This is a different order of experience. The speed, the responsiveness, the smooth glide of it, the richness and detail of the display, the heft in your hand, the rightness of the actions and gestures that you employ, untutored and instinctively, it's not just a scaled up iPhone or a scaled-down multitouch enhanced laptop - it is a whole new kind of device. And it will change so much.

Newspapers, magazines, literature, academic text books, brochures, fliers and pamphlets are going to be transformed (poor Kindle). Specific dedicated apps and enhancements will amaze us. You will see characters in movies use the iPad. Jack Bauer will want to return for another season of 24 just so he can download schematics and track vehicles on it. Bond will have one. Jason Bourne will have one. Some character, in a Tron like way, might even be trapped in one.

I've been mostly uninterested in this device, but this review has me curious. And Mr. Fry is the second person I've heard describe the device as "magical". I wonder if that's because they were primed by the keynote to use that term, or if it really is that?

7 tips for the home baker

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 04:15:00 -0800

Seven tips from a home baker. I think it may be time for me to start mastering sourdough and other naturally leavened breads. WildYeast and The Fresh Loaf as good starter (ha ha!) resources.

The wisdom of youth

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 10:41:16 -0800

The roughly 20-year-old delivery man upon soliciting my signature: "You are 21 aren't you?" Me, grinning: "I know it's hard to tell sometimes." Young man, I salute you!

Exercise keeps your cells younger than your chronological age

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 09:00:46 -0800

Exercise is anti-aging at a cellular level! Scientists are wondering how much exercise is necessary to see these effects; I'm wondering if the effects are as profound if you start exercising at a later age (or if the exercise will just stop you where you are when you start).

Recess before lunch as a new best practice for elementary schools

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 09:00:00 -0800

Plus this: Scheduling recess before lunch results in less food waste, higher consumption of milk, fruit, vegetables, and water, increased academic time, and fewer behavior problems. Not only are the kids not rushing lunch to get to recess, I'll bet they are hungrier when they sit down, and less likely to turn their noses up at foods they might have been skeptical about before. "Kids are calmer after they've had recess first. They feel like they have more time to eat and they don't have to rush." Janet Sinkewicz, principal of Sharon Elementary School in Robbinsville, N.J.

Using computer interfaces as narrative devices

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 08:17:12 -0800

Robin Sloan on the ways in which people are using interface elements as storytelling devices. Watch this Google ad (my favorite) and tell me if it isn't a perfect short story. Yes, understanding the narrative depends on a great deal of context - they used to call that "allusion" back when stories were told on paper. (via waxy)

Google's China decision is pragmatic, not idealistic

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 04:14:00 -0800

Two weeks ago, when Google announced that it would no longer censor search results in China, half of the Internet jumped for joy, and the other half sneered with cynicism that Google hadn't been doing that well in China anyway.

In its announcement, Google stated that Chinese attackers have accessed 2 Gmail accounts and stolen intellectual property - Google company secrets. Additionally, Google has found evidence that, independent of this attack, Gmail accounts belonging to advocates for Chinese human rights have been routinely accessed by third parties, probably as a result of poor security practices on the part of those individuals. As a result, Google has announced that they "have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn".

Wait - how did Google jump from "We have been the subject of an attack" to "We will no longer censor search results in China?". I think I know.

A new theory of gravity

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 04:15:00 -0800

String Theorist Erik Verlinde has proposed that gravity is an entropic force emerging from the fundamental properties of space and time.

To understand what Verlinde is proposing, consider the concept of fluidity in water. Individual molecules have no fluidity, but collectively they do. Similarly, the force of gravity is not something ingrained in matter itself. It is an extra physical effect, emerging from the interplay of mass, time and space, says Verlinde.

"It is not even a theory yet, but a proposal for a new paradigm or framework. All the hard work comes now." - Erik Verlinde

Ubicomp pills that can communicate with the outside world

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 04:14:00 -0800

Smart pills are a "disruptive innovation about to happen".

When one of Proteus's pills is taken, stomach fluids activate the edible communications device it contains, which sends wireless signals through the body to another chip worn as a skin patch or embedded just under the skin. That, in turn, can upload data to a smart-phone or send it to a doctor via the internet. Thus it is easy to make sure a patient is taking his pills at the right time, to spot adverse reactions with other drugs and so on.

Don't miss the caption on the photo. (via MikeK)

Who killed the three 2006 suicide victims at Guantanamo Bay?

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 12:25:35 -0800

Dahlia Lithwick: Why aren't we talking about the new accusations of murder at Gitmo?

Scott Horton's devastating new exposé of the possible murders of three prisoners at Guantanamo in 2006 is...simply too terrible to allow to be true. Which is why it has been mostly ignored this week in the mainstream American media.

Read it and judge for yourself.

AT&T and Verizon manage to stay in business only because the entire cell phone industry is a racket

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 07:55:00 -0800

Stop me if you've heard this one before: A man walks into not one, but two, cell phone stores eager to buy a phone. In both stores, the staff is so uninterested in responding to his needs that he ends up not buying anything.... The cell phone industry is surely on a par with cable providers in its avaricious and cavalier attitude toward its customers.

Robin Sloan on Stock and Flow

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 04:15:00 -0800

Robin Sloane applies the lessons of economics to writing and making other art.

Flow is the feed. It's the posts and the tweets. It's the stream of daily and sub-daily updates that remind people that you exist.

Stock is the durable stuff. It's the content you produce that's as interesting in two months (or two years) as it is today. It's what people discover via search. It's what spreads slowly but surely, building fans over time.

I feel like flow is ascendant these days, for obvious reasons - but we neglect stock at our own peril.

It's all true. After this page, the most popular parts of this site are my Zoom Teeth Whitening Caution (it hurts!) and Eating Organic on a Food Stamp Budget which, people tell me, they "read like a novel".

Robin may overestimate the rate of flow which is necessary to keep you on the radar, but she is absolutely correct in understanding that it is a necessary mix. (via @jayrosen_nyu)