On the surface, saving images for the web can be a pretty straightforward process. However, if you dig deeper there’s a wealth of information and techniques you might be missing out on.
This article will focus primarily on the diverse features of Photoshop’s “Save for Web & Devices” command along with some best practices related to saving images that are optimized for web use. More…
Watch it, people. Just because information is second only in volume to pollution on this planet, it does not mean all info is available for you to use and then slap your name on to it like you wrote it or something. Plagiarism, for those of you who missed that day in class, is when you take someone else’s work and falsely claim it as your own. It’s very bad, and it makes you look like an ass@$%*.
The NY Times has an article up about plagiarism and the tech-savvy information generation. The lines are blurry for Gen-Y, apparently.
If you’d like to avoid being an uninformed cheating ass@#$%, the following links are helpful.
I must go. The line above regarding information and the volume of it is freaking me out. Can digital information have volume at all? And is it possible to measure the volume of every printed word on the planet? What about all the still-intact newspapers in old landfills? Do those count as existing information? Crap!
The list is broken down into the following categories:
Small Business and Entrepreneur Blogs and Resources
Marketing Blogs and Solutions
General Business Blogs
Human Resources and Ethics Blogs
MBA Survival Guides and Business Career Blogs
Economy Trends and News
Investing News and Financial Blogs
Resources for Business Women
Online Business Blogs and Tools
Management Resources and Information
Harvard Business Heavy Hitters
Being so deeply smitten with brick-and-mortar university campuses, it’s likely I will forever be a hard sell when it comes to the whole online learning extravaganza. Viewing online education from strictly budgetary and global society angles, then yes, I’m totally on board with the shift toward online education. And I’m even one of those perfect-for-online-coursework nerds who is intense and focused and driven toward knowledge-consumption like a surfer is driven to a perfect set at dawn; it’s cold and dark and I haven’t had enough sleep but I can’t not get it done.
Janine Yancho Swenson wrote an article, How Online Universities Really Stack Up about the state of online higher education today, including her own experience with an online graduate program.
Global colleges and universities are competing for the title of “Ivy League virtual university.” But debate rages as to whether online education — also called distance learning — can deliver the same quality of degree as traditional schooling.
In 2007, a study conducted by the U.S. Department of Education determined that 12.2 million students were enrolled in 11,200 college-level distance learning programs. Of these students, 77 percent completed their programs either away from campus or away from their instructors. More…
Researchers analyzed 30,000 teens and the relationship between screen time (tv, video games, surfing the net, etc.) and the teens’ tendency toward experiencing routine backache and headaches. The study was just released, and the findings boil down to this: cumulative screen time, even in young, healthy bodies, causes headaches and back pain.
I’m pretty sure this can easily be applied to college students and full-fledged adults as well. Ergonomics, massage therapy, and a reduction in screen time: Know it. Live it. Love it.
One more reason to be paranoid and mistrusting: virus-writing bastards who want to send their flying monkeys out to the ether and into your helpless, naïve little computer, wrecking college, career, and any hope of a happy future for you and your currently non-existent spouse and children. How could you let this happen? When are you going to grow up and take responsibility for all factors within your control?
Not yet paranoid enough to make you feel the urge to be responsible? Watch this SANS security expert discussing security issues with modern technological gadgetry:
No one could ever hope to describe me as a rabid Star Trek fan. Ever. It’s a cool show, interesting concept, blah blah blah. But I never have and never will go out of my way to sit still and watch it. (I do confess to having a bit of a crush on Spock; what girl can resist a tall, dark, pointy-eared man who’s saturated with logic and utterly lacking in emotion? What am I, made of stone?)
The best thing Star Trek has to offer (excepting Spock, obviously) is not Next Generation’s Picard walking along a beach in a disturbingly non-Shakespearian banana hammock*, but the fact that the first season of the show came on as a flippy little wisp of a wacky television series seemingly destined for cancellation, and has engrained itself inextricably in the pop-culture knowledge of several generations of television viewers.
Where are the original Star Trek cast members now? Alive and well in society’s cellular makeup. I have seen probably less than ten episodes of Star Trek (either series), and I am aware, down to my ribosomes, of all that is Star Trek. Upsetting to be sure, but a phenomenon nonetheless.
Is there any other television series that has utilized synthetic fabric to such an extreme degree? No. And I find it hard to believe that any other series has inspired for-credit college courses in cultural anthropology and linguistics, including: “Xenolinguistics: The Anthropology of Alien Language.” The students were required to learn Tribble, Klingon, Vulcan and Romulan, as well as creating their own fictitious language. I don’t feel like I need to learn those languages, but that’s just damn cool.
I think this is where I say, “Live long and prosper,” and I do the Vulcan hand sign thing. (Which I can totally pull off, by the way.)
Here’s a list of all the stuff you thought you didn’t know about Star Trek. I knew more than I should have. Click it and it’ll get bigger and actually readable.
*I have it on good authority that there’s an episode in which Picard does a flashback/memory/holodeck thing and is walking along a dreamy beach wearing a very small Speedo-type get-up. I searched the Internet and am so happy to have found no such image to share. You’ll thank me later.
Wired magazine calls him “the explainer.” Michael Wesch is a social anthropologist who teaches at Kansas State University. In his 15-minute TED talk, he explains the effects of media (social and otherwise) on learners, on humanity, and on the classroom environment.
Wesch also manages to squeeze in a bit telling other educators how to take advantage of all the media and the technology humans have available as a way to make students more “knowledge-able” than just knowledgeable. It’s not just memorizing facts and theories anymore—all the information is out there, students need to learn how to find it and ponder it and bring their own thoughts and theories to the table.
Watch it. It takes about 15 minutes; that’s less time than it takes to drink a cup of coffee. And no way one cup of caffeine will blow your mind like Michael Wesch can.
As of yesterday, students, scholars, faculty, and librarians needing to research the fields of Islamic Studies, Social Work, Criminology, and the Classics have available to them the Oxford Bibliographies Online. The first four modules were launched on Monday, with more to come.
In recent years, the explosion of original research and its increasing accessibility through new technologies is a blessing for scholars—but also a tremendous challenge. For faculty, students and librarians querying new areas of research, the most pressing challenge for researchers at all levels is sifting through and managing the immense amount of material available online. “With the growing ease of digital access and dissemination, scholars and students are increasingly overwhelmed by the enormous volume of academic material available to them,” noted Nigel Portwood, OUP’s Chief Executive. “The need for responsible and sophisticated filters has become critical. Oxford Bibliographies Online represents a significant step forward in providing meaningful navigation through the vast body of research material accessible on the web.”
Oxford Bibliographies Online—a series of intuitive and easy-to-use “ultimate reading lists” is designed to help users navigate vast seas of information. OUP’s first online-only product goes beyond search algorithms to present bibliographies in several disciplines selected by leading subject experts and vetted by the highest professional standards.
According to Casper Grathwohl, VP, Publisher of Reference and Online Products, “An increasing amount of scholarship is bypassing traditional publishing channels. OBO is one of several ways in which publishers are extending their reach beyond their own publishing models to validate good research in a new world of unregulated online scholarship.” Oxford Bibliographies Online will help scholars increase productivity, save time and elevate the quality of their work, while enabling them to more efficiently engage with platforms like Google Books.
I rarely cheer the idea of having to pay for information, especially research (scholarly or otherwise). However, I dislike the gallons of time I’ve spent with a numb ass and eyes glued open in a trancelike attitude, searching and searching for the articles I want and require until everything either looks perfect or utterly worthless.
And, lest we forget, we all pay money for books, journals and access to the Internet. I’m fairly certain that those all count as paying for the information we want and need. And, seriously, it’s worth the money if it will cost you less time. We are very busy people! Also, you can try it out for free before you jump.
“A website + desktop app for people who want to learn, but lack motivation.” So say the Popling folks. It’s free, so trying it out won’t cost you anything. Go ahead, give it a whirl.
Lifelong fan of index-card learning that I am, I support the basic idea. I threw out (recycled, sorry) at least three full grocery bags of standard, white, lined, 3 ½ by 5, index cards when I finally felt I was done with school for a while. It took me longer to ditch the cards than it did for me to cleanse my bookcase of superfluous science and math reference texts. (I really like school and have a hard time letting go. It’s sad, in a pathetic, non-poignant way.)
However, a pop-up index card showing up on my screen would never work for me. I’m such a focused little sucker, and except for my very first semester of college, have never had a problem motivating myself to study. There were several Saturday-night interventions involving the housemates and/or the whole dorm hall peer-pressuring me into going to a party and laying off the books for a few hours.
Because I am such a badass focus-er, I dislike being interrupted. Seriously. I will rip your throat out. I allow only three interruptions without annihilating the messenger: fire, choking, spurting flesh wound. If it’s a slow bleed, you should probably wait because I’m only interested if it’s arterial.
But that’s me. I’m nowhere near normal. Most people would appreciate the Popling technology. Especially unmotivated humans with short attention spans.
All right, all right. Sorries all around (especially to my clearly neglected progeny). Popling’s good points: They have over 10,000 flash card sets covering 150 topics. And should you want to create your own set, you can do that, too.
