Cindy was horrified and amused to find in a grocery store in Florence this package of Mokaflor espresso coffee, which depicts a frightening depiction of an African person with an insane smile carrying a cup of joe on a tray. The bow tie seems to imply that the person is supposed to be a waiter. …
Plone Magic!
I’m at “Plone Magic Camp” this weekend to learn about the Plone content management system, programming and designing in Plone. (For web geeks: Plone is an open source CMS built on top of the Zope framework which is written in the Python programming language.) Going to “Magic Camp” I was hoping to get a wand…
The future of tour guide technology, Part II
In my previous post, I blogged about how in the near future we might see the tour guide industry expand from a location-based vocation to one that might be expanded to include experts from around the world using ICTs. Beyond the use of distributed experts to serve as e-guides, there are many possible technologies that…
Cheryl is not dead yet
Lots of people would kill to be featured in The New Yorker. Cheryl Horsfall simply had to die. My lovely and witty friend Cheryl was recently profiled in the "Talk of the Town" section of this week’s New Yorker for not being dead. Apparently, in some Brazil-esque bureaucratic snafu the New York state government decided…
Small grants for media policy research available
My group the Social Science Research Council just announced a call for applications for a number of small grants we are offering to fund research on media policy and advocacy. The goal of the grants is to encourage collaborations between media activists and media researchers on research relevant to public policy. The first round will…
Media Justice position available at MEP
My colleague Saskia Fischer at the Media Empowerment Project recently announced that she is leaving as program manager of the MEP to move back to Europe. The MEP is currently search for a replacement. Here’s the description: Project Manager, The Media Empowerment Project of the Office of Communication of the United Church of Christ, Inc…
Pictures of bella Italia
Here’s some of my pictures of Italy, from Florence to Positano to Pompeii to Rome. I’ll spare you most of the boring tourist shots that everyone has and focus on what I think are the more interesting ones. Of course, I had to take the one of Cindy and I at the Trevi fountain, which…
The future of tour guide technology, Part I
I’m back from a lovely trip to Italy with my girl Cindy. It was a fantastic trip, from the magnificent art of Florence to fun and sun on the Amalfi Coast to the rich history and vibrant present of Rome. Visiting the ancient city of Pompeii a couple of days ago, it was obvious that…
The Simple Pleasures of Positano
Cindy and I are spending a few days away from the hubbub of urban Italy hanging out in the resort town of Positano, on the Amalfi Coast. Called the most photographed fishing village in the world, Positano is dominated by steep cliffs on which 4,000-ish Positanesi have built these pastel-colored homes leaning out dramatically into…
Young kittens in love
My cat Mole and Cindy’s cat Vespa have become inseperable these past weeks, as they have become comfortable around each other. I caught Mole licking Vespa’s face the other day, and they love to chase each other all over the house. Now we have to worry about what is going to happen when Cindy returns…