text:
Goodbye KAT
It is so easy for us to focus on the overwhelming issue of lack of funds. And it should be. The fact is, the KAT centre currently only has enough funding to run for three more months. Some long term volunteers are frantically strategizing ways to come up with the money, and all donations help. What gets overlooked, or forgotten, are the day to day success stories. Lately we have adopted out three in-house dogs and successfully rehabilitated eight more. Two dogs (Johnnie and Sweetie) that came in over a month ago with serious spinal injuries and a poor prognosis were released last week with a clean bill of health. It was amazing watching them recover with the help of vet medicine and homeopathy. As well, following the strike, our two long term leg fracture patients were released as well as many other hairless, mange – turned luscious coat dogs. The recoveries these animals are able to make, if someone just gives them some time and care, is remarkable. Animals come in with massive wounds festering with maggots and a week or two later trot out looking for food and their companions. In Poland they say, "It heals like on a dog." And I believe it.
These next few months will be crucial for the survival of the KAT centre. If the staff can settle their differences and therefore permit efforts to be focused on proper fundraising, KAT's future can be bright. As the leaders in Animal Birth Control and treatment in Nepal, KAT has the potential to further reduce the stray dog population, educate the future of Nepal, and even expand to a second or third location. However, if staff issues remain and proper funding is not received the future looks grim. I urge readers to make even small donations. However, down the line I believe KAT will require a larger, corporate sponsor to thrive.
Over the past three months I've learned more about veterinary medicine, shelter medicine, life and humility then all my education combined. I also believe I have provided the KAT centre assistance in every way I could. Sometimes the staff and volunteers needed a laugh more than anything, and I did my best to help ease the tension when applicable. I will greatly miss everyone involved at the KAT centre, especially the children that lived in the attached home. I had the pleasure of taking these children to the cinema one day, and watched them marvel at the shear size of the building and play for hours on the "moving staircases". I think I may have enjoyed myself more than they did.
My time with VWB has gone by in a blur and I loved every second of it. VWB makes an investment in us students. They send us across the globe to provide help bettering communities for animals and people. We do are absolute best to provide said help, and in doing so, learn more than we could ever imagine. For this, I could not be more grateful. I have made connections here that will last a life time. And, if I'm lucky, I hope to return to Nepal one day. Thanks to everyone I met and all the departure gifts. Your notes were hilarious and heart warming. I am in Manali, India now at a battery powered internet cafe during a power outage. I will be here for a few days then I will take a 22 hour bus or jeep to Leh, Ladahk.
All the best,


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The little book of space law
- Matthew J. Kleiman
- American Bar Association, 2013
- Find it in Pittcat ›
- Request this book by email ›
Well thought-out laws that govern spaceflight activities minimize the risk to people and property in outer space and on the ground, while not prematurely stifling innovation. This book examines some of these laws and subsequent court cases.
PittCat: KZD1145.K49 2013

subset: commoncrawl


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The California Division of the State Architect eliminates the 90-day closing letter and introduces a new certification process on August 1, 2014. Read the full story here:
California's school districts, community colleges, and design professionals requested an innovative, convenient, user-friendly process to view a list of outstanding forms, fees, and design documents required by the Division of the State Architect's (DSA) office. Today, DSA announces the implementation of DSA Certification Box: a cloud-based solution that saves time, increases communication, and helps partners to resolve uncertified projects. DSA Certification Box allows everyone to view uncertified project files, sorted by district, campus, and project. This will streamline the process of submitting required information that ensures compliance with all state codes, policies, and procedures.
The Division of the State Architect provides design and construction oversight
for K–12 schools, community colleges, and various other state-owned and leased facilities. The Division also develops accessibility, structural safety, and historical building codes and standards utilized in various public and private buildings throughout the State of California.
For information on DSA's secure cloud-based collaborative solution, see the DSAbox.com Information Web page. For step-by-step instructions on using DSAbox, see the DSAbox External Library.
The DSA is implementing significant changes to the Construction Oversight Process. These changes are designed to streamline the DSA construction phase process and to ensure that projects are certified at the completion of construction. Effective June 1, 2013, the DSA will utilize an Inspection Card Process similar to that used by virtually every building department throughout the State.
See the State Architect's Corner Web page for a letter to our Stakeholders, sharing initiatives and changes the Division of the State Architect has underway and is planning to implement.
View All
Excellence in School Construction


text:
Data breaches on the rise
Although small business owners are becoming more clued up on IT security generally, this has not translated into fewer data breaches, it has been claimed.
According to a survey commissioned by Infosecurity Europe and conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers, half of the organisations polled had increased their expenditure on IT security over the past year and a similar amount expected to spend more next year. The research also found that three-quarters of small businesses assess IT security risks now, compared to just 48% who did so in 2008. However, Chris Potter, partner at OneSecurity, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, said small businesses were still not doing enough to deal with today's level of IT security breaches, the number of which has doubled over the past two years. "The number has risen to well over double what it was two years ago and has reached record levels for all sizes of organisation," said Potter. "All types of breach were on the increase and a conservative estimate is that the total cost of breaches to UK business in billions of pounds is now well into double figures." Around 74% of small businesses said they had suffered from a malicious security breach in the past year, along with 90% of large organisations, compared to 35% overall two years ago. More than 43% of small businesses are bracing themselves for further IT security incidents next year. Andrew Beard, director, OneSecurity, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, added: "Part of the solution to ensure better security is encrypting data and we see that there has been huge improvements in this area with regard to laptops, USB sticks and other removable media. "But educating people is just as important. Investment in security awareness training, while on the increase, is still often inadequate." © Crimson Business Ltd. 2010


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I'm telling you..RUN do not walk to Create My Keepsake to get this July kit! I had so much fun with it! It's just gorgeous! :) Here's everything I made with it:
This is just a little something I made using a wooden Prima box I had that held my velvet Prima flowers. I painted it black, then used green crackle paint, added the kit papers, embellies, my pics and did a teeny bit of stitching plus added a few more buttons. I love how this turned out..it's going on my scrappy desk :)
Just a little "hi" to ya!
My GORGEOUS girl :) Those eyes!! THAT smile! :) I LOVE her!
AWW!!! Here's my little man! Shaypher when he was 6 (and up there today at 16)
Is he NOT a CUTE kid? :) Gotta love those dimples!
(I had to remove this layout for a bit..be back soon!)
My sweet girl again and her bestest buddy. These 2 are always laughing like this!
So can ya tell I had fun with the kit? GO get one...SERIOUSLY!!!!!!!
Want a good "freedom" challenge? Go to the Design X blog right now for one! Our challenge this week is: "Happy Independence Day! What does Independence Mean to you? How do you Celebrate Independence Day, or how do you celebrate YOUR independence?"
Feeling challenged? I hope so!! Be sure to link your layout up to the comment section for a chance to win a GREAT RAK!!
So here's MY freedome layout....
SEE those WAY CUTE polka dot buttons??? Those are made by the EVER so talented (not to mention CUTE as all get out) Tessa Ann Watte! She has a FABULOUS Etsy site, you HAVE to go check her out right here--------------> Tessa Ann's Etsy
Have a GREAT week everyone!!!
HUGS to all of you...
~Me (new and all!) :)


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Pet Stories: In Your Own Words
The Mourning Dove
I'm on my third reading of Out On A Leash! I haven't figured out how to share something extraordinary with Mike, my signifigant other. He's been playing with me and says I read your book like some would memorize the Bible ... "Verse 6 Psalm 5: the word according to Terry. Dog spelled backwards is God." Don't get him wrong; Mike is wonderful. I tease him because he reminds me of the playful and unconditional love I used to receive from my childhood pet (a basset hound named Angus). I explained he must have received a Walk In of Angus during his serious automobile accident (required a helicopter medivac) many years ago. So, I'll try to share this with you.
Recently, I was sitting in my living room ruminating about exploring my nature of reality. I noticed a mourning dove sitting on our balcony ledge. He/She seemed to be fixed on me but I knew the sliding screen door, between our window, was blocking her view of me. Our bird feeder had been empty for several days and no doubt the dove was patiently waiting for the next serving of feed. Before I knew it, I'm negotiating with the feathered friend. I pledge more attention in keeping our feeder supplied with seed. In return, she must display proof in understanding my thoughts.
Mourning Doves. First I ask her to jump from the balcony ledge to the arm of the feeder. Then up to the prominent ledge squared around the feeder box (see photo). She does this. Then I ask her to jump inside the box. No problem, she does this too. Not enough for me, and knowing the feeder has been empty for several days, I ask her to pretend to eat from the box. And to eat as though she hadn't eaten for days. To my astonishment, she looks down and feverously pecks at the screened base of the feeder. I'm amazed! And in some ways this is more exciting than my first experience with astral travel, from my bedroom and beyond the moon (I returned once I feared how far I was and how easy it felt to sever with my body's life chord).
I've been tending much more to the bird feeder. I've noticed a more respectful exchange (and pecking order) of eating between the various families of birds. Although they have displayed their limits with me. Asking them to refrain from pooping on our ledge and inside our balcony does not appear to be of interest to them.
Oh, but it feels wonderful to achieve these small steps. Especially when struggling to understand the big dance of life we display in the Universe's fishbowl we call Earth.


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Firefighters spent two and a half hours at an Edina home on Wednesday morning, working to free a worker who was trapped under a slab of concrete in a 6-ft. hole.The man was stuck since a little before 8 a.m. Wednesday until 10:15 a.m.
The worker was pinned face-down in the dirt under a 2x2 ft. concrete slab that covered his lower half. He was in pain, and was administered medicine at the scene, but was conscious and talking throughout the rescue.
The patient thanked the team effort from the Edina Fire Department, Hennepin EMS, and everyone else involved in the extrication, saying, "They did a top-notch job and made me comfortable throughout the rescue. They were absolutely professional."
More than 60 firefighters from eight metro departments assisted the highly-specialized Edina Urban Search and Rescue Team.
The patient has since been treated and released from Hennepin County Medical Center.
The man was doing foundation work on the home off Paddock Road when the concrete slab fell and pinned him. He was trapped in a very small area where crews had been hand-digging dirt and concrete while trenching around the foundation to build a drain tile.
"This is very back-breaking work," said Edina Fire Chief Marty Scheerer. "They're literally in a hole, digging out dirt by hand with very small shovels, trying to get it out. It's a very hot day and our crews are being stressed and suffering a little bit of heat exhaustion as well."
Inspectors from the Minnesota OSHA were also on the scene, but the database shows no past safety violations or investigations against the contractor involved during the past five years.
WFTC-TV11358 Viking DriveEden Prairie, MN 55344Phone: (952) 944-9999Fax: (952) 942-0455


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DSpace Collection: Research Papers (LAMP) http://hdl.handle.net/2289/148 The Collection's search engine Search the Channel search http://dspace.rri.res.in:8080/jspui/simple-search Emission dynamics of an expanding ultrafast-laser produced Zn plasma under di erent ambient pressures http://hdl.handle.net/2289/5859 Title: Emission dynamics of an expanding ultrafast-laser produced Zn plasma under di erent ambient pressures

Authors: Smijesh, N.; Philip, Reji

Abstract: We report time and space resolved spectral measurements of neutral Zn emission from an ultrafast laser produced plasma, generated by the irradiation of a Zn target with laser pulses of 100 femtoseconds duration, carried out in a broad ambient pressure range of 0.05 to 100 Torr. The measurement is done for three different axial positions in the expanding plume. The spectra are rich in neutral Zn (Zn I) emissions at 334.5 nm, 468 nm, 472 nm, 481 nm, and 636 nm, respectively, depicting the characteristic triplet structure of Zn. Fast as well as slow peaks are observed in the time of flight data of 481 nm emission, which arise from recombination and atomic contributions, respectively, occurring at different time scales. Average speeds of the fast atomic species do not change appreciably with ambient pressure. The plasma parameters (electron temperature and number density) are evaluated from the measured optical emission spectra. The rates of ionization and recombination can be enhanced by a double-pulse excitation configuration in which optical energy is coupled to the ultrafast plasma through a delayed laser pulse.

Description: Open Access Structural evaluation and nonlinear optical properties of Ni/NiO, Ni/NiCo2O4 and Co/Co3O4 nanocomposites http://hdl.handle.net/2289/5848 Title: Structural evaluation and nonlinear optical properties of Ni/NiO, Ni/NiCo2O4 and Co/Co3O4 nanocomposites

Authors: Rahulan, K Mani; Padmanathan, N; Philip, Reji; Balamurugan, S; Kanakam, Charles C.

Abstract: Nanocomposites of Ni/NiO, Ni/NiCo2O4 and Co/Co3O4 have been synthesized by a chemical reduction technique. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) images confirm the mixed composite nature of the sample and uniform particle size of approximately 13 nm. Formation of Ni/NiCo3O4 solid solution or NiCo2O4 spinel phase in the mixed composite is confirmed by energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) spectrum. Magnetic hysteresis (M–H) curves of the nanocomposites show excellent ferromagnetic (FM) nature at room temperature. Nonlinear optical transmission of the nanocomposites is measured using the open aperture Z-scan technique employing 7 nanosecond laser pulses at 532 nm. Experimental results show that NiO/NiO–Co3O4/Co3O4 nanocomposites exhibit good optical limiting performance. From the measurements and numerical fitting of the data to theory, it is found that nonlinear absorption has contributions from excited state absorption and two-photon absorption. Optical limiting is enhanced in Co3O4 and Ni/NiCo2O4 in which the Co3O4 content has a larger volume ratio.

Description: Restricted Access. Macrorealism from entropic Leggett-Garg inequalities http://hdl.handle.net/2289/5790 Title: Macrorealism from entropic Leggett-Garg inequalities

Authors: Usha Devi, A.R.; Karhik, H.S.; Sudha; Rajagopal, A.K.

Abstract: We formulate entropic Leggett-Garg inequalities, which place constraints on the statistical outcomes of temporal correlations of observables. The information theoretic inequalities are satisfied if macrorealism holds. We show that the quantum statistics underlying correlations between time-separated spin component of a quantum rotor mimics that of spin correlations in two spatially separated spin-s particles sharing a state of zero total spin. This brings forth the violation of the entropic Leggett-Garg inequality by a rotating quantum spin-s system in a similar manner as does the entropic Bell inequality [ S. L. Braunstein and C. M. Caves Phys. Rev. Lett. 61 662 (1988)] by a pair of spin-s particles forming a composite spin singlet state.

Description: Open Access Ultrafast optical nonlinearity, electronic absorption, vibrational spectra and solvent e ect studies of ninhydrin http://hdl.handle.net/2289/5766 Title: Ultrafast optical nonlinearity, electronic absorption, vibrational spectra and solvent e ect studies of ninhydrin

Authors: Sajan, D.; Uma Devi, T.; Safakath, K.; Philip, Reji; Nemec, Ivan; Karabacak, M.

Abstract: FT-IR, FT-Raman and UV–Vis spectra of the nonlinear optical molecule ninhydrin have been recorded and analyzed. The equilibrium geometry, bonding features, and harmonic vibrational wavenumbers have been investigated with the help of B3LYP density functional theory method. A detailed interpretation of the vibrational spectra is carried out with the aid of normal coordinate analysis following the scaled quantum mechanical force field methodology. Solvent effects have been calculated using time-dependent density functional theory in combination with the polarized continuum model. Natural bond orbital analysis confirms the occurrence of strong intermolecular hydrogen bonding in the molecule. Employing the open-aperture z-scan technique, nonlinear optical absorption of the sample has been studied in the ultrafast and short-pulse excitation regimes, using 100 fs and 5 ns laser pulses respectively. It is found that ninhydrin exhibits optical limiting for both excitations, indicating potential photonic applications

Description: Restricted Access.


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Nice rashguard Great selection of colors and the fabric feels nice, of good quality. It would be great if TB made coordinating 3" boardhshorts! January 13, 2014
I love this shirt - perfect fit with no chafing! I purchased my first Tommy Bahama Rashguard in Maui with an adorable matching bathing skirt bottom. I loved the Rashguard so much that I went back to the store and bought a second one. If two are good, three are better - yes, the Rashguards are THAT good! I purchased my third online. The high quality material and fit are superb. I paddle board year 'round, so I can wear them as layers, too. Simply the best! October 18, 2013
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NFA Talk
Below you will find a list of discussions in the NFA Talk forums at the XDTalk Forums - Your XD/XD(m) Information Source!. The NFA Talk forum is for discussion of: When one shot per trigger pull is too slow, 16" of barrel too long, and "bang" too loud! All discussions of NFA items (full auto, SBR, suppressors) go in here. No discussion of illegal conversion or use of NFA items will be tolerated!.
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Art-Fueled, Playful, Kid Heaven
Kids Room Tour
Name: Mae (10) and Marius (8)
Location: Brooklyn, New York
Room Size: 2 bedrooms, 250-300 square feet
When Marius
Enter Kids' Rooms
Each room, including Marius and Mae's bathroom brims with toys, artwork, and potential adventure. There is no designated playroom because much of the 4-story brownstone satisfies any and all urges to imagine, invent, and explore. A prime piece of evidence for this theory is the trapeze hanging from the living room ceiling!
Sophie and Michael have built a home together that isn't too precious. It's an open invitation to play of all sorts. On weekends the family goes on "treasure hunts" haunting upstate auctions for old relics. Mae and Marius enjoy the thrill of the hunt as much as their parents and have learned how to bid on items for sale.
The family aesthetic that recognizes and celebrates vintage signage, someone else's trash, inherited furniture and art swaps is easy to admire. The kids see beauty and fun in many forms. Their physical environment is a launch pad for creativity—colorful and full of love. It seems like anything is possible here.
A family that plays together stays together.
How would you describe the look and feel of this room?
Playfull, messy most of the time, bright. The rooms are like the kids—their personality comes through.
What is your favorite piece or element?
Marius loves his bunkbed/fort. Mae likes the desk Michael made for her although she always ends up doing her homework on the kitchen table.
I love the animal prints from Sharon Montrose.
What was the biggest challenge decorating this room?
To have enough storage. I'm not sure there is such thing as enough storage…
Enter Kids' Rooms
What do your friends say about the room?
The rooms are like the kids, their personality comes through all the little details.
Do you have any advice for parents creating a room for their child?
It really depends on the age. Don't project what you would want. Let them express themselves.
What, if any, are your additional plans for the room?
No plans; the room evolves with the need and taste of the child. They take ownership and that's a good thing.
If money were no object, what's your dream source?
I like to mix and match. I don't have a dream source. I like to find things unexpectedly. I love surprises!
Enter Kids' Rooms
Source List:
- Animal Photographs by Sharon Montrose
- Bookshelves/mini-library, desk, bunked night stands designed by Oeuf Design, Michael and Sophie's design company for children's clothing and furniture.
- Canopy bed from IKEA
For Sophie and Michael's full house tour, check out Sophie and Michael Collect, Enjoy and Live.
Thanks, Sophie and Michael!
(Images: Jill Slater)
17 Comments
Can you share a source for the french/english counting print? Lovely rooms, look like spaces for big imaginations!
also monkey and porcupine prints please??
@ Dianna, those are Sharon Montrose photos. There's a link in the resources list. Her work is really wonderful.
I thought it was weird that this tour article started with an implied criticism of some other parents. It set a tone for the write-up that was desperate for approval....which was so unnecessary since the rooms seem so beautifully loved and lived-in.
Really fun and creative! I especially LOVED reading their philosophy on how they should live in their home. I'm an interior designer in LA. I get so many clients who want a beautiful home they love but feel they have to sacrifice style for durability. So I have made it my design motto to live in your home and love it too!. I think I realized this was really possible when I started designing nurseries and children's rooms as my niche. These rooms especially have to be able to take extra wear and tear, but no one should have to sacrifice beauty to do so. Love the article, thanks for sharing!!
Thank you for your nice comments. The counting print is actually from Oeuf. It will be available on our website by the end of the month so stay tuned :)
I just loved how CREATIVE they felt! What wonderful rooms to be a child in.
cool, DIY bed?
No need to put others down as being anal retentive, fun discouraging, monsters. It portrays these parents as equally controlling creativity snobs who "allow" their children to be whimsical. Which I'm sure they are not. Loved the rooms...hated the author's bias.
I LOVE the aesthetic of these rooms. So creative and real-life. But an empty bottle of Veuve as decor in a kids room? Really?
I love the laid back French whimsy of this. I also agree with the idea that your kids should design their rooms. It will give them security and ownership, then confidence, which will help them grow.
These are such fun! The bunk bed is wonderful, and I'm going to go check out that porcupine print! We have a thing for porcupines in our house.
OH! THANK GOODNESS there are no posts saying things like "A kid could fall out of that bunk bed!" or other such dumb comments about how kids should live in hermetically sealed bubbles. Finally, messy rooms for messy kids that invite play & creative exploration. Great fotos!!!
Love, love, love that these rooms look lived in. They may be staged for photos, but at least they show the clutter, collections, and creativity bubbling over. As much as I love a simple streamlined orderly room, the reality is that life is always brimming around us. This appeals to my reality and shows that lived in can still look beautiful.
So beautiful - and exciting to see my own kids' bunk bed and book shelf! There are, indeed, favorite pieces in my home, so it was cool to see the connection with the couple that designed them. After looking at both of Sophie & Michael's home tours, I am nostalgic for Park Slope.
Where can I find these bunk beds? Or were they diy?
Okay never mind they're not ikea brand.


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Anti Anti-Anecdotalism
The recent flurry of attention to SL and its numbers (here, here, here, and, most recently, here) leads me to think that folks might be interested in having a chance to chew through some methodological stuff, along the lines of the "Methodologies and Metrics" panel on which Nic, Dmitri, and I served at the State of Play/Terra Nova Symposium early this month. Below the fold, some tweaked ideas from some emails I circulated among the panelists in preparation for the panel. While I'm not discussing virtual worlds and the methodologies we'd use to understand them specifically, I hope this will be helpful background for such a discussion.
It is hard to get away from a common conception, both within and outside academia, that numbers are the one, true path to understanding. This is part of a set of cultural expectations that are reproduced precisely because they are so rarely challenged. Most commonly, one hears that claims with numbers are "grounded" or otherwise true in a way that other kinds of claims (such as the ones based on the kind of research that Tim talked about here), are not. Claims based primarily on those other kinds of research, particularly on interviews and participant observation, often get branded as "anecdotes", with the suggestion that they hold no real value as reliable claims. Here I would like to push against this association, and help clarify our understanding of what qualitative social science research methods (ethnographic research ones in particular) bring to the table. In short, they are not "anecdotes", and they can form the basis of reliable claims, even without numbers, although as Dmitri and I never tire of saying, having both is better than having just one.
No social scientist, of course, would want to "generalize from anecdotes," but the problem is that often we do not really understand what that means; or perhaps it is more accurate to say that across the academy many scholars (not to mention the public at large and policy makers) do not know enough about methodology (this is true of both qualitative and quantitative methods, and more broadly about exploratory versus experimental research), and therefore these charges are in essence a political move meant to marginalize the other side's research that can succeed because of that lack of broad grounding. From my conversations with everyone involved with TN I have never felt that we (as a group of authors) were particularly prone to make these errors, but there is no question that it finds its way into the discussions on TN, as in the recent threads.
The goal of all social science is "generalization" in a sense, but the legacy of positivist thinking about society (that it is governed by discoverable and universal laws) has left us in the habit of thinking that the only generalization that counts is universal. It is always interesting to me how some work (especially that done by the more publicly-legitimized fields, such as economics) can proclaim itself to be about the universal despite the fact that only a moment's thinking reveals the application of the ideas to be narrow (to industrialized, capitalist contexts, etc). The strange thing is that this doesn't end up being a problem for those already-legitimate fields; instead, it is largely ignored -- this is what being well situated on the landscape of policy and academic relations of power gets you (to be Foucauldian for a moment).
But of course generalization, in the more limited sense of seeking a bridgehead of understanding across times and spaces, has long been the hallmark of history (the first social science, in a way). The strange thing is how difficult it seems to be for those who would like to criticize methods such as participant observation and interviewing to see the projects those methods support in a similar light to history and its efforts. There is nothing inherently problematic with such claims; they are just as able to inform policy as universal ones, and have the benefit of incorporating more nuance.
So then what is an anecdote? It is a description of an event isolated from its broader context, so no wonder all of us would like to shy away from the suggestion that we are drawing our conclusions in isolation of the broader context. But ethnography (meaning principally participant observation, along with interviewing, surveying, and other methods), to speak of that relevant methodology most familiar to me, quite distinctly does not treat these events in isolation. Brief descriptions are often presented in the course of ethnographic writing in order to illustrate a point concretely, but the point made is only as sound as the degree to which we trust the author's command of the broad array of processes ongoing in the context at hand. How is this credibility established? Through a complex of many, many, many techniques of writing, thick description, peer review (always including experts in that period or place), solid reasoning itself, track record of previous research, etc, etc. This form of generating reliable claims is not somehow "less" viable than other ones, and its strengths and weaknesses of similar scope (though differing in their particulars).
So one of the tropes that one finds in the recent spate of posts about SL and its numbers is the suggestion that only when numbers that we trust are present do we feel that the claims authors make are "grounded". This is not true. As anyone with much experience with statistics knows, the numbers say nothing without the ability to interpret them provided by other kinds of interpretive research. In fact, given the above, if any research has a claim to being "grounded" it is the first-hand research of participant observation.
Even when this kind of contribution from qualitative research methods is acknowledged, however, there is still a tendency to see the claims of work based on them as always and severely limited to a "niche", at least until numbers come along. But a social history or ethnography of a place and time is not this narrow. They are able to make general claims at the level of locale, region, or even nation, and they often do (when done well). The idea for ethnographies is that the ethnographic research method, at root, inculcates in the researcher a degree of cultural competence such that he or she can act capably (and sensibly) as a member of that culture. Supported by observation, archival research, surveys, or interviews (usually some combination), as well as (possibly) prior work, this learned disposition informs an account of the shared disposition of the actors on the ground, and is laid out in the published work (as best one can in writing) as representative of a worldview from a particular time and place. Thus, my claims about gambling in Greece were made beyond the level of the city where I did my research, and I argued for the existence of a cultural disposition that characterizes Greek attitudes toward contingency at something like the national level (without holding too much to hard boundaries).
Of course, these claims are further bolstered by the broadening of one's research methods, whether through surveys, demographic data, archival research, media studies, or any other means that support the big picture. Relatedly, there is nothing about quantitative methods that dictates that they must "stay big." They can be productively focused and narrow as well.
This is not to say that there isn't a limit to the level of generalization for qualitative research that is exceeded by quantitative methods. So, for example, while an ethnography could make reliable claims about Greek culture, I don't think it could about American culture. The reason for this connects to what culture is -- a set of shared expectations, based on shared experience and continually re-made through shared practices -- and why it is far too fragmented and varied across the US for an ethnography to make such claims. But while this is true, the important point is that qualitative methods' levels of claims are not as particularist as they are sometimes made out to be.
I become, I confess, a bit sad whenever I encounter this kind of marginalization in action (for me, it most often happens on interdisciplinary fellowship review panels and the like), because at root it bespeaks a lack of trust across the academy. There is little doubt that there have been excesses across the gamut of methodologies and theories that the social sciences use (reductions to representation, or materiality, or power all come to mind), and perhaps this accounts for the parochialism and suspicion, but let's hope that we don't fall prey to what are more often, in my view, essentially not battles over the nature of sound inquiry but instead part of gambits meant to direct or redirect institutional resources.
Comments on Anti Anti-Anecdotalism:
Are there any particular examples that you are thinking of here where anecdotes have been criticised despite an author's ethnographic knowledge?
Posted Dec 30, 2006 3:57:01 PM | link
Hi Thomas,
I completely agree with your main point. One thing I don't understand is why you feel the need to say it when it seems self evident to me. Why do you care if others emphasize quantitative research over ethnographic research? If I were you, I would just concentrate on what you think is important and screw everyone else. If you're right, which I think you are, then let's build on it and see where it takes us. People can only ignore the truth for so long (although sometimes it is amazing how long it takes).
In regard to virtual worlds, I've said in another thread that I think the appropriate way to proceed in their study is to treat them as if they truly were newly discovered economies. Economists rely on numbers such as GDP, inflation, unemployment, wages, etc but where do those numbers come from? They come from ethnographic research. Still when you perform a survey, it helps to know what percentage of the population your sample represents. I think that is one of things that Clay is saying. We don't even know what the population is, so how can we have faith in a survey?
Virtual economies pose an interesting difference though. Unlike real economies where it is impossible to trace every microtransaction so that reliance on ethnographic research is essential, in virtual economies, at least in principle, you CAN get at the numbers purely from querying a database. Nonetheless, it seems obvious to me that there will need to be some level of ethnographic research to study virtual economies.
So how should we proceed with ethnogrpahic research? Should we hire avatars to roam the virtual landscape to conduct virtual surveys? May not be a bad idea, but I'm not sure how to motivate people to do so.
Ultimately, the state of ethnographic research may need to advance to the point that the results can be aggregated into meaningful numbers that can then be studied by virtual economists. I don't know many economists who actually go out and perform ethnographic research themselves, but they rely intensely on the ethnographic research of others.
Best regards,
Posted Dec 30, 2006 4:00:34 PM | link
@Ordinal: I don't really understand the question. The issue is not that "anecdotes" have been criticized, it is that some work has been labeled as "anecdotal" to start with, when it is not.
I'm not speaking about my own work, actually (at least, not that I know of -- there just haven't been that many people who've read Gambling Life! ;-) ), but I hesitate to point to the particular examples of which I am aware, since I'm not interested in specific recriminations. I'm more interested in developing our understanding of what qualitative research methodology is and what it can accomplish. Labeling qualitative work as "anecdotal" is common enough around the academy that it provides a useful frame through which to get at this issue.
Posted Dec 30, 2006 4:08:28 PM | link
@Eric: Great questions about how to move forward. My short answer is that while for some time I was quite a skeptic about the prospects for doing ethnographic research that is primarily situated in virtual worlds, I have recently come to feel that the bandwidth for human action within them (through better and better avatars, plus lots of other old and new stuff, including text-based interaction, etc) has increased enough that we can begin to think about these domains as generating distinctive dispositions for their participants (that is, generating distinctive cultures, if you will). This means that, from an ethnographer's point of view, the same process of enculturation can be followed, with the right training, by a researcher in order to develop a reliable picture of that cultural point of view.
But challenges remain. One of the biggest for online communities in general is still true of most MMOs, and that is the "person-to-person" quality of a lot of communication. In Greece, I knew if two customers at a cafe were whispering to each other, even if I didn't know what they were saying, and this meant that it wasn't lost (I knew I could follow up about it with them, or others, etc). In most MMOs, private tells and the like between third parties are essentially invisible to the ethnographer. This is something that is an issue, but, again, becomes less of a dealbreaker as the more visible dimensions of action widen in scope.
Another related challenge is the relatively low fidelity of the environments. If something big and bad went down on the other side of the old harbor in Chania, where I did my research in Greece, it was immediately apparent, and one could quickly head to that kind of "diagnostic event" (as Sally Falk Moore called them) and try to capture as much as one can. In MMOs, the situation is both better and worse. The graphical fidelity (and scope of action, above) are so narrow that if a large-scale event goes down in, say, a WoW server, it would be harder to stand somewhere and feel like you could follow a number of simultaneous developments (and check them up with contacts later). But, MMOs do provide the opportunity to marshal technological resources (such as add-ons in WoW and the like) that could be used to aid the ethnographer (a possible analog is the "gargoyle" from Snow Crash :-), though sort of like having one in the Metaverse). Nic's presentation for the panel above demo'd the beginnings of some incredibly cool tools for just this kind of application.
Posted Dec 30, 2006 4:26:12 PM | link
Thomas: Fair enough; I was just wondering whether there were any good examples that one could get one's teeth into, as it were.
In the context of Second Life, I would say that qualifying one's ethnographic experience would be quite a vague process, in that it would depend on displaying sufficient familiarity with the culture and history. There are certain historical events of which displaying knowledge might be sufficient, but on the other hand, a new resident could have "got it" without knowing anything about the history. Accurately reporting and analysing certain aspects of resident interaction would be a sign for me... how people react in different situations, where you've entered their land by mistake, where you're in a club, where you're in a store, displaying some knowledge of what happens there.
To be honest almost anything above the usual journalistic "SL is all about sex and you can make money there too!" would give a researcher some credibility.
Posted Dec 30, 2006 4:36:36 PM | link
"the numbers say nothing without the ability to interpret them provided by other kinds of interpretive research."
"Ultimately, the state of ethnographic research may need to advance to the point that the results can be aggregated into meaningful numbers that can then be studied by virtual economists."
And if one had the ability to capture both qualitative and quantitative data, aggregated, and historically trended, it would be even better....
Good insights in this post. Of course I'm more focused on the quant rather than the qual, how to capture meaningful qualatative data has been an issue I've had trouble with for awhile now because its not my area of expertise.
Posted Dec 30, 2006 6:41:29 PM | link
I'm all for getting away from obsessive and narrow literalist number-crunching -- it's never enough, anyway, and I suspect that even if the Lindens handed Shirky figures showing the actual, true, list of accounts defatted of alts and mess-ups, and showed him the actual and true percentage of log-ons after 90 days from sign-ups, it wouldn't be enough and he wouldn't like SL anyway.
However, I get very wary of new-fangled anthropological and sociological and ethnographical studies of SL when they begin to throw around the usual campus Marxist jargon about "empowerment" and "neoliberalism" and "capitalist" this and that. Just study the stuff, please, without the scrim of ideology.
And here's where I just don't get your field of study, Thomas, I'm sorry. Writing an ethnography of Linden Lab may be a very worthy and interesting (and obviously already funded) endeavor likely to produce a fascinating book. I don't know what you are quite calling this genre. Corporate ethnography?
But for me, studying LL without studying its main product, the world and the people in it is, it like being the court scribe and writing about the French Revolution from the point of view of the king. It would be only a partial account.
Posted Dec 30, 2006 7:45:13 PM | link
I agree in general with the critique of the overdetermination of anthropological (and plenty of other social scientific!) conclusions by the vulgar application of theory. This happens all the time, because it's easier than doing the empirical work. The postmodern "turn" in anthropology of the eighties was just the most recent incarnation. I don't see how that relates to what I'm saying here, though I'd be happy to hear how.
Re: what kind of ethnography I'm doing -- I answered that question in the other thread. It is not "corporate ethnography"; it belongs to a subgenre of ethnography called the "ethnography of organizations", if anywhere, and this has a long and distinguished history, in fact. It is concerned with the social processes that characterize how organizations work (and think).
Yes, my account *will* be a partial account, just as my account of Greek cultural attitudes toward the unexpected was itself a partial account (and of course it was a partial account of Greek life!). But that work doesn't exist on its own; there are a raft of ethnographies of Greece, and reading the lot would take one a long way toward understanding Greeece (along with other kinds of studies -- histories, etc). The same will be true of the Linden book.The essential point is that there is a *lot* going on with LL and SL (as there is with any human endeavor involving more than, say, 8 people ;-), and therefore there is plenty of room for multiple studies on all the aspects of this that interest us. Your interests may be partially served by my ethnography, maybe not, but there is a lot more work of all kinds to do about all these spaces.
Posted Dec 30, 2006 8:07:28 PM | link
Peter Drucker contributed greatly to the study of corporations as a major social entity. I think you guys will fill the same role for VWs as an emerging social entity.
He was a bit of iconcast and didn't follow the standards of the day and did pronounce much "dogma" or "qualitative claims", but after a few decades he got credibility when many of his claims were found to be "golden wisdom".
His principles and claims worked for the corporate organization and I think much of it will work for VWs. I thinik we should look to him as a role model and his practice as a process model for VW.
One aspect I liked about his approach is that he looked for practical application and results. He gain acceptance and traction because his "dogmas" were practical, applicable, and focused on results (which businesses can readily understands).
Keep at it Thomas and Co. Happy to contribute whatever I can.
Posted Dec 30, 2006 9:43:28 PM | link
Thomas, there are now so many threads going on this subject of the SL numbers that I can't find your previous answer -- I even went searching for your name specifically. I do take your point. I quite understand, having read up on it that "corporate ethnography" is more a term involving a corporation's own use of ethnography to do something like determine how its customers are adapting to a product. What you are doing is a study of an organization, hence, ethnography of an organization.
Again, I feel we are very, very far from Greece when we take up an object of study like "Linden Lab". Greece has lots of books out on the subject already; Greece is a kind of known area of knowledge.
The Lab, on the other hand, has never been studied (except upside down from underneath the microscope slide by its sometimes unsuspecting amoebae residents). So either you are studying "just another company" or you are studying something that has revolutionary or evolutionary new potentials and actualizties (i.e. all that Love Machine stuff, the fact that they've made a virtual world kicking off the Metaverse to a new level, etc.) or you are studying something that may be all too ordinary but has made something extraordinary -- or however you put it.
No doubt my pesky questioning makes you uncomfortable, but since you *are* a public intellectual who is going to be publishing a book in the publice eye, I can only plead a kind of consumer's plea: look beyond whatever flora and fauna you find at 1100 Sansome Street into the world and the residents' feedback, where I think you *do* have to look to understand the company and what they are doing.
For example, if you read a text like this:
about Philip Rosedale's own notions of voting, organizations, companies, the market, etc. and his idealistic and enthusiastic blog about it, what context could you understand it in? Only in the reality of the feedback not only of the residents right on that blog, but looking at things like the feature voting tool -- where you can't vote "no"!
Or looking at his idea of the "wisdom of crowds" as applied to SL literally -- as if a lot of SL crowds in fact aren't so smart lol -- take where it is absurdly played out as a justification for ramming p2p back into the world (the excuse that it was once there during a smaller earlier phase doesn't cut it)and ripping out telehubs where they made sense (infohubs) and keeping them enabled where they didn't make sense (private islands).
Posted Dec 31, 2006 12:30:47 AM | link
Lol, Prok. The voting system(s). Perhaps you may find my ethnography interesting after all :-).
And I'm not uncomfortable by the questions at all, though I find it a bit strange that you presume I haven't found much of the same material and researched it in my own way (such as Philip's entry, above). Look, why don't you read it when it comes out, okay? I'll look forward to your reaction, though I'm sure that at least in some ways it won't measure up to your own view from under the microscope slide. :-)
P.S.: The reply to your first asking of the corporate ethnography question is actually in this thread (it's not a Shirky one; that may have tripped you up).
Posted Dec 31, 2006 12:41:12 AM | link
@Frank: Your comments are very much appreciated. Drucker's ideas are very, very close to my own in many ways -- I chalk it up to a (presumed) common background in American pragmatist thought. Though I've always wondered if he was influenced by some German thought given his background -- but he's so optimistic that he really sounds a lot like Dewey in the end. I'd love to read a good biography of him, if you have a recommendation.
Posted Dec 31, 2006 12:44:54 AM | link
I am not sure I am ready to dismiss the anecdote so quickly. In a lot of cases, anecdote is the home of nuance, it has incredible power to provide illustration and illumination. We generalize from anecdotes all the time and if you look at the work of someone like Kenneth Burke, he makes a case that certain anecdotes (or types of anecdotes) are "representative" (if not generalizable).
More importantly, anecdotes capture something that academic research has traditionally had trouble with, which is the performative nature of gaming as an "event."
We've all lived through one of the most significant anecdotes of our lifetimes in Sept 11th. It would seem absurd to argue that we need not study or pay attention to it because it was only an "isolated event." It was an anecdote and I would argue it was an incredibly powerful one which provided an opportunity to see, discuss, and debate things that were not part of our national consciousness prior to it.
In fact, I will go out on a limb and contend that illustrative anecdotes are better at getting at *some* things in games than many other approaches.
@Eric: "Ultimately, the state of ethnographic research may need to advance to the point that the results can be aggregated into meaningful numbers."
This seems to me to be precisely the problem. I would contend that ethnographic research and a host of other qualitative approaches cannot be translated in the way you suggest. Doing so creates a kind of category error. It is not possible to test out certain kinds of knowledge. Put differently, if you take a particular event ("WMDs in Iraq") you can measure it as an historical question (were there or weren't there), as a social scientific question ("Did people believe there were WMDs" or "How did major newspapers report WMDs?"). Translating one from the other, potentially results in research which begins with interviewing a few key people in Iraq and reviewing documents and then turning to public opinion polls to see if the documents were right, you know, giving meaningful numbers to a single interview or text.
@Prok: "usual campus Marxist jargon about "empowerment" and "neoliberalism" and "capitalist" this and that." I am curious why you would have an objection to this kind of specialized language? You do realize that these are words and ideas that have rich theoretical heritage and meaning, that they are words that do work to help us understand things happening in the world (both real and virtual). I never quite understand the reaction to "jargon," as if it only exists among left-wing academics. It seems to me a way to dismiss ideas without engaging them.
Your postmodernist, anecdotal pal
Posted Dec 31, 2006 9:03:44 AM | link
I agree with everything you've said, Doug, except that I'm not sure "anecdote" in the sense you use it can be recuperated. Besides, when anecdotes *are* effective in the way you describe, it's because the context that makes them sensible is implicitly shared among the interlocutors to such a degree that they do not even need to state it. The danger in that direction is the reproduction of a kind of class (or generational) view of things. Thick description, by contrast, was in my view part of an effort to ensure that we don't rely overmuch on the implicit understandings between, say, the ethnographer and the reading audience when we talk about events.
And events *are* vitally important; you're absolutely right. Sally Falk Moore talks about the events that are powerful in the way you describe as "diagnostic events", because their ruptures allow us to see social cleavages otherwise kept offstage.
Perhaps the confusion here, then, results from two ways of thinking about the term. If an anecdote is simply a tool of writing that presents a brief account of an event amid a broader analytical and descriptive work, then certainly ethnographers (and many others) use anecdotes all the time, and use them well. Beyond the diagnostic events above, there is also the written "mise-en-scène" that begins many an ethnography (including mine) as an example of this kind of writing tool. It is incredibly effective at evoking a sense of place and time.
But I think the dismissive use of "anecdote", meaning a brief description that is isolated from its context, is how the term is most commonly used around the academy today. If we could bring it back to a less politically-charged meaning, that would be great, but I'm afraid I'm not sanguine about it.
Posted Dec 31, 2006 9:21:47 AM | link
Excellent, inspirational post, Thomas, and great discussion too, as I'm pounding away at the manuscript for "Virtually Human: An Anthropologist in Second Life." There's a lot I would like to add to this discussion, but in the interest of pressing on with the book, I'll hold off and just provide a couple sentences from my book The Gay Archipelago (Princeton University Press, 2005) where I briefly address this issue. Thanks again for this great exchange.
"Qualitative methods are not more micrological or localizing than quantitative ones; they illuminate different aspects of social life. When explaining this to students I tell the story of a quantitative researcher and a qualitative researcher who go to Japan to study the Japanese language. The quantitative researcher prepares a survey that can be distributed to a large, random sample, providing valuable data concerning, say, varieties of Japanese dialects. The qualitative researcher studies a far smaller sample; he or she could not learn every vocabulary item of Japanese, for instance, or every dialect. Yet through immersion in daily life this person could learn to speak Japanese: from a handful of individuals one can learn how to communicate with millions. Qualitative research can be effective in drawing out cultural logics that, like languages, are shared: it is an approach suited to the study of similitude. There is no necessary relationship between methods and spatial scale: it is not true that qualitative methods like ethnography are 'more local' and quantitative methods 'more global.' As globalization becomes seen as the new default state of affairs in the world, there is a real need for qualitative studies of the global." (p. 20)
Posted Dec 31, 2006 10:00:23 AM | link
Thanks, Tom!
Posted Dec 31, 2006 10:25:43 AM | link
A couple thoughts: Generalizability isn't always about a universal scope. It's about knowing how your sample is or isn't representative of a larger population. That population might also be fractional. That's OK.
The qual/quant process is indeed best when done concurrently, but let's be honest about how science works. Due to people, projects, funding and the like, it's usually iterative. I like to draw a census as step 1, but the census-taking can certainly be informed and improved by qualitative insights and empiricism.
For example, in game research, I like to play the thing and talk to people to understand local customs and language before I develop any kind of survey or census. If I had better ethnographic skills, I'd have better outcomes, which would in turn lead to a better quantitative survey.
Now, the dreaded anecdote. Doug is right that it is very important to be able to freelance and develop new thoughts outside of sampling frames and generalizability. That's very often the start of crucial insights and should never be dismissed. I'm there with you.
So what's the problem then? Well, every method has its abusers. Just like there are legion of statisticians screwing the pooch, there are qualitative researchers who do that purely anecdotal research AND THEN imply generalizability. That's where I have a problem.
Someone discovers the Gor subculture in SL? Cool. Tell me all about it. But don't at the end of the paper then tell me it's "common," "rare" or anything else that connatates frequency without also telling me something about the sampling used so I can evaluate the claim. If the goal isn't generalizability, don't then imply that it's there. If it is, do the legwork to back it up, or at least give us the famous "future research should investigate . . ." it.
An example of how to do this well is in Thomas' own work on Greek gambling subcultures. As he described it to me, he learned a ton from anecdotal and systematic ethnographic information. He then had a sense of how and why his subjects did or didn't generalize to a larger culture. Given enough detail about that step, the reader can evaluate it and decide if he/she agrees, and it's all good.
Posted Dec 31, 2006 11:20:30 AM | link
It's also worth stating that one of the theoretical approaches associated with ethnographic research is an idiographic, rather than nomothetic, approach to data -- a concern with the particular, rather than the general. Many ethnographers -- and even more humanists -- would argue that the goal of inquiry is _not_ generalizable results but detailed knowledge of a particular thing. Particularizing research can be done both qualitatively and quantitatively.
Posted Dec 31, 2006 12:49:34 PM | link
I agree with you, about avoiding category errors in qualitative analysis that is aggregated.
That's what's so frustrating, its hard to do accurately. Especially hard for an old fashioned data mechanic like myself.
"For example, in game research, I like to play the thing and talk to people to understand local customs and language before I develop any kind of survey or census. If I had better ethnographic skills, I'd have better outcomes, which would in turn lead to a better quantitative survey."
You touch on a key concept here, to get at the quantitative data one must understand the underlying context or rather system from which the data occurs. Then one must describe components of the system, assign it a language. As you know all languages that aren't dead evolve over time through meaningful contribution.
The language may be rudimentary and need work to begin with, but a descriptive language of a system that allows for quantitative study, and data, is better than nothing at all.
In this I mean a descriptive language that allows for symbolic annotation. Much like Koster has described in Grammar of Games.
This brings me to another point, it takes many actors to form a language, and give it a common meaning. A casual gamer may assign meaning much differently than a developer, an academic or members of the press (is this where the media disconnect with SL went wrong? Could be). So the description must encompass an aspect of common utility, this allows it to be used over again, and in fact to evolve. Advanced concepts can be extrapolated from this but not the reverse. Otherwise we would all be speaking the Kings English rather than American no?
Is it not true that if I say to you: I phwn noobs ir l33t, lolz… you will likely understand that as the common dialect and assign it meaning as you understand it.
IMO academics do not desire the reverse of this relationship in any field of study, however if those you study do not understand what your asking them your likely to get both qual/quant errors coming and going.
"So what's the problem then? Well, every method has its abusers. Just like there are legion of statisticians screwing the pooch, there are qualitative researchers who do that purely anecdotal research AND THEN imply generalizability. That's where I have a problem."
And so here the age old argument's of the subjectivist vs. the objectivist begin…..
Implied generalization is fine, if one wants to exile themselves to the ivory tower…
Posted Dec 31, 2006 1:08:44 PM | link
As much as I hate to agree with Prokofy...
You do realize that these are words and ideas that have rich theoretical heritage and meaning...
The words have a rich theoretical heritage and meaning, and many of them also carry a lot of baggage and unquestioned assumptions from the sixties about power and cultural relationships- assumptions often just as biased and skewed (though in different ways) as the relationships which these meanings arose in opposition to. It could, of course, be possible to use the terms critically, and to resituate them in a less value-laden context. For better or for worse, though, I think Prokofy's unspoken assumption that this is very rare is likely correct, which means that any work using that jargon is often tainted by association.
Tangentially, and speaking of learning and teaching by anecdote, I'll give an anecdote about the jargon-creators: at my undergrad institution, there was a course which purported to be an introduction to Marxism, taught by a professor of literature whose work you've no doubt read, Douglas. Unusually, it was cross-listed in six different departments, including literature, sociology, etc. None of those six departments were political science or economics.
I shall forever be curious as to how one teaches an intro to Marx which can't qualify for cross-listing in political science or economics. My hunch was that even the actual Marxists in the political science department wanted nothing to do with what passed for Marxism over in the litcrit department. Sadly, since the course wasn't cross-listed in political science, it didn't help me with my political philosophy requirements, so I was never able to squeeze the course into my schedule and confirm that hunch myself.
Posted Jan 1, 2007 8:32:48 AM | link
May I suggest that anyone who would like to gleefully engage in theory-bashing for its own sake head over to this thread? Much of that territory was covered there.
P.S. to Frank: The good news is that in re-checking that thread, I found your recommendation of Peter Drucker: Shaping the Managerial Mind by John E. Flaherty. I'll be picking that one up.
Posted Jan 1, 2007 10:06:22 AM | link
>You do realize that these are words and ideas that have rich theoretical heritage and meaning, that they are words that do work to help us understand things happening in the world (both real and virtual).
No, these aren't richly theoretical, they're just lame, one-dimensional, shrill phrases from standard lexicons of Marxist cant and rant. They aren't really tools for thinking or discourse, but just ideological memes that have infected lots of stuff. Yes, it's all about this warmed-over Marxism.
Posted Jan 1, 2007 5:20:44 PM | link
@Prok: I do find your opinion valuable, but on this point you're not making sense. You said,
I get very wary of new-fangled anthropological and sociological and ethnographical studies of SL when they begin to throw around the usual campus Marxist jargon about "empowerment" and "neoliberalism" and "capitalist" this and that. Just study the stuff, please, without the scrim of ideology.
"Neoliberalism" and "capitalist", at least ;-), certainly do have rich theoretical heritage and meaning, although of course this doesn't mean that they're well-used and applied just by being invoked. In any human endeavor there is always plenty of bad craftsmanship around; it's like a law of gravity. This is exacerbated by new and interesting phenomena that draw the interest of those with too much time on their hands coupled with just enough education to be a danger to themselves and others. Add in a dash of youthful idealism amongst the connected and well-heeled, and you've got a recipe for disaster. So if you're thinking of a particular set of people's work, then fine, but it should be obvious, if I may say so, that it's possible to use these terms in effective and nuanced ways, just as Doug described.
Posted Jan 1, 2007 5:33:17 PM | link
One of the things I really love about my chosen career -- marketing -- is that it has a couple absolutes; at least in my book, and when it's done well. One of these is that you don't study nothin' without first establishing a reason for doing so (goals) and the metrics by which you'll know if those goals are getting closer or further away.
We're currently beating this dead horse on all the various "SL Numbers Are Crap" posts, but I'm not sure the fundamental point has been made in terms that could (maybe?) relate to academic research, i.e., anecdotalism vs. quantitative research.
In marketing, there's plenty of good reasons to do both quantitative and qualitative research, as long as you set those reasons up ahead of time and know what you're going to do with the data after the fact. It's like planning a vacation. You can either ask a bunch of people, "What fun beaches have you been to?" (qualitative), or you can measure distances to various beaches, prices of hotels nearby, likelihood of bad weather, etc. (quantitative). One method isn't better, they're just different, depending on what you want to know.
It's that last part that trips up lots of investigation, I think, outside the (somewhat) more focused world of business/marketing. In business, at the end of the day, we usually have a couple of pretty clear "root goals." Make more money, increase customer satisfaction, keep employees happy (that'd be a "Balanced Scorecard" approach anyway).
But if you want to "study stuff for the fun of it," or to get a graduate degree or to make an argument for a religious or political debate (and no slight intended on any of those pursuits), the "goal" of the research may often be much trickier, and, thus, the relative need for qualitative vs. quantitative data (and types of such) ends up being balanced (I've often found) AFTER the data has been gathered.
Sometimes, when a particular subject is just so new and fuzzy and weird... yes. You wander in and start learning. You measure everything you can and take whatever learning out of the situation is possible. Whether anecdotal or quantitative, however, that kind of initial "soaking in it" kind of investigation needs to be backed up by reproducibility to be true knowledge.
The job of a poet is to make us think deeply about things that may not be. Which is incredibly useful. It is an anecdotal pursuit of limitless, fictional proportion. On the other end of the spectrum, the census taker should try to be purely quantitative. An unruly, metaphoric survey is worse than none at all.
When we know the goals of what we are looking for -- or at least know what kind of knowledge we are trying to increase -- it's much more effective. Measuring for the sake of measuring is often like running in place; it may feel like there's a lot going on around you, but you're really not going anywhere.
Posted Jan 1, 2007 6:56:05 PM | link
Andy Said: "Sometimes, when a particular subject is just so new and fuzzy and weird... yes. You wander in and start learning. "
Fuzzy logic and its usages are useful in this discussion. Marketing and corporate innovation are two functional areas that uses both quantitative and qualitative approaches. Qualitative research usually yields insights while Quantitative research usually yields proof. Feeling you way around is an unstructured approach while hypothesis and parameters is a structured approach. I think both have their uses.
@Thomas: hope you will find the book useful. Check out Bruce Nussbaum (BusinessWeek) and his blogposts on Ethnography. He has a couple of articles on the subject as related to design and innovation. A key article is "Ethnography is the new Core Competency" or just do a search on Ethnography within BW's website.
Posted Jan 3, 2007 4:41:43 AM | link
@ prok "No, these aren't richly theoretical, they're just lame, one-dimensional, shrill phrases from standard lexicons of Marxist cant and rant. They aren't really tools for thinking or discourse, but just ideological memes that have infected lots of stuff. Yes, it's all about this warmed-over Marxism."
Ummm. I guess I don't really have a response to this. You are right. There is nothing to capitalism. It doesn't exist as anything other than a meme used by warmed over Marxists. It would be silly to mention it at all in the context of Virtual Worlds. I think we should also abandon those warmed over economic memes, made popular and overuse by the whole "Free Market" crowd. Supply, demand, inflation, profit, market. Nothing but silliness. So, we agree, such terms should be abandoned.
I had no idea it was so easy to dismiss ideas. You simply claim they aren't serious and they go away. What a relief, I can't wait to visit sweatshops in the global south. If they only knew that oppression, surplus value, and exploitation were worn out Marxist tropes they would feel so much better. I know I will now.
@Dmitri I don't think we have a difference of opinion in principle. No one likes it when anyone makes claims they can't support. On the flip side, there seems to be a hierarchy emerging, perpetuated in part by the practices of some academics, suggesting that the kind of knowledge which generalizes is better than kinds that don't, or that there is a rational progression from non-generalizable knowledge (which may be interesting, but is trivial) to generalizable knowledge, which is "True."
The point I wanted to make about category errors is a big one. There are certain things that are knowable in a generalizable sort of way and certain things that aren't. I am amazed that Columbine produced a movement to try to find out if aggression and violence from video games was generalizable (it seems obvious that if the Columbine kids' experience was generalizable, we'd have millions of shootings). In fact, it seems that understanding what was in Dylan and Eric's heads that day is precisely the kind of thing that you don't want to generalize. It doesn't make sense to (does it?)
But that is exactly what we did, we said "Ohhhh, kids played video games and shot people," is there a causal connection. That strikes me as an idiotic question. And worse, it leads to a bunch of research that we think is answering the question, when it is measuring something completely different.
Do we really care if there is a statistically significant causal connection between video game playing and aggression? I think we only do if there are consequences to such aggression. Are there? Of course there are, look at Columbine. . . . There is your big fat category error. And it is a bad one.
"I shall forever be curious as to how one teaches an intro to Marx which can't qualify for cross-listing in political science or economics."
Would you make the same argument if it had been a class in econ not cross listed in literature?
More important. I can think of lots of reasons:
1. Economic: poli sci and econ may be in different schools, programs, or areas which divide up revenue differently.
2. Personal. Said professor may not like the econ or poli sci people
3. Perspective. I can think of quite a few works that Marx wrote or were inspired by him that have little to do with Econ or Poli Sci as it is taught at many universities.
4. Student cross over. Said professor may work regularly with students in those programs, serve on their committees, or have joint appointments there. Would make sense to cross list so they could count his classes toward their degrees.
5. Politics. There may be turf issues among different departments
6. Methodologies. Econ and Poli Sci tend heavily toward quant methods, the others have a bent toward qualitative methods. That seems as good a way to divide things as any. (I don't know the uni, prof, or class, so that is speculation, but you ask how it could be possible).
7. Maybe said professor tried? And maybe the Poli Sci and Econ departments weren't interested?
8. Perhaps the class was on Marxism and literature, which would seem deadly boring to Econ types, but not to the others?
That is the beginnings of a very long list of reasons. But I have to say, the idea of dismissing a class in anything based on where it is not cross listed seems like a fairly weak argument. If you are a scientist you could make the same argument from Theology classes not cross-listing in Astronomy and Biology. Or Econ departments not cross listing in Psychology or Sociology. Most knowledge is multidisciplinary, so the list of potential cross listing is boundless.
A better question to me is "Was the class any good?" And if it was why would it not fulfilling some checklist for a degree stop you from taking it?
Posted Jan 3, 2007 6:17:35 PM | link
Thomas, I agree that really great research shows a thoughtful interplay between qual/quant.
I was nervous when I first saw the title of this post. The foundational authors for "addiction," to the interweb and online games, still use unsupported anecdotes in the worst possible way. They talk about marital distress and junkie adolescents, marginalizing anyone who plays or, conversely, has an interest in experiencing a persistent world of contrived contingency.
I'm ridiculously thrilled to see that TN is actively pursuing standards for games. Right now brilliant people are using addiction and dependency standards which lack face validity. I would ask that you not overlook studies in addiction and dependency, as along with fears of online violence, unrepresentative anecdotes here present one of the greatest obstacles to social acceptance and a resultant understanding of these worlds.
Posted Jan 4, 2007 5:21:44 PM | link
@Neils: Thank you for the comment. You may be interested to hear where the title comes from. It's a reference to Clifford Geertz's famous distinguished lecture, "Anti Anti-Relativism", in which he took pains to note that the title was meant to indicate his opposition to the shrill denunciations of anti-relativists, rather than that he was in favor of relativism, which he called a "drained term." As he put it, "My through-the-looking-glass title is intended to suggest such an effort to counter a view rather than to defend the view it claims to be counter to." :-)
Posted Jan 5, 2007 4:08:08 PM | link


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"Spanish Word Booster"
I rated this audio book a 5 because there were a lot of common phrases to help a beginning conversational speaker in everyday Spanish. It was also a very good review. My wife's family is up visiting from Panama, and I got to use a lot of the phrases on my eight-year-old niece. The teaching style in the audio book was very beneficial to me. I feel I have more confidence & ability in my conversational Spanish. It would be nice if Spanish Word Booster expanded to more advanced converstational useage in the future so as to give the growing conversational speaker something as a stronger foundation, being not everyone gets to live in a foreign country for extended periods.
"Superb Story Teller"
It was a very skillfully written book on the battle to take Rome. I was glued to it the whole time and listened to it in one day. I was fascinated with the narrator's ability to mimic various English accents or dialects, which really brought the story to life. This was the glue that held it together for me. Vessel of Sadness is not a Ernie Pyle book on the Anzio Beach experience. It seems to be more of a rendering from a British infantry perspective with an unusual skill for weaving a story that paints a picture in your mind. I was a little disappointed that there was no mention of General Mark Clark, the hero of Anzio, the massacre of over 700 US Army Rangers by German infantry or the terror tactic of the Germans to walk long-range artillery in just to take out a single soldier they spotted. My father who is deceased was at Anzio. His unit, the 102nd Barrage Balloons, were brought in from Naples to land on the Anzio Beachhead four days after the initial invasion. He said they were in fox holes and trenches filled with water up to their chests while living in their own excrement & urine. He said they were brought up out of the trenches every three days.He said there was a British Army unit next to there's. He said the Germans hit the Allies with artillery every day. During one barrage, a British soldier came up out of the water in the trench and started walking for the open; he dropped his rifle and kept walking. British & American soldiers started yelling and hollering for him to come back, but he kept walking. Suddenly the sound of German artillery was heard coming in. My father said the German's walked the shells until they took him out. One moment there was a soldier, and the next there was no one there. The most traumatic experience for my father was when German "commandos" hit the fuel supply that the British unit had. He said they heard screaming and yelling and crying. They went running to the British area to see many British soldiers totally engulfed in flames and running. He said they tackled them and threw them down and rolled them on the ground. When I asked if they had saved any, he only shook his head indicating "no" and held his head down for the longest time. My father told me before he died at age 80 that he had nightmares & night sweats his entire life; it was the same reoccurring nightmares about trying to save the burning British soldiers. He said he could still hear them crying: "My feet are burning!" He said their boots burned right off from them. My father said they had artillery attacks every day for four months until reinforcements came in and got them off the beachhead. He said after every artillery barrage, they would go out looking for survivors. One day he saw a GI standing alone holding his intestines in his hands. My father asked if he could help. The GI told him he had a brother and what unit he was in and to get him. My father brought the brother and the two brothers embraced, and the wounded brother died in the arms of the other brother. I said to my father: Daddy, did that happen often at Anzio. He said quietly: "That was Anzio everyday." And he hung his head and was silent for a while. When I asked my father who suffered the most at Anzio, he said the infantry took the brunt of it. After Rome my father's unit was disbanded because they took down more Allied planes than enemy planes. If you asked my father what Anzio was like, he would whisper in a very low voice: "Anzio was hell." If you tried to push him further for information, he would tell you:" If you were at Anzio, you'd wish you were never born." He would only talk with combat war veterans about the war. I had great difficulty gleaning what I got. He said he went to a replacement detachment and was in the invasion of Southern France, the Rhineland & Central Germany and never again saw anything that compared to Anzio. The book Vessel of Sadness is an important read on the battle of Rome-Arno.
"An Interesting Idea for a Detective Story"
I got this audio book for free. I did not like it. I assume there must be people out there who eat this stuff up. I thought it had a trashy edge with the foul, profane, vulgar language. This story was not on the level of a PBS murder mystery. It doesn't compare to the top British, French, or German crime writers. I found it an interesting concept that a pregnant detective would be on the job up until the last moment and then give birth to a baby. I am sure there are many criminal-types who would love to get the best of a pregnant cop on their trail; you know, kind of like getting two for one. I thought the author had skill in writing and is very imaginative. But still I considered this audio book to be low on the totem pole for ability to really drag a listener in and captivate them and keep them guessing to the end. The narrator was definitely top shelf, but I think she was a poor choice for this book; she would be better on other types of books. I think if they could have got either a male or female narrator with an authentic Boston or big city east coast dialect, it would have helped this book much more. But as accents are very quickly being washout in the US, only a nursing home might have such a candidate.
"A Beneficial Tool in Assisting Hebrew Study"
It may seem that I rated this Hebrew course a little higher than others. Yes, the tape-recording sound quality dates this course from a time gone by. Almost all of my audio books come as a Level 4, but because of the poor sound quality, it is more difficult to listen to. I found that by listening to the lessons for a while, I was able to finally understand the pronunciation; that is, my ears adjusted to the sound, and I could understand it. At first, I was discouraged, but once I found I could assimilate the sounds and understand the communication, I found it was useable for me and beneficial in my language learning in Hebrew. One of the down sides of this course is, there is no booklet to follow along and learn the meaning of newer words. The thing that made this course workable for me was the fact that I completed the entire Audio Pimsleur Hebrew Levels 1 to 3. I was able to understand many of the sentences, numbers, clock times and everyday happenings in Hebrew despite the poor sound quality. Also, some of the sentences I had never heard before, but I knew everyone of the words from having completed the Pimsleur Hebrew. And therefore I was able to assimilate the meaning of these newer sentences and expand my base of Hebrew comprehension. I will admit I was a US military linguist using German behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War, and I and other linguists had to deal with much poorer sound quality than this but yet understand it and process it; so maybe I have an edge. I would not recommend this to the Hebrew student starting out for the first time. I would recommend doing the Audio Pimsleur Hebrew first then go for this one for reinforcement and language maintenance. The more different Hebrew speakers you listen to will help you to understand more Hebrew speakers with different accents and patterns of speech.
"This Is A Story That Defies All Odds"
This is a story about Israel's existence that can only be explained by divine intervention. The military screw ups and scenes by the Arab opposing forces are similar to scenes in the Bible where God fought the battles for ancient Israel, i.e., large enemy forces fleeing out of unexplained fear, confusion among Arab forces, the leaving behind of large amounts of weapons & war supplies, hot food left on the tables of Arab homes in a suddenly-vacated city, etc. Although author Michael Oren does not credit God with any of these incredible happenings, a student of the Bible will begin to see the Hand of God. One thing, however, is for certain: The Arab order of battle, initial Arab air superiority, the vast numbers of Arab armies and war supplies against the world's 100th smallest nation, Israel, can only leave the secular reader with one conclusion: Israel shouldn't have been able to win this war. But they did, and it was against all odds!
"Pimsleur Hebrew Quick & Simple"
I gave the Pimsleur Quick & Simple a Five because I believe it really works. I was skeptical at first but now am a believer in the method. My experience has been in formal education learning German over a long time. I was once a German "linguist" for the US Army and had lived inside the former East Germany; so the Pimsleur method was totally alien to how I was taught German.I have not been to Israel yet, but I have met a number of Israelis while traveling in the US, and I have blown their socks off. They were totally surprised that a non-Israeli could learn their language. One Israeli asked me if I was an Israeli who left Israel as a child for the US. When I said no, he asked if I were an American-Jew. And I said no. He found it hard to believe. He said I was the first non-Jew he had ever met that could speak his language. Another Israeli, an older man, who claimed to have fought in most of Israel's wars thought I was an Israeli at first. He questioned me quite a bit and finally said:"Today you have earned my respect." He too said he had never met a non-Israeli that could speak Hebrew. I have gone through all Three Phases of the Pimsleur Hebrew. I took two years to do it and did it slowly and faithfully. If I were to give any advice, I would say study it exactly the way they say and do not try to write down sounds. That is why I think these Israelis thought I was a former Israeli because I got the pronunciation and pattern of speech down like the Pimsleur Israeli speakers had spoken. I listened to the Pimsleur instructions (30-minutes long) maybe 8 times over a period of 6 months to be sure I was doing it right because I have a tendency to go back to old ways I was taught. I might add, my wife who is a native speaker of Latin-American Spanish and who is now fluent in English used the entire Pimsleur ESL course and did Hebrew Phase I (all 30 lessons). During our respective lunch breaks at our places of employment we would do small, short conversations in Hebrew over our cell phones five days a week. She travels to Panama and meets Israelis on the planes and has astounded them as well with her basic skill in Hebrew. It is even more astounding for a native of a Latin country to address and begin a conversation in Hebrew.
"Pimsleur Quick & Simple Spanish"
Excellent learning tool for the beginner. I used the expressions on my wife, a Panamanian ex-Patriot, and she gave me high kudos for improved pronounciation and more realistic expression of the short sentences and expressions. I only wished there were follow up lessions that would take me further; otherwise, I would have given it a 5.
It was a very good narration; it seemed the speakers carried a modern twist in their selfish, egotistic manners. It did portray good over evil. It gives people who do not meet the world's standards of being perfect the chance and the hope they can find beauty and love from handsome, unselfish stars who see their true beauty and worth and see beyond the glitter and deception of a really not so perfect world to find a heart of gold.
"Alice in Wonderland"
Excellent narration. Very interesting. I took a negative view of it and would not allow a child to listen to it. I didn't like the child abuse scenes, especially where the woman's voice says repeatedly, "I beat my baby." The scenes where the queen constantly says, "off with their heads" didn't take me too well either. I am sure the familiar violence mirrors another time period and would make those of us from the 21st Century squirm.
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text:
PASCO, Wash. - Colleges
across Washington State want to be ready when the unthinkable happens.
The Federal Emergency
Management Agency this week is conducting an intensive training course at
Columbia Basin College for emergency coordinators at college campuses
throughout the state.
FEMA instructor J.
McLellan says by the end of the course, the emergency coordinators, as well as their
local police and fire departments will have a better understanding of how to put an emergency plan in
place and improve the safety of the students on campus.
"From flooding, to natural
hazards to man-made hazards, as we've seen, active shooters are a big concern,
student safety is a big concern," McLellan says.
has been conducting this training course for about three years at college
campuses nationwide.


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Drinking a glass of fine wine with dinner is something a lot of people do when they want to unwind from a long, hard day, but when these same people want to celebrate something momentous, they bring out the Blanc de Blancs champagne. The same can be said of a great automobile. Sure you can drive around in a Mercedes on a daily basis, but for those special evenings, an Aston Martin V8 Vantage is the way to go. Bringing together these two ideas is Graf Weckerle who has designed a package for the V8 Vantage that gets its one-of-a-kind design from the most refreshing champagne produced.
The car's interior and exterior are styled based on the white, green, and gold details on the Blanc de Blancs champagne bottle and look sensational on the sports car. The 21" wheels, however, leave much to be desired. Made of 180 titanium and aluminum parts, these "unique" wheels take up to 20 days to build. If it were up to us, we'd let them stay a little longer. No offense to the Graf Weckerle logo, which is what the wheels are styled after, but we can think of hundreds of other options that would have looked much better on this beautiful vehicle. But hey, at least the interior sparkles with 24 karat components.
In addition to the beautiful - and not so beautiful - stylings of the Aston Martin, Graf Weckerle have also tuned the standard 426hp 4.7 Liter V8 engine to deliver an improved 470hp.
Not a fan of the V8 Vantage? Graf Weckerle can also mount this package on an Aston Martin DBS and a Ferrari 599 GTB . Plans for adding it to the Ferrari 458 Italia are also in the works.


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text: Description Suggest an Edit The Fox River Trail features 43 miles of spectacular biking, hiking and cross-country skiing along the scenic Fox River. The paved path can be challenging at times, but the extra pedal pushing is rewarded with some impressive scenery along the trail and in the small towns. In addition, you can link with other trails in the region directly from the Fox River Trail for a multi-day journey (the Prairie Trail in Algonquin and the Virgil Gilman Trail and Illinois Prairie Path in Aurora).As the trail meanders south from Algonquin, it closely follows the Fox River. It is possible to switch back and forth over the river since the trail does extend on both sides of the river at times. While this is a nice amenity, it also increases the potential to be confusing. The signage along the trail is good in most parts, but be sure to consult a map before heading out for a longer trip.The upside to bouncing back and forth across the river—aside from the scenery—is the bridges you cross on. The Fox River Trail offers no less than six of them, some specifically for bicycles and pedestrians, across the river. The bridges are perfect spots for some of the best photo opportunities to be had along the trail. The bridges vary in form and function, from trestle to pedestrian, and allow you to experience the Fox River from many different viewpoints. The trail was built on stretches of three former railroads: Chicago, Aurora & Elgin; Aurora, Elgin, & Fox River Electric; and Chicago & North Western. Today, it hosts a multitude of different birds, trees and wildlife, including bald eagles, herons and woodpeckers.The Fox River Trail draws a lot of visitors, and many of the towns (and business owners) along the trail have embraced the tourism. You will find restaurants, cafes, bike shops and souvenir shops.Small parks that dot the landscape throughout the trail are perfect for picnics or a well-earned break. They are local fishing haunts, too. So whether it is for a leisurely stroll, a hard cycling workout, a picnic in the park or just a relaxing day of fishing, the trail offers plenty to make your day. Click to read more Parking and Trail Access To reach the Algonquin trailhead from State Route 31, travel toward Algonquin and turn east on State Route 62 then north on North Harrison Street. Riverfront Park, with parking, is approximately a quarter mile ahead.Reach the Aurora trailhead from Interstate 88 (Ronald Reagan Memorial Tollway). Exit on to State Route 31 in Aurora and head south. Willis McCullough Park is on the left in approximately 1 mile. Click to read more Reviews Trail closed due to I-99 bridge work August, 2014 by rpeete A portion of this path is closed near the I-90 bridge. Info can be found here: http://www.illinoistollway.com/documents/10157/3a7246aa-8e96-4368-8f4f-3196cbbab11a read more Beautiful Scenic Trail with lots of stops along the way! June, 2014 by melcycle Started @ Hotel Baker in St. Charles and headed south to Geneva for a bathroom break @ Mill Race Cyclery (also have an outdoor cafe available). Headed further south to Batavia, where we grabbed a bite to eat @ O' Sole Mio (great Italian food w/ huge gelato ...read more Trail closed June 6th 2014 north of Trout Park May, 2014 by ronv42 I was riding the trail today and there is a sign that says the trail will be closed June 6th. Nothing about what they are doing or where north of Trout park the trail would be open again. I tried searching on the internet and found nothing on this trail ...read more


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A Toledo man is recovering after suffering several gunshot wounds Friday morning.
Police crews were sent to the emergency room after Jeron Sutton arrived, suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. Police say Sutton drove himself to the hospital around 11:30 a.m. but none of the wounds seemed to be life-threatening.
According to police, all Sutton could say before being whisked away for X-rays was that he was shot in his SUV somewhere on Vance Street.
After responding to the parking lot, a handgun was recovered from inside Sutton's truck.
An investigation is ongoing. Anyone with more information that could help police is urged to call CrimeStopper at 419-255-1111.
Copyright 2014 Toledo News Now. All rights reserved.


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2012 Yalumba Y Series Riesling
"This silky, dry style offers crisp balance to the toasty pear and citrus flavors, lingering gently."
Reviewed by: Wine Spectator - 87pts
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2013 Pewsey Vale Dry Riesling
"A fresh and open-textured white, offering inviting flavors of slate-accented pear and lime that pulse pleasantly on the dry finish."
Reviewed by: Wine Spectator - 89pts
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