Berkman Buzz: Week of August 17, 2009

BERKMAN BUZZ: A look at the past week's online Berkman conversations
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What's being discussed...take your pick or browse below.

* Andrew McAfee learns from the history of electrification.
* danah boyd sizes up the tower of babble.
* ProjectVRM mourns TipJoy.
* David Weinberger confesses to more fanboyism.
* The CMLP hasn't warmed to the IL bill making it illegal for convicted sex offenders to access social networking sites.
* Weekly Global Voices: "Peru: Proposal Shortens Time for Media to Correct Inexact Information"

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The full buzz.

"I came across a wonderful 1983 paper by Warren D. Devine, Jr. in the Journal of Economic History called 'From Shafts to Wires: Historical Perspective on Electrification.' Devine combed through the contemporaneous business and technology press to learn what 'experts' were saying as manufacturing switched over from steam to electrical power, a process that took about 50 years to complete."
From Andrew McAfee's blog post The Cloudy Future of Corporate IT

"I challenge each and every one of you to record every utterance that comes out of your mouth (and that of everyone you interact with) for an entire day. And then record every facial expression and gesture. You will most likely find what communications scholars found long ago - people are social creatures and a whole lot of what they express is phatic communication. (Phatic expressions do social work rather than conveying information... think 'Hi' or 'Thank you'.)"
From danah boyd's blog post Twitter: 'pointless babble' or peripheral awareness + social grooming?

"It’s shocking and sad to read Jason Kincaid’s Tipjoy Heads To The Deadpool story this morning in TechCrunch. Ivan and Abby Kirgin were neighbors just up the road from Cambridge...and kindred spirits to the VRM community as well. Keith Hopper and I had a nice get-acquainted lunch with them a couple months back, and talked often in ProjectVRM conversations about how EmanciPay might use the excellent TipJoy API, among other possibilities."
From Doc Searls' blog post for ProjectVRM, Appreciating TipJoy

"On the other hand, I’m old, so I look at the video and say 'HOLY MOTHER OF CRISPIES, YOU KIDS PUT THOSE THINGS DOWN THIS INSTANT!!!'"
From David Weinberger's blog post Kids with flamethrowers

"The memory of pain can be one of the best painkillers. Anyone who has had the misfortune of enduring acute physical agony has later repurposed that nightmare as a psychic analgesic. “This needle might hurt, but it's nothing compared to that time I broke my arm. I can do this.” Previous extremes make the mild more bearable. This holds true for a surprising number of situations: long plane delays, expensive fines, and now sex-offender Internet bans. (Don’t worry if that last category didn’t make too much sense, I’m just about to explain.)"
From Andrew Moshirnia's blog post for the Citizen Media Law Project, Out of the Frying Pan and into the Mildly Uncomfortable Sauna: The Not-So-Bad-But-Still-Unconstitutional Social Networking Ban

"The Peruvian Congress has begun to debate a bill that shortens the time allowed for 'inexact information' to be corrected by the media from 7 to 3 days. The current Penal Code will be modified to include online publications, including websites and blogs."
From Juan Arellano's blog post for Global Voices, Peru: Proposal Shortens Time for Media to Correct Inexact Information

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A special thank you to Lexie Koss, who has served as the editor-curator of the weekly Berkman Buzz since January 2008. The Berkman community wishes Lexie the best of luck in her new endeavors.