Alan Jacobs

I’ve moved a few links from the sidebar to the About page, for neatness’ sake. And I’ve added to that sidebar a link to my Pinboard page, where I record and organize my online reading. I love Pinboard more than I can say, and I post there all the time — my site there is probably way more interesting than this blog, largely because it features the words of other people, not me.

Sometimes I struggle to decide whether I’m going to post a quotation from a story here or there, so, in the spirit of further streamlining of my online life (see note below), from now on I’m going to try to post all quotations there, and leave this largely for my own thoughts, plus the occasional image. I’ll post links to some of the more generally interesting quotations to Twitter also, but if you want to get everything, Pinboard has an RSS feed.

There, that should do it. Oh, and about that streamlining:

My New Year Social Tech Trilogy is now complete: 1) https://t.co/hQmYcFPpp1 2) https://t.co/V2Q721k6Tn 3) https://t.co/HXxFALe8CZ

— Alan Jacobs (@ayjay) January 7, 2016

We expect to be held accountable, but we would also hold accountable our professors as well. Nothing will guarantee our attendance if we do not have the opportunity to challenge our professors, ask questions of them, and engage with our paying classmates. When we feel as though we won't be missed if we skip class, it makes it easy to do just that.

We don’t all agree that the lecture is doomed. A number of us have found professors who have really inspired us with their lectures. They convey their subject with energy, and engage us as people. One gathers students on stage to act out what he is teaching. Another, a climatologist, asks us to send him photos of the day’s weather. Professors who ask us questions, make jokes, bring in their dogs — do anything to humanize themselves — make us feel less like just a body in the room.

We can tell you those professors are too few and far between. Websites like RateMyProfessor have become an indispensable resource for finding them. Professors might not like being reduced to a mere number, but, hey, neither do we.

— here

BP: Is there a question you wish someone would ask you?

CB: The question I wish people would ask me is “How do I order your books in bulk?”

A: We’re still getting hammered in the press — well, everywhere really — for all the abuse some of our users take. Do we have any new ideas about how to fix that?

B. I’ve got this idea for adding a kind of news feed, we can call it … hang on … yeah, let’s call it “Moments”

A. “Moments”?

B. Right. “Moments”

A. And this will help us deal with the abuse problem how?

B. If we put it where the Notifications tab used to be people will click on it like all. the. time

A. Okay, but …

C. You know this “140 character” thing has been an albatross around our necks for EVER

A. Hang on, can we get back to the issue I was raising?

C. I mean, one hundred and forty? Why not, like, TEN THOUSAND

B. LOL

D. LOL

E. ROTFL

E. We’re totally doing this

A wonderfully thought-provoking meditation on uniqueness, value, scarcity, the work of art in the age of mechanical reproducibility, and similar themes. Should be read, I think, in conjunction with the story reported here and here.

[caption id=“attachment_15584” align=“aligncenter” width=“672”] Sample page of Gill Sans, via Flickr user Mikey[/caption]

It has been published and adapted as Ten Little Indians and Ten Little Soldier Boys (though also, I have to say, sometimes republished under its original offensive title, right up to the 1970s), and naturally the option is available to me to discuss the text under one or other of these euphemistic names.  But the offensiveness of using the original title needs to be balanced against the greater need not to airbrush away the immanent low-level racism of the culture out of which these novels were created. To render the racism of the past invisible is to empower the racism of today by inoculating it against history.

— Adam Roberts

Our default expectation is not that we’ll try to give every comment an airing; it’s that we’ll highlight worthwhile material. What counts as worthwhile material? That’s a judgment call, of course, and we’ll be making many such calls. We’re seeking to promote comments that are civil, informed, readable, issue-driven, and relevant to the article at hand.

— here. Percentage of comments that will meet all five of those criteria: .001.

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Why don’t people go around telling one another about this song? Like, all day, every day? This is Dusty Springfield with a fabulous Memphis session band singing an amazing Carole King song. Do you understand? Listen to this. Tell your friends.

Wright said the man, who has not been identified by police yet, was carrying the rifle without a clip in one hand and a loaded ammunition clip in the other hand. But, Wright said, he didn't know if the rifle had a round of ammunition in it.

Wright stepped down quickly from the pulpit when he saw the man, who appeared to be in his late 20s. The man continued moving toward the front of the church, pointing the rifle into the air. The two met, near the front of the sanctuary.“Can I help you?’’ the pastor asked the man.

Wright, who is a 57-year-old retired soldier, said the man’s answer determined his next action. “If he was belligerent, I was going to tackle him,” said Wright, who is 6-foot-2 and 230 pounds. But the stranger was calm, and Wright took the weapon from him. He then patted him down, and the pastor summoned four strong deacons to embrace the disarmed man, in an effort to make him feel welcome. Wright then prayed for the man, who fell to his knees and began crying.

The man was then invited to sit on the front pew, and Wright resumed the Watch Night service. During the altar call at the conclusion, the man came forward and asked for salvation.

“He gave his life to Christ,” Wright said in an interview Saturday with The Fayetteville Observer.