Creepy much?

After our “Twitter” discussion, I remembered an interesting iPhone app (available only to those who hack their phones) called Twinkle. It adds the ability to Geo-locate your twitter feed via the phone’s built-in cell tower triangulation GPS system, and the ability to map people whose Twitter feeds indicate they are nearby. I don’t want to call this creepy…but i just did.

Article Link

The Man who wrote 200,000 books!

Hey Guys, This is a really cool article from NYT. Phillip M. Parker uses a team of computers to compile public information from the net. He then frames all the pertinent stuff into books for consumers. This seems to be one of the more important changes to the way that we link to together information and is certainly a function of the “wealth of networks.”

“Comparing himself to a distant disciple of Henry Ford, he said he was ‘deconstructing the process of getting books into people’s hands; every single step we could think of, we automated’.”

Similar to Wikipedia but not really

So here’s something I’ve wanted to post since class this afternoon.

It’s a site called Encyclopedia Dramatica.

It’s formatted exactly like Wikipedia except that it specializes in internet memes and the like. Go here if you want to find out the real meaning of “shoop da whoop” or “over 9000!!”

I thought this was really interesting since the site has a much more relaxed feel to it than wikipedia, so it offers a different perspective about how a wiki can be used.

Oh, yeah, and I should warn you that some “mature” stuff is right on the front page. You’ve been warned.

And no, this is not a rick roll. 🙂

What should Midd do with the Internets?

As I mentioned, I’m on Middlebury’s Internet Strategy Task Force. So what do you think Middlebury should do differently in its “web presence”? How do you use our current site, and what could we do differently that you’d find useful (either as a current student, future alum, or as a prospective student in your part imagination)? Feel free to brainstorm wildly, gripe profusely, or vent your spleen about Middlebury online – I’ll pass along comments anonymously (unless you have a great idea, in which case you’ll get full credit).