User:Metadawson/Blog

=My Wikiversity Blog - Free the knowledge= Copy this link and paste it into your aggregator. Add entry

Linked Data
Yesterday I got my copy of Linked Data: Evolving the Web into a Global Data Space. The book was release in February. I'm looking forward to getting my understanding of Web data up-to-date. This is the broad area of study I am looking into to find a niche for my PhD. I want to get started in my research within the next 5 years. By then the industry may have changed drastically, so I need to stay abreast of the technology in use. Metadawson 16:31, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Freeing Knowledge
“We can make knowledge available online more easily, more widely and more cheaply,” Willinsky said. There is an excellent article found at The Stanford Daily. The efforts are focused on making research articles and journals more available to everyone. The Public Knowledge Project itself will be one of my topics of research in the coming months. Metadawson 16:58, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Berkman Center
I just found the Berkman Center for Internet & Society which is a organization at Harvard University interested in many aspects of Internet knowledge and law. I never knew where Larry Lessig works. I don't think there are any opportunities there for me to do research, but they are doing some interesting work. 16:43, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Gaming inspiration
Last night, in three hours of concentrated effort my online guild took down five raid bosses. These are big bad guys that take total coordination of 10 or 25 people. I had already killed and gotten treasure from the first three bosses on a previous date, so I chose to sit out and let other guild members play. I did minor chores in the game while listening to my guild (in VOIP) work together, fail and try again. I celebrated their wins with them and shared in our group success. After the first three bosses were dead one of my guild-mates offered to leave the group of 10 to make room for me to play. I joined in the group and helped to take down two more bosses. I did not get any treasure, but I was extremely satisfied that my friends and I conquered our foes and some of them got some nice rewards. I tell this story because this was the happiest I have been in several days. I felt accomplished, accepted and part of something bigger. Today I watched Jane McGonigal's Ted talk on gaming to save the world. With the recent extreme highs and lows in my life I realize I have to do something different. I need to try to integrate my online and real lives to make me feel successful and valuable in life. My challenge now is to determine how. I've accepted the quest, but there are no directions and no wiki to help. Right now, I am excited and scared and a bit confused. Hopefully I can maintain the hope. Metadawson 16:05, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

In Control 2011 conference
Monday-Tuesday, Feb. 21-22, I attended the second annual In Control conference organized by Environments for Humans. The topics included HTML5, CSS3, microformats, jQuery, design, user experience and testing. It was a fabulously energizing two days. The presenters were all friendly and had more exciting information than they could share in the limited time. It is so nice to be with fellow nerds that are into intelligent (Web) design. I've given myself a huge design project to put all I learned into practice. Metadawson 19:07, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

An Open Web, open to edits
A new ebook An Open Web begins with a dire warning that the Web is now closed. Reading further in the introduction I found two sentences that make me want to read this collaborative work.
 * "This book will take the view that the Open Web is an essential technology and cultural practice for the future of the Internet and human society. The Web as we know it has had a positive and even revolutionary impact on key areas of science, technology, politics and culture."

Perhaps this is not a doom and gloom warning about the rise of proprietary information. I will have to give it a read and report back. Metadawson 17:56, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Mozilla Drumbeat to make CC easy
Today "Learning freedom and the web" posted an article "Announcing Open Attribute". The new tools strive to make posting open content with the proper Creative Commons licensing a super easy task. So far the tools are available as Firefox and Chrome addons. When I have some content to post, I'll try it out. Metadawson 17:45, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

More training needed for a cool job
I'm getting more and more interested in research every day. I have thought about looking for a PhD program in the next five years. I found this job listing today. It gives me some skills to shoot for in order to be ready for my next career. Wikimedia Foundation Job Opening --Metadawson 20:14, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Joining Wikiversity
February 2nd, I added my name to a list for the Composing free and open online educational resources class on Wikiversity. It looks like the course should have began in January but has been postponed. We will see if there is a new start date announced.

Signing up to support Wikipedia
January 31st I completed the "Wikipedia Campus Ambassador" application. It looks like the second ever training session took place in January so I was late in applying. I hope the Wikimedia group hosts another training session this year. I am too excited to wait until 2012. Metadawson 18:25, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Getting Started
January 30th I stumbled on Wikimedia's ambassador program. After reading up on the movement to promote free knowledge I excitedly threw my hat into the ring. I am so thrilled to have a new venture to pursue. Extracurricular and intellectual pursuits are important to me. Without such challenges I feel I am not living up to my potential. Check in with this blog for the story of my adventure. Metadawson 18:25, 2 February 2011 (UTC)