Categories

Tuesday, February 5, 2008

A diverse group of approximately 25 people gathered at the Johnson County Library on Monday to participate in reference librarian Scott Vieira’s class, Wikiwhatia? Wikipedia.

Scott opened the session by sharing a disparaging quote from Robert McHenry (former editor-in-chief of Encyclopedia Britannica) comparing Wikipedia to a public restroom. He then shared a quote from Andrew Keen, author of The Cult of the Amateur, in which he stated Wikipedia is the blind leading the blind. Scott shared Wikipedia usage data from a 2007 Pew Internet study showing 36% of adults have consulted Wikipedia and that that Wikipedia receives 10,000-30,000 searches per second. Scott also pointed out that Wikipedia now has over two million articles in English alone (over nine million articles in 250 languages). So there is a discrepancy here, lots of critics and lots of use.

Scott then shared some historical information in order to provide a context for understanding Wikipedia. This included some important names and dates in the history of encyclopedias… including Pliny the Elder (23-79 C.E.) who published 37 Volumes of Natural History, and Joachim Sterck van Ringelbergh (c. 1499-1556) who first used the term encyclopedia, and then d’Alembert and Diderot who published 17 volumes of their French Encyclopedia from 1751-1765. Encyclopedia Britannica was first published in Scotland in serial format 1768-1771.

Scott also discussed more recent history, sharing a photo of Ward Cunningham –who is credited with being the inventor of wiki software. Wikipedia was founded on Jan 15, 2001 by Larry Sanger and Jimmy Wales. Sanger left Wikipedia in 2002 and founded Citizendium in 2007 a complementary project which now has 4500 articles.

After the historical perspective, the class moved into using Wikipedia. Everyone in the audience had used Wikipedia. The class explored the content of Wikipedia, realising there is a whole lot going on. Scott demonstrated that the article about “frogs” for example, is semi-protected. The “history of science” article was examined, including the history of changes. Discussion covered how people contribute, who contributes and edits. The group also talked about Wikipedia bots, which aid in routine tasks in a semi-automated or automated fashion.

A discussion about teachers, school media specialists and students regarding their use of Wikipedia ensued. Some teachers and school media specialists are negative about Wikipedia, but Scott’s hope is that they will use it to start a discussion about the need to evaluate and critically think about information (even when it’s from more traditionally reviewed and edited sources).

An unanswered question from an audience member was, “What was the first Wikipedia article?”

Discussion topics from Scott to audience were as follows:

• Do you think Wikipedia is less accurate than published resources and how important is that accuracy to you?
• How do we determine authority on a subject? How important is it that an article be written by an expert? How is Wikipedia changing our idea of what an authority is?
• Currency – the ability to publish immediately – what are the advantages and what are the disadvantages?
• What do we think about the content selection in Wikipedia?
• Should Wikipedia be used by librarians?
• What do you think about the future of Wikipedia?

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Vassar Clements, age 77, a legendary fiddle player who took bluegrass music from an obscure cultural art form to a mainstream influence, and who played on over 2000 albums, passed away at his Goodlettsville, Tennessee home August 16th 2005 at 8:35 am Nashville time (CST) from lung cancer which had metastasized to his liver and brain.

Mr. Clements taught himself to play the fiddle at age 7, and though he had no formal training was recognized as one of the world’s most versatile fiddle players and was considered a virtuoso. The first song he learned was “There’s an Old Spinning Wheel in the Parlor”. He described his talent saying, “It was God’s gift, something born in me. I was too dumb to learn it any other way. I listened to the (Grand Ole) Opry some. I’d pick it up one note at a time. I was young, with plenty of time and I didn’t give up. You’d come home from school, do your lessons and that’s it. No other distractions. I don’t read music. I play what I hear.”

He didn’t always earn his living playing music, though. In the mid-1960s he was employed briefly at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where he worked on plumbing. He also performed several other blue-collar jobs including work in a Georgia paper mill, as switchman for Atlantic Coast Railroad; he even sold insurance and once owned a potato chip franchise.

In his 50 year career he played with artists ranging from Woody Herman, and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band to The Grateful Dead, Linda Ronstadt and Paul McCartney, and earned at least five Grammy nominations and numerous professional accolades. He once recorded with the pop group the Monkees by happenstance, when he stayed behind after an earlier recording session. He also appeared in Robert Altman‘s 1975 film “Nashville”.

His 2005 Grammy award for best country instrumental performance was for “Earl’s Breakdown,” by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and featured Mr. Clements, Earl Scruggs, Randy Scruggs and Jerry Douglas.

Mr. Clements, whose last performance was February 4 in Jamestown, N.Y., was hospitalized earlier this year for 18 days to receive chemotherapy and other treatment. He had been diagnosed in March 2005.

Born in Kinard, South Carolina, his musical career began at age 14 when he associated with Bill Monroe, and later officially joined the Blue Grass Boys band where he remained for seven years. In 1957 he joined bluegrass band Jim & Jesse McReynolds where he remained until 1962. In 1967 he returned to Nashville where he became a much sought after studio musician.

After a brief touring stint with Faron Young he joined John Hartford‘s Dobrolic Plectral Society in 1971 when he met guitarist Norman Blake and Dobro player Tut Taylor, and recorded Aereo Plain, a widely acclaimed newgrass album that helped broaden the bluegrass market and sound. After less than a year he joined Earl Scruggs, who first earned widespread renown for playing the theme to sitcom The Beverly Hillbillies.

His 1972 work with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band on their album Will the Circle Be Unbroken earned him even wider acclaim, and later worked with the Grateful Dead’s Wake of the Flood and Jimmy Buffett‘s A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean.

Though he played numerous instruments, Mr. Clements indicated that he chose the fiddle over guitar recalling that, “I picked up a guitar and fiddle and tried them both out. The guitar was pretty easy, but I couldn’t get nothing out of the fiddle. So every time I’d see those instruments sitting side by side, I’d grab that fiddle.”

Big band and swing music were considerable influences upon his style and musical development, and he said that, “Bands like Glenn Miller, Les Brown, Tommy Dorsey, Harry James and Artie Shaw were very popular when I was a kid. I always loved rhythm, so I guess in the back of my mind the swing and jazz subconsciously comes out when I play, because when I was learning I was always trying to emulate the big-band sounds I heard on my fiddle.”

His last album ‘Livin’ With the Blues’, released in 2004, featured guest appearances by Elvin Bishop, Norton Buffalo, Maria Muldaur and others.

Mr. Clements’ daughter Midge Cranor wrote on his website [1] that “As I was still holding his hand his breathing stopped. I looked at the clock and it was 7:20 am.”

Mr. Clements’ remains have been transported to Bond Memorial Chapel, 1098 Weston Drive, Mt. Juliet, TN 37122; (615) 773-2663.

Saturday, October 6, 2007

Few artists ever penetrate the subconscious level of American culture the way RuPaul Andre Charles did with the 1993 album Supermodel of the World. It was groundbreaking not only because in the midst of the Grunge phenomenon did Charles have a dance hit on MTV, but because he did it as RuPaul, formerly known as Starbooty, a supermodel drag queen with a message: love everyone. A duet with Elton John, an endorsement deal with MAC cosmetics, an eponymous talk show on VH-1 and roles in film propelled RuPaul into the new millennium.

In July, RuPaul’s movie Starrbooty began playing at film festivals and it is set to be released on DVD October 31st. Wikinews reporter David Shankbone recently spoke with RuPaul by telephone in Los Angeles, where she is to appear on stage for DIVAS Simply Singing!, a benefit for HIV-AIDS.

DS: How are you doing?

RP: Everything is great. I just settled into my new hotel room in downtown Los Angeles. I have never stayed downtown, so I wanted to try it out. L.A. is one of those traditional big cities where nobody goes downtown, but they are trying to change that.

DS: How do you like Los Angeles?

RP: I love L.A. I’m from San Diego, and I lived here for six years. It took me four years to fall in love with it and then those last two years I had fallen head over heels in love with it. Where are you from?

DS: Me? I’m from all over. I have lived in 17 cities, six states and three countries.

RP: Where were you when you were 15?

DS: Georgia, in a small town at the bottom of Fulton County called Palmetto.

RP: When I was in Georgia I went to South Fulton Technical School. The last high school I ever went to was…actually, I don’t remember the name of it.

DS: Do you miss Atlanta?

RP: I miss the Atlanta that I lived in. That Atlanta is long gone. It’s like a childhood friend who underwent head to toe plastic surgery and who I don’t recognize anymore. It’s not that I don’t like it; I do like it. It’s just not the Atlanta that I grew up with. It looks different because it went through that boomtown phase and so it has been transient. What made Georgia Georgia to me is gone. The last time I stayed in a hotel there my room was overlooking a construction site, and I realized the building that was torn down was a building that I had seen get built. And it had been torn down to build a new building. It was something you don’t expect to see in your lifetime.

DS: What did that signify to you?

RP: What it showed me is that the mentality in Atlanta is that much of their history means nothing. For so many years they did a good job preserving. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a preservationist. It’s just an interesting observation.

DS: In 2004 when you released your third album, Red Hot, it received a good deal of play in the clubs and on dance radio, but very little press coverage. On your blog you discussed how you felt betrayed by the entertainment industry and, in particular, the gay press. What happened?

RP: Well, betrayed might be the wrong word. ‘Betrayed’ alludes to an idea that there was some kind of a promise made to me, and there never was. More so, I was disappointed. I don’t feel like it was a betrayal. Nobody promises anything in show business and you understand that from day one.

But, I don’t know what happened. It seemed I couldn’t get press on my album unless I was willing to play into the role that the mainstream press has assigned to gay people, which is as servants of straight ideals.

DS: Do you mean as court jesters?

RP: Not court jesters, because that also plays into that mentality. We as humans find it easy to categorize people so that we know how to feel comfortable with them; so that we don’t feel threatened. If someone falls outside of that categorization, we feel threatened and we search our psyche to put them into a category that we feel comfortable with. The mainstream media and the gay press find it hard to accept me as…just…

DS: Everything you are?

RP: Everything that I am.

DS: It seems like years ago, and my recollection might be fuzzy, but it seems like I read a mainstream media piece that talked about how you wanted to break out of the RuPaul ‘character’ and be seen as more than just RuPaul.

RP: Well, RuPaul is my real name and that’s who I am and who I have always been. There’s the product RuPaul that I have sold in business. Does the product feel like it’s been put into a box? Could you be more clear? It’s a hard question to answer.

DS: That you wanted to be seen as more than just RuPaul the drag queen, but also for the man and versatile artist that you are.

RP: That’s not on target. What other people think of me is not my business. What I do is what I do. How people see me doesn’t change what I decide to do. I don’t choose projects so people don’t see me as one thing or another. I choose projects that excite me. I think the problem is that people refuse to understand what drag is outside of their own belief system. A friend of mine recently did the Oprah show about transgendered youth. It was obvious that we, as a culture, have a hard time trying to understand the difference between a drag queen, transsexual, and a transgender, yet we find it very easy to know the difference between the American baseball league and the National baseball league, when they are both so similar. We’ll learn the difference to that. One of my hobbies is to research and go underneath ideas to discover why certain ones stay in place while others do not. Like Adam and Eve, which is a flimsy fairytale story, yet it is something that people believe; what, exactly, keeps it in place?

DS: What keeps people from knowing the difference between what is real and important, and what is not?

RP: Our belief systems. If you are a Christian then your belief system doesn’t allow for transgender or any of those things, and you then are going to have a vested interest in not understanding that. Why? Because if one peg in your belief system doesn’t work or doesn’t fit, the whole thing will crumble. So some people won’t understand the difference between a transvestite and transsexual. They will not understand that no matter how hard you force them to because it will mean deconstructing their whole belief system. If they understand Adam and Eve is a parable or fairytale, they then have to rethink their entire belief system.

As to me being seen as whatever, I was more likely commenting on the phenomenon of our culture. I am creative, and I am all of those things you mention, and doing one thing out there and people seeing it, it doesn’t matter if people know all that about me or not.

DS: Recently I interviewed Natasha Khan of the band Bat for Lashes, and she is considered by many to be one of the real up-and-coming artists in music today. Her band was up for the Mercury Prize in England. When I asked her where she drew inspiration from, she mentioned what really got her recently was the 1960’s and 70’s psychedelic drag queen performance art, such as seen in Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis, The Cockettes and Paris Is Burning. What do you think when you hear an artist in her twenties looking to that era of drag performance art for inspiration?

RP: The first thing I think of when I hear that is that young kids are always looking for the ‘rock and roll’ answer to give. It’s very clever to give that answer. She’s asked that a lot: “Where do you get your inspiration?” And what she gave you is the best sound bite she could; it’s a really a good sound bite. I don’t know about Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis, but I know about The Cockettes and Paris Is Burning. What I think about when I hear that is there are all these art school kids and when they get an understanding of how the press works, and how your sound bite will affect the interview, they go for the best.

DS: You think her answer was contrived?

RP: I think all answers are really contrived. Everything is contrived; the whole world is an illusion. Coming up and seeing kids dressed in Goth or hip hop clothes, when you go beneath all that, you have to ask: what is that really? You understand they are affected, pretentious. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s how we see things. I love Paris Is Burning.

DS: Has the Iraq War affected you at all?

RP: Absolutely. It’s not good, I don’t like it, and it makes me want to enjoy this moment a lot more and be very appreciative. Like when I’m on a hike in a canyon and it smells good and there aren’t bombs dropping.

DS: Do you think there is a lot of apathy in the culture?

RP: There’s apathy, and there’s a lot of anti-depressants and that probably lends a big contribution to the apathy. We have iPods and GPS systems and all these things to distract us.

DS: Do you ever work the current political culture into your art?

RP: No, I don’t. Every time I bat my eyelashes it’s a political statement. The drag I come from has always been a critique of our society, so the act is defiant in and of itself in a patriarchal society such as ours. It’s an act of treason.

DS: What do you think of young performance artists working in drag today?

RP: I don’t know of any. I don’t know of any. Because the gay culture is obsessed with everything straight and femininity has been under attack for so many years, there aren’t any up and coming drag artists. Gay culture isn’t paying attention to it, and straight people don’t either. There aren’t any drag clubs to go to in New York. I see more drag clubs in Los Angeles than in New York, which is so odd because L.A. has never been about club culture.

DS: Michael Musto told me something that was opposite of what you said. He said he felt that the younger gays, the ones who are up-and-coming, are over the body fascism and more willing to embrace their feminine sides.

RP: I think they are redefining what femininity is, but I still think there is a lot of negativity associated with true femininity. Do boys wear eyeliner and dress in skinny jeans now? Yes, they do. But it’s still a heavily patriarchal culture and you never see two men in Star magazine, or the Queer Eye guys at a premiere, the way you see Ellen and her girlfriend—where they are all, ‘Oh, look how cute’—without a negative connotation to it. There is a definite prejudice towards men who use femininity as part of their palette; their emotional palette, their physical palette. Is that changing? It’s changing in ways that don’t advance the cause of femininity. I’m not talking frilly-laced pink things or Hello Kitty stuff. I’m talking about goddess energy, intuition and feelings. That is still under attack, and it has gotten worse. That’s why you wouldn’t get someone covering the RuPaul album, or why they say people aren’t tuning into the Katie Couric show. Sure, they can say ‘Oh, RuPaul’s album sucks’ and ‘Katie Couric is awful’; but that’s not really true. It’s about what our culture finds important, and what’s important are things that support patriarchal power. The only feminine thing supported in this struggle is Pamela Anderson and Jessica Simpson, things that support our patriarchal culture.

Sunday, April 24, 2005

New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) announced last Wednesday that it has agreed definitively to merge with Chicago-based Archipelago Exchange (ArcaEx) and form a new publicly traded, for-profit company known as NYSE Group. This announcement was followed two days later by NASDAQ®, which independently announced a definitive agreement to purchase Instinet Group.

Archipelago and Instinet are innovative e-trading (electronic trading) companies, and formerly were the two largest American rivals to NYSE and NASDAQ, in recent years taking increasingly large portions of their market share. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and other regulatory agencies still have to review and approve the transactions, particularly with respect to US securities law and antitrust law, in order to ensure that the marketplace remains lawful and competitive.

Other pending issues for NASDAQ include obtaining the approval of Instinet shareholders, as well as customary closing conditions. NYSE must obtain the approval of its members and Archipelago shareholders.

These changes, a reaction to increased e-trading competition and a changed regulatory environment, will result in NASDAQ and NYSE trading each other’s shares and attempting to grab market share, which many hope will drive down transaction costs and ultimately benefit consumers. However, at least one commentator, Dan Ackman writing in Forbes, has noted that the trading commission at the NYSE currently averages less than a nickel (US$0.05) per share, and was less enthusiastic about potential efficiency gains from electronic trading at the exchange.

The transactions are also intended to make the two leading American stock exchanges more globally competitive with such exchanges as the London Stock Exchange, the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, the Toronto Stock Exchange, and the Australian Stock Exchange located in Sydney.

Thursday, April 11, 2019

In two studies presented on Monday at the annual meeting of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in Orlando, Florida in the United States, scientists have disclosed new steps toward using natural adhesives made by the dusky Arion slug (Arion subfuscus) in medical applications such as in closing skin wounds and reducing scarring.

When threatened, the dusky Arion slug secretes an unusual glue, making itself a difficult target for predators. This glue remains both sticky and flexible and works even when the surface the slug is on is wet. Previous studies have shown that, unlike many artificial adhesives, Arion slug glue is non-toxic to mammalian tissue.

Scientist Rebecca Falconer, an Ithaca College undergraduate who led one of the two studies, said “Typical sutures like staples and stitches often lead to scarring and create holes in the skin that could increase the chance of infection after surgery […] Understanding the roles of adhesive proteins in the slug glue would aid in the creation of a medical adhesive that can move and stretch yet still retain its strength and adhesiveness.”

In her set of experiments, Falconer observed eleven proteins found only in slug glue and used DNA recombination to produce usable amounts of each of these proteins. Specifically, she produced complementary DNA sequences (cDNA) for each protein, which are stretches of DNA with all the pieces not necessary for producing the protein removed. She then spliced these into circular DNA sequences called plasmids, which she inserted into bacteria, whose natural cellular machinery began to produce the proteins in quantity. She then analyzed the three-dimensional structures that the protein molecules form with each other and with other substances that make them work.

Christopher Gallego-Lazo, also an Ithaca undergrad, evaluated glue from the dusky Arion slug by focusing on the chemical bonds within the glue and the way they affect the glue’s deformability. Gallego-Lazo found that slight changes in these chemical bonds could alter the strength of the slug glue.

Gallego-Lazo said, “Few studies on biological adhesives have identified the exact nature of the bonds holding the glue together […] This knowledge can guide the development of an organic synthetic adhesive that would reduce the risk of infection and scarring compared to stitches and staples and could be applied rapidly and simply.”

Falconer and Gallego-Lazo both performed their research in the laboratory of Dr. Andrew Smith.

Wednesday, December 28, 2005Black American women living in communities with high poverty rates are significantly less likely to be screened for cervical cancer, a study finds.

The Harvard School of Public Health’s Geetanjali Dabral Datta investigated the relationship between individual characteristics and larger socioeconomic factors and cervical cancer screening rates. The Febreuary 1 issue of Cancer carries the study. More than 40,000 black women from across the United States participated in the Black Women’s Health Study.

“African-American women have twice the mortality rate from cervical cancer as white women,” said Elizabeth Ward, the director of the American Cancer Society. “Researchers need to investigate how those differences are related to socioeconomic status. One of the big factors that may account for this finding is access to high-quality medical care. Often communities that have high poverty rates either lack access to good quality care, or people have to travel longer distances to obtain high-quality care.”

David L. Katz at Yale University’s School of Medicine said; “While this finding is not surprising, it is noteworthy just the same. No one should die of cervical cancer, because a simple screening test reliably finds the condition in its earliest stages when cure is almost universally achievable. Yet, several thousand deaths from this cancer occur each year in the U.S.”

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

Yesterday, La La Land, directed by Damien Chazelle, received a record-equalling fourteen Academy Awards nomination, tied with 1950s movie All About Eve and 1990’s Titanic. Mel Gibson’s HackSaw Ridge based on true story bagged six nominations.

The movie, featuring Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone, received nominations in all major categories. Gosling and Stone received nominations for Best Actor and Actress respectively. The other nominations include Best Picture, Director, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film-editing, Original Score, Production Design, Sound Editing, Sound Mixing and Original Screenplay. Two songs from the movie, Audition (The Fools Who Dream) and City of Stars, received nominations for best original song. Lionsgate studio received 26 nominations — more than any other studio.

Andrew Garfield, who previously starred in The Amazing Spider-Man along with Emma Stone, competes with Gosling for his role in Hacksaw Ridge. Based on the true story of US combat medic Desmond Doss, the movie has received six nominations including Best Picture, Actor in Leading Role, Best Director, Film Editing, Sound Editing and Sound Mixing — La La Land also receiving nominations in these categories. Lion and Manchester by the Sea also received six nominations.

Author J.K. Rowling’s screenwriting début Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them starring Eddie Redmayne received two nominations for costume design and production design. Redmayne won the award for best actor two years ago for playing Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything and was nominated last year for The Danish Girl.

This year, six black actors received nominations setting a new record. The hashtag #OscarsSoWhite was mentioned lot of times on Twitter as no non-white received nominations for the past two years. April Reign, creator of the hashtag, said “Everyone is saying the Oscars are more diverse this year. No they’re not. They’re blacker, but where are the Latinx movies, the LGBTQIA movies? The Asian American/Pacific Islander community has had a worse year. We can’t forget just because we have black nominees this year.” Bradford Young, cinematographer of Arrival, is the first African-American to be nominated and Joi McMillon – editor of Moonlight – is the first non-white woman to receive nomination. Mahershala Ali, Naomie Harris, Viola Davis, Dev Patel, and Octavia Spencer are the non-white people who are nominated for their supporting roles.

Disney’s Zootopia and Moana received nominations for Best Animated Feature film. Pixar’s Finding Dory did not receive this nomination. Last year, Pixar’s The Good Dinosaur also missed the nomination but Pixar’s Inside Out, directed by Pete Docter, won the award.

Manchester by the Sea‘s nomination made the e-commerce website Amazon.com the first movie streaming company to earn a nomination for the Best Picture category. Arrival bagged eight nominations. Florence Foster Jenkins starring Meryl Streep nominated for Best Actress earned her 20th career Oscars nomination.

The award ceremony is to be held on February 26 to be hosted by Jimmy Kimmel.

Wednesday, May 11, 2016

Comply or Die, the racehorse who won the 2008 Grand National has died at the age of 17. His death was announced by his former trainer, David Pipe. He died over at the weekend in Gloucestershire, where he had been staying with jockey Timmy Murphy. He was cremated on Monday and his ashes will return to Murphy.

Murphy was the jockey in the saddle when Comply or Die won the 2008 Grand National. Speaking to the Press Association, he spoke about the horse’s death. He said, “He was part of the furniture at home so it’s very sad. He gave me the greatest day of my career, obviously that can never be taken away. He paraded at Cheltenham and Aintree and was getting ready to do some dressage in the summer. I’m not actually sure how he died, to be honest, but it wasn’t nice to come home to. He was cremated on Monday. He was a happy horse and he was also very clever.”

During his racing career he made £798,809 in prize-money after winning a total of eight races.

The 2008 Grand National victory was his greatest achievement and he almost matched it when he came second place in 2009. He retired in 2011 but remained active, often being paraded at race grounds such as Aintree and Cheltenham. He also participated in some hunting activities. Pipe said, “Since his retirement he had been a lead-horse at Timmy Murphy’s establishment before trying his hand at dressage, a discipline in which he had proven very successful”.

Tributes have been paid to Comply or Die on social media by horse racing fans with several tweeting their appreciation and memories.