reframe » Uncategorized http://arthurjosephson.com Arthur Josephson's personal blog Tue, 22 Feb 2011 01:45:22 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.5 The Requisite Apology http://arthurjosephson.com/2010/05/24/the-requisite-apology/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2010/05/24/the-requisite-apology/#comments Tue, 25 May 2010 02:55:37 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/?p=959 Requisite Apology

Since I last blogged, Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize and bombed the moon, built an unbeatable coalition to drive sweeping health-care reform and utterly lost health-care reform, re-regulated Wall Street and stepped in to run Haiti. There can be no excuse- except perhaps my next post explaining the continents, organisations, discoveries, conferences and festivals that lay between then and now, and my deepest commitment to the Internet that I will never abandon it again unless the dice are running unexpectedly hot, in which case I promise to roll the windows down a notch and bring it back a Pepsi.

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2010/05/24/the-requisite-apology/feed/ 0 THY 1951 http://arthurjosephson.com/2009/02/25/thy-1951/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2009/02/25/thy-1951/#comments Wed, 25 Feb 2009 11:25:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2009/02/25/thy-1951/ I work in the Schiphol World Trade Centre, i.e. the airport, i.e. the field next to the airport where this crash just occured.


No-one was killed. Sadly nine people, including two pilots, died. Rest in Peace.

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2009/02/25/thy-1951/feed/ 2 Koala, Bushfire Survivor http://arthurjosephson.com/2009/02/11/koala-bushfire-survivor/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2009/02/11/koala-bushfire-survivor/#comments Wed, 11 Feb 2009 08:26:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2009/02/11/koala-bushfire-survivor/ This is incredibly Australian on about fourteen different levels.

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2009/02/11/koala-bushfire-survivor/feed/ 3 Barack Obama: He Completes Us http://arthurjosephson.com/2008/08/29/barack-obama-he-completes-us/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2008/08/29/barack-obama-he-completes-us/#comments Fri, 29 Aug 2008 10:08:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2008/08/29/barack-obama-he-completes-us/ Jon Stewart’s Daily Show develops its own intro for Obama’s acceptance of the Presidential nomination of the Democratic Party.

See Obama’s acceptance speech here.

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2008/08/29/barack-obama-he-completes-us/feed/ 0 My Sister Liases with Dignitaries in Foreign Lands http://arthurjosephson.com/2008/04/11/my-sister-liases-with-dignitaries-in-foreign-lands/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2008/04/11/my-sister-liases-with-dignitaries-in-foreign-lands/#comments Fri, 11 Apr 2008 09:23:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2008/04/11/my-sister-liases-with-dignitaries-in-foreign-lands/ Yesterday, I wrote of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd speaking truth to power while on a diplomatic visit to Beijing. Well it turns out that last night, my very own sister ran a media conference for him in fair Peking! Proof? I shall supply weighty evidence!

My sister, Alethea (or Ti-li in mandarin) moved to Beijing two months ago to begin a traineeship in public relations. How awesome is this? Answer: Totally awesome. Congratulations Ti-li!

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2008/04/11/my-sister-liases-with-dignitaries-in-foreign-lands/feed/ 0 The Rise of Mr Splashy Pants http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/12/11/the-rise-of-mr-splashy-pants/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/12/11/the-rise-of-mr-splashy-pants/#comments Tue, 11 Dec 2007 12:00:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/12/11/the-rise-of-mr-splashy-pants/ Fourteen days ago, the following message appeared on The Internet,

“Greenpeace are having a vote to name a whale they have ‘adopted’. All the options are the names of ancient gods of the sea. And then there’s ‘Mister Splashy Pants’. Please vote ‘Mister Splashy Pants’.”

Yesterday, GP confirmed it, “Out of 11,000 submissions in our competition to name the humpback whales we were tracking on their migration to the Southern Ocean, we narrowed it down to the final 30. Over 150,000 people then voted for their favourite name.” The ultimate winner? Mister Splashy Pants – with a huge 119,367 votes (over 78 percent of the vote).

Brian Fitzgerald, who judged Omar Zayed’s original entry for MSP, describes how the internet went into full meme.
“We saw traffic double in one day to the voting page. Our referrals showed a big spike in traffic from Reddit (1) in particular, which was driving 18% of our referral traffic. And there, lo and behold, was Vote for Mister Splashy Pants, third link from the top. Within 24 hours, Reddit would bestow upon MSP the ultimate honor of being its “What’s Hot” Icon upper left of the page…

Ivan Krigin thought this was all very funny, and dropped a line to everyone’s favourite über-blog BoingBoing (2). BoingBoing editor (and former Greenpeace canvasser) Cory Doctorow picked it up… But at this point, we didn’t need stats to see things were getting out of hand. Blogs from (insert many many blog names here) and many more were cranking up the Vote for Mister Splashy Pants campaign…

It was then I threw a search into Facebook and found the “Vote for Mister Splashy Pants” group, which had been created by none other than Omar of the UK — the original source of the suggestion.”

The idea faced internal censorship at Greenpeace and derision on some enviroblogs- for being silly, for being supported by people who “didn’t really care about the environment” and for being an “internet fad”. But the ability of Web 2.0 technology to mobilize leagues of people around something funny was far too strong, and the “come-to-think-about-it” people realised that as an anthropomorphous tool MSP was perfect. Simply put, “Mummy, why do the Japanese want to kill Mr Splashy Pants?”. GP have now integrated the trend into their “you named him, now save him” campaign, calling for signatures on a petition to the Japanese Fisheries Agency.
(1)- Reddit is a popular social bookmarking site, where members add, prioritise and comment on new content. A democratic internet aesthetic without the idiocy of Youtube comments.
(2)- BoingBoing is one of the most popular blogs, focusing largely on gadgets, creativity, the unique, it is self-described as “a directory of wonderful things”. Updated multiple times daily.
(3)- Mr Splashy Pants is a humpback whale in the Southern Ocean. Rarely Online.
]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/12/11/the-rise-of-mr-splashy-pants/feed/ 0 Seinfeld: Back to Stand Up http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/10/12/seinfeld-back-to-stand-up/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/10/12/seinfeld-back-to-stand-up/#comments Fri, 12 Oct 2007 15:15:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/10/12/seinfeld-back-to-stand-up/ It’s Friday, I’ve got the flue, the company I work for was just bought by The Consortium and our CEO resigned- no energy to blog about strolling the Vatican or Forum Romana. All I can do is chuckle slightly and pray to the patron saint of Kleenex.


Seinfeld: Back to Stand Up

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/10/12/seinfeld-back-to-stand-up/feed/ 0 Mixed Reality http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/02/14/mixed-reality/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/02/14/mixed-reality/#comments Wed, 14 Feb 2007 11:55:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/02/14/mixed-reality/
Sitting in a Harvard lecture on Secondlife, while virtually sitting in virtual Harvard in Secondlife.

From Virtual Worlds, Real People and Learning, a presentation (ppt slides and mp3) given by John Lester at the New Media Consortium. John is the Community and Education Manager at Linden Lab, the makers of Second Life. The presentation gives a good introduction to Second Life, how people interact with and through it, and a few of the learning possibilities people are utilising. For deeper enquiry into the education potential of SL try the Second Life Education Wiki.

The picture is also great example of what I think should be called World 3*; a virtual world with common touch points to the real- synchronous places, individuals and events. With a palmpc, Googlemaps, GPS and World 3 the possibilities for mixed mode experiences are truly magnificent- and I’m sure most lie beyond our capacity to predict. It’s awesome we get to live in this period of rapidly unfolding consumer technology and new potentials.

* From Karl Popper’s philosophical theory of reality that includes three interacting worlds.

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/02/14/mixed-reality/feed/ 0 Minority Report Technology http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/02/08/minority-report-technology/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/02/08/minority-report-technology/#comments Thu, 08 Feb 2007 11:54:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/02/08/minority-report-technology/ A multi-touch driven computer screen. Now all we need are the precogs.
(Thanks Tom W)

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/02/08/minority-report-technology/feed/ 0 ABC Linkdump- January 15 http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/01/15/abc-linkdump-january-15/ http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/01/15/abc-linkdump-january-15/#comments Mon, 15 Jan 2007 12:32:00 +0000 admin http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/01/15/abc-linkdump-january-15/ As Nostradamus did so prophecy for this 2007th year.

The fugitives, fire from the sky on the pikes:
Conflict near the ravens frolicking,
from land they cry for aid and sweet linkdump.

Uncannily accurate. Sweet salvation in the best of Xmas-NY internetage.

AJ- The Motherload of awesome learning resources . Berkeley Courses With Video Lectures, Free Online Documentaries, Education With Podcasting etc. The future of learning is now.
AJ- Citizenium; an experts wikipedia, proposed and lead by Larry Sanger one of the founders of Wikipedia, “will soon attempt to unseat Wikipedia as the go-to destination for general information online”. Of course Wp’s entry on Citizenium.
AJ- Directors Notes is an awesome site promoting independent filmmakers. Every week they release a short film and the next week they have a discussion with the Director covering aspects of film making from concept to completion.
AJ- 20,000+ of your favourite tv shows, music videos and anime online . It’s another copyright infringing, low-resolution version of The Future of Entertainment.
AJ- A great podcast with Richard Linkater. Linklater made Waking Life (made my favourite film), as well as A Scanner Darkly, Fast Food Nation, Dazed and Confused to name a few. via the movie show podcast on a FBi Sydney.
AJ- Get some internet skillz with The Ultimate Google Search Guide. Zen mind, noobs mind.
AJ- Parking Idiots in Singapore is a blog testing whether the author can maintain his communalist rage at minor social infractions beyond the 500th post. Unintentionally hilarious.

]]> http://arthurjosephson.com/2007/01/15/abc-linkdump-january-15/feed/ 1