In 2000, Tom Wolfe published a series of essays with a catchy title: Hooking Up. For Wolfe, who had scored two best-selling novels with The Bonfire of the Vanities (1987) and A Man in Full (1998), the collection represented a brief return to his nonfiction roots. Wolfe had been a pioneer of the so-called New Journalism in the 1960s and 1970s, producing trenchant and often hilarious portraits of any American who caught his eye: hippies, astronauts, architects, and more. More...
Harnessing the Collective Intelligence of Humans and Machines
Irving Wladawsky-Berger, 2018/06/05
This is an overview of Thomas Malone's book Superminds: The Surprising Power of People and Computers Thinking Together. Malone clearly builds on concepts like collective intelligence and the wisdom of crowds, defining a supermind as “a group of individuals acting in ways that seem intelligent.” The interesting twist here is that the individuals in question might be both humans and computers. More...
Higher Education, Upping the Ante
Review of Derek Bok's Universities in the Marketplace: The Commercialization of Higher Education. The argument is familiar. Universities are in need of ever more money, and so the prospects offered by commercial enterprises are alluring. More...
Une nouvelle proposition de loi visant à renforcer le soutien des collectivités aux librairies indépendantes labellisées vient d'être enregistrée à la présidence de l'Assemblée. Sa copie (presque) conforme est déjà sur le bureau du Sénat depuis avril. Plus...
By Joshua Kim. There are those amongst us that are guaranteed readers of Mark Kurlansky’s latest book Milk!: A 10,000-Year Food Fracas. We have read and loved all of Kurlansky’s previous deep dives into the history, biology, economics, politics, genetics, and literature of specific foods. More...
By Joshua Kim. Eleven hours and 2 minutes is the time that it takes to listen to the audiobook version of God Save Texas. Those hours will be amongst the most enjoyable 11 hours you will spend this year. More...
By Barbara Fister. Climbing Mount To Be Read, one book at a time. This one is a keeper. More...
The struggle between piety and libido in the age of mechanical reproduction is at the core of Amy Werbel's Lust on Trial: Censorship and the Rise of American Obscenity in the Age of Anthony Comstock, writes Scott McLemee. More...
Scanning Text Books - a New Form of Intellectual Property Theft?
Well of course it was inevitable that the issue of textbook copying would emerge. Publishers will face the same issues as those currently faced by the music and video industry, which is why I have given developments in those fields space in this newsletter. More...
Bookmarklets
This one has been around for a while, but Rod sent the link around and I think it's worth passing along. Bookmarklets are little bits of Javascript you insert instead of URLs in your bookmarks (or favorites) list. More...
/https%3A%2F%2Fprofilepics.canalblog.com%2Fprofilepics%2F1%2F0%2F1076071.jpg)
