13 June 2011

A day made of glass

Interesting, but is it really the future we want? On the other hand, now that the idea is there, will we even have a choice in the matter?

Via Next Nature.

11 June 2011

06 June 2011

God Complains

Some lyrics, worthy of contemplation. No images, just words

Via Randomness Thing.

05 June 2011

New Look for 2011

My new look, if anyone is interested. The horribly broken wrists courtesy of the pose ball. I'm not in pain, honest. (I should have taken a picture of what it did to my back. Ooof!) Can someone get me something to drink ... with a straw? And possibly a stretcher?

Same me, not counting some small bits of tweaking not visible in this picture, different skin.

My favorite Infinity skins, by Maximillion Grant and now under the LOGO brand name along with the works of Polly Pavlova, have some new series out that take not only look great but take advantage of viewer 2 tricks and tools.

LOGO is one of the two skin lines I have found that work on smaller frames in SL. The other is more popular, but I don't like the way it looks on me quite as much, and it requires wearing a cleavage reduction layer, rather than just having skins with less shading. Needing less breast shading instead of more is always a challenge in SL. As is avoiding inflatable doll crotch.

But what I like most about LOGO is that you can go online to their custom skin creator and design your own from a menu set. I think they still give discounts for multiple combinations purchased off the same base skin, but don't quote me on that until you've tested it yourself. Before the skin was what you purchased, but now you can buy mod layers to expand your options without having to buy every singly possible combination. This is especially useful for some of the older skins, which he is busy adding new features for, and which have a very large number of lipstick and other makeup options.

In any event, my older skins are all from their "Natural" series, while this newer one is from the "Divine" series. And my really, really old skins are all also by Max before he started his Infinity series. I confess to finally having deleted them. They look like cartoons now compared to the newer stuff.

Now if SL would let me make my eyes more Asian without making my eyebrows all bushy ...

Oh, and the awesome hat hair is Roxy in plum by EMO-tions. I have been spending lots of time coming up with outfits to go with the hair, and it definitely goes with the Divine skin set. Be forewarned though, it is a very laggy sim.

The LOGO blog.

The LOGO teleport map.

04 June 2011

Review: Mamaa Saiz

Haven't done one of this in a while, and am totally out of practice, but here goes ...

A wonderful hour just sitting here in SL listening to Mamaa Saiz siging what he sings. A mellow combination of music with R&B overtones, or maybe that is his voice.

The guitar work is masterful and you feel each little pluck and strum playing on the strings of your heart. A sort of warm, ever so slightly misty-eyed, wonderful. Accompanied by a voice with just enough gravel to give it body without losing that smooth melodiousness that makes a singer so perfectly listenable.

Each song comes with the story of why it is in his collection, and each is sung as if it is a personal piece of himself. Most of the music is a selection of Americana with a distinct feeling that these are songs he has lived, not jsut come upon at some point and liked. Close your eyes and you can see him sitting there with the original artists jamming away.

If he is performing in SL, make the time to catch him. It will be the most worthwhile hour you spent in SL all week.

I think there is something in my eye, making it hard to type. Honest. So back to listening to the music.

Just don't ask him for any Joan Baez.

01 June 2011

The Education Cycle

Let's look at a typical business proeject cycle. It looks something like this:

There are more complicated models, but this one is nice and simple and covers its bases.

Now let's look at a comparable education cycle. It might look something like this:

It is a problematic model. One might even argue that it is not a cycle at all:

Now it is easy enough to argue that these three images paint a very unrealistic picture of how education works. And the argument would be right. Much planning and work takes place outside the classroom. The instructor has to plan and develop courses, assess themselves and their courses as to what could be done better, and then bring the implementation part of the cycle to the classroom.

In this model, the classroom operates more like the shop floor, tackling one task at a time according to a plan handed down by management. But that is exactly the problem.

The classroom is not the shop floor of learning. It needs to be an active and collaborative process of managing the education of all participants. But, unless we turn the entire process of education over to the students (which, like an anarchist state, is a great idea on paper but not all that practical in actual implementation) we can't just grab a traditional business project cycle as our model for how to develop effective educational systems.

That is not to say business models can't help us think about education. It is just to say that like a good business, we need to be looking at 21st Century high-tech models, not early 20th Century industrial models.

The way we do that is by bringing both development and implementation into the classroom. Which is to say, we plan and develop courses and academic resources that can dynamically adapt to the needs of that particular classroom. Then we build on that. In other words, we need a much more agile approach to education.