The Daily Rumpus
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From Stephen Elliott
Google is nixing their RSS reader in July, but at least we still have this fun demo of real-time collaborative Google docs.
“See what it’s like to collaborate with famous storytellers,” says the blurb on the side of the page.
...moreSeveral major publishers, including Penguin Groups and McGraw-Hill, and Google announced this morning that they have reached an agreement in the Google Books copyright infringement case.
The private settlement brings a close to the case for publishers, though the claims of the Author’s Guild have yet to be resolved.
...moreThis might seem obvious to many, but apparently there is now research behind the idea that smart phones, computers and the Internet are weakening our memories.
According to this article, the phenomena is called the “Google effect” (which you can surely google for effect).
...more“French publishers Albin Michel, Flammarion and Gallimard are suing Google for having scanned 9,797 books without prior permission…”
Another lawsuit has been launched against the Google Book Search program.
(via PW)
...moreWelcome to the weekend, everyone. Make it a good one.
For those of you (like me) who will be watching a little football this evening and tomorrow, it’s time to admit that there’s not much action in an actual game telecast.
...moreHave some questions? “Q. and A.: Google and China” with Evan Osnos.
The Atlantic’s James Fallows says China is hyper-confident (in their “Bush/Cheney phase”), but that the government has been “thrown off balance” by Google’s announcement.
After Google’s throwdown, why is the U.S.
...moreI love Philip Larkin’s “An Arundel Tomb.” He hated it. On a side note, I really love that the BBC is willing to spend 30 minutes on the story behind a single poem.
This is, I think, a good way to approach an online poetry journal–make it something other than a paper journal transferred onto a website.
...moreGood morning! I’m up against a pretty nasty deadline, so blogging might be a bit light today. In the meantime, here’s some links for you from the book blogs.
What is the state of reading among the armed forces in Iraq and Afghanistan?
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Have you seen Big Picture’s photo-essay on Mars? It is the best thing.
What does the grammar of Google searches say about us?
I am just linking to this article so I can use the phrase “monkey justice.”
The great Pacific garbage patch.
...moreWe’ve covered the Google book settlement quite a lot recently.
While we tend to focus on how the case affects authors, Geoffrey Nunberg, a professor at the UC Berkeley School of Information, is looking past the settlement and examining what Google’s massive digitization effort will mean for academics.
...moreIt’s time to release my inner geek. Okay, not so inner.
Behold the cannibal galaxy! Triangulum, your day is coming!
The nonprofit Solar CITIES is installing solar power systems in the poorest parts of Cairo.
Global warming science is complex, and deniers are either co-opted by a dirty energy lobby or just stupid, and this news is going to make refuting them a little tougher.
...moreDo you have what it takes to be the next Philip J. Fry? Turanga Leela? Bender Bending Rodriguez? Fox is apparently bringing Futurama back yet again, but is planning to recast the voices.
YouTube might be profitable soon, thanks to advertising.
...moreThe Oxford University Press is in favor of the Google book settlement, and the title of this post sums it up pretty well. But I’ll give you a bit more of their reasoning.
...moreFrom a New York Times article, published two months ago, about the end of the line for Encarta:
“It’s hard to look at the end of the Encarta experiment without the free and much larger Wikipedia springing immediately to mind. But Encarta arguably would have failed even without that competition.
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Technological innovation seems almost strangely commonplace these days, from say, contact lenses that could layer data directly onto your view of the world to robots fighting far-flung wars to computer systems perhaps smart enough to compete on “Jeopardy!” All astonishing developments in their own right, and yet the most profound change of our times may yet be purely informative in nature: The digitization of all that we read.
...moreThe Internet was supposed to wash away the walls governments use to keep information from the people. But the Web is a resource and, like oil or art or love, corporate hands have capitalized in every way they can. While companies like Google and Microsoft help shuttle info at light-speed around the globe, they’re also helping repressive governments control the web.
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Children are cramming in almost six hours of Internet time a day. A third of young people say they cannot live without their computer.
The Spy Who Came In From The Gold. KGB agent turned billionaire banker is purchasing a controlling stake in famed London tabloid The Evening Standard.
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