Archive for September, 2009
« Previous EntriesBucknell U. Investigates Letters Saying That Students Owe for Downloads
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009Bucknell U. Investigates Letters Saying That Students Owe for Downloads
More than 300 students at Bucknell University got hit with letters from a collection agency last week charging that they had illegally downloaded material from Cayman Academic Resources and must pay $500 “to settle this matter.”
Several of the students who got the letter contacted university officials [...]
Florida Lightens the Financial (and Physical) Burden of Textbooks
Saturday, September 26th, 2009Florida Lightens the Financial (and Physical) Burden of Textbooks
In an effort to bring down the cost of learning materials, a new project will allow Florida college students to get digital versions of some of their textbooks free of charge, The St. Petersberg Times reported on Thursday.
The undertaking, called Orange Grove Texts Plus, is being spearheaded [...]
College Bookstores Hope to Turn Their Web Sites Into E-Book Portals
Saturday, September 26th, 2009College Bookstores Hope to Turn Their Web Sites Into E-Book Portals
College bookstores are taking steps to turn their Web sites into e-book portals, hoping to stay relevant as publishers make a push to electronic textbooks.
A project announced this week by bookstore associations in the United States and Canada will bring a library of downloadable e-books [...]
Supercomputers Often Run Outdated Software
Thursday, September 24th, 2009Supercomputers Often Run Outdated Software
Washington–Supercomputers keep breaking records for processing speed, but software to operate them has not kept up with that increasingly zippy hardware. The often-rickety supercomputing computer code is becoming an obstacle to making better weather models, medical simulations, and other applications of high-performance computers, said experts at a conference here Wednesday on [...]
Making Academic Conferences Short and Sweet
Thursday, September 24th, 2009Making Academic Conferences Short and Sweet
Henry Farrell thinks academic conferences go on too long.
Mr. Farrell, an associate professor of political science at George Washington University, uses a blog post for The Monkey Cage to call for a system that would keep presentations at the American Political Science Association moving along—and that would cut them off [...]
Unmuzzling Diploma Mills: Dog Earns M.B.A. Online
Thursday, September 24th, 2009Unmuzzling Diploma Mills: Dog Earns M.B.A. Online
How’s this for “hounding” diploma mills?
GetEducated.com, an online-learning consumer group, managed to purchase an online M.B.A. for its mascot, a dog named Chester Ludlow.
The Vermont pug earned his tassles by pawing over $499 to Rochville University, which offers “distance learning degrees based on life and career experience,” according [...]
MIT Students’ Facebook ‘Gaydar’ Raises Privacy Issues
Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009MIT Students’ Facebook ‘Gaydar’ Raises Privacy Issues
Students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology created a computer program that they say can deduce whether or not someone is gay by doing an analysis of his Facebook profile, The Boston Globe reports.
According to The Globe, two students in a course on Internet ethics and law designed [...]
81 BlackBerrys: An Amherst Administrator Compiles a Campus-Tech Index
Wednesday, September 23rd, 200981 BlackBerrys: An Amherst Administrator Compiles a Campus-Tech Index
An administrator at Amherst College has put together a list of numbers that demonstrates how the role of technology is changing at Amherst, and perhaps at other colleges. Peter Schilling, director of information technology, models his list after the index in Harper’s magazine, which comments on politics [...]
Archive Watch: Good Samaritans
Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009Archive Watch: Good Samaritans
The Samaritans of biblical fame still exist, although their numbers are small: The current community, split between Holon, Israel, and Mount Gerizim in the West Bank, numbers just over 700 people. In 1901, a Michigan industrialist named E.K. Warren traveled to the Middle East and was asked to bring home a collection [...]
In Facebook Fracas, Beauty School Sues Student for Online Comments
Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009In Facebook Fracas, Beauty School Sues Student for Online Comments
A beauty school in Illinois is suing a student for his “defamatory” comments on a Facebook site that encouraged students to vent about their instructors.
The Salon Professional Academy of Elgin, Ill., says Nicholas Blacconiere created a site called Tspa RobinHood that looked similar to TSPA Elgin’s [...]