| Jun |
| 24 |
Steven Levitt, of Freakonomics fame, at a 2005 TED Talk speaks about the economics of car seats. His data lead him to ask the morally difficult question, are children’s car seats worth the time and expense it takes to use them?
Hit play or watch Steven Levitt on child carseats at TED.com. (Hint: there’s a little button on the right side of the player that lets you view fullscreen).
| Mar |
| 19 |
I just watched Dave Eggers TED talk about the 826 Valencia project. It’s inspiring and funny; please enjoy:
Accepting his 2008 TED Prize, author Dave Eggers asks the TED community to personally, creatively engage with local public schools. With spellbinding eagerness, he talks about how his 826 Valencia tutoring center inspired others around the world to open their own volunteer-driven, wildly creative writing labs. But you don’t need to go that far, he reminds us—it’s as simple as asking a teacher “How can I help?” He asks that we share our own volunteering stories at his new website, Once Upon a School.
| Jan |
| 17 |
This remarkable video shows a glimpse into the fascinating world of the ant. The narrator describes the intricate ant nest as an accomplishment equivalent to the building of the great wall of China.
The structure covers 538 square feet and travels 26 feet into the earth. In it’s construction, the colony moved 40 tons of soil. Billions of ant loads of soil were brought to the surface. Each load weighed four times as much as the worker ant, and in human terms, was carried over 1/2 mile to the surface.
I also recommend the TED talk by Deborah Gordon: How do ants know what to do?
(via)
| Nov |
| 18 |
This summer, while working at a camera/photography store in Lethbridge, one of the jobs I did was Photoshop work and printing photos.
One day a middle-aged woman came into the store carrying an old 8×10 of her deceased parents. She explained that the photo had been damaged when it fell off the wall and the glass protecting it, broke and cut into the image. She asked if we would be able to photoshop the damage out and make a new copy.
Before I could speak, the manager of the store pulled the image from my hand and inspected the photograph.
“Who took the photo?”
There was no stamp on the back and she didn’t know. She explained, “It was taken about 30 years ago by a photographer that their pastor hired to take family photos at their church”.
He told her due to copyright laws, he would not print her a new image. (Nevermind the illegally copied Photoshop program he was using to charge $45/hour to make other’s copies).
Should it be illegal to recover the woman’s photo? Common sense revolts at the idea.
But she never did get it fixed.
See this great TED talk by Larry Lessig speaking about the shortcomings of our dusty, pre-digital intellectual property laws.
| Jun |
| 13 |
What you are about to watch is truly remarkable, and it just gets better as it goes.
Using photos of oft-snapped subjects (like Notre Dame) scraped from [Flickr], Photosynth (based on Seadragon technology) creates breathtaking multidimensional spaces with zoom and navigation features that outstrip all expectation. Its architect, Blaise Aguera y Arcas, shows it off in this standing-ovation demo.
Hit the black triangle for play embedded in this window or the full screen button on the right.
See more on Seadragon and Photosynth. (Please note that these links go to Microsoft sites which are notorious for destroying old links—chances are if you’ve come here through the archives, these links no longer work).
| Mar |
| 02 |
If you enjoyed the Richard Dawkins documentary I linked to yesterday, I recommend you also check out: