Things of interest I've stumbled across in the past few days:
>>: I have an ongoing interest in the hacker counter-culture (or H4XX0RZ for the initiated). It's an inevitable part of the ebb and flow of culture at large that those movements that occur on the margins of our society eventually end up getting folded into the mainstream, I suppose (read your Bakhtin, kiddies). And while I've known about the "ethical hacking" movement for some time (some big companies hire such talent to insulate their wares), this is a sign of further mainstreaming: A Scottish university is now offering a course in ethical hacking. Once this leads to a bona fide major, I wonder if graduates can choose from among white, black, or grey mortarboards?
>>: My research interests have to do, at least in part, with interface design, particularly the push towards a new paradigm where verisimilitude is the coin of the realm--I call it the embodied interface (although I find that term to be somewhat troubling). So of course my spidey-sense was tingling when I ran across this prototype interface, the BumpTop:
Chock full of awesome, no doubt, and highly intuitive--needless to say, I want it. My only qualm is that they should consider changing the name of the OS to "Piles." That way, this Abott-and-Costello-esque exchange could take place in places other than my mind:
"So what platform are you running over there?"
"Who, me? I've got the Piles."
I'll stop there.
>>: Look at me! I won the 2005-2006 Muste Award, our departmental award for the best dissertation in any given year. I'm humbled, of course--humbled, and still awaiting my check...
>>: Finally, I'm linking to this black-and-white TIFF scan of an article from this month's Poker Pro Magazine (sorry for the quality--I was in a rush). I and my friends (Nishanta, Tiffany, Matt) were profiled in their monthly "University of Poker" column, which charts the poker scene at various colleges and universities across the nation. Step 1: Acquire fame. Step 2: [redacted] Step 3: World domination.
What do they know, anyway? I think this would make an excellent addition to their "Jargon Watch" column, but alas, many months have elapsed since I submitted it, and so I share it here with you:
netro design (NET-ro duh-ZIN)
The old-school web aesthetic still favored by the long-time members of the technorati (See, for example, the home pages of Clifford Stoll, Jaron Lanier, Ted Nelson, Larry Yeager, or RU Sirius). Eschewing contemporary web design elements such as flash animation, rollover menu tags, or even (gasp!) color, netro designers instead opt for a simple black & white, graphics-lite page of no-nonsense content unconstrained by tables or style sheets.
Memphis was hot, sticky, and sultry. Not the typical melieu for a bunch of buttoned-down academic-types, but it worked. Gave my paper, "Rhetorical Delivery and the Remediation of Hypertext," to a crowd of 10 or so at 8:30 on a Saturday, so it went as well as I could expect. Socialized with good friends, ate good food, drank in a bar that had once been a bordello, listened to a panel talk on satanic death metal, saw the world-renowned Peabody Ducks, saw the Civil Rights Museum, and sweated off nearly 5 pounds. All in all, a good haul.
Next up, I'm participating in DMAC, so expect a quasi-update after the deeds are done.