Need Wireless?

Is your favorite Library closed during Spring break? Check out this directory of Wi-Fi access points from PCWorld Magazine. Search by address, city, state, country, airport or zip code to find free wireless service.

Posted by Chris

Open Source White House Redux

Digital Urban is reporting on White House Redux, a collaborative architecture project that seeks to collectively redesign the White House in Washington, D.C.

From the project website:  Analogously, the concept of Source Code is readily found in the everyday practice of architecture in forms of drawings, agendas, documentations, ideas, specifications, and material libraries. However, none of the above, with the seldom exception of ‘ideas’, are freely redistributable, publicized, or allow for criticism and input akin to what an open-source model offers. The architectural practice, today, is skewed towards personal benefit and gratification of individual architects. Thus, the laws protect creative property, on one hand, but are constricting and oppose collaborative creativity that could contribute more rapidly to architectural theory and practice.

Read about another collaborative architecture project taking place in Second Life here and here.

And for more, see the Open Architecture Network as well as the Library Design Wiki.

Posted by Chris

The Library Café

The Library Café is a weekly program of table talk with scholars, artists, publishers and librarians about books, ideas, and the formation and circulation of knowledge. It is hosted by Thomas Hill, and can be heard on WVKR FM 91.3 Tuesday afternoons between 12:00 Noon and 1:00 p.m. ET (16.00-17.00 GMT) during the academic year.

Posted by Chris

The Wikipedia Debate

You don’t have to think it’s destroying our culture or that it’s igniting a cultural renaissance to understand that Wikipedia represents a major shift in how information is created and stored. Some opposing views:

Wikipedia and the New Curriculum David Parry Science Progress 2/11/08

The Great Seduction: Cult of the Amateur Andrew Keen 10/15/06

What to Do With Wikipedia William Badke Information Today, Inc. 3/27/08

Posted by Chris

Sloan Foundation to Give Wikipedia $3M

“Doron Weber, a Sloan Foundation representative, said in a statement that Wikipedia ‘represents a quantum leap’ in the collection and organization of knowledge.”

Sloan Foundation to Give Wikipedia $3M Brian Bergstein AP 3/26/08

Read a press release about the president of the Sloan foundation, Paul L. Joskow’s, recent appointment as a trustee to the Yale Corporation, here.

Posted by Chris