Post #11: Get "NetSmart" by Harold Rheingold   (from email)

Mr. Rheingold asks us in his book to take the “mindfulness” that we began using in Affordance Analysis, and apply it to how we pursue and take in information from the internet.  He begins by asking internet perusers to follow something similar to Buddhist/Hindu techniques for breathing and meditation.  The intent is to calm the mind and body, so that it can focus and not be distracted by the sideshows of advertising and social media.  Once focused, the peruser must sift through the data presented and decide which is relevant, with a process he calls, “crap detection”.  The interconnectivity of the Internet provides the infrastructure for people to participate in topics on the internet that they deem as relevant, and should they choose, to be able to join in the digital discourse on that topic. Collaboration results as the participation continues to develop and can lead to new social opportunities. So as the peruser navigates their way through the social networks on the internet, they gain a sense of belonging to a particular community.

Personally, I frequently do the breathing techniques to achieve what Mr. Rheingold is necessary to navigate your way through the social networks of the internet, but I use them to focus on my personal priorities in what I need to get done in the near future of my daily routine.  I think that having “Net Smarts” is akin to having “Street Smarts” but applied to the internet.  Growing up in New York City or any other city, you kind of get that as part of your growth process.  So for me this is another application for something that I already do.  I think that Mr. Rheingold has outlined a process that seems fairly intuitive to me.  I avoid the distractions of social media, and frankly don’t want to spend my free time on it.  Now that schools want us teachers to also use social media as a communication tool to parents, colleagues and the local community, I feel some reluctance to use my free time to do that.  It can lock you into these social networks and take away from other things that you might want to pursue.  I’m sure we all one or two people on Facebook, who publish comments about every aspect of what is going on in their lives.  While it may be interesting and okay for them, I’m not willing to spend my precious free time as part of that as a frequent activity. Even though, in some cases, it may prove to my detriment.

As I commented in class, I believe that Mr. Rheingold sees the social networks as something ultimately positive, if you can go through the process of getting“Net Smart”. He sees the milk glass as being “half-full”, while I on the other hand do not want to spend my free time in unending social networks, see it as “half-empty”, and am just glad to have some milk. Got milk? "Sorry about that chief."

Post #10: I Can See Clearly Now, with Copyright Clarity by Renee Hobbs and implications in my teaching practice.

This book introduced the laws and examples of copyright infringement and what entails "fair use" to avoid any of the legal pitfalls associated with copyright infringement in teaching environments.  The useful examples of what is and what is not copyright infringement help illustrate how it can be used successfully in the classroom.

For our BiteSlide.com project, one of my tasks was to find three famous scientists of our assigned decade, 1901-1910. One of the scientists that I selected was Nikolai Tesla, a Serbian who emigrated to the U.S. in the late 19th century and was a prolific inventor of original devices and theories.  Since he was was more concerned with the scientific endeavor than the business side of making money, many of his patents were illegally used by others, at his loss of opportunity and for their profit. The most famous of these thieves was Guglielmo Marconi, so-called inventor of radio.  However, he had illegally used 17 devices, each covered by a Tesla patent. It wasn't until 1943, years after Tesla's death that the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the decision that gave Tesla the credit for the invention of radio. But who cares at that point? Name recognition and money had already been given to the wrong people, while Tesla died in poverty and obscurity. Tesla, stoic and above it all as usual said, "It does not bother me that people steal my ideas, it bothers me that they have no ideas of  their own."

In my practice, I do follow the "Fair Use" guidelines about transformation, use in an educational setting, one-time, not for profit, to develop my own lessons.  I give credit in many instances where I have not transformed the material.  For the students we use the website, TurnItIn.com, to check for plagiarism of submitted, supposedly original student work.  We depend on  the Media staff to train the students about proper use. As a physics teacher of mostly seniors, I am not going to teach them the details about what is and what is not copyright infringement. We kind of subcontract that out to others, but I have my other content constraints which I am judged on more strenuously. So the bottom line, you do what you can with what you have. "And upon your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness," -- Carl Spangler, Greenskeeper, Bushwood Country Club.

Post #9: New Habits are Hard to Break: Critical Evaluation of Internet Web Pages

Don't worry, I know we didn't have to do a post this week, but as the title says....  Anyway the only reason that I am posting this week is because I came across something last night and I cannot believe it even though it passed my Halo Evaluation, Review and Observation criteria, aka "HERO".  After looking at the bogus web sites, it is not that difficult to quickly pick up on the clues for them turning out to be "unreliable".

However, try as I may, I cannot get this piece of information to be proven as a fallacy.  If it is true, then why hasn't Hollywood made a B-Movie out of it like they did with SharkNado I & II, or MegaGator versus Sharktopus?

Ok, so here is what I saw on "River Monsters" on the Animal Planet channel.  Apparently a fossil has been found dating back to just before the Triassic Period of the dinosaurs, some 250-290 MYA, for a shark-like fish called by its genus, Helicoprion. It actually is related to the "ratfish", another attractive fish, that roamed the oceans for some 40 million years before going extinct.  So here's the crazy part, instead of rows of sharp teeth in the upper and lower jaw, it's teeth were arranged in spiral, like a buzz saw, but the teeth kept unwinding from the center. The teeth were located vertically in the fish's jaws, I don't even know how it could eat like that, but apparently it did. Anyway, the Smithsonian Institution link is below.  So enjoy.....buzz.....

http://paleobiology.si.edu/helicoprion/