Elijah Meeks's Blog, page 7

Google Revolution Beta

Google has released updated kmls with fresh satellite imagery of Tehran, though it’s from June  18th, so it can’t begin the real process of commons-based examination for clues as to what’s going on in Tehran.  According to their update, they’re trying to get higher resolution imagery which, assumably, would also be more recent, in which case we’ll see a flood of image analysis.  Unlike the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, which used high technology to organize protests but was an internal Ukrainian

Final Boss of the Internet

Whyweprotest.net, the activist faction of Anonymous, the collective entity that exists as the sort of summa cum laude reductio absurdum of all that Web 1.0 was, is running a secure site for news and communication and distributed denial of service attacks in support of protesters in Iran.

I suppose this is what the world looks like when the hackers become more aware of systemic social issues.  If all the energy, technology and networks that have heretofore been directed at pranking corporations an

Manifest Destiny

Just finished another read-through of the new Digital Humanities Manifesto and it’s interesting to see how the Digital Humanities continues to position itself as an academic, intellectual ally to so many of the progressive movements found on the Internet. Still, the discipline, or “array of convergent practices” as the UCLA folks like to call it, is struggling with a crisis of identity. Namely, there’s the nervous hipsterism (including scatalogical gif humor*–boy, there’s a strange phrase) inj

A bit of peril

For those of you unaware of Ani DiFranco, she’s the authentic version of Alanis Morissette or, shoot, my musical knowledge fell to pieces during the Y2K disaster and I can’t even make a hip Joan Jett reference because she’s coming back into the limelight and, frankly, once I’ve exhausted Ani, Joan and Alanis, I’m stuck.  Anyway, I was bouncing around through the horrendous music available on YouTube (Is there some kind of requirement that all music videos on YouTube not officially sanctioned and

The Phenomenon of the 99¢ eBook

In case you haven’t noticed, there are several thousand free books available for Kindle readers, and many more that cost about as much as a pulp novel did in 1945 and less than a decent pack of gum costs today.  Now, there have always been cheap-as-free books available for eReaders, but this isn’t just your usual suspect list of Project Gutenberg and other public domain goodie goodies.  The 99¢ (Or, with the 20% discount, 80¢) Kindle edition isn’t so much a book as it is a marketing venue for no

Son of the Great River: Review Roundup

Son of the Great River has been out for two months now and I’m happy to report the reviews have been solidly positive so far.  Book reviews get scattered all over the Internet, and it’s a rather maddening trap to start googling yourself and your book, so I’m sticking with what was posted either on GoodReads or Amazon.com.  Here’s a sample of what people are saying about it:

This is an enjoyable tale that reminds me of a quaint mixture of Pocahontas, White Fang and the Horseclans Saga. Plenty of p

Middle School is Web 3.0

I got to put on my Author Hat and meet with a bunch of 4th, 5th and 6th-graders and discuss the process of writing, the story in Son of the Great River, and numerous other topics, not least of which was Edward Cullen and Stephanie Meyer.  When I was told that Son of the Great River was best suited for intermediate audiences, I blanched at the prospect, because I thought it meant the book was overly simplistic.  After visiting a class full of small, precocious people, and the brave souls who teac

Topicality be Damned, Back to Geography!

I keep meaning to write something about poor Jared Diamond’s woes and the shadenfreude that the entire discipline of anthropology is currently feeling.  Other topics that should have already been thrown into the giant hopper but haven’t:

I’ve started racking up good reviews for Son of the Great River, including librarians and middle-schoolers.  I doubt I’ll be quitting my day job any time soon, but it’s nice to know that it wasn’t terrible.  Interestingly, when you speak to modern 4th-6th graders

Infants, Rodents and Blind People

Jurgen Appelo just bodychecked Web 2.0.

I should just repost the whole thing, but I’ll pick and choose the very best parts.  Everyone should simply go over there and read it.

Have you noticed that, with the exception of infants, rodents and blind people, the whole world has picked up the hobby of digital photography?

As an aside, Hajra is on DeviantArt, and a non-scientific but long survey backs up Jurgen’s claims.

It’s very different for software developers. Programmers are like novelists, movie

Search Visualization

How interesting…  Infosthetics just pointed out Google’s new toy, an entry in the realm of visualized search.  I just stumbled on FaceSaerch which promises a different kind of visual search experience.  I wonder how long it will be before we have a search engine that doesn’t require any text whatsoever…