Allison Kipta

"Mike Arrington's CrunchPad web tablet, already several prototypes in, is quickly bubbling to reality reports Bits: There's going to be an announcement in July or August, and it'll be available 'as soon as possible.'" - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

Bold move if he can pull it off. But there are so many potential obstacles I doubt it. - Brian Sullivan

"When 1,400 letters from World War II soldiers turned up last September in an old library basement at Bryant University, the discovery unleashed a torrent of memories and emotions. Mary F. Moroney, director of library services, and a student stumbled upon a box of dusty scrapbooks while doing research on an unrelated project. Out of curiosity, the pair perused the pages of aged, crisp letters and realized they were holding something untouched for decades." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"Reduce the cost of purchasing multiple PCs for your business. The new LG SmartVine™ virtual desktop monitors enable 11 users to share a single PC*. Each user runs their own applications as if they had their own desktop. Just add a keyboard and a mouse. Available in standard 17" and 19" widescreen class sizes, the SmartVine virtual desktop monitors can help you achieve a cost effective multi-user computing solution." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"Some professors are unsubscribing from scholarly e-mail lists because they say that discussion has shifted to academic blogs, to social networks like Facebook, and to Twitter. In response, the groups running some of the largest academic e-mail lists are adding Web 2.0 features to their mix of services. Many devoted fans of e-mail lists, meanwhile, say that the form is far from dead, and that discussion on e-mail lists are richer than what’s happening in the blogosphere or other new forms." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"Buffalo Public Schools (NY) recently selected DimensionM™ education video games to supplement their math curriculum for 12,000 students in 45 schools. The district will begin using the games during the upcoming summer school session and continue in the fall." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"Gloves that are wired with sensors can provide useful information about a user's motions, and they offer a novel way to interact with computers beyond the keyboard and mouse. At the end of May, AnthroTronix, a company based in Silver Spring, MD, released its first commercial version of the AcceleGlove, a programmable glove that records hand and finger movements. Other gloves--like 5DT's Data Glove, used primarily in virtual reality--normally cost $1,000 to $5,000, but the AcceleGlove costs just $499. It comes with software that lets developers use Java to program it for any application they wish. AnthroTronix initially developed the glove with the U.S. Department of Defense for robotic control. The glove could also be used in video games, sports training, or physical rehabilitation." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"The National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind are suing Arizona State University for its use of the Amazon Kindle to distribute electronic textbooks to students, saying the device cannot be used by blind students. The groups say the Kindle has text-to-speech technology that reads books aloud to blind students, but that the device’s menus do not offer a way for blind students to purchase books, select a book to read, or even to activate the text-to-speech feature, according to a joint statement by the two groups." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"One of the main reasons I started using Blogs with students was so their work had permanence, and wasn't just shoved in a box in the back of an attic, but published in an authentic venue, where people could continue to interact with it. For years to come. I still have people leaving comments on the first Blog that I set up for students over 5 years ago. It remains a living, breathing organism. The students can still go back and see their previous work." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"In salamanders, new tissues come from a tumorlike mass of cells that forms at the site of the injury, called the blastema. Until now, most scientists thought that the blastema contained a population of stem cells that had become pluripotent--capable of giving rise to all the needed tissues. But a new paper in the journal Nature provides evidence that this is not the case. Instead, stem cells involved in regeneration only create cells of the tissue that they came from. The finding suggests that regeneration does not require cells to reprogram themselves as dramatically as scientists had assumed." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"At a time when tech-savvy educators are touting the power of technology to transform teaching and learning, thousands of attendees at the National Educational Computing Conference gathered here this week to discuss and debate how to make the best use of those resources and extend their use to more of the nation’s classrooms." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"...Reed Elsevier reported profits over $800-million from its Elsevier publishing division in 2008. Not over $800-million in total revenue – over $800-million in profit. How does a company make such an incredible amount of money? By persuading you and I to do their work as volunteers. We not only write the articles they publish, but we also volunteer our time to review the papers they publish. And then, inexplicably, our universities pay publishers exorbitant subscription fees so that we can regain access to the results of our own research, writing, and peer-review efforts." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"This undated image released by Britain's National Archives Thursday, July 2, 2009, shows a copy of the United States Declaration of Independence, which has been discovered at the National Archives in Kew, England. The rare copy of the American Declaration of Independence has been found hidden in a file at the British National Archives. The Archives say that the print, known as the Dunlap print after the printer who commissioned it, is the 26th copy of the document to be found. The last Dunlap print found was sold at an auction for $8.14 million in 2000. Archives spokeswoman Katrina McClintock said Thursday that the file was found by a researcher looking through late 18th Century files for something unrelated. McClintock said it was discovered months ago but not revealed to the public until it could be extracted and catalogued. National Archives / AP Photo" - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"A couple of days ago, upon hearing that Microsoft had officially joined Twitter, the official Linux account sent out a tweet welcoming them. “Welcome to Twitter, @Microsoft!,” they said. The tweet sat unanswered for over a day, and it seemed like Microsoft may never answer. But about a few hours ago, they did. “@Linux thanks, nice to be here,” they replied." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet

"How hip is this for a 122-year-old lady? The Statue of Liberty is tweeting on the social networking site Twitter.com (@statuelibrtynps) and giving e-tours of her innards, just in time for the Fourth of July, when the icon’s crown opens for the first time since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks." - Allison Kipta via Bookmarklet