Secrets Revealed.

According to my RSS reader, the only other subscriber to this blog is wondering who I am.

Like there could be any other answer.

?

According to my RSS feed, there are two people subscribing to this blog.

I wonder who the other one is?

tips for bloglines

This is the exact same post as I just made on my new LiveJournal blog for AC365. I have too many blogs. I should just give up on this one, but I don't feel like it just yet.

It was entitled Lending a Helping Hand... so I could link in a picture from my flickr photostream.

When people talk about blogs they also tend to talk about RSS feeds. You might remember RSS from our last course. It might bring back bittersweet memories... but do not despair, RSS is not something to be feared. Or as I like to say, (because I like to use this super geeky joke) RSS is not a pain in the rss.

Simply defined, RSS is Really Simple Syndication... or a set of coding that will automatically update a feed aggregrator (think kind of like an email client that checks for new messages) when that site has been updated. It's kind of like the friends page in LiveJournal, except that you don't have to go to the actual site to see if your friends have posted anything.


Here are some tips for bloglines, a free web-based feed aggregator that helps you keep track of blogs and websites that publish RSS, XML, or Atom feeds. (And did I mention that just like my personal favourite Flickr, Bloglines is free?) Feed aggregators are extremely helpful when you find that you are going to a number of websites all the time to see if they have been updated. Today, especially with the proliferation of online news sources, weblogs, and Flickr photostreams, programs like Bloglines can become a "what did I do without it?" kind of tool (note how my tone has become very infomercial announcer). I use Bloglines to keep track of friends' blogs and photostreams (yes, Flickr publishes RSS and Atom feeds too...), various academic blogs, and of course my selection of online news and entertainment sources (I don't get tv so when I have time I catch up on the few shows I would have watched through this wonderful site). Just remember that not every site publishes an Atom, RSS, or XML feed.

This link gives pretty comprehensive instructions on how to use bloglines. Try it out if you have a bit of time to spare... it will change your online browsing habits dramatically. And with that I conclude today's tip column.

random generation

I talked about the Sokal hoax a ways back... here's a little something a little more recent that is more or less related. A trio of MIT computer science graduate students created a program that would randomly generate a research paper. The trio submitted two of these computer generated papers to an academic conference and one entitled "Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy" was accepted for presentation.

Go here for the full-text article from BBC News about this newest academic hoax.

on classification and social networks

Occassionally I come across terms that I am not familiar with in the least. Take for instance folksonomy. This term I came across while researching my current paper on the photo sharing application flickr and online social networks. It's an interesting term to be sure, referring to "an emergent individual/local or small group taxonomy with no imposed hierarchy, pick list (lexicon) or term control. Users apply their own (free) terms aka tags to digital objects (pictures, links)."

The relevance of the term to social networking is a little unclear at first. But folksonomy (or tagging as we lay persons may call it) in flickr is the most basic way that networks are formed. All three of the photos are from the flickr site (two are from my photostream, one is from my friend's photostream) and each have been abitrarily tagged with terms that have some basic reference to the subject or theme of the photographs. Some are tagged with sun, portrait, sunset, shadow, etc. (I think you get the idea...). Anyhow, all the other photos on flickr that share any of the same tags are grouped in a pool that you can view by simply clicking on the tag. Voila... there's a simple explanation of how folksonomy relates to social networks.

Obviously my research paper will explore this term in a lot more depth. But after neglecting the BAAC blog for many months (although I feel no guilt) I felt like making a couple posts for any of the lost souls out there to read and ponder. Comment if you would like, or click on any of the photos that I've posted here to browse the wonderful world that is flickr. If you haven't experienced flickr yet, you don't know what you are missing.

For more about folksonomy... go here:

• Social Classification

communication theory list

I've been noticebly absent from the BAAC blog for several months, but I have the feeling that no one really missed my posts so I do not feel any guilt. I've been busy with other things... school, spring colds, spring snowfalls, digital photography, and growing my hair. It's been a hectic couple of months.

Today I came across this link through one of my RSS feeds. It's a comprehensive list of communication theories from De Universiteit Twente in the Netherlands. I have yet to find another site that so clearly lists all the communication theories that we studied in (what else?) our communication theory course.

So, for future reference bookmark this link:

Communication Theories

and that's my good deed for the year. I hope somebody out there appreciates my effort.