So after borrowing a DVD from the library for my daughter to watch, the ill-timed Kit Kiddredge movie from last summer, my daughter asked me if this was going to be like the "Great Desperation" in the movie. Got the name wrong, but captured the sentiment then (and now) perfectly, like always, from what she's seeing on the news and in classroom discussions.
Oddly, I'm overwhelmed with work, with classes larger than ever, more classes to teach, and a growing interest in public transportation and open source software research. I'm starting a semester-long case study in the MythTV project, starting from the discussion of computer hardware, operating systems, device drivers, and open source software, moving to application architecture, networks, home automation, internet data feeds (XML) and intellectual property considerations. So far, more students are awake in class than normal, so I might have just hit another nerve.
All in the name of helping people dump cable TV and save some bucks each month. The hard part is replacing Internet connections. Can this work if we dump the always-on model of internet connectivity and go back to the old days of intermittent connections and batch uploads/downloads?
Really, the economy looks like it's going down the toilet these days, and the Fed is armed with a plunger to speed the process along. I'd like to see if little projects like this, and the mobile computing, and the open source software movement, and public transportation can help just a little to save people money so they can invest it more constructively, like improving energy efficiency, or maybe even developing new kinds of quality-of-life services through massive peer networks that actually help people do more with less stuff.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Responsibility sucks
Settled in my first free Saturday of the semester for research, and I'm still being hit by a flurry of student emails. Though I can't reproduce the questions of others without their permission, I sure can summarize my responses over the past week:
It's a bit too clear now that overindulgent parenting has ill-prepared students for the real world. That responsibility is now falling on public school teachers and now the colleges. In the new economy where colleges are struggling to maintain enrollment, the temptation to indulge is going to be greater. Colleges aren't parents, schools aren't parents, and parents aren't so much parents anymore. So where do people learn responsibility?
- Yes, you do have to read the required textbook for the course.
- No, the final exam isn't optional.
- No, you cannot get partial credit for work not turned in.
- No, you can't get partial credit for questions not answered on a test.
- Yes, you're required to attend class.
- No, you can't submit the work of others as your own work.
It's a bit too clear now that overindulgent parenting has ill-prepared students for the real world. That responsibility is now falling on public school teachers and now the colleges. In the new economy where colleges are struggling to maintain enrollment, the temptation to indulge is going to be greater. Colleges aren't parents, schools aren't parents, and parents aren't so much parents anymore. So where do people learn responsibility?
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Solutions needed
So, after digesting a few months of headlines about the economy, I've got a couple of thoughts: things are bad, so what are we going to do about it? I'm struck with Dave Winer's interview with George Lakoff last year, where he discusses Lakoff's research into political dialog.
In short, the Republican party appeals to those who feel the world is a dangerous place, and they represent the stern father who protects us. Democrats, it follows, represent the nurturing mother who comforts us. So, the response to the economy of late from Republicans is that companies should be allowed to fail when they've been irresponsible, and Democrats will help us out and write us checks when we can't pay our bills.
Is either party acting in our best interests?
Deregulation, failing to enforce existing (reduced) regulations, or handing out blank checks to failed industries isn't exactly a solution. Being a Stern Dad to the lower and middle class, and a Nurturing Mom to Wall Street hasn't really worked out, and being a Nurturing Mom to everyone isn't going to work either. After all, in the current climate where billions are just vanishing into thin air, and the only solutions seems to just print up more money to throw into the void, what's the point, really? Maybe it's just time to break the cycle of codependency, move out of the house, and away from Mom and Dad.
In Megatrends, John Naisbitt identifies a bunch of trends in the early 1980's, some of which have become more clear than others in the past couple of decades. The idea of the information economy replacing manufacturing seems a bit odd today, now that we're bailing out Big Steel as well as Detroit. Nor does the trend from Government help to Self-Help seem clear these days. When times are bad, we're still running back to Mom.
Self-help is a misnomer- when you look at the trend from centralization to decentralization, or from hierarchy to networks, it's really community rather than self-help. But decentralization has also meant fragmentation as the networks don't work as well as expected. As I like to ask my students, often having hundreds of "MySpace Friends", how many of those "friends" would they be willing to meet in a dark alley. The answer turns out to be just a few, if any. It turns out we need reall community, not just bowling partners and drinking buddies, but a rich network of the other interpersonal relationships we need to get things done.
We need solutions that don't require government or cash. It's hard to imagine what a cashless economy looks like, but trading for things in time and effort makes sense when there's an absence of cash. Bartering is considered highly inefficient, in that a lot of value is lost in successive transactions, and that value is relative instead of the absolutes awarded by cash. But when you look at "the way things used to be", people volunteered more, helped each other out more, shared more, and split costs more. There used to be more social capital than now, in short. That's a hard solution for Government to promote, so it'll stick to printing money instead.
In short, the Republican party appeals to those who feel the world is a dangerous place, and they represent the stern father who protects us. Democrats, it follows, represent the nurturing mother who comforts us. So, the response to the economy of late from Republicans is that companies should be allowed to fail when they've been irresponsible, and Democrats will help us out and write us checks when we can't pay our bills.
Is either party acting in our best interests?
Deregulation, failing to enforce existing (reduced) regulations, or handing out blank checks to failed industries isn't exactly a solution. Being a Stern Dad to the lower and middle class, and a Nurturing Mom to Wall Street hasn't really worked out, and being a Nurturing Mom to everyone isn't going to work either. After all, in the current climate where billions are just vanishing into thin air, and the only solutions seems to just print up more money to throw into the void, what's the point, really? Maybe it's just time to break the cycle of codependency, move out of the house, and away from Mom and Dad.
In Megatrends, John Naisbitt identifies a bunch of trends in the early 1980's, some of which have become more clear than others in the past couple of decades. The idea of the information economy replacing manufacturing seems a bit odd today, now that we're bailing out Big Steel as well as Detroit. Nor does the trend from Government help to Self-Help seem clear these days. When times are bad, we're still running back to Mom.
Self-help is a misnomer- when you look at the trend from centralization to decentralization, or from hierarchy to networks, it's really community rather than self-help. But decentralization has also meant fragmentation as the networks don't work as well as expected. As I like to ask my students, often having hundreds of "MySpace Friends", how many of those "friends" would they be willing to meet in a dark alley. The answer turns out to be just a few, if any. It turns out we need reall community, not just bowling partners and drinking buddies, but a rich network of the other interpersonal relationships we need to get things done.
We need solutions that don't require government or cash. It's hard to imagine what a cashless economy looks like, but trading for things in time and effort makes sense when there's an absence of cash. Bartering is considered highly inefficient, in that a lot of value is lost in successive transactions, and that value is relative instead of the absolutes awarded by cash. But when you look at "the way things used to be", people volunteered more, helped each other out more, shared more, and split costs more. There used to be more social capital than now, in short. That's a hard solution for Government to promote, so it'll stick to printing money instead.
Tuesday, January 06, 2009
Unlike Sci-Fi, real future technology is pretty lame..
I'm getting back into research- which largely consists of random surfing of tech news article to get my brain back into gear, and find current events to drop into class discussions.
It's bit after bit of odd news, like these:
Sigh. I remember when mobile computing was cool.
It's bit after bit of odd news, like these:
Sigh. I remember when mobile computing was cool.
Sunday, January 04, 2009
Break over - back to work!
Tomorrow the kids go back to school, and I have one week left to prep for next semester- possibly the hardest one yet, with an even heavier teaching load, and a dissertation proposal that absolutely, positively, must be finished by March. But tonight and next week, it's time to finish what's left for next semester lectures- I've got the first half of the semester planned for most courses, complete with assignments, deadlines, and release dates for the online materials, not to mention a little more work on the proposal.
And once again, asking myself where two weeks went- though between the holidays and the kids home from school, not a lot got accomplished. Unless you count the time spent with them these past two weeks- no matter what the workload is, sometimes you still have to find time to be a parent. But it's the last night of their winter vacation, so I'll end here.
And once again, asking myself where two weeks went- though between the holidays and the kids home from school, not a lot got accomplished. Unless you count the time spent with them these past two weeks- no matter what the workload is, sometimes you still have to find time to be a parent. But it's the last night of their winter vacation, so I'll end here.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)