Julian Dibbell @ RIT, Weds 7.30pm

Mar 31, 2008 //


Play Money by Julian DibbellJulian Dibbell is going to be speaking at RIT this Wednesday. Julian, an associate editor at Wired, is an awesome guy and someone whose been involved in, and writing about, cyberculture for years. His latest work, Play Money, is an exploration of the various economic systems that have developed in various virtual spaces. At RIT he’ll be speaking on “Ludocapitalism – A few ways of making real money from a virtual economy, and what they mean.”

I first met while at the University of Chicago. Julian’s input was really helpful for me while writing my thesis. We touched base again late last year at the American Anthropological Association Conference. Again, I got a lot out of the conversation. So if you’ve got the chance, come out and hear him speak.

Here are the official details:

    Julian Dibbell

  • Topic: Ludocapitalism – A few ways of making real money from a virtual economy, and what they mean
  • Time: 7:30pm (the talk will be followed by open q&a time from 8:30-9)
  • Location: Liberal Arts (Bld 6), Room A205
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Categories praxis

i heart WordPress 2.5

Mar 29, 2008 //


I’ve been testing the new WordPress interface for a while and just think it’s da bombiest! The user interface is clean, the new functions rock, and the .php seems pretty optimized (everything running faster, even on my slow server).

It’s amazing to think that I’m already done with the first three weeks of my final quarter at RIT. It’s been intense — and the reason that I’ve not been blogging. By the end of this coming week, I’ll be able to premier all the stuff that I’ve been working on.

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Categories personal, praxis

lots of interesting photo tech

Feb 29, 2008 //


Following up on the PictLens posting, I have two other cool bits of photo tech (admittedly the photos that you’ll see are not the best). First I give you a snowy RIT night:

A test of GPS tagging of an image on a Titan PPC
What makes this unique is not what you can see, but what’s buried in the metadata:

Latitude: N 43° 5′ 16.844″
Longitude: W 77° 40′ 36.637″

This photo was take by my phone (which now has an active GPS chip in it thanks to the excellent work of others) and my coordinates were then encoded into it’s .EXIF file header and uploaded directly from the phone to Flickr. The only thing that currently stinks in this process is that Flickr didn’t recognize the GPS data when I attempted to place this picture on my map.

Here’s the second picture:

The most technologically advanced penguin on the web (Eye.Fi test 1)

Alberto here is noteworthy because of the workflow that got him to Flickr. This picture was shot using my Kodak V705 and uploaded directly to Flickr thanks to the Eye-Fi Smart Media (SD/SSHD) card inside of it. Function both as memory and as a wireless modem, the Eye-Fi card routed the picture, via our home WiFi network, to the Eye-Fi site, and then pushed copies both to Flickr and the hard drive of the laptop I’m presently working on.

Both of these technologies have some interesting implications and tie into things that I’m working on at RIT, but I can’t quite talk about just yet. Soon though. Real soon.

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Categories photo, praxis

sweet annie liebowitz picLens is friggin cool!

Feb 21, 2008 //


PicLens version of my flickr site

My office mate just introduced me to the PicLens web browser plug-in. It’s pretty incredible. This cross platform plug in can grab a collection of photos, like those in my flickr account above, and converts them into an interactive (Apple aesthetic) gallery. The resulting user experience is elegant and totally engaging. Give it a try!

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Categories photo, praxis

in the meantime

Feb 20, 2008 //


So I haven’t been able to update the site on any consistent base in a while. Life’s been really busy. Unfortunately, as of late, it seems like I only have time to blog around major, and often tragic, events. So, quickly (with RIT’s quarter drawing to its close, I have a mountain of grading to do) here’s some good things:

  • My presentation at the American Anthropological Association’s national conference went well. It looks like I’ll get a journal publication out of it.
  • The quarter itself has gone pretty well, in particular a lot of strides have been made at setting up a publishing research lab here at the school. More on that soon.
  • Our (boy) cat Lewis, has made a full recovery after having two toes amputated because of a cancerous growth.
  • I got a new phone/pocket pc, which has helped me get organized.
  • I was a judge in a national variable data print competition.
  • The blog helped me reconnect with an old friend.
  • Dre and I are succeeding in getting out (and traveling) to see friends and family. At this rate, who knows, we might actually go on our Honeymoon this year.
  • I was awarded my teaching rank (black sash) in Kung Fu.

I’m sure there’s more, but my timer is going off, reminding me that it’s time to get back to grading.

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Categories personal, praxis
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