CogBlogged from ‘November, 2004’

I give credit to “Thomas” , a participant in one my recent workshops at Manukau Institute of Technology here in Auckland, NZ for turning me on to a new search site- A9. It is a whopper. It’s been about a Google years since I got interested or even raised an eyebrow at a new search engine, but this one is worth a click. If I can scan the docs right, it is “powered by Amazon” (uses Amazon logins and likely for looking among books). Yup just clicked the A9 sign in link, and was prompted for my Amazon.com user name, the sanem familiar Amazon interface. Niiiiiice integration. And A9 uses Guru.net for looking up reference queries, it uses Google for doing web and Image searches. Internet Movie Database provides movie results. Alexa comes into play somewhere- I think for the recommending or “Discover” feature. Accounts allow you to save searches [...]

flickr foto Find the Dogavailable on my flickr See if you can locate the puppy trying to get someone’s attention from this truck parked in Rawena, New Zealand. While enjoying a flat white in this cosy cafe in Rawena, I was mesmerized by this simple composition of a truck parked in front of a grey shed… I think it was the geometry of the shapes, and the contrast of the blue door. Or maybe I was just in caffeine fog. As I was reaching for my camera, I was suprised to see a small dog jumping up and down. I was sure I missed the shot until I looked at it later and found the little guy’s face staring back at me. Surely it was worth a flickr, if anything to push that cat off the top photo position!

Despite a lack of clearly focused photographs, there are some out there clinging to firm beliefs in Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster. I get the same sensation trying to get a clear picture of Blackboard’s ePortfolio functionality. Some messages of inquiry about the legendary beast in question bounced around the AAHE Electronic Portfolio Action Committee. As much as I believe in the concept of Blackboard’s content management system, and see how it provides a platform for potential eportfolios, I am left Google-less in actually trying to find one I can see. Is the only one out there the one Bb snapped for Lisa Smith? Maybe I am looking in the wrong places. Maybe they cannot be seen outside the Blackboard fence. Maybe they are all un-published. Maybe Bigfoot and Nessie have munched them all. I just do not know. I am not slamming Blackboard’s technology or content system, but [...]

Stranger than real life, or maybe not. The day after my third Weblog workshop here in New Zealand, broke a stranger than life story. The just announced winner of the 2004 Best Personal Blog award at the Netguide Web Awards was the bizgirl blog, advertised with an aluring photo of the “librarian of international mystery”. The awards read: Blogs are all about allowing the mindset and personality of the writer come through. Bizgirl does this, and more. I enjoyed reading her entries because they are witty and fun and full of personality. It seems a little like a New Zealand version of the Bridget Jones’s Diary. The layout and organisation are crisp and easy on the eyes. When you get to the blog, you immediately know why you’re there and where to look. Clever, different, funny. She gets the gold here. The only hitch is that “Natalie Biz” the author [...]

flickr foto Pick a Sideavailable on my flickr There is humor on the New Zealand tricks on the highway… often you see pithy sacrastic remarks like “Keep Smoking- That’s Why You Have Two Lungs”, or this example suggesting there are two sides to be passed upon… which one would Robert Frost take? Okay, this is the last odd New Zealand photo to post from flickr… today. You ought to click the image to see the full effect in flickr.

flickr foto Logging on to Bloggingavailable on my flickr The day of my blogging workshop at Manukau Institute of Technology in Auckland, there was put out in the hallway a marketing magazine that heralded blogging as a marketing tool. Playing all the stereotypes of a MALE blogger YELLING into a magaphone. Edgy stuff, eh? I vote for “scared turf”… It was rather eerie reading how marketers are looking at blogs, but the article did give decent credit that this is something different, that one ought NOT to try an advertise via blogs, that it can be used to “reach” the audience. Then again, other articles in the Magazone glossed the marvels of Direct Mail Marketing, and lots of ads for companies that will put your logo on a coffee cup. Blog that.

flickr foto What do YOU want?available on my flickr Are you talking to me? ARE you talking to ME? Are YOU talking to…. can you believe that CogDogBlog will feature a photo of a cat? What is going on here in New Zealand? It is almost heretical to feature a cat photo here in CogDogBlog! What the _____ is going on? Hannah is kind of cute, in a “snobbish I really do not need or care for humans where is my food” sort of cat way. But this ought to be the last time a feline appears here. Someone else can do ScatCatBlog.

I might have been a bit premature to share the wiki links for my New Zealand workshops. Apparently the server here got rather overwhelmed with traffic, because it was pretty much unusuable during my workshops down south at Manukau Institute of Technology. At 10:00 am I was pretty much up the wiki without a paddle… until I realized that the day before I experimented with loading all the wiki content to a server back in Arizona. Brilliant! I was saved! I did lose some of the additions I made last night, but I was much better off that trying to describe a wiki and content in words only. Be careful of living and dieing by the wiki ;-) Please do me a huge favor– if you are interest in looking at this wiki content, please hit my Maricopa mirror: http://realgar.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/wiki It has all the same content (though I need to [...]

flickr foto Weet-Bixavailable on my flickr The number one cereal for New Zealand is a giant Shredded Wheat. And you gotta love a food product from the folks at “Sanitorium”! More on New Zealand brands. I am talking all kinds of photos of signs, packaging, labels etc. Look at the size of that “bix”! You are lucky if you get one in a bowl. They aren’t all that bad (and please do not sent your suggestions foir vegemite, etc ;-)

Hmmm, The November 2004 issue of Wired has the goods on the notion of “Rip-Mix-Feed” line of thought. The magazine includes an audio CD with music specifically with Creative Commons licenses for ripping and mixing, and even a few are further licensed for sampling and commercial use. I’ve yet to listen to it (maybe on the flight home from NZ), and most of the artists sound like they may hurt my 1960s rock and roll ears, but the concept rocks. Literally. At root, sharing and stealing music start from the same impulse: Cribbing is creation. Building on what other musicians have done – with or without their blessing or collaboration – is what it takes to make new music, music that will delight and sustain people. That, after all, is why it’s called making music (playing music is something else altogether). Elvis Presley, that pioneer of appropriation, put it best: [...]