however, as i was recently sifting through my email spam folder (after achieving inbox zero, of course) ... i was struck by the creativity in topic headings to promote the sale of certain male-enhancement products and dissuade the spam filters.
here are a few that had me laughing at my desk.
- Member alert
- Firing without fear
- To protrude and serve
- Problems with your micro-sample
- Large-scale success
lawrence.lessig's 2002 book 'the future of ideas' is now available under a creative commons license and can be downloaded as a pdf file here!
haven't read it (yet), but i enjoyed his 2000 text, Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace.
though i have to admit, i thought some of his ideas seemed to be at odds with elements of the 1998 digital millenium copyright act... odd, in the sense that l.l. supposedly influenced not only the bill, but bill.clinton's thoughts on the matter.
ASBMB and biomedical research very much need ten minutes of your time today to help insure that funding at the National Institutes of Health increases this year.As expected, the President vetoed the 2008 Labor/HHS/Education bill this morning, November 13. The bill contains over a 3 percent increase for the NIH, thus allowing the agency's budget to keep up with inflation for the first time since 2003.It is very important that you contact your Member of Congress (and Senators) and urge him or her to vote to override the President's veto. It is particularly important that you do so if you are represented by one of the following Republican House members:
- Dent, Charles (PA)
- English, Philip (PA)
- Murphy, Tim (PA)
- Peterson, John (PA)
- Platts, Todd (PA)
from a recent email from ASBMB:
Alert: The President has threatened to veto the modest increases in NIH funding proposed by Congress.
What We Need From You: Your calls or e-mails to the White House urging the President not to veto the 2008 Labor/HHS/Education appropriations bill.
Background: The FY2008 Labor/HHS/Education Appropriations bill (which allocates funding for the NIH and other federal agencies) has been approved by both houses of Congress and sent to the President for his signature.
The bill allocates $30 billion for NIH, a 3.1% increase over FY 2007, the first increase since 2003 that keeps the agency's budget even with inflation. The President has threatened to veto the bill because (among other reasons) the total spending in the bill is about $10 billion above his budget request.
It is unclear at this point whether there will be enough votes to override a veto in the House or the Senate. Therefore it is crucial that we do our best to discourage the President from casting a veto in the first place. It is critical that we protect the modest increase for NIH in the L/HHS bill because there could be no NIH increase at all this year if the bill is vetoed.
Action: Please contact the White House and urge the President to support biomedical research and sign the 2008 Labor/HHS/Education Appropriations bill.
Please contact the White House at:
Email: comments@whitehouse.gov
Phone: 202-456-1111
Contact us if you have questions:
Peter Farnham, CAE ASBMB Public Affairs Officer pfarnham@asbmb.org 301/634-7384 | Angela Hvitved, Ph.D. ASBMB Science Policy Fellow ahvitved@asbmb.org 301/634-7364 |
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pbs and nova are getting ready to air 'judgement day', get your tivo and/or dvd-recorders ready (don't know if there is a webcast). if you are from pennsylvania; this is a piece of our history. if you are from state college -- then you should check it out due to the interesting comments by our recently elected school board members (the link to the comments and subsequent letters are 'broken' on the cdt site....).
if you don't feel like clicking further, read this:
Teaching intelligent design in public school biology classes violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States (and Article I, Section 3 of the Pennsylvania State Constitution) because intelligent design is not science and "cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents."
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i really like the new efforts to educate students about it (this, not this), esp. the 'what was i thinking' segments.
for my $$$, this cartoon says it all:
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sharing documents is all the rage. google.docs has certainly spurred others on ... though, i'm not sure that zoho isn't a better alternative (especially with their new datbase & reports tool). in my (subjective) experience, zoho is a bit slower than google.docs (someday i'll have to actually time it); but, i seem to use it more.
to the point. i recently gave a talk at the DUS conference on "Sophomore Year: Critical Turning Points for Students and Their Academic Advisers" (this falls just under my 12-word limit for titles).
needless to say; my talk (titled above) recounts some of my experiences using my avian genetics lab as an educational laboratory for fresh/soph undergraduates. here is my resurrected educational.technologies page. and (here comes the web2.0-reprise) ... the slides are shared here.
having grown up at Exits144&138&63 on the gsp, lived a few blocks from scooter (my aunts saw him at the nursing home the week before he passed away), and being a lifelong yankee fan ---- i thought i might start here...
back on point... the yanks did it!, but it requires some explanation.
the yanks started out an abominable 21-29, looking like the worst-best-paid team in sports history. but, joe.torre -- who may have coached his finest season of baseball -- guided the yanks to the best record in baseball since the all-star break. this was no fluke.
following the ideas in his management/motivational book, joe didn't let his players panic. he integrated some talented and energetic rookies -- a cowardly lion, scarecrow, tinman and dorothy -- and, instead of having competition and fighting WITHIN the team, he was able to concentrate on the game and their opponents. a scrappy resilience, a historic season from a-rod (helped, no doubt, by jim.fannin), the resuscitation of mo, and the discovery of joba.
reminds me of something michael.jordan once said, "individual talent may win some games, but teams win championships."
it may sound trite, but: don't stop believing!!
go yanks!
just a brief note to start the psu-based blog... this should (in theory) replace the frontpage blog from my eportfolio... we'll see.
now if i can just figure out how to insert some javascript!
: )
