Partially Attended

Nature has just published an editorial (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v463/n7281/full/463588a.html) promoting the idea of writing text books (http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/463588a). Having worked for a number of years as a commissioning editor for a major academic publisher, responsible for more that 20% of academic book output, I have to say that the cost-benifit analysis for publishing books ends up saying that it just does not justify the effort for academics to write monographs. You probably won't see more ... (more)

I just posted the following on a forum (http://network.nature.com/groups/orcid/forum/topics/6547) on Nature Network, I thought it was interesting enough to repost:Bruce Schneier yesterday posted a very "interesting article":http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/02/anonymity_and_t_3.html that gets to the heart of identity systems on the web. The bottom line of the article is that anonymity will always be a given as the price for introducing verification or coining systems will always be too high, and even if present they won't be effective. ... (more)

Having a discussion earlier today with one of my colleagues, we were discussing pricing models for iPhone applications. I buy a lot of apps on my iPhone, but the content that we were discussing pricing for is academic article content. This traditionally sells online for tens of dollars per unit. If one wants to sell such content on an iPhone, but at the same time retain the apparent value of the content how do you ... (more)

I'm eating a chocolate bar which contains, I'm told, a 'cheeky caramel layer'. It's shit like this that makes me despair of our modern civilisation. According to the dictionary 'cheeky' means 'impudent; insolent', and it has the synonyms 'saucy, audacious, bold'. I guess that I am to feel that I have made a bold choice in opting for the opulence provided by that extra caramel, but I can't raise the ... (more)

Unable to retrieve spec for http://localhost:8080/test/gadget.xml. HTTP error 404 ... (more)

I just commented over on the digatilist:I'm in two minds, but on balance I'm optimistic. What they are delivering is not a product, but a new platform, and one who's limitation has the potential to drive innovation in the open web. What I really don't like about what has been delivered is how closed the system is, and how much this is not a tool that a developer could use. ... (more)

(co-author graph example) inspired by ... (more)

Looking back at my goals for 2009, I've not done very well, however my current level of fitness is pretty good, so I think 2010 is going to be a good year. The main factors in holding back my climbing in 2009 were taking a few months off to get married and not being able to rent a car. Getting married was absolutely worth it, and the level of organisation and stability I have in my life now due to being married will only help in the long run. ... (more)

DSC00458 Originally uploaded by Ian MulvanyI just got some great feedback on this picture from someone on flickr, it was taken back in February when I was on a skiing holiday in Switzerland. The house was built by my wife's grandfather, and we came to it, it buried in a drift, the air as sharp as the icicles. It was a magical week, and I'm keen to return. At this time of the year thoughts turn to such things. ... (more)

I don't know if the following is going to work, but I'm going to try it. Dopplr allows you to subscribe to your trips in iCal from a link from the trips page. You can also publish a calendar locally to the Dopplr servers that Dopplr will pull trips from. I've set up two calendars in my iCal, one for pushing into Dopplr, and another for pulling all Dopplr trips from. ... (more)