The Blog of Desperate Measures: July 2007

Money began in nonliterate cultures as a commodity...[and] always retains something of its commodity and community character...Speech comes with the development of the power to let go of objects. It gives the power of detachment from the environment that is also the power of great mobility in knowledge of environment. So it is with the growth of the idea of money as currency rather than commodity...Money, as a social means of extending and amplifying work and skill in an easily accessible and portable form, lost much of its magical power with the coming of representative money, or paper money...Today, as the new vortices of power are shaped by the instant electric interdependence of all men on this planet, the visual factor in social organization and in personal experience recedes, and money begins to be less and less a means of storing or exchanging work and skill.

--"Money"
from Understanding Media
Marshall McLuhan, 1964

Sunday, July 22, 2007

Links

LUDWIG VON BERTALANFFY: General Systems Theory http://www.survey-software-solutions.com/walonick/systems-theory.htm
http://www.geocities.com/~n4bz/gst/gst1.htm

ALBERT-LASZLO BARABASI: The author of Linked.
http://www.nd.edu/~alb/

Saturday, July 21, 2007

Peeling off the layers of Cohort-7-Pittsburgh-Week fatigue, I dedicate this first back-home blog entry to my presentation project group.

I hear we spent more time than most on our project, and yet I believe we were all disappointed by end result. Well, I learned some things, and I hope you all did, too.

1. Completion, not perfection: Harder for some of us to swallow than others, yet nevertheless essential--to this program and to our lives overall.
2.We were four very independent individuals, three of us having external pulls: Gabriel by his work commitment, Erin by her health and understandable determination to experience as much of Pittsburgh as possible in our short week, and myself by extreme family circumstances. Lydia was eager to lead, and Jennifer had her sleeves rolled up and was ready to go, but:
3. We were not cohesive. The pulls were stronger than Lydia's brave attempt to organize us, we did not succeed in consolidating the work we actually accomplished into a presentation of the quality which I believe most of us expect from ourselves, but:
4. I for one learned a lot about the websites we investigated and evaluated.
2. I learned something important about each of us, and I value that.
3. I learned something vital about group endeavors.
4. I even learned somethings about power point and animated clip art.

Heartfelt thanks to each of you, and warmest wishes,
Valerie

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Feed2JS

I've got a nickel for the mastermind who can solve this mystery for me: How does one paste that code?

Friday, July 13, 2007

Last Blog 'fore Pittsburgh

Last Train to Clarksburg circa 1965 comes to mind. Well, now--there's a giggle. But, alas and otherwise, not packing tonight as lightly as I'd hoped, ie, webpage frustrations, time woes have got me flummoxed and a bit less than bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. But I'm looking forward to meeting everyone, and I'm sure By the Time I get to Pittsburgh my good humor Will Be Rising....

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Statutory Law

Statutory law is written law (as opposed to oral or customary law) set down by a legislature or other governing authority such as the executive branch of government in response to a perceived need to clarify the functioning of government, improve civil order, answer a public need, to codify existing law, or for an individual or company to obtain special treatment. (Contrast common law.) In addition to the statutes passed by the national or state legislature, lower authorities or municipalities may also promulgate administrative regulations or municipal ordinances that have the force of law — the process of creating these administrative decrees are generally classified as rulemaking. While these enactments are subordinate to the law of the whole state or nation, they are nonetheless a part of the body of a jurisdiction's statutory law.

...Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statutory_law

Common Law

Common law is law that comes from the common people, vers., legislation, which, comes from the "experts."

Common law comes about at the root levels of society: it is not law that is imposed by some authority from on high. The development of common law was "essentially a private affair concerning millions of people throughout dozens of generations and stretching across several centuries." It is a process that is self adjusting and which goes on everyday unnoticed, without great expense to the state and with out fractionalizing society.

...Peter Landry
http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/BluePete/LawCom.htm

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

The American Copyright League Motto

"In vain we call old notions fudge,
And bend our conscience to our dealing;
The Ten Commandments will not budge,
And stealing will continue stealing."

...James Russell Lowell

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Article 27.

(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.

(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.

See: http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html

Monday, July 9, 2007

My Koha Virtual Shelf

1. Schizoaffective Disorders, 2006. ISBN: 1600210309.

2. Affective and Schizoaffective Disorders, 1990. ISBN: 0387520716.

3. From Borderline Adolescent to Functioning Adult, Masterson, James F., 1980. ISBN: 0876302347.

4. Borderline Personality Disorder, Gunderson, John G., 2001. ISBN:
1585620165.

5. Borderline Conditions and Pathological Narcissism, Kernberg, Otto F., 2002. ISBN: 0765703629.

6. I Hate You--Don't Leave Me, Kreisman, Jerold J., 1989. ISBN: 089866595.

7. Sometimes I Act Crazy: Living with Bipolar Personality Disorder, Kreisman, Jerold J., 2004. ISBN: 047122860.

8. The Challenge of the Borderline Patient: Competency in Diagnosis and Treatment, Kroll, Jerome, 1988. ISBN: 039370047X.

9. Severe Personality Disorders: Psychotherapeutic Strategies, Kernberg, Otto F., 1984. ISBN: 0300032730.

10. The Borderline Personality in Analysis, 1988. ISBN: 0933029136.

11. Borderline and Narcissistic Patients in Therapy, 1988. ISBN: 0823605728.

12. Borderline Personality Disorders, 2005. ISBN: 9780824729288.

13. Handbook of Bipolar Disorder: Diagnosis and Therapeutic Approaches, 2005. ISBN: 9780824729356.

14. Diagnostic Criteria for Functional Psychoses, 1992. ISBN: 0521423155.

15. The Divided Self: An Existential Study in Sanity and Madness, Laing, R. D., 1999. ISBN: 0415198186.

16. Personality Disorders, Friedland, Bruce, 1991. ISBN: 0791000516.

17. Personality Disorders, Veague, Heather Barnett, 2007. ISBN: 0791090027.

18. Bipolar Disorder: Your Questions Answered, Hunt, Neil, 2005. ISBN: 0443100705.

19. The Everything Parent's Guide to Children with Bipolar Disorder: Professional, Reassuring Advice to Help You Understand and Cope, Stillman, William, 2005. ISBN: 1593374461.

20. Personality and Psychopathology, 1999. ISBN: 0880489235.

21. Personality Disorders in Children and Adolescents, Kernberg, Paulina, 2000. ISBN: 0465095623.

22. Bipolar Depression: A Comprehensive Guide, 2006. ISBN: 1585621714.

23. Manic-Depressive Illness: Bipolar and Recurrent Depression, Goodwin, Frederick, 2007. ISBN: 9780195135794.

24. Comparative Treatments for Bipolar Disorder, 2005. ISBN: 0826148352.

25. New Perspectives on Narcissism, 1990. ISBN: 0880481781.

26. Practice Guideline for the Treatment of Patients with Borderline Personality Disorder, 2001. ISBN: 0890423199.

27. Understanding and Treating Borderline Personality Disorder: A Guide for Professionals and Families, 2005. ISBN: 1585621358.

28. Mentalization-based Treatment for Borderline Personality Disorder: A Practical Guide, Bateman, Anthony, 2006. ISBN: 0198570902.

29. Through the Looking Glass: Woman and Borderline Personality Disorder, Becker, Dana, 1997. ISBN: 0813333091.

Sunday, July 8, 2007

ZoomClouds

The last statement in this blog with respect to ZoomClouds was that I would be making three more. Since I seem to have succeeded in making the aggregated cloud, I moved on from this. If I should have time at some point during the remainder of this course (or if I receive instruction that makes the three a requirement), I'll come back to this. As is, I believe I satisfied this assignment on time last week. Oh, ye Powers That Be! Correct me if I'm wrong!

Saturday, July 7, 2007

John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid

More about the authors of THE SOCIAL LIFE OF INFORMATION can be accessed via their webpages:

http://www.johnseelybrown.com/

and

http://www.ischool.berkeley.edu/~duguid/

Friday, July 6, 2007

oh, come on

Now look. I have nothing but respect for this program. Nothing but respect for the powers that be, the colleagues that get all the tech stuff way faster than I do, and maybe most importantly--I love the stuff when I master it. But hey, come on, really. What is going on here? Is this simply the school of being thrown into the pool and you learn to swim or you sink? Perhaps my objection is that if this IS the blueprint of the course, I don't feel I've been respected enough to have had the rules explained. Now, please. Understand. I'm exhausted. I'm frustrated. I'm worried. But if the purpose is not so much that we complete these assignments, but that we learn to--what? To solve problems in discussion boards? I just don't get where this is helping to train us as librarians. Okay. I'm rambling. I'm bellyaching about the Kompozer assignment. And I am bellyaching big time. And I'm just going to go ahead and say this, because at the moment I'm sleep deprived and angry and so the devil may care: What in the world are we supposed to be accomplishing? Sure, we're going to get something done in the long run. We're going to piece enough together to get some damn grade, but DANG it all to heck-- I feel like we're a bunch of ants swarming around a goshdarned drain trying to figure out how to keep from being sucked down and build our path back to the sugar line. We're sending SOS's back and forth. Morse code and whatever works to figure it out, but hey--what are we learning? That we can troubleshoot our way back up out of the suction cup one more time?...I don't get it. I really don't get it. I'm so damned tired. Gotta work all day tomorrow and still handoverhand through the discussion boards when I get home tomorrow night to figure out how to make this assignment fly by end of day. Okay. Fair is fair. My job, my other responsibilities don't really count in this discussion. I'm getting personal, and I'm getting childish. All that should matter in this discussion is the course itself. I'm a grownup. I can still cry, but I know the choices I've made to be here. But here's what I believe is my rightful bellyache: really, and goodness, and truly--there doesn't seem to be an actual assignment. It's more like a dang fool scavenger hunt.

Thursday, July 5, 2007

Koha

The Koha assignment seems to be fulfilled. Thanks to the rubric, assorted notes from collegues and professor, patience with intermittent Koha crashes (only experienced at point of attempt to deliver item to shelf, by the way), my own rhythm was established, and I seem to have fulfilled the goal. I love the look of the virtual shelves. They beg to be utilized. I do not, however, feel that I have much comprehension of all that is available with this tool (Koha that is)! It seems to be a tremendously useful application, but there is so much there that we didn't even touch upon--though I certainly do not mean to invite another assignment at this moment in time! Heaven help us with Kompozer!!!

My Aggregated Cloud

Valerie's Cohort 7 Widget

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Monday, July 30, 2007

Sunday, July 29, 2007

Saturday, July 28, 2007

Thursday, July 26, 2007