"Smarter" carsl? Bonus Post 2

Lindenberger, Michael. "Cars May Soon Have More to Tell Us." Chicago Tribune. 21 June 2010: section 1, page 22.

The Department of Transportation is looking at a black box for your car that will transmit and receive continuous traffic data. Ray LaHood, the Transportation secretary who has led the charge against txting by drivers, touts the potential of the technology to manage traffic and keep drivers safer.

Pilot programs underway already in Dallas have installed boxes in cars that communicate with other cars and traffic managers who can use software to make decisions about police response or send out messages about traffic tieups. Continuously transmitted information eventually will include speeds, route data, and location.

Equipped cars will be able to tell dozing drivers to wake up and brake automatically if there's danger ahead. This technology is already available as an option on luxury cars like BMW.

Think of the pluses! Cops will be able to track or stop a car that has been involved with a crime-- maybe even conveniently in front of the police station. Who needs red light cameras? The car will just confess for you. I'm thinking of starting a prepayment fund for the speeding tickets I'll collect. Wait. I won't be able to speed anymore because my car will stop me.

And wouldn't this be great for Homeland Security in a Little Brother world?

The Truth is Out There Somewhere--Isn't It? (Post 5)

Goodman, J. David. "Now in Blogs, Product Placement." The New York Times, Sunday, June 13, 2010, pg. 3.

NBC News at 5, Monday, June 14, 2010.

Sachdev, Ameet. "Blogger Eventually Cites Jackson Ties." Chicago Tribune, Tuesday, June 15, 2010, pg. 19

All right, I know that only in the contorted randomness of my mind do these three things have any relationship. On the other hand, the connection really bothers me.

In 1976, I watched Network, a really dark comedy that dealt with the trend toward changing television news from a reliable information source into another entertainment show. The "new" news showcased beautiful talking heads, brought in a live audience, featured a seer, introduced a segment "Vox Populi" that gave poll results, and starred an insane, charismatic anchor who began every segment by shouting, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore."

Flash forward--and take a look at news websites and television newscasts. They invariably--with the possible exceptions of the seer and the mental status of the anchor--mirror all of the things that amused me with their sardonic impossibility in the movie. Stories are open to comment, a daily poll asking for opinion is featured, O'Reilley, Limbaugh, Olberman, et. al have obsessed fan clubs, and blogs are a featured link.

In the Times article, an extraordinary number of Brooklyn blogs feature a reference to Absolut vodka. The reporter discovers that the bloggers have been paid for product placement. The second article from the Tribune reports that a noted legal blogger for the Huffington Post and frequent guest on Fox News had blogged that Jesse Jackson, Jr. was clearly blameless in the Blagovich senate seat for sale mess; it turns out she has a direct, financial link to Jesse Jackson, Sr. And, wow, on last night's local newscast, Ellen DeGeneres made a "spontaneous, unplanned" appearance right after the report on the Blagovich trial.

I really want to keep current on the affairs that matter in my world. I accept my responsibility for evaluating information. But what do I do when I can't rely on the good faith of others to accept and abide by the same ethical tenants?

The First Amendment grants absolute freedom of the press as one of the essential cornerstones to our social contract. But shouldn't there perhaps be some requirement of honesty and incorruptibility beyond libel and/or defamation?

Bonus Post

So have we traded the Bill of Rights for convenience?

I log into Amazon and it welcomes me by name. Netflix offers me personal suggestions based on ratings I've volunteered in large part because I get a rush out of the number of movies I've watched. I always accept the user agreement on ITunes because I'm in a hurry to get the download so I can move on to something else on the to do list. And God forbid that I have to wait a second longer on the SkyWay to dig out the $3 bucks; the IPass transponder linked to my checking account means that I cruise through the toll gates to get to the airport or the real fun faster.

Everything I've mentioned is completely voluntary--and thoughtless. I've chosen to give up the Fourth Amendment because it makes my life easier. How about the rest of you?

Why? Because we'd all prefer to live in the world of Locke and Rousseau, even though we really think that Hobbes was right. I know that I can be trusted because I'm good, but I'm not really sure about the rest of you.

This strange dichotomy means that we love Marcus's mom, but most of us in this class are actually his dad. (Sorry, Derek. Some day I'd really actually like to meet you.) We really want to believe in the ultimate goodness of people, but we're realistic and cynical enough to know that there are way too many people who see us as targets. Worst of all, there's my real, true level of bigotry: stupid. Ignorant can be fixed, but stupid is forever. I don't really think any of these philosophers ever really dealt with dumb and lazy, which are, unfortunately, very real parts of my real life.

Besides, like Van in Little Brother, we'd rather those we care about be protected.

I think this post really sucks, so don't comment if you read it. It's way too likely to just go away--but if you have terrific skills, even when I disappear it, you can find it.

This class makes my head hurt. But since thinking helps keeps me away from the final dirt nap, maybe that's not so bad.

Art Meets N.I.M.B.Y.-Post 4

Williams, Carol J. "It's Ink, but Is It Speech? Apellate Case May Tell?" Chicago Tribune. 30 May 2010. Section 1, Page 8.

In keeping with its zoning ordinances which prohibit tattoo parlors in city limits, Hermosa Beach, California has refused to license a shop for tattoo artist Johnny Anderson, owner of Yer Cheat'n Heart in a nearby less affluent town. Anderson claims that his freedom of expression is being violated by the zoning codes and has filed suit.

The city claims that tattoos are a risk to the city's health, safety, and welfare; the "unhealthy mutilation" and the potential for infection overrides, in their viewpoint, Anderson's assertion that artistic expression is a protected First Amendment right. Anderson's case, by the way, has reached California's Ninth District Court and is supported by some con law professors.

Heather blogged that individual rights end where the rights of others begin. I have to admit that I'd prefer not to live next door to a tattoo parlor, strip club, or even a fast food restaurant with an all night drive up window.

So don't the folk of Hermosa Beach have the right to decide what is in their backyards?

But where do their rights end?

Anderson can always create his "art" somewhere else, but what if a community refuses the Klan or Tea Partiers a permit to march because it risks the "health, safety, and welfare" of the community?

What if a community bars low end apartments and homes to keep "undesirables" out?

What if a community districts schools in ways that create racial quotas?

What if a Mapplethorpe exhibition is barred?

What if the "risk" is a book?

Student Rights or School Safety-Post 3

Dean, Terry. "OPRF Adds Cops to Stymie Second Student Protest over Tardy Policy." Wednesday Journal of Oak Park and River Forest(online), May 6, 2010. http://www.wednesdayjournalonline.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&SubSectionID=1&ArticleID=17413

The last weeks of school are always tough for kids and teachers alike. Tempers are frayed, people are tired, and frankly, we all need a break from each other. Sometimes we do things that make the situation worse because we're too fried to think things through.

At a local high school, Oak Park-River Forest, administration decided to begin actually enforcing the existing tardy policy in early May after problems had built for the entire year, installing a system that tracks tardies using ID cards. According to the school, tardies and hall wandering were out of hand with students rambling into classes at will.

Led by the senior class, students responded by organizing protest, using FaceBook and other social networking sites. They planned to clog a hall with students to inhibit passage, so that everyone would be late to class. Their intent was to overwhelm the tracking systems, so that enforcement would fall apart. On the first day of the protest, kids behaved like kids at a concert; the hall was shut down, but students were also hanging and shrieking into the stairwells and body surfing. Citing concerns with student safety and security, the Administration responded by having police on hand for the threatened second day of the protest.

Here's where I'll start rambling as I try to figure this out. I believe in free speech. Student free speech is protected as indicated by the Tinker vs. DesMoine decision. School officials are legally responsible for the safety of students in school. The planned protest had a peaceful intent (even if I really believe that students should actually get to class on time, so the purpose was sort of immature. Kids sort of are.) Not all students were misbehaving, but body surfing in a world of terazzo and metal lockers is pretty dangerous.

So at what point, if any, do student rights collide with the legal responsibilities and obligations of a school to provide a safe environment that enhances learning? Does the age of the student involved matter? Are students entitled to protest anything/everything? Bad lunches, I get, but is it ok to protest the amount of homework a teacher assigns or the cell phone policy? Sure hope I can figure this out before I tackle the Little Brother essay.

So what's the value of ethics?-Post 2

In Sunday's New York Times Book Review, Emily Parker in "Censors without Borders" takes a look at the impact of the growing economic power of China on censorship.


According to Parker, a prime example of this revolves around Denise Chong's most recent book Egg on Mao, which focuses on the story of a farmer who threw paint eggs on a portrait of Mao in the Tiananmen Square protests. Chong says that many people assume that the book attacks Chinese policies. Since its publication, the Library of Congress is among others who have refused to participate in events at which Chong was to be featured. Parker strongly implies that this is a direct result of the power of money the result of the spider web that ties that the world's economy together.

The Chinese government has pressured organizations to disinvite dissidents, as was the case at the Frankfurt Book Fair.

One of the "dissidents", an American professor at Princeton claims that this is leading to self-censorship among academics. saying anonymously that as a group, scholars are "compromising our academic ideals in order to gain access to China . . .we all do it."

Does everything really have its price, or is the article just filled with self-justifying rationalizations and excuses?

Is this any different from a school signing on with Channel One or an exclusive contract with Coca Cola?

Do we as librarians do the same sorts of things if we accept grants or gifts that come with strings, even if they're unspoken?

Parker, Emily. "Censors without Borders." The New York Times Book Review, May 16, 2010, pg. 35.

Ah, the ironies of life- Post 1

Today, I'm the Bitch of Buchenwald, running a homework prison for 12 lovelies who managed to cause so much trouble in school that we were afraid to take them on a field trip. Actually, I volunteered to stay with them because I thought it would be an opportunity to catch up on work and maybe get ahead in this class.

Imagine my dismay when I discovered that, like many other sites, the state's net nanny blocked me from Wikispaces bcause of its potential for "adult oriented, illegal, and racist" materials. Of course, I'm writing this post on my school computer; in the infinite wisdom, logic, and insight of INSchools.net, Blogger is fine, even though Twitter and Facebook are verboten. The filters block sites with equal vigor from elementary through high school; after all, there are no developmental or maturational differences in those groups.


In the reality of my experiences here, the only people genuinely blocked by the nanny are teachers; students know a variety of ways around them. So is in loco parentis just loco? And who are these mysterious censors making these decisions on our behalf?

I know that economics drives the decision for most schools; to be eligible for state-funded internet service, the school must also accept the filters that accompany them.

But I also know that the real impact of the filters is extremely random. For instance, a few years ago, an African American student who was trying to write a paper on the Klan was blocked from primary sources such as the Klan's own website, and another couldn't get to site about peanut butter (come, on, people! Peanut butter?). On the other hand, spam emails offering me Viagra make it through regularly, and I'm still reeling from the results of a search for a recipe by "The Two Fat Ladies."

Nobody is opposed to protecting kids, but isn't it more important that they learn to protect themselves? And isn't that really the role I need to fulfill as I try to teach them genuine information literacy? Working with the filters is a little like trying to teach them to cook without being able to take them to the kitchen.