overstated

Mr. Negroponte wrote a simple and elegant introduction to the Technology Review’s 10 Emerging Technologies issue this month, touting the benefits of interdisciplinary research, youth and creativity.

Even though it’s a simple reiteration of the Media Lab party line, the article sent my mind off in a thousand directions. As an academic in an interdisciplinary institution, I can firmly say that while many groups around MIT are moving in this direction, the world is still far from being accepting of breadth as an education style.

Tenure, an infrastructure most people think is as old as the university, is actually quite young institution in America. Based on the German concept of lehrfreiheit, or freedom to teach, tenure also has the effect of locking in to an age heirarchy that undermines young thinkers. While the ideals are good (i.e., disconnecting professors’ ideas from their employment), the resulting system lacks the adaptability and creativity necessary to bridge new ground.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting that we fire all tenured professors and replace them with younger, less experienced researchers. But when new professors spend their time appealing to the venerable members of their program, they lose their potential to break new ground through alternative methods and perspectives.

Or maybe I’m just worried about getting tenure someday.

Tech Review: Creating a Culture of Ideas

Pitt: A history of Tenure

This week’s New Yorker carries a fascinating story, one that is unfortunately not online, but would surely spread like crazy if it was. It tells the sad tale of people who are “locked in,” that is having lost complete communication with their muscles, and in turn the outside world. These people are not in comas, rather they have all of their thoughts, but no way to communicate them.

Dr. Niels Birbaumer, a neuroscientist from the University of Tubingen works with these patients using a system some call a Brain-Computer Interface (BCI), which is a sort of pong game hooked up to a person’s EEG (brain waves). In a miraculous extension of the brain’s capacity to learn, many of Birbaumer’s subjects have successfully used the system to spell words, reestablishing the connection between the brain and the world it resides in.

There is surprisingly little literature about Birbaumer’s work on the web (one measly Nature abstract), but the importance of his work deserves some serious attention. It is an inspiring story for those academics stuck in their labs, working on animals or otherwise, showing that research can have a real impact on the world.

To say the least, it’s worth the $4.

Mardi Gras.. Cancun?! What kind of life is that for a graduate student?

I’ll be making my return to the Sunbelt Social Networks Conference at the beginning of February to present more findings on the analysis of Blogdex data. Since the findings last year were such a big hit, I’ll make sure and post them here before I leave.

The Sunbelt conference is always my favorite, covering such a wide range of topics, from school children bullies to trucker prostitutes. With any luck they’ll have wifi, and I’ll do some real time blogging.. I’m not sure at this point, but I do know that they have “beamers” (a.k.a. overhead projectors)

In response to Rusty’s offensive image of the week:

I felt I should let our readers know that the infamous bunny-with-pancake has passed on to bigger better worlds with more ridiculous stunts. Its owner
documented the entire event. I cried.

Two bits of MIT related news that might be interesting to the outside world: first, four MIT professors, including one Marvin Minsky (along with Steven Pinker and Rodney Brooks) wrote memos to President Bush answering the questions “What are the pressing scientific issues for the nation and the world, and what is your advice on how I can begin to deal with them?”

Marvin’s memo is short and to the point, containing only one suggestion:

Also in the news, William Mitchell, author of City of Bits has just officially given up his position as dean of the architecture department to become head of the Media Lab’s academic program. This is an unprecidented move since the Media Lab is merely a part of the architecture department, ostensibly three steps down in the chain of command. But Bill has some big ideas about how to things are changing here at the lab.

MIT News Office: MIT Profs Offer New Year’s Advice

MIT Tech Talk:Mitchell to step down as dean of architecture

After about 15 minutes of translation with Babelfish, I was able to set myself up an account on the ISize ECard site, a Japanese electronic card system. Just check out some of the awe-inspiring flash cards they have to offer, and you’ll see why the effort is worth it.

I can’t see any reason to use any American equivalent, since ICard even provides English translation for the recipient (that is, if you can make it through the interface which is entirely in japanese.. be careful! left button = submit, right button = clear!)

A most useful writing guide, Matt Olson gives us an inverse Strunk and White for the web, along with some witty social commentary on the average virtual community member:

How to Write Like A Wanker

This week I must shift into overdrive with respect to my generals examinations, to be completed by the end of February. I’m reading a massive amount of papers every day, and since I’ll be avoiding the Interweb as much as possible, I’ll try and post some choice quotes from my reading to keep people stimulated.

Quotes today come from Barry Wellman’s essential networks paper on the roles of social support in the East York neighborhood outside Toronto:

Barry Wellman, Scot Wortley (1990): Different Strokes from Different Folks: Community Ties and Social Support (pdf)

Almost 6 months to the day after it was announced, the anonymous donor of the XBox challenge has been revealed as Michael Robertson, chief executive of Lindows.com (and founder of MP3.com). His identity was revealed in a bulletin board on SourceForge

Robertson has officially extended the deadline for the contest, since no group has successfully completed a full working version. He’ll still dole out the $200k, given that none of the contracts against his life are successful in the mean time.

Mercury News: Mystery man revealed in Microsoft Xbox hack contest