General

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Paper intéressant: "Hierarchie européenne ou réseau mondial? Une analyse relationnelle de Paris et de Lyon" par L. Vereecken*, B. Derudder*, F. Witlox* and P.J. Taylor.

Nombreux sont les auteurs à mentionner la position dominante de Paris et de Londres en tant que métropole européenne. Cette affirmation se base sur le score élevé obtenu par ces villes pour un ou plusieurs attributs. Le premier objectif de l’article consiste à expliquer en quoi cette approche pourrait s’avérer problématique. Le deuxième point d’attention concerne l’échelle utilisée pour déterminer la dominance de villes telles que Paris et de Londres, qui est limitée à l’Europe alors que ces deux villes sont ce que Sassen appelle des villes mondiales. Le second objectif consiste dès lors à démontrer que le concept de réseau européen n’existe pas, et devrait être remplacé par celui de réseau mondial dans lequel certaines villes sont fortement connectées à d'autres villes européennes. Dans ce but l'analyse se portera principalement sur Paris et Lyon. Mots clés: hiérarchie urbaine, relations, villes mondiales, connectivité, hintermondes Key words: urban hierarchy, relations, world cities, connectivity, hinterworlds

I especially like the "hinterworld concept". Here is a representation of Lyon hinterworld:

[Prospective] The Singularity Institute

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The Singularity Institute appears to be of interest:

Sometime in the next few years or decades, humanity will become capable of surpassing the upper limit on intelligence that has held since the rise of the human species. We will become capable of technologically creating smarter-than-human intelligence - perhaps through enhancement of the human brain, direct links between computers and the brain, or Artificial Intelligence (AI). This event is called the "Singularity" by analogy with the singularity at the center of a black hole - just as our current model of physics breaks down when it attempts to describe the center of a black hole, our model of the future breaks down once the future contains smarter-than-human minds. Since technology is itself the product of intelligence, the Singularity is an effect that snowballs once it occurs - the first smart minds can create smarter minds, and smarter minds can produce still smarter minds.(...)The Singularity Institute is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit devoted solely to creating the Singularity.

[Tech] Bluesnarfing is the new bluetooth buzzword

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Bluesnarfing, according to Daily Wireless:

to connect to the device without alerting the owner of the target device of the request, and gain access to restricted portions of the stored data therein, including the entire phonebook (and any images or other data associated with the entries), calendar, realtime clock, business card, properties, change log, IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity, which uniquely identifies the phone to the mobile network, and is used in illegal phone 'cloning'). This is normally only possible if the device is in "discoverable" or "visible" mode, but there are tools available on the Internet that allow even this safety net to be bypassed. "

[MyResearch] Theoretical stuff about distributed cognition

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The ecological approach in psychology try to account for the natural complexity of behavior as well as the properties of the environment and the ongoing interaction withe environment. According to this vision, cognitive processes are analyzed as relations between agents and other systems. As noted by Greeno (Greeno, 1998),

“paradigmatic situations in this research include people communicating with each other as they plan and evaluate their activities and coordinate their interactions with each other and with material and technological systems… In particular the research focuses on interactive systems of activity in which individuals participate, usually to achieve objectives that are meaningful in relation to their more general identities and memberships in communities of practice” (pp. 5-6).

This vision is also the core of the Activity Theory. According to this theory basic unit of analysis of all human experience is "activity", a broader concept than individual goal-oriented actions (Leontjev, 1981; Vygotsky, 1978). An activity is undertaken by a human actor motivated towards an object and mediated by a tool (also called “artifact”).

I should read Lucy A. Suchman (1987) Plans and situated actions: the problem of human-machine communication, Cambridge University Press, New York, NY.

[Research] GOFAI

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According to wikipedia, Haugeland coined the term GOFAI, which stands for Good Old Fashioned Artificial Intelligence, describing, loosely, the Artificial Intelligence research techniques of the 1970s and before and in the perceptions of mind. Semantic networks are considered old fashioned in the field of AI, because knowledge representation using first or higher order logic is considered as a more powerful model of knowledge representation.

(Weird) A Social firewall after the social proxy

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Some people already elaborated on social proxy. Mirweis and me preferred the social firewall thing. The social proxy is "a visualization widget that provides cues about the presence and activity of participants in an online conversation system". So what? The social firewall is just the digital equivalent of the party pooper thing. It does not exist yet but it might be a visualization widget that provide cues about the presence and activity of party pooper in an online conversation system...

hum I think this is absurd and meaningless

Workshop about Spatial Positioning, Cognition and Collaboration

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In the context of the Kaleidoscope Conference about CSCL in Lausanne in October 2004, we are organizing a workshop about spatial positioning in mobile collaboration (description hereafter). It aims to study the relationships between space, collaborative problem solving and cognition in group. It will address basic research issues at the crossroads of human cognition and information technology. If you are interested in participating, please send us an abstract (10-15 lines) of your research project by April 23rd. Workshop Proposal: Spatial Awareness in Collaboration and Group Interaction

The recent technical evolution in the field of mobile technologies allow mobile devices users to have location based services such as optimal route generation with GPS or nearest point of interest by SMS. Positioning technologies are more and more precise and taking the context into account is one of the new trend in computer software. Collective uses of those 'locative media' are also on track. Mobile computing should also be seen as an answer to the needs that emerged from geographically distributed organizations. People still need to work together from different places at the same time and collaboration must be fluid. The use of location based services enable to bridge the distance between teammates thanks to different features. The most commonly used context of mobile systems is the location of the user since it is easy to determine and it could be meaningful to use it in order to adapt the behavior of a mobile application. However, spatial awareness should not be restricted to location since information about presence, direction, relative location, physical proximity with resources could also be drawn from context cues. This led designers and researchers to support collaborative work and learning with mobile technology, namely handheld computers, mobile phones, GPS-enhanced tools and wearables. One of the postulates is that space and spatial features such as location could be considered as a resource for collaborative problem solving. We hence aim to understand the impacts of mobile tools on social and cognitive processes.

Location-Based systems (LBS) often propose various services such as: - annotation of space: it is now possible to leave "virtual post-its" attached to specific location. - synchronous positioning: participants among a group can localize their partners. - location based storytelling/narratives - matchmaking between participants of a conference - video games that takes advantage of location-awareness to propose augmented reality scenarios.

All those systems offer both innovative ways to create new affordance for supporting collaborative activities like mobile work or mobile learning as well as smart testbed to address research questions. What are these research questions ? What are the methods ? The workshop will bring together researchers and academics from or out of the KALEIDOSCOPE NoE coming from several disciplines, including learning sciences, psychology, computer science. It aims to study the relationships between space, collaborative problem solving and cognition in group. It will address basic research issues at the crossroads of human cognition and information technology.

The objective is to: 1. Study the role of spatial awareness as a link between mobile technology and collaborative activities. 2. Discuss emprical results concerning the role of space or spatial features in group cognition and collaborative activities (mobile work, mobile learning) 3. Discuss methods of how to study the impact of those Location Based Services with regard to their efficiency as well their impacts on group interactions.

Position Paper Topics Relevant paper topics include, but are not limited to: - Evaluation of location based services in learning or work context - Location based services design - Users and usage of location based services - Mobile learning scenarios - Location-aware interaction - User modelling - Applications that use real world context - Modelling of available physical and social resources

Workshop Organization The workshop will last 1/2 day or 1 day depending on the number of contributions. It will gather researchers among the Kaleidoscope Network of Excellence plus some external participants. External participants will have to apy an extra fee. If you would like to participate in this workshop, please submit first an abstract by April 23rd and then your position paper (max 8 pages) to nicolas.nova@epfl.ch by July 15th. Work in-progress will be accepted, but describe your research questions!

Workshop Comitee

Organization: Nicolas Nova and Mauro Cherubini Chair: Pierre Dillenbourg and Mike Sharples

(Blogosphere) Polemique in the french blogosphere

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There seem to be a growing polemique in the french blogosphere. Quite amusing in fact. A researcher (hypermedia stuff) published a paper about bloggers insisting on their ego-trip (here, in french). Few french bloggers (like bingirl) commented on it (laughing at this researcher). Some others also set up a website to make fun of it. I do share the feeling that this person does not really understand what a blog but I have mixed feelings concerning all this polemique. There is a growing gap between two different kind of bloggers in france (I think it's the same elsewhere): those who describe their life (with humor or without) and the ones who deals with specific issue (tech, politics... a specific topic). The latter are called "blogs chiant" (boring blogs) by the former. I may be part of the blogs chiants and I don't care at all.

[Humor] Educate people regarding God's Law

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Via heures creuses, a letter from Jim.He asks some hilarious question to a religious person.

Dr. Laura Schlessinger is a US radio personality who dispenses advice to people who call in to her radio show. Recently, she said that, as an observant Orthodox Jew, homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22, and cannot be condoned under any circumstance.

The following is an open letter to Dr. Laura penned by a US resident.

Dear Dr. Laura:

Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination. End of debate.

I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some of the other specific laws and how to follow them.

1. When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord - Lev. 1:9. The problem is my neighbours. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?

2. I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?

3. I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of menstrual cleanliness - Lev. 15:19-24. The problem is, how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offense. (...) 8. Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?

9. I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?

10. My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev. 19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them (Lev. 24:10-16)? Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws (Lev. 20:14)?

I know you have studied these things extensively, so I am confident you can help.

Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.

Your devoted fan, Jim