I'm a huge fan of Improv Everywhere and I work in social media, so when the two meet up, it's like rainbows and nutella. Here's what happens when those merry pranksters invade the GEL social media conference in NYC. Gotta share! More on the Improv Everywhere site.
Category: Information Society
Using Augmented Reality to Find Swing Dancing in San Francisco
I have been playing around with some augmented reality apps recently, including the Layar AR system, one of the most popular ones out there today. Layar provides a common platform for developers to share their augmented reality data using common standards, and then share them with a global community of users. There are currently more…
Virtual Worlds, Transgender Photos, and My Life as a Dancing Cyborg
Last Saturday I was involved in a really interesting conversation on the subject of "The Customizable Body: The Present / Future of Identity" at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. The featured speakers were Second Life founder Philip Rosedale and photographer Amos Mac, documents trans male lifestyles in his zine Original Plumbing. I love…
Social Media Stats and Ego Stroking
Noise to Signal Cartoon Rob Cottingham hits it on the head for me with this cartoon. I must admit that I'm addicted to my blog, Twitter, and even my Flickr stats. It's like a never ending search for validation that I'm an interesting, cool, insightful person. Somehow this is going to make up for all…
Review of SocialCam for iPhone4: Can’t Save Video Files Locally?
Here's a quick mini-review of SocialCam, the new video sharing mobile app from the makers of Justin.tv, that came out a week or so ago. Generally it's great, and does what it says it will do with no fuss or difficulty. My main quibble with the otherwise excellent service is that you don't have the…
SMALLLab at MacArthur DML Conference: Games that Teach STEM Skills to Kids
One of the neatest exhibits I saw at the MacArthur Digital Media and Learning Conference this past week in Long Beach was a series of interactive learning games created by the SMALLLab group at Parsons. They have a bunch of neat simulations and games they created to teach various science, math and engineering principals…
Connecting Digital Learning Theory and Practice at MacArthur DML Conference
I'm currently in Long Beach, California for the MacArthur Foundation-sponsored Digital Media and Learning Conference. The DML is a three day gathering of about 500 academics, educators, nonprofits, techies, and funders focused on "fostering interdisciplinary and participatory dialog and linking theory, empirical study, policy, and practice." I.e. the event is intended to get folks who…
Quakers, Participatory Culture, and Our Mission in the World
A few weeks ago, I went to a really interesting talk by Wess Daniels on Quakers and mission at the lovely Friends Church of Berkeley. Wess is a doctoral student and a released minister from Camas Friends Church in Washington. I really had not idea what to expect, other than the fact that a cross-section…
TechSoup Global Contributors’ Summit: 250 Leaders Strategize on Using Tech to Address Global Problems
For the past two days I've been at the TechSoup Global Contributors' Summit at the Microsoft Campus in Mountain View, California. It's a really interesting gathering of a select couple hundred TechSoup partners, NGOs, tech industry folks and funders talking about how to connect the best technology tools to support the most worthwhile social causes. …
My elderly mom tries out the Prius electric/gas hybrid (video)
My sister rented a Toyota Prius hybrid electric-gas car yesterday and really likes it. Here's her giving our mother a quick lesson in driving the Prius. I think it's interesting how nervous mom is getting the thing started, but once she was driving for a couple of minutes, it just became another car to…