There are often fears that the growth of technology will isolate its users from the physical world. I remember a picture in a local newspaper, a couple of years back, of a kids’ birthday party. The group was all seated in neat rows in front of computer monitors, apparently playing some type of interactive game. It didn’t really seem like your typical kids party, and it seemed a little sad.
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Here is a slice of internet software I am currently using daily and am finding invaluable to my research and writing efforts:
Firefox - Rediscover the web
Since its official version 1.0 release in November Firefox use has been growing quickly. I gave it a good, critical trial before abandoning Internet Explorer but Firefox is now my default web browser. Features such as tabbed browsing, and the ability to add features created in the open source community are really powerful. I’ve got spell check, a web design toolbar, and all sorts of other cool additions. Microsoft seems to have given up on improving IE, and Firefox is striving ahead with a dedicated worldwide group of volunteer programmers. I’m never going back!
RSS — Feed Demon
I am a news junkie and RSS allows me to create my own personal news program that pulls the latest updates from websites of all types. These websites include those maintained by fellow researchers all the way up to major news organizations like the New York Times. And Feed Demon is my RSS aggregator and reader program. FeedDemon gives me a good bit of control over how my feeds are organized and other good features. Sure, there are plenty of web-based readers too, and in fact I have my wired feed on my personalized Yahoo page. But for the really heavy reading Feed Demon is great.
I’ve been working my way through Douglas Rushkoff’s book Playing the Future: What We Can Learn from Digital Kids. This book came to my attention based upon a colleague’s recommendation. Rushkoff’s basic idea is that the current generation of kids is fundamentally different from their parents, having grown up in the chaotic, multimedia, environment of modern times. But rather than suffering from the distracting influences of video games, the Internet, instant messaging, hundreds of cable TV stations, DVD’s and other technologies, they thrive. And, according to Rushkoff are ideally adapted to succeed in the today’s technology driven climate.
Surveys of college faculty show that, at best, 30% are using course management systems (CMS) in their classes. And based upon my experience most of those are only using them to post a syllabus and maybe some reading materials. Technology has transformed other industries over the last 30 years — why has education been so slow to follow?
This is my second web log experience. For my first version I utilized Noah Grey’s terrific Greymatter software hosted on my family web server. But it turns out that the web server is probably going by-by, and the software was starting to show its age.
Content provided by Randall Rode, a professional technologist based in Clinton, Connecticut, USA
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